Desperately Seeking Coffee

Caffeine Addicts Anonymous.  That’s the group my roommates joke I should join.  Back in the states I have a large cup coffee every day, sometimes two cups if it’s been a long day (or even if I just feel like it).  Since starting to drink coffee in my first year of college, I’ve more or less reached the point where the Starbucks on Loyola’s campus knows who I am and what I want to drink the second I show up.  That being said when I landed in Australia and found that chain coffee stores, like Starbucks, are few and far between I panicked a little but after finding a store called Coffee Wise in the campus center I began to relax.  

There was coffee on this campus after all!  It was just a little coffee bar with a pick up window and a handful of sandwiches and brightly colored pastries on display but still they had coffee.  It even said so on the sign.  This place was definitely going to become part of my daily routine, I thought as I passed by without stopping.

One of the other Loyola girls on my trip, Bianca, drinks even more coffee than I do so we were thrilled we wouldn’t have to leave campus to get a decent cup of coffee.  Then one of the days during orientation someone was standing in front of Coffee Wise offering red and black free coffee vouchers to the international students walking by.  Bianca and I couldn’t believe our luck.  Desperate to get our coffee fix, we both lied and said we had a friend who’d just left for the bathroom so we could get two.  Two free coffees, it was any coffee addict’s dream.  

I stuffed the two vouchers into my wallet and as the days passed I forgot about them.  I thought I was adjusting fairly well to not drinking coffee and with temperatures in the nineties almost every day it was just too hot to drink it anyway.  Then one day after class this week, I wandered into the campus center in an attempt to figure out how to get back to the residence halls and immediately saw that Coffee Wise was open.  It was 2:00 in the afternoon but I didn’t care.  Armed with my free coffee card from orientation, I made my way to the counter.

“Hi, one coffee with milk and sugar please.”  My standard order when I wasn't getting iced coffee.

“So you want a latte?” the girl behind the counter asked already pushing the appropriate buttons on the cash register.

“No.”  I shook my head.  Why did milk immediately mean latte?  After a week without it, plain coffee was all I wanted, but I didn’t know how to explain myself.  Long black?  Flat white?  No, that wasn’t right either.  I racked my brain trying to think of what they called it here. 

“You just want a black coffee with cold milk and sugar?” the girl asked seeming confused about why I’d want to drink it that way.  Was putting milk in coffee not a thing here?

“Yes, please.”  Wasn’t that what I’d said originally?  I handed the girl my voucher and waited patiently while she made my coffee before hurrying off to the dorms clutching my prize in my hands.  When I stepped out of the air conditioning and into the blazing heat, sipping my coffee, I didn't even care how hot it was outside.  It was exactly what I’d been craving and in that moment it was the best cup of coffee I'd ever had.

My coffee was finished by the time I got back to my hall (after a week without coffee it just tasted so good) and told some international friends on my floor about my little order mishap.  Most of them had similar experiences that week and it was good to know that I wasn’t the only one who was still adjusting to how things work in Australia.  From the sound some of people’s stories we still have a lot to learn.

Not knowing how to order my coffee was a little bit of a culture shock for someone who drinks coffee every day, but now that I know how (and my friend gave me his voucher) it’ll be back to my usual coffee routine.  I can deal with the weird looks when I voice my order (the local Aussies drink their coffee black) but I’ll have to remember to specify cold milk from now on otherwise I’ll end up with a latte.

Directions Sold Separately

 As anyone who’s met me knows my sense of direction is pretty much nonexistent so to say I was nervous for the first week of classes is somewhat of an understatement.   After two weeks of orientation activities, beach trips, and essentially vacationing in Melbourne it was finally March 4th and to our group of international students that meant it was time to face reality (at least a little).  

When the day approached it felt like we were all mimicking the “Stuff Study Abroad Students Say” YouTube video.  Class?  Oh right, class.  This wasn’t just an amazing vacation after all.  Classes were starting for the semester and we could no longer sleep till noon and stay out all night.  There would now be papers to write and lectures to attend in addition to the exploring we'd grown so used to.

Going to school in Australia feels different from going to school in Baltimore though, mainly because everything is so much bigger at Monash than it is at Loyola (and I’m not just talking about class sizes).  The campus here is big enough to fit at least five of Loyola’s evergreen campus and although the buildings are numbered their locations don’t correspond to any sort of numerical order.  Unfortunately for my sense of direction this means that building 12 could just as easily be next to building 73 as building 13.  Loyola’s campus, on the other hand, has a grand total of eight buildings on the academic quad so I’m not used to finding my way around a campus this large.

Despite all that while I was walking to class with my friend, Hailey, on Monday my nerves subsided.  This isn’t so bad I thought...that is until I had to walk back to the residence halls.  I’d spent the entire afternoon on campus with Hailey since we both had the same lecture--Buyer Behavior--but she had another class to attend and now I was on my own.

In the two weeks since arriving on campus it was the first time I’d had to walk anywhere alone and now, left to my own devices, I was completely and utterly lost.  I was questioning myself on every turn.  Was I really going the right way?  All the buildings here look pretty much the same to me.  After some wandering (thankfully in the right direction!) it became clear that for the past two weeks I’d more or less followed the others wherever we had to go without paying much attention to my surroundings.  I arrived at my dorm later than expected with the resolve to do better the next day, and I did.

