Once we got on campus, an RA met us and led us into our building. We had been assigned the same building, the same floor, and even had rooms right next to each other. We have two communal showers and three toilets on the floor, as well as a living room area and a kitchen. We don’t have a meal plan, so we immediately asked around about the buses and headed off to Stockland Mall for provisions.
We had three main goals: get food, get showering supplies, and get phones. Two of these objectives were completed. We looked over prepaid cell phone plans while we ate some food court lunch (their Subway is NOT the same as in the U.S.) and decided on one that would allow us to talk and text each other for free.
We went to the store (Crazy John's) and they were sold out of the phone I wanted, so we decided to come back on Tuesday.
The next day, Monday, was a small orientation welcoming us to the school, and telling us about another orientation the following day. Once that was over, we came back to our apartment, ate dinner, and crashed.
On Tuesday we were broken up into groups to take a tour of campus. We also got to participate in a trivia game, which our team, Team Amurika (because we all were from the U.S.), soundly won with a perfect score. One kid seemed a little suspicious, but clearly he doesn’t understand how awesome Amurika is, and was jealous of our $10 gift cards to the nice restaurant on campus.
The bad thing about being Team Amurika is that no one could pronounce our name properly. They tried things like Am-err-eek-ahh, but we would set them straight by saying "AMURIKA!" in our finest male, hillbilly accents. Truthfully, I don't think a single Australian in the room understood the joke, but that's okay because it wasn't for them anyway!
The bad thing about being Team Amurika is that no one could pronounce our name properly. They tried things like Am-err-eek-ahh, but we would set them straight by saying "AMURIKA!" in our finest male, hillbilly accents. Truthfully, I don't think a single Australian in the room understood the joke, but that's okay because it wasn't for them anyway!
.... YEA!
So after Team Amurika dominated (obviously) we went back to Stockland mall to get our phones. While walking toward the store, we passed two men in Australian Army fatigues. I did a double take. I don't know why I have a thing for men in uniform, probably has something to do with seeing Pearl Harbor when I was young and impressionable.
Josh Hartnett's fault.
I mean really.
Not that far...
I was embarrassed by Kelley checking out EVERY SINGLE MALE IN UNIFORM AT THE MALL. But what could I do? I just sighed and rolled my eyes. Some women just can't resist a man in uniform.
When we were at the mall on Tuesday to get the phones, there was good news and bad news. The good news was that they had the fancy phone that Kelley wanted. The bad news was that they didn't have the cheap phone that I wanted. Kelley decided to go ahead and purchase hers though. Apparently in Australia you need ID to buy a mobile phone. So Kelley gave them her driver's license. They needed more though...but her 'Cane Card was rejected. Apparently in Australia, you need 60 points worth of ID to get a phone and a U.S. driver's license is only worth 40 (U.S. student ID's are worth zero). Don't ask me how the points work: all I know is that buying a mobile phone is apparently not equivocal to playing a game on "Whose Line Is It Anyway?" because the points do matter. So after all of this, we were going to have to come back to the store the next day...again.
In order to ensure that this trip wouldn't be a total waste of our time, we headed over to Cole's (a supermarket) to check out their supplies. We started in the fruits and vegetables section and I was immediately delighted to find four kilograms of potatoes selling for a mere $5! Kelley said, "Are you sure we can eat all of these before they go bad?" to which I responded "Definitely!" We also stocked up on some basic good such as: flour, sugar, spaghetti, spaghetti sauce, several kilograms of rice, two huge containers of vegetable oil, and some baking necessities. Though we had to carry our loot from Cole's to the bus station, it wasn't that far so we were unconcerned.
However, it just so happened that on this very day...THE BUS DRIVER MISSED OUR STOP! After he went flying past it, Kelley said, "HEY! Can you stop!?!?" He responded to this by slowing down--thank goodness! We stood up to get off, when, out of no where, he sped up again! Since we were nearly at the next stop, we just decided to get off there. The walk didn't seem that far when we did it every other day, so I was optimistic. The reality was this: it turned out to be the longest walk...in the world. I regretted buying the four kilograms of potatoes so much that I was cursing at them in my head. And I also wondered why I felt the need to fit the American stereotype by purchasing this much food. Eventually (literally a solid 10-15 minutes later) we reached our rooms and threw our bags to the floor.
On Wednesday we went to get our course situation worked out by meeting with "Advisors" who weren't actually advisors but they got the job done. We are both planning on taking 5 courses in order to graduate next spring, but they were pretty adamant that by taking 5 classes instead of 4 we would basically be condemning ourselves to lives of pain and suffering. We ignored them.
