Day 13: Free Internet Does Exist in Brisbane!

I woke up around 8:00am to get my bags all packed and ready for checkout and departure at 10:00am. I finished about 8:45, with enough time to head back around town and take a few pictures of the town and have devo by the beach over the phone with Brittany. I got back to the room about 9:30, in time to pick up my bags and head out with the rest of the group. We departed in the reverse fashion that we arrived at Surfers Paradise, and found our way back to the same hotel we had previously stayed at in Brisbane by 12:45 - 15 minutes before the scheduled 1:00pm group check-in time.

We met briefly as a group, with Anoop calling another meeting in an hour (at 2:00pm in the Cinema Room). A group of us used this time to grab some lunch across the street at Thai Rosa, which was my first ever Thai food experience! When I made my order, I had no idea what I was ordering until it arrived at the table. The main dish was Pad Thai Chicken, which turned out to be diced chicken in a bowl of noodles with a delicious sauce. I'm not sure what all was in the dish, but I would definitely recommend this establishment!

Bellies full, we walked back across the street and then went up to meet the group in the Cinema Room on the 6th floor. We had just begun to share stories of the past weekend (The professors went to a World Heritage Site along the coast while most of the Environmental Design students went to Cairns, pronounced like the word "canes," and went to the Great Barrier Reef to snorkel and scuba dive) when the fire alarm went off (for at least the second time of the day so we were told) and we had to evacuate via the fire stairs. Nothing was on fire, so within a matter of minutes the "all clear" sign was given. We decided not to go back up to the unairconditioned Cinema Room, but instead went up to the 7th floor to Caitlyn and Brooke's room that turned out to be penthouse suite, handed out randomly. (There was plenty of room for our 18-person group to gather around in the living room and kitchen area) The room also provided a great view of a building I had been trying to capture on camera since arriving in Brisbane. Here's a look:

We finished sharing stories of the weekend, thankfully without having to evacuate again. At the end of the meeting, Anoop gave us a forecast of what to expect during our remaining days in Brisbane and then we adjourned. A good number of people (including myself) headed out to the State Library of Queensland where we were told that we would have access to free public WiFi until 5:00pm! It was already 3:00pm, so we took a 5 minute bus ride over to the library instead of a 30 minute walk to maximize our time. Once there, I was able to quickly connect to the internet and began catching up on blogging and posting several hundred pictures to Facebook and the blog. I made a couple of videos using iMovie and then (after some difficulty) uploaded the videos to Facebook, to which I was able to create links on the blog. If you haven't already, feel free to check out the videos on the "Video" page of the blog!

The library ended up not closing until 8:00pm, at which time I walked down to the ground floor and found several people sitting around using their laptops. Intrigued, I opened mine and found that the internet was still working! I was not quite done with the work I had set out to do, so I happily sat down on the concrete benches and was able to continue working! Finally - free 24-hour internet in Brisbane!!

I got back to the hotel around 10:45 and took a quick shower before falling asleep to gear up for another day!