My favorite holiday!

Its Election Day in Australia, aka My Favorite Holiday!!  Though, it was hardly a holiday for me this time round. It's been a crash course in all the differences in political systems and culture between the US and Australia.  My academic reason for coming to Australia was to compare a different yet similar government and public health system, what better way to do that than during a national election.

There are two main parties in Australia, Labor and Liberal.  The Liberal party is somewhat similar to our Democratic party....though in Australia the Liberal party is the conservative party.  And as the conservative party, they stuck with the stereotype and chose a twat to be their Prime Minister candidate (Tony Abbott).

The biggest difference I've learned tonight is the way they decide which party is in power.  I was under the misconception that they voted for their Prime Minister (PM) the same way we vote for President.  And based on who won that election, their party would seize power of the government.  What actually happens is that voters vote for their local Member of Parliament (MP) (Congress person) and which ever party wins the majority of seats seizes power of government.  So, even though Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott, the two up for PM have been the only two people campaigning, most voters don't actually vote for them.   (Some do, as they are MPs in their own districts, so if they don't win the PM spot, they will still be in Parliament.)  The poor politics part in my opinion is that the MPs, which are the people you actually vote for don't really campaign at all and assume that people will vote for them because of their party affiliation.  Which may be why independents and greens are becoming so popular....

This was a special election.  Kevin Rudd (Labor Party) was the PM 2 months ago.  The party held a political coup and ousted Kevin Rudd and made Julia Gillard PM.  It was VERY fast, literally happened over night.  Kevin Rudd proposed taxing the mining industry, which is Australia's largest industry.  This created a huge uproar and Labor started losing popularity.  So Labor decided Kevin was out, and Julia was in. Julia then called the election early (would have been early next year) so she could actually win her seat.

The early election seems to have backfired on Labor.  The Labor party has lost more seats than they expected and Australia is now facing a hung parliament.  Watching the election results tonight feels very much like watching election results in the US in 2004.  They won't know until at least tomorrow, and maybe later, who actually holds the majority of seats.  Adding folly to the situation, 4 seats have been won by parties other than Labor or Liberal.  The Greens (the largest independent party) historically won a seat in Melbourne, and three other independent candidates won seats, taking away from the main parties.  The winning party needs 76 seats to claim the majority, at the moment Labor has 70, Liberal has 71, Independents 4, and 5 seats undecided.  Which means, at this point, it is impossible for Labor to win the election.  The best they can hope for is a hung parliament.  Labor will have to take all 5 seats to win the majority.  Innnnteresting.

There is a different sense of tension then what I'm used to from working in politics in the States.  Because Labor and Liberal are quite similar, there isn't a sense that the country's going to hell in a hand basket if the opposing candidate wins.  Or at least thats how I sense it.  Aussie's might feel differently.  It does definitely seem like you're choosing the less of two evils though.  Julia Gillard does not inspire a lot of confidence in voters, but Tony Abbott is a bit scary.  Tony's main running point is "the boat people."  Aussie's hate folks that come over on boats...i.e. refugees.  Australia's refugees are very similar to the US's illegal immigrant population.  While its a serious issue and Australia needs to make sure that they aren't being taken advantage of by people smugglers...Tony Abbott and everyone who hates "boat people" just sound racist.  (similar to how people who hate all Mexicans because they may be illegal just sound racist).  Abbott's other running point was to end 'wasteful spending' of the Labor party.  It sounds a lot like conservatives saying they're "fiscally responsible" but in Australia's case, the Liberal party wants to only guarantee mothers 6 months paid maternity leave instead of a year, and there is absolutely no talk of scaling back their healthcare system.  So yea, Tony Abbott may not be the best choice for Australia but it doesn't seem like a whole lot will change now that he's in.

UPDATE: Its been a few days since the election....and still no result!  It turns out though that the independents have to choose a party to join.  If Julia gets them, Labor wins power.  If Tony wins, Liberal wins.  So Julia and Tony are courting the independents and throwing money and whatever they want at them to get them on their side.  I have a problem with this system.  If I voted for an independent I wouldn't want to them to have to commit to a party, they're independent of parties...  The other problem is that they are throwing money at them...way too much power for three MPs to have.

