Who's Your Paddy?

Definitely one of the most eventful and fun weekends thus far. Despite not sleeping for close to 55 hours, I wouldn't change a single second of it. This weekend started off with an eventful Friday night that never seemed to end. So, that is sleepless night number one. I then proceeded to meet up with the crew at my favorite pub in all of Sydney, The Cock and Bull for St. Patrick's Day. Greatest little Irish pub and it happens to be literally right down the street from out apartment. Got to Cock and Bull around 11:00am and for $10 we got a full breakfast and an awesome T-shirt that said "Who's Your Paddy?" and this shirt became an instant hit with people throughout the day all over the city. The pub was great. They played so much Irish music and there was beer and dancing everywhere you looked. After hanging out at the pub for a while, we made our way down to Darling Harbor for our St. Patrick's Day booze cruise around the city. The cruise was from 2:00pm - 5:00pm and was definitely a lot more fun than I expected. It was mostly study abroad students from all over New South Whales and everyone was decked out in their full Irish attire. Open bar for 3 hours only leads to embarrassing pictures and lots of dancing but we had an awesome time and met some really cool and interesting people. After the cruise, we went for a walk around the city with our final destination being The Rocks. We stopped at this amazing place called Pancakes On the Rocks. It is more or less the fanciest I-Hop you could ever imagine but the food is absolutely delicious. I got this big chicken and bacon pizza that was delicious and they put a huge glob of sour cream and guacamole in the middle which just topped it off. Since our one friend Jenna went a little too hard on the cruise, she was pretty much comatose for the dinner so I also took it upon myself to help her with her pancakes which were out of this world. They top the long stack of pancakes with vanilla ice cream, butter cream, and whipped cream. AMAZING. Definitely going back there for a late night snack since Pancakes On the Rocks never closes! Yes, that's right, they never close. It is pretty common around here for a lot of restaurants and pubs to never close. After dinner we attempted to go on a pub crawl through The Rocks but some people in our group were slightly too intoxicated which made getting into the places a bit difficult. We ended up coming back to Bondi and just enjoying the rest of the night here but St. Patty's Day in Aussie was definitely the best one that I have ever experienced. The next morning, Matt, Josh, Andrew, Ben, and I took a train WAY out West to a small city called Penrith to visit some of Ben's family friends. Western Sydney is an area that many Australians call "Chat" which basically means very sketchy and rough. In these "Chat" cities, there are also a lot of "Bogan's" which is the American equivalent to a Hill Billy or White Trash (I know that is mean and I apologize but it is the only way I can describe it). Once we finally made it out to Penrith, we met up with Ben's friend Matthew who was actually born in the US but since he has been in Australia since he was about 9, he has complete and total Australian accent. He is now in his early 20's but he can still squeeze out a slight American accent which is funny to hear. It is also funny because there are NO Americans out in Penrith so when locals hear us talk, they love it more than anything. The can't tell that Matthews American accent is pretty bad because they don't know what they are listening for but when I hear it, you can tell it is a bit broken. We then made our way to Panther Stadium for our first professional Rugby game. We saw the Penrith Panthers take on the Rabbito's and it was one of the coolest sporting events I have ever seen. I have been going to Baseball, Football, Hockey, and Basketball games my whole life and I have sat in some of the best seats that money could buy but I don't think that I have ever had this much fun. We payed $11 for General Admission tickets and we sat on a grassy hill right in the Panthers end zone. We were literally able to go right up to the field and get within 10 feet of all of the players. I learned all of the rules to Rugby and I can now watch it on TV without wondering to myself, "What the hell is going on here?" It was fun to be an outsider and learn how sport fans are in other countries. One thing I learned was that rule number one is that you NEVER EVER EVER "root" for a team. That is a HUGE no no in Australian culture. You can cheer for a team or go for a team but NEVER root for a team. Rooting for a team essentially means that you have sex for the team. So it is like a groupy but 100000x worse. You don't want a Bogan in a Chat area to hear you say you root for the Panthers...Unless you're looking for a good fight. After the game, we went across the street to the Panther Club which is basically where everyone goes after the game for a few drinks and some food. The club was gorgeous and a lot of fun to hangout in. The locals all love that Americans take the time and effort to come out and see what it is like outside of the big tourist areas. Over all, it was a pretty awesome weekend. I cannot wait to go back out to Penrith for some more Rugby games. Today is family BBQ day so shortly I will be going to the store to pick up some Kangaroo steaks and Kangaroo Sausages (also known as Kanger-bangers) and also some Swordfish steaks. Should be another delicious BBQ at 97 Grafton Street! Stay tuned for more interesting stories and I appreciate you checking in and reading up on my journey down under. Means a lot to me. Cheers!