Back to School, Back to School...

The first week of class gave me a strange feeling as to how things are done in Australia. On the slate this semester: TV Broadcasting (similar to a class I’ve already taken), Sport Literature and the Media, Sport and Leisure Law and Aborigines, History and Colonialism. Oddly enough, the class dealing with my major is the one that will count the least towards my degrees (minors anyway).

This semester brings a great opportunity to produce a package in TV Broadcasting class. It’s nothing I haven’t already done, but at the same time it will be one of my harder classes simply because I have to figure out how to do my entire information gathering process. Trying to find story ideas is my biggest challenge at the moment because their major newspaper, The Advertiser, is, from what I’ve been told by basically everyone (including journalism instructors), a very unreliable, somewhat biased and overall “lazy” newspaper – apparently many of their writers are very good at reading press releases.

The overall class goals don’t really worry me, considering I’ve already done a few packages in my day for sports and news. We even have an assistant, Evan, who runs the editing lab. He will shoot our video as well as edit it – we just provide the script. It makes me glad that I’ve been through the Ohio University journalism department, hauling around my own camera to get interviews and shoot my own stories. Hopefully this class is cake because of it. Also makes me wonder what an Australian broadcast student studying in the U.S. might think upon taking OUR class…

Sport Literature and the Media will involve minimal work since our major assignments are just to read sports stories and be able to comment on both the subject and the way they are written. This should be a great way for me to learn a little about their sporting culture. Two presentations during the class and a few other small assignments, including keeping a journal throughout the course of the semester.

Sport and Leisure Law was the most interesting of my first classes. To start, my professor showed up late. Then half the class wasn’t present because the didn’t get the memo about a last-minute classroom switch to accompany more students in the class. The professor, Rick Sarre, is a really nice guy who talks fast from apparently being very excited to teach what he does – a good thing from a student’s perspective. He sent two students over to get the other half of the class who was in the wrong building and offered to buy them coffee after class just for volunteering.

After going through a list of study programs and having people raise their hands, he figured out that Sara and I didn’t ever raise ours. This led to that immediate pointing-out of the American kids in the class – not that it’s embarrassing, it just happens ALL the time. Prof. Sarre welcomed us and asked us to stay after class so we could have coffee with the other two aforementioned students. He plopped down 15 bucks for us all to get to know each other and learn a little bit about each other. He said the decision came mainly on the fact that he received similar treatment upon showing up to study in Iowa during an earlier stage in his life. Prof. Sarre also knows where Athens, Ohio is – he has a friend that teaches at Ohio University – and said he visited awhile back. He jumped up my favorites list pretty quick after Day 1.

My Wednesdays are busiest because I have two classes – Sport Law in the morning and Aborigines, History and Colonialism in the afternoon. The instructor for the latter class is really weird, but the class should be pretty interesting overall. There are a few older people in the class who remember all the stuff that has happened between the government and the aboriginal tribes over the past five or six decades, so I’m sure as students they’ll offer a neat perspective.

That is one thing about classes here – no matter what time the class meets, there seems to be a few older people (called “non-traditional students” in America) that are also in the class, studying right alongside everyone else. It’s only a bad thing when they try to take over the class, which was the case on the first day of the history course. They lived through it so they feel like their perspective is the one that matters, instead of just letting the teacher teach.

I also feel like I’m “seeing the future” of America in my classes – but don’t take those words in their very literal sense. In Adelaide, there is a large amount of the population that is non-white – a lot of people (students especially) from Asian countries and quite a few students from India as well. They come to places like Australia because it’s relatively affordable and there might not be as many good universities in their home countries. It’s for reasons like these that I’m glad to be an American, born into a country where I really don’t have to be overly worried about those types of things. “Lucky” and “fortunate” are a couple good words to use here.

Soon in the U.S. the former majority – those with white skin – will become the minority, numbers-wise, to groups like those of Latin American descent. It’s not a bad thing, just a different thing. It’s something that will take a lot of adjustment for everyone. But for those who think Spanish will soon be the only language spoken in the United States, you won’t be correct if the Australia is a model. The country still gets along just fine using English as the spoken language – though it may be due to the languages being more distributed in Australia – having all different Asian languages, while most Latinos in America possess a native tongue that is a dialect close to Spanish.

So that was my first week and everything that came with it. Looking a little farther down the road, it looks like there is a pretty good chance that I will be able to finish my final exams – a package (TV class), presentation (Sport Lit.), written exam (Sport Law) or final essay (History) – before the actual dates of the exams (which aren’t made final until October). Sara and I are trying to move things around with instructors, so there’s a possibility I could be back to the U.S. in early November. It would be nice to actually get a break from classes and it’d be a better decision financially because I have to pay for housing food and everything else while I’m here. Therefore, keep your fingers crossed.