Waking up early enough to leave half an hour before my class started, I opened up the Monash University app I’d downloaded from iTunes the night before and set off.  My new favorite feature on the app is exactly what someone like me needs: an interactive campus map that shows you where you are in real time.  You can even tell it where you need to go and just head towards the little red pin point marking your destination on the map.  Thrilled with my own personal GPS I wandered around campus still not paying any attention to which buildings I passed on the way (but hey I was staring at my map).  Thanks to my Monash app I arrived to class with time to spare, which was much better than I anticipated.

Progress has definitely been made and after a week of staring at my map like a jaffy (Aussie slang for first year) I’m proud to say that although I still need the app to get to class on time, I now have a vague idea of where most of my classes are and I can get back to the residence halls on my own.

Night Riding Through Melbourne

*modeled after Crawling through Bangalore

Sitting in a lecture hall in the middle of the Australian summer with what seemed like hundreds of other students my group of friends and I shook off our day dreams of escaping to the beach when the Monash University staff got to the travel part of the program.  They were talking about how to get around the city and after my last cab ride I was desperate for a change.  I’d imagined being able to get around the city solely using public transportation (which is difficult at night if its possible at all) when they told us the news I’d been waiting for.  There was an alternative to taking a cab after all (well sometimes).

Running only after midnight on Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays the Night Rider bus is the ride of choice for both uni students and local Aussies who don’t want to pay seventy dollars to get home from the city.  We thought this bus would be great. Not only would we be saving money but we could meet all sorts of interesting people, not to mention fellow Monash students returning to campus.  It was a cheaper alternative to taking a cab and really how much longer could it take?  We were still driving.  It’s not like we were taking a bus to a train to another bus (which believe me I’ve done).  The Night Rider was supposed to have multiple stops in the Melbourne so late night travelers could easily find it and best of all it would drop us off directly in front of the residence halls.

So, wanting to experience the local nightlife, we headed off to Melbourne’s first ever White Night celebration ready to take the Night Rider just like real Aussies.  Streets were blocked off by police cars and food trucks alike as we pushed our ways through the throngs of people crowding the streets eager to see what the city had to offer.  Patterns of bright light reflected off the buildings changing every five minutes creating an ever-changing rainbow against the night sky.  It was nothing short of amazing.

Flinder's Street Station on White Night

Panoramic view of Melbourne on White Night

At around 2:30 in the morning we decided it was time to find the Night Rider and get back to campus.  We were about to head off to Flinders Street (where the bus was supposed to pick us up) when it dawned on us: wasn’t that one of the streets blocked off for the White Night festival?  Now hopelessly lost we wandered in circles around the city asking local police if they knew where another stop was for what felt like forever before finally getting our answer: Collins Street.  But it gets better.  There’s actually two Collins Streets in Melbourne.  So much for this bus being easy to find!  Rounding the corner onto the correct Collins Street we saw a crowd of people standing on the curb under a bus sign.

“I hope they’re not all taking our bus,” my friend Rebecca said.  There was definitely more people than could fit comfortably.  

We walked over to join the crowd (it was now almost 3:00) and looked up at the sign. Night Rider the sign proclaimed smugly.  I could tell we were all doing the mental calculations and one thing was for sure.  There was no way everyone on the street was getting on the next bus.  Some people would be waiting an extra half hour for the next one or giving up and hailing a cab.  By now, the 3:00 bus could be heard rumbling quietly in the distance. Determined to be part of the group that made it on this bus we linked arms and waited.

When the bus pulled up to the curb, somewhat of a frenzy erupted.  Everyone was pushing each other out of the way trying to get on the bus.  Rebecca in the lead, the five us squeezed through the crowd pulling the friend behind us through the door and into the bus before the doors closed behind us.  After that everyone was silent except for the occasional name called out to make sure groups, like us, had all our members safely aboard.

One of the many people who had to stand, I quickly grabbed onto the handrail as the bus lurched from the curb.  I’d been expecting a seat where I could rest my head against the window after a tiring night out but clearly that was not the case.  People were packed so tightly you could scarcely shift your weight without knocking someone over and we’d left others behind on the curb.  For the first few stops no one got off and when the number increased it was still only two or three people per a stop (clearly we were all going to the residence halls).

Each time the bus stopped I had to fight to keep from falling into the people packed around me (Bonus points if you can do this in heels).  It was difficult with people everywhere and needless to say a couple collisions did occur followed quickly by mumbled apologies.  My feet were aching and all I wanted at that moment in time was somewhere to sit, even for a second.  I was starting to regret passing on a cab, at least then I’d have a seat.  But no, the bus is cheaper I reminded myself and we’re almost halfway there.  It’ll be fine.

View from inside the Night Rider

When the bus finally pulled up to our stop across from the halls, people started spilling out the doors to reunite with lost friends and begin the short walk home.  Having been the closest of my group to the door, I waited patiently for them on the curb before kicking off my shoes and going back to my hall thinking about how crazy the night had been.  

I’m not saying I expected the Night Bus from Harry Potter to come whiz us away into the night but that definitely wasn’t what I expected.  They should have warned us about how busy it would be.  I am never taking that bus again I thought to myself as I climbed into bed that night but hey I’m a uni student and I can’t afford a cab (so the next time I spent the ride sitting in a luggage rack).