Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, everyone! I haven't updated lately because I've been living such a normal American life. But what is normal? Come to think of it, this is all still pretty novel to me. Here are some of the highlights:

Christmas

It was a brown Christmas this year, but I truly enjoyed overdosing on Christmas cookies and pigging out with my family and hanging with the newly extended family! Presents are always a treat! Home is without doubt the best place to spend Christmas!

Snow!

We got a good 12 inches in a matter of days. It was beautiful, and I actually enjoyed shovelling. I was impressed by the way Mom and Sam and all drive through it, plowing and sliding and spinning without even breaking a sweat. This is normal North Dakota stuff.

A picture of me shovelling from last year

New Year's

Sis took me out to a few parties and it was fun, but for me the best place to spend New Year's will always be Japan. I missed eating mashed chestnuts and rice cakes with cheese, visiting a temple in the middle of the night, and getting a slew of New Year's postcards on the 1st. Sigh.

Japanese New Year Mashed Chestnuts---YUM!

The GRE

I crammed to full cerebral capacity. My weakest subject is---and having been an English teacher for so many years this is a little embarassing---English. I studied a panoply of erudite vocabulary which never showed up on the test, but I have since discovered that they appear regularly in crossword puzzles. Thank you, Kaplan Study Guides, for boosting my crossword ability! Much more useful in life than a measly test. I have no regrets.

33 Hour Amtrak Ride

I found a ridiculously cheap ticket to Seattle on Amtrak. I thought I would enjoy the ride, leisurely viewing the mountains and scenery, but it was way, way too much time in a box. The guy next to me was a young east coast environmental studies major who was in awe of the North Dakota landscape. He thoroughly interrogated me on what North Dakotans do for a living, the main cash crops, dont they get lonely out there in the plains? Do they like living here? And everytime we passed a butte jutting unexpectedly from the middle of a flat prairie he would gasp in awe---! So to those of you who think ND is boring, its all a matter of perspective!

Off to Mexico!

I leave to Mexico on Jan. 18th, ¡Olé olé! More on that later!

P.S. Tired of checking for new updates? I can send you an e-mail notice, kind of like a subscription, when I update my blog. Let me know and I will put you on the list! -Shannen

My first American wedding (since I was about 4 years old, anyway)

Congratulations, Samantha and Jamie!

It's been a BUSY two weeks since coming back to the States, helping mom prepare the house for visitors and researching wedding stuff on the internet. I was so honored not only to take part but to have such an important role--maid of honor! So here's what I learned about weddings in the ol' US of A:

1. Weddings are very expensive
2. Weddings are hard to prepare for (especially for the bride)
3. Weddings are a good excuse to convince family to come all the way to po-dunk North Dakota, even in the middle of winter
4. Weddings are fun

Two more interesting facts:

1. The more immediate the family, the more wedding cake you get to take home, YUM!
2. If it's your own wedding, you get to pick ALL the music (and everyone will dance to it with smiles on their faces)

Best quotes of the night:

"All my friends are here, my family is all here, this is the best night of my LIFE!"

Jamie (groom)

"We have to do this EVERY year!"
Sam (bride)

"I could definitely drink a rum and coke tonight."
Mom

Mom won't touch alcohol,

nor did she have her rum and coke this night, either

"Just think of baseball!"
Jamie

When someone said they might cry at the wedding

If anyone has another quote, put it in the comments! I'd love to hear it!

Thanks to Antie Dot, Dee and the junior bridesmaid girls Madelyn and Haylee, Don & Shirley and Lindsey (my camerawoman) and Kristen and their handsome intelligent gentlemen all for coming all the way from Wisconsin! Hope you all made it back safely and enjoyed your trip.

Fiji: WOW!

I was woken up by a phone call the morning of my flight to Nadi, Fiji. I was informed that Australia had just issued a red alert to travelers to the tropical island country due to a possible military coup. I checked the internet for news and called the airline. Their representative assured me not to worry, “Having a coup in Fiji is like having a margarita in Mexico.” I was slightly relieved, figuring since I had no plans to visit the capitol I should be unaffected. I just hoped my parents weren’t too up-to-date on the news.

