The Jungle Blog

So, this one has been a long time coming, but I was trying to get some photos/videos off my phone, who was refusing to co-operate. However, thanks to the magic of Andrew Victoria, we're back in business. So, without further ado, my trip to the rainforest.

NB: For the vast majority of the time, I couldn't actually see my phone screen due to the glare of the sun, so there's a very real possibility that these pictures are awful.

So, I had to get up really early to go into the rainforest- I was picked up by the tour bus from N Joy and we sped along toward adventure. My tour guide was kinda weird- he kept acknowledging that no one really wanted to listen to him, but this didn't seem to deter him from speaking. He was also morbidly obsessed with Steve Irwin and kept touting how we would be able to see the actual spot where Irwin died (Neato!). We stopped off at a look out point where one could see some of the reef and the jungle.

We then sped along toward a wildlife sanctuary, where there were cassowaries, which can split a man in half, and ducks, which can't but had a go anyway- while I was feeding an adorable little kangaroo, a horrid bird flew up at me to try and get the food for itself, after I specifically refused it anyway for not being cute enough. Yes, I said boo to a goose and in response was viciously attacked. (This would actually be a theme of that day- being attacked by animals.)
But not before I held a koala, a python, and a motherfucking crocodile. Yeah, that's right. An actual, living crocodile. And I held it, with my unprotected human hands. How badass am I right now?
However, the croc wasn't half as problematic as the drop-bear, oh, I'm sorry, I mean 'koala'.
A koala which tried to eat me. As in, sniffed out its meal, leant back and opened its maw- at which point, the keeper stepped in and pulled him out of my grasp. The Koala was named 'grizzly' (I wonder why), so I can say I've faced being eaten by bears both drop and grizzly. I'm pretty sure I'm the most bad ass person in my social circle now. And I'm not even finished yet.
So, in the sanctuary, I saw pelicans, cassowaries and a lungfish (which is fucking horrific, btw), crossing three other animals off my Ozzie bucket list (how do I only have four months left?!). I also fed kangaroos for the second time, as well as some weird birds, and, inadvertently, one overly-eager duck. 
Then, it was on to the river and this is where things get really bad ass.
Anyone who read the last post and clicked on the link at the end will have read how crocodiles on the Daintree river have been becoming more aggressive, and that one croc actually attacked a river ferry a couple of years ago. This is the croc that I encountered on my trip along the river. We were chugging along, and I'll admit I was kinda bored, having only really seen mangroves at this point. Then I spotted two eyes popping out of the river, staring, I thought, right at me. I pointed them out and we all marvelled at this pair of eyes, which belonged to a croc named 'Scarface', as our guide informed us. After a while, the eyes submerged and we all thought that was that. I'll show you my picture versus one I found on google:

So, that's what I saw; pretty cool, but not all that threatening, right?

Found here

That was what I was actually up against. And I say 'up against' because guess what? Scarface resurfaced, and our guide informed us he was stalking the boat. 'Don't worry, though' he added, 'they hardly ever attack boats'. This was not as comforting as he thought. Had I read the article before I went, I might well have abandoned ship then and there, even though this would have simply put me even more in Scarface's domain. So, I can now say I've been stalked by a monocular bull croc named 'Scarface'. Jari, step down as the badass-king of our friendship group. We have a new monarch of badassery.

This guy.

After the river cruise, we stopped off at the point where you could see EXACTLY WHERE STEVE IRWIN DIED! ERMAGERD! After telling us how he died for the third time, TJ, our tour guide, let us off the bus and made us wait at this point for what felt like an inordinately long amount of time. I think he wanted us to fully appreciate that THIS IS THE PLACE WHERE STEVE MOTHERFUCKIN' IRWIN CEASED TO LIVE!!1!

Taste the death.