Interesting points

• Australians are required to vote.  By law.  As someone pointed out to me...that kinda goes against everything that democracy stands for...
• Politicians are about 10 years behind on campaign strategy.  I saw Julia's speech before the election and she said Tony Abbott oh more times than I could count.
• Australian election season is 5 weeks long.  (this one was at least, but Im pretty sure a regular election season would only be about 2 months)
• All elections are held on Saturdays

I'm Awesome

I had a pretty funny weekend I thought I might share. Friday night my friend Uschi and I went out to our favorite club...The Golden Sheaf! We love the Golden Sheaf because of the high proportion of seriously hot men that are there every weekend. We didn't know why, but we knew we liked it.

At the Golden Sheaf.

We may have figured out why there are so many hot guys there. After this weekend, I'm pretty sure its an undercover gay bar. Now I love me some gay bars from time to time, but in this instance, I'm disappointed. It was like a haven for hot men, now its a haven for hot unavailable men. It may also just be a convenient excuse as to why none of them approached us any of the numerous times we've been there.

After this revelation we decided to hit Kings Cross. Kings Cross, for those not in Australia, is Shady McShadesville. There's a whole tv series based on true stories of the drug/prostitution/corrupt police of Kings Cross called Underbelly which I refuse to watch on the premise that it scares the piss out of me. That being said, The Cross is also like the hottest place to go out at night. For reasons unknown to me its where everyone ends up going out. I tried going out in Kings Cross once and saw the most violent fight I've ever seen between a drunk man, a bouncer, and the police. After that I decided that Kings Cross wasn't for me. Why would we decide to go there then? Well, it was close, and open late, and both Uschi and I are dealing with Ben dramas that we wanted to forget about. Kings Cross it was!

When we first arrive, I saw a club named The Lincoln. How appropriate! In Chicago, I lived in Lincoln Square, off Lincoln Avenue, in the Land of Lincoln, with a dog named Lincoln. I thought it was a sign of great things to come and decided to take a picture. I was wrong. As I held my camera up and zoomed to take the picture, the bouncer came running over and grabbed my camera. Apparently you can't take pictures of the outside of a club. He really freaked out and wanted to know why we were taking a picture of the club. To which I told him the dumb Lincoln thing, he still was not impressed. Uschi talked him into taking our picture in front of the sign, which I thought was just as good. Until I saw the picture:

Really dude? You can't work a point and shoot camera?

After that debacle, I decided I didn't want to drink at that establishment. Who freaks out over a picture?! So we walked on. We were going to go to bars that didn't have a cover, so we ended up at a very dead pub and with in 2 minutes a guy approached us and asked "Got any drugs?" I literally laughed out loud, said no and rolled my eyes in the same moment. He went up to Uschi and tried to sell her drugs and listed off all the stuff he had. To which we laughed and promptly walked away. Seriously? Kings Cross you are living up to your reputation.

I've heard of World Bar many times, but never been. All I know is that they serve your drinks out of teapots and people tend to steal the teapots. Uschi and I decided to bend our no-cover rule to go to World Bar. I went up to the bouncer to ask what the cover was. I was willing to pay $5, I would've paid $10 but that was pushing it. The cover was $15. No effing way. I hate the idea of covers anyway. I don't feel that I should have to pay to spend money in your establishment. And I am definitely not paying the cost of 2 drinks! We tried another bar with a cover...that one...$20. I laughed in the bouncers face and walked away.

After that we gave up and went to get a burrito. Then took a cab home. Kings Cross, I am not a fan.

Last night (Saturday) my friend Alexis had a party at her apartment. There was Flippy Cup. It was epic. And I must say that my Flippy Cup skills came back just like riding a bike! Early in the night, I lost possession of my phone. A girl I had just met took it and apparently was texting a 'Ben.' I wasn't completely unaware of what was going on, but I couldn't be bothered to care what she said, lol. The string of messages that resulted were completely inappropriate and hilarious. I'm pretty sure I won't be hearing from that Ben again.

The really funny part of last night was after I left the party. I stopped to drunkenly get a kabab. Kababs are everywhere in Sydney. The equivalent of getting Taco Burrito King at 2am. I can only eat them after drinking because I'm pretty sure there's about 3,000 calories in each one. And they're delicious. I took my happy self and my kabab home where I proceeded to not send drunken text messages or drunk dials, but drunk skyping. I took it up a WHOLE new level. But really, it was only Jacob because with the time difference, calling him at 3am is actually perfect ( I think its like 7pm in Norway then). Recapping the conversation with him today he told me that it was "a very Kassi-like conversation." I basically went on an egotistical narcissistic rant. I told him over and over again that I'm awesome and he's an ass for not seeing it. Ha! After making him feel like an ass I was "very sweet in a very odd way." Classic Kassi right there. I may have also done a bit of bragging about how tone my legs are and my new found ability to do full push ups.  He introduced me to this hilarious song that he dedicated as my theme song, and I couldn't agree more. Except that I actually am awesome :)

Beware:  The video will make you laugh so hard your drink comes squirting out of your nose.  Also, its heavy on the cursing.

