2014 - The Year of Doing

My new years resolution was to start blogging again in 2014. You are welcome.

I have decided that 2014 is the Year of Doing. The reason for this is because I have no idea what is going on in my life! So to start somewhere, I made a list of things I want to accomplish by the time I turn 25 and then a list of things I have to do before I die. Now some of these might not seem like a 'finding your path in life' type of things, but to me they are a definite necessity.

Things to do before I turn 25

1.  Go HangGliding, because it sounds like fun
2. SCUBA Dive with a Great White Shark, again, because it would be fun, plus a huge adrenaline rush
3. Go back to school, I am pretty sure my degree is worthless... sorry dad but thanks for the great college experience, I had fun! Oh, and to actually get another degree when I go back to school.
4. Find a career that I actually like, because obviously that is a good idea
5. Read 250 books, at least 50 being educational
6. Go visit Laurel in whatever country she lives in when I visit
7. Learn how to be more clean so Andrew does't keep freaking out about how messy I am

Things to do before I die

1. Go to every continent
2. Live abroad for at least a year
3. Be able to retire by 65, (see finding a job that I like/make money at in "before I turn 25"
4. Be bilingual, because I definitely can't do that by 25
5. Become a SCUBA instructor, that way I can retire by 65 and just dive all the time for free
6. Go to the Galapagos, I like animals
7. Have enough money to live comfortably after I retire, which means I have to start saving yesterday
8. Climb an active volcano, because who wouldn't want to do that

I am sure that if I truly thought about it that there would be a lot more to say about what I want/need to do before I turn 25 and before I die, but then I got distracted by another thought. What other people should do in their lives. 

The number one thing on my list that people should do at least for 3 months of their life, PEOPLE NEED TO WORK IN THE SERVICE INDUSTRY. Then they would be a lot more nice. I just don't think that people understand how crazy and ridiculous they are. After working in the service industry, I started tipping more and being a lot more nice to people that I talk that are doing a service for me, even being nice to the people in India that answer the phones for AT&T, which takes a lot of effort. SO to everyone that has not worked in the service industry, I beg you to do so. If you do not take my advice, then I ask for you to be nice to those of us that do, because you make my day a living hell if you are not. 

Coming from that statement, we can go into my thoughts on my job. I really dislike my job. I am doing what an ant could do. I was going to say what a monkey could do, but since everyone tells me that they are smart, I will steer clear of that. So I do what an ant can do. I answer phone calls and check people in and out. It is really boring but at least it pays the bills. I am the only person that I work with that has a college degree, so I definitely feel like my degree was worthless. My director keeps telling me to be patient and a position will open up and she will promote me. I doubt that will happen though. The managers pretty much don't want to promote me because I voice my opinion (shocking, I know) and because I think that things need to be changed and they think that things are fine. However, they have never done the job that I do because they came in as managers so they have no idea what goes on. They can't even come to the front desk to help check people out because they don't know how to do it. So they don't know what needs fixing because they can't even do the job themselves. The spa would run a lot smoother if we could fix things, since the job that I do is the center of the spa. We book the reservations, we greet the guests, we make sure the guests are happy their entire stay by serving them food and wine and get them warm neck wraps and robes and any other random crap that they request because they are all high maintenance people, then we check them out and take their money. Without my position, there would be no spa. We could make so much more money if the little things that need fixing of my job were fixed. But since we already make so much money, they don't want to change anything. When I got a facial today, one of the estheticians informed me that they fired two other estheticians because they didn't upgrade enough facials, which means that they weren't charging people more than what they originally booked for. The Spa is like an ATM, we are just a cash machine. MONEY MONEY MONEY. Which is good, but we could make more. Thats what I want to help them do as a manager but they get scared of change. The same rules and ways have been in place for years. Sometimes things need to change, especially as the times and social norms change. 

I have decided that I need to get out of this industry. I love it but I want better hours and better pay than I will ever get in the hospitality industry. 

I have looked into many different options. I keep thinking dental school because of dad, but then I know that I would date that, plus that is a lot of school to do. Then I thought about being a surgeons first assistant, aka stitching people up and handing surgeons tools and stuffing gauze in when the people produce too much fluid or bleed. Hmmmmmm, doesn't sound much like me. So now I am looking into going back to school for sonography. Which means doing ultrasounds. After doing research into this, I found that you can specialize in certain areas of ultrasound. I want to do pediatric cardiovascular. So for little ones. But that is today, who knows if I will want to do that tomorrow. These things I have to ponder on for a while because I get an idea in my head that I think I like and am not sure if I actually like it. 

