The University of Queensland seems to have quite a considerable number of students from overseas, so rather unsurprisingly, quite a number of foreigners live in the immediate surrounds. I'm sure the Australians feel rather outnumbered by the foreigners combined with resident Kiwis such as myself who are just here to partake in New Zealand's favourite international past-time of bludging off the Aussie government. This place definitely has a much more international flavour than the Gold Coast, which is essentially a combination of white people trying to tan themselves pitch black and Asian tourists. My block of apartments has a swimming pool, which my flat's living area and balcony overlooks, and I've certainly heard a variety of accents and languages wafting in while I've been making dinner or watching TV or hanging the washing. It's been quite nice, really, or at least until today. I'm out on the balcony putting washing on the clothes horse when I hear this nails-on-a-chalkboard American accent screeching up from the pool, declaring in the most painfully stereotypical of ways, "I'm like, duuuuude" and "um, whatever!" MTV could've had sex with a trashy teen girls' magazine and given birth to this bimbo. I was rather surprised to overhear that in high school, her sport of choice was volleyball rather than cheerleading.
Five bucks says this apparently very bright spark is back on the plane to America within a year. Or that she drops out of university, marries the Aussie guy who was trying to chat her up in the pool, divorces him within two years, and THEN hops on the plane back home. I really did not need to hear a conversation between MTV's Best and Chatting-up's Best while I hung my washing out to dry.
In other university-related news, today was my first day actually at university, though it's only orientation week. I attended a few seminars and welcome sessions, none of which really told me anything new. Ah well. Hopefully the other things I've chosen to attend this week are more useful. If nothing else, at least this is helping me to find my way around the place - it sure is big! Big enough to have its own post code, even. Tomorrow, I shall be signing up for debating, and I certainly hope they employ the same format as the Queensland Secondary Schools debating competition. I think both high school and university debating falls under the authority of the Queensland Debating Union, so hopefully I will get my wish.
