Wednesday Student Nights vs. Thirsty Thursday

American college life and uni culture in Australia both have set drinking nights.

In America we call it ‘thirsty thursday’ and among other drinking nights, thursday is the night that starts the weekend off and is very common around most college campuses. When living in the dorms, a thursday night usually consists of a students trying to find cheap thirty-racks of beer and then crowding into a room to drink out of beer funnels, play numerous card games, and pray they don’t get caught by the RA’s. If you’re 21, thirsty thursday is more of theme where bars promote cheap deals to appeal to college kids looking to get drunk off little money. It can also mean throwing huge house parties with kegs and loud music or getting dressed out to go to a club.

In Australia however, Wednesday nights are massive in uni. They are referred to as student nights where bars promote $3 spirits or pints and pubs usually have a line out the door. It’s probably the biggest night to go out and the night usually starts off with bringing goon to the dining halls. Students usually eat early then head up to their rooms to begin drinking and getting dressed. Around eight, groups of people will find their way to common rooms, benches outside or even in the middle of hallways to play cards and drinking games before leaving college. Everyone usually makes their way to the train or bus station around 9:30 to head into town. Rides into town are usually fun because of the drinking songs, chants and huge crowds of people on the bus or train. Upon arriving into town, there are typically a few main pubs to go to and everyone lines up. Once getting into the pubs, the crazy night begins with lots of dancing, loud music and cheap drinks, always a good time.

So what’s the real difference? Which one is more fun?

Honestly, both nights have a different feel, yet both have their drawbacks and fun aspects.

Thirsty Thursdays are great because they are an introduction to the weekend, and closer to the end of the week, making it more of a socially acceptable night to blow off some steam. Bars have great deals, parties are usually well-planned out and a big event, and you can expect a good night regardless of what you’re planning. The drawback with thursday drinking nights are that because they usually are big nights, you realize that you’ve still got friday to get through, leaving you with a day full of hungover classes and work to get through.

Wednesday student nights at uni are awesome because it gives you a chance to let loose in the middle of the week after getting through the first two rough days of class. Pubs are packed with students, cheap spirits and pints, and good music. The problem with drinking on Wednesdays are that you’ve still usually got a great deal of work to do before the end of the week, giving you a bit of apprehension of whether or not you should be going out. The other drawback is that after a few cheap pints, you wake up in the morning knowing you’ve got two more days of uni to trudge through, making it difficult to blow off steam and still be productive at the same time.

Both nights consist of an extremely good time, are socially acceptable, and provide good reasons to hang out with friends over a few cheap drinks. You basically have to go out on Wednesday nights in Oz, at least if you’re living at college because everyone around you is drinking, being loud and getting ready. So even if you’re apprehensive on whether or not you should be partying on a Wednesday night, you’ll likely be dragged out of your room anyways, but its always well worth it.

Answers from an Australian

So I asked one of my friends in Australia if he would come up with a list of 5 things he found to be true/untrue about Americas and this is what I got:

1. I thought everyone (in America)  loved basketball.
2. I thought more of you could dance, the bumpin and gridin thing was a shock.
3. You still can’t understand how we talk.
4. I’ve never known what Thanksgiving was about and why there is a big turkey on everyone’s table.
5. Australian’s can relax better, you guys are always doing something.

Awesome answers, very interesting…

Life in the Dorms, or Should I Say ‘College’

Local News Story after party at college

As true with many aspects, living in the dorms at Uni in Oz isn’t even remotely similar to dorm life in America. To begin, dorms aren’t even usually referred to as dorms at Uni, they are called college. Since there are no colleges, just universities in Australia, college is considered the hall or building you live on at Uni, and like here, the halls are separated. One would say, “let’s head back to college,” instead of “I’m heading back to the dorms.” So here’s a list with explanations of the major differences:

• Everything is co-ed at college, I mean toilets, showers, everything; it was very hard to get used to. Each corridor is separated within the floors and there are 3 showers and 3 toilets to share between 13-15 boys and girls. I lived next to a boy, across the hall from a boy and had to shower in the next stall with boys. It’s odd because in America, dorms make it a point to separate boys and girls on opposite ends of floors, have separate bathrooms and RA’s make sure that it stays that way. Needless to say, it was very weird walking into the bathroom and having a guy standing there, but after a few months, it became almost normal.
• You can drink anywhere at college, in the dorms, in the bathrooms, in the common rooms, even in the dining hall. Because (almost) everyone is 18 when they arrive at Uni, not only can everyone buy alcohol, but everyone expects you drink it while it you’re there. It was very common on a big night out to have your RA gather everyone in the common room for drinking games before going out and without doubt, most people would carry down their goon bags to the dining hall for dinner before coordinated parties or student nights.
• Events and parties happen very often at college. Social coordinators make it a priority to keep everyone involved and make sure everyone has a good time. Like I had mentioned in my post about O’Week, I lived at ‘Teds’ Hall, which was known as the party hall. Not only were planned parties a monthly occurrence, other events and big days out pretty common. There were formal dinner nights where we all dressed up in gowns, a carnival day, bar on the hill nights (the bar on campus) an event called ‘murder week,’ girls night out, boys night out, beach days, pool days, coordinated buses into town, floor functions to get dinner with our corridors, sport days, competitions against other colleges, and of course– huge theme party nights.

Carnival Day Party for Teds Hall

Carnival Day Party

Carnival Day Party outside college

Swimming Carnival- Teds Pride

• College Competitions are taken very seriously at Uni in Oz. Of course I originally thought on the first sporting day that it was going to be something like a Harvard vs. Yale game, but that couldn’t be farther from the truth. Colleges are constantly competing at Uni, our major competition at Teds was Evatt Hall. We always had to wear blue during competition days and you could always tell an Evatt member if they were wearing Red. It was common to have Evatt members yell out at Teds members outside of college and visa-versa. As I had mentioned about drinking songs being big there, Teds members also had a nice little song for Evatt kids on the bus rides into town, which went a little something like this: “F**k off home, f**k off home, go on Evatt f**k off home, with a knick knack paddy wack give a dog a bone, go on Evatt f**k off home.” So that was always pretty funny to hear.

Teds Pride, Swimming Carnival

Swimming Carnival- Teds Hall (blue) IH House (green) Evatt (red)

• Everyone has single rooms in college and it’s awesome. Nearly every freshman’s first apprehension when they find out their shipping off to school is who their roommate(s) will be. Well at Uni, you need to worry about that. (Or at least at my uni) Everyone has a single room, not just in my college, but at all the surrounding colleges. The rooms are small, but they almost all have windows, closets, and a desk. Everyone in the corridor shares a common kitchen, and everything else for that matter, but they at least have their own room, which was fantastic.

Although many things about living in college at Uni was very unique, different, and a bit hard to get used to, there were also many aspects of it that were refreshing and fun. Not having to hide from your RA’s from fear of getting caught drinking, (cause you know pretty much everyone else will be doing it) having a single room, awesome social events, and the fun amount of involvement your surrounded by, was incredibly exciting and overall just enjoyable… besides the whole co-ed bathroom ordeal of course.

Being a Yank in Australia

When thinking of my six months in Oz, nothing negative comes to mind.

As a conscious American, I know how we are perceived and stereotyped by many cultures around the world (and rightly so in many cases), so initially traveling there, I was apprehensive.

Although I had never heard anything terrible about Australian’s view on Americans, I had known few aussies before traveling there and they often joked about the typical American stereotypes. Most notable were the refusal to give high fives, constantly criticizing our drinking age, the lack of color, size and non-waterproof money, no VB (Australian beer), and of course the way we talk.

Upon arriving in Cairns, I was put with seventy other Americans and Canadians in a hostel. Needless to say, we stuck out like sore thumbs. Luckily, I made friends with a girl from Toronto and every night we went out we told people we were Canadian, which was a fun sort of experiment.

So after a week being stuck in a tourist trap, I arrived at uni in Newcastle and soon realized I was the only American on my entire floor, and as far as I knew, there were only about ten Americans in all the dorms combined.

Initially I was terrified, but after a week of being there, I no longer felt like a complete outsider than was going to made fun of constantly.

Obviously people had a lot of questions about me being an American, but it was mostly curiosity and most of the stereotypes faded as time went on.

The overall impression I got from my Aussie friends was that as long as you don’t act like an arrogant, stereotypical American, people won’t treat you like one, it was pretty common sense.

However, this is not to say I didn’t experience any judgement or hate towards Americans. Most of the time I just got called a Yank, which was fine, cause it’s partially true. I never once got called a seppo, except for in a joking manner, and only when I was in a big American group did we get hollered or swore at, and it was very few times.

Towards the end my trip, my Aussie friends whom I was now very comfortable with, would randomly make comments about Americans we saw on the street or typical American dudes, but it was still much less threatening than I had imagined.