HAPPY 2014 PEOPLE. THE YEAR OF DOING.

Port Douglas/cairns/Sydney/fiji

Well so since last time I blogged I've done a lot. Since then I've been to port douglas, cairns, and Sydney in Australia and am now in Fiji.  In port Douglas we got to go out on a big research boat to the great barrier reef. I got to finally dive the great barrier reef!!! The first day the visibility was really poor because it had rained so I was disappointed but the second day the diving was amazing! I got super annoyed though because there were two other certified divers on our trip but they just got certified and had never been diving except for their certification dives. One girl couldn't figure out her bouancy control and this girl just couldn't stay under water. In the middle of our 80 foot dive, this chick just soared to the surface. So dumb. It turns out that she couldn't figure out how to empty her vest of air. I laughed so hard at her because she could remember how to put all her equipment together, which I can't remember to save my life, but she couldn't remember how to empty her vest of air which is one of the most important parts!!! We helped the people on the boat with research and were giving an area to snorkel and we had to count certain types of fish in that area. Probably a terrible idea having us do this because half of us had no idea what type of fish we were looking for so we just made up numbers. So fun fact, research isn't right always. Especially when they have volunteers like us helping them. We were too busy looking at everything to stop and count the fish.  Port Douglas was really cool. We went cane toad racing. A cane toad is a frog that was introduced to Australia to eat the cane beetle when  sugar cane was brought over to farm. Only certain people got to cane road race. If your name was drawn you could. Of course, I got called to race this frog thing. So they put a hair tie around the frog so you know which is yours and you get a party blow thing. Like the things you use at birthday parties or new years when you blow into it the end unrolls and it makes a noise. You have to blow this to where is expands to hit the frog. The frog has to move to the end of the table and jump off and you have to catch it and run to put it in a bucket and then you win. So here I go blowing this freaking thing so it's jumps to the end of the table and I'm running around frantically trying to grab this damn frog. Well duh, I grab the frog and win of course! I won a free day trip on a catamaran to the reef and then a pass to some crocodile place! So that was entertaining and fun.  Then we went to cairns (pronounced cans). There we had our final exam, which was easy since it was open note. Other than that, we had free time the whole time. We went to the beach and just walked around. It's the backpacking capital of Australia so that's where I'm going back to when I start backpacking. It's a really neat place. It has a city centre area that has all the hostels, bars, and restaurants all there.  Now onto Sydney. I love Sydney. We went to the zoo and it was awesome! The zoo had every type of animal possible. Even a snow leapord. They had a sky rail type deal since the zoo is on a mountain/hill. We got to ride up and down it and it overlooked sydney harbor. We then ferried to the harbor and sat outside and ate lunch overlooking the opera house. Sydney was pretty much like new York city though. It was exactly the same but instead of the statue of liberty, it was the opera house.  Fiji. My favorite place ever. This place is just great. We are staying at hostels but they are sooo nice. We did a village stay where we stayed in the village with families. This place is so third world it's unreal. We sat on the floor to eat our meals and they don't even use silverware. The honored guests get to eat first so while we were eating, the women would walk around with towels and swat the flies away from our food. It was extremely awkward. Then the males get to eat and then the women get to eat. They shower at least three times a day...let me tell you, this is because their "showers" are not showers. They fill up a five gallon bucket with the coldest water on earth and the use a bowl to scoop the water out and pour it over your head. Oh, and the bathroom isn't even attached to the house so you have to go outside to use it. It's really funny and disgusting at the same time. They all have huge TVs and cell phones but they can't even invest in a proper shower or shoes. They don't wear shoes ever. We did a kava ceremony. Kava is like their alcohol. It's made from a root and mixed with water. It's considered a mild narcotic and is illegal in America. I asked our mom how much she drank of it and she said she drinks a little so I asked how much a little was and she told me about 30 bowls. I drank 7 and my whole face was numb. I don't know how they do it. Plus it tastes TERRIBLE. like muddy water. It's so gross. Then they all came out in costumes and did a dance. Oh, the houses. These are practically huts. They are one room and have curtains Seperating the "rooms". This was an experience for sure. And the food that they made has me running to the bathroom every 30 minutes now. Today, we ferried to an island called bounty island. It's so cool. You can walk around it in about 15 minutes, it's so little. We are at the only resort here. Today we kayaked and played beach volleyball so it's been a lot of fun and tomorrow I think that we are going on a boat to snorkel and do more research. 

Done

I am sick of blogging if you can't tell. So I'm not anymore!

