About two years ago, I heard that the choir was planning a 2007 tour to Australia. I asked my godson to get me information about chaperoning the trip, and he put me in touch with his choir director. After sending the director an email asking if they needed chaperones, I received a brief response saying they had enough people to chaperone. Okay. No biggie. I emailed him back asking him to keep me in mind if a position opened up. Then I went on to tell him that I sang with three choirs, worked at three summer camps (and was the music/drama specialist at one of them), taught for seven years, and have a lot of experience supervising children of all ages. (I figured it couldn't hurt to sell myself.) He wrote me back the same night saying I have "terrific experience" and that he wanted to meet me. Cuz I rock. (Okay, he didn't say I rock… but we all know it's true.)So I went to a tour meeting, talked to the director and long story short (too late), I was invited to be a chaperone on the tour. In Australia. Oz. The Land Down Under. The other side of the world. Holy shit.
It's not exactly a vacation. I'll have chaperone duties during the day (I'll be responsible for about 5 or 6 boys and their belongings), but I will have most of my nights free. And this trip is expensive. But when I found out how much we're doing, I didn't mind the cost so much. We leave on
July 1st and fly into Los Angeles (I've never been to the West Coast… wooooo!), and from there we fly to Melbourne for 4 days. Then we fly to Perth for 3 days (the other side of the continent!), and then to Adelaide for 2 days. From there, we go to Uluru (also called Ayers Rock, in the Aboriginal desert) for 1 day, and then onto Sydney for 3 days. Then Bathurst for 1 day, Brisbane for 2 days and Bundaberg for 4 days (where we'll visit the Great Barrier Reef). We arrive home on July 22nd.I'm ridiculously excited about the whole thing. I still can't wrap my brain around it. It's like, I know I'm going, but I can't believe it yet. It's completely surreal.
Practically everything I know about Australia I learned from an episode of "The Simpsons." (Or a Men At Work song.) I've gotta start reading up on all the cities we're visiting.
So that's what's new in my world.
2 comments:
Hi Dree, I'm also a year one teacher in Sydney Australia! I was reading your blog as part of a postgrad uni course I'm doing. You will love it over here. You are coming in winter but it has been pretty warm and as you probably know, there won't be any snow, although in Bathurst it will get pretty close! If you need to know anything, mainly about Sydney or general ozzie stuff let me know!!! I'll check back soon to see if you replyed to my post :)
Wow... it's kinda funny, it didn't occur to me that I had readers in other countries. And then I post about Australia, and I find out I have two readers there! Very cool!
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