Today I had a case of the Monday's.
I woke up late for my religion class because I had trouble sleeping the night before. It was too late to get to class so instead I did some house cleaning/organizing that I had been putting off for a while. I cleaned all my clothes (this is an amazing feat because I have yet to actually have all clean clothes, usually I just clean enough to make it by through the week, haha), I cleaned my bed sheets, and I cleaned and organized my desk space and drawer area. I'm slowly preparing for the arrival of Henry and Ben, who will be here Wednesday night.
I then spent the better half of the early afternoon searching desperately online for riding stables in the area. I finally found one in Upper Hutt (far away :( ) that wasn't expensive and offered dressage lessons. I emailed them and they emailed me back saying they'd love to have me check out the place. Now I just need to figure out how to get there and if it's worth the "commute" to purchase a pair of riding pants and cheap boots off of the secondhand trading website "trademe". Despite possible travel issues, I'm really excited. I've been really missing riding and I think part of why I felt so out of it today was because I was missing riding and being around animals.
After that I went and did some banking. The exchange rate went down a TINY bit today so I withdrew some money and deposited it into my NZ bank account, so I should be okay for the next couple weeks. Then I went and walked around the bay. I was feeling rather penisive and homesick so I walked for a really long time. I walked all along the pier, past the library (where I had been planning to do some reading) and all the way over to the beach. I hung around there for a while reading and then wandered around the outskirts of Wellington, learning about new streets and stores. I slowly made my way back to Stafford by 6 and did some homework and cooked dinner. Chris and Stephen came over around 8 and we talked and drank tea together. Then we watched Flight of the Conchords in the Stafford common room (it always has a huge turnout whenever it's on because all Kiwi's love the show). After that we got candy at the Starmart (similar to a 711 or quikcheck).
Now I'm here and I realize that part of why I felt so out of it today was that it's Monday and the weekend was so wonderful that having a Monday and starting it off on the wrong foot (waking up late for class) just sort of threw me out of wack. Hopefully tomorrow will be better and then Wednesday, Henry will be here! I also think that I might be going to this barn on Wednesday depending on how much homework I have.
Monday, March 30, 2009
I exist
Pictures of me, since all the pictures I take never actually involve me being in front of the camera. These were taken by Stephen. This is me and Chris walking around Lower Hutt.
Me in Wellington. In New Zealand, the peace sign with the back of the hand facing the person (as opposed to the palm facing them) is considered similar to giving the middle finger in the states. I'm just showing some American ignorance here.
Me and Chris walking around Welly
Earth Hour in Civic Square. I'm standing with the candle.
Me and Chris
Me playing tons of Jenga at Stephens and clearly having so much fun with it.
Aro Valley hike
This is a shot at the trail head. It's looking down into Aro Valley, specifically onto Aro St. Yes, this is still technically Wellington. Wellington is a very green and wonderful city.
On the hike.
More hiking.
Up some stairs.
And surprise, this is what we saw!
Cement structures...
Weird
More cement things
Wow. This is looking out at the back of Wellington and the bay.
This is looking over at the airport area and also the water that leads out into the ocean.
Behind those mountains looms the South Island - you can't actually see it though, it's just there.
Pony!
Final view as we made our descent.
Saturday - Sunday pictures
Chris at the rugby game taking pictures.
You can see number 17 was a large girl. We made a lot of jokes at her expense. If she had overheard us, I probably would not be alive to recount this story.
Running to make a try.
Shannon is in the white and green with blue shorts at the very back of the beginnings of a scrum.
Waiting to catch the bus we lazed around this area.
Chris lying by some trees.
View of Lower Hutt
Fisherman in Lower Hutt
View of the mountains behind some stores. The mountains were covered with these yellow flowers that are extremely prickly.
Back in Wellington, this is the Beehive - parliament's building. It's really close to where I live. I walk by it every time I go to the grocery store. 
More of Wellington, near the Beehive.
The bay.
