My 12-day tour in Sydney

Introduction: What do I want to learn from the tour?

 

This year Christmas and New Year’s break was really a different one for me.I can say my Christmas breaks are often dull. After having a few days of celebrations with my family and friends, I should be back to my boring tutorial jobs till the last day of holiday. In order to make my holiday break a different one, I decided to apply for the 2010 BAEP study tour.To be frank, before receiving the pre-tour learning aim sheet, I can say the only aim I could think of was solely: to broaden my horizons. (I like traveling so much as it is always a good way to learn, no matter different cultures and communication skills ) and of course: to have fun!

After completing the pre-departure study plan and learning aim, I had a more concrete idea about what did I really want to learn and achieve during the trip.Of course English learning and communication skills is one of the big target that I would like to accomplish.After the trip, I should be able to talk to English speakers without hesitation and also be more confident when speaking English. Besides, I would also like to understand more about the culture and values of the country.

SInce It is impossible to tell everything about my trip here therefore in the following parts of the journal, I have chosen those of which I think could reflect my learning aims most to write about.

English learning time on the flight

  

It was a eight hour long trip and I have watched two English movies on the flight: The Salt and Glee. And it was the first time that I watched English programmes without subtitles.

Glee is a musical comedy-drama television series. Although I realized that I missed out some of the dialogues, it didn’t affect much of my understanding of the drama since what I enjoyed and care most was the songs they sang! However, problems appeared when I watched the second one The Salt. After watching the whole movie, I thought I only understood 50% of the movie… From that time on, I promised myself to watch more English movies (without subtitles!!) and listen to English channels more often.

An embarrassing start: Oh! What happened to my listening skills?  

Before the trip, I was confident in my listening skills. I studied in an EMI school (English as Medium of Instruction School) so I am quite used to an English speaking environment. In the public examinations, listening is always my best part and I can always achieve satisfying results. However, despite the experience on the flight, the first few days in Sydney, when I was speaking to the locals(such as when I was asking for information, ordering food) I ALWAYS couldn’t listen to what they said clearly. ‘Pardon?’ was the word I said most =[…(sometimes when I was frustrated I would just ignored it) It makes me realize that to be a good listener, speed and accents count!

An unforgettable experience before the New Year

On the New Year ’s Eve was a free day for us to plan our own routine for the day. At first we were really not sure whether we should to go for the countdown since the routine on the previous days was so packed and it made us exhausted. “But It’s a precious chance to celebrate the New Year in a foreign country, we shouldn’t waste the chance!” one of my groupmates yelled. We all agreed and decided to go count down near the Sydney Harbour Bridge. We were told that in order to find a good seat near the Harbour Bridge, we should arrive there at around seven o’clock. However, since we didn’t check with the bus timetable of the day and all bus to the Circular Quay stopped at 6p.m, we could only get there by train! So it was already 8 when we arrived. It was really a tiring day.Yet, when I looked back for the whole trip, the countdown day was one of the days which I experienced and learnt the most, no matter as a language student or as an individual experience.

Misunderstanding 1: Six packs VS one pack 

Before settling down, we wanted to buy some alcoholic drink for the celebration.
At first we went to the convenience store (since it is easy for us to buy several kinds of beer and alcoholic drinks in HK’s ones we thought that the case was same here.) and of course we failed. Lastly, we found a bar which sells alcohol and we would like to buy 6 tins of beer.
A scene of misunderstanding happened:

We: Hello, can we have a pack of ‘Ice’?

Shopkeeper: What? You want six packs? (We thought it means 6 times 6 = 36tins)

We: Nonono, one pack only! (It costs 30 aus for a pack!!!)
Shopkeeper: OK. (and he took out a tin of it)

We: No, we would like six of it…
Shopkeeper: Oh!! You mean you want a six packs!

At the moment we finally understood there were some misunderstandings with the use of the quantifier ‘pack’ between us. We thought that a pack equals to six tins and in fact it is called a six packs! This is not matter of cultural difference, just that we are not aware with the simple words around us in our everyday lives.

The two fireworks

 

At nine o’clock sharp, there was a five minutes firework ! We all wondered why there was a firework at nine. It was not a big scale one so we guessed it was a rehearsal.When we were waiting for the ‘real’ fireworks under a tree, three guys approached us (we were not sure about their nationalities).We asked them to have a guess of our nationalities, one of them said Japanese and the other one said Korean. What we concluded was that Asian all looked similar in foreigners’ eyes. It’s never easy for them to distinguish Chinese, Korean and Japanese. They said that they thought we were Korean in the first place since there are so many Korean in Sydney. As they said they have been living in Sydney for many years, we quickly asked them the reason of the 9 pm firework. “Oh, the 9pm one is for the kids! So that they can also watch the fireworks and then go home to sleep!” They answered. The government is quite attentive to the citizens! Since we were protective that we didn’t give our contact number to the strangers, I think it is always good to talk with more people when we are travelling. The more we communicate with different people, the more we can know about the culture of a place better! 

We waited from 8 pm till 12 pm...

The three guys we met told us that it is indeed illegal to drink alcohol in public area in Australia. So, we immediately wrap our drinks up with paper bags!

