first day in sydney...

so... today the roomies and i went to the city of sydney for the first time! it's super crazy and crowded this weekend because of world youth day and all the pope-y madness, so they advised us not to. but our host mom said we should check it out because "with all the people, the city will be just electric!" so she took us around and showed us where all the stores and stuff are near us (they totally have target here... i haven't gone because i'm gonna try to avoid it. but it's good to know it's there...). so she showed us where the train station was, and we were off on our own. they had this pilgrimmage across the harbour bridge that we wanted to check out. so we went, thinking we'd have to have tickets or something, but we followed the masses and before i knew it we were on the bridge! it's a big deal because they shut the whole bridge down, which has only happened something like 4 times in history. i wasn't expecting it to be that great, but it was honestly such a cool experience. there were just thousands and thousands of people from all over the world walking and singing praise and worship in all different languages. i've never been in that kind of thing before. there were no drunk people or fights or people cussing or throwing trash on the ground. everyone was just so happy and loving the Lord! they were all going to camp out tonight to go to mass in the morning, but we just wanted to explore after the walk. brittany and i got separated from elle and esther on the way to the opera house, and we accidently stumbled on the sweetest thing ever! it's the government mansion, and it's just this huge gorgeous house surrounded by gardens and fountains. it's right on the quay (pronounced like "key") and it basically has the opera house in the back yard. they have free tours, so we're gonna go on one :) it was also really cool getting to know my roommate one-on-one. and i'm fully gonna go to the museum of contemporary art! woohoo! it was a pretty good day...

these are my roommates! (l to r) brittany, esther, me, and elle. i don't know the guy smiling behind us... haha. this is during the pilgrimmage walk just about to get on the bridge. you can't really tell but there were so many people!!

i'm having trouble uploading any more pictures right now... but at least now you can see what my roommates look like.