Happy February everyone. How did it become February already? More importantly, how is it that I only have 25 days of my summer vacation left??!! My nearly three months of unburdened time has simply flown by, leaving me standing agape at the time that has passed and anxious to make the most of what's left. And not just what's left of my summer. My yearlong Australian adventure will be ending in five months...but I won't think about that right now.
Summer in Melbourne is really great. The city is so lively, and when the weather is nice, it's such a pleasant place to be. I think I've actually seen more outside of Melbourne than in it, so I've been trying to explore and enjoy the city itself this summer. I haven't been able to do that as actively as I had planned, though, because I unluckily injured my knee soon after my vacation began, back in early December, which pretty much immobilized me for a good month. I didn't let it stop me from enjoying Tasmania, but I'm sure I prolonged the injury, and since the beginning of January, I've been going to physical therapy. Boo.
The second and third weeks of January my time was completely occupied by my two intensive summer classes, one of which was perhaps the most poorly taught class I have ever taken. It was hard enough being in class 6 hours a day during the summer, but this class completely sapped any motivation I had to do my school work.
Even so, January did not slip by without its highlights. I managed to go to the Australian Open and see some of the top seeded players, including Kim Clijsters (unfortunately, my camera batteries died before I could get a picture of her). That's David Nalbandian below.
January 26 was Australia Day, a national holiday celebrating, well, Australia. Basically, people have a day off work and get together for barbecues. I hung out with some friends at the Belgian Beer Cafe, which has a great outdoor bar area, and I witnessed The Great Australian Mussel Eating Challenge, where contestants must eat 35 mussels (in their shells) and drink the juice as fast as they can. Big Willy Choi was defending his title. Unfortunately, he lost. (That's Big Willy in the yellow shirt).
I also went to the Royal Botanic Gardens and saw a black swan for the first time. I love all this amazing wildlife I'm seeing.
Other than this, I've been tutoring a few students in English to fund my summer activities. I'm actually working on pronunctiation with a couple of them, which Aussies would find very ironic, since to them, I don't proncounce English properly either!
I've also had time to do some pleasure reading and right now I'm reading Nelson Mandela's autobiography, Long Walk to Freedom. It's 751 pages, and I'm just under halfway through--hopefully I'll finish before school starts again.
I've posted some pics from a road trip I took back in December onto my shutterfly account (click here). Don't worry--there aren't nearly as many as from my Tassie trip. I went on the Great Ocean Road, which runs along the southern coast to the west of Melbourne. It's considered the #1 scenic route in Australia. I don't actually have that many pictures of the scenery--we had to rush a bit to get to our destination for the night and the weather wasn't that great either. We also went to Grampians National Park, but the conditions weren't ideal for this place either because it suffered from bushfires, which were still raging in Victoria at the time, and the sky was simply hazy.
I hope your winters haven't been too dreary weatherwise; I hear it's been rather unusual this year. Would love to hear about what's new with you all (I mean "y'all").
My birthday was one week ago today. I turned 29 on 2/9--how cool is that?! (some of you have probably already heard me talk about how cool I think that is--sorry). But it's only cool in North America because here they write the date day/month, so I'd have to wait until I'm 92, when I probably won't even remember that it's my birthday at all. 
My friends Preethi, Monica, and Valerie, whom I've known the longest here, threw me an amazing birthday barbeque (or "barbie"). It was probably the only time I will ever have a barbeque on my birthday since it's in the middle of winter at home, and it was a blast. (Not to rub it in, but, I've been hearing about the monster snowstorms in the U.S. these days--I've forgotten how cold that must be, given that just yesterday, it was near 100 degrees, as it will be this weekend. I hope you're all safe and surviving it all). 
