I took some photos around the neighborhood today:

Stone Wall

Yesterday was officially one of the best days of my life – well, since my arrival in Australia.

For the first time in about 3 years now I got to see not one but several friends from Alabama! I went to the Cockburn Rotary Spring Fair just for the occasion – when I was moving to Cockburn I never knew its ’sister city’ was actually Mobile, Alabama – where I lived for 6 years and the BEST place in the world! The theme of the fair was America and there were American flags everywhere as well as Alabama’s state flag on the main stage. The band from Murphy High School (w00t I almost went there when I lived back home!) came all the way to Perth to play with Hamilton Hill High School (Murphy was way better). They even hard a Mardi Gras parade – Mobile style.

I looked for them for hours without any success (the fair was held at Manning Park in Cockburn, beautiful place). I enjoyed walking around the fair, watching the car show, the toy car rally racing, the sumo wrestling, the laser tag, and so much other stuff! Finally I had some lunch and sat to watch a magic show by the stage. Then we saw each other – Henry was right by the stage, waving at me! I rushed over, excited, gave him a hug, and stared talking about something that I can’t even remember right now. Then we went behind the stage where all these Murphy band people were – I thought that I would only know Henry from here but it turns out I was in for a big (and awesome) surprise: Lucy, Knowles, Erica, and more people were there, too! I also got to meet great new people. We spoke for a while, then I got to listen to them play Jazz on stage (it was great, I can’t believe how good they are, they made up solos on the spot and everything).

Then came more talking, looking through the box of awesome gifts Olga passed on to me through Henry and the giving of my box to Olga. We tried calling her, but were unable to get through (suspected mobile phone credit issues to blame). Some funny quotes of the day included (some of these aren’t exact):

“Welcome to Bootcamp. FLIP THE SWITCH!”
“Did she go to Murphy?” – “No, she went to Baker” – “We’re not dedicating a song to her”
“What’s a STAAAFF room?” – “You know, for teachers, staff” – “Oh, a STAFF room!”
“We thought ‘Brekkie’ was some kind of a brand until we went past McDonald’s and saw the “Brekkie served until 12pm sign.”
“Here – I won this for Olga. Tell her I shot four little people for it.”

I had to leave before being able to see the fireworks that came at the end and another performance by Murphy Band. It was very sad :( I had to try not to cry. I also won a plushie for Olga and almost forgot to give it to Henry to put in the gift box! I had to run back and get all sad all over again.

HHRay picked me up and that was that. I feel like I’m never going to see them again :( I’ve decided as soon as I move out (which I will officially get onto again after my car unless something comes along before I get a car) I’m paying for half of Olga’s trip to Australia.