Valete, Margaret River, and Halloween

A few weekends ago, Tommy celebrated its students who have been living at the college for 2 or more years, and who are leaving the college at the end of the year. Valete, which is Latin for "farewell", is the last annual formal dinner held at Tommy. So for the last time, everyone gets to dress up and shine their dancing shoes in order to celebrate and send off the departing Valete students. This year, Tommy celebrated 28 students, 2 of which included Max and Erin, two of my best Aussie friends.

Erin, me, and Max

Valete was another amazing night; it started off with Mass which honored each of the kids who would be leaving Tommy. It should come as no surprise that I started crying when I saw all the people leaving--so many of them are people I'm lucky to be able to call my good friends, and even though I won't be here next year, the thought of Tommy without them is pretty unbearable. I think the realization that Tommy will never be the same place for me after this semester really hit me at Valete mass, which is bittersweet. Selfishly, I want this place to stay frozen in time so that I can come back and visit whenever, and have everything be the same so that I don't ever have to really say goodbye.
Sad thoughts aside, after mass we had a cocktail hour, formal dinner, and then an afterparty (all at Tommy!). Dinner was wonderful (and delicious) and the time was passed with speeches from different Tommy employees who spoke about all of the Valetes. One of the most popular valetes of the night was Pauline Ibbs, Tommy's Rector who is retiring after working here for 17 years. So she had quite a send off along with all of the Tommy valete students.

Pauline! 

The best part of Valete was the afterparty. It was the first time that Tommy has hosted an official party on campus, and it was a BLAST. Honestly one of the best nights I've had here so far--I think what made it so fun was that every single person there was one of my friends, and it was all about good company, good times, and goon (the cheap boxed wine everyone drinks here). To quote my friend Kevin, "Goon Times" pretty much summarizes the night.
Here are a few pictures from Valete!

Julien and I!

Unintentionally matched color palettes

Erin and I 

My good friend Ben! 

Valete Dinner! and Kim :) 

Valete Dinner Date <3 

My friends Blade and Kurt at the Valete after party

Valete after party!

Me, Nugget (I'm not kidding), and Erica :) 

My favorite boys Gangnam-Styling like professionals

Erin, Max, and I!

All in all, VALETE WAS AWESOME.


The day after Valete, I was lucky enough to go down south for the rest of the weekend with Erica, Alanna, and two of my Aussie friends, Sam and Amber Cochrane (the best brother and sister pair ever who both live with me at Tommy!). Sam and Amber live about a half hour from Margaret River, so I was able to spend the weekend with their family and get some much needed R&R and family time!
The second we got to their house, I couldn't stop hugging their amazing mom ("Mum" in Australian) because I needed to get enough Mommy hugs to hold me over until I get back to the US!
The Cochrane family took us on a tour of the area, where we went wine tasting, cheese tasting, chocolate and fudge tasting, and to various beaches in the area. It was so so so much fun!!! Margaret River is an incredibly beautiful area, and I'm so happy I was able to go and see it!

Breathtaking

So beautiful! I love this one

Me, Amber, Sam, and Alanna

Panorama

Vineyards!

Wine Tasting!

Wine Tasting!

Leave it to me to find a wedding..

The Busselton Jetty -- the longest jetty in the southern hemisphere (reaching 2 km out to sea)

Busselton Jetty

After a long, incredible, and exhausting day of being full-on tourists, we went home, had a homemade dinner, and all cuddled on the couch in our PJ's where we ate cake and watched Toy Story :) It was the perfect day!

The next morning, the Cochranes took us out on their boat to go dolphin watching! While we were on the boat, we saw dozens of pods of dolphins, and they were so beautiful! I see dolphins all the time at home in Virginia, but getting so close to them in the boat was really exciting; they would swim right up to us! It was another amazing day :)

Sam and Mojo!

View of Bunbury, WA

Bunbury lighthouse

Our trip down south was another amazing weekend, very well spent. Thanks so the Cochrane family, we were all able to get our family-fix and enjoy time at home with them. It was wonderful, and just what the doctor ordered! 

Lastly, I need to tell you all about Halloween. Halloween is not a big holiday in Australia, so when all the Americans started making Halloween plans over a month ago,  the Aussies were a bit confused. When we realized Halloween wasn't really celebrated, we went to work, and some of the amazing people at Tommy organized a Halloween party for residents to attend before going to our favorite bar down the street, called Captain Stirlings ("Cap S"). The Aussies got really into Halloween, now that they had a reasonable excuse to celebrate it. It was a blast! Me and my group of friends dressed up as "Party Animals"; we were each a different animal with various party decorations all over (ribbons, noise makers, bubbles, glitter, party bags, that sort of thing). So it was pretty punny...Get it?! I was a teddy bear, Erica was a cat, Alanna a lion, Max, Erin, and Kate were zebras, Ben was an owl, Glenda a koala, and Leon was a kangaroo.

Anyways, Halloween was a ton of fun. Tommy set up a haunted house, organized a pumpkin carving contest (my team definitely won), had kids go bobbing for apples, etc. Here are a few pictures of us from the night! 