Although Australia is very Americanized in ways, their culture is completely different from ours and they often tend to think their way of doing things, saying things and views on everything are right, which is fair enough. (And I don’t disagree with much)

Watch this video: It pretty much sums up everything.

Top five things I got made fun of for being an American:

1. Words & Sayings: (I could go on for days, so here a few. Look at Oz slang tab for more)

• Using what’s up? instead of how ya going?
• Using what? instead of pardon?
• Aluminum vs. Aliminium…yeah I still don’t understand.
• Barbwire…Just say it to an aussie, I got made of fun of for it.
• Melbourne, its pronounced almost like Mel-bin, not Mel-born
• Toronto, drop the t, Tor-ono
• Pissed, just use mad otherwise people might actually think you’re drunk
• Wanker, again, drop the er, wanka, it ultimately just sounds silly when we say it.
• G’day, don’t bother.
• Heaps, why we don’t use it in American is unknown to me, but you’ll hear it in most conversations there.
• Tomato sauce, pronounced Tom-o-to, no ‘a’ its not ketchup.
• Its petrol, not gas.
• Thongs, as in flip flops, you get used to it.

2. Our ‘casual’ drug use: So maybe it’s because I grew up in a hippie town in Vermont, or maybe because pot is decriminalized in most states, or maybe because college in America is usually a big drug scene, but most of the aussies I met there saw any sort of drugs in a pretty negative light. (Not that it’s a bad thing) 420 isn’t really celebrated there, and I only met a few people who had ever ‘done pot.’ And yes, it was ‘doing pot’ not ‘smoking pot.’ Although I had a friend there who did ecstasy once and another friend admitted to trying acid and mushrooms, for the most part, nobody did any sort of drugs and for good reason. If caught with drugs, the penalties are much higher there than they are here and pot is no where near decriminalized. What I also found odd was that no one I met ever even experimented with prescription drugs like adderall. In college here, I’ve found that pot, ecstasy, coke, and even mushrooms and acid, are used pretty casually. Most of the students I know in America have tried at least one, if not more of these, and no one really thinks any different of them, not to mention the massive abuse of adderall and similar amphetamines here. Oh, and smoking cigarettes is not as common there. So long story short, American’s drug use is seen as somewhat frowned upon because kids in uni there never experienced drugs like many of us do.

3. The obvious stereotypes: loud, dumb, arrogant, ignorant, fat, lazy, slutty, and rude. Like I said before, I never directly got called any of these except for in a joking fashion, but that doesn’t mean I wasn’t asked about them. All the stereotypes listed have become so mainstream that most people find it hard to separate them from what is true, not to mention the media doesn’t help. I know many Americans who fit this stereotype in one way or the other, so its understandable why Aussies would wonder about their truth. Ultimately, it is in your best interest to try and breakdown and toss those stereotypes out the window whenever possible. When I left, my two best aussie friends told me how their views on Americans had changed after hanging out with a few of us yanks, which was awesome to hear. So be who you are, but as long as you don’t portray these stereotypes, you won’t be labeled as one.

Chaser’s War on Everything: (Australian TV Show)  Stereotypically Dumb/Stupid Americans

4. Our use of Z. Australian English doesn’t use Z, or zed I should say. Every z is replaced with either a ‘s’ or a ‘c’ and aussies don’t get why we use Z in our language. Fair enough, I’m not sure I completely understand why Australian English doesn’t use Z.

5. Our lack of drinking songs: In America we don’t really have any typical drinking songs, however, in Oz, they have heaps and they get chanted throughout corridors, on bus rides into town and anytime there’s a gathering of kids drinking. My favorite and most commonly known song went a bit like this: (Using my name, it be as if a group was yelling it while I was drinking)

“Here’s to lexis she’s true blue, she’s a piss pot thru and thru, she’s a bastard so they say, she tried to go to heaven but she went the other way, she went down!, down! down!”

Top questions I got asked as an American: (Will add more as my mind comes back)

1. Do you own a gun? Apparently many people think most Americans have a gun.

2. Do you really use those red cups at parties? Yup, I hardly saw a solo cup while I was there and no one really knows how to play beer pong.

3. Are the parties like they are in the movies? Apparently a lot of aussies wonder if Americans party like they do in the movies.

4. Why is our drinking age 21? I wish I knew.

5. How we dance. Okay, so maybe not a direct question, but when out at night, don’t expect to dance like you would in America, girls don’t dance on each other and grinding doesn’t really happen. You could literally be 3 feet away from your friend and it would be considered dancing with them.