Sara and I traveled to Perth this past weekend, seeing all the tourist sights there, like King’s Park and Botanical Garden (though it started raining, so we didn’t see much of those), Rottnest Island (where we rented bikes and rode around all day) and the Wave Rock – a really cool natural landmark where a river carved a huge rock into a shape like a wave.



We swam in the Indian Ocean at Rottnest. The water was freezing, but we knew there probably wouldn’t be much of a chance that we’d get to swim in the Indian Ocean again, unless something brought us back to Perth or Southeast Asia, for whatever reason. I forgot my trunks, so I had to go in regular shorts, which was OK, but that basically showed how unprepared for this trip.



We forgot to bring plenty of towels. We didn’t bring much soap or shampoo either. Which didn’t matter a whole lot because we also forgot flip flops to wear in the shower and I wasn’t about to go walking around in this hostel without shoes on. Underground Backpackers in Perth was basically Perth’s version of Ohio University’s Washington Hall, except “Wasted Washington” actually got cleaned more than once every two weeks.

The whole thing got off to a bad start when we showed up at the front desk Thursday night and the private double room we booked was not available. Even though we had it booked for weeks, they gave away all the private rooms. So we had to stay in separate dormitory rooms with complete strangers and we could get our private room the next morning for the remaining three nights. FAN-tastic.

I had a room with three Irish guys. We were pretty beat at that point in the night, so we just did what we had to do and went to bed, hoping to wake up early in the morning to 1) get started with our day’s plans of sight-seeing and 2) get into a private room. The worst part was that we were charged the full price for a dorm room, even though that wasn’t what we booked.

The night before we left, however, I went down and got it all straightened out with the front desk. The guy was really nice about it and though he didn’t have the power to give us a full refund, he called someone who did – and he called that person at 11 o-clock p.m. I was really glad that guy was helpful because if he was as ridiculous as the guy who checked us in (and gave away our room), I probably would have flipped out.

We got the first night’s rent back - $50 apiece, in cash. Which was a great thing because of another great planning fiasco – we didn’t carry enough money. While credit cards are OK, each transaction carries with it a foreign currency exchange fee, so we try to stick to bank cards as much as possible. I have a banking account here, but I needed to put more money in my savings account so I could use it (at the ATM or wherever Visa is accepted). But when I went to connect to the internet banking website, the site was down for whatever repairs they had to do.

This was a big problem considering we were leaving Perth at 6:45 Monday morning and needed some cash to buy bus tickets. The refund from our first night made that possible. I have another bank card that I can use at the ATM, but it doesn’t have sufficient funds. I tried to reload it before leaving Adelaide – apparently you have to leave four business days for that to be sure to happen. I didn’t leave four business days and, therefore, didn’t have any available money.

In fact, upon returning to Adelaide, I checked out my balances. In my Bank SA student account, I had 83 cents. It’s no wonder the ATM wouldn’t let me take out $20. Perth was a pretty good trip overall

Notes:
+Australia is becoming one of my favorite countries for different reasons. One is the 3rd degree of separation from the Cleveland Browns. You see, when I hear AC/DC songs, I think of the Browns and the upcoming season. AC/DC is a 1970s rock group from Australia. Therefore, Australia=The Browns. Yet there is only one Browns Backers group in Australia, located in Perth.

+I learned a little “cocktail knowledge” from Jess Morgan before I left for Perth. The city is the spot on the earth that is directly opposite from Athens, Ohio. So if you really started digging towards Australia, you’d probably end up in the Indian Ocean, which wouldn’t be too bad I guess.

+I’ve been in Australia for just over a month now and I’m still not used to carrying around a lot of coins. Just as a refresher – the country has no paper money under $5, so the change below that amount is given in coins. I actually had to think twice about putting my legs up the other day because I had a ton of coins in my pocket. Luckily, my legs don’t need much stretching, considering I’m not a tall person.

+Check out my facebook profile to see the albums of pictures as they accumulate during our different trips around Australia and the surrounding places. Feel free to comment on this blog or on the pictures.

That’s it for now. Love you all in the states, check back soon to see how my job search has gone in the past few weeks and see whether I have a job yet.

From the other side of the globe, I’m Kevin Hunt.

If you want to see me soon, start digging.

What's Now?? "Touch Football"

Hopefully you did your homework before reading this blog entry. I said you should watch the “Who’s Now” segment of ESPN’s SportsCenter because, well, they copied an idea that was originally started by Luke Florence, Sara Normand and me.

