I Found Nemo!

Hopefully by the title you can guess that I went to P. Sherman 42 Wallaby Way, Sydney and when you think of that you see the Sydney Opera House. If not, I went to the Sydney Opera House!!

Because Devyn (my roommate back at NAU who came with me to study abroad) and I had such a long layover in Sydney, we decided that we wanted to get out and see the city. We both really wanted to see the Opera House and besides, have you really even been to Australia if you didn’t go there? The only question about it was how to get out of the airport and to the harbor.

The Sydney airport was huge! It’s so big, in fact, that there are two separate parts to it and you have to take a bus from one building to the other. Getting out of that airport was like going through a maze. Plus, the Phoenix airport told us that we wouldn’t have have to get our checked bags at all until Darwin, which was wrong. Thankfully, we asked the right security guard for directions because she told us to get our bags before leaving to transfer them to the domestic flight. Once we figured out how to do that and went through the whole maze again to find the luggage lockers for our carry-ons we were finally able to head out to the taxis. Thankfully we were able to find those pretty easily. There was so much traffic on the way there and we almost got in about ten accidents. One time the driver even had to slam on the brakes and swerve away from the car in front of us to avoid hitting them. Honestly, if it’s even possible, I’m pretty sure the traffic there was worse than rush hour in Phoenix. Luckily, one insanely expensive taxi ride later we made it alive to the Sydney Harbor!

The Sydney Harbor was absolutely breathtaking! Seeing the Sydney Harbor Bridge, the water, and the Opera House together was like something out of a dream. It didn’t even seem real, it was almost as if it was a mirage or a hallucination. I think I’ve been seeing it all these years in pictures and movies and just assuming that it was a made-up place like Hogwarts or something. I honestly expected to go my entire life never seeing this place and here it was right in front of me! In pictures the Opera House looks like one big plastic shell, perfectly white with no lines or scrapes on it. In person, however, its made out of white and cream tiles with concrete blocks underneath them. Seeing the tiles completely caught me off guard. The shape of the building doesn’t seem to be the same shape either standing on the ground next to it. No matter what angle you look at it from it seems misshapen, but it’s still so beautiful!

Because it took so long for Devyn and I to get out of the airport, we missed our tour! Fortunately, the people there were able to simply put us with the next tour instead. This allowed us the perfect amount of time to take pictures, record some things for Devyn’s YouTube videos, and look at the gift shop. When we met our tour guide at the welcome desk, he handed out an mp3 player looking thing and a pair of headphones to everyone. The tour guide actually had a microphone that he would talk through and then that would come through our headphones so we were all able to hear him. We were also shown a couple of videos about the history of the Opera House and its architect, Jorn Utzon. It was really interesting to see how they chose the design and all of the politics behind the building. In the tour we got to see all of the theatres, including the main one, which I was particularly excited about. In this theatre there was a massive organ in the wall which was stunning. Sadly, we weren’t able to take any pictures inside though, but we were able to get a book of pictures of the theaters that they had photoshopped us into at the end. During the tour we were also able to see Pinch Gut, which is a little island in the middle of the harbor where the convicts would be sent, back when the queen ruled over Australia. The convicts would starve to death there which is actually why it’s called that.

After the tour our feet were hurting so bad and we were so hungry and tired that we just went right back to the airport. At the airport, we ended up getting Hungry Jacks, which is just Burger King. Then we waited for six hours to get on the plane! Once were on the plane we only had four more hours until we were in our new home and boy was I happy to be there!