Hi everyone,

This will be my first blog message written on Australian soil. I have been here now for over 2 weeks. Currently I'm staying in Sydney, or as I now mostly call it 'Shitney'. Not because I don't like the city, but because I'm not fond of cities in general. This is also why I'm looking to only working on farms or anywhere as long it is outside a city. Ideal would be close to a city as it is convenient having a city in the neighbourhood. But I wouldn't mind being somewhere on a farm in the outback surrounded by nothing but nature. Anyway, currently I'm still in Sydney. I'll start from the beginning. On arrival in Australia I was a little bit sad because I had to say goodbye to New Zealand and some awesome people. My shuttle was late and I stuggled locating him. My paper said I had to go to entrance D, which didn't exist anymore at that time. I decided to call the shuttle service and then after half an hour looking around I finally found the shuttle driver. On arrival at the hostel I was placed into a 6-bed dorm. And guess what... there were 3 other Flemish people staying there (a guy from Limburg and a couple from Leuven). It felt strange to me as I met only 2 Flemish people in my entire stay in New Zealand. At that moment there were apparently more than 10 Flemish people staying. Do you think I went to them to hook up? Of course not! I didn't travel to the other side of the world to meet Flemish people. Monday morning I met the group and the Ultimate OZ representatives, Heather and Dan. They took us to the office and after giving us a SIM card we headed out on a walk to Darling Harbour where I would see the georgous Botanic Gardens, the famous Opera House and Darling Bridge. Right at that moment I felt like Sydney wasn't really a city where I could stay too much time. It was just 'too busy'. It was impressive though. I met a lot of people who absolutely loved Sydney and people who had been on a Working Holiday visa and so far hadn't left Sydney,even if they had been there for months. But that just isn't me. During  the day I talked with a lot of people: Candadians, Brits, an American, ... A lot of different nationalities. A got along with everybody, but there were a few people I would not talk with more than once as they just weren't interesting to me. Actually I didn't really connect with someone and haven't so far here in Australia to be honest. The people I hung out with the most were Georges (a French Canadian), Lindsay (a English speaking Canadian) and Andreas (a Deen). On Tuesday Ultimate OZ sceduled a harbour cruise for us, but the boat broke down so we went laser tagging and bowling instead which was pretty funny. They propmised to reschedule the harbour cruise, but they never did unfortunately. Wednesday we went to a hostel near Newcastle (north of Sydney) for 'base camp' which was awesome. We stayed there till Friday. On base camp we went sandboarding, we walked to the summit of Mount John to enjoy the panoramic views, I participated in a surf lesson and we went on a dolphin cruise. Besides the activities a    lot of alcohol would be consumed, most of it 'goon' which is actually a very cheap version of white and red wine. It is the only alcohol in Australia that is cheap. It is famous for the hangovers and memory loss you get out of it. I drunk the cheapest beer as I didn't really like the goon. The two nights we spent at base camp were awesome. Saturday we did a 2km walk to Bondi Beach, one of Sydney's most famous beaches. It was a very beautiful walk. But because of the enormous amount of people doing the walk that day we hadn't any time to enjoy Bondi Beach as we had to be back in the Wake Up hostel in time for the goodbye dinner. After dinner we went to a few clubs. In the Home bar in Darling Harbour (the last club we did and the biggest of all) I lost my group and walked all the way back to the hostel by myself. It was an 'ok' night. Sunday would become my unluckiest day so far in New Zealand and Australia combined. A money transfer didn't come through which was a problem as I was unable to pay for a farm     course I signed up for. Secondly a malfunction in my new charger destroyed my Nokia phone which held my Australian SIM card. My Samsung had to be unlocked to be able to accept the Australian SIM card which was quite expensive. I didn't want to pay that. Normally that would not drive me that crazy but I had a few phone calls to make Monday morning. But I left Monday morning on a Surf camp where I would not be able to make phonecalls. This combined with a few other things made Sunday a real 'hate' day. But then I thought: Tomorrow can only be better. And it was!!! From Monday to Friday I went to a Surf Camp which is the best and most painfull experience in Australia so far. The surf camp was located in a Holiday Park at Seven Mile Beach south of Sydney. There were around 90 people in surf camp, divided over 2 groups (which were each again devided into 3 groups). Every group got 2 sessions of surf lessons each day with a duration of 2 hours each. I would find out it would be the maximum you could do in 5