It all began with a blank 64-team bracket that was printed on a dry erase marker board. Sara gave it to me for some reason because she had no need for it and, quite honestly, I didn’t really either. But I took it because I hold things for much too long, adding this to the latest pile of unused junk that sat around Bromley Hall room 310. This board, however, sparked what would be one of the most ridiculous things I’ve even been a part of.

After March Madness 2006 passed, I pulled the bracket out and began thinking of some crazy match-ups that could be seen in real life. The movie “King Kong” had just come out and Papa John’s had the King Kong pizza. Luke and I ordered it for dinner one night and I came up with one of my trademark stupid lines – something to the effect of, “I’m pretty sure King Kong would be a #1 seed in any tournament.”

And so the “F’d Up Tourney” started. Luke, Sara and I filled the 64-space bracket with the most odd-balled and random match-ups of things in our lives...


**It might be easier to right-click the image and view it on its own**

The scoring system was based on simple coin flips, yet was very elaborate and depended on the round of the tournament. The higher seed in the match-up was awarded the tails side of the coin (a quarter that we deemed the “official” quarter of the F’d Up Tourney) and had to win a certain number of the coin flips. For example, in the first round the #1 seed had to win just one (I believe) coin flip out of 10 in order to advance. In the second round, the higher seeds had to win more (you get the point).

This scoring system didn’t lend its hand to an amazing amount of upsets in the first round, but subsequent rounds provided a lot of excitement. Unfortunately, I do not have the updated bracket with me here in Australia to share with the rest of the world. Suffice it to say that we created a bracket-style tournament that pitted random people (as well as things and ideas) against each other after having subjectively seeded them.

The most disappointing thing about the F’D Up Tourney is that, to this day, it isn’t finished. We didn’t complete it due to disagreements between people and places and things and nonsense, basically. As with any bracket, we put money on the whole thing, something like five dollars apiece between the three of us (though we never officially put anything in). The third member of Bromley 310 (besides Luke and me) was Matt Barnes and he hated the whole game that we eventually made into a Thursday night tradition (which is why Barnes is a 10-seed). Watch “The O.C.” then grab our brackets and start flipping.

The weeks listed on the bracket were supposed to be the weeks when we completed that round of the bracket, but it never ended up this way. We almost always flipped the coin way before we were supposed to. It was hilarious to sit there and talk about the made-up match-ups. Lesbians made a huge run in the tournament after having upset Gus Johnson in the first round. Keith Cawley was having a nice tournament as a 4-seed. If memory serves me right, The Browns won more in this tournament then they did the whole 2006 regular season.

I probably never laughed so hard that Spring Quarter as I did when we flipped for the F’d Up Tourney. It was a topic of discussion usually once a day. And the best part was that it was completely fictional – it had no bearing on anything. For this same reason, though, ESPN should NOT be making money off such a ridiculous segment. I know it’s a tough time of the year to be searching for good sports stories, but this is a nationally-based channel, so surely there must be a good story somewhere in the U.S.

It doesn’t really matter because we came up with it first – in the Spring of 2006. Completely fictional, yet an amazing way to spend time instead of the same old TV shows or staring at computers screens. My next life goal is to finally achieve a life goal – basically to actually go through on a good idea that makes its way to the top. Had Luke, Sara and I presented the idea to ESPN, we would have been laughed at (probably), but then they might have had a second look. So the moral of the blog is: no new idea is too stupid, it’s just different.

The moral of the next story is: try to find out what you’re getting into before taking it on.

Part of our foreign exchange student orientation at UniSA was an open house of different clubs and groups associated with the university, as well as area banks, meeting in one place to present what they have to offer to the students. One table held the spot for university recreational groups and I picked up a flier about “Touch Football.” As I described in a previous blog, Australia has three types of football: Aussie Rules Football (“footy”), rugby and soccer.

Take note that none of those is American Football. The guy manning the table, however, said that it was “football” and not “footy.” So I decided I’d check it out because I figured it would be a great way to eat up time while also keeping myself somewhat active and meeting new people. After figuring out a new bus route, I showed up for the Wednesday night league ready to play some football.

Of course, the guy was right. What I saw being played was not “footy” at all; it was “football.” Glorious “football.” In America, though, it’s called rugby. I stared blankly at one of the many matches going on at the park, trying to pull in everything I did not already know about rugby from having watched it on TV. I met up with the representative whom I had e-mailed earlier in the day and, lucky for me for my first game, they were going to be short in the numbers of guys that night, so I would get to play.

I wasn’t scared because I really had nothing to prove to anyone. I admittedly had no clue what was going on and just tried to understand everything I could from what my newly acquired teammates had to tell me. The worst was what one ‘mate, Megan, told me: “The rules are the easy part. It’s the strategy that’s really hard to pick up on.” When do I go in, Coach?? First, I needed a team shirt, which was provided to me as just being one of the extras in the team bag. I unfolded it to find the number 69 across the back. It might as well have said, “Please laugh at me more than you already are. Much Appreciated... Kevin.”