Arriving in Nadi, I wasn’t sure where to go in my mere 6 days. I opted to leave the next morning for the Yasawa islands, depicted in all the brochures with pristine white beaches, clear blue coral-filled waters, grass-skirted islanders and smiling bikini clad tourists drinking from coconuts. It looked like paradise.

And it was paradise. The snorkeling was amazing, like swimming in the tropical fish tank at your local buffet restaurant. Nemos everywhere! Neon colors from the entire spectrum, fish of all shapes and sizes, and I even saw a few sharks! Life was regulated by breakfast, lunch and dinner times (all included in price of lodging), with snorkeling between high and low tides, drying off on the beach in the sun and napping in hammocks to fill in the gaps. My dorm bed was in a grass hut where I would awake to chirping birds perched on my bed rail; there was no hot water but showers refreshing. I visited an island village where I was introduced to the village chiefs bearing real flower leis and shown their school. School children in colorful purple uniforms sang for us and begged to have their pictures taken so they could see themselves on the digital camera screen.

I decided to live my last day in Fiji to the fullest. My flight was at 11pm and I had all day to enjoy. I took an introductory scuba course that morning, amazing but took some time to get used to the breathing. Then I had a drool-inducing 40 minute beach massage. Later I took my snorkeling gear to “feed the fish”, an island sponsored activity that involved taking bread into the open waters where the fish were already waiting for us---see, fish have brains after all! There were thousands of them, so many you could catch the little ones in your hands. At one point I realized I had wandered a little too far from the group when I noticed the fish were getting bigger, and, what’s that??? A STINGRAY???!! It must have been a meter long---plus the long pointy nose! Lastly, once back to shore, I decided to try swimming around the entire island. This particular island, South Sea Island, could be circumferenced on foot in about 15 minutes, a little oasis of sand and coconut trees that could be mercilessly wiped out by the most cowardly of tsunamis. It took about an hour, but exhausted and happy, I gathered my things for the ride back to the main island, and to the airport.

I was contented and excited to head back to the States for my sister’s wedding. Eager to show off my new tan, I realized my skin was starting to itch something fierce…I had developed a huge rash right there on the airplane. The doctor later diagnosed me with “swimmer’s itch”, sounds cute enough but the internet tells me it has something to do with flatworms mistaking me for waterfowl—EW!

By the way, Fiji is still on high alert for a possible coup. The Prime Minister was making an important speech on television the day I arrived, but to the adults’ dismay the Fijian kids at the hostel kept turning the channel to cartoons. On one island I heard an announcer shouting from the radio, all the islanders surrounding the radio with expressions of great concern---but found out they were listening to a live rugby game. It makes sense, paradise can only be unaffected by politics.

New pictures are up! Check ‘em out!
By the way, the pictures program has changed a bit, but just click the "slideshow" button and they'll zip by like before!

Dolphins!

This morning I put on this sexy wetsuit, got on another rocky boat, and SWAM with DOLPHINS!!! There were dolphins everywhere! We were told to make silly noises and try to swim like a fish, and the dolphins would be more interested in us. I sang a couple bossa novas there in the freezing water, and had up to 5 dolphins swimming loops around me! It was the most amazing experience.
Then after about a half hour I had to swim back to the boat and be sick again.
No more boat trips for me please!

NZ Pics are UP!

Pics are at side bar, Come and see!

North Island
(Aukland, Clare, Tracy, White Island volcano, Mt. Taranaki)

South Island
(Julie, Tekapo, Mt. Cook, Milford Sound, Franz Josef glacier hike)

NZ's North Island: Volcanic Paradise!

I took 20 pictures of mud in a New Zealand town called Rotorua to get this photo. I erased most of the twenty, but still have about five excellent mud action shots in the camera. "Mud?", you ask? But behold, this is not normal mud. This is bubbling mud, found in the Rotorua city park. The park would be an average park with grass and benches and ducks, except for the fact that it erupts now and then. The duck pond bubbles. And the whole place steams and smells of sulfur. The last park eruption was in 2003 when mud was spewed up to 200 meters into the air. I want to live here.

