Sorry Perth, But You Need More Than One Person For a Siege

Saturday was far more exciting than it should have been.

It started off all good, I ran some errands and fed my friends weird stalker chickens. They really are weird, they follow you everywhere making weird chicken noises. Anyways, I left, realised I had left my phone behind, went back, and had just missed a phone call. Really wish I had gotten that phone call. Phone call was from boyfriend who was calling me from a boat somewhere hours and hours north about the fact that some street near where we lived (which is another story altogether) was blocked off and if I wasn't home I may have a hard time getting there, and if I was home I may have a hard time leaving.

Sweet, but whatever, I was sure it would be fine. Which means it wasn't at all.

I drive back into Perth thinking about lunch and get to the block before my apartment and there is a crazy long line of cars. I am unfazed by this. Then I saw that the first street going by my apartment was blocked off by the police. Well, no worries I would go up the next one. Not so much. Instead I argued with a police officer over getting into the apartment. I tried to convince the police officer blocking off the second street to let me through, but apparently my pleas of 'but I live RIGHT THERE!' mixed with lots of pointing didn't work and I was told to go park somewhere else.

After much driving I found a faraway spot and started my trek back to the apartment, while carrying four chicken eggs from the weird stalker chickens. So I begin the walk back and head down a street blocked off by police from cars, but they are allowing pedestrians. Yay, almost home! Except not, because randomly in the middle of the street there is another blockade. Can't drive through it and can't walk around it. So I went back up the street and over towards the apartment. Eventually I get back, and assuming that because I was allowed to walk by other police cars I could walk by this one. Wrong. I made it a little ways until I got caught and yelled at. Opps. Back up the street and over.

Down the next street I thought I was set, particularly since the cop who was most recently irritated with me said I could. Wrong again. Walking down the street I noticed fire trucks and more cops. I got spotted again, although this time before the police barrier I was seen and then finally given an explanation!

Explanation: There was a siege! (Which to me sounded very intense and scary). A siege with one guy in a house with a gun.

Um, what?

I know I am foreign (and American) and have been jobless for four weeks and therefore have been watching an unhealthy amount of TV so my brain is kinda mushy (granted it's a lot of crime TV so I could be biased), but I'm pretty sure a siege is not one guy in a house with a gun. It's not, I looked it up. Found out Perth is not under siege, but was creating a siege, at least according to Merriam-Webster as they say it's "a military blockade of a city or fortified place to compel it to surrender." Ok fair enough, but still, 'siege' seems a little strong.

Anyways, police guy who actually explains things said there was no way I was getting to the apartment, despite my looking sad and holding up my chicken eggs. So I went off in search of a place to be and get a snack. After some wasting time I tried again. With success! Managed to get around the blockade and onto the street in front of the apartment I had originally driven on to get into the apartment. Found out it really was a guy in a house with a gun (at least according to the news) and hung out. Went back outside later and the police were still out there with a crowd of people watching them on the street. I went over and asked a guy if anything had happened (crowd guy, not police guy) who said they had just pulled a guy out of a house. I couldn't see anything so I went and bought groceries.

A couple hours later I ventured outside to see if I could get the car back and the police were gone and you would never have known it happened. At least it made my day more interesting.

Footy!

Ok Australia is a pretty calm place, people are laid back, and very go with the flow, but then they play/watch footy all that goes away. It is the most intense sport in the world! It’s 80 minutes of constant running around, running into each other, and throwing/kicking an odd shaped ball (kinda like a rugby ball). It’s amazing! There are tons of clubs (teams) and the season goes from March until the end of September and games are constantly on TV, you could easily watch it all weekend. The scoring system is a little strange, you either get 6 points if you get the ball through the middle posts and 1 if it goes through the posts on the sides. You can run with the ball, but you have to bounce it ever few steps, you can throw it or kick it, but if you kick the ball and someone catches it before it hits the ground then no one can tackle them. Also all the ovals (fields) are a different size, which is crazy, but pretty cool, and they are oval shaped. This is my basic understanding of how the game works, so hopefully I am right, and if not someone correct me. You can also check Wikipedia for more clarification.

