I think I'm going to Boston

Beginning the descent into Christchurch (New Zealand), watching the ice crystals form on the window next to my seat, I contemplated, “Why exactly did I want to come to New Zealand?” Over the past few days I’ve been living with Lindsey’s friend’s family in the outskirts of Christchurch—an open space of small residences, roads, fields, and gorgeous mountains. Rather than write on in paragraph form, I wanted to share with you the things Lindsey and I have learned being in Christchurch and the surrounding area. We were able to visit the center city, the Antarctic museum, outdoor wildlife park and more. Note the following:

-Try not to travel from Cairns (30 degrees Celsius) to Christchurch (1 degree Celsius)
-There are rabid wild sheep running around the hills
-Kiwi birds are much bigger than we thought
-New Zealanders call themselves “kiwis”
-The penguin exhibit in the Antarctic Center is way better than Phillip Island in Australia
-Christchurch is the gateway to Antarctica for the United States, New Zealand, and Italy
-Hagglund isn’t only the name of a room in the campus center, it’s also the name of a vehicle used in Antarctica
-Antarctica holds 70% of the earth’s fresh water; therefore, prevent global warming
-The ice thickness of the Antarctic can be thousands of feet
-Rutherford (the scientist that split the atom) is from New Zealand, went to school in Christchurch, taught at school in Christchurch, and is buried with Sir Isaac Newton in England
-Peter Jackson’s (director of Lord of the Rings) first movie was set in Christchurch, co-staring Kate Winslet
-New Zealand zoos have American animals in them...like the Mallard Duck...
-The first game of Rugby in New Zealand was played with a pig’s bladder
-When in the mountains with a lot of sheep, Lindsey and I have a great urge to break out in the Sound of the Music soundtrack
-New Zealand’s mountains are the most amazing sight in the world
-Old married couples make fantastic travel companions
-Cheetahs are like Kitty Cats
-You shouldn’t breed wild dogs with domestic dogs
-In a fight between lion and a tiger, a liger would win
-Rather than Nor’easters, New Zealand gets Nor’westers
-Rhinos are not hairless
-If a rhino was running at you in the wild, climb a tree and pray (seriously though, rhinos have poor eyesight, so use that to your advantage)
-The Christchurch art museum is free and amazing
-Christchurch has one tram (unlike Melbourne) that is used for tourism
There’s the short list, and this is the last post of my Interactive Qualifying Project adventures. I appreciate those who’ve taken time to read it whether you did or did not enjoy it. I mainly started writing this so I would have a personal record of my trip; however, a special thanks to those who have publically commented (aka Cindy & Elizabeth), have sent me emails, or have just plain enjoyed reading my ramblings.

This trip has been the experience of a lifetime. This evening I opened up my email to find out that my project received an A and that my advisors thought highly of our project professionalism and final recommendations, which, of course, put the icing on the cake of this experience. Tomorrow I’m going back to Boston and couldn’t be happier for cheap coffee, dollar bills, senior year of college, and a paying internship (I don’t have a horse to sell for this trip like the Canadian in Cairns). Hopefully I will come across another adventure like this in my future with new scenery and experiences.

-and scene-
Jen
jhimottu@wpi.edu

On Holiday

The project isn't the only great opportunity that IQP provides. After the project, students are free to travel as they please (if there isn't school in session, of course). Therefore, I am currently in Cairns.

The past few days have been packed with tours around the small city of Cairns—the “sunshine state” of Australia (are there copyright laws on state motos?). Upon our arrival, myself and three other WPI companions relaxed at the lagoon for the entire day to relax before the adventure began. The lagoon is a fancy name for “town pool.” In Cairns, the beaches are infested with jelly fish and crocodiles; therefore, everyone swims at the lagoon which is strategically placed right next to the actual beach. The days after this were filled with a rainforest tour, white water rafting and snorkeling/diving in the Great Barrier Reef.
Rainforest tour – This was a small tour that took us up the coast exploring certain areas of the rainforest and Cape Tribulation. We hiked around the forest a lot and stopped for a nice buffet lunch at a tucked-away beach resort. This area had one of the nicest beaches I’ve been too. The unfortunate part, of course, was that you can’t swim in the water; however the scenery was gorgeous and we were the only people on the beach for a kilometer or so…this might have something to do with this being Cairns’s winter. The locals find the 80 degree Fahrenheit weather quite cold… In the afternoon we went on a river cruise to view several wild crocodiles sunning themselves on the shore.