The quest thats consumed my life

I'm not sure you all appreciate my blog titles as much as I do :)

My life has been consumed, more than normal, with trying to lose weight.  I say more than normal because ever since I actually succeeded at losing weight, all I can think about is losing more!  Since its always on my mind, and I'm feeling especially helpless as of late, I've decided to share my strategies and frustrations as a way to hold myself accountable. 

I'm feeling helpless to lose more mostly because I've been pretty much been on a "plateau" since the bout of strep throat threw me under 90kgs.  Its not really a plateau, I've just leveled out.  I can't change much more about my lifestyle.  I already work out as much as my schedule will allow, and living on my own again, I feel like Im doing the best I can in the diet department.  I don't have the best diet, but its as healthy as I can realistically get.  Its a struggle to get fresh produce in, its expensive for me to buy it and it always goes bad before I can eat it all.  I no longer eat for the love of food, its all about convenience now.  My housemate makes fun of me when I boil a half dozen eggs.  She says its odd that I eat everything in one "vessel"  ie roasting a pumpkin (squash to you and I) for dinner with nothing else, boiling eggs for snacks with nothing else.  I say its a healthy snack, and its convenient.  And why make things with more than one ingredient when something like a roasted pumpkin is more than enough food for me?  :) 

So here is what I've recently done to try yet again to get off this damn plateau:

• I bought a bike.  A bike will not only save me bus fare and time, but will also give me one more exercise outlet in my day.  I haven't gotten used to the time thing yet though, lol.  Everytime I ride I end up getting to where I'm going about 35-40 minutes early, lol.
• I cut out all fast food and fried food.   I didn't eat a lot of these before, but I've put an all out block on them now. 
• I'm attempting this week to cut out all sugar in the form of drinks and sweets.  If theres sugar in something else I eat thats ok, but no sugarey drinks or sweets.  Aussies love their sweets.  Danishes, cinnamon rolls, chocolate croissants, etc.  They are off the list!  No matter how yummy they look while I wait for my coffee.  I also stopped taking sugar in my coffee, which isnt that hard here since they dont make coffee here, they make lattes, meaning lots of milk and a little bit-o-espresso.  And no more pop.  I go through phases with pop, sometimes I'll get up to one a day then I'll stop, then I'll slowly go back up to one a day.  So no more cokes.  I did allow myself a diet coke the other night cuz I was at a bar and needed the caffeine, but diet coke doesnt have any real sugar in it.  My other loop hole is that if Im really craving something sweet I'll have a piece of toast with jelly on it. 
• Keep alcohol to one night per week.  I haven't really committed to this yet, but I haven't been drinking more than that lately anyway.  I know alcohol has sugar in it, but the one night I drink it will be my exception.  This will also help my bank account :)

So there you have it...my attempt at dieting.  We'll see if I can actually drop any kilos from it.  I don't have high hopes, but I have been about to stick to the sugar-free thing for 3 days now.  I recently read an article that people take in most of their calories from drinks now.  Which I believe is definitely true for me.  And we tend to not count the calories in our drinks.  Since I read that, I've paid more attention to what I'm drinking and as a result have been drinking a lot more water. 

Sandals on a bus

Don't bother sweeping in Broome...

...the red dirt is everywhere. Ah ah ah. Who appreciates my 'Kevin joke'??

I don't have many pictures of Broome because it rained.  The only time it wasn't raining (just drizzling) I went on an old people's tour.  Seriously.  I didn't know it was an old people's tour until the bus picked me up and I was the only one under the age of 70 on the bus.  I felt like I was 15 on a family trip with my grandparents.  Homosassa anyone?

When it wasn't pouring buckets Broome was really pretty.  Its known for its contrasting colors, red dirt, green bush, blue water, white sand.  Beacuse of the unseasonably wet weather it was more green than normal.  Which can actually be said for all my pictures going down The Center as well.  The best color-contrasting picture:

Yea.  Its pretty.  I wish I could have seen it in the sun. 

