Of course, that is just some of the experiences the 14-year-old Moreno Middle School student hopes to have on her two-week trip to Australia through the People to People program later this year.
“I want to learn about the culture,” she said. “It is so different than here.”
Sydney is the only Bee County resident making the trip this year through the international program, although there have been many others in the past.
This isn’t the first year that Sydney was asked to join the other students abroad but it is the first year that she decided to take advantage of the opportunity.
“I was like in 4th or 5th grade before,” she said. “I wasn’t into traveling.
“This year it was Sydney, Australia, and my name is Sydney.”
It was fate, she said with a smile on her face.
Part of the application process for the trip was getting recommendations from former teachers.
One of those was Mrs. Ross Brown, who teaches at St. Mary’s Charter School
Brown had nothing but high praise for her former student.
“I did highly recommend that she go,” Brown said. “She is a very adaptable young lady. She very driven.
“She is a magnificent ambassador for the U.S. She will bring honor to herself and her school.”
People to People is designed to immerse students in the culture of another country, exposing them to everything from the native foods to the habits and customs of the people living in that country.
“I want to eat kangaroo. I want to learn how they make all of their stuff. I want to learn how to surf.
“The boomerang – I want to learn how to throw that.”
While her goals for the trip are few for now, the organizers have a variety of trips planned in the country.
“I know we are going to the opera house,” Sydney said. “They are going to take us to the zoos. We are going to several museums. I just don’t know which ones.”
She leaves June 11 for Australia and her mom seemed torn about her going.
“Yes, very nervous about letting her go and being that far away from me,” her mom, Terri Scott, said. “I think this is an experience she should have and take advantage of.”
Scott said she knows her daughter will be prepared for the journey.
“She has to learn about government and economics over there before she can go,” Scott said.
“You have to take tests and prepare,” Sydney said. “I have only taken one or two. I have not learned that much yet, but I will.”
Scott, and her husband, Gentry Wesson, are also using this trip to teach their daughter another lesson – one about money.
Scott said that her daughter is paying for the trip herself.
“It would be easy for mom to write a check,” she said. “I don’t think you really appreciate anything unless you are an active participant.”
So Sydney will be going from business to business and door to door selling home-baked peach or blackberry cobbler using her mom’s secret recipe.
It will be the same cobbler she entered in the junior livestock show a couple of years ago.
She didn’t win a blue ribbon but she did get some high praise.
“My teacher told me it was the best she had ever had,” Sydney said. “I didn’t enter this year. I didn’t have enough time.”
Sydney admitted that finding the time to bake the 300 cobblers she needs to sell will be difficult.
“I will do it in between meetings and track practice,” she said.
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