Then, we had lunch at an ice cream factory. Sadly, this is not what it sounds like- lunch was provided by the tour group and we sat and ate outside the ice cream factory. Still, I did sample some of the ice cream and it was delicious- chilli and chocolate, which I always think of as mine and Freya's flavour. There was maybe a touch too much chilli in there, so rather than cooling my pallet (Cairns is tropical, you know), it just made me reach for the water jug.
Also, while eating I walked into a spider's web. My natural reaction was to shake myself free and then to move on as though nothing had happened. This is the spider into whose web I had walked:

It's known as the Golden Orb spider and can kill people. And I shook its web whilst entangled in it. This is my life now.
Oh, also, the ice cream factory's toilets had a confusing use policy:

"Strictly" *nudge**nudge**wink**wink*. This reminds me of Rik's story about a friend who became a "Taxi driver".

After this, it was onto the rainforest, and I fulfilled another childhood wish by trekking into the jungle, even going barefoot at one point.

Sadly, this was a rather uneventful trek, even though we saw some more venomous spiders and I ate a live ant (I was told I could- it tasted of lemon). We were told to look out for cassowaries, which, as previously stated, can split one in half, but sadly none approached. Oh well, I'm still more badass than you, Dr. Fowkes and all (y)our little friends.

The next and final stop was at the beach, where I encountered this lovely sign:

I love the way the tentacles are artfully missing his lack-of-crotch.
I also want to point out that the beach looked like this:

Ok, the photo doesn't do it justice. Just understand that it was fucking beautiful- the water was pristine and inviting and full of killer jellyfish. *Sigh* Nice one, God, you got us. Also, I totally wrote 'Moi Smells' in the sand but it didn't come out in the picture- but it was definitely there, so, yeah. It's been written on both hemispheres. It's official now.

Anyway, after this we pretty much just headed back to the hostel, but I wanna share one final anecdote with y'all. On the way back, I struck up a conversation with one of my fellow tourees (I don't like how much that sounds like 'Tory', oh well), whose name was Peter. Peter was having a mid-life crisis. You could tell because he kept saying 'this is my trip around the world and then after this, it's settling down and having kids' and then laughing hysterically. Peter lived in San Francisco, but had been all over and was basically filling in the blanks on his travel check-sheet before he reproduced and his life ended. I can only hope I've done as much when my mid-life crisis comes around.
God bless you, Pete, wherever you are, and God help your children.

More photographs to be found here.

Chasin' Jason

So, Jason has left. This is saddening- but we must soldier on. We will reforge the shattered pieces into a glorious new jigsaw puzzle, one free of Jason and his incessant boasting of how much he has done with his life.

Right after two days of moping in bed.

'But, Rory!' You cry, spittle flying and a crazed look in your eye (my god, you do get passionate about these blog posts, don't you?), 'I wanna hear about Australian Christmas!' At this point, you stamp your feet and throw all your toys out of the cot because I haven't housebroken you properly. Well, fine, metaphorical baby readers, here's how christmas went down: on christmas eve, Jason and I attended a double bill of Shop Around the Corner and It's a Wonderful Life; we had to leave the second slightly early and so in my mind that film now ends with him committing suicide- I don't know why everyone calls it uplifting.

Pictures from the Astor, where we viewed this depressionfest.

Jason and I then returned home and drunkenly chatted with loved ones on the internet, and showed each other pictures of how we used to look (so much hair...*shudder*).
The next morning, Shane, Jason, me and some douche I've never met before had a barbecue for breakfast.

Not pictured: croissants in the conservatory.

There were sausages, sauce and bread. We'd hunted the bread ourselves, because we're MEN. During this time we tried to name all fifty states of the US because the brain can atrophy like any other muscle.

All that's left of the dropbears that jumped us during the bread hunt.

Then, the douche left, stung by his inability to remember New Hampshire, and the three real men sat down to smoke and ruminate. Not cigarettes, little one, my heavens no, but a hukkah pipe. It was really rather relaxing.

Jason's christmas hukkah.

After this, we watched some christmas movies, including Charlie Brown and, perhaps more bizarrely, Batman the Animated series, then Jason and I went for a walk, wherein we encountered a brown snake. Let me dictate for you how it went down:

JASON: (Thick Gloucestershire accent that is somehow at once both homely and grating) Oi'm not looking where I'm going, so oi'm no!

(The brown snake appears. Jason makes to step on it.)

ME: NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!


