My last week of school (19th - 23rd December)

My first 3 weeks in Australia have passed by incredibly quickly. When I had my last day of school on the 23rd of December, I couldn't believe it. I am really sad that my flight to Sydney is already on the 29th of December. Through school, I have met so many nice people, whether they are classmates, teachers, or staff from the office of the language school Langports. The short stay didn't really help me improve my English skills. Most students stay here for at least 2 months, some even up to a year. Yes, saying goodbye to the Gold Coast and my new friends on Thursday will be very difficult for me. I am leaving this beautiful city with a heavy heart. I felt at home here immediately, as if I had known the city forever.

I therefore enjoyed my last week of school even more. I went kayaking with a classmate. His host family has a house right by the river that flows from the sea. This river is known for having a lot of sharks, as they can't find their way back to the open sea. So you should definitely not swim there. I was skeptical from the beginning because I was afraid that the kayak could tip over and we would be the evening snack for the sharks ;-). But my classmate assured me that it's a big kayak and it can't tip over. However, it quickly became clear that the kayak is only for one person, so we were rocking around a lot. My classmate quietly said that when he goes kayaking alone, it doesn't wobble that much, which didn't exactly reassure me. So I sat in this kayak completely tense for the first 15 minutes and with every big wave, I saw myself lying in the water, surrounded by sharks. Eventually, I noticed that there were ducks swimming in the water, and I thought as long as they are still alive, I can survive too, even if I fall into the water ;-). So I started to relax slowly. My next big concern, however, were the motorboats that kept coming towards us at high speed. Every time, I thought they wouldn't see us and would run us over. But again, my concern was unfounded and I survived my first kayaking trip unharmed.

On the second to the last day of school, friends invited many classmates to a house party so that we could all come together and celebrate. Afterwards, we went to a club (once again). I had planned to stay awake the whole night so that I could see the sunrise at 4:30 am. Many of my classmates had already watched the sunrise together two days before while partying (I stayed home like a good girl), but no one wanted to stay awake that long on this evening. One classmate finally volunteered and spent the time with me at McDonald's and Burger King after the club closed at 3 am. Once again, I waited in vain. It was so cloudy that we couldn't see a real sunrise. When I got home, I was wide awake and went to bed at 6 am, and then my alarm went off again at 7 am. I wouldn't have thought that I would go to school on that day, but since it was my last day of school, I decided to push myself to go. Thanks to a few energy drinks, I managed to stay awake throughout the day. After school, I went out to eat with some classmates. Then I went to the 'Currumbin Wildlife Sanctuary'.

Unfortunately, I had underestimated the time. Classmates told me that you only need two hours for the park because there isn't much interesting stuff there, except for koalas and kangaroos. However, it turned out that we would have needed a lot more time, as we wanted to see all the animals. There were also shows, like with parrots or feeding the animals and snakes that you could hold. But there was no time for all of that because the park was only open for another 2 hours, and we wanted to first see the koalas and kangaroos. Well, maybe the time wouldn't have been so tight if I hadn't spent what felt like an hour with the koalas, trying to capture every little movement and every pose of the koalas with my camera ;-). They are just too cute, they are among the cutest animals in the world for me. They are like little teddy bears :-). Of course, I thought it was super cool to be able to take a photo with a koala. In retrospect, though, I have to say that I felt a little sorry. It's not good at all for the animals to be used for photos with tourists, even if it's only for a few seconds and the koalas are constantly being swapped so that everyone gets their 20 hours of sleep.

The kangaroos are also very relaxed animals. Some of them hopped around freely on the grounds and let the visitors pet and feed them.