White Water Rafting – Definitely one of the best experiences I’ve had and the best experience in Cairns. My friends and I were in a boat with another American from California and 2 guides. Deciding to be original, we named our boat group “Team America.” We rafted for over 5 hours in level 4 rapids throughout the rainforest. Our guides were great and let us stop and jump in to several lagoon type areas along the way. After lunch I decided I could handle being in the front of the boat. And I guess I could handle it…despite falling in during one of the larger rapids. I came out alive, with my rather strong guide lifting me up by my lifejacket and placing me back in my seat while all my rafting companions kept speedily paddling. Because we were ahead of schedule, we were able to get in a couple extra kilometers of rafting before loading ourselves into the bus back to the city.
Great Barrier Reef – This was a relaxing day of getting a nice, yet bumpy, long boat cruise to and from the reef and getting to view a slice of the 7th natural wonder of the world. I knew the reef was big, the name says it all; however, I didn’t realize that “great” equated to the size of Japan! We went to two locations along the reef and snorkeled for a couple hours. Our group also decided to do an introductory dive lesson and get a scuba tour of the reef for 30 minutes. That was incredible. Something about being under water and being able to breathe perfectly fine is amazing. By doing this, we were able to get extremely close to all the living creatures in that area. Our guide even let us touch a giant clam.

During our stay in Cairns I have met people from so many different countries. Cairns, being a tourist spot, attracts people from all over the world. I met a couple Frenchman, a Slovakian, a Belgian guy that my friends and I instantly nicknamed “waffles,” and a Canadian that sold his horse in Alberta to fly to Australia. Quite the variety of travelers! The last day in Cairns was spent at the lagoon and shopping around town. Now that everything I needed to see in Cairns has been seen, I will head off to New Zealand for a few days.

Lesson 4 – Set your alarm on the last day of your project…

Considering the last weekend in Melbourne was filled with us 23 WPI students running around frantically, fixing all those last minute corrections on our project papers, all my roommates and I forgot to set our alarms for Monday morning. Luckily, I still woke up early…only it was at the time we usually leave to go to work.

This past Sunday our boss invited my team and our professor to his house an hour outside of the city. He lived at the “fern gully” train stop, and if you’ve ever seen that classic Disney cartoon, it was definitely named appropriately. His house was basically in the rainforest. We’ve come to learn that in the Melbourne suburbs, on the outside, houses are rather small and almost dirty; however, inside they stretch on forever. Our boss’s house was set up like a museum with antique photos and souvenirs around the world. My boss is from Scotland and his wife is from Zimbabwe, so they’ve traveled a lot of places. Here’s a picture of katie showing off one of the crazy knifes in this house.

Presently, I am sitting in Cairns, enjoying the fact that this project I’ve been working on for the past 16 weeks is over and that I’m on “official” vacation. On Monday we handed in our 200 page paper, and on Tuesday we gave our final presentation to our fellow students, sponsors and advisors. Everything went swimmingly, in my opinion. Our advisors were pleased which made my group and sponsor pleased. I’m glad that I was able to help work on the tram system, such a staple of Melbourne tourism and life, in Australia for 7 weeks. But now that the projects are over, I think all the students are ready to move on with their travels.

I arrived in Cairns this morning (Great Barrier Reef town) and will be touring the rainforest, snorkeling in the reef, and going white water rafting within the next few days before flying to New Zealand.

So although my official WPI project is over, I will try to keep those who have been reading this religiously (hi mom, dad, Elizabeth, etc) informed on my travels when I come across the internet every once and a while :)

Signing off!!!
-Jen

The torch arrives!

This morning the Olympic torch arrived in Canberra (Between Sydney and Melbourne). My roommates and I are hoping to get to see it whether in Melbourne or during our travels to Cairns; however, the news refuses to tell us what the torch travel path is.