(I dive between Jason and the snake, and, using my incredible kung fu skills, vanquish the fucker (the snake that is, not Jason))

JASON: Oi've never seen a snake trounced so thouroughly before! Neato!

Starring Rik Hart as the serpent.

Truly, I am both the st Patrick and the shakespeare of our time.

On Boxing Day, I saw the Hobbit, and honestly I was disappointed: they've turned what is an enjoyable fantasy heist movie into a bloated diatribe on what 'home' means. There's a lot to be enjoyed, but also a lot that could be cut.

Gandalf the grumpy.

Interestingly, I saw Les Mis and I would have much preferred for that to have been split into multiple films: or, even better, presented like an old film with an interval in between two two hour parts. So, essentially, a stage play on screen. Hmmm...

Then, on the 27th, I stayed up all night with Jason, wishing him farewell and then spent the next two days sleeping it off. Go me. I really will miss the blighter, and am now holding auditions for his replacement, but things aren't looking too swell on that front: I may have to wait til term begins anew. Which is in february. Alack.

P.S. I realise I still owe a Blank slate post and a 'the other stuff I did when I didn't post for ages' post, but hold your horses. They're coming.


Probably.
P.P.S. As of today, this trip is the longest I've ever spent away from home.

Ice to meet you

I turned on the air conditioning last night. I felt bad (not just cos I didn't really know how to work it and ended up chilling my room to Morgue levels), I know there are horrid environmental impacts, but I was just so hot. It was giving me headaches. Sleeping with the window open is out since I've now had dreams where I've encountered a) spiders, b) rats and c) adders (why?) in my room, having let themselves in through the window. I'm still not sure if the spider one was a dream, which is concerning because the bugger was the size of my fist.

Meanwhile, my writing was compared to Joss Whedon, again. Someone in my writer's group compared my script to Buffy and I was over the moon. Sadly, it wasn't the doctor himself, but it was gratifying all the same.

You'll soon be mine, precious.

I met with Andrew again, and the theatre company (of which I'm secretary, don't you know?) has been officially created, so, yay! There was even a suggestion of putting something on; a very special something; something both ancient and modern all at once; something that has marked every single journey I've made since I started tertiary education. But more on that later. Or probably never.

I went back to Queery, and we discussed gender. It was...polite; I can't bring myself to 'interesting' or even 'informative' because we all just seemed to espouse different versions of 'gender is a spectrum' (is anything not a spectrum these days?) with a side order of 'aren't labels terrible?' (I kept oddly silent on this matter). As I've said, the people there seem cool, but I've found that trying to form a friendship with someone just cos you're both gay, or not heteronormative, in this case, doesn't really work. I'm sure I'd get along with these people if I met them in a different context, it's just that meeting in the queerspace dictates that we should talk about being queer, and I've been queer so long, it just no longer interests me.

Finally, I had a job interview yesterday- it was a group interview, which I'd never done before, and I was the best dressed there, which is also an unprecedented event, plus, I didn't make a tit of myself, which marks a turning point in human history, I think. Sadly, I was also the least experienced person there, so I'm not holding my breath- but, at least if I don't get the job I'll know it's not cos who I am but because of what I've done, or not, as the case may be and, in fact, is.

What I did on my holidays

Academy of Moving Images

Adrian and I were at a loose end on Thursday, the 20th- we were originally gonna hunt elephants in the great concrete jungle that is the CBD, but then we realised there weren't any, so we instead decided to visit the Academy of Moving Images, otherwise known as AcMI; sadly, they don't stock dynamite. In spite of this, I enjoyed myself, one may be tempted to say immensely. The first room detailed the history of the moving images in its various forms (TV, films, video games, etc.), and although I noticed a mistake (Snow White was NOT the first animated feature film), it was mildly interesting and there were enough clips/games to entertain even the most distractable of kids, i.e. me. 

