Submitted by Ariana Acosta on the 2019 winter session study abroad program in Australia sponsored by the School of Nursing…
My experience in Sydney, Australia over the past week has been one that is life changing. It is my first time fully being immersed in a different culture and seeing different parts of the world and I have experienced things that I will take home with me as a nursing student at the University of Delaware.
On my first day in Sydney, I got to walk around Darlington Harbour and meet local people. I went with a group of students Paddy’s Market in the harbor and negotiated prices for boomerangs and other Australian souvenirs. I found it to be a shocking resemblance to the Newark Farmers Market I visit when at home in Delaware. We enjoyed our first group dinner and watched a massive thunderstorm unfold as we sat and ate on the harbor.
My second day in Sydney, we got to tour a place called the Rocks which is located in Circular Quay. We learned about the first early settlements in Australia and its association with convicts who were shipped to the country from Europe. Along our tour, we stopped at a road known as the Nurses Walk which paid tribute to convict women who cared for ill sailors and inmates sent here from their home countries.
The Sydney Opera House is notoriously famous for its beautiful structure and reputation for beautiful music, theatre and instrumental performances. On my third day here, I got the chance to see the inside of the Opera House and was amazed by the depth and luxury of their concert halls. We also got a chance to learn about the architect who was the genius behind the opera house’s amazing shape.
The Aboriginal People are a large part of Australia’s extensive history. During my fourth day in Sydney, I got to tour the Australian Museum and see some Aboriginal relics and works of art. I also learned more about their hardships and the fight they had to gain basic human rights and preserve their culture from white colonizers.
As a sophomore nursing student I was beyond excited to tour Sydney’s large and old eye hospital and learn from tour guides in the Florence Nightingale Museum. The first part of our tour took us into rooms with preserved and diseased body parts encased in a display. It was so fascinating for me to actually see some of the diseases I had learned about and what they actually look like in the human body. Throughout our tour of the hospital, we also got to discuss the origins of bedside nursing which was fascinating to me as that is the profession I am studying to practice back in the United States. I was surprised to learn that Australia’s healthcare systems are not completely foreign to the ones we have in the United States.
My sixth day in Sydney was one of discovery as I had the opportunity to explore Watsons Bay, one of the original fishing villages in Australia. We learned about Australia’s focus on mental health as we viewed the Gap, a cliff which is known to be a popular place for citizens to take their lives. A fascinating part of the day was when I learned about a famous World War I veteran who received the highest honor for Australian citizens not for his military efforts, but for his work with young adults who were close to taking their lives at the Gap. He would patrol the area and find young adults in distress and talk them through the most difficult time in their life which allowed for him to save countless lives. As I conclude my first week abroad, I am excited for the places I still have to see and learn from in the week to come.
