Lefkas Taverna – A traditional Greek restaurant that sits on the corner of Hardgrave and Ganges Streets in West End, Lefkas is undoubtedly the best food I’ve had in Australia so far. Like most of the places

Yiro!

on Hardgrave, it’s nothing even close to being fancy yet the food is exquisite. As an appetizer I had the ‘famous’ tzasiki with homemade pita bread along with a lamb yiro that sat on another slice of pita bread topped with tomatoes, garlic sauce, and lettuce. Needless to say it was amazing. I was very happy to learn that they have an identical take out menu, which I am sure I’ll abuse for the rest of my time here.

Jackpot Dining – My first eating out experience was at a local Chinese restaurant about five minutes from me. The menu caught my attention as I walked past it one day for the sole reason that all entrées were $10. Although that may raise a red flag to a few people it made me slightly ecstatic since I’m living on a college budget and have an ongoing craving for Asian food. A friend and I tried out the restaurant soon after I spotted it and indulged in its cheap and BYO status. I had a beef and noodle platter while she ordered chicken with a special spicy sauce and we both split side dishes of spring rolls and dumplings. The food obviously wasn’t topnotch cuisine but it was good enough and we were both satisfied in the end (me enough to go back again in the future!).

Patcharin Thai – Another quaint little restaurant on Hardgrave Street is Patcharin Thai, which lived up to the street’s stereotype of strangely good exotic foods. Keeping it simple with beef pad thai and spring rolls, I was very happy once again with my decision to try another local place. Pretty soon I’ll probably have gone to all of the restaurants on the street!

Hawken Village’s Kebab and Pizza – I have a group of friends that live on Hawken Drive near St. Lucia campus and they introduced me to my first ever Australian kebab. When first offered the opportunity to get one, I declined since I immediately thought of a kebab as the American ones (a shish kebab that is). When asked if I’d ever had one and I said no, I was dragged along and almost forced to order one – it was a good decision on their part because it was absolutely delicious. I have always been a fan of Mediterranean/Middle

Yummy Kebab!

Eastern foods and the chicken wrapped pita with garlic sauce and lettuce, tomatoes, onions and other toppings made for a perfect late night snack. I have since returned to that specific store at least three more times and there is no doubt in my mind that I will definitely be back for more! I’m also glad that there is a kebab shop about three minutes from my house…

My Own Kitchen – Opting to live off campus in my own house comes with its ups and downs, a debatable up or down (depending on my mood or level of exhaustion) is having to cook for myself. Although there are

Cake pops!

plenty of times when I wish I had food cooked for me or simply decide to pour myself a bowl of cereal as a pathetic replacement for an actual meal, there have been times when I’ve put my effort into cooking and very good results have come out of it. Some examples include roasted chicken, homemade pizza, spinach and feta lasagna rolls, and cake pops!

Markets – I’ve been to various markets around Brisbane and the food there is always pretty good too. The great part about them is that most stalls have free samples that you can nibble on while you get your weekly fresh fruits and veggies. Some of my favorites include the churros, dried French sausages, infinite licorice flavors, assorted chocolates, flavored peanuts, and the superb variety of fruit. On a hot day, I suggest trying some of

West End Market

the gelato they offer since it’s pretty good and offers a little compensation for the growing temperature numbers! There are also food stalls which vary from Mediterranean delicacies to brick-oven pizza which I have yet to try but hopefully will get to by the time I leave.

Sushi – One of the things I was surprised to see was how cheap some of the sushi in Brisbane is. All over the city you can find little shops that offer $2-$3 rolls of sushi, which makes for a very convenient on-the-go snack. It may not be the greatest sushi in the world, it’s definitely not terrible!

Pancake Manor – For my roommate’s birthday we went to the highly suggested Pancake Manor for breakfast. The restaurant is situated in an old church which gives it a really cool feel while you’re sitting. The menu, compromised of a grand selection of pancake platters amongst other options, gives very vivid examples of each meal, making it quite difficult to make a decision when ordering! In the end I decided to get a short stack with fudge and a side of

Pancake Manor Deliciousness

eggs, a mundane order compared to some of the other platters which included chocolate pancakes and assortments of fruits and sauces. The restaurant is open 24/7 and makes for a great meal anytime of the day and definitely gives IHOP a run for its money!

Lychee Lounge – Although the Lychee Lounge in West End is known more for its drinks menu, my work colleagues and I were treated to a range of appetizers after the West End Block Party. We tried everything from lamb, chicken, and prawns to bread and seasoned chips – I have to say that everything was excellent (as it should be given the price..). The lamb was sautéed in a special barbeque sauce while the chicken was cooked in champagne and the shrimp seasoned in garlic; the bread came with three delicious dipping sauces as did the potatoes. The meal was accompanied by two lovely bottles of champagne to make for a lovely evening. I would definitely go back!

