I am sitting on UQ's campus (free internet, but unfortunately not close to where we're staying) and I am surrounded by rainbow lorikeets and kookaburras.
This morning there was the first day of orientation. We got an overview of the program and then got to meet a few of the professors and our organizers / support team. After that we had morning tea, which is adorable and I wish we'd have it every day. There were teas and coffee and cake and fruit. After tea we had our "occupational health and safety introduction," aka "Crocodile 101." Dave Harris, who gave the talk, had a crocodile skull with him. From an entire morning of lectures, these are pretty much my only notes:
CROCS-
- north of Gladstone = croc territory
- can live to over 100!!!
- up to 7m long (usually no more than 5m)
- smart. They stalk their prey and make note of where people generally enter water, and lay in wait
- typically attack from water
- always assume there is a croc in any and every body of water
- do NOT swim unless you know it's safe
- stand back 3+ meters from water's edge
and so on like that. There is also a parenthetical note in tiny text which say "SHARKS: Don't swim at dusk, don't swim in the Brisbane River, and don't swim at river mouths."
Afterwards we got our photos taken for our UQ visiting student ID and then went on a really quickie tour (I retained nothing). Then we went to a barbeque around 2:30pm and I've been chilling on the lawn here with people ever since.
A lot of people are talking about going on a surfing trip on our free time this weekend, but I'm thinking that I'll go to Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary so I can hold a koala (seems like a requirement for being in Australia, right?).
And yes, Australian accents are fabulous.
p.s. There are two guys named Ilan in our group. What is the likliness of that.
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