But the second room is where it really kicked off; it was more experimental in its approach to motion pictures, and it really paid off. There was a room where you could see clips from different films (different Australian films) presented in surround viewing- there were three different screens (one in front and one either side) and whenever the camera view changed, the screens switched as well. There were experiments with silhouettes, adding weird animated clip arts to one's shadow, and a section where you could versus another player, with one of you playing wii tennis and the other pong.  It was really rather cool. There was also a room with a cone of light being projected across some dry ice; it may sound lame, but it created a really cool effect. Hopefully, I'll post a video tomorrow of me walking toward the camera with the light behind me and looking like every sci fi villain in the history of ever.
There was also the opportunity to create your own flickbook, and Adrian and I decided upon one of me punching him in the face. 'A wordless masterpiece', the critics are calling it; we're considering submitting it for a Pulitzer prize. They also had a genuine Academy Award, behind a glass case to stop idiots like myself from stealing it practicing their speeches.

*Sigh* Thanks, I guess.

Sufficient Grace
I also attended a book launch with Mistress Raso- the book was called Sufficient Grace, and was written by one of Milly's professors. I went hoping to land a publishing deal, but instead ending up spending the night talking to Frank, an RMIT architect. Alack.

Bonfire
A couple of months ago, I expressed to Aspen how I wanted to see a controlled burning- where the bush is set on fire to keep it from getting overgrown or something. She responded by inviting me to a bonfire at her house. She also invited almost everyone else from Yarra, so it didn't feel quite so special.
The bonfire was still a lot of fun, though.

I drove out with Aspen (and Manthy and Jason and Smeargle) on Friday, a day ahead of everyone else, and met her parents and stayed in her house. This was technically the first time I'd left Melbourne, as Philip Island and Frankston were both counted as some kind of suburb, apparently.
Aspen's parents were pretty fly, and the dinner was really yum. Aspen's mum had actually cooked a birthday cake for me, which was random, but sweet (in both senses of the word). We then watched Airplane (Australians know it as 'Flying High') and then gossiped late into the night.

The next day, we went for a bush walk, so I can officially say I've been into the bush. It was peaceful, but untamed, and there was a distinct air of potential danger to the place (there were poisonous snakes hiding in the grass, after all). There were kangaroos (which I missed), Blue-tongued lizards (which I missed) and an echidna, which I watched for about twenty minutes. That's right, I got to see an echidna in the wild; that's extremely rare, just so you know. My friend Jason filmed it walking (some idiot insisted on singing the Baby Elephant Walk) and the video will be added to the Wildlife page.

Then of course, there was the bonfire itself, which I got to light! Jason was also afforded the honor, but he kinda messed it up and his flame went out, whereas mine spread much faster than anticipated, no doubt fueled by pyromania. We danced around it naked, roasted marshmallows, played never have I ever, you know, the typical boy scout activities.
I got a little bit tipsy, but then sobered up pretty quickly and spent the rest of the night wondering whether or not I should reintoxicate myself. I decided not.

Sydney
Periodically, I need to be reminded to not leave everything to the last minute. It happened in first year, with Bedlam stuff, second year with Exchange paperwork, and this year with my flight to Sydney. I actually planned my journey to the airport and arrived at the train station with ample time. I just had no money on my Myki card; this was a problem because it meant I wouldn't be able to leave the station on the other side, and thus couldn't catch the airport shuttle bus. I tried using my cards, but both were declined. I tried getting cash out at the Petrol station, but it didn't work, I tried getting a lift, but no one was in- time was running out. I then ran to the nearest cash point, and tried one of my British cards in there; it granted me $20 and I dashed back to the train station, and I just managed by the skin of my teeth to catch a train there- if I'd missed it, I wouldn't have made my flight. I arrived at the airport two minutes before check-in closed. I didn't have my flight info but I did have my passport (even that was a fluke), and they printed out a reciept which was meant to count as a flight pass.
It is worth noting that Tiger airways, who took me to Sydney, were the least professional airline I've flown with. I was warned before booking that they'd been sued for flying low (like, literally, not having their zippers undone), and I did notice that the ground was much more visible during this flight than many others I've taken. I also felt much more ill during landing than usual, but I can't really blame that on them (unless altitude poisoning is a thing...to HOUSE!).

Still totally me.

