First Update

The only way to really experience an 11 hour flight on a Boeing 747 is to sit in the middle two seats of the center four. After watching a movie and sleeping for 6 or so hours and losing Sunday somewhere over the Pacific, Lola and I arrived in Fiji. The airport was definitely different-- elevators called lifts, restrooms labeled toilets, and couches outside the terminal. But seeing someone wearing a Twins jersey and hearing New Kids on the Block playing in the background beckoned the American spirit and made me realized how much I was going to miss some things about home.

My first cultural experience came when trying to set my clock. Three different sources showed three different times. This was my introduction to "Fiji time" which essentially means no time at all. And that is exactly how the rest of the week felt. Except for catching the ferry to our destination island, there was no need to worry about time. Meals at our resort were signaled by a drum and the sun gave us an idea of the general time. We spent our days snorkeling and laying out, but also went on a cave expedition and visited a local village. One of the most interesting parts of staying in the dorms at the resort was meeting all the other travelers. There were very few Americans and almost everyone had been traveling for at least 6 months and Fiji was just a stop on their adventure.

Our flight to Australia caused one of the most stressful travel experiences of my life. We got to the counter to check in and the attendant informed us that she couldn't give us boarding passes because we hadn't applied for visas. We didn't even know we needed visas! So we rushed to an Internet cafe in the airport, filled out the forms online and made through immigration and security just in time to board the flight. Whew.

It is now our second day in Australia and there has been a total of 30 min where I haven't been absolutely freezing. We are staying with our friend Georgie in her suburb outside of Sydney and it actually snowed today. Snowed. We were in the city where it was thankfully just raining (with some lightening and thunder on the side). Tomorrow we are heading back into the city while Georgie is in class and the first thing on my agenda is to buy some warm shoes and maybe gloves.

I will get some pictures from Fiji up soon. Unfortunately, my underwater camera ironically got ruined by water but thankfully my memory card is intact and the pictures survived.