Also, I am staying here three extra weeks to travel. Yayauayayayay

Daintree/Cape Tribulation

yesterday we left tyrconnel to come to the daintree rainforest in cape tribulation. yesterday was the day from hell. we got on the bus at 9 am to leave and we literally stopped every 30 minutes for no reason. we stopped outside of cape trib to get groceries because there are none on this island. but then our professor told us not to get naythign that cant be refrigerated because we are stoppign on the way for outdoor lectures. so that results in me eating peanut butter AGAIN. what should have taken about 30 minutes from the grocery store to our hostel was actually a 5 hour venture. we got to stop at all these spots in the rainforest and the guy, small paul, who was giving us all our elctures talked for freaking hours and most of it wasnt about anything to do with teh rainforest. its really frustrating sometimes because taking notes is making it to where we cant look around and enjoy the rain forests. finally we got to our hostel and then were supposed to go on a night walk to animal spot. thank goodness our professor realized that none of us were going to do it so she postponed it until tonight. so of course, we all just went to the bar.

this morning we went to the rainforest discovery centre. it was really neat. they built pathways to walk through certain parts of the forest and there were different levels. we got to walk on teh bottom, then the middle, then we got to go up high above the canopys. it was really neat. the rest of the afternoon has been a free day so we went to the beach but it was kinda cloudy so we didnt stay for long.

uhmmm nothing else really exciting going on right now besides the MASSIVE spiders that are here. they are the size of my hand, if not bigger, and im not exagerrating. they are everywhere and even in the hostel showers.

Camping

For the past two days we have been in Tyrconnell. It's in the outback. With, I don't think really looks like the outback because it's hilly and it has trees and shrubs everywhere. Not the type of outback I was expecting. I think Disney has put wrong ideas in my head. This place we stayed at was literally in the middle of nowhere. It's on the top of a hill and this persons house is made of tin. It's like they are living in the 1940's. They barely even have electricity and have to run a generator if they want to toast a piece of bread. We stayed down the hill from these people's house. We stayed in tents. It was two people to a tent but we thought it was a good idea to use one tent for our changing room and then five of us stayed in one tent. Me, Joey, Andrew, tally, and Becky all slept in one tent and we hung my iPad up on a string to the top of the tent and watched movies both nights. I say we watched movies but we watched Thor both nights and fell asleep ten minutes in. The place we stayed at has an old gold mine on it. It's from the 1800's and still works. They turned it on for us and everything. It was pretty cool. Other than that we did nothing but write our paper. It was pretty boring. Really boring actually.  Now we are on the bus on the way to cape tribulation/daintree. Another rainforest. This one is supposed to be like the tropical rainforest type, like in the Disney movies. Disney really just messes with your head and then you are disappointed when you don't get what they portray in the movies.  Supposedly, the outback doesn't get much water but it rained the whole time we were here. I swear the rain is following us everywhere we go. It rained so hard in cairns and port Douglas (both places I would go diving) that the dive boats didn't even go out. If that happens while I'm here I'm definitely not getting on the plane to LA from Fiji and coming back so I can go diving. I talked to the guy at Tyrconnell that knows all this stuff about gold and he told me where I could get a gold Australian kangaroo coin and how much they would be and stuff, so that would be something cool to bring home.  Hope it doesn't rain!!  Tata