I realized I never concluded my last post with a final impression of Sydney…because I definitely did have a strong impression that wasn’t expressed. To give some background, I’ve gotten the consensus that Melbournians HATE Sydney. I couldn’t quite grasp why anyone wouldn’t like Sydney until after this weekend. Compared to Melbourne, Sydney’s much dirtier, has a lacking public transport system, has a lot of crowded streets, and much less open space. Sure it had the Olympics, has the bridge, has the opera house, has Finding Nemo, and has the title of being a great city, but I don’t think I’d want to stay there much longer than a few days. So despite my enjoyable weekend, I’m glad that WPI’s project is in Melbourne, every day life seems a bit simpler, cleaner, and more relaxed…plus I get to work on their tram system (Sydney tore up their tram system several years ago).

So with this being the last week to work out the rest of the kinks in our final paper, it’s been rather busy in the office for us students. On Monday my team met with our boss’s boss’s boss—the head of the public transport division of the state of Victoria. He basically sat our team down with our professor and let us know how impressed he is of what we’ve been doing here for the past seven weeks and that everyone’s really looking forward to seeing what we recommend, because, frankly, the DOI is out of ideas. It really made me proud to know that I haven’t been doing all this project work for nothing over the past several weeks.

Next Tuesday we will have our final presentation, this project will be over, and I will have to say farewell to Melbourne. I have loved living here for nearly two months, but I will be glad to hand in that final 170 page paper and travel Australia and New Zealand for a week before coming back to Boston.

Sydney--Where the other half of the Australian population lives...

This past weekend Lindsey and I had an adventure to Sydney, because, why come all the way to Australia and not spend at least a couple days in one of the most famous cities in the world?!

Being cheap, I decided to book a greyhound bus that would depart Friday at 8PM and show up in Sydney the next day at 8AM. This wasn’t all that bad, I just never assumed when coming to Australia that I’d find myself in the middle of nowhere at a Caltex truck/fuel stop at 3AM one morning eating burnt raisin toast for our “stretch out legs” stop. So when we finally arrived at Sydney Central Train Station we managed to find a bus that would take us to Kings Cross—the area in which our hostel was located. Kings Cross is an interesting area to say the least, maybe more stories on that if you ask. We dropped our bags in our room, grabbed a quick “brekkie” (breakfast in Australia), and hopped on the Sydney Explorer—a tour bus that runs to every stop a tourist would want to see in Sydney.

For me to realize that I was actually in Sydney I needed to see the Opera House, so we immediately jumped off the bus at the Botanical Gardens in which there is an amazing view of the opera house and the bridge. Frankly, I could have gone back to Melbourne right then and there, I was in my glory after seeing two of the most amazing structures in the world (yes, that’s the civil engineer in me talking again). However, there was still a lot that could be seen. Following that the rest of the day was filled with the following:

-New South Wales Museum of Art—luckily, this is was free, however, probably one of the only things that is free in Sydney.
-Opera House Tour –because I couldn’t just see the outside of the Opera House. This gave us a great overview of its history and the struggle the architect/engineers went through to plan its structural design. Unfortunately, the original architect was forced to resign half-way through the construction and went back to his home country; presently, he’s 90 years old and has never been back to Sydney to see the final design :(
-Sky Walk Tower—A tower specifically built for viewing the city.
-Free BBQ! – So the museum of art isn’t the only thing that’s free in Sydney, our hostel provides free BBQ’s every Saturday night to all its guests. It was held on the roof with gorgeous views of the city. The food was great despite the fact that Australian’s versions of hot dogs are not hot dogs, they’re definitely sausages. Lindsey and I also saw other students from EVERYWHERE around the world. I think we were actually the only ones from the States. There were students from Germany, Sweden, Canada and Britain to name a few.

