When life throws a bag of crap in your face...

So, the other night at the hostel we are all sitting outside on the patio, laughing, talking, playing games, sipping wine, and having an all together good time. That's what it's like here, constant social hour getting to know the people around you, and just chilling out. So, anyway, I turn my face slightly to the left while I'm laughing about something and all of a sudden, somthing hard fits the right side of my face, hard. Everyone is silent, and I ask, "Do you smell something?" A boy walks over to the bag to see what it was, and low and behold, it was a bag of human fecal matter, yes, it was a bag of crap, literally. I am in New Zealand for the first time in my life, and I, of all people, get smacked in the face with what felt like semi-formed rocks. Fred, Mk, and I start laughing hysterically and everyone is staring shockingly at me. They can't believe that we are laughing so hard, but in all honesty, what can you do but laugh? It's true what I've heard, you just can't take yourself too seriously, life then just becomes too stressful. After a minute, after everyone realizes it's okay, they start to laugh hysterically too. A couple of the guys ran down the hill behind the little hoodlums that threw it, but they got away too quickly, it was nice though that they tried to defend my honor. All night last night we spent discussing what was going through the minds of these silly kids on Saturday night. Thy thinkg, hmmm, you know what we should do tonight since we are bored? We should all crap in a bag and throw it at the first person we see...and with my luck, it was me. What are the odds, can't I win the lottery instead? I mean, really?! So here is the life lesson I've learned from this, and I hope you learn the same: When life throws a bag of crap in your face, just throw it away from yourself and have a good chuckle about, don't take yourself so seriously! Really, I don't mind at all if you are laughing about it, imagine the scene in your head and it's even funnier! OOOh, if only you all could have seen it live.

Home Sweet Home

So plans have now changed, again. It's not that we are fickle, it's just that we have now found a place where we feel pretty happy and almost like home. Rosemere Backpackers in Wellington. Yes, you have read my words correctly. We will be living in a hostel indefinitely. It's a pretty tight squeeze, I won't lie, but it's a really great place to live. It is actually very homey, and everyone is nice and interested in each others lives. It's true, we live with about 70 other people, we make our meals in a large communal kitchen and then we eat at our father's table. We didn't think we would be living at a soup kitchen until the townships in South Africa, but it turns out we get free soup for dinner on Wednesday nights. In the morning we wake up at 8:50 with just enough time to run downstairs to eat free cereal and toast, and there is nothing sweeter than eating rice krispies you didn't have to buy with milk you didn't have to carry across town from the grocery store and eat with strangers you may never see again. Every meal is interesting. We end up talking to someone new, or getting to know our new best friends better. This morning for example, we woke up at 8:50 with the intention of eating breakfast and then returning to our room to fall asleep again. As soon as we got down there, we ran into a few guys we had befriended and end up sitting at our father's table for about an hour after we finished eating just talking, laughing, telling stories about our childhoods, our countries, our friends. It seems that has been what our meals have been like, and hopefully continue to be. It feels like we are getting to have our freshman year of college all over again. Anyway, we really are happy here. We all are a bit relieved to have a "homebase", just somewhere to come back to. We actually went way across town to check out a boarding house, but it actually turned out to be more like a crack house, so we decided Rosemere was a much better option. Wellington itself is a very unique city. It is so compact. It is really unnecessary to have a car, one can easily walk anywhere in the city. There are tons of cafes, in fact there are more cafes per capital in Wellington than anywhere else in the world. It is also the most southernly capitol in the world. It’s a magical place, no really it is, we live with a magician and it is absolutely some of the best live entertainment. There’s also a queen who is so over the top that he makes Paris Hilton seem like Hulk Hogan. We also went to this really small really quiet and what I'm assuming to be a jazz/night club to hear some music that a guy at our backpackers suggested. We go. The performers were three very young, very eclectic, very tall and skinny white guys that played what I understood to be "progressive" sounds. It was instrumental at first and actually quite beautiful, one played the guitar, one the bongo drums, and the last a violin that he played like a guitar. It sounded very new age, very "yogaish", and really meditative and peaceful. Then, all of a sudden, the vocals began and it basically sounded ridiculous. I was trying so hard not to start giggling and disrespect the performers, but oh my. He sounded like an oppressed animal crying for its freedom, to the point that Fred and Mary K and I all just stared at each other wide eyed trying to figure out where we were, in Wellington, NZ or in a Bhuddist monastery in Tibet. We climbed Mt. Victoria the other day which is supposed to be a nice walk but turned out to be some intense hike that we were seriously out of breath at the end; we climbed it with this friend at the backpackers who turned out to be a little monkey jumping around to the top, but the view was so beautiful. You can see for miles, city, mountains, clear water, white sandy beaches! The beaches here are so surprisingly clean and clear seeing that they belong to such a busy and crowded city!
On another note, my family may be the only ones that find this of any interest, but as we were walking yesterday across town to the beach, I noticed a Cedar tree painted on a window and the word "Habibe". I quickly got closer to see it and found a restaurant serving "authentic Lebanese cuisine". I remembered what my mom and aunt said about how much I was going to miss their food, and they are right by the way, and what my Dad said about trying to find a Lebanese community (which I was hoping would cook food for me) and decided to go in and ask them if they are hiring. Turns out, they were, and he asked me to come on Tuesday for a trial period to see if I like working there. I hate working in restaurants, but the thought of eating real Lebanese food and not some crap kebabs that seem to be sold everywhere in NZ was alluring to me. And the food is authentic. The owner/cook is Lebanese and the menu is basically everything we eat at home, and it looked so appetizing. And it was. I had kafta, baba ghannoush, tabouli; it was all so good, and I think I may enjoy working there. They speak Arabic, so it’s nice to hear it and speak it so I don’t completely forget the language! Fred found a job at a Turkish restaurant she seems to like, and Mary K is still looking, she’ll find one soon, we’re sure! Until next time, friends and family, we miss you and love you!

