GOodbye

Hello darlings! I’m saying goodbye to this blog…it’s been great, but I am no longer in Michigan 😦 And it’s been a month (yes, a whole month already, what????) since I was… so now I am not-angsting my way through life at http://www.noangstemily.tumblr.com.

Feel free to say hello, I’m going to try show some snippets of my australian life here, and my big 5 year plan of finishing law school by next year (am I silly? Yes I am), casually popping back to the states indefinitely and generally being as not angsty as a human can be.

Bye lovers!

PS Anyone want a penpal? I’m trying to beat the world record for number of penpals one person has. Leave me a message if you do. I love writing letters.

xoxo

Sup Perth

I’ve become an old lady since returning to Perth.  Apparently turning 21 means the demise of my liver’s ability to take good care of me, so in accordance with this new life lesson, I’ve embraced my pyjamas, my dog and cups of tea.  Not complaining.

Working in the law firm has been pretty alright – I’ve never been totally decided on my future career in being a legal eagle, and to no fault of the firm’s own, I’ve definitely realised it’s not for me.  But I’m definitely glad it is for some people.  I’m raaaather grateful to make this definitive decision today, but after several days of discovery, I’m really seeing all the parts of law I’m just not sold on.

But I’ve enrolled in seven classes for this semester (yup, seven, don’t worry about it, it’s only 42 credit points, it’s nothiiiiing) and I’m feeling like my life is on schedule to become about as ridic but exciting as it can possibly be for a (hopefully sooner rather than later) future move to my second home country, the USA!   I do love living in Australia, and being back for (only) three weeks so far has reminded me of all the great things it has going for it… but trying to shop online for anything is a real effing bitch, and I can’t access Pandora, and to be honest, I’m done with it.  Just kidding, they’re not the actual reasons.  But really – change is exciting!

Unfortunately it’s ‘winter’ in Perth, so it’s averaging about 56 during the day, so I’m barely wearing a jacket – it’s real handy, I don’t need to purchase any winter clothes since my fall clothes from AA keep me sweating during the day.  But it also means I don’t have any beautiful Australia pictures to share with any of my darling Americans who are still checking in here… but not to worry, I’m on it.  I became cool and signed up for an iPhone 4 since getting back to Perth, and I have a whole pile of photos of what it’s like living in Australia to share with you.  Confession, so far they’re of the most perfect puppy in the world, Barlow (not to be confused with the most perfect AFL player in the world Barlow), but I’m working on the ‘Australia’ life part of it.  I’ve been living up to my roots though, and only eating Vegemite toast for breakfast and to be honest, the Australian accent is still surprisingly foreign to me.

America I miss you heaps and heaps, but I have a 12km to be training for and a job at a law firm to be dressing professionally for (thank you Kapi for all the practice).

Much love to Ann Arbor and everywhere else in the world!

xoxox

PS if you want a pen pal, I’ve become addicted to writing letters. Let me know. xo

Aaaand I’m back.

Couldn’t stay away.  I’ve been back in Perth for almost two weeks now.  It’s been busy and weird. I’ve started working in a law firm being a real person, (I got to call myself a practitioner at the Supreme Court!)

But far more importantly and devastatingly:

Over.  No words.  I need to go back to Harry Potter world to pretend it’s still happening. Re-do spring break anyone?? Anyone?!?!

Goodbye Harry 😦 I feel like my childhood is over.

 

Also, Michigan, I miss you.

The End…

In exactly five minutes, my time as Emily in Michigan is basically up.  I’ve spent the day getting to JFK airport, to say goodbye to my second home 😦 and head to the Motherland tomorrow! I’m more sad than I can say – it has been a very magical year, and it really hurts that it’s over! I may or may not have cried.  Although I definitely cried a lot.  I think I’m going to keep this blog going though – if you want to see some Australian adventures my lovely American family, then hopefully I can show you some! I’ll have to update on my last three weeks in Ann Arbor at some point – they were full of special moments like the Glee Live! Concert with Rachy, Petoskey with Clark, a deathly 21st birthday or two with Jolly, Theresa and Mallory, some reminiscing, some enjoying and lots of America 🙂 I can’t believe it’s over 😦

America and darling darling Americans, I’m going to miss you with all my heart and hopefully be back so soon to see you all again!

And I leave with this image, courtesy of the most patriotic of them all, Clark Hoffman:

 

 

Okay apparently it isn’t working so that’s awkward, but ikmagine a very patriotic sparkling image of America.

Love love love xx

While I’m on a roll…

Alright I’m going to talk about Columbus too since I’m in the zone.

I was SO happy to finally leave DC – it was great but I was there a little too long.  The last night there was great though – got to meet up with Caitlin and eat NANDOS and it was everything I’ve been missing in my life.  Delicious and fun to catch up on everything that had happened in the month or so since we’d seen each other a little teary and drunk after birthday karaoke.