6. Types of alcohol: In Australia, almost any mixed drink or spirit that you want, you can find already pre-mixed in a can or bottle. The word awesome comes to mind… However, in America, we don’t have anything even remotely similar to those and most of my Aussie friends didn’t understand why UDL’s or pre-mixed soco or jack weren’t available in the U.S. Also, most of our American beers aren’t served there. I never once saw a bud light, a mich ultra or any type of college beer we drink here. On the other hand though, Aussies couldn’t comprehend not having Toohey’s, VB, Carlton Dry or Hahn Super Dry.

Types of Beer on Draft in Sydney

7. Tipping: Aussies don’t really understand our concept of tipping. Fair Enough. Minimum wage in Oz is anywhere from something like $18/hr, whereas in America, waitresses make as little as $2.89/hr. Although the aussies I’ve met in America do tip, the people I met in Oz couldn’t fathom our low minimum wage or why we tip at all.

Ultimately as an American, I was treated really well and much better than I initially thought. As long as you don’t portray yourself as a stereotypical yank, you’re not treated as one. I’ve been told I was lucky to have such a great experience, but overall, everywhere I traveled and just about everyone I met was more curious about me being an American than concerned with me fitting the stereotype. From my experience, Aussies are outgoing and easy to talk with, they are no more judgmental than any American I’ve met, and nearly everyone I encountered was friendly, helpful and didn’t hate me purely because I was a yank.

Uni and O’week Commence This Week!

Tight and bright party, OWeek

While American college students are currently taking midterms and wondering where the first half of the semester has gone, uni in Australia has just begun it’s new academic year.

In the states, the academic year (usually) begins in August or September, breaks for the month of December, begins again in January and breaks for summer at the end of April or beginning of May.

However, in Australia, the academic year begins the very end of February, breaks from the end of June until the end of July and begins again until November, breaking for summer, from them until February.

The first week of uni is always difficult. Getting back into school after summer break is hard to get re-adjusted to, not only because it’s the start of new classes, a new schedule, or training your mind to get back into school-mode, but also because of O’Week.

O’Week or orientation week is something we have in America, but in no way compares to what happens in Australia. Due to the drinking age being 18 down under, the potential for parties and events during o’week is endless and doesn’t disappoint.

Upon arriving at my college last year, (called Edwards Hall or ‘Teds’), I was completely unaware for what I was in for during the next week. Once into my room that first afternoon, there were the typical papers, forms and notices. I had only been in Oz for a week, and it was my first day at uni, so everything was still new and exciting.

While unpacking and looking through the papers, I came across the booklet, “Teds Hall ’10, Edwards Hall Survival Guide.” The first few pages were full of expected information, facilities, tips, social life coordinators and RA information. Then I stumbled upon the ‘socialising page,’ which read:

“Our aim for 2010 is to make your social life as intoxicating and eventful as possible. Parties to look forward to include pimps and hos, graffiti, gender bender, and many, many more. Teds is known as the hardcore party college, we plan to maintain this status. Make sure that you make the most of college life and never miss a wednesday night– early morning classes are no excuse as teds is expected to represent on the dance floor and at the bar! Go hard or go home.”

Toga Party OWeek

Needless to say, it was something I had never found even close to similar in my American dorm, and probably never would. O’week consisted of a constant party. Buses were provided into town, a different theme party was held every day and every night and you were expected to participate.

That first night I still hardly knew anyone. Someone knocked at my door and when I opened it, my RA (who happened to live next door to me) was there and asked me if I wanted a shot. He proceeded to introduce me to everyone on our corridor, who were passing around goon bags dressed in hawaiian outfits.

In America, most students avoid there RA’s like the plague,  but in Australia, they are someone you want to party with.

That first week was unlike any week I had ever experienced in American college life, and have yet to upon returning. Granted, if I hadn’t lived in the dorms, it might not have been as eventful, but every night, whether on campus or in town, there was some party or something to do, and if you weren’t there, you were basically the only one.

So next time you think starting uni is difficult, imagine on top of all the stress, you had just experienced tropical night, a toga party, international night (at the bar on campus) pub crawl on student night, college night, and a tight ‘n’ bright party, within 5 days of beginning class.

So I say good luck to everyone starting uni in Oz this week, I can only imagine!

Hello world!

Welcome to my blog! I will post anything and everything I can think of or write about regarding American College Life and Uni Life in Australia, enjoy!