UQ Sausage – One funny meal that I have to include in this post is the sausages that are offered on the UQ campus every now and then to raise money for whichever club is selling them. Although I personally am a fan, I have never seen a sausage stand and found it to be quite a funny concept to sell a sausage wrapped in a piece of white bread!

Exploring your own backyard is never going to be quite as exciting as someone else’s.

Maybe that’s why exchange students seem to stick so solidly together at their host universities.

 With their shared fascination for the locals’ everyday and ordinary and the freedom of only having to just pass their subjects, it makes sense.

At McGill, the international students’ network (MISN) is so welcoming that it would be easy to socialise and travel with students from everywhere and anywhere but Canada.

But, of course, meeting true locals is also an exciting part of being an exchange student.

That’s why I’m so lucky to have had the best of both worlds over the past two weekends.

The first was in Boston with fellow exchange students keen to pack the weekend with as much sightseeing and camera clicking as possible.

And the second was at Mont Tremblant with McGill students from Toronto keen to make the most of the last of the snow by skiing in Spring sunshine.

They will probably be my last two away-from-Montreal adventures before the end of the semester now as those final-exam jitters start to creep on up.

Spring skiing in Tremblant

Soaking in the hot tub after a sunny Saturday of skiing in positive temperatures, I was feeling pretty lucky.

Day two wasn’t quite so perfect though, with early-afternoon rain cutting our ski session short.

But I was actually a little secretly happy – the rain had smelt so beautiful on the top of the mountain!

I’m sure my skiing/snowboarding buddies weren’t quite so impressed.

A perfect day on the slopes

All four were from Ontario, where it sounds like skiing closely follows walking for most toddlers.

As I found out though, skiing is about much more than skiing.

A big part of skiing is eating.

And I was definitely just as good at that, especially when it came to beaver tails!

Beaver tails are yummy fried dough creations dowsed in maple syrup or sometimes chocolate and caramel sauce and topped off with lollies.

They taste even better after a maple taffy – another great Canadian invention, made from maple syrup frozen into a toffee lollypop on fresh snow!

April about to devour her beaver tail

Power sightseeing in Boston

In Montreal I’m a fairly laid-back sightseer.

A Bostonian avenue on the edge of the afternoon

Having a whole semester to really see things takes that fast-paced, touristy edge off travel.

But when we got off the bus in Boston with two-and-a-half days to discover one of the oldest cities in the States, we knew it was time for plenty of power walking and some intense map-deliberation sessions.

Boston is full of must-dos – The Museum of Fine Arts with its iconic impressionist pieces and ancient Egyptian mummies; Fenway Stadium, home of the Red Sox baseball team, and Mike’s Pastries where fans queue the block for giant eclairs served in boxes tied up with brown string. 

Of all the places we visited, my absolute favorite was undoubtedly The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum – the public legacy of a wealthy Victorian lady with exceptional panache for the beautiful and rare.

Mrs Stewart Gardner traveled Europe, Africa and Asia collecting art, jewelry and furniture and then expertly pieced the treasures together in her Bostonian mansion complimenting them with musical soirees and indoor gardens.

As the museum’s guidebook states, “it is one of the few museums in the world that speaks to nearly all the senses through flowers, music and architecture”.

And there was plenty more sensory delight to come.

The next day we crossed the Charles River, where rowing and sailing boats glide by on cue, to visit Cambridge, home to Harvard and MIT.

At Harvard, the buildings seemed to match perfectly. There were lots of little red brick cottage-like ones mixed with elegant white towers, all surrounded by plenty of lush lawn.

They made striking contrast with the space-age architectural feats at MIT.

Both universities seemed like such inspiring places to learn in.

But, of course, I’ll always have a special spot for a certain set of sandstone arches, jacaranda blooms and even those overly friendly ibis!

Quaint red brick buildings to match Harvard’s crimson colour code

Contemporary architecture at MIT

 

 

 

Outside today, Montrealers are sharing in a special treat - a long-awaited Spring time teaser.

The sun is a’ shining, the temperature a’ rising and jackets are open or even completely left behind to hang limp on the coat stand.

Café patrons are sipping their lattes alfresco along St Laurent Boulevard.

Brightly floraled, cotton scarves and loud sunglasses fill the window display of the uber hip men’s boutique I pass by on the way to uni.

It seems everyone’s allowed a little extra flamboyancy in Spring, and I’m guessing, especially in Montreal.

The promise of sunshine has brought new vivacity to the city and, as the clocks were wound back by one hour this morning, it can linger well into late afternoon.

This ubiquitous appreciation for seasonal change is something I’ve never experienced before.