I have been in the north island of New Zealand for 2 weeks now, and it has been great. I spent the first week with Clare in Aukland and the weekend with Tracey in Hamilton, we were all mates in Japan. I also met their moms and dads and sisters and brothers and cousins and friends and flatmates---I feel like I've joined in on a New Zealand family sitcom! Lots of laughs. Tracey took me to her mom's house in Rotorua where we went around to the lakes and the volcanic Kuirau Park, then she's lent me her 1985 Honda Accord, a.k.a. the "Golden Bullet" for the week. I have not yet crashed or bumped into anything, hurrah!

I waited 3 days to get on a tour boat to the White Island, NZ's only active marine volcano. You can only get there by guided tour boat as the island is privately owned and is 50km away by sea. The sun finally came out, but the water was still so rocky that most of us spent the trip filling motion sickness bags. I tried to not notice, but you should have seen the swells out there, swell after swell, rising, crashing, rising...swelling...urghxxxhxhf!!!! We had to use hard hats and gas masks, and the volcano was incredible. Well worth the seasickness.

There is so much to write about NZ, but I will leave off here for now. Pics later!

Take care, all!

Tasmania: Rental wrecks & chocolate highs

Can you guess where this photo was taken?
Fiji?
Nope. Can you believe it's Tasmania!? (I'm sure you already guessed by reading the title of this blog entry, duh)

Never in my life had I imagined I'd ever be in Tasmania! I was always interested in the mysterious island south of the Australian continent, imagining an island of rocks, full of animals that snorted and spun around on two legs. Then I read that there was a Cabury chocolate factory there---and added a chocolate oasis to my image of uninhabited piles of rocks and spinning animals.

The overnight ferry from Melbourne took 11 hours. Infamous for rocky vomit-inducing waters, I made sure to take a Dra-my-mine (Aussie for Dramamine) and conked out in my splendid 2 berth cabin. Just to give you an idea of how rocky it can get, there were 5 giant motion-sickness bags provided in the pocket of every seat.

I arrived to Tasmania fortunately refreshed and excited to experience the rocks. I went straight to the rental-car office, paid for my week reservation, stuck the key in the ignition of my little Daewoo, and within seconds backed the car straight into a pole. Right there in the rental car parking lot, right in front of the rental car agent. Ouch. But I had to swallow hard and forget...and left town as soon as possible hoping for a new and luckier start.

Leaving town I discovered green fields! Houses! Towns! Sheep! Cows! I was soon stuck in a herd of cattle crossing the road at their own will. Then there were many, many national parks, full of wildlife many distinctive only to Tasmania. Kangaroos would dash in front of the car at night, and you would have to screech your breaks to avoid a slow waddling echidna---an ant-eating porcupine-looking fellow. I avoiding driving at night because the amount of roadkill was phenominal, and when I did it was at a slow pace to observe all the nocturnal activity.

I was hoping to meet fellow travelers, make travelling friends, and chat with people here and there, but the tourist season doesn't start until Oct. I was alone almost everywhere. Every backpackers hotel gave me my own room of 6 to 8 empty bunk beds, and most campgrounds were empty. I met and chatted with friendly Tassie hikers on the paths, but didn't find many people in the campgrounds or hotels. One night I camped in a national park, alone, with only the "thump thump thump" of distant kangaroos hopping along in the forest. I lit a campfire, opened a bottle of wine, and found singing my only form of entertainment. The "roos" must have thought I was mad.

The famous Tasmanian Devil is actually really cute! It does not spin around like Looney Tunes projects, but it definately sounds like a devil when it growls, which he likes to do a lot. A little trivia, the Tassie Devil is a scavenger, being too slow to hunt, and he eats every part of the dead things he finds including fur and bones, ick. They are marsupials, having up to 15 babies---only 4 of which can survive as the female has only 4 nipples in her pouch. Wild devils are on the brink of mass extinction due to a contagious facial cancer that kills most by the age of 2 (usually live to be 6?). The devil parks are raising healthy devils in isolation as backup in case the entire population dies out. Scientists still can't figure out why the cancer occurs, as it is the only contagious cancer ever known to man.

