Hello everyone, this is Tyler and Kay-lin giving you all an update (if you remember the amazing blog post way back from Auckland, you should be excited).
Anyways, we spent our last few days in alice springs hanging out by the pool and watching good movies at night. It was all very relaxing and peaceful UNTIL the morning of our departure, two girls (Chelsea and Elizabeth) woke up with a surprise. The girls were covered in bed-bug bites, Chelsea had 72 alone on her left forearm. At first this little turn of events was hilarious to all of us, but hours later it turned into a serious nightmare. Slowly it began to spread throughout the entire group (excluding your dear bloggers- thank god). Luckily Kay-Lin stopped by the hospital and found heavy duty anti-ich/numbing cream. A few days later, once the epidemic (much worse than the Swine Flu) had spread to others, Marissa had had enough and went on a mass cleaning frenzy and exterminated the bed-bugs once and for all. So don't worry, the critters are gone and we'll be a bunch of clean kids coming back to our homes.
Thankfully, the meditation at Chenrezig Buddhist Institute helped a lot of the infected group memebers deal with their itching and scratching. Our week at Chenrezig was filled with yoga, meditation, Buddhist lectures, and great food! We got to pick the brain of Sonam- the coolest nun ever, for an hour each night. Sonam was eloquent and intellectual in answering our endless questions on the philosophy of meditation and Buddhism. We also were able to challenge our flexibility, balance, and minds with multiple yoga sessions with our wonderful teacher Lorie. We think we speak for everyone when we say that we definitely want to explore more yoga and meditation when we get home. Additionally, there was a Mani Retreat happening while we were staying at CI. We were able to partake in a Mani session. This meant repeating Om Mani Padme Hum 108 times while counting prayer beads and then repeating the 108 cycle as many times as possible in an alotted amount of time. We also learned a lot about the situation in Tibet with the Chinese occupation. We got some time away from Chenrezig when we visited the Eummundi markets and the Australian zoo. The markets were ridiculously huge with free food samples galore (including the best banana smoothie ever). And for those of you who didn't know, the Australian Zoo was famously funded by the Irwin family. Everyone that went (Tyler, Blake, and Drew stayed back at Chenrezig) took the opportunity to see the famous crodidile show and loved it.
We were all sad to leave Chenrezig but at the same time all very excited to start scuba diving. But before we could start that, we had to endure the longest, meaning 41 hour, train ride of our lives. Everything that could have possibly gone wrong did, but we still managed to make the best of it and we all had a great time and it was an interesting experience. This included horrible stomach aches for those who ate the "bangers-and-mash" (sausage and mashed potatoes) and they had a hard time sleeping in their triple-bunk claustrophobic rooms.
We're now in Cairns for our last week of the trip (crazy i know) and today was our first day learning how to scuba dive. It involved sitting and watching instructional videos, swim tests, and actually practicing skills in the pool. We have one more day of pool diving and then we finaly get out onto the Great Barrier Reef! We'll spend two days diving and a night on the boat, some of us are nervous for the open water but we all know it will be an amazing experience. There's even going to be an optional night dive (which Tyler and Kay-Lin are for sure doing)!
We'll plan on updating you one last time before we say our goodbyes. So until then, we miss you and love you all, see you in a week! ahhh!
-Kay-Lin and Tyler
P.S. we'll post photos of Alice Springs, Chenrezig, the train, and some UNDERWATER PHOTOS (we're all chipping in to rent an underwater camera) in our next post.
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