Some highlights from the first three days: Sarah Vaccarri and Rachel Pow (from Em's homestay) took Em and I on a walk along the coast down to Bondi Beach. The walk is right along the cliffs and beaches and has some breathtaking views, it was an amazing first view of Australia. On Wednesday, we met Sister Rosemary, our primary contact here for the first time and finally got to thank her in person for all the hard work she has done helping us arrange the details of our trip. I got to go over to the Catherine Sullivan Centre across the street from Santa Sabina College. The Centre is a place that works with children younger than school age that have hearing impairments to get them ready to enter primary school. I talked to Clare Hopley the director and then helped out during play group by just playing with the little ones like Eric who took apart every lego tower i built and threw the pieces on the ground, much to his delight.
Although i had recovered mostly from the Jet lag there is one funny story as I went lost for the afternoon because i had come back to the house and laid down for a nap in my room but nobody knew that i had come in. Later Gulian rang Emily's homestay family and found out she had gotten back hours before. Fortunately, before he declared a manhunt, he took a peek in my room to see that there i was. Whoops! already causing anxiety on the other side of the planet.
Thursday, after running some errands in the morning, I went to mass with Sr. Rosemary at the Catholic Institute of Sydney. Then at dinnertime Emily and I went with a couple of teachers and students from Santa Sabina College to Matthew Talbot Hostel in the city to help serve dinner to the residents there. It was amazing to see the number of men the center was able to feed in the span of an hour! It was a joy to help out and talk to the other volunteers there. One gentleman was adamant in convincing me that Rugby Union is better than Rugby league, I'll get back to you on the difference, gotta work that one out myself first.So thats a bit of a snapshot of whats been going on with me, last but not least i have slowly but surely begun to add vocab like: dodgy, Uni, heaps, moppet, mum, shmozel, primary and secondary school, and ringing someone.
Well thats it for now tune in next time for my first experience with rugby league and netball and some sightseeing over the weekend.