It is very popular in my house, although we are divided in our support. Half (2) of us support the East Coast Eagles and the other half the Fremantle Dockers (my team), which are both Perth teams. So when we watched the derby the other week, where the two teams played each other, there was much gloating when the Dockers won. There continues to be lots of gloating as the Dockers keep doing better than the Eagles, go team!

(the second half of this was written later)
Footy is now over and culminated in the ever exciting Grand Final, which is like the Super Bowl, but the commercials are not as good. Last Sat was the Grand Final and it was the Collingwood Magpies vs. the St. Kilda Saints (I think, not so sure about everyones mascots). And it was intense. The first quarter St. Kilda was down and through to the second it looked like they were out, but they must have gotten some crazy pep talk during half time because they came back pretty strong. In the final quarter they catch up and tie with Collingwood and in the last 10, and definitely the last 5 it's pins and needles to see who is going to win as it's either a goal away or tied. And it ends in a tie! for the first time since 1977 and the rules on this are ridiculous. There is no overtime, no shoot out, rather they have to play again. The whole game the next week. Which is ridiculous and all the players are most unhappy. Which is understandable, they put everything in it only to be told to do it again. Lame, but kinda exciting as a spectator. Anyways, the rematch was this weekend and it was most depressing as Collingwood blew St. Kilda out of the water. But yay footy!

Australian Politics: My Vague Understanding

So the other week (about a month ago) Australians Prime Minister was a man named Kevin Rudd, or more affectionately K-Rudd. Then magically he wasn't and instead the Prime Minister is now a woman named Julia Gillard. Was there an election? Was it the natural changing of leaders? Did he die? NO! Apparently the changing of Prime Ministers is not a difficult thing and can happen a couple of ways. First, and how it was done here, starts with the fact that Australians do not vote for an individual, but rather a political party. This means that if the political party does not like how the PM is doing their job, they can vote in a new PM, who I think asks for the job. If everyone agrees, or the current PM accepts defeat, then BOOM! new PM. That's what happened here, and it was super weird. The other way, which I think is amazing, is that, because Australia is a British Commonwealth, the Queen of England can decide that she doesn't like the Australian PM, will call up and say she doesn't like him/her and Australia HAS to get a new PM. Crazy, right? I love it, it's hilarious.
Elections are super weird here as well and tied to how long a PM has power, which is tricky. They are in control for 2-3 years at a time. 2-3 you ask? Why is it unknown? Well it's unknown because the PM gets to choose when the election happens after their first two years. This has it's advantages because you don't have to listen to election craziness for that long. Also everyone has to vote. If you don't vote you get fined. Which I think may be a good thing especially when right now the two people running for PM aren't that great and I think that no one wants to have to pick, so if people didn't have to vote they wouldn't.
Really the whole thing is quite strange, but definitely interesting to watch.

Kalgoorlie

So I went to this crazy place called Kalgoorlie, which is a mining town 8 hours drive outside Perth. It’s in the middle of nowhere. It was the weirdest trip I think I have ever been on. I went into it only knowing one person, so it was a bit of a chance that I would get along with the other 6 people. All the people I went with were really nice, fun people, but it was still a crazy trip. It was four days in a small van, it looked like a car, but no it was a van! It wasn’t tall enough or have enough space in it to be a real van, but it fit all of us, so it wasn’t a car. Should you put 8 people in a van/car that size? No! It’s slightly inhumane. There was definitely not enough space and I spent most of it in the back, which was my choice because I don’t like being in the middle, but it was a bad choice.