Favorite location. Across from where I've taken the picture there is a wooden bridge with some designs. This is where Civic Square is and also the library. I spend a lot of time here.
This is from Earth Hour. We all signed this. My signature (though you can't make it out) is below the W and Chris's is at the bottom below the E.
This kitty lives near Chris's house, near Aro St. I see it EVERY time I go by and always in the same spot. Because I was in a touristy mood this weekend, I had to finally get a picture of this ridiculous kitty. It's so cute, but so silly because that fence looks so uncomfortable. It's there everyday and also every night.
This is Lambton Quay (Kiwi's pronounce Quay - "key"). I walk down this street to get to Stafford.
More of Lambton. Those yellow circular things are an interactive sculpture that moves (they spin and move up and down) depending on how windy the day is. On a really windy day they swirl around wildly.
I really like these little budding fern sculptures. They're outside the entrance to Civic Square and the library.
Civic Square looking out on the bay, this is right by that wooden bridge.
Sunday, March 29, 2009
This is going to be really long, but it was a fantastic week
I haven’t updated in a while and I apologize, but yet again I have been super busy running around and exploring the greater Wellington areas.
Monday I had religion class, which turned out to be a huge let down, compared to last weeks class. After class Chris, Brian and I deposited money for booking hostels in Samoa. We did this through a company called “Flight Centre” with a man named Stuart. He was very friendly and helpful despite having overly spiked hair. I left before everything was finalized because I had to make a religion tutorial. The tutorial turned out to be kind of interesting. Although we discussed a really boring and pointless paper, we found that the class was half and half kiwis and Americans. I was pretty disappointed by this because I didn’t come here to learn with more Americans. There were 2 people from Texas, 2 from California, 2 (myself included) from NJ, and 2 from Colorado. Pretty interesting that that was how it worked out. So the professor split the class up by Americans v. Kiwis. We were all kind of shocked by this because it was the opposite of facilitating cultural learning, so we all sort of made a joke about it. After that I went to my psych class which proved to be quite boring because I had already learned about the information they had covered. I then met up with Chris, did some homework in the library and then I cooked hamburgers with Chris, Stephen, Morgan and Brian.
Tuesday... ugh, I can't remember what I did. It must have been fun but not fun enough for me to remember. I went to sociology, went to psych... OH. Sorry this is sort of stream of consciousness, haha... I went to Chris's and we got Fish and Chip's together and then went to the tramping club meeting with Stephen. After that we went to the Matterhorn (our favorite bar) and got coffee and tea.
Wednesday I didn't have class so Chris, Stephen, Brian and I spent the gloriously warm and sunny day outside. We finalized everything for our trip to Samoa (Stuart at Flight Centre hooked us up with some great accommodation and also ferry rides). We ate Nando's - this delicious chicken place with really delicious spicey sauce they put on everything called Peri-peri sauce. I'm drooling thinking about it. Chris, Stephen and I have eaten there at least 3 times this week. haha. Then we went down to the beach. We sat there for a while, I tried to find starfish and sting rays with no success. Then we played on a playground and made plans to go bowling. Chris and I went grocery shopping and then went to his place on Aro St. and got some Indian food for dinner. Then we went bowling with a group of people for a couple hours. (My bowling game is improving!) After that we went to Stephens for a while. We played Jenga, watched Summer Heights High and then played "Kings" the card game. The night ended with us all getting Kebabs.
Thursday I went to class all day. I had two tutorials in the morning, which I was pretty disappointed to have woken up so early to get to. My psych class revolved around developing a thesis for a paper I've already started working on. My sociology class, which is a 100 level, was about HOW to write a paper. Hahaha. After class Chris texted me saying it was really nice out and was wondering if I wanted to go on a hike. So I made my way over to Aro Valley (where Chris lives). He made us lunch and then we went on a hike that started right near his house. The hike was amazing. Well, I guess there was nothing really substantially different from this hike than any other aside from the fact that it was basically in Chris's backyard and also still so close to Wellington. We climbed along a ridgeline of a Mountain, up steep hills, through some really prickly bushes, and up some wooden steps. When we reached the top (after about an hour of hiking up hill) we saw a spectacular view and both of us were amazed at how far we had climbed and how high up we were. We saw a view of the entire back of Wellington, the bay, Mt.Victoria and also Cook Strait, of the area of water between the North Island and the South Island. We climbed further, toward a wind turbine.