Thankfully, there were enough people there so I didn’t have to start the game. It was an upbeat and competitive atmosphere for a touch game, which I loved immediately. I got to soak up some more little tactics as told to me by some others who were on the sidelines beside me. When I got my chance to replace someone on the field, I was terrible. Dropped balls, bad passes, missed formations. The hardest part was keeping myself from moving forward because when I see a ball that I think I can intercept, I want to go get it. But the defense in rugby is mostly “zone,” so my running ahead made for a huge gap.

For those who aren’t familiar with rugby, the ball cannot be passed forward (it can be kicked forward, but that does not apply for this league). So being a receiver in my bygone days of high school football, though well in the past, must be sticking with me. I probably ran forward without the ball more than I ran backward to try and receive it.

After the teams ended in a 2-2 tie, everyone on the UniSA team got in a circle and talked about things that could have been done better/differently. I tried to take in as much as I could, attempting to sort out all the little things I learned throughout the course of the game. I was also told that, as usually happens with first-time players, I didn’t look completely lost for the whole time I was out there. Props to me, I guess. I really had no clue as to how well I performed, so it was nice to know that I didn’t completely stink. We have this Wednesday off, so I’ll bring you an update of my progression after the next match on August 1.

I keep a small notebook with me most of the time in case I come up with a random thought or encounter a situation that about which I want to remember to write. I want to get rid of some of these, so I’ll start putting the “non-stories” into my Notes section.

Notes:
+I’ve been asked why I’m quiet by fellow students and friends Sameer and Sohair. Their rationale?? Most Americans they’ve met were loud or, at least, talkative. I guess I’m not American by those standards. Maybe it’s because I’m shorter than the average American (by 3 inches). I usually like to think that I speak with my actions, in which case I would be overwhelmingly American: I eat too much fast food, I constantly have to get something done and I love apple pie and baseball.

+The pictures in my albums on facebook don’t lie – my hair hasn’t really grown at all since I came here. Either I’m in the early stages of balding (my downward spiral towards becoming George Costanza) or there’s just something in the water. But I’m not complaining because a haircut here probably costs 20 bucks. If that’s the case and my hair actually does get too long, I’ll probably just shave it off. Stay tuned.

+My cell phone doesn’t work here, so I usually keep my wristwatch on my book bag because I hate wearing watches – I like my arms to weigh the same (thanks Mitch Hedberg; rest in peace). But I noticed that based solely on my having a stopwatch, I started to time the most ridiculous things, like how long it takes for the crosswalk sign to go from one side to the other. The legitimate things I timed, such as how long it takes for the bus to go from our suburb to the city, really didn’t need the milliseconds attached. That, however, isn’t the point. The point is, I have the ability to get it exact and that’s precisely what I’m going to do. If you don’t follow into such a pattern, just consider me weird. It wouldn’t be the first time, so I don’t take offense or anything, I’m way past that stage.

That’s it for now. Love you all in the states, check back soon to find out how the first week of classes went for me.

From the other side of the globe, I’m Kevin Hunt.

If you want to see me soon, start digging.

The Who

I’ve never been more excited about moving to a new place than I was to get into my current abode. That’s right, more so than getting out of Riverpark (but not by much). Living in the hostel in the city wasn’t bad, but it’s so much nicer to have the space that I have in this place. For starters, I don’t need to go outside to get internet access. And right now, I’m sitting at a desk, something I took for granted until I didn’t have that privilege. There’s a couch, in front of “Pay TV” (cable television) that includes ESPN. It’s great being here.

Contrary to expectations I listed at the end of my last post, learning the bus system hasn’t been as difficult as I thought. All the route maps and stop times are listed online. I even managed to find my way to a park outside the city through a bus transfer – arriving at the destination on time to play some touch football with a university team. I’ll get to that later...

The more I dissect it, the more I love the idea of bus systems. It’s nice here because students get a discount. Multi-trip tickets cost $9.10 and allow for 10 two-hour trips – so you can ride anywhere you want as long as your ticket is punched before that two-hour limit is up. So theoretically I could ride to a place two hours away and it would only cost me 91 cents ($9.10 divided by 10 trips for the non-math majors). And the buses advertise that they’re better for the environment because they operate using natural gas. Sounds like a huge win on my part.

There’s a bus stop basically right outside the house, the tickets are sold at a TON of locations, there are a few services that run late on Saturday nights and I haven’t had a ticket malfunction (yet). All in all, good experience there.