So plans have now changed, again. It's not that we are fickle, it's just that we have now found a place where we feel pretty happy and almost like home. Rosemere Backpackers in Wellington. Yes, you have read my words correctly. We will be living in a hostel indefinitely. It's a pretty tight squeeze, I won't lie, but it's a really great place to live. It is actually very homey, and everyone is nice and interested in each others lives. It's true, we live with about 70 other people, we make our meals in a large communal kitchen and then we eat at our father's table. We didn't think we would be living at a soup kitchen until the townships in South Africa, but it turns out we get free soup for dinner on Wednesday nights. In the morning we wake up at 8:50 with just enough time to run downstairs to eat free cereal and toast, and there is nothing sweeter than eating rice krispies you didn't have to buy with milk you didn't have to carry across town from the grocery store and eat with strangers you may never see again. Every meal is interesting. We end up talking to someone new, or getting to know our new best friends better. This morning for example, we woke up at 8:50 with the intention of eating breakfast and then returning to our room to fall asleep again. As soon as we got down there, we ran into a few guys we had befriended and end up sitting at our father's table for about an hour after we finished eating just talking, laughing, telling stories about our childhoods, our countries, our friends. It seems that has been what our meals have been like, and hopefully continue to be. It feels like we are getting to have our freshman year of college all over again. Anyway, we really are happy here. We all are a bit relieved to have a "homebase", just somewhere to come back to. We actually went way across town to check out a boarding house, but it actually turned out to be more like a crack house, so we decided Rosemere was a much better option. Wellington itself is a very unique city. It is so compact. It is really unnecessary to have a car, one can easily walk anywhere in the city. There are tons of cafes, in fact there are more cafes per capital in Wellington than anywhere else in the world. It is also the most southernly capitol in the world. It’s a magical place, no really it is, we live with a magician and it is absolutely some of the best live entertainment. There’s also a queen who is so over the top that he makes Paris Hilton seem like Hulk Hogan. We also went to this really small really quiet and what I'm assuming to be a jazz/night club to hear some music that a guy at our backpackers suggested. We go. The performers were three very young, very eclectic, very tall and skinny white guys that played what I understood to be "progressive" sounds. It was instrumental at first and actually quite beautiful, one played the guitar, one the bongo drums, and the last a violin that he played like a guitar. It sounded very new age, very "yogaish", and really meditative and peaceful. Then, all of a sudden, the vocals began and it basically sounded ridiculous. I was trying so hard not to start giggling and disrespect the performers, but oh my. He sounded like an oppressed animal crying for its freedom, to the point that Fred and Mary K and I all just stared at each other wide eyed trying to figure out where we were, in Wellington, NZ or in a Bhuddist monastery in Tibet. We climbed Mt. Victoria the other day which is supposed to be a nice walk but turned out to be some intense hike that we were seriously out of breath at the end; we climbed it with this friend at the backpackers who turned out to be a little monkey jumping around to the top, but the view was so beautiful. You can see for miles, city, mountains, clear water, white sandy beaches! The beaches here are so surprisingly clean and clear seeing that they belong to such a busy and crowded city!
On another note, my family may be the only ones that find this of any interest, but as we were walking yesterday across town to the beach, I noticed a Cedar tree painted on a window and the word "Habibe". I quickly got closer to see it and found a restaurant serving "authentic Lebanese cuisine". I remembered what my mom and aunt said about how much I was going to miss their food, and they are right by the way, and what my Dad said about trying to find a Lebanese community (which I was hoping would cook food for me) and decided to go in and ask them if they are hiring. Turns out, they were, and he asked me to come on Tuesday for a trial period to see if I like working there. I hate working in restaurants, but the thought of eating real Lebanese food and not some crap kebabs that seem to be sold everywhere in NZ was alluring to me. And the food is authentic. The owner/cook is Lebanese and the menu is basically everything we eat at home, and it looked so appetizing. And it was. I had kafta, baba ghannoush, tabouli; it was all so good, and I think I may enjoy working there. They speak Arabic, so it’s nice to hear it and speak it so I don’t completely forget the language! Fred found a job at a Turkish restaurant she seems to like, and Mary K is still looking, she’ll find one soon, we’re sure! Until next time, friends and family, we miss you and love you!