We came to a pathway that lead to these strange cement structures. They were circular and somewhat underground with a main entrance and multiple chambers or rooms. They were obviously abandoned and were covered in some really creative graffiti. We climbed on top of them and took loads of pictures and also explored inside them. It was extremely windy and both of us were getting blown around and also getting pretty cold because our sweat was drying and we didn't have sweaters. But we endured it to explore a bit more of the cement structures and also continue to hike for another hour. We continued on a path that lead right next to the fence line that seperated Wellington from the wildlife reserve called Karori Wildlife Sanctuary. We came across a grey pony in a field. It was the first horse I'd been able to touch/be close to since coming to Wellington and it made me want to ride really badly. It was accompanied by a white goat. So cute. We explored a bit further, trying to reach the wind turbine, but the hike looked steep and it was starting to get dark, so we turned around. We took the road back for part of the way because it was faster and then we took a shorter pathway down the mountain, so we made it back much faster than we expected.
Thursday night... oh Chris and I made plans to get Burger Fuel (this delicious burger place on Courtenay Pl) but it was closed by the time we got there. We ended up eating some crappy Chinese takeaway and then met up with Stephen, Shannon and a friend of Shannons. We went to Stephens and Brian came over. We watched Summer Heights High and talked.
Friday... I went to my sociology class which was extremely interesting. We talked about gender and sex as two different ideas. I had some notion of this concept because of Elizabeth writing about challenging the gender binary, but I still found it to be a really engaging and interesting class. Chris and I met up afterwards to get Burger Fuel (which we had been craving since we missed out on it the night before). After that Chris, Stephen and I went to the library and did some homework. Then we went to my place, Stafford, and I cooked dinner - Beef Satay for me and Chris and Stephen had tofu teriyaki (because someone is vegan) - and Shannon chilled with us. We ended up heading over to Stephens for a little, then to the Malt House, then with Derek and Morgan added on we went to the Matterhorn and met up with Stephen's flatmate Sonya (who is really cool). We ended the night at Stephens and then getting kebabs. Haha.
Saturday was absolutely beautiful outside. Actually, this whole week was, which was why it was so good. Saturday though was a particularly great day, especially because I spent it with my two favorite people here. Chris, Stephen and I went to see Shannon play in a rugby game (she's on the women's club team). The game was located in the most random, far away town. We had to take two buses to get there. The first bus took us from Wellington to Lower Hutt. Lower Hutt is a good 15 - 20 minute drive from Wellington and is really boring. But the drive was beautiful, we got a good look at the bay area and of the landscape surrounding Wellington. We caught our second bus (after some very confused conversation with our Maori bus driver who didn't really understand us). This bus took us around the suburbs of the nearby towns. We were really nervous we would get lost, but our bus driver managed to pull through and brought us directly to the field we were looking for. We got to the game (after over an hour of travel) and watched Shannon play. Her team won by a lot. It was a pretty cool game to watch and we cheered Shannon on despite being surrounded by people cheering for the other team. The other team was comprised of some massive Maori or Samoan looking girls. They were enormous. Their advantage was that they were extremely intimidating and hard to knock down, but they couldn't run so Shannon's team just breezed past them whenever they were in possession of the ball.
During halftime we went into the club house for the local rugby team. It was really bizzare and empty. We got some really shady food from there and Stephen bought a beer that was brewed at the club house and was their very own brand of beer. Haha. After the game we talked to Shannon for a bit and then she went off with the team and we went off to explore.
