Great Ocean Road!

We stayed in Adelaide, which is nice in a small, slightly boring way. They have lots of markets and stalls, and run trams and roadworks. Their botanic gardens are nice, but have next to no natives - just one little corner with an assortment of flowers and shrubs. We didn't even see a Sturts Desert Pea.

The next day we drove to Warrnambool via Mt Gambier, stayed with some friends and walked along the breakwater where we saw a seal frolicking in the water! Unfortunately no camera except my phone but it was a total highlight. The next day...

London Bridge

The bridge used to connect up to the mainland, but it fell down in the 90s. A couple of people got stuck and were rescued by helicopter. 

The grotto. It's hidden in the bottom of the hole, but it's super nice.

There were so many people at the Twelve Apostles. I personally think that they are among the least interesting of the things to see, but if you drive the great ocean road you have to look at them.

Then we went to Melbourne, stayed with some other friends, then to Goulburn and home on Christmas eve.

This is Grandfather in Goulburn, sitting in his chair, reading his newspaper. 

Conversations

There's nothing like talking to clarify one's thoughts. This is why I talk to myself so much. I don't think very well inside my head, so I say it out loud, even if there is no one else around. Nice as this is, it is considered odd, and I sometimes find that having another person to talk to even more useful, especially since they might think of things that I lack the broadmindedness to come up with. So when I went back to NSW for a few weeks I had some great conversions about MTS with... Well pretty much anybody who would listen. These included: my parents, various friends, current AFES staffworkers at Newcastle uni, and a current MTS trainee. Unfortuanately I am amazingly lazy, especially when it comes to blogging, with the result of forgetting a lot of important things before I ge the motivation to write them down. Here is the summary of my chats with folks, such as I remember them. Parents: they think I should do it, that it would be good for me, but I should be prepared for how hard it will be. AFES workers in Newcastle: would be happy to have me and I should decide by June for financial reasons. I was mildly hoping that they would say something like "it's good that you're keen, but we're not sure this is really for you." It would have been a blow to my pride, but also a lovely excuse to have an easy life. Oddly enoughg, the time limit is a good thing It will (hopefully) prevent some of the more extreme procrastination to which I am prone. Friends: mostly "that's pretty exciting" and listening to me talk about it. MTS trainee LG: probably the most helpful conversation. This was a mostly one-sided conversation where I listened to h talk about her experiences, the good bits, the bad bits, joys and struggles. She is a good talker, and said lots of things, some of which I knew or had thought of, some of which were new and interesting. - Work doesn't just happen when you're working, it can happen any and all the time, and parties can end up being difficult rather than relaxing. - The relationship with the trainer is an odd one. It's not really boss, or friend, or teacher, but a strange mixture of all those things with perhaps a few other things thrown in. - Students are hard to get to sign up and commit to things. This I knew. Everybody knows that. - It gets hard, but there are plentiful holidays. I'm sure there was more (LG talked for ages!) but that's all I can remember right now.

There's no place like home...

At some point I'll have to decide where I want to do my traineeship. I want to work at a university, but there are plenty of unis, all around Australia and the world where I could conceivably complete MTS. So how do I decide where to go?

The first place I think of is Newcastle uni, where I studied. I have a historyther, already know the staff, the culture, the geography, some of the students, that sort of thing. On top of all this, mosquitoes notwithstanding, I miss Newcastle. So that is an option.

I could stay where I am and work in a uni in Perth. I only know one staffworker in all of the unis here, so I would most likely be with a trainer I have not known for a long time. That could be an issue. My current home is not really that close to any unis. All that being the case, there is a very strong argument that there is a greater need in Perth. There are just less Christians here. Also there are bunch of unis, some of which are quite small, an option I rather like.

Along with these options is the fact that I could go anywhere, providing it has some sort of uni ministry for me to join. I am not restricted to where I have already been. This seems to me like making a difficult road even hard, so I will probably not follow it, but God may have other plans.

My next jobs are then to talk to the people who work here in Perth as well as in Newy to work out what... to do...