Retraction

Okay, so we have now arrived in Wellington, which is the capital of New Zealand. It's one of those cities that you arrive in and feel an instant connection with, you just want to know it, as best as one could befriend a city where they know no one. But I guess I didn't realize it would be so difficult to find a place to live here. Rent is more expensive here, comparable to a big city in the states, so we are torn between sucking it up, working longer hours, having less money to spend, and find a flat to live in here, a fun, young, cosmopolitan city....or going elsewhere, to a smaller town, pay less rent, have more spending money, but not being in Wellington. I'm pretty confident that things turn out right in the end, but my goodness is it frustrating at the beginning of it when what you want doesn't seem like it's panning out. Life, huh? I guess it builds character, right, Dad?

Anyway, New Zealand is treating us well! We are thinking of crossing the Cook Strait by three hour ferry (I would swim it but I don't think Fred and Mary K can keep up with my Olympic-like stealth speed) and touring the West Coast of the South Island by either car/hostel or camper. Which ever is the most cost-efficent will be the way we go. We will be kayaking along Abel Tasman, trekking glaciers, sailing the remote fiordlands, hiking the highest NZ points(well probably not) and seeing the NZ that Bindy the Jungle Girl would want to see!

I think after two weeks we will be settling down, and things in our lives will be a little more steady. Until then, I am in NZ for the first time, and who knows maybe the only time, and I will enjoy each day, love each day, learn more about my friends, hopefully a bit about me, and keep in mind that I am definitely one of the lucky ones!

For those who may be keeping up with this blog, I posted some false information on the last one. This my retraction: In order for a phone in the U.S. to call my cell phone here, you must dial 064 210 261 2519. Also, there may be an additional 0 at the very beginning. I receive incoming calls for free, so by all means, call us! I lied, however, when I told you it is $.02 a minute on skype. Apparently, that is wrong, it is more, but we are worth it, and that is NOT a lie!

By the way, I usually do not have enough time to re-read and edit the blog, so that is why there may be the occasional error. But please do not judge my character and intelligence by my infrequent(maybe) typos.

This city stinks...

Greetings from Rotorua! We have now meandered our way down to Rotorua by way of Waitamo. And yes, we drove on the LEFT side of the road the entire time with no accidental right-laning despite innate reflexes. On our way down from Auckland we stopped first in a village called Waitamo, which is famous NZ-wide for the inhabitants of its caves. As one makes his/her way through the stalagmites and stalagtites that have taken hundreds of thousands of years to form, the caves get colder and darker. And in this cold darkness is the perfect home for millions and millions of gloworms, that if you didn't know better you would think you were underneath the night sky resting your eyes upon the millions of starts above you. It was awe-inspiring. No one speaks, they just stare in the mysterious silence.

