Halloween & Memphis

Hi guys,

The weather started to get extremely cold this week. Aside from some Halloween celebrations and a day trip to Memphis, not a whole lot went on. But alas, another week living the dream!

Monday 28 October

Woke up this morning still feeling gross, and even had a vomit scare (thankfully I didn’t throw up). Dylan came and visited me at my dorm during his break between classes and brought me some medicine and vitamin waters to help me feel better (what a gem!). We hung out for a bit and went to Rebel Market to get some food before he had to head back to class.

I spent the rest of the afternoon in bed trying to get better, and skipped my class tonight as I really wasn’t feeling up to it. Dylan took me out to dinner at a Sushi buffet restaurant which was delicious, and then we headed back to his where I got straight back into bed and fell asleep.

Tuesday 29 October

Had an easy morning before heading off to my classes. My drug crimes class was nothing special, and we had an exam in my family law class.

I met Dylan for dinner at Rebel Market and then we went to the library so I could help him write a new resume since I’d spent a few weeks learning how to make a good one in my Personal Insight class last semester at Deakin.

Wednesday 30 October

Georgia and I went to the Grill for lunch today, and I was so excited since I hadn’t been in a few weeks. We made the trek down there even though it was raining. Although it had been a few weeks since she last saw me, the pasta lady still remembered my order. I also got a smoothie on my way out (I usually don’t bother because the line is generally super long), and had an interesting time trying to ride home with it in the rain, one handed, with no lid on the smoothie.

My negotiation class this afternoon was probably my least favourite one so far. After sitting and listening to the professor ramble on for over an hour, we finally got to the negotiation exercise which I’m usually really excited for. However, I was paired up with a useless guy who hadn’t really even read the brief, and we were up against a team that included an extremely extroverted frat guy who I’ve always been scared of having to go up against in class because he’s a really hard negotiator, and so far I’d avoided it. The negotiation went horribly because my partner wasn’t educated enough on the scenario to really help me out, and I think he was getting intimidated by frat boy too, so we just decided to refuse their ridiculous offers and ended the class with no deal. I felt really deflated after the class because it hadn’t gone well, and the combination of not being backed up by my partner and an intimidating opposing team had made me really anxious.

I met up with Dylan and he took me back to a journalism event he’d been at in the building next door where they had free pizza, wings and cookies. We ate some of that for our dinner and headed back to his place where I devoured the rest of the cookie dough ice cream we bought last week. My soul needed it after that class.

Thursday 31 October

Had a chilled morning, and I mean that literally, because temperatures for the day ranged from 0-5 degrees Celsius. It was f**king freezing! Dylan and I popped by a costume shop so I could find something to wear tonight for Halloween, and then grabbed some brunch at Abner’s (whose chicken tasted exactly like KFC Australia’s original recipe – yessss!)

The combination of the weather and the fact that it was Halloween meant campus and my class were pretty empty today. After class, I hung around in the dorm until it was time to start getting ready for Halloween.

We didn’t really have any plans tonight except to head into the Square and see what was happening. We ended up at the Library, a popular 21+ sports bar (not an actual library lol), where everyone was dressed up in great costumes. We got a few drinks down and danced the night away. Somehow most of us ended up getting drunk pretty quickly and easily, and when it was lights up around 1am, we were quite disoriented. We ended up following a group of our friends to the pickup spot for the Hub bus (The Hub is an off-campus apartment complex that many of our international friends live at) and rode there. Georgia was starting to look in bad shape, and when we got off the bus, she claimed she’d thrown up on it. We for some reason then ended up running (literally) to our friend Linda’s apartment, and she and our other German friend Franziska started making us toast. It was kind of gross, but we were all starving so just ate it anyway. Apparently at some point during this feast (as I found out the next day), Georgia had, for reasons unknown, started spreading butter on her hand with a knife. She doesn’t remember doing it, and I don’t remember seeing that happen. Perhaps she thought her hand was a slice of toast? Who knows.

We then decided to leave and head back home, and I somehow ordered Ciara, Vera, Georgia and I an uber. Unfortunately, just as we were a few minutes away from the dorm, Georgia decided to vomit in the car, mainly all over Vera. The uber driver was not happy, and pulled over to the side of the road, where shortly after we were joined by a cop car. They just wanted to make sure the driver was sober, and went on their way while Georgia threw up on the curb. When we got back to the dorm, I took Georgia back to our room while Ciara and Vera tried their best to clean the guy’s car, hoping we wouldn’t get charged a cleaning fee (however I received an email the next day letting me know we were charged the $150 cleaning fee, lucky Georgia). Georgia was still a little sick in the room, but eventually fell asleep, and I did too.