When I actually arrived, I found I'd been upgraded at the hostel from a 36 person dorm to a 6 person dorm, which I think is the only reason I didn't suffocate because the rooms were windowless, with no air conditioning in the Sydney heat. This had a surprising benefit in that all the guys in the room (save me) slept in their underwear sans blankets. So, y'know, silver linings. However, this also meant that I had to sleep on the top bunk of a bunk bed, which those of who know me will know is a problem for me. Alack. I managed.

Sydney was beautiful- the juxtaposition of ocean and metropolis was so striking that I spent most of my time riding ferries and just admiring the view. It was extremely satisfying. I had a travel ticket, so I could use all the public transport as much as I wanted, so I just zipped around the harbor in boats. They even had water taxis, which I've probably seen before in London but I'm gonna pretend are exclusive to Sydney. I can see why my dad was so enthusiastic about Sydney now because he's quite the marinophile.
I saw all the famous sites, because they're all within like three feet of each other, which is certainly convenient, but probably makes the rest of the city feel unpretty. After all, people are only there to see the bridge and the opera house- who cares about downtown Sydney, honestly? Anyway, not only did I see the opera house, I actually saw an opera in it. They did a thing called 'student rush' which allowed me to get $170 tickets for $50. It was Madama Butterfly, and it sounded so beautiful, but lacked substance in the plot- I really wanna see an opera where something actually happens, because I think it'd be a lovely mix of beauty and awesomeness. Also, in the Opera house, there was a tall, dark, solitary man who for a moment I thought was following me, and I realized this would've been an awesome place to have met my Antipodean Paramour, but then he stopped following me and I didn't see him again. Darn.
On top of this, I went to the Sydney Aquarium, which was pretty unremarkable, except I paid the child's rate for the glass bottom boat ride cos the woman running it liked me. I learnt alot, and I always like things like aquariums, so it wasn't unenjoyable, it was just the only part of the trip where I felt lonely (Jason was meant to come, but backed out). Alack.
I also took the 'famous' Manly ferry, which was a very cool boat ride and then paddled at night on the beach- there were shark or stinger nets up, which worried me slightly, but I decided to ignore that anyway and paddle outside the netted area anyway. Like a badass. On the ferry back, I found an iphone, and considered just keeping it, because free iphone, but then the owner phoned it and I felt I had to give it back once I could attach a voice to the person I was depriving. Anyway, I returned it to him, he offered me money, I refused, he offered me a lift, I refused and that was that. I thought this would've been another great jumping-off point for a whirlwind romance, but it seems it was not to be. So much for naming my first-born 'Sydney'.

Ballarat Wildlife Park/My Birthday
Not that anyone remembered (not even Spanish Daniel, who I reminded not two weeks ago that it was coming up) but Friday was my birthday. Milly, Martin, Aspen and I (Jason was meant to come but backed out- starting to become a recurring thing with him) drove out to Ballarat Wildlife park.
I chose this location because visitors are allowed to feed kangaroos and hold koalas- sadly, the koalas were kept inside cos of the rain (like it never rains where they're from). But, I did get to feed kangaroos and emus and llamas, and there were other typically Australian animals like crocodiles and wombats and taipans, so I completed my Australian animal bucket list. I felt up a boa constrictor and got extremely close with an eagle (if you know what I mean). I also got to witness an emu shit all over a baby kangaroo (called a joey, you know), so that was something.
It was good fun, but quite a drive- it wasn't very expensive, though, which was refreshing for Australia. The rain was unavoidable, sadly, and did slightly hamper the enjoyment of the day (not to mention keeping me from getting Koala chlamydia).

When we got back, I skyped my mom then we went out for dinner to a local pub- I had chicken curry. Then we got back, had cake, and got drunk. Well, I got drunk. It's not really particularly clear after that point, but I remember finding Taken hilarious (it was just so bad), and singing Annie loudly in the street, so I clearly enjoyed myself and didn't smash any glasses this time. Progress.

I haven't done that much this weekend (apart from hearing the best insult ever, see yesterday's post) and class starts back tomorrow, but I think all in all this was an extremely enjoyable Spring Break (woo! Spring Break!) and I have officially left Melbourne and also been to another state, so no one can say I'm not seeing the rest of Australia. I can put another pin in my map.