Anyway, so I travelled an entire frickin day on Friday – leaving at 8am and arriving at 5:30ish in Columbus. The metro, the train, the bus, the plane, the shuttle, the second plane and my luggage were all late.  It was very exhausting. But so worth it to see John and Rob and Bailey! We had a really great bbq dinner and I got really jelly looking at their holiday photos of the 5 days they spent in Key West.  Then the next day, we went out on John’s brother’s AWESOME pontoon boat from their AWESOME house at Indian Lake in the warm warm sun, and felt very relaxed and awesome.  Awesome.  Then spent the night shopping and exploring the monthly gallery hop on North Street or South Street or some street in Columbus after there was a massive storm and power outage.  It was a buzzing and exciting street and there was lots of musical street performers and cool stuff, like a puppy bakery and wine tasting and a kind of Turkish bazaar store that was awesome.  They bought me my new favourite noisiest piece of clothing and Imma wear it to the lakes when we go swimming soon! And then I skyped mum for her birthday, packed up all my crap (again…god) and left early for another late bus back to Ann Arbor 🙂

As an aside, there are a lot of creepers in the states. Guys, you need to go.

Washington DC

So I’ve been kind of lax with talking about DC cos I was there an entire week and did so much it’s kind of overwhelming.  It really is a great place though.  However, it was so nice to get to Columbus, OH and then now back home to Ann Arbor that I have just enjoyed relaxing.

So DC…it’s a kind of small city, surprisingly.  I’m not sure why I thought it would be huge, NYC style, but it definitely isn’t. But the weather was HOT and STICKY and delightful after Boston and its stupid rain.  It was a little magical though.

I went and touched a moon rock the first afternoon I got there after struggling to find my way over to my hostel from the Greyhound.  And I did other stuff but I was tired so I’ve kind of forgotten. There is also a really pretentious conversation going on over my shoulder in this (really cool) coffee shop I’m in at the moment, so I’m distracted. Sorry.

I got up really early to get a ticket to the Holocaust museum the next day, but even doing that, I couldn’t get in to the main exhibit until 3:45. Lame. So I sat in the Mall and read The Nine (HIGHLY HIGHLY recommend this, read it if you like history, courts and other important things) for a while, before immersing myself in Nazi Germany history.  It was very heart-wrenching.  I was lucky enough to be there on a day where a survivor of Auschwitz was giving a talk on her experiences, which was really hard to hear about, and very surreal seeing her tattooed number on her forearm, in her words, the only proof she has of ever being there.  Her story was incredible – because her father valued languages so much, she could speak Hungarian (she was Hungarian also), German and English, which saved her life at least twice throughout her story.  After hearing what she shared, I took a minute, then saw all this unreal propaganda that tracked the rise of Hitler to power.  And finally I got to go into the main exhibit (it was PACKED omg, so many tour groups).  Thankfully the vibe inside was so sombre they weren’t too obnoxious.  But there were so many relics.  I cried when I saw the pile of shoes, and the bunk beds.   Anyway, it was a very powerful museum.

Saw a whole bunch of money being printed afterwards, the new $100 US bills and was disappointed with how lame people are that they would buy shredded money (they have over $77 million …ish I don’t know, I forget the exact number waste every day of money that doesn’t print properly.) Anyway.  It was fun. Then I got lost on my way home and that was tiring.

To be honest from now on I’ve forgotten the order I did anything, so I’m just going to do another list. Sorry it’s not as fun to read, but otherwise I”m going to forget too.

*  Eastern Market – it was delicious and fresh.

* Georgetown – it was cute and expensive.

* Arlington Cemetery – it was sombre and inspiring. It was also somewhat annoying because it was like, I don’t know Bikers weekend or something in DC and it was full of bikies and noise, which is fine, but also ruined the vibe a little.  The changing of the guard was really cool.

* Memorial Day concert – it was AWESOME and very American. We had Mexican afterwards. Woops.

*  Tour of Capitol building – it was big and airy and inspiring and a little rushed.  But still very cool.

* Library of Congress – is something I had never thought to go to, and in fact in all my google searches of ‘stuff to do in DC’, it never came up.  But it was AMAZING – the library is just beautiful, and the documents they have in there, and the reading room and the accessibility and the fact they add over 7000 new books a day…if you go to Washington, you absolutely must see this library. Even if you don’t like books. It was great.

*  Newseum – this museum has re-directed my overall life goal. I have never seen anything I loved as much as this.  I think I really appreciate living modern history more than like, I don’t know, old history.  The Pulitzer Prize exhibit was unreal (if you haven’t, look at the pictures and read the stories that go with them – I must’ve spent about an hour or two in that area).  There were pieces of the Berlin Wall, the handwritten ‘newspapers’ from the tsunami in Japan so that the people in the refuge shelters could know what was happening, the top of the North Tower from the World Trade Centre and amazing footage I’d never seen.  In case you can’t tell, I was obsessed. The ticket was valid for two days too, so I went back.  I could happily have gone three days.  This is another, okay so the rest of DC museums are free and this is expensive, but it’s worth the expense.

