We both speak English, but they don't speak American.

The other day, I was asked what kind of accent I had, and it felt awesome! I thought about telling the gentleman "What accent?", but I knew that I had to make a good first impression, so I told him "The accent from the best and most powerful country in the world, ya bloke."

Just kidding, I told him I was American, and he kindly wished me luck in my endevours.

So far, my endevours have ranged from the totally wickedly awesome to the fairly typical. Although since I'm in Australia, even the fairly typical is decently wickedly awesome. To prove my point: on Friday the 28th, I went scuba diving in the Great Barrier Reef and touched a sea turtle. Three days later, on Monday the 1st, I went grocery shopping. Boom.

Australian supermarket, inside a mall. Pretty much like an American supermarket, just double the price on everything.

Grocery shopping was pretty normal, aside from the fact that my checkout girl spoke Australian, and I had to carry my groceries half a mile to my house. For those of you that haven't been shopping with me, I a bit of a thrifty fellow (read, cheapskate.), so spending money on groceries was a little hard for me, considering absolutely everything in the store is more expensive than it is in the states. So, I bought the least amount of groceries possible for me to survive. Shockingly, the next day, I realized that I was dying and needed more food. So, I'm going to go out tonight and buy some more food for my tired, weak, starving stomach. (Just a tid bit of info, you know how KMarts don't exist anymore in the States? Yeah, that's cause they all are on holiday in Australia. KMart is the second biggest department store Down Under. Blew my mind.)

My house, at 81 Union Street, Brunswick, Victoria 3056, is about half a mile from the nearest major road, which is Sydney Road. Sydney Road is a decent sized road, lined with shops and restaurants and homes and my grocery store. Also on Sydney Road are trams!



Tram. My personal mode of transportation. And by personal, I mean me and 2 million other people.



Trams are my livelihood. I take them to work, to all attractions, to downtown and everywhere in between. Melbourne sports the worlds largest tram network (source, Wikipedia.). Even though Wikipedia isn't a Noble Prize winning source, I believe it. The tram network stretches far into the nearby suburbs, and covers an extensive part of downtown (what they call the CBD, Central Business District.) It is fairly reliable and relaxing. Although, during my 25 minute commute to work this morning, a car ran into my tram! You see, trams have special traffic laws. They always have the right of way, and some stoplights don't apply to them, while others always do. It sounds complicated, but the Melburnians seem to have it down pretty well. That is, everyone except for this one lady. We went through an intersection, and all of the other 20 cars stopped for the tram, but she kept going and clipped the side of the tram! It made for quite an exciting start to my day.

Also, if you look at the above picture, you may notice the placement of the tram stops. That's right, you have to jaywalk just to get to the tram! Cars are very reasonable, and will generally let you cross to get to a stop, or you can wait for the traffic light to switch and walk with traffic, but still, it makes waiting for your tram fairly adrenaline filled. Cars rush by two feet behind you, and multi-ton trams blur by two feet in front of you.



Walking, bikes, motorcycles, small cars and trams = confusing rush hour traffic.



Above is a very typical picture of the CBD's traffic. Biking is very, very popular in Melbourne, not only as a tool to commute but as a sport, too. Motorcycles and scooters are popular, since they often have special parking spots. And just like in Europe, it's hard to find a car that's bigger than a twin-sized bed. In the States, we have trucks the size of the trams! Rock on, USA.

While I love the USA (I'm proud to be an American, where at least I know I'm free!), I must admit that Australia may have us beat in the department of city parks. Melbourne has so many extravagant and lush parks, it makes for a cross country runner's dream. I went to the Royal Botanical Gardens, which were pretty cool. I don't know how many acres it is, but you could easily get very lost in the gardens. I took a video of a brief bit of my walk through the gardens.

The Gardens had plants from all around the world, and everything was in prestine condition. It was one of the most peaceful, calming places I've seen. There was an asphalt track for running or walking, but there were also many dirt paths that took you deeper into the gardens and into the thick of the plants. If you've been looking for a place to have a picnic, look no further. Go ahead and buy the $2,000 plane ticket, take the 3 flights, fly across the Pacific Ocean for 13 hours, and then tram it to the Royal Botanical Gardens, cause it'll be the best picnic of your life.



Totally worth it.



There were a lot of cool plants, with even cooler names. I found a tree called a "Queensland Jack-In-A-Box". I also found a real strange animal, and I was wondering if anyone who reads this could help me out with identifying it. It wasn't in the provided literature, and there were no signs talking about. I took a picture of it, so please look below.



Just kidding. It's me.

Now that's one handsome creature. Although not everything in Australia is handsome. See below, which is a picture of my office.



Luxury.



To be fair, I work at a construction site, so you can't expect much. And while this may look a bit junky, it as actually quite homy (Homey, homie? I don't mean homie like my gangsta brotha, I mean homie like it's comfortable. Whatever.) I work with two other guys, both in their late 20s. My desk is immediately in the foreground, and then next desk, with the laptop, is the desk of the foreman Paul Jacobs, and the last desk with the monitor on top is of the project engineer and my boss Gabriel Faris. Both guys are great and very helpful and totally committed to helping me learn about Australia and learn about engineering/construction. My project is the refurbishment of a 26 story office building. And while my office may not be too glamorous, it only takes me a short walk from my job site to have some pretty dang nice views.



Pretty nice, yea? And that's only half of the CBD!

I took that picture from the bank of the Yarra River, which runs right down the middle of Melbourne. The river walk is a lot fun, with restuarants and shops lining the river, and further down the river, there was about 12 rowing teams! this made me excited, since Joy was on a rowing team when she was in Oxford. I walked along the river for over an hour, and then decided to sit down and enjoy the sunshine for a bit.



Chilling.

I've been in Melbourne for five days now, and it's been going great. I love the sun, and the walks, and all of the sights. God has been good to me and I'm enjoying every minute of His goodness.