End of Semester, Post School Plans, Footy Excitement

Alright so pretty much the reason why I haven't written anything in awhile is because nothing that interesting has been happening. The last few weeks I have kind of fallen into a routine of playing Aussie rules, going out, going to class and doing school work.

Last weekend I started on the field for my first Aussie rules game for the team I play for, the Razorbacks. I started at half-forward which was pretty fun and played for most of the game. I played pretty well with a few kicks, a couple tackles and a handful of disposals. Needless to say, we lost handily. Since we one the first two games of the season both the seniors and the reserves (I play reserves) have experienced some injuries. As people get injured the best players on reserves move from reserves up to seniors. This is nice because it gives us international students a chance but on the other hand it makes reserves play a lot worse. After those first two games we have lost four straight.

On Sunday the 17th, Will Arundell (my Australian roommate) took Will (my American roommate) and I too the Melbourne Cricket Ground. The MCG is one of the largest athletic stadiums in the world (Number 8 on the list, capacity of just over 100,000) and that day we went to an Aussie Rules Football game between Carlton and Collingwood. It was a pretty good game but it was clear from the beginning that Carlton was going to win. It was really fun though since Carlton is the team that I root for.

In the past few weeks we (American Will) and I have finalized our travel plans. After our last final exam on the 17th we will fly to Cairns on the 18th and stay there for two nights and go on a day trip to the Daintree Rainforest. After the rain forest adventure we will take a bus down the coast to Aerlie Beach where we will stay the night. The next day we will board a sailing ship and stay on that for 6 nights among the Whitsunday Islands and the Great Barrier Reef. The ship that we will stay on isn't very big with space for only 21 people so it should be pretty cool. Seeing the Great Barrier Reef was my number one thing to see while I'm here so I am really excited. Its going to be expensive but I kind of doubt I will ever come back to Australia so I have decided to spring for it and borrow the money from my parents.

So that brings me up to yesterday. Yesterday we had a game up in Kew at Victoria park. The game was going alright up until the 3rd quarter. I had been assigned to the defensive back line which kind of sucks because your main job is just to prevent the man you are guarding from catching the ball. I like to have more creativity like what you get when you play half forward or in the middle of the field which I had been playing earlier in the game. Anyways, in the 4th or 5th minute of the 3rd quarter I was charging forward after a bouncing ball as one of my teammates was charging backward. His elbow ended up hitting me in the eyebrow and a few seconds later I'm on the ground spouting blood like a leaky garden hose. Part of my eyebrow was drooping down in front of my right eye as a walked off the field led by our athletic trainer. She did a pretty good job momentarily stopping the bleeding but it was clear that it was going to require stitches to close the 5 cm gash. One of my teammates drove me to the closest hospital and about three hours later I walked out with 8 stitches. Luckily, I had taken care of my health insurance situation a few weeks earlier so I was covered. I think I probably won't play next weekend because of the stitches but we'll see I suppose.