My next experience of which to speak is orientation. I didn’t skip any of the freshman orientation stuff at OU and I paid for it. Long, boring speeches and few other things that really mattered. If nothing else, that helped me realize that giving out a schedule of orientation events shouldn’t be seen as “necessary things to do,” but rather “here’s the menu... find what you want and show up.” So I haven’t exactly attended every session here. I mean, how many times do I need the “this is what college is” type of stuff. We got what we needed and got out of there.

Meeting people, however, was a different story. There is a nice program here called “The Exchange Society” that consists of a group of Australian UniSA students that help out the foreign exchange students by organizing events where they can all meet together and enjoy a good time. It helps that these students know the best drink specials around town ($6 champagne bottle night, for example) and the better places for students to see movies. And they do all the advertising and organizing for it, we just have to show up. A beautiful service.

The Exchange Society helped me meet a Canadian, a few Germans, a couple from England and even some guys from San Diego. Plus, I met the Frank twins’ twins. Not really, but Sameer and Sohair are from the United Arab Emirates and remind me in many ways of Kris and Nic. Some of us met up for a bowling night to celebrate the birthday of Breelyn, the girl from Canada – an opportunity only afforded by meeting people in the same boat as each other. These are most of the people you’ll find in my photo albums on facebook. It might sound corny, but coming here has already allowed us to learn about some aspects of a bunch of different countries – not just Australia – which is pretty cool.

And those are just the exchange group students that we met, still leaving an introduction for the housemates from Malaysia. This includes the landlady and the four psychologists and a business major living in the same housing complex as us. On our first night here, we kept dinner simple – a large from Pizza Hut. The second night we were invited to join the landlady (who lives in a bedroom right down the hall) and the other housemates for dinner at a Chinese restaurant. It was a great way to get to know everybody and introduce ourselves formally, as opposed to me randomly showing up in the kitchen to grab a glass of water and having to meet people that way.

As soon as we sat down at the restaurant, terror struck – only chopsticks were on the table, no forks. It was obviously going to be a challenge to eat and I wasn’t shy to let everyone know that the entertainment at the table for the night would be watching me try to feed myself. Even though forks WERE available, I was going to be stubborn and wanted to try to go the whole meal without using one.

It wasn’t as hard as I thought it’d be, I completed my goal – though I’ve never had to work so hard to get full. My hand hurt the next day from having to use muscles that I’ve really never had to use in that way before that dinner. I immediately put myself on the 15-day Chinese cuisine disabled list.

The dinner itself was a success for more than that reason. The roommates are all great people and speak understandable English. With foreign students speaking a non-native tongue, it can sometimes be a little hard to pick everything up, just as it would be if I ever learned Chinese and tried to go speak it in Peking or something. This group, however, can communicate very well and are all really friendly and helpful, in general.

Apparently quite a few of them cook and each has their specialty. They asked me if I cook, to which I could only respond, “I’m not sure that what I do is really considered cooking.” Perhaps I can institute Mexican night each week and try to bring back a part of my taste buds vacated by the lack of Taco Bells on the world’s largest island. I’m sure there’s one somewhere in Australia, but not in Adelaide. Maybe I’ll try a stroke of Italian every once in awhile – stromboli or spaghetti with homemade pasta sauce, easy-yet-different dishes.

I’ve exhausted my will to write for now after taking a break from slaving away at the keyboard to stuff my face with a piece of double chocolate cake baked by Quin Chien, one of the female housemates. It was delicious and now I’m beyond full, but well worth it. My next blog will include my initial stab at playing flag football. Also, before reading my next entry, tune in to SportsCenter on ESPN and watch at least one show that includes the “Who’s Now” segment. Watching that will help you understand what I have to say about that (other than, “Why do I wait to enterprise things??”).

Love you all in the states, check back again soon.

From the other side of the globe, I’m Kevin Hunt.

If you want to see me soon, start digging.

Rugby isn't football, but Footy is kind of Football...

I’d like to start this post off by explaining my dedication to the Cleveland Browns. IF we can find a bar in this city that will pull in a satellite feed of the Browns games, we’ll be there. With the time difference, a 1 p.m. start on Sunday afternoon means the game kicks off here at around 2:30 a.m. early Monday.

I may not be drinking, but you can bet I’ll have the Braylon Edwards jersey on and ready – probably the only one in the city (other than Sara) with the orange No. 17.