Here’s some pics from the night:

(This is one of the rooms in the Library sports bar)

(Myself, Linda (Germany), some random, and Vera (Germany))

(Linda from Germany)

(Vera from Germany)

(Myself, Vera (Germany) and Georgia (Australia))

Friday 1 November

This morning I woke up to the sound of Georgia and Ciara laughing in the corridor, and I could hear that they were exchanging stories about last night. I went and joined them, and found out that Georgia had no recollection of anything after a certain point in time at the Library (so no recollection of the Hub or the uber ride). I also found out that Vera had passed them in the corridor on her way to class this morning wearing the same jacket she was wearing last night i.e. the jacket that Georgia vomited all over in the uber. It wasn’t until later that someone finally told Vera that her jacket was vomited on (she was drunk last night so didn’t remember this happening), and safe to say, she was disgusted and super embarrassed, but was able to laugh it off.

We spent some of the morning nursing our hangovers while watching some Criminal Minds in one of the common rooms. Later on we met up with Linda and another German girl Tabea who came to our dorm to return Georgia’s phone and purse which she’d left at their place last night. They shared some stories from the night (as they were more sober than us and had remembered more, including the butter story).

Ciara, Georgia and I then walked to the bus stop to catch the bus to Walmart, but it ended up taking about an hour and a half just to get to there. This was due to the bus not being on time, and then having to wait at a swap over point for a new driver to come and take over the current one. Poor Georgia and Ciara (who was having withdrawal-like shakes and had also thrown up last night and this morning) were feeling really sick from all the driving, especially because the suspension on these buses is basically non-existent and they bounce around soooo much. Shopping was slow as we were all super sluggish, and I was disappointed at the fact that the store was completely covered in Christmas decorations. It’s only November 1st, people! We eventually caught an uber home as we were not in the mood to wait around for a bus again.

We hung out in the kitchen while Georgia made this week’s fam dinner of spag bol and garlic bread.

Dylan picked me up after work and I hung out with him for a couple of hours while he packed as he’s spending the weekend at his mum’s place.

I got back and everyone had crashed into bed, still recovering from last night, so there were no plans to go out. I, too, hung in bed for the night except for a cheeky trip a few of us made to Papas John’s and the market for some late night snacks.

Saturday 2 November

Slept in this morning but had to get up and ready straight away because today we were going to Memphis for the afternoon and night! Before we left, though, we got to meet Vera’s dad and sister who had arrived last night from Germany for the weekend. They were so sweet, and they even gave each of us a little bag of German candy!

At 1pm we met the study abroad advisors Maggie, Roc and Kayla out front of our dorm and jumped onto the bus they’d hired for us, and we headed to Memphis. We got there around 2:45pm, and were let free to do whatever we wanted for the afternoon. A group of us made our way to Beale Street (a significant nightlife street in Downtown Memphis), and we popped into a restaurant to grab some lunch. To be completely honest, Beale Street was quite underwhelming as it wasn’t super busy (Memphis itself just feels very quiet in general from my experiences here), there was trash all over the streets, and overall it just felt pretty dodgy.

After our subpar meals, we headed down towards the riverfront park to see the Mississippi River. After a little bit of strolling along the water, Georgia and I decided to hire electric scooters as they had the same ones we used in both Nashville and Atlanta and we always have so much fun on them. Plus, Georgia had tripped over a curb again earlier and her bad foot was hurting again. We ended up scooting through the park, up through a nice suburban area, and ended up scooting onto a bridge that went over the river and joined Tennessee to Arkansas. Of course we had to take the opportunity to step into another state (making it our 5thone so far), so we scooted across the halfway mark of the bridge so that we were technically in Arkansas.

(View from the bridge - Arkansas on the left, Memphis on the right)

(Our selfie in Arkansas)

We rode back into town and up into Beale Street where we met up with the others and had a drink at a bar before we headed over to FedEx Forum to meet up with our advisors and the other international students, where we were going to watch an NBA game! Tonight’s match was the Memphis Grizzlies v Phoenix Suns. After grabbing a few snacks, we headed into our seats which were up on the second tier. The game was enjoyable and there was always something happening. However, the stadium was relatively empty and so the atmosphere wasn’t as exciting as I hoped it would be. Nonetheless, it was an experience ticked off the bucket list!

After the game, we headed straight back to the bus and headed home. While on the way home, we realised that a video I’d sent into the @oldrowrebs Instagram account (an account showcasing hilarious videos of students and Ole Miss antics, especially drunk game day videos) of Georgia being dragged down the corridor of our dorm after she’d busted her ankle was posted on the page!!! So far it’s amassed around 9,500 views and 1,300 likes hahaha.

We were all exhausted, so when we got home I facetimed dad to help him with getting ready for his flight here (which is only in a few days!!!) and headed to sleep.

Sunday 3 November

Had a nice long sleep in this morning thanks to the extra hour with daylight savings ending and going back an hour (so I’m now 17 hours behind Melbourne). The whole morning was spent watching shows in bed.

After working on an essay for a bit and listening to a crime podcast (my fave), Dylan and I went to Sonic to get some burgers and shakes (they were delicious!), and then watched 10 minutes of a show before falling asleep around 9:30pm.

Although it was one of the quieter and less exciting weeks I’ve had here, it was good to chill out and get over my sickness in preparation for my 21st birthday celebrations next week! Dad gets here on Wednesday, I’ll get to spend the week showing him around, and then the weekend will be filled with lots of bday fun and another home football game! I can’t wait!!!

- Emily xx