You must have missed me...

Hi hi...

I am in Australia now and there's so much I wanna say but then due to limited internet access, I could not. Anyway, here's a cut and paste email from what I emailed to friends.

Apologies that it will take a long time before I update this again. Let's hope my internet connection will come fast.

School has started 3 weeks ago and I am almost 2 months in Australia now. That's quite a long time. Did you miss me? Haha...

Assignments are piling up. I have E-learning to do here too and it's a weekly affair for 3 modules. I am taking 4 modules. There's a writing assignment (1000 words) due next week and I haven't got started!! It's getting a bit stressed but I can still cope, I guess. Don't worry, I won't pull my hair out because of that.

Internet at home is not set up yet because my housemate and I are looking for a plan that does not use the landline (home phone cos' we do not need one) and we managed to get one last week but that will take about 3 weeks to set up because it's "new" technology for them. Anyway, I am coming to uni to use internet most of the time. Unlike SG, it's not unlimited access. We have to pay for the limit to upload and download so it's quite costly to use the internet here.

Thank goodness, there's Straits Times in the library but I haven't been catching up with SG news for a long time. Will do that when I have the time perhaps.

Just to update you a bit. I was looking for accommodation for a month since I was here. Just before I left, I found out my friend's student was coming here as well. We are doing the same course but different majors - he in exercise science and I in education. To look for accommodation for 2 pax, I had quite a bit of problem cos he only came 3 weeks after me!!

We only managed to complete all paperwork to rent a 2-bedroom apartment close to 3 weeks ago and we have moved in for almost 3 weeks now. It's a unit (in SG, you call it apartment with no swimming pool) and we are on the top floor. There's only 4 units in the block and we have a garage too! We try to minimise our spending by cooking at home but food costs here is quite high here. Moreover, there's not much Asian vegetables here unless you go to Asian supermarkets which is far and few.

I am currently staying in FF, which is half an hour walk to school but we have been taking the bus mainly to outside school. We will then walk into school (which is 10 mins walk on the bridge) and then walk to our tutorial rooms or lecture theatre (another 10 mins). So if I walk to school from home, it's like 45 mins walk!

I could not stand staying in the suburb which is next to school (on the other side of campus - where it's called the student area) because it gets super quiet and dark after 6.30pm. There's not much shops around and inconvenient unless you take a bus out to the next suburb. I am staying 1 minute walk to FF Gardens (something like Serangoon Gardens) but much smaller. At least it has a supermarket (aka Coles) which opens till 9pm on weekday and 5pm on weekends. There's also a Chemist (Pharmacy), Post Office, Clinic (you got to make an appointment to see the doctor), Locksmith, Barber, Bookshop, Dollar and Sense shop (concept similar to our $2 shop but of cos the price here is not $2), my Housing Agent's Office. Kinda like self-contained which I appreciate.

The bus from City stops at my place as well - like a mini-bus terminal. It's about 20 minutes to the city by bus. We just have to make sure we catch the bus on time. 2 services run every 10 minutes or so on weekdays up to 7pm. After that, it's like 50 mins to wait for the next bus. On weekends, it's just 1 bus service to my place and it's like 30 mins for the next bus to come. I guess once you are used to it, it's okay. By the way, the train station is near to me too. It's about 4 mins walk to the station but then again, it's quite a long wait if you missed it.

Come visit me and you will learn more about the transport system here. :)

I am thankful that I have a mutual friend in Brisbane and she helps me heaps when I just came. Now we tend to hang out often on weekends. We have been to Gold Coast already but it's kinda dark when we get there. I have been to Chinatown too so we bought 3kg of meat back! That should last for more than 10 days already. I managed to cook chicken rice, steamed egg, pork with char siew sauce, pork with teriyaki sauce and pork chops. Check out my facebook for pictures.

If you can email me at using my school's email add, I won't be charge for usage if I use the school computers.

Got to go. Catch up later...