At low tide...very low tide, you can climb down the rocks and find dinorsaur fossils in the rocks!  This however, is a picture of the replica of dinosaur fossils.  The doesn't usually get low enough for you to find them, only on special low tide occasions.  And I'm pretty sure it was high tide when we were there anyway.  Still cool in my opinoin!

Do you recognize this rock?!  You might not.  Buts its Australia!!  Its a natural formation, and actually I was trying so hard to get Tasmania in the picture that I cut out Western Australia, where I was.  Tasmania is not part of the natural formation, someone put that there, but having the mainland Australia almost split into the states is still impressive.

The only picture I took in town is of the old time outdoor movie theater:

I didn't get a chance to check out a movie here.  Did I mention it was raining?

This is the Japanese cemetary.  Broome is known for Pearl farms.  Bet you didn't think about someone having to dive to the bottom of the ocean to get those pearls for you.  Anyways, its risky business.  Or at least it used to be before Scuba equipment existed.  Ever seen that Cuba Gooding Jr. movie about him being the first black navy diver?  The equipment they used to dive for pearls was about the same.  You basically wore a few hundred pounds of waterproof suit with a tube going back to the boat for oxygen.  They lowered you into the ocean and the boat was coast around the top while the diver walked along the bottom trying to find shells.   They had to pick up the shells and put them in their basket before the boat moved too far forward, if they weren't fast enough or bent down to pick up the shells they would fall forward and not be able to stand straight again.  They'd get dragged along the ocean floor for lord knows how long and most likely die.  If they didn't fall over, when the came to the top it was like to get decompression sickness.  Decompression sickness is when you come up to the surface too fast and the nitrogen thats in your bloodstream expands and causes extreme pain in the joints, or embolisms in your brain or heart, etc.  Its bad news.  You learn about decompression sickness in dive certification, now they have techniques to avoid getting it.  They didn't know about it when the Japanese were diving all day everyday.  Why Japanese you ask?  Because they're little.  Yup, its that simple.  They're little and could get into the equipment easier than others.  Japanese migrated over to Broome to work on Pearl farms, were treated like crap, and died quite often.  Hence the Japanese cemertary.  They are also restoring the headstones that crack or break off, which is why some are black and some are still the old sandstone originally used.

More colors just for the fun of it :)

Mental Health Update: A Paradigm Shift

Don't worry, its not a mental health breakdown.  Quite the contrary actually.   I've been to a lot of new Sydney neighborhoods--I mean suburbs--recently (I say neighborhoods because even though they are technically suburbs, they are literally in the city) and they're forcing me to explore a bit more.  Which is good.  I'm always around students and travellers and it seems that that's all there is in Sydney.  Sydney has seemed very transient.  Coming across "Sydney-siders" is a lot more difficult than it should be.  But having to go to all these new places for various reasons had made me see Sydney in a different light.  Like it is some place that someone could live long term.  Like its someplace I could live long term.  Its been difficult (and still is) to imagine Sydney as home because I know its only temporary and I treat it like its only temporary.  I realize now that if I were staying long term there are things I would do differently.  Like get a real job, find a nice(r) place to leave with my own stuff, and get a car.  I like Sydney.  It's laid back, accepting, easy to get around (especially on my new bike), warm 9 months out of the year (disregard my recent whinging, it is winter here!).   I've even gotten used to the return of the 80s and the more alternative dressing style  Today I saw a girl in a black tutu and black and green stripped tights.  It was not a costume.  I may not fit in when I return to the real world.

I think I'm going through the stages of transition (that I made up) right on schedule.  I knew coming to Sydney a few things were going to happen:  I'd be super nervous yet excited, I'd get depressed and want to go home, I'd come to love it, I'll not want to leave it.

I've analyzed my state of mind in my own little made up timeline:
Month 1-2:You move to new city, everything is new and exciting which we call the "Shiny Ball Syndrome"
Month 2-3: Shiny Ball Syndrome slowly wears off.  You want the different things to be normal again (like driving on the wrong side of the road)
Month 4: put energies into something productive.
Month 5: Acceptance of the new city
Month 6: Growing fondness of the new city
Month 7: ??

I'm glad I decided to come for a year. Some people said that a year is too long, but even a year feels temporary and it took a whole 6 months for me to feel like Sydney is a place I could live. The next three months will probably/hopefully solidify my feelings for Sydney. Then it will be time to leave. Funny how that goes. (I won't be coming home in 3 months, I'll be travelling around Australia and living on a farm until February...I am not stupid enough to come home just before winter hits and miss summer here).