I woke up after my first night in a hostel with all my fingers intact, so I’d call that a pretty good night. Sunday, being our final day in Sydney was filled with everything we might have missed the day before:

-Anzac Memorial in Hyde Park—Anzac Day is celebrated this Friday throughout Australia to remember past wars and the citizens who fought in them.
-Barracks—On the corner of Hyde Park is an old brick building which was used to house convicts at night, and let them work in the city during the day. This was after Australia realized that they didn’t want to be known as the “prisoner dumping continent” so they would slowly and very structurally allow convicts back into the city life. Apparently, this worked well, considering Australia is still around today and not burnt to the ground by prisoners…
-Powerhouse Museum—Sydney’s version of the Boston Science Museum. Lindsey and I stood in a line for 45 minutes to get in. Bad timing considering there was a Princess Diana exhibition the same day (no mom, I didn’t go, but I took a picture of the poster for you). Lindsey was in her glory in the airplane/space exhibit (being an aeronautics concentration). We were both waaaay too excited to see an exhibit dedicated to Robert Goddard, father of modern rocketry! Unfortunately, WPI, Worcester, or even Clark wasn’t mentioned…but it was still nice to see a bit of home in Sydney.

-Wildlife Museum—After our meat pie lunch, we headed to the bay where the Sydney Wildlife Museum is located. The best part of this zoo was getting up close and personal to a koala. Lindsey and I both had our pictures taken and were even allowed to pet the koala. I’m pretty sure the Koala got annoyed with me, considering it exerted a good week’s worth of energy climbing up its tree and jumping onto the next branch after I pet it.

-Manly Beach—Despite, the sun setting and the bus departure drawing near, I needed to be able to say that I saw Manly Beach. So we hoped a late ferry and made an EXTREMELY quick trip to the beach. The nice part about going when the sun was setting was that on the ferry ride back I was able to see the lit up skyline of Sydney harbor.

So after two incredibly packed days of being a major tourist, Lindsey and I hopped back on our greyhound bus and slept (or at least tried to sleep) through the night on our way back to Melbourne to work the next morning.

A Day in the Life of a WPI IQP Student...who happens to be in Melbourne

I often wondered as a Freshman, Sophmore and even a prospective student: What do students do on a global interactive project when they're not working or traveling over the weekends?
So I have compiled what I like to call "A day in the life of a WPI IQP student...who happens to be in Melbourne" Maybe this will clarify what a typical day (this past Wednesday) is like during IQP.


7:30 AM – Good Morning Sunshine!

8:30 AM – Walk to work with a possible coffee pitstop along the way

8:50 AM – Arrive at the office

9 AM – Meeting with our boss—Jim. At this time he usually goes over tasks for the day, grants us some of his wisdom, and makes fun of my gigantic water bottle…which I constantly have to tell him is called a “nalgene” and is actually very popular in the U.S. I think he’ll never believe me.

10:30 AM – Time for Cake. Remember earlier when I wrote that I rarely see people work in the office? Well this is one of those key moments. On an average of twice a week it is someone’s birthday or someone’s last day/first day working in the office. Therefore, we celebrate with cake.

11 AM – Field Work. During the weeks we did field work, our team would be out on site about now, sporting our fashionable orange vests.

1PM – Lunch in the kitchen, which happens to overlook the gorgeous city of Melbourne. Presently, there's a building being constructed next to ours, so being a Civil Engineer, I typically take note of their progress (nerd, I know...).

2PM – Presentation. On some occasions our project team will give presentations to remind everyone what we’re doing taking over their office space and eating all their cake.

4PM – Wrapping up the day in our cubical

5PM – Time to leave!!! And if this doesn’t happen, I usually get glaring looks of death from my project partners.

5:30 PM – Come home to my apartment. In this case, on a Wednesday, I come home to a COMPLETELY spotless apartment to find that the maids have hidden all my food, magazines, hair dryer, etc. But, I guess, at least we have maids, I definitely don't have that luxery back in my apartment in Worcester.

6 PM – Go to the gym to get my sweat on (excuse the “my new haircut reference”…mom and dad you won't get this, so ask my brother about it)

7 PM – Watch the sunset on our balcony

7 PM – Hunker down and relax for a bit. Lindsey usually starts/finishes making some intense dinner. While I write my blog (Katie insisted she take a picture of me doing this), watch Friends or Will and Grace (which is on every night here, similar to The States), or watch one of the 5 movies we rent every week from the local video store. This particular night, we watched a true Australian classic—Chopper. It’s a movie about Australian convict, Mark “Chopper” Reid, played by Oz native, Eric Bana. When Lindsey and I visited the Melbourne Gaol during Easter, one of the watch guards insisted we rent this movie.