We went back to the mall, this time with passports in tow, to finally get our phones. The phone Maria wanted was in, along with mine, so we happily purchased them and decided to just buy the plan online when we got back to the apartment.
Fatal mistake.
I tried to pay for the $20-plan using my debit card. Nope. Credit card. Nuh uh. Checked with Maria, and she had the same problem. She called the company, and they said they wouldn’t take overseas cards. Really? REALLY? We just paid for our phones with overseas cards!
This is probably the appropriate time to say a few words. We were encouraged by the people working at the store to buy the plan online. I guess you just can't get advice from customer service people who refuse to stand up when speaking to you though. So now we had phones, but they weren't able to be used...classic.
This is probably the appropriate time to say a few words. We were encouraged by the people working at the store to buy the plan online. I guess you just can't get advice from customer service people who refuse to stand up when speaking to you though. So now we had phones, but they weren't able to be used...classic.
We would have to go back to the store. Again. We were livid with this company. They had neglected to inform us of needing a passport, the issue with foreign cards… and now we would have to go back to the store every month to buy recharges for our plans. But the best part about them has yet to be revealed...
We had our phones. We had our passports. We had our receipts. And we had brought multiple forms of payment with us...just in case. Getting the plan was pretty easy, but what it took to get there was downright ridiculous. After getting that situation taken care of we went to Big W to purchase more goods (which was either because we believed that the bus driver would let us off at the correct stop, or because we were just being downright stupid.) Anyway, Kelley paid for her goods and was patiently waiting for me. The worker announced my total and I reached for my credit card. It wasn't there. CRAZY JOHN'S!!!!!! I almost belted out a string of expletives. I decided that I had to keep my head in the game though, so I calmly paid with my debit card instead and set off to start World War III.
When I got to the store the male worker (who was the most helpful...though this is in no way a compliment to his customer service) came up to me. So I said, in a non-confrontational way, "Do you have my credit card here?" He responded with "No, sorry love."
DID HE REALLY JUST CALL ME "LOVE" IN THIS TIME OF WARFARE AND CRISIS!?!?!?!
"Well," I replied, "can we take a look?" He agreed and mindlessly moved some documents about while I tore the store to shreds. "It's not here," he said. I was 100% sure that it was, but I had to play it cool so I said "Well, call me if you happen to find it, please."
I wasn't mad anymore--I was LIVID. I was absolutely positive that they never gave me my card back and I had a sneaking suspicion that they might be up to something. I expressed this to Kelley as we waited for the bus to arrive. Suddenly, my phone started vibrating and I knew who would be on the other line. It was the man from the store and he said that they had magically found my card!! I rushed in there and mustered up all of the nice-ness that I had left in me to say "thanks!" The other lady worker said "Yeah...sorry about that."
In the end though, there were several good pieces of news that came from this day: #1: We had functional phones. #2: The bus driver stopped at the correct stop (!!!!). And #3: My credit card was back in action.
We had our phones. We had our passports. We had our receipts. And we had brought multiple forms of payment with us...just in case. Getting the plan was pretty easy, but what it took to get there was downright ridiculous. After getting that situation taken care of we went to Big W to purchase more goods (which was either because we believed that the bus driver would let us off at the correct stop, or because we were just being downright stupid.) Anyway, Kelley paid for her goods and was patiently waiting for me. The worker announced my total and I reached for my credit card. It wasn't there. CRAZY JOHN'S!!!!!! I almost belted out a string of expletives. I decided that I had to keep my head in the game though, so I calmly paid with my debit card instead and set off to start World War III.
When I got to the store the male worker (who was the most helpful...though this is in no way a compliment to his customer service) came up to me. So I said, in a non-confrontational way, "Do you have my credit card here?" He responded with "No, sorry love."
DID HE REALLY JUST CALL ME "LOVE" IN THIS TIME OF WARFARE AND CRISIS!?!?!?!
"Well," I replied, "can we take a look?" He agreed and mindlessly moved some documents about while I tore the store to shreds. "It's not here," he said. I was 100% sure that it was, but I had to play it cool so I said "Well, call me if you happen to find it, please."
I wasn't mad anymore--I was LIVID. I was absolutely positive that they never gave me my card back and I had a sneaking suspicion that they might be up to something. I expressed this to Kelley as we waited for the bus to arrive. Suddenly, my phone started vibrating and I knew who would be on the other line. It was the man from the store and he said that they had magically found my card!! I rushed in there and mustered up all of the nice-ness that I had left in me to say "thanks!" The other lady worker said "Yeah...sorry about that."
In the end though, there were several good pieces of news that came from this day: #1: We had functional phones. #2: The bus driver stopped at the correct stop (!!!!). And #3: My credit card was back in action.
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