We walked about 20 minutes to the nearest "town" which was very small. We sat near a bus stop playing "I'm going to a picnic" and talking. We caught a bus that took us back to Lower Hutt. We got coffee and hung around the Hutt for a bit. We wanted to explore more, but the Hutt offered us little to nothing to look at. We looked around a deserted parking lot and saw a man fly fishing, but that was about it. SO we caught a bus back to Wellington and went down to the pier area to relax. We took LOADS of pictures on the way because it was so wonderful and sunny out. We ended up getting Nando's (again) haha. While we were walking there we had a pretty gratifying encounter. A family of Kiwi's stopped us and asked if we were from Wellington. We sort of glanced at each other and answered an unsure "yes". They then asked us where they could find a grocery store and also what were some good places to eat. We happily answered them and gave them directions. We felt really great about it because it sort of warranted us as Wellington residents now.
After eating some delicious Nandos (Chris challenged me to get "hot" instead of "mild" sauce and I agreed to as long as he got "extra hot", which both he and Stephen did) we went to the Civic Square (one of the favorite locations in Wellington) for an Earth Hour concert (it was earth day, and you were supposed to turn your lights off from 8:30 - 9:30 to conserve energy in a world wide way). The concert sucked, but I got a candle and got to participate in something I care about. We went to Stephens for a little and watched "Summer Heights High" in the dark (to conserve more energy) and drank some wine to celebrate. We ended the night watching Summer Heights High bloopers, which were hilarious.
Sunday was another gorgeous day. Chris, Stephen and I got lunch together at "Dixon Deli." I had bagel and lox (which I had been craving), Chris had french toast, bacon and bananas (which he had been craving) and Stephen had a coffee (because he was feeling off). Then the three of us went to the library and did homework outside by Civic Square because it was too nice to actually sit inside the library. However, we got cold after a while and went to Borders (the library closes at 4? so stupid) and studied there until 7. Then the three of us went to Stafford, I cooked pasta, we watched some episodes of "The Office" and then played a game of scrabble. The three of us have been playing so much scrabble that the games have become way more intense. Chris and I got really competitive in the end, I won with 236 points (we're all trying to break 300 by the end of our time here, haha).
And now here I am, writing is ridiculously long post. I hope someone actually takes the time to read this entire thing because it really was a wonderful week. I wish that every week was as fanastic as this. However, I must prepare myself for the cold, windy and wet fall that is upon Wellington.
This week Henry is coming on Wednesday night and will be in town until Monday! I'm so excited, I can't wait for Henry to meet all my friends and to show him the city that I've come to love.
I will now proceed to post a billion pictures in a seperate post.
Monday I had religion class, which turned out to be a huge let down, compared to last weeks class. After class Chris, Brian and I deposited money for booking hostels in Samoa. We did this through a company called “Flight Centre” with a man named Stuart. He was very friendly and helpful despite having overly spiked hair. I left before everything was finalized because I had to make a religion tutorial. The tutorial turned out to be kind of interesting. Although we discussed a really boring and pointless paper, we found that the class was half and half kiwis and Americans. I was pretty disappointed by this because I didn’t come here to learn with more Americans. There were 2 people from Texas, 2 from California, 2 (myself included) from NJ, and 2 from Colorado. Pretty interesting that that was how it worked out. So the professor split the class up by Americans v. Kiwis. We were all kind of shocked by this because it was the opposite of facilitating cultural learning, so we all sort of made a joke about it. After that I went to my psych class which proved to be quite boring because I had already learned about the information they had covered. I then met up with Chris, did some homework in the library and then I cooked hamburgers with Chris, Stephen, Morgan and Brian.
Tuesday... ugh, I can't remember what I did. It must have been fun but not fun enough for me to remember. I went to sociology, went to psych... OH. Sorry this is sort of stream of consciousness, haha... I went to Chris's and we got Fish and Chip's together and then went to the tramping club meeting with Stephen. After that we went to the Matterhorn (our favorite bar) and got coffee and tea.
