Category: Oceania

Traveling While Abroad: Make It Easy on Yourself

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I’d say, for the most part, that I’m a pretty organized, prepared person. I always have important documents in one place, I “measure twice, cut once” in every situation, and I’m the queen of “what if.” Extra socks? Check. Have I packed a reading book, music, cards, and a coloring book in case I get bored? You betcha – even though I’ll never get bored enough to get through all of those items. Usually, I’m prepared with items of actual importance too, i.e. a copy of my online visa.

Cut to mid-semester break. For the past month, I’ve been planning a two-part trip: 4 days in Cairns, Australia and 5 days in Dunedin, New Zealand. In preparation, I printed out all of my flight information, as I’m more inclined to have physical copies of things, rather than electronic copies. Although I had only printed these out to keep dates and flight times straight in my head in the days leading up to my trip, I decided to shove them in my bag as I flew out the door to catch my first flight. Technically, I didn’t actually need my flight information – these weren’t my tickets and I had my flight numbers on my phone ready for check-in.

My experience in Cairns and traveling to Cairns was delightful. No issues, lots of sunshine and warmth (finally – a day above 60 F), and a great reunion with a friend from DU. But leaving Cairns took a bit more effort and involved enough frustration for me to learn a little travel lesson.

My friend and I showed up to Cairns International Airport relatively early in the morning. Sleepy-eyed and deprived of coffee, I walked up to the Virgin Australia counter to get my ticket and check my bag. A few seconds after handing my passport to the woman at the counter, she began to ask me questions about my travels. I was a bit surprised, as I would only expect to be interrogated at customs, but nonetheless I answered. She asked me why I was in Australia, my plans for New Zealand, and other standard questions directed towards international travelers. Following this, she asked me for my flight itinerary. Perfect. My flight information will come in handy for this. But she then asked, “Ma’am, when will you be reentering Australia?” In my sleepy state, I struggled to answer.

“Um…I fly back on the 2nd”, I answered. She gave me a weird look and replied, “The 2nd of October?”. Shoot! *palm to face moment* This is when I wished I had gone to sleep earlier or bought coffee that morning.

“I’m sorry, I don’t know why I said that. I meant the 12th…the 12th of September. I guess I just forgot to put the 1 in front of the 2.” I smiled as my cheeks turned red in embarrassment. It was obvious she wasn’t very happy with me, and it didn’t get better when she asked for my visa and I told her it was an online visa. She then proceeded to make me pull up my visa on my computer and finally handed me my ticket.

I learned a few travel lessons from this. One, always have your flight itinerary – having that definitely made this situation better. Two, always have a copy of your visa, even if it’s an online visa. If you don’t want to carry that around, then you better be able to access it with your phone, computer, or tablet. Three, make sure your brain is awake when you go to the airport. This is especially important so you can remember the simple things, like what dates you’re reentering a country that has graciously taken you in.

In the moment, I was a bit flustered, but I know the Virgin Australia representative was just doing her job and enforcing the law. Thank you, Australia, for letting me be absent-minded every once in a while.

A Guide to Australian English

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“Excuse me, do you know where the baking soda is?” The store clerk looked puzzled for a second, but then looked at me, chuckled to himself and said, “Ah, yes. Do you mean bicarbonate soda?”

 

Turns out that there are quite a few differences between American English and Australian English, or at least enough differences to catch you off guard every once in a while.

 

Slang words and dialects are what differentiate regions and countries that use the same language. The English language is widely used throughout the world and is the official language of more than 50 countries. Every country and region that uses the English language sounds at least slightly different.

 

As for English in Australia, it is unique and varies throughout the country. It seems to have more similarities with English in the UK than English in the United States. Moreover, Australians love to abbreviate words.

 

I’ve been in Australia for about 2 months now and still get confused by certain words and phrases. So, here’s a list of the top ten words and phrases used Australia that I hear in conversation almost daily.

 

  1. Uni – “Are you a uni student?” Uni is short for university. Don’t get caught using the word college, because that is the word Australians use when talking about high school.
  2. I Reckon – “It’s been about 30 minutes, I reckon.” I reckon is used in place of the phrase I think. I actually haven’t heard anyone use the phrase I think.
  3. Heaps – “Thanks heaps!” Heaps means a lot.
  4. Rubbish – “Those food scraps are rubbish.” Rubbish is another way of saying trash. Trash and garbage are used from time to time, but rubbish is more common. All trash bins are labeled with the word rubbish.
  5. Biscuit – “Oreos are my favorite biscuit.” As you can guess, biscuit means cookie. Oh and Oreos used to be my favorite biscuit, until I came across Tim Tams here in Aussie.
  6. Aussie/Oz – “Have you spent much time in Aussie?” Australia is more commonly known as Aussie or Oz to the locals. Here in the state of Tasmania, locals say Tassie instead of Tasmania. Note: the “s” sounds like a “z”, hence why Oz is common.
  7. G’day – “G’day, mate!” G’day is used as a greeting in place of other words, like Hey! Howdy! Hello!
  8. Macca’s – “Let’s get a Big Mac from Maccas.” McDonald’s? Mickey D’s? Nope. They call it Macca’s here.
  9. Jumper – “It’s going to be cold today, don’t forget your jumper.” Jumper is used in place of the word sweatshirt or sweater. More recently, I’ve actually heard the word jumper used to describe a person’s jacket, as well.
  10. Arvo – “Let’s meet up at uni on Monday arvo.” Arvo is commonly used in place of the word afternoon. I had no idea what this word meant the first time someone said this to me.

 

There are heaps more words and phrases that I’ve come across in Aussie and there are even more that I haven’t encountered. Thus, I will continue to thumb through my Australian Slang book for the remainder of my time here.