...On a side note, walking through the local mall on Monday afternoon, I saw a Saints jersey donning the number 17 and the name “Berger” across the nameplate. Definitely Mitch Berger, the recently released punter. A Mitch Berger jersey in Adelaide, Australia. “Wow” was my only thought…

Now to the previously advertised section on Aussie Rules Football, a sport that’s really not seen anywhere outside of the western portion of Australia. I must say first and foremost that I really like this sport. There are so many intriguing things about it – things that make me think some guys were in the pub on a warm afternoon watching rugby and just coming up with ridiculous things they saw “wrong” with that sport. They put them together and became the forefathers of the AFL. That’s my theory anyway.

While in Sydney, we watched rugby because that was the dominant sport that was going on. Here in Adelaide, there isn’t a television newscast (or even newscast promo) that goes without telling viewers about Aussie Rules Football players who were suspended, fined or injured due to occurrences during the past weekend’s games (or “fixtures” as they’re called). I find it great that people care so much about the sports in their area.

My first experience with watching “footy” came with “Friday Night Football” on channel 7 (recent TV ratings champion), before the doubleheader Saturday on channel 9 (long-time ratings champ, like since the ‘80s). The ball can be advanced forward by a few different means: kicking (most likely), punching (less likely) or running (least likely).

When a player kicks (punts) it to a teammate and that player catches the ball on the fly, it’s called a “mark” and he cannot be tackled at that spot unless he advances forward. So it’s advantageous to move down the field quickly by earning mark after mark. The catches can be contested, however, so it’s not just a “punt in the park.” I call the second option “punching” because the way of forward passing is basically just an underhand volleyball serve. If this option (along with running) is chosen, the opposition can tackle the ball carrier and recipient at any time.

Running is not a very likely option because 1) it takes a long time for one man to run the field, 2) the defense is usually a man-to-man type style and 3) the runner has to touch the ball to the ground every so many meters (I’m not quite sure exactly how the rule in enforced, but they all do it IF they’re running with the ball). Just know the main action of this sport involves one player in possession of the ball while all the others are running around in a mad pattern.

There is a method to the madness, however, because commentators are always talking about the teams’ set plays. I’ll just take their word for it. There are four 20-minute periods with a running clock (except for after scores and penalties). The tackles are vicious and there are no pads, which I love. It’s rugby with another dimension – reminds me of going from number lines to the x-y coordinate plane in algebra. Or imagine Emeril cooking up some rugby and going “BAM,” adding some zest to it and making Aussie Rules Football. Anyway…

To score in this game, the ball must be kicked. From where it does not matter, as long as it leaves a foot and travels in between the “flagpoles” located at the opposition’s end of the field. I have no better word for them than flagpoles. See exhibit A…



Kick the ball between the two middle poles and your team is awarded a goal – 6 points – and the ball is returned to midfield for a restart. This is the ultimate prize and players always seem pretty ashamed if they miss a goal and instead earn a “behind” – a 1-point score awarded when the ball goes between an end pole and the next pole in the line. If the ball hits a pole, it’s also just one point. If one point is awarded, the team which gave up the score gets the ball and takes possession looking to go the length of the field for their own score.

OK, so that’s a lot of the technical side to it. There’s a lot more, but if you have any kind of a mind for figuring sports out, it’d probably only take you a couple whole games to see more or less what is going on. The best parts of the games aren’t even really part of them.

First of all, the field is elliptical in shape – or for the non-Math majors, an oval. It acts as a boundary just like any other sport, yes, but how many other sports have a rounded field of play?? Golf doesn’t really count because there isn’t really a standard.

I’ve already noted a second great part, no pads worn. Only a funkily-designed tank top that acts as the jersey, a pair of shorts and a seeming chip on each player’s shoulder. All these guys are crazy if you’re asking me. When a player jumps to grab an airborne kick, there are usually 2 or 3 other players flying right beside him to knock him over and knock the ball away (making it up for grabs by anyone). Tackles are ridiculous, but never end up being the bell ringers often seen in the National Football League in America – these are clean hits right in the chest area. Penalties can be assessed for high or low tackles. Terrific viewing.

The best part of the game has to be the score callers, for lack of a better term. There are actual officials governing the rules of the game, but at both ends of the field, usually right down the middle of the flagpole goals, there is a man that reminds me of Colonel Sanders sans the bucket of famous recipe chicken. These guys are dressed in white shirts (and sometimes all-white suits), wear white hats and make the rulings of whether the kick went through for a behind (1 point) or a goal (6 points).

That’s plain and simple. It’s the WAY they show it that’s terrific. If there is a goal, the score caller pulls two “guns” out of their holsters and points them to the middle of the field. They’re not actually guns, just his fingers – but they’re whipped out so fast that it’s hard to explain the hilarity of it. If the ball crosses for a behind, only one “gun” is drawn, and the ball is handed to the team to advance it. Simply put, when points are scored, it looks as if these guys dressed completely in white are practicing their technique of dueling. And the TV camera shows it basically every time a point is scored.