Homestay

Tonight is the last night in our home stays. We have been here for almost two days now. My family is so great. It was never awkward for us and they made us feel right at home. They have a 3 year old daughter, Ava, and a 10 year old son, Luke. They live on a farm but not to sell the animals but just to provide food for their own family. It's pretty cool.the father is paralyzed from the waist down but he has these braces on his legs that let him stand up and he can walk with these crutches type things. He used to fly helicopters and his crashed and that is why he is paralyzed now  It's actually pretty remarkable. I haven't seen him use a wheelchair once. This was an amazing experience. We got to learn what life is for an Australian and not just the tourist aspect of it.  We finally got breakfast, lunch, and dinner provided for us for two days. This is the first time that we have had every meal for the entire day provided. Thank goodness. It was nice to actually have a home cooked meal for us. All the ,eat was great. Obviously, it was so fresh, coming straight from their backyard. We did activities that I would never have dreamed of doing. We had to herd the goats into the pens first. We had to feed each goat their medicine with a syringe and then tag their ears. They definitely didn't like us much after that. Then we had to herd the sheep into the pens. We had to do their medicine as well. Next, was the baby lamb. This next part is not for the nauseous type. In all my excitement I Said I would cut off the lambs tail. Who knew that the lambs tails just weren't that short to begin with. I'm thinking that I get to use a big butcher  knife or something and can just whack the thing off. Oh no. David, the dad, gives me his pocket knife. I look at him and tell him that this better be the sharpest pocket knife I've ever seen or else this won't be working out so well. so David and Becky, his wife, pick up the lamb and hold him still for me. I have to pull his tail really hard to make the joint that I have to cut through as thin as possible. Next, I think that I supposed to saw this tail off but really I just sliced right through the thing. The knife got stuck like half way through because of the joint and I freaked out thinking that I was going to have to stop but I managed it... I got squirted everywhere with blood and definitely ruined my rain jacket. After that we had to saws off some of the horns on the cow. We had to here the cows into the pens without a horse so here we all go running through the fields like a bunch of chickens with out heads cut off trying to herd about 39 cows into the pens. It took us a good 45 minutes to get every cow in. David is just laughing at us the entire time telling us he could do it faster being paralyzed.  finally, we get all the cows in. Then once in the pen, we have to separate the ones with horns so that we can lock their heads in the holding thing and saw them off. David saws the first cows horns. He cuts too low. It's like a dogs toe nails, if you cut too short then they will start to bleed. Will this poor cow. Blood is squirting everywhere. I don't mean just oozing out, I mean freaking squirting, like it does in the movies, a steady squirting of blood. I have pictures to prove it. Becky is running to get the spray to stop the squirting so I had to use my finger to plug the hole so that it wouldn't keep on going. I have decided at this point that farm life might not be for me. Ava has a little Shetland pony that she rides to do horse shows. The ground here is too soft so that it doesn't need horse shoes but they have to go and clean the hooves and cut and file the hooves. So got Panda, the pony, and have to clean those. It was pretty easy and nothing exciting happened. Which i would consider exciting because I was over the blood and stuff. That's about it for my  farm work. Definitely glad to say I experienced that and hat I will never be doing it again.  Tomorrow they take us to the bus at 9 am and then we bus to Tyrconnell and camp in the outback for two nights. It's frickin freezing here though so we went to the big W (their version of Walmart) and had to buy sweatpants and jackets for camping.  All I want is ice in my soda and to chew on. Nobody here has any ice. It's infinitely not okay.  I also discovered what cordial is over the two days. It's like a flavor that you put in your water. They have like, berry, cola, lemonade, sport flavored, and a Thousand more. Most Australians like it better than soda because they thing soda is too sweet. David and Becky has coke for dinner and they out water in it to make it not as sweet.  They also have barely any fast food here. They have been to America and are appalled at how many fast food restaurants we have and our all you can eat buffets. Cheerio mates. Hope I don't get eaten by a dingo!

Waterfall swimming

So, last night like I said, I was really looking forward to the night canoeing. Instead of getting to go night canoeing, I got sick. I swear it was something I ate but the boys ate the same thing as me and didn't get sick. So I have no idea what it was. I felt terrible all night and slept with a bucket by my bed. But when I woke up I felt fine.

Today, we went on what they call a bus tour. But it really wasnt much of a bus tour. The first stop we went to look at these massive fig trees. I wish I could put up pictures to show you all how cool everything is but it wont let me. So I will have to make an online photo album when I get home to show everyone. After the trees, we got to go to another waterfall. But this time we could swim under it. It was so cool. This was the waterfall that the herbel essence commercial was filmed at. The one with the girl and the waterfall, that flips her hair up and the water sprays everywhere. Paul, the hostel owner and our guide, took our pictures while doing this and it looks exactly like the commercial. Getting so close to a 150 foot waterfall and swimming under it was breath taking. Not only the view was breath taking, but you literally could not breathe because of how fast the water was flowing down. Probably one of the coolest things I have done and seen in my life..besides the 700 foot waterfall yesterday.

The rest of today is a free day and tonight is the state of origin rugby game. Which is North Queensland vs. new South Wales. This is supposed to be the biggest game of the year in rugby. We all went and bought maroon shirts (they say 'marone' and not maroon) to wear tonight. We are going to go to the only pub in Yungburra and try to understand the rugby match.

Tomorrow, we go to our homestays. I have a family that has all these farm animals and supposedly we have to shave and cut off sheeps tails? Interesting. I met the young 3 year old girl today and all she says is 'bloody bastard' might be the most comical thing I have ever listened to. I can't wait! We will be there for 2 days and then off to camp in the outback. I probabyl won't have internet for the next four days unless my family has interent. Obviously, I will not have it while camping.

cheers.