Cultural Immersion Program

Report by Katja N.

ICMS organizes a 5-days Cultural Immersion Program to Cairns before the beginning of the O-Week. Cairns is a city about 2,500 km north of Sydney with many clubs, bars and travel agencies. I think that it is only a place to be for backpackers. Except for the harbour and the esplanade, Cairns wasn’t really lovely. Although, I highly recommend the International Cultural Immersion Program.
The aim of this time is to learn more about Australia and meet your fellow students in a relaxed atmosphere off the dress regulations and the academic setting. It simplifies the start at the university if you already know some people from this week.

Getting the week started…

We met on Wednesday afternoon and checked in into our rooms. The hostel was called “Gilligan’s” and was directly located next to a club, so in some rooms you could hear the music. But all in all, it’s a good hostel, which is clean and modern. I shared a room with four other girls – three from the USA and one also from Germany.
On Thursday we visited the Rainforest station in Kuranda, a small city further to the north. We learned some facts about the life of the Aboriginals and had the opportunity to throw a boomerang by ourselves. This was very funny! We painted some pictures with the typical Australian colours and for the highlight of the day, we had the chance to hold a snake and a koala. The picture of holding a koala was included in the program.

Great Barrier Reef

On Friday we took a trip to the Great Barrier Reef. It was absolutely amazing. We could snorkel or book a 15-Minutes scuba-dive. I decided to go scuba-diving, because I’ve wanted to try it for so many years. The introductions for the dive were very clear, so I felt save all the time. Since it was my first time, it was a bit difficult to concentrate on the fishes and the corals beside me. Scuba diving was a great experience, but I saw much more fishes when I was snorkelling. It seemed like taking a swim in an aquarium. And we even saw a Clownfish (Nemo :)), this was so cute. We borrowed an underwater camera in Cairns, so we had the chance to take fantastic photos.

Sky Diving

The Saturday was activity free, so we could choose what we wanted to do. I decided to go Sky-Diving. Me and my friends booked this fantastic trip in the travel agency from the hostel. If you are looking for an adrenalin rush, I can really recommend this experience. We made the Sky-Dive with Sydney Skydivers (also called tandem Cairns) and although it was quite expensive, you should do this. The guides gave us a sense of security the entire time. If you want to do something else, you can book a water rafting trip or a horseback ride and more. I also suggest a travel to the city of Kuranda. It’s very lovely, because it’s a small hippie village in the rainforest. It’s a good place to buy crazy stuff.

Going back to Sydney…

After the breakfast on Sunday, we left for the airport and flew back to Sydney. A bus took us to the college, where we checked into our rooms.
You have to pay 750 AUD for these 5 days + the costs for the flights to Cairns and back to Sydney. But it pays off. Almost all meals are included and they were quite good. We went to different restaurants and enjoyed meals. The tours to the rainforest station and the Great Barrier Reef were included. Furthermore we had some lectures with a very nice teacher, where we learned more about the “Aussie way of life”.