A long long way to school

What will you do if you get lost in a place that you are totally unfamiliar with? If I get lost in Hong Kong, I will never feel worried since the transportation in HK in so convenient, there are always numerous ways to go home no matter what time it is. However, the place that I got lost this time was Sydney!! At 11:30 p.m. which was the last 30 minutes before the firework, the place we were at was fully occupied by thousands of people(maybe even more), all the people at the back pushed forward in order to give themselves a better viewpoint. At first we (eight people) were standing close to each other, when the countdown started, the situation became out of control and we were being separated. I and Icey were still with each other and the rest of them were in a few metres away. At first we were not worried as we thought we could get back to each other afterwards. However, when the fireworks finished we finally realized that it was impossible to get to the way you want! So, I and Icey are being pushed to walk upward which was in the opposite direction of our other groupmates’ location. When we finally stopped at a street, we knew that it was impossible for us to find our other groupmates. So, what could we do? We did not have a mobile phone, a map or even enough money to catch a taxi (Since we were advised not to bring much money in such a day)! So, what we could do was keep walking ( at least we knew the direction towards school) and keep asking people for directions. I thought we had at least approached 15 people for directions on the day. At first we were not very successful in it since we asked people to show us the way to Wesley College. We soon found out that we should be asking for Sydney University instead ( What we were doing is just as silly as asking people how to get to the Fong Yun-Wah Building of CityU…) After two and a half hour, we were finally back to the college safely. Although getting lost is not a pleasant experience, I think I have learnt a great lesson. Getting lost will never be something that worries me anymore! As long as you are willing to ask and to be brave enough (and of course it is needed to be careful as well!), there are always different ways to solve problems.

Free time in Bondi Beach: another language learning time!!
 

Although I really enjoyed visiting different places that were planned by our lovely community members, I also treasure the free time since we could explore the town by ourselves. On 2^nd January, after visiting the Bondi Market, we went to a coffee shop nearby to try some coffee. (I learnt that Australian is highly proud of their coffee so I was so eager to try it as a coffee lover.) Other than tasting some good coffee, I also learnt something new at the shop:

‘Hi! I would like two latte, tall size please.’

Apple added: ‘hot coffee please.’

‘Do you mean you want extra hot?’

‘No, thanks!’

‘Because people only say so if they want extra hot..’ he added.

In Hong Kong, when we are ordering drink, ‘hot or cold?’ is a question that we will be asked very often. Therefore it is the reason that we said we would like to have ‘hot coffee’. So, next time, we will remember not to add ‘hot’ for hot drinks in Australia!

Time to speak English! Nice chat with a Aussie student

At night time, when I and Icey were sitting on the sofa outside our room having some fruit that we bought from the supermarket, a charming boy walked pass by and talked to us. He said he was boring so he sat down and we chatted for a while. It was the first time in the trip that I spoke English constantly ! At the first five minutes I was so nervous that I felt like forgetting how to speak English properly (what a shame as a student majoring English=P). His name is Alan and came to SydneyU from Melbourne. At first we were merely talking about some casual stuff and told him that there was a rat in the common room in the previous day. He laughed at us immediately and told us that was not a rat but a possum! He said its size is bigger than a rat but it won’t attack human normally, just that they are not those very nice animals like rabbits.

This is a photo of possum that I found from the Internet. I think it is not as horrible as rats but looks a bit like rats actually…

And then suddenly he switched the channel to academic topics and said, ‘I know that you guys are studying English so I am telling you these...'

He said that Australians like using abbreviations when talking very much and he gave us an example that he used often. When someone says ‘How are use?’ actually means ‘How are you guys?’ But he reminded us that it is actually not proper English but colloquial English instead. 

Besides learning about Australian English from Alan, actually we had also learnt some of it from our speakers of the three seminars. Some interesting abbreviations that I remembered included:

‘Sheila’= pretty girls

‘Bloke’= guy, man

‘She’s a great sort’= She’s great/ pretty 

Conclusion: Were all my learning aims fulfilled?

Look back on the whole trip,I can say that the language learning aim was met quite successfully. Of course, I never expect my English to be improved greatly and gain any notable improvement in such a short trip. For me, the most important thing is the chance to speak English in real life context as well as the process of communication ! In Hong Kong, students really have very limited chances to practice their oral English especially with English speakers. Therefore their oral English are often weak (it is my weakest part as well!). At the end of the trip when I was communicating with the foreigners, I sometimes still couldn’t understand 100% of what they said due to their accents and speed. However, I was not afraid to speak to them anymore and ask for clarification whenever I encountered problems. 

How about the aims to distinguish cultural differences and to learn about the values behind? I think I was learning and experiencing the culture of Australia everyday though the different visits! At the Sydney Museum and Taronga Zoo, I was introduced to the different creatures of the land. In the Hunter Valley, I had experienced the drinking culture of Australia...Even when we were exploring the down by ourselves, we were able to understand more about the culture of the city.

Thanks for the information at the zoo, I finally know the difference between Kangaroos and wallabies.

Sometimes there wasn't enough time to look at everything in detail, I would take a photo of it immediately so that I won't miss anything that I am interested in!

Thanks to my groupmates, we got  along very well in the whole trip, it was fun to plan a day together(although sometimes we made different mistakes!).