Australia Update part 2.

Sydney proved to be an incredible show. We had some crazy technical difficulties but it didn’t matter because the kids were incredible and everyone just had an all around good time. We’ve been really surprised by how many people have known us here. We have had so many people singing along and jumping and just have a good time with our music and it’s the best feeling in the world. Another amazing thing was to see our friends from Texas who had flown all the way from America to see Australia and the Soundwave Festival. It was great to see familiar faces in the crowd! Amazing thing #3 is that I received a few Starbucks and I’m halfway around the world. What an amazing thing the internet is.

The other thing that has been really cool is our new phone. We’ve never done something like this where we have a phone and kids can call us. We’ve been overwhelmed with text messages and phone calls from kids in Australia and even all over the world calling just to say hello and talk. It has been really cool… so much better than just a myspace comment to hear people’s voices and know who I’m talking to. So if you like, call us, we love it!

After the show we took a shuttle back to the hotel and rode with In Flames. Literally the nicest dudes we’ve ever met. Two worlds were colliding between Swedish metal and American pop punk and it was awesome. The best part was when they were leaving and they didn’t know we were… so the tour manager yelled at them to come say goodbye to us in Swedish. Just heard them yelling a whole mess of Swedish and then our name right in the middle. It was great.

We finally settled in at the hotel and worked out the room situation and decided to go out. Hodge, George and I. the Three amigos!! We walked all around Sydney looking for something to do. We must have walked like 6 miles. Finally we got back to the hotel and found out that everyone was going to the after party. We got lost on the way to the after party and asked these people who also had no idea. Fortunately we ended up talking to these Norwegian people for about an hour. Hodge fell in love and we parted ways. 20 minutes later, Hodge realized that he loved this girl and made us walk all over Sydney and knock on every hostel looking for this girl. Little did we know there are like 50 in the same area and there was no chance of finding her. Needless to say we came home empty handed and ended up just going to the after party and hanging out with friends. Hodge is still heartbroken.


The next day we headed down to Sydney Central Station to take the train to the harbour. We had planned on going to the zoo and seeing the sites. We went down and saw the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge. It was really cool to see the things that I’ve seen so many pictures of and in movies. We took the ferry across with the intention of heading into the zoo. Unfortunately the zoo was closing in about 45 minutes so we didn’t want to spend the money for such a short time. We ended up just taking a nature walk that was really cool and got some great views of Sydney. We were taking pictures of these Iguanas that we saw. We thought it was so unique and cool until we realized that it was actually something similar to squirrels in America. Then we saw like 10 more and realized we were fools… but it was still cool no matter how silly and touristy we are.

After another 6 mile walk we headed down to the sauna in the hotel and sweated as much as anyone ever should in 50 degree weather. 50 degrees and we were sweating like pigs… I think they’re thermometer was broken. Next we went to an internet café to eat some internet and use some coffee and snacks for information, it was very strange, the guy next to me was watching Journey live videos for the entire hour we were there. I also overheard some foreign girl trying to spell something on the phone and she was like ‘ok it’s on john street… J as in George, O as in Ernie, H as in elf and N as in myspace’…. It was pretty sweet.

Next stop was the bloodhound gang show. We left a note for our buddies in Biffy Clyro. They are playing there in a few weeks and I hope they receive our message. The show was short and afterwards we caught wind of another afterparty going on. Of course, we got lost again. We ended up walking about 5 more miles and 10 miles round trip. We came back and hung out in the lobby. I think my favorite part about this trip is that we’ve on tour with a bunch of really cool bands and they are all really cool and just hang out. We’ve hung out with some bands that we never though we’d be on the same tour, let alone hanging out together. It’s pretty great and we’ve loving it.


The next day we went to the Featherdale Wildlife Reservation and hung out with some of Australia’s crazy animals. We got to pet some koalas, feed and pet kangaroos, play with dingos and wombats. We held snakes and lizards and whatever else there was for us to do; we did it. I took soooo many pictures and they will surely be up once I can get internet that is fast enough!

At night we went to hang out with our friends Andrew and Ben. Ate thai food. We walked heaps of miles (my great Australian slang!!) to the New Found Glory show. We got some Neighbours dvds from our friends and we are going to watch EVERY EPISODE EVER!! Okie from Houston calls went absolutely insane and was doing Aretha Franklin moves and the Macarena on stage. Chad from nfg picked him up and threw him into the crowd. It was just an overall silly night.

After the show we went to a weird casino bar and everyone hung out. It took FOREVER to get everyone together to go to the bar. The guys from new found were getting cleaned up and by the time they came down no one wanted to go to the one bar. Then no one was sure which way to go and which bar was which. We finally got there and it was silly, but we still all had a good time. Everyone was together and just having good conversations and good hangs. It ended up to be a pretty good night.

We ended up having some local Australians show us the real way to eat Vegemite and I MIGHT be coming around on it… but I might not be too. I’m still on the fence about it. And when I say ‘the real’ way to have Vegemite, I mean they took their finger and dipped it into the jar and just ate a teaspoon full. Bold.

Tonight is the show with Goldfinger and Riverboat Gamblers and Mike Hererra. I’m pretty stoked. I hope you guys are too. I’m sure you’re not as stoked as we are. It’s about that time to load in, but I hope you’ll call us and hope to see you soon.