Wednesday I didn't have class so Chris, Stephen, Brian and I spent the gloriously warm and sunny day outside. We finalized everything for our trip to Samoa (Stuart at Flight Centre hooked us up with some great accommodation and also ferry rides). We ate Nando's - this delicious chicken place with really delicious spicey sauce they put on everything called Peri-peri sauce. I'm drooling thinking about it. Chris, Stephen and I have eaten there at least 3 times this week. haha. Then we went down to the beach. We sat there for a while, I tried to find starfish and sting rays with no success. Then we played on a playground and made plans to go bowling. Chris and I went grocery shopping and then went to his place on Aro St. and got some Indian food for dinner. Then we went bowling with a group of people for a couple hours. (My bowling game is improving!) After that we went to Stephens for a while. We played Jenga, watched Summer Heights High and then played "Kings" the card game. The night ended with us all getting Kebabs.
Thursday I went to class all day. I had two tutorials in the morning, which I was pretty disappointed to have woken up so early to get to. My psych class revolved around developing a thesis for a paper I've already started working on. My sociology class, which is a 100 level, was about HOW to write a paper. Hahaha. After class Chris texted me saying it was really nice out and was wondering if I wanted to go on a hike. So I made my way over to Aro Valley (where Chris lives). He made us lunch and then we went on a hike that started right near his house. The hike was amazing. Well, I guess there was nothing really substantially different from this hike than any other aside from the fact that it was basically in Chris's backyard and also still so close to Wellington. We climbed along a ridgeline of a Mountain, up steep hills, through some really prickly bushes, and up some wooden steps. When we reached the top (after about an hour of hiking up hill) we saw a spectacular view and both of us were amazed at how far we had climbed and how high up we were. We saw a view of the entire back of Wellington, the bay, Mt.Victoria and also Cook Strait, of the area of water between the North Island and the South Island. We climbed further, toward a wind turbine.
We came to a pathway that lead to these strange cement structures. They were circular and somewhat underground with a main entrance and multiple chambers or rooms. They were obviously abandoned and were covered in some really creative graffiti. We climbed on top of them and took loads of pictures and also explored inside them. It was extremely windy and both of us were getting blown around and also getting pretty cold because our sweat was drying and we didn't have sweaters. But we endured it to explore a bit more of the cement structures and also continue to hike for another hour. We continued on a path that lead right next to the fence line that seperated Wellington from the wildlife reserve called Karori Wildlife Sanctuary. We came across a grey pony in a field. It was the first horse I'd been able to touch/be close to since coming to Wellington and it made me want to ride really badly. It was accompanied by a white goat. So cute. We explored a bit further, trying to reach the wind turbine, but the hike looked steep and it was starting to get dark, so we turned around. We took the road back for part of the way because it was faster and then we took a shorter pathway down the mountain, so we made it back much faster than we expected.
Thursday night... oh Chris and I made plans to get Burger Fuel (this delicious burger place on Courtenay Pl) but it was closed by the time we got there. We ended up eating some crappy Chinese takeaway and then met up with Stephen, Shannon and a friend of Shannons. We went to Stephens and Brian came over. We watched Summer Heights High and talked.
Friday... I went to my sociology class which was extremely interesting. We talked about gender and sex as two different ideas. I had some notion of this concept because of Elizabeth writing about challenging the gender binary, but I still found it to be a really engaging and interesting class. Chris and I met up afterwards to get Burger Fuel (which we had been craving since we missed out on it the night before). After that Chris, Stephen and I went to the library and did some homework. Then we went to my place, Stafford, and I cooked dinner - Beef Satay for me and Chris and Stephen had tofu teriyaki (because someone is vegan) - and Shannon chilled with us. We ended up heading over to Stephens for a little, then to the Malt House, then with Derek and Morgan added on we went to the Matterhorn and met up with Stephen's flatmate Sonya (who is really cool). We ended the night at Stephens and then getting kebabs. Haha.
