Beaches, Birthdays and Broken Trains

3/16/2012

FRIDAY! Got to talk to my school girl friend, Gabby. We chatted at the bus stop about her weekend plans. Then the bus came so we hoped on. At school, I was a littler early for class so I sat by some of my second year Australian friends. I now feel like I’m at the level of, if I see them sitting on the couches in the student center I can go sit with them and it’s not weird. So I chatted with Deckland, Blake and Sam (I have several classes with them). Also with a guy named Caleb who I met a few weeks ago.

Then I went to aboriginal class and we learned about their beliefs on how the earth and people were made. We also learned about clan relationships and what the rules are for marrying. A man has to marry someone who is in the opposite clan. And then there are all sorts of rules surrounding what clan their children belong into. It was complicated, but interesting.

After that, I ended up going to the beach with Becky, Joel, Carly and Erica. I wasn’t planning on going to the beach, so I was rather unprepared. But we were just going to do a walk along the coast, so I tagged along anyway. I didn’t have any other plans. So we took a bus, a train, and another bus, and then we where there! Bondi Beach! It is so incredibly beautiful! Too bad I wasn’t prepared for the beach at all. 

We waited a little bit after arriving for a few other people to join us. Then we did a 6k walk along the coast, passing through heaps of beaches, everyone of them was gorgeous! Here is some photographic evidence:

Looking back at Bondi

Tamarama Beach

 

The walk ended at Coogee beach. At this point, Erica carly and I split from the group. Today was Erica’s birthday, and Michelle had said we would have a birthday dinner for her. It was around 4:30 so we had to head out to get home on time for dinner. 

So began our 3.5 hour journey home.

You’re probably thinking, ‘there’s probably a really long and exasperated story to go along with that last comment’. If you thought that, you are correct. 

Here is the tale of how we returned home Friday evening: We figured out how to get back to the train station. That was easy. We called Michelle to let her know that we had made it to the train station and should be home somewhat soon. Once we got on a train and sat down, there was an announcement saying that there was some emergency track work being done on that line and the train wasn’t leaving and they didn’t know how long it would be. There were buses upstairs if we wanted to take them, or we could just wait. I was a little over the bus and above ground traffic, so we determined that we would just wait…like the suckers we are.

 After 35 minutes, we were just deciding whether or not to figure out the bus, when an announcement came on saying “The train on the other platform will be leaving before us. If you want to catch that train, you better run,”

Really? That seems unprofessional. But it worked. We ran.

 We made it to the other train, (along with everyone else in Bondi). We were pretty packed in there. We rode the train 1 whole stop, and then it stopped working again. We stood there for about 20 minutes deciding whether we should get off or keep the faith. Then we saw Becky, Joe and Ronnie getting off another car. These are the same people we had parted ways with OVER AN HOUR AGO! But we caught up with them in hopes that all of us together could figure out how to get home. We went up to where it seemed all the buses were going to. We tried to figure out which one would take us to Circular Quay, another train station. This would have been much easier if there were more signs.

Finally we figured out that we needed the 324 to get to circular quay. We could see the bus driver of the 324 taking a break just across the street. Finally he got in his bus and drove into the stop. When we got on, we asked to make sure he was going to circular quay. To which he replied, “No, I’m going to Watson’s Bay”

What do you mean you’re going to Watson’s freaking Bay?! How am I supposed to get to Circular Quay? Well according to him we needed to take the 327, which had left a few minutes ago. Awesome. Then another 327 pulled in, and we went to them and asked if THEY were going to Circular Quay. Nope. They sure were not. Turns out we were on the wrong spot to be catching buses in that direction.

Finally we found where we were supposed to be. With lots of other people who wanted to be on the trains but were forced to take the buses. People were tired and cranky. Myself included. There was even a woman eating icecream straight out of a tub. With a fork mind you. She had her ipod in and was just going to town on that chocolate ice cream. Probably listening to Adele 'Someone Like You'

So after a few buses came and went that filled up before we could get on them, we finally got on a bus. Just as we got on the bus there was announcement that the trains were working again. They had fooled me too many times. I wasn’t going to trust that line. So we stayed on the bus and took it to Circular Quay and got on a train there. Eventually we made it home, 3.5 hours later. We ate tacos, sung happy birthday to Erica, ate cake and the world was right again. 

Michelle was super sweet and not mad at all at us for being so late. She didn’t really care actually. She just laughed at the situation of us running all over Sydney trying to get home. The cake turned out really well. It looked kind of weird. But it tasted awesome. And after that commute, chocolate was just the ticket.

We capped the night by watching Sweet Home Alabama.