While we made it to Kalgoorlie in one day, we spent the whole trip getting in the car, driving around in the desert/outback/bush for extended period of time, getting out of the car for maybe – maybe – 30 minutes, and then getting back in the car. It was like training for the circus to drive the clown car. However I saw some pretty cool things. There was Lake Ballard, which has no water and instead has these crazy statues spread all around it and Wave Rock, which is a giant rock that resembles a wave and although it doesn’t sound cool, it was.

We also took pictures of everything. Everything. Every small town, sign, food stuffs, it was crazy. I feel like a hypocrite because I love taking photos, but I am a terrible tourist, I have little patience for tourist photos. Although I am glad the trip was well documented by someone.

I am glad I went, it was an experience, and now I never need to go back there.

I Say/Eat the Funniest Things

Apparently I am a constant source of entertainment in my household. The other day it was my housemates birthday and her parents bought her a cake. So I am eating a slice of cake and thinking that I am thirsty so i go and grab a glass of milk. This inspired shock and awe for those around me. The Australians had never heard of milk with cake before, it is now a constant source of amusement. The phrase 'ice cream bar' was introduced today, which is also hilarious. That is new for them. 'Lame' and 'jelly' are also slowly infiltrating their vocabularies. Jelly may not sound like it's weird, but here 'jelly' is what we call 'Jell-o' and jam is the only thing you would put with peanut butter. Really it's my eating habits that provide the most entertainment. I found bagels, they're a creepy blue color (they are supposed to be blueberry) and that freaks the housemates out, and the peanut butter with bananas. Also my mom sent me a box of Lucky Charms (go Mom!) and that introduced marshmallow cereal, which they all found to be tasty. We are going to have American Food day soon, it will be good, and probably quite an adventure.

Margaret River

So we had two weeks off school only four weeks into the semester, which is officially called a "study break", so what did I do? I went on two trips. The first was 5ish hours south of Perth to Margaret River, home to 158 wineries and a handful of breweries. Oh, and some pretty beaches. It was a random trip decided on 5 days before we left and the third person joined on the day before we left. On the way down to our campsite we stopped at a brewery called Occy's and a winery that I don't remember the name of as it wasn't that great, but I know it started with an F. Our campsite was pretty cool, although we failed miserably at lighting the fire and ended up borrowing someone the fire of two surfers, until we realized that ours had magically lit. We went back and played cards with another surfer who called us by the names of our respective countries (America, Canada, and Norway). The next day we planned on driving to some wineries and possibly checking on the beach, but ended up on a wine tour (with Wine for Dudes) instead. Our tour guide was this funny New Zealander and the group included some people from England, Ireland, and some other part of Europe that I can't remember. We went to five wineries, one that had a brewery attached, a cheese place, and a chocolate factory. They were all pretty good (and I'll add the names later) it was a good day. At then end we went and watched the sun set over the beach and drank a bottle of Wine for Dudes brand wine, which is pretty good. The next day was more wineries, a lighthouse, and a really awesome section of beach called Sugarloaf Rock. The next day we drove to the Glouchester Tree and the Jewel Caves. In the caves we went really deep underground and at the tree we went 61 meters up a tree on a ladder system made up of re bar stuck into the trunk of the tree. We were followed up the tree by a school group, which makes it harder to get up when they are all yelling about how high they are and not to look down. It was good. We stayed at a different campsite that night and then the next day went on the Tree Top Walk in Walpole. It is this bridge system suspended on posts between the trees. Then we went a looked at the crazy tall trees that grow with gaps in the middle that are in the pictures from the last post. We were supposed to stay another night, but it was cloudy so we didn't want to go to the beach so we went home. It was a really good trip and this is a pretty brief overview. But I suggest going to these places if you ever get the chance.

Not so Much an Update, but Pictures!

This was a beach near Walpole, Western Australia. It was a good sunset and we then made dinner on these weird electric outdoor barbeques that are in parks. And there were kangaroos hanging out near us too.


This is a giant tingle tree, they just grow like this with the middles out. This was down in Walpole, Western Australia.


Me and a kangaroo! I got to feed it and pet it, they are cute. I like them.