Saturday was absolutely beautiful outside. Actually, this whole week was, which was why it was so good. Saturday though was a particularly great day, especially because I spent it with my two favorite people here. Chris, Stephen and I went to see Shannon play in a rugby game (she's on the women's club team). The game was located in the most random, far away town. We had to take two buses to get there. The first bus took us from Wellington to Lower Hutt. Lower Hutt is a good 15 - 20 minute drive from Wellington and is really boring. But the drive was beautiful, we got a good look at the bay area and of the landscape surrounding Wellington. We caught our second bus (after some very confused conversation with our Maori bus driver who didn't really understand us). This bus took us around the suburbs of the nearby towns. We were really nervous we would get lost, but our bus driver managed to pull through and brought us directly to the field we were looking for. We got to the game (after over an hour of travel) and watched Shannon play. Her team won by a lot. It was a pretty cool game to watch and we cheered Shannon on despite being surrounded by people cheering for the other team. The other team was comprised of some massive Maori or Samoan looking girls. They were enormous. Their advantage was that they were extremely intimidating and hard to knock down, but they couldn't run so Shannon's team just breezed past them whenever they were in possession of the ball.
During halftime we went into the club house for the local rugby team. It was really bizzare and empty. We got some really shady food from there and Stephen bought a beer that was brewed at the club house and was their very own brand of beer. Haha. After the game we talked to Shannon for a bit and then she went off with the team and we went off to explore.
We walked about 20 minutes to the nearest "town" which was very small. We sat near a bus stop playing "I'm going to a picnic" and talking. We caught a bus that took us back to Lower Hutt. We got coffee and hung around the Hutt for a bit. We wanted to explore more, but the Hutt offered us little to nothing to look at. We looked around a deserted parking lot and saw a man fly fishing, but that was about it. SO we caught a bus back to Wellington and went down to the pier area to relax. We took LOADS of pictures on the way because it was so wonderful and sunny out. We ended up getting Nando's (again) haha. While we were walking there we had a pretty gratifying encounter. A family of Kiwi's stopped us and asked if we were from Wellington. We sort of glanced at each other and answered an unsure "yes". They then asked us where they could find a grocery store and also what were some good places to eat. We happily answered them and gave them directions. We felt really great about it because it sort of warranted us as Wellington residents now.
After eating some delicious Nandos (Chris challenged me to get "hot" instead of "mild" sauce and I agreed to as long as he got "extra hot", which both he and Stephen did) we went to the Civic Square (one of the favorite locations in Wellington) for an Earth Hour concert (it was earth day, and you were supposed to turn your lights off from 8:30 - 9:30 to conserve energy in a world wide way). The concert sucked, but I got a candle and got to participate in something I care about. We went to Stephens for a little and watched "Summer Heights High" in the dark (to conserve more energy) and drank some wine to celebrate. We ended the night watching Summer Heights High bloopers, which were hilarious.
Sunday was another gorgeous day. Chris, Stephen and I got lunch together at "Dixon Deli." I had bagel and lox (which I had been craving), Chris had french toast, bacon and bananas (which he had been craving) and Stephen had a coffee (because he was feeling off). Then the three of us went to the library and did homework outside by Civic Square because it was too nice to actually sit inside the library. However, we got cold after a while and went to Borders (the library closes at 4? so stupid) and studied there until 7. Then the three of us went to Stafford, I cooked pasta, we watched some episodes of "The Office" and then played a game of scrabble. The three of us have been playing so much scrabble that the games have become way more intense. Chris and I got really competitive in the end, I won with 236 points (we're all trying to break 300 by the end of our time here, haha).
And now here I am, writing is ridiculously long post. I hope someone actually takes the time to read this entire thing because it really was a wonderful week. I wish that every week was as fanastic as this. However, I must prepare myself for the cold, windy and wet fall that is upon Wellington.
This week Henry is coming on Wednesday night and will be in town until Monday! I'm so excited, I can't wait for Henry to meet all my friends and to show him the city that I've come to love.