straight days. In total everyone could participate in 8 sessions. I learned very fast but as the week progressed I got some rashes on my right ankle and the backs of my knees. This was the result of putting on and taking off the 'wet' wetsuit twice a day. The rashes on my ankle become so severe that they became wounds. This was the work of the ankle leash which is attached to the surf board. The wound are still healing. But I thought during surf camp and I still do now: If a sport takes that amount of effort (putting on and taking off a wet wetsuit, collecting boards in trailer and walking a km to and from the beach twice a day) and pain (wounds because of rashes and painfull arms and legs because of the intensity of the sport and the lessons) and you still love every minute of it, it has to be awesome... And it really was!!! I am planning on buying a surf board when I will be travelling the East Coast in a few months after my farm work. It is just an amazing sport. I booked cheaper hostels for the rest of my time in Sydney. Friday after surf camp I checked in into Nomads Westend. I got a bed in a 32-bed dorm. Try to have a good night sleep after 5 exhausting days of surfing. Saturday I went to do some shopping with a few of my 'friends' or people I met. In the evening I checked in into a hostel called 'Red Star Backpackers' which was a really good hostel. It was smaller so the kind I like. It's more personal. You have more conversations in a smaller hostel than in a big hostel. I guess it is for a lot of people psychological. In a big hostel they know it is likely they will never see the same person twice. In a smaller hostel you bump in to eachother a few times a day so it would be weird if you didn't talk to eachother. During my times in hostels (16 so far in New Zealand and Australia combined) I learned that people are more sociable in smaller hostels. It is also better to travel by yourself. A very annoying thing about people travelling in group is that they don't 'want' interaction with other people. They feel like they don't 'have to'. It has happened a few times that I tried to talk to someone who belonged to a group (French, Belgians, ... I actually have the worst experience with a group of Flemish people - Why are we so cold???) and they answer in a way that says: 'Why are you talking to me? You just pulled me out of my comfort zone.' People... LIFE BEGINS WHERE YOUR COMFORT ZONE ENDS!!! Why are you doing this if you are scared of interaction with people you don't know? I do not understand it, even as I am not in every situation the most sociable person. Anyway, when I arrived at Red Star Backpackers I got invited to play some drinking games on the roof of the hostel. So we played a few games with an amazing view over Sydneys' skyline and I met some cool people. I talked a while with a girl from Chili, partially in English and partially in Spanish. My Spanish is still at 90 % of the level I had in Lanzarote which was quite surprising. It was nice. Sunday I went to Manly Beach with Andreas and Lindsay. We had to take a ferry to get there (only 2 dollars 50 which is really cheap for Sydney). Manly is a very nice and beautiful coastal town, though tourist infested. Yesterday (Monday) I checked out at Red Star Backpackers and made my way back into the city where I would stay for two days in the YHA Central Sydney, a hostel next to the central station. I'm staying there now (I'm even writing my blog now in the YHA) because tomorrow (Wednesday) I will be taking a train with Lindsay to the airport where we will pick up a camper van which we have to drive to Melbourne. The van has to be delivered there Friday afternoon which gives us some time to do some sightseeing on the road as Melbourne is only 900 kms from Sydney. It almost doesn't cost us anything and we have accommodation with us. Saturday night I will take a night bus back to Sydney from where I will depart on a 4-week farm course on Monday. Yesterday was a lazy day. Lindsay, Andreas and myself had a BBQ on the roof of the hostel at night which was nice. For today I haven't planned anything. This gave me the perfect opportunity to write my blog and charge all of my devices. Maybe I will do some laundry but I guess I'll wait a few days as I still have a few things to put on. So this is my story so far. It is possible that on the farm course I will not have that many opportunities to connect to the internet. In general, I'm having a great time and I'm excited about the future. Hear y'all later! ;)

Greetings

Thomas