Erin Murphy

I really wanted to experience life outside of my regular classes here at Berkeley, and wanted to see more of the world. Australia was a top choice for me because it has animals and plants that can be seen nowhere else in the world, and it would provide an environment different enough from home where I could enjoy learning about a new culture and history, but not so different that I would be too nervous or would have a hard time adjusting to life abroad. This program specifically appealed to me because it included field trips and research with our actual professors and graduate student TA's with the entire UC student group, while still providing us an immersive experience through homestay and classes at the Uni.

I was not yet 21, so I had never gone out to bars or clubs, but the drinking age in Australia is 18, so lots of us in the program took advantage of this. There is a huge section of Brisbane called Fortitude Valley, where many bars and clubs line a series of blocks and provide hundreds of people an outlet to go out and drink and dance. Beer is a huge part of Australian culture, so we would try lots of different kinds and talk with Australians, and just act as any university student there would on a Thursday, Friday, or Saturday night (Thursday nights are more popular than Friday, because Friday is when most high schoolers go out). On field trips, our professor even took us out to local bars and sang karaoke with us while enjoying some beer! That is something that never has happened in Berkeley for me. Additionally, while the Aussie slang never failed to confuse us, we did love when we actually started using it (Macca's=McDonald's, top up=add money to, cue=line, scooner= pint of beer).

Aside from being very cautious of the deadly creatures (specifically in the Great Barrier Reef), the biggest challenge was simply keeping an open mind about everything involved in the program. This goes for the UC students I was with, to the homestay, to the sometimes grueling public transportation, to the living accommodations during field trips. This program put me way outside of my comfort zone, but the comforting fact was knowing that most people felt the same way- I just needed to talk to people to find that out. Not every single person loved the long day hikes with our professor in the National Parks, and not every single person had an outstanding time with their homestay families, nor did everyone become best friends. There were so many new things, which was overwhelming at first, but keeping an open mind and accepting the change was an integral part of the experience. I learned that just because something was done differently there, that does not mean that is any less valuable. I lived farthest from the University, so I would spend much longer on buses than some of my peers, and on one of our field trips, we got flooded in and lost access to freshwater (toilets, showers, drinks), and were sleeping in tents in the rain. It could have been easy to only see the down side of those situations and let that take over, but there was always a positive side, always something to appreciate and learn from, and I knew that I needed to savor every moment because my time in Australia was limited to that one semester. Besides, now I have really great stories!

While attending Uni, I would wake up around 6:30 or 7am and make breakfast for myself. By this time, both my host mom and sister would be gone for work and school, respectively, so the three of us UC students living there would be on our own. We would walk down the street to catch our first bus as 8:16am and take that for about 25 minutes to Indooroopilly, the huge mall and bus station. Here, we would hop off and wait for one of the University-routed buses to come, usually for no longer than 10 minutes. We would then ride for another 20 minutes or so to the main bus stop on campus, Chancellor's Place, where we would get off and maybe grab a coffee and snack before class. We never had class earlier than 10am, so this gave us some time in the morning to walk around, finish homework, or study for a test. We usually had two lectures, then lunch at 12 or 1, then two more lectures, finishing up our day at 3 or 4pm. More often than not, a few friends and I would go to the Red Room, an on-campus bar, to get some drinks and food and unwind before heading home. We would take the same route going home, but the buses were fewer as evening approached so it took closer to 1.5 hours to get home than just 1. This would get us home in time for dinner with our family.

On Terrestrial Ecology field trips, we would normally wake up between 5 and 7am, depending on the day's schedule, and would start with a walk or breakfast. Days usually started with a lecture, so we would take notes for an hour and then make our lunches for the day. Sometimes we were allocated to a long day hike with our professor, or shorter trails and lots of field work with the graduate student TA's, or would have a free day to explore on our own (and still do some field work). Dinner would be around 6:30, always served with dessert, and we would finish with either a lecture or reflection or ghost story from our professor before heading to bed.

Marine Biology field trips were much less organized, in a sense, because we were split into groups to work on different research projects. We would wake up around 5am if we wanted to snorkel before breakfast, or maybe 6:30am if we wanted to sleep in. Breakfast was always at 7am, followed by a morning meeting at 7:45am to go over the day's general schedule. Depending on our location, we might spend the majority of the day conducting research- performing experiments, collecting data, analyzing data with statistical tests, beginning our papers- or just exploring. On Heron Island, in the Great Barrier Reef, we could get 5 snorkels per day in, if we planned around morning and afternoon teas, and the three meals. Dinner would be at 6:30pm, again with dessert, and evenings would involve workshops, presentations from staff, or labs. Swimming and researching left us exhausted, so after a few card games we would head to bed in preparation for another early morning.

I took Marine Biology and Terrestrial Ecology (which included ~3 weeks of Australian Studies by another professor). This equated to 15 semester units. I found the coursework easier than Berkeley, but because we were usually focusing on one subject at a time, the material was extremely detailed. The professor required us to think critically and apply what we learned in the field directly to exams and papers. One of the most challenging things was learning to write a scientific paper, having performed statistics I had not known before. Luckily the graduate students helped a lot and we received guidance for how to format and write in scientific language.

I loved being around such passionate and relatable people. Everyone was there for a reason, whether it be a love of science, a longing for adventure, or calling to meet new people and experience a different culture. This program forced us to become close quite fast, for we were sharing tents with each other within the first week, and we spent almost all of our time for 3 months straight together. I never thought I would meet some of my best friends on another continent, and that they would be from different universities, but I am so grateful I did! I will always have memories of us getting lost in the Uni libraries, figuring out the bus schedules, hiking for hours in the rainforest, and swimming in the reef. It is hard to believe that I did so many things in such a short span of time, and that I did them with my wonderful friends. It would not have been the same without them, for they provided me an abundance of laughter, empathy, and then sadness when we said our goodbyes.

Studying abroad made me even more independent and appreciative of little things than just coming to college did. I traveled halfway around the world, got myself where I needed to be daily, learned how to truly go with the flow, and came home with a new appreciation for toilets and showers longer than 4 minutes. Being at a university not associated with stress like Berkeley was refreshing, and even surrounding myself with new students (UC and UQ) provided me a new perspective on college life and relationships.

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