*  American History musem – by this point I was frickin over museums so I went inside and did the fastest museum tour ever in the world. I saw Julia Child’s kitchen, Dorothy’s slippers, the star spangled banner and some other museum type stuff and got out. But it was cool.

*  Art Museum – I walked in and walked out. Couldn’t handle more museums. I did see some Picasso though.

* I decided it was time to strengthen my knee while in DC, so I went running again. It felt sooo good. It also hurt as well, but whatever. I really loved my almost-daily morning run past the Department of Justice, FBI building, IRS building, the Washington Monument, and all these other incredibly important and exciting areas.

*  Monument tour – I had a weird and wacky (I debated for way too long just then over whether wacky has an h – wacky or whacky? I don’t know. I think it looks weird with an h, but it’s probably more right. You know what, I don’t care anymore. Feel free to correct me) tour guide, who took us on a decent hike through DC to see all the monuments. DC is very good and having lots of monuments and statues. He told us lots of stories but I forgot most of them. They were funny though.  I also met a pilot and that was fun. It was a pleasant morning.

*  One night me and two people I met in my hostel went for a walk to see the monuments at night.  It was so beautiful, I’m so glad we went.  Recommend with two ++.

*  Even though I promised myself I wouldn’t, I shopped.  At the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court was the most amazing thing, particularly after reading The Nine.  You sit IN the court! So close to where all these amazingly important decisions about everything are made.

*  Okay I’m over this.  DC was cool. I did a lot of cool shit, the best was the Newseum, seeing the monuments at night and the Supreme Court.  I would go again and do it all again. Museums can get tiring.

Phillayyyyyy

So now I’m in the magical city of Washington, D.C. after a three hour bus ride from Philly today along some beautiful water and in beautiful sunshine! I call Washington D.C. magical because today was just about the most perfect weather I’ve ever seen, hanging in the Mall, watching all the runners and skaters and feeling warm and fabulous. Compared to Boston it’s a nice change.

Anyway, so I only spent two days in Philly but I have a surprising amount to say about it.

1.  If I ever seen another school tour, I may need to punch myself in the face. They. Were. <i>Everywhere</i>.  And they were obnoxious. And loud. And always always always I was in the middle of some group tour by accident.

2.  I heard a lot of Kylie Minogue’s Locomotion. This was very weird.

3.  Philly has a LOT of pretty incredible history, but you can see it in a day.

4.  There are a lot of creeps.

5.  Philly cheesesteaks have a lot of steak in them.

6.  There are also a loooooot of parks.  This was very pleasant as I was finally seeing the sun and sitting out in a park just whiling away hours is a good way to spend your summer.

7.  I just want to talk briefly about the Liberty Museum.  There are lots of museums in the world, and to be honest, I’m getting really sick of them. I feel bad saying that, but museums after a while just feel all the same.  I only really enjoy museums about people; and even then I do a lot better when someone is kind of walking me through the process.  Anyway, this museum I entered on a fluke, and I didn’t want to pay $7 for it, so the woman let me in for $3 (still not really sure why but I wasn’t going to say no).  Anyway, there were a lot of mega-cheese displays, like the ‘path to peace’ and the jellybean people, who show us that we are never going to be identical but our differences are beautiful. Or something, I don’t know. Far more importantly was two of the exhibits; one a wall of people from around the world who fought for peace and justice, and the other about violence amongst American youths.  The first display really amazed me because there were just so many people who you never ever hear of who risked their lives to do the right and human thing during horrible events, and it really made me realise how brave you need to be to do that.  The second, the violence, really upset me.  More children were killed by firearms last year than the entire casualties of the Vietnam War for the USA.  That is absolutely sick, and I was reminded of the classes Jess and I worked with in Detroit, and how so many of them would be able to have written one of the powerful testimonies on the wall about how difficult life is without them realising that is a nightmarish life.

That’s all on Philly.  I’d say more but despite seeing a fragment of the constitution from the 1700s, and where the Constitution was drafted and the Declaration of Independence signed, the above was the most powerful thing I experienced.

Onto DC 🙂

Couples Dorm

By some strange occurrence I’m in a couples dorm in Philadelphia. This means I’m in the old people dorm, and this means it sucks. Well it’s fine. But everyone goes to bed at like 10, and I came to my room at midnight last night, it was pitch black and I walked into exactly five bunk beds. This is embarrassing.

Philadelphia so far is really pretty! As soon as I arrived there was a ghost tour, so I went on it. I was super scared by all the fake ghosts. Actually I wasn’t, the ghost stories sucked.

NYC

I have no photographic proof but I have significant purchase receipt proof that I have spent the day in New York City. Thank you NYC for stealing all my money and letting me look fabulous.

New Jersey

In true Emily style I got conjunctivitis between Boston and New Jersey.  My eye looked like it had melted, it was disgusting. The wonderful Blitzer family has been looking after me, thank goodness, and helping me recover. I also was re-reminded how rude doctors are here.  Now I can actually open my eye again, it’s Princeton today and then spending the day in NYC tomorrow before heading to Philadelphia tomorrow night! :):)