On a brighter note...
The Cadbury factory was a dream come true, with free samples, and huge bags of out-of-specification chocolates sold at cost-price. I don't think I have ever eaten so much chocolate in my entire life.

It was sad to return my dented car and hop back onto the Spirit of Tasmania a week later, but I was pretty excited to join society again in Melbourne.

Melbourne, by the way, was cold. Everyday. A huge contrast to Sydney in many ways, but it seemed a cooler, more hip and international city. More my kind of place. And I met a few new salsa-loving friends, yippeee! Noriko-san was a wonderful host and having my own room in her comfy house was heaven, especially for getting over my cold. (I'd caught a cold in Sydney, blah!) Noriko doesn't eat meat, either, and we feasted on vegetarian food every night, it was bliss.

By the way, I discovered where my Tasmanian image of rocks came from. When I reached the Freycinet peninsula it was perfect deja vu---giant piles of rocks, just like I'd imagined! I must have seen it in a TV program or in National Geographic at some time in my life, amazing how the mind works.

I put pictures up, check them out if you have time!

Sydney, Australia

Sydney is a really excellent city. I cannot help but open my Sydney entry with those simple words. It is just a really, really cool place. I arrived Tues. morning, dropped my stuff off at a backpackers hotel, and within an hour was exploring the town. It is supposedly winter but the sun is shining, the air is crisp and warm, and the sky is blue with fluffy clouds here and there. I was crossing the street to the Botanical Gardens when I heard, "Excuse me...", I look back and a young, quite handsome man (with a cast on his arm) says to me, "You are beautiful" and walks away. I could not help but like Sydney right away.

To resist being impartial, I would like to take this time to list four of the coolest things I have discovered about Sydney since...

1. The "Tiger"
A meat pot pie smothered in mashed potatoes, topped with mashed green peas, and then covered in a sauce (cheese, gravy, etc.) of your choice to boot. All for about US$4.50. In my case I had the "Veggie Tiger", and the pot pie alone would have been heavenly enough. Ooh la laaaa!

2. Cockatiels
You walk along, hear a deep throaty squawk above your head, and look up to see what it is. Could it be a giant crow? A seagull? A bird, a plane...Superman? No, folks, it is a giant white cockatiel--now please forgive me if I spell him wrong--with a yellow trill of feathers on his head. If you feed the birds in the park you are guaranteed a flock of them to join in with the pigeons. And some of them will say Hello to you in an Aussie accent, how cool is that?

3. Free Beer
I really don't know how they can do this, but bars around the backpackers hotels have a Happy Hour where they serve free pitchers of beer! Not just 1 pitcher, the other day our group got 7 or 8 pitchers!! If there was anytime to learn to drink beer, now would be that time. (and I still wont touch the stuff...)

4. Cadbury Chocolate
My favorite chocolate company....everywhere! You can buy Cadbury Eggs year round, along with a whole plethora of chocolate bars and snacks. Even McDonald's shakes and sundaes use Cadbury chocolates. It is Shannen's chocolate heaven. They only downfall is a candy bars cost a buck fifty around here, ouch!

These along with the laid back Australian attitude, it being safe to walk about at night and a huge mixture of foreigners all make it a colorful, exciting city.

Today I went to the Koala Park Sactuary and got to see all the native Australian animals, feed the kangaroos and pet a koala. Koalas sleep 18 hours a day, what a life! The park ranger woke one up for us to see and get pictures with, and he was a total grog-case. After I saw a man sheer a sheep, and "chatted" with the cockatiels ("Hello, hello, hello, goodbye, hello, goodbye").

So far, a cool, cool trip. Monday I go to Melbourne, and the week after that to Tasmania.
Miss you all!

See pics at side bar