The "Party Animal" Family

Kevin and I (Squints from The Sandlot)

Max and I

Erica, Ben (SCARY), and I

Omar and I! How good is his face paint?! 

A very cuddly teddy bear and a very cute kitty

It was another amazing week!!! Now I'm headed off for a 5 day road trip up north, all the way to Exmouth. I'm going with a group of about 12 people, but I'm in a car of 5 (me, Erica, Alanna, Max, and Ben). It's going to be an amazing trip--I'm so excited to see this part of Australia! I've heard nothing but good things, its supposed to be absolutely beautiful. We'll be camping along the way, going cliff jumping, snorkeling, swimming, you name it. Its going to be an incredible few days, and I can't wait to tell you all about it!! 

Talk to you in a few days :) 

Cheers, 

Becca

Parklife and Tommy Ball

For those who know me, you know that I spend all of my money going to shows in Boston, that I have a set list collection, and that I spend way too much time downloading (completely legal) music. That being said, when I saw a poster advertising a music festival here (its called Parklife) on my very first day in Australia, I knew I would be going. Lo and behold, I bought tickets for the fest a few weeks later and I went with Erica and my aussie friends Erin, Katelin, and Anna on October 1st. 

We wrote our set lists on our arms so that we wouldn't miss a second of the shows we wanted to see! :) 

Parklife was a BLAST. The lineup was incredible, and I was seeing a lot of the acts for the 2nd time-- they were all just as good the second time around. My favorite act of the day was Nero, who's set was absolutely mindblowing. You could feel their synth beats pulsating through the field we were in, and between the light show, the music, and their overall performance, they did an incredible job. Passion Pit was great as well, especially when they fired confetti into the air while playing "Sleepyhead", which didn't happen the first time I saw them back in Virginia. Robyn was once again phenomenal, her dance moves are stellar and for an older woman with kids who was able to make a comeback from the 90s? Well, I'll just say she's awesome and she has my utmost respect. She also still looks like an elf. 

Here's the Parklife lineup for those who are curious and so everyone can be jealous: 

While I was at Parklife, one of the craziest things happened. To give a bit of background, in Virginia I was a member of the Virginia Childrens' Chorus (VCC) for 5 years (5th through 10th grade). VCC performed in the annual Virginia Arts Festival, which included the Virginia International Tattoo, which was a massive show in our hometown arena that featured artists from around the world, all in the one show. Anyways, I sang in the Tattoo for 2 years. While in the Tattoo, I met a group of Australian guys who were in a bagpiping band from Scotch College, a school here in Perth. I fell out of touch with almost everyone after the show ended, but I remembered that they were from Perth when I was applying to study here. Needless to say, I didn't think I would see any of them while I was here--I was wrong!!
While at Parklife, I was walking from one stage to another in between acts, and I looked up and saw a familiar face--I leaned into my friend Anna and said I recognized a guy standing in front of us as one of the boys I met 5 years ago at the Tattoo, and I couldnt decide whether to go up and say something incase he didn't remember me (I also didn't want to completely freak him out or come off as a psycho stalker...) but Anna walked right up to him, asked if he remembered me (he did, thank God) and we hugged over and over again while freaking out over the odds of us running into each other! Imagine that, seeing someone you met 5 years ago, on the other side of the planet, at a music festival with thousands of people. Its just so crazy! 

Hugh and I at Tattoo 5 years ago, and at Parklife! What a crazy reunion!

After the festival ended, we were all completely exhausted, covered in dirt and mud, and riding a music high. The day was unreal between all of the acts we saw, I could not have had more fun! Here are a few more pictures of the festival :) 

Anna and I 

Katelin, Erin, and I!

Nero

Robyn!

Robyn!

 The weekend following Parklife, I went to the St. Thomas More College Ball -- the most formal event at Tommy! It was SO fun seeing everyone all dressed up, and we had the most wonderful time together. The Ball was at the University Club, a short walk over on UWA's campus across the street. After a cocktail hour and a 3 course dinner, everyone hit the dance floor where we stayed until the night ended. Between dancing "Gangnam Style" and a conga line that ran around the dance floor for a solid 5 minutes too long, everyone had the best time. The open bar probably didn't hurt either. 
Here are a few pictures of us from the ball! 

Me and my good friend Glenda, from Italy! :) 

Anna and I

Dinner menu

Still too tall 

Giselle and Jeff (from Notre Dame) and Erica!

Erica and I had to take advantage of the professional photographer that was there....

That's all I have for now, it's been another amazing couple of weeks! I'll try to put another post together next week so that I can tell you about Tommy Valete (our last formal dinner/graduation type of deal) and about my weekend trip down south to Margaret River! Now I should probably get to doing my homework, since I actually have some this week....Sometimes I forget that I'm here for school. Hahaha oops! :) 

I have another 34 days here, and I don't think I'll ever be able to leave. 

What an amazing time I'm having, I'm so lucky!

Til next time
Cheers, 
Becca :)