And after each goal, the program goes almost immediately to commercial break…for one commercial. The game is pretty fast-paced, so there really isn’t time during play to just go to a break except for the bit of time after a goal is scored. The winner of the fixtures usually put up at least 100 points. It’s a performance-enhanced combination of rugby and the NFL. And it’s great to watch until Sara and I return to the U.S. for NFL week 13 (the Browns play at Arizona, 4:15).

This is a great sport, though I know the Adelaide Crows (my randomly-acquired “favorite” team) will never replace the Cleveland Browns. In fact, I’m pretty sure nothing will replace the Brownies as long as I live – unless Aussie Rules Football really takes hold in the U.S. and finds a home in Cleveland. If it does, you can bet I’ll be the voice you hear on-the-air, bringing you all the action. Until that day comes, I’ll be classifying this trip as vacation/tourism more than a learning experience.

So that was my stab at giving you an overview of Aussie Rules Football. You can leave a comment with any questions you might have and I’ll try to address those as best I can. You can pretty much guarantee that I’ll be betting on the AFL before too long. Adelaide is good in the rain (just beat a team by 70 points while playing at home in dismal conditions), while Geelong sits atop the standings (called “the ladder”), holding a 9-fixture win streak. I guess it all depends on the betting line.

My next blog will surely include some new experiences that come with our orientation...meeting and hanging out with new people, figuring out the campus and, what is likely to be the best of the stories, figuring out the bus system. If there’s a bad ticket to be handed out, you can bet it has my name on it. But as Sara says, if you can get a good story out of it, it’s all worth it.

Love you all in the states, check back again.

From the other side of the globe, I’m Kevin Hunt.

If you want to see me soon, start digging.

You Stay Classy, Australia

If life’s decisions were based on just one variable, I would be staying in Australia forever – my selling point being the fact that sports are a part of every newscast here. In fact, the sports report comes BEFORE the weather on every newscast I’ve seen thus far, due in large part to there being no horrific weather to update.

The sports segment of newscasts is slowly fading away in many markets in the United States. That puts me in a predicament as far as finding a job. I’m not particularly upset about that because I’m pretty sure news producing is in my future. But just watching the nightly news to get my semi-local sports fix has always been a part of my dinnertime routine.

Here in Oz the rugby and Aussie Rules Football updates are ongoing throughout the day. Injury updates find their way higher in a newscast rundown than “sunny with a max 16 in Sydney.”

What I don’t particularly like about Australian newscasts is the lack of creativity. Quite honestly, Athens MidDay rivals these casts in terms of visually aesthetic terms. There are no big newscast opens, no produced anchor introductions, dull lower-third graphics and text-on-solid-background full screens. Tech-wise, MidDay is right there.

Unpredictability might be the reason weather comes so late in the newscast (usually the last thing to be seen before the cast ends). To get online here at the hostel, we have to go outside – usually pulling up a seat at a table next to the sidewalk.

This situation has proven something to me about weather in Adelaide, Australia… the most ridiculous I’ve seen anywhere. It could go from rain to sun and back to rain about five times within a couple hours. Not having an umbrella handy in this town just means you’re playing Russian roulette with the storm clouds.

I’d hate to be as unpredictable as the weather, so I’ll let you in on what I’ll be posting next. It has to deal with my latest adjustment to sports here in Australia. Everyone who’s somewhat fluent in sports knows rugby – and the sport is no different here in Oz, either. Hard-nosed and backward-passing. The sport you WON’T know unless you’re a dedicated viewer is Aussie Rules Football. It’s amazing and ridiculous at the same time.

I’m spending this weekend getting a hang on the game so I can talk about it a bit more knowledgably. I look to post about “Friday Night Football,” Colonel Sanders calling the goals and behinds, a 9-game win streak and a 70 point win – all after watching just two games. But still not many graphics… oh the things I would change…

Love you all in the states, check back next for AFL knowledge.

From the other side of the globe, I’m Kevin Hunt.

If you want to see me soon, start digging.

Big, Big, Big, Bleh

My last blog talked about adjustment and I promised I would let everyone who constantly clicks for my latest blog update (that means you and only you, Luke) about the adjustment to the beer.

After dinner, Sara decided to ditch our plan to head to the sports bar down the street, opting instead to do Sudoku and watch an old “LOST” episode. Well, it’s new to those in Australia – an idea reminiscent of NBC’s theme for its summer TV lineup years ago, “If you haven’t seen it, it’s new to you!!” Family Guy made fun of this along with Ted Kaczynski later on. But I digress.

