Happy Mother’s Day

Happy mother’s day!

I miss my mum so much. I called her this afternoon and we talked for ages about everything. Haven’t actually felt very homesick at all these past months but I miss her heaps today. It’s like in developmental psych where babies are the most willing and confident to explore the world when they have their mother as a safe haven to return to.

This video made me tear-up in the computer lab. Also sponsors will donate a penny to  maternal health in the third world for every view the video gets.

bravo sony, more food and not alcatraz

Sony finally sent me the replacement hard drive for my laptop (after I spent an hour of study-time chasing them up about it over the phone) and found out they hadn’t even ordered it yet. It arrived today and I installed it and the computer works fine and all – but then I find out that the windows installation disk is the wrong model! fuck!

So now I have to wait for them to post the disks again…ughhhh booo.  Sorry for whining. Here are some interesting photos.

Annalise and I had been planning to go to Berkeley Bowl for 3 weeks or so before we finally made it. Berkeley Bowl is probably the only decent place to get vegetables around here, at least from what I’m used to in Canberra. The other markets (Walgreens, Trader Joe’s, Safeway, Andronico’s and Wholefoods) have most of what you need, but no real selection and the stuff isn’t that fresh.

So anywho. We decided to cook a feast made from the most outlandish foods we could find. We picked up amaranth seed, starfruit, tiny purple potatoes, this little coral-formation of mushrooms, and this weird squash I’ve forgotten it’s name.

The walk home was reaally long….so we hitchhiked!! Annalise had her thumb up for about 2 minutes when someone decided to stop. The driver (Hugo) was awesome, he works at Berkeley in the Integrative Bio department and studies human bones! He also lives on the same street as us so was able to drop us off really close by.

So anyway, this epic dinner was put together between 1:30am and 3:00am, and we slept at around 4:00am. That’s kind of my fault though.

Library and computer lab hours around Berkeley have been maximized for dead week (1 week of no class before exams) and finals week. The comp lab nearest my house is about 2 mins away and is open 2pm-1am, so they’re the hours I’ve begun to structure my life around.

Annalise's amazing pie

Worst day this week: waking up at 3pm and having pancakes for breakfast at 5pm as Megan was heading out for dinner.

Also I tried (and failed) to go to Alcatraz with the ihouse crew. They cancelled the tour because someone set the fire alarm off. Bahh.We went to the Cheesecake Factory instead though!

good hike

Sandra messages at 8pm about a hike and a bunch of us turn up, no idea of where we’ll go but all keen for some exploring. It was Sandra, Justin, Eman, Tomas and I & we hiked through the soccer/hockey field in front of Bowles, then headed up past it to the Strawberry creek trail that we walked on orientation day, except this time Eman took us on a steep uphill scramble straight up (near where I remember seeing a deer on the first day).

It was fair slippery, Sandra kept sliding into everyone haha and we all thought we’d be heading back down on our butts. We found a really good sitting spot though, to see the bay area and SF (great view) and also a really old swing that I thought was steady but the others all thought was about to collapse. Anyway, it felt awesome swinging out towards all the lights of the city at night. Prob one of my best swinging experiences, since writer’s retreat in year 9.

We were on our way down when Eman took a detour and heard “Hi! do you want potatoes?” from out in the scrub, and this is how we stumbled across a homeless couple’s campsite. We spent a good 20 mins talking to this guy as he explained theories of how the government was poisoning all our food with ‘heavy metal’ aluminium and how Albert Einstein showed how a cell that was removed from our body reacted electrically when we got angry or upset.

Overall, a fantastic two hour adventure. In the  continued absence of my laptop, this is what my posts are likely to be about. Maybe photos soon. Annalise and I cooked an amazing incredible feast last night (started at midnight, finished at 4am) and I took photos!

party much

The laptop hard drive still hasn’t arrived, so I’m doing work on my roommates computers when they’re not home/at the computer lab/ihouse. These last few days have not been uneventful:

I went to a rave in San Jose!! It was good, although um I was kind of floored and spent a large portion of it sleeping on a (frat guy called Lloyd’s) bed while Annalise kept me company. Or kept Lloyd company. I didn’t talk much. Light shows and glowing gloves are really fun though, I’m still waiting for the photos to come up.

Went to a party with Megan last night, although she got way drunk and we brought her home before midnight. I met a few more Australians, one of them told me about how he’s been getting into bars with his 1/5/1990 ID because they think it means fifth of January here! I got so excited until I got home and checked mine, which (screw ACT licenses) doesn’t have a delightfully ambiguous 3/6/1990, it actually says 3JUN1990…

Ihouse Boat Party was amazing fun, but probably because I finally tried an APPLETINI and it was AMAZING. Sorry that this entire post has been about parties and drinking…

We’ve also been to San Francisco a few times since I last posted, Japantown, the Academy of Sciences and De Young museum of fine art, all really great places to go. Japantown is much nicer than Chinatown. It’s a lot more authentic, less junk. The Acad of Science and De Young are both in Golden Gate Park, which is masssive and definitely worth spending a few days exploring.

Lastly, I have booked my summer trip! Boston->New York->Philadelphia->Washington DC->Chicago and then back to San Francisco for my 21st to party! I’m getting really excited about coming home too!

OOPS. Also I was supposed to post about our fantastic weekend roadtrip down the coast of California! Okay, that’s next.

frrrrrgh

Laptop dead April 20 System collapsed unexpectedly last night and won’t start again wahhh. Too late in the semester to mail to company for fixing so I think I may have to go without a laptop until I get back in Australia… 2 freaking months hah.

Anyway, this sucks and I dunno if I’ll be able to blog much. Computers in libraries are slow as hell.

EDIT okay dial down the drama, turns out Sony is BOSS and are mailing me a new hard drive in 3-5 days! t o b e c o n t i n u e d

more sleeplessness, the end and gushing

This Peace and Conflict course isn’t good for me. Second easy paper led to 2nd all-nighter. I didn’t start the essay until 9pm the night before it was due and didn’t stop until 7am. Well no, I worked on it with two friends and we went and got cookies & jammed to jazz music for the first 2 hours.

Also, after getting in trouble for sitting on my roof, I found another one to perch on! One of my friends lives in a co-op house called Sherman Hall. She showed us around (the houses have self-painted murals all over the walls and there are tons of comfy couches, it’s amazing) and I went straight for the roof.

There was this rickety old ladder but it went right up to the tiles & we got the most incredible view. We could see all of Berkeley, other rooftops (roof parties!!) and as well as the Bay bridge and San Francisco. This was at nighttime so all the lights were on.. I could sleep up there, it was so cool. Going to go back with my camera so I’ll get some pics next time.

The photo up there is a view from the Lawrence Hall of Science, higher than I was at the co-op – you can see the Camponile (campus clock tower) and Berkeley. I put this photo in because I didn’t take a nightview pic today and this is to make up for it. I didn’t take it btw, I think I got it off a friend’s facebook.

I’m getting really really sad about leaving. When I was applying for exchange they told us we’d settle some time a few months in and if we’re only here for 6 months, it’ll feel like we’re leaving just as things get comfy. and then they told us we couldn’t stay for longer than 6 months!! But it’s completely true. I love being here (I also miss home and all you guys), I love living so near to campus and everyone I see at school, how easy it is to get awesome dinners and lunches, how easy it is to see everyone I know in America lol, I love my awesome apartment and roommates. I love that people notice I’m Australian haha, I love staying out late and just walking around, I love being able to travel to amazing places on weekends, I love cooking for myself, going to ihouse and seeing so many people from everywhere, and living where something incredible, significant and new happens every day.

Upcoming this weekend: road trip to Big Sur!