Scando parties and zoo fun!

So after staying up til 4am on Saturday morning to register for classes I slept until brunch. Normally I don't like sleeping in here, but I figured I deserved at least 6 hours of sleep. I went down to get some food and then worked on homework for the next five hours. Jolly leaves to stay with friends in the city every weekend and Dana was out with friends doing karaoke in Chinatown so I had the room to myself. I was actually productive and got my second case study written... two down, two more to go. I finally got out of my pjs at 5pm to go down for dinner. It was a lazy, but productive day. I decided to treat myself to a night out with the girls.

I cleaned up and had some wine before heading into the city. There was a Scando party at Side Bar. I didn't really know what to expect, but the Swedes were pretty excited about it. We took the 10:15 ferry and caught a taxi to the bar. It was a great night! The bartenders had viking helmets on and Swedish or Norwegian flags painted on their faces. There were people with flags and jerseys, and others dressed in blue/yellow or red/blue. We didn't wear any special attire but it was fun anyway. Every now and then the DJ would play a popular Swedish song and you could definitely tell who was actually Swedish because they were the only ones who knew the words. Also, the DJ was my marketing professor... that was kind of weird. We took a break from dancing and some guy told me I looked European. I was surrounded by blonde Swedes, but am pretty sure I look about as American as you can. When 2:30 rolled around we called it quits and got a taxi back to Manly.

Ellinor, Helena, Melissa, and I before we went out. I got to wear my new dress and Dana straightened my hair for me:) Too bad it didn't last long... it was misting outside.

Notice the Scandinavian decor

I woke up at 8:30 Sunday morning to go to the zoo with Brittany and Candace. I've had several people tell me Taronga Zoo is well worth the trip, and after going, I'd agree. The zoo is huge! Much bigger than Como Zoo which is the only zoo I've been to in the past five years. To my utter disappointment, it was penguin breeding season so they were not in their normal showcase habitat. I did catch a glimpse of them from far away, and also through a little underwater glass viewing spot swimming around. I love penguins. I had to settle for entertainment from the gorillas. They were really funny to watch.

The gorillas I watched for about 20 minutes

The real koalas were sleeping, so I settled for this guy

Side note: they have bandicoots in the zoo here. It'd be the equivalent of having a racoon in a zoo back home. While endangered, they're still just nocturnal rodents. I thought it was kind of odd. We walked through the entire park and then headed back to the city for Pancakes on the Rocks before catching the ferry home. I realized how much time I spend on boats here... with all the ferry travel on Sunday it was 1 1/2 hours. I spent the night relaxing and watching the Office with Deb.

After the heaps of food I ate on Sunday, I felt the need to get some exercise. This morning I woke up at 8am to go to the gym with Deb and Chelsey before starting on homework for the day. I'm ready to hand in two reports to McRae tomorrow morning that are worth 80% of my final grade. Little scary, but its nice to be done. I also found out that I got 25/30 on the midterm I thought I failed!! Its not a great score, but much better than I was anticipating. Nothing too exciting going on this week just more case study and group work for classes. Friday night they are having a karaoke night at the school bar (which I thought was closed? maybe they just won't serve alcohol?) and Saturday we are going out for Deb's birthday.

The weekend was a little chilly and it looks like it'll be overcast and raining most of the week. It would be nice to finish up all of my final reports ahead of time so I can spend a full two weeks preparing for finals at the beach. We'll see if that happens or not.

Hope all is well back home:) Have a great week!!