After Waitamo, we continued on the left to Rotorua, the Sulfur city of NZ. And oh lord does it stink here. As we drove into the city, we could see billows of steam that we later found out where rising from the lakes and the ground. We started out the morning at the Polynesian spas, which are outdoor thermal and mineral baths reaching temperatures of over 44 degrees CELCIUS and looking over Lake Rotorua like an infinity pool, truly blissful! Then we shopped a bit and went to the Redwood forest for a walk. We saw redwoods that seemed kilometers high and meters wide! We also went to a lake that seemed only imaginable on screen. It was a beautiful day, but my time is running out and must go! My cell phone number here is 64 210 261 2519. Call me!!!!

A piece of paradise

Hello there! Let me begin my saying that we have experienced something yesterday that reaffirmed for us the reason we chose to spend so much time in New Zealand. These past couple of days we have been in Auckland, which is NZ's largest city, and who would have thought it is very much just a city. I suppose we expected everything in NZ to be green, pristine, "New Zealand-esque", but Auckland is a city like any other; however, unfortunately for Auckland, it lacks personality. You know how other big cities may be large and in charge, but they have something special, a feeling you have when you are there, a memory, or just some idea in your mind of what it should be(and hold to it), but Auckland, just a city, not one that will instill a special memory other than being the beginning of my journey. Needless to say, the three of us were disheartened. Thoughts of doubts crept up and we began to wonder if this was such a good idea after all. Then, all of a sudden, like an unexpected gift, we boarded a ferry to Waihike Island, about 40 minutes from Auckland. We found paradise(and nudists...). Seriously though, it was a breathtaking day, more and more, as the day went on, more beauty everywhere we turned. That island is what New Zealand is. It's white beaches, ice-blue clear water, views as far as the eye can see, enormous rolling green hills filled with vineyards, cows, horses, and of course sheep! Every person we ran into smiled and made conversation with us. We were so fortunate to meet a tour guide at the ferry harbor who was as local as a local can be. Without him, we wouldn't have seen the Waihike that the locals love. He was exactly what I thought a Kiwi would be like in my mind. He was excited, happy, funny, full of life, and has been to GAINESVILLE, GA. When he found out we were from GA, he immediately loved us. Apparently, his son is a world renowned kayaker, and had a competition in Gainesville, GA a few years ago. Apparently he is #7 in the world and will be competing in the next summer olympics in Beijing! Anyways, he took us to this vineyard that makes the most expensive wine in all of NZ. We didn't taste that one because it was $30 for a glass, but we did taste their other wines and they were quite good. Be sure to look for Fallen Angel Sauvignon Blanc, it was absolutely wonderful! Anyways, we are now thinking about spending the next few weeks visiting the rest of NZ then coming back up here to live in Paradise. It is one of the top 5 beaches in all of NZ, and that's saying something seeing that NZ is completely coastal! Anyways, I'll update you all more later, and I hope you are all doing well! I will soon have a phone number and receive incoming calls free, so you have to call me! You can use skype for $.02 a minute! Good-bye!

We Have Arrived!

Greetings friends and family from Auckland, NZ, however, right now, more like Buford Hwy... everything here is in some sort of Asian, characters, including the blog right now, so I don't actually know if this is going to post correctly. Each time we have stopped to ask a question or for directions, the store owner does NOT understand us: "supermarket??" "What??", "big store of food?" response: no, no no. But then we finally made it out of Buford Hwy and into regular Auckland it feels a lot like the states, except for the fact that there were men on the corner with their pants down promoting student travel agency and ONE real supermarket in the entire AREA...we were exhausted today, we've been up since 3am, and it is only 3:30, now but feels like it should be midnight. The flight was so easy, however. I watched 4 movies and 2 sitcoms, while Fred and MK sat beside me passed out with their mouths open. I was jealous. I couldn't sleep, but I think I will tonight. Air New Zealand is a wonderful airline, clean, new, great service, and complimentary NZ wine! Anyways, I'm really tired now and this internet cafe sucks and my fingers hurt. Await lovely pictures, for they shall soon arrive! Goodbye dear family and friends, and talk to you again soon!

Don't worry, I don't think I want to live on the moon, but a visit is always nice!