Hi there, as you've probably noticed, keeping up with the blog hasn't been going very smoothly lately. The more the backlog built up, the more it became difficult to catch up, and the easier it was to think, "Oh, I can put it off for another day." I initially planned to write out each day in detail, but I think that's too ambitious, and it also makes less sense to keep working on it when I'll be back in the Netherlands in a week. So instead, I think it's better to just post a huge summary of the past few months here, and you can ask me for the details when you come to visit, haha. I'll also see if I can just dump photos from that time into a big post later, but it's a bit of a hassle with my old (read: dead) phone that holds those photos. It's a bit of a pain when it randomly shuts down and reboots...
Oct 21-31: Went to Manning Bar with Cynthia for live music by basically the same bands as from Battle of the Bands earlier in the semester, and then Sunny and Angela joined us in Newtown for a brownie/cookie brisket—yummy! We also played some guitar and worked on uni stuff.
Finally got to go to the Sydney Opera House!!! Like, the inside, haha. I've seen the outside, of course. We went with the whole group to a live orchestra playing music by Tchaikovsky, among others. It was beautiful to hear, and the hall itself was beautiful too. I recognized which pieces were by Tchaikovsky because they reminded me of Swan Lake, haha. Unfortunately, it wasn't played, but I guess that was to be expected (although I was hoping for it).
Day trip to Bowral: visited many charming shops and enjoyed delicious pastries at a well-known bakery. The "Champion cake," or whatever it was called, was literally a cream puff, literally the same thing, except it wasn't pink or orange.
We went to the Sydney Opera House again! This time just with Cynthia. We went to the musical Rent, which was great! We didn't quite grasp the plot the whole time, but it was fun nonetheless!
Did some more guitar lessons with Cailene, yeeyyy. Trivia and study sessions at the library.
Halloween time! Sunny and Angela convinced me to go to several parties, so I went in Alice in Wonderland outfit to a boat party (we accidentally got on the wrong boat, so all we got was French music, uhh yeah...), a home bar party, and another party there, and after that, it was all good for a while, haha.
Cailene and I ran a 4k lap around campus for the RUNSYDUNI fun run, which was fun! Not as good a time as when I ran the Venloop, but I hadn't really trained for it, so it makes sense (19:50, but my phone said it was less than 4k). There was a great atmosphere on campus, though; it was fun to see so many people running around, some dressed as bananas, pirates, Minions, Mario, etc.
