THIS WAS ORIGINALLY MEANT TO BE POSTED ON FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 3RD.

Goodness gracious me oh my get me out of this freakin’ hostel. At first, I was cool with it. At second, I was a little annoyed. At third, I can’t wait until Monday to get into my apartment, I don’t care what it costs me. I think the problem is the fact that I’m living with nine other girls, and I don’t like girls…at least these girls. One has a poor aroma that I recently started noticing assaulting my nostrils while trying to fall asleep. Another is a dirty hippie, she sleeps in the bunk above mine, and this morning swung her feet down right into my face…gross. Another one missed the seminar on “climbing in and out of things” when she was three, so she continually struggles getting into her top bunk every night, and the other night I was the only witness awake to watch her round behind struggle in the air as she huffed and puffed her way up, only to lose her strength and tumble down the three rung ladder to the ground. Another one uses her blowdryer in the room at 7 in the morning (wtf?). And yes, there’s also the girl who’s parents taught her, “To whisper is to scream.” And thus every morning there’s a flurry of LOUD Spanish, while she preps for her day as a sound effect impersonator, her specialty being eighteen wheeler horns. Sigh.
Anywho, I hate bureaucracy, and it totally screws up everything I want, which really is just a job. This is the line from all employers, “We really enjoyed our interview with you, however we must have employees with proper permits and papers in order to hire you. Please feel free to contact us when you obtain these, as we’d be happy to offer you a position within our school.” I guess it’s better than being told, “Nah, we liked someone better. Good luck next time.” Kind of like Groton School which kindly ended their letter, “We’re sure there is a position out there suitable for you, unfortunately it is not with us.” There’s nothing unfortunate about it... ‘unfortunate’ denotes regret, and if you really were regretful, you’d give me a job, losers.
I hope everyone had a splendid Halloween, I surely did, and I didn’t even have to get all dressed up. The cheap-in-price-but-fantastic-in-taste wine here is very good to me and my friends, good times I’ll always remember (or will I…do I even remember them now?) I guess that’s all for today, I would like to give a birthday shout-out to Ms. Sara Henderson, though I’m sure she won’t read this, as she’s too busy stealing bagels from the United States Postal Service. To the rest of you, consider seeing Scorsese’s The Departed…I highly recommend it. And of course, happy Friday, it’s the freakin’ weekend.

AND NOW FOR THE LATEST ENTRY, WRITTEN TUESDAY, NOVEMBER 7TH.

So my friends and I are all at the ‘After Hours Social Club’ that we like to dub, “The Reading Room.” This is basically because there are a lot of books on the wall, and every once and a while we’ll pick one up, flip through it and quickly place it back on the shelf, knowing that our eyes are not necessarily capable of moving along a line in the same direction while comprehending information. Maybe this is why a number of the books there are art books…you can just look at all the pretty pictures. Anywho, this particular evening, two girls from Vancouver who had been studying abroad in Paris joined our group. I don’t really want to be mean, but these girls were definitely not the brightest bulbs on the tree, which was probably compounded by their inebriation. One girl was telling a story about her ‘world travels’ or some such thing, and made the comment, “Yah, you know, New Zealand…it’s part of Australia?” At this I sort of chuckled, while my Australian friend Chiara calmly informed her, “Uh, it’s its own country. Two separate places.”
“Um, excuse me? I wasn’t even talking with you, so I don’t feel like you need to be a part of this conversation.”
“I’m just telling you, seeing as Australia is my country.”
“My country?!? My country?!? Look, I don’t think this concerns you, so just back the f*** off, okay?” At this, Vancouver chick turned her back, placed her hand behind her head, and extended her middle finger, and only her middle finger.
“Woah, woah, woah,” I intervened. “There’s no need to flip her off, let’s just calm down a little bit.”
“Um, ex-cah-use me, I am not flipping her off.” At this point I became belligerent towards her belligerence.
“Oh come on! You’ve got your middle finger straight up in the air, I don’t see how that’s not flipping someone off.”
Chiara stepped back in to moderate. “Look, let’s just drop it okay, I just wanted to make the point that Australia and New Zealand are two different countries. It’d be like me saying that Canada is a part of the United States.” At this, Vancouver flipped out.
“Canada is NOT a part of the United States. Canada is a completely different country, with its own political system, its own characteristics and its own history. It is definitely NOT a part of the U.S.”
“THAT’S THE POINT!” I exclaimed.
“Hey, you know, let’s just drop it. Sure, New Zealand is a part of Australia, okay.” Chiara was ready to let it drop, I was getting caught up in the heat of the moment, because I FEEL PASSIONATELY ABOUT GEOGRAPHY, DAMMIT!!! Or at least I did at that particular moment.
“And anyway,” Vancouver continued, to the groan of the group, “I was talking about the whole region—Oceania (which she pronounced Oh-she-ann-KNEE-YA).”
“Okay, sure, fine, I believe you, whatever I said, or that you think I said, I’m sorry. I don’t know what I did to offend you so much, but I’m sorry, let’s just let it go.” It was about time to move along in this debate, but Vancouver wouldn’t let it drop.
“Oh my God, if you don’t even know what you’re apologizing for then you don’t have any right to tell me what’s right and wrong. You are just so provincial.”
“Provincial?!?!” Chiara stared back at her in disbelief, because she has every right to, seeing as she’s lived in Belgium, the U.S, Australia and Italy, plus speaks 3.5 languages.
“Yeah, you know what?” at this, Vancouver got up to make her dramatic exit, “If you traveled outside of your own country, maybe you would understand the rest of the world that’s out there.” Her dramatic exit was not so dramatic, as everyone was trying to stifle laughter, which given the circumstances came out in huge guffaws and snickers. Her friend who was with us just stared at her as she left, wide-eyed, as if she’d just witnessed the girl from The Exorcist turn her head 360 degrees.
“Wow…uh…” She blinked a few times, her face was long, “I just really don’t know where that came from. Woah.” We all agreed, and that was the end of that. Ridiculousness is funny, especially when it involves over-reactions over being informed that New Zealand and Australia are in fact their own separate entities. Phew, glad she’s gone back to Paris.

On another note, I’M IN MY NEW APARTMENT!!! It is miraculous, I love it, I’m glad to be here, and I think it will be a splendid place to be unemployed in. Our location is awesome, we’re right in the city center, and after living at Bruna’s and the hostel, I thought the day would never come when I was back in a place I could call my own. And I can do so for at least the next seven weeks. When we moved in, there were no sheets on the beds, so my friend Matt and I made a mad dash to the store to get some. Number 1: sheets are expensive, please tell me why. Number 2: It’s funny to think of the two of us picking up various sheets and asking, “What does this mean? How long are the beds? What are the differences between this and that? Wait, what’s this word mean?” We eventually got everything figured out, and are sleeping happily in our new apartment. I’m excited to lounge in my pajamas, cook my own meals, take naps freely and frequently (as I wait for phone calls explaining why I can’t have a job), invite friends over, be within walking distance of my favorite watering-hole and just generally relax a little bit. Yesssss.