9 PM – Depending on the night we could do several things:
Option 1: Sometimes all of us roommates will be exhausted and relax in the room for the night. I, for one, have become a brand new fan of Law and Order SVU.
Option 2: Other nights we will go out to the movie theater, even though most of the movies have already been in the states for a few months.
Option 3: Getting gelato for dessert is a popular favorite of mine, sometimes that’s combined with a late night Hungry Jacks (Burger King) trip.
Option 4: Go to some type of show. On this particular night we are going to a comedy show to get in a good laugh before the International Melbourne Comedy Festival ends.

11:30 PM – Goodnight!


P.S. - as an addition to last weeks "things I miss" list, we forgot to add "feet, inches and miles"

Australia versus America

This week has marked the halfway point of my stay in Australia. Although it has been a month, time has flown by. I can finally begin to answer Australian strangers correctly when they ask me for directions! The weather is SLOWLY changing to a sweatshirt climate; although, Melbourne weather can never seem to make up its mind (much like New England). Due to our perfect scheduling, this past week has been the first five day work week we’ve experienced in Australia (considering Easter weekend and labor day made the past three weeks 4-day weeks). There was a lot of work to be done out on site for our project; however, now that all our major field work is done, the following weeks are for interviewing different stakeholders and writing our results and recommendations.

This past weekend has been relaxing. Our clocks moved back an hour on Sunday (we’re now only 14 hours ahead of Worcester), so everyone seems well rested for beginning of the work week. Friday was my roommate Lindsey’s birthday which our apartment celebrated by going out to dinner on Lygon Street, getting the best gelato in Melbourne, and eating a FANTASTIC chocolate mud cake from a local bakery. On Saturday I decided to explore the souvenirs section in Queen Victoria Market. I’m pretty sure that I somehow wasted an entire afternoon wandering around taking everything in. I was able to get a lot of souvenir shopping done, and decided to buy an opal ring for myself. Opals are native to Australia (another thing I picked up in that geology class…), so what better way to remember this continent? Saturday night, a few of us decided to see what Melbourne’s International Comedy Festival was all about. The comedy festival is a month long event every March/April. HUNDREDS of comedians flock to Melbourne to perform. The show we saw was with American comedian Kristen Schaal (Flight of Conchords). I had never heard of her before, but it turned out to be pretty good. On Sunday we went to yet another footy game (Richmond Tigers vs. Collingwood Magpies); however, this time, we sat in the “cheap” seats. After experiencing so many Red Sox games where I pay approximately $100 for the ticket, $30 for parking, and at least $10 for a hot dog with a soda, it amazes me that you can go to a football game here with 70,000 other fans, buy tickets at the door and get a soda and meal for $30.

I’ve absolutely loved being in Australia so far, but I’ve been thinking of things I miss back in Massachusetts and the states in general…maybe so that people don’t get TOO jealous reading this blog :) I discussed this issue with several of the other students and we came up with this list:

-Dollar bills (all money less than $5 comes in coin form)
-Cheap coffee (Dunkin Donuts doesn’t exist)
-Pepperoni (No such thing as pepperoni pizza), and good pizza in general
-Bacon
-The beginning of the Red Sox season
-Music in stadiums
-Spring
-The dollar menu (Fast food is expensive)
-Cheap food in general…
-American Gladiators (Australian Gladiator just doesn't make the cut)
-Stores open past 6pm
-Looking left before crossing the street, and walking on the right side of everyone on the sidewalk
-Lemonade
-Tide and dryer sheets
-Watching TV episodes when they actually premiere, rather than 2 months or even a year later
-Fast Internet (Australia has yet to understand the complete power of the internet)
-New England clam chowder and a good variety and good tasting macaroni and cheese brand

We could definitely also come up with a list with things that are awesome about Australia, but that will have to wait until another post.

Well, it’s back to the drawing board with work. Besides work this week, I will be planning out things to do within the second half of my trip—going to Sydney, Cairns, New Zealand, Phillip Island to name a few. There’s even a possibility of surfing again!