Canadians who pick my accent tell me I’m so lucky to live in a place where the sun shines nearly all year round.

But perhaps the stark seasonal variation here makes every year that much richer.

It definitely seems to define time more clearly.

All of a sudden, I feel like I should be getting on with post-semester travel plans.

I guess though, it could also be that at the moment I’m in a bit of a breather period and am taking the chance to get organised after exploring a little more of Quebec and tackling mid terms.

Quebec City - full of quaint buildings and stunning views

 

 

Visiting Quebec City felt like taking a day trip to Europe.

With 400-year-old buildings, cobbled streets and flowing French, it was obvious why American film producers sometimes use the city as a backdrop for European scenes.

Crazy costumes at Carnivale

After spending the day café hopping in and out of the cold, we watched the festival’s grand finale – a colourful parade full of school dance troops and inflatable floats.

 Skiing Mont Tremblant 

Jess and Yvette ready to take on the runs

I arrived in Tremblant a little shaken up by my fairly unsuccessful first go on the slopes at Mont St Anne a few weeks earlier.

It’s not so much the actual skiing that bothers me; more so, walking in ski boots without cracking my skull, getting on gondola carriages with ski poles in tow, remembering to attach my lift pass to my jacket etc.

But I left the trip with a much more positive outlook.

Our hostel was super cheap and delightfully homely.

Right away, we made friends with an Argentinean snowboarding instructor called Emiliano, who worked behind the bar at the hostel.

Emiliano not only gave the boarding girls heaps of tips on the runs but also gave us real insight into local slope-side culture.

On our first night, he invited us to a house party, where they actually had a skating half-pipe in the apartment.

It was being thrown for an Aussie snowboard instructor, who, coincidently, was heading home to Brisbane in time for the start of the UQ semester. 

It seems though, a lot of other instructors never leave; instead they get caught up in this crazy lifestyle of partying and extreme sport.

Tiptoeing through the snow after a good bake in the sauna

Halfway through our trip, we treated our sore, shocked muscles to a heavenly day at the Scandinavian Spas.

Rotating warm and freezing-cold submersion surrounded by snow and frolicking deer, it was all too easy to forget all about our approaching, slightly underprepared-for, mid-term exams.

Time for a reality check

After plenty of coffee, some well-timed napping and a few miracle last-minute break throughs, I was sitting my mid terms and, surprisingly, had most (although definitely not all) of the answers. 

I think the good thing about mid terms while you’re on exchange is that, once they’re over, you become a little more reasonable about your grading prospects.

The ‘OMG-I’m-going-to-fail’ days of cringing over foreign course outlines and criteria sheets now seem distant and over dramatic.

So now I can go on mixing exploring and socialising with study, knowing I have a good 20 or 30 percent under my belt for each course to face finals with.

Au revoir exams!

We gave mid terms a big send off with a party at our apartment.

As my housemates both go to another university, which was hosting an international student conference, the party ended up being a very multicultural, multi-campus affair.

Making lots of new friends that night, I again realised what Montreal has already taught me a thousand times over, going on exchange is a perfect and special way to expand your worldview and already I couldn’t recommend it more!

Kate and I say cheese before we freeze at the Ice Hotel on the way to Quebec City

Tess (right) and I make the most of our last few weeks of Aussie summer

So there we were - two gals chatting away between sips of icy frappes.

Luckily, we’d picked a spot under one of cafe’s brightly coloured umbrellas, escaping the excess of sunshine drenching the Mooloolaba strip.

Even in our shady little circle though, it seemed far too hot to be talking about winter coats.

But that’s exactly what Tess and I had met up to discuss.

We were just weeks away from leaving our sunny uni holidays in Australia to start classes early in sub-zero temperatures, a world away from our family and friends.

And we could not be more excited.

Along with five other University of Queensland students, we will be turning our worlds upside down, on exchange at McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

We have all spent months planning the adventure – getting courses approved by our lecturers for our study plans, working day and night to save as the Aussie dollar plummeted, applying for scholarships and, more recently, booking flights, organising travel insurance and finding accommodation.

I completely lucked out with my accommodation.

Just before the end of semester, a very helpful email popped into my inbox from Will, a UQ student currently in Montreal and studying at McGill.

About to return home, Will wanted to pass on his room in a cute apartment, minutes from uni and one street back from a bustling strip of restaurants and boutique shops, where he had lived for six months with two great housemates.

His housemates, Julien and Damien, are both from France and studying in Montreal, so although they speak perfect English, they talk to each other in French.

I jumped at the chance to move in with them. Although I only know the tiny bit of French I can remember from school, I figure what I will pick up from them at home will really help me learn the basics.

But I’m sure there will be a few language faux pas along the way!

Will keep you posted, Monique