I decided to head downstairs to the Euro Bar (connected to our hostel) and try a glass of a different beer. Carlton Draught was on tap and I thought I’d give it a whirl. Sara and her sister, Katie, made it famous (and driven into my head last summer) by singing the version of this commercial…

To make this quick, I was disappointed in my first “new beer” experience. It was different, that was for sure – but I won’t be recommending Carlton Draught to anyone anytime soon. I’d say it’s pretty close to Natural Light, but I’m not even sure I would finish my night with this beer. Not that Carlton Draught has a worse than Natty, it just has a terrible aftertaste that didn’t sit well with me.

It probably didn’t help that the music video “Free Your Mind” by En Vogue was playing on the TVs around the place. Oh well, hope the next venture plays out a little better. What helped was getting that 15% off just for being an international patron. That was nice, but didn’t make the Carlton Draught go down any better.

I also figured out why Australians are so apt to give out discounts on various items. Anyone who has seen the movie “Office Space” knows the plot deals with some office minions who create a program that deposits “fractions of a penny” from their employer. Australia is very similar, and it cracked me up when I realized the comparison.

Australian currency consists of bills and coins, just like American money. Bills range from $5 and up, while there are $2, $1, $0.50, $0.20, $0.10 and $0.05 coins. Here’s where it get interesting… no coins lower than five cents. That’s because every total purchase is rounded to the nearest five cent level – fractions of a nickel, in this case. It’s an amazing concept and I’m kind of surprised the U.S. didn’t implement it first.

It’s unknown what the weekend holds for me, but on Monday begins the very logical point of my trip to the Land of Oz… international student orientation. While we’ve been sitting around being a bit bored with having a lot of time on our hands lately, that changes next week when our 9-to-5, Monday-through-Friday routine sets in.

As for me, it will be welcomed (at least at first) since we spend most of our time just lying around on the bunk bed in our room. I’m sure I’ll want to come back and lounge once the bored and I-can’t-believe-they’re-making-me-listen-to-this-crap feelings creep in next week. But hey, I’m here to learn, not to sit around in a hostel, and I guess the orientation is Step One.

Speaking of learning, I’m a sports journalism student and in my next blog, I want to let you know of a great pattern I’m noticing in the television news in Australia. And it would be a true delight if American TV news would take notes and follow these guidelines. That’s for the next blog.

Love you all in the states, check back for that update.

From the other side of the globe, I’m Kevin Hunt.

If you want to see me soon, start digging.

The Game of Inches (or Metres)

So this week has been busy… I grabbed a six-inch sub for just $3.95 AUD, bought and drank a 1.5 litre Coke, went on a morning run of about two kilometers and all in rainy conditions at around 15 degrees Celsius.

As confused as you are right now, you know what I’ve had to deal with in adjusting the past week or so. In my notebook of “things to remember” for this trip (it’s basically a guideline of what to put in these blogs), I have a page designated for conversions. And nothing says “I’m Foreign” more than whipping out a U.S.-to-Aussie currency converter from your breast pocket. That and asking for American cheese (which I did AGAIN).

When we walked into our new place of residence here in Adelaide, we found it to be MUCH better than the dump we lived in while staying in Sydney. Community showers, yes, but it’s a nice place with decent beds and it doesn’t smell awful. Plus, free laundry and we get a discount for staying longer than a week.

That leaves out one of the better points – the fast food. Even though we’re trying not to eat out all the time, it is inevitably going to happen, with our first fast food encounter in Adelaide, Australia coming right across the street at the “Burp Burrito” restaurant. Those of you who know me know I was a bit worried that there would be no Mexican food here. Tragedy averted.

And there’s a 24-hour pancake shop out back. And we get a 15% discount at the bar that’s downstairs. Suffice it to say we’re in a much better boat here than in Sydney.

This post comes on the American eve of America’s birthday. And what better way to celebrate than we already have. No, we didn’t buy Chinese fireworks off the black market – because we are staying during the time of our home country’s Independence Day, we received a percentage off our total bill for our stay.

So I’d like to use this space to thank Thomas Jefferson for completing the Declaration of Independence when he did. I’ll use that saved money to drink to him later – another adjustment on our long list. There’s no Bud or Coors Light here. It’s Toohey’s New or Carlton Draught. Haven’t made a trip to the bar yet, but that is likely to be a topic in my next blog.

You should drink to big Tommy J as well. Imagine his having finished the historical document on January 4, 1776. Sitting in below freezing temperatures while watching the fireworks probably wouldn’t have sat well with most Americans. Unless you’re Alaskan, at which point this day probably ticks you off every year.

Love you all in the states, check back for more updates.

From the other side of the globe, this is Kevin Hunt.

If you want to see me soon, start digging.