Okay, so this was written when I was in the heart of Brisbane and has been saved as a draft and never posted... So please just imagine I'm still there. ;o)
Well, long story short, I'm currently sweating my face off, in downtown Brisbane, Queensland, AUSTRALIA!!!! I made it. Despite all the struggles and all the times I questioned I was going to make it here, by an act of God... I made it. From now on, the blogs are going to keep rolling; and most likely will be short and sweet. They keep us very very busy here and I don't have a whole lot of down time (and if I do, I catch up on emails and Skype my American boy).
Here is a very brief rundown of what was missed in the long stretch of no blogging/panicking that this trip wasn't going to happen:
The first and most important thing: AustraLearn was saved, as well as the airline ticket (which saved my life, possibly literally... I'll explain later). A few people from my support team emptied their bank accounts and saved everything. Shortly after, the much needed loan went through making the rest of the process significantly easier. From there, I had to get everything approved through Grand Valley - which was cake other than trying to coordinating schedules and meeting places with advisors. Banking threw me for a loop, but ended up being cake as well. I have my regular credit and debit cards and just pay a "small" transaction fee every time I pull out Australian dollars (which are like monopoly money, btw!). The one thing that really held me up was my Student Visa. Ohhhh man... I literally almost got stopped at the gate in GRR. My Student Visa must have come through within the hour of me checking in at the gate. It wasn't completely my fault that it was so late. There was a mix up with the coordinator through AustraLearn - long story short, I didn't get paperwork that I was supposed to sign off on. Regardless, I got the Visa that I needed when I needed it, with a small fee of $550 AUD (Australian Dollars). HOLY SMOKERS!! That was a little over budget (budget was $400AUD).
The month of January slid by, like sand through my fingers. All this time I thought that I had ended up disappearing. This trip and saying goodbye to everyone that is near and dear to me came and went. And was significantly harder than what I imagined it to be. We had a fabulous farewell Griffin's game with my best friends in the whole world, and even some old friends (and a couple new ones) came out to wish me farewell. We had a great night with some Ritz Koney (I enjoyed 2 full size meals to myself, in one sitting... because I was signing off on American food as well. bad idea) some karaoke, and ended with some good-byes. I didn't realize what a real fear it was that my best friends were going to forget about me. It almost felt as if I was saying goodbye to them for good. But, I should have known how amazing my friends are, and of course they had emails and facebook posts waiting for me, before I even arrived. Much of my first week was spent on Skype with Dustin and emailing people at home, just to keep some type of 'normalcy' in my life.
January 30 came and thank gosh, Dustin and I kept going back and forth on being strong. When I would absolutely lose it, he was strong and would comfort me. When reality would start hitting him, I was strong and knew it was only a little while in the large scheme of things. He was my absolute hero and helped me tie up all the loose ends in America, finished packing my suitcase for me, and drove me to the airport ensuring I was 100% ready to go. I flew out of Grand Rapids and both my mom and his mom met us in the airport. Nerves really got the best of me while waiting to fly out. I couldn't eat, couldn't sit still, and really couldn't think straight. At first I wasn't sure if I wanted the moms there cuz this was it for D and I. The last few minutes that we'd have for nearly 4 months. But, I'm SO glad they came. Mrs. Schuiling showed up with a little goody bag of snacks, and a planner, and a card that is hanging in my room. They took my mind off of the seriousness of the whole situation. Dus and I went off by ourselves and said a prayer for my trip: for safety, for health, for endurance, for strength. When we were walking back, there was an announcement that I had 3 MINUTES until the plane was leaving. HOLLYYYY SMOKES! I flew through security faster than I had ever moved in my whole life. It was the fastest goodbye and somewhat of a blur. No worries - I made the plane. :o) Once I sat on the plane (that had 25 people on it), I lost it. I had said goodbye to my best friend and hugged him for the last time. That was it. I was on my way out of the country. And was devastated. I'm somewhat thankful that the flight was only 35 minutes long, because before I could keep feeling sorry for myself, we had landed in Chicago and it was time to find the next gate.
I had an hour until my flight from Chicago to LA and decided it was time for some food. Australian prices had set in. The only thing I wanted was pizza... and hey, I was on vacation. There was no way I was passing up a pizza - even though it was $11. OUCH.
Anybody that knows me, knows I'm an awful flyer. I jump outta my seat and assume the worst every time we hit a little turbulence. But this time, I think I was so distracted with all the drastic changes that were taking place in my life, I didn't have the brain power to be scared. Before I knew it, we were in LA waiting to take off to Brisbane. This is where the "group flight" began. I met a number of other Americans that were about to embark on the trip of a lifetime with me and we were all flying to Brisbane together. I was shy (which is not like me...) and just stayed on the phone with home the entire lay over. At 11:30, we boarded the plane. It was go time.
On the plane, I sat next to this Australian guy. He was probably just a couple years older than me. Even before take off, the stewards came by with the menu and timeline for the flight. For those of you wondering, I had more than a cornbread muffin. ;o) This plane was the mac daddy of all big planes. Absolutely massive. The nerves finally kicked back in about flying. So I started to talking to this kid next to me and I'm so glad I did. He told me his story that he was from Australia, but just spent the last 3 months of his life backpacking around the world. So one more flight home was like nothing (I agreed then felt silly I was wiggin out about flying). We talked about home. We talked about the difference in culture and what I should/could expect and the places that I should visit while I'm in Oz. Next thing I knew, I was getting woken up for dinner. Ribs, green beans, carrots, pudding, and a roll. Fabulous. Passed back out until I was woken up for breakfast. Cereal. merr. Passed back out until they announced that the flight attendants should prepare for landing. Thank goodness I had the window seat for the entirety of my trip! It made it sooo much easier to sleep. Which I did - I slept for 12 out of the13 hours in flight. Before I knew it, we had arrived in Brisbane with a whopping 30 degrees (they use Celcius... double it and add 30 degrees and its a rough guess of what it equates to in F). Next feat was to catch the plane to Cairns... that plane came and went and we weren't on it.
Okay, now that alot of the business is out of the way... let the fun stuff begin! Well, maybe not the 'fun stuff'... but the adventure.
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