I will now proceed to post a billion pictures in a seperate post.
Thursday, March 26, 2009
Some pictures of this week
A picture I took this morning of Wellington while I was walking to class from Aro Valley.
Stairs on my way to class
On Wednesday, Chris, Stephen, Brian and I went to the beach because it was so nice out.
So nice
Wall climbing by the skate park.I'll post more stuff later, but right now I'm about to catch a bus to go on a hike with Chris.
Sunday, March 22, 2009
Another weekend in Welly
Rugby game. I'm sitting next to Chris and Tara.
Enjoying the match with (Stephen taking the picture) Shannon, Jon, Brian, me, Chris, Tara, Morgan, and behind her (who you can't see) is Wally.
Playing around in The Warehouse. Thomas the Tank Engine?
Bowling, this is kind of old, but I figured it was a good picture to add to the blog.
Chris and I posing with this random statue. It's located on a side alleyway off of the main street near Stafford, Lambton Quay. It's right at the entrance of the alley so you can see it when you're walking down Lambton. I get startled every time I pass it because I think it's a real person. Morgan insisted that we face our demons and take a picture with it. To be honest, I don't get as startled anymore.Update on my weekend:
Thursday saw me heading to class at 4 and then afterwards I went to the pier and did some reading and writing. It was really nice out, a little windy, but sunny and clear but I was in a really strange mood. Chris and Stephen met up with me and we did some homework in the library together. The two of them noticed I felt a little off so we put off doing homework and instead they took me to a Moroccan restaurant, which was delicious. Afterwards we rented "The Big Lebowski" and "Clueless" and watched the first one at Stephens flat. We then played some card games and by the end of it all, I felt much better.
Friday I had one class and later met up with Chris for some lunch. We planned out our upcoming midsemester break together. We were thinking of either Tonga or Samoa instead of Australia, and were planning on going with Stephen and our friend Brian. We ended up hanging out in my flat doing homework. We had dinner with our friend Shannon (she cooked fish and some pasta) and then had a MASSIVE pregame party in Brian's flat before the Hurricanes (Wellington's rugby team) game. A large group of us walked over to the stadium and saw the game.
After the game was done (and the Hurricanes had lost) we all went to Occidental, a bar near Stafford, for some free drinks. After that a couple of us went back to Stafford for a bit, got some kebabs and then called it a night.
Saturday I spent yet again with Chris and Stephen, as well as Brian. The 4 of us had lunch to discuss break plans. Stephen had to back down due to lack of funds, but the rest of us still planned on going. We talked to a travel agency to see what was the best bet for a vacation and decided upon Samoa.
Later on, Chris, Stephen and I unintentionally ended up shopping for clothes together. Since I was in the minority gender group, we ended up in a lot of male clothing stores which I quickly got bored of. We managed to go to a large department store (equivalent to maybe Target and Walmart) where we played with toys and bought board games (for rainy days). You can obviously see our shananagins by the picture of me in the halloween outfit. Then, because it was raining, we played scrabble at Stephens flat.
The night saw us celebrating a friend of ours, Lizzy's, 21st birthday. There were about 15 of us, and we went to a korean karaoke restaurant and had quite a night of entertainment. Everyone was pretty amped after that and went out to the bars, though I called it a night early because I was pretty tired.
Sunday, Chris, Brian and I finalized our plans. We bought all the important intransit tickets, and are going to finalize all the inbetween means of transportation once we get to our destination. Our tentative itinerary is:
Pick up rental car in Wellington on April 10th (good friday). Drive from Wellington to Rotorua and spend the night there. Spend a full day in Rotorua and then drive to Waitomo. Spend the night there and then the next day drive to Raglan/Hamilton, spend the night there. Arrive in Auckland on Monday, the 13th, drop off car rental. Spend the night in Auckland (hopefully I can crash at Henry's). Fly from Auckland to Samoa around 3:45pm on the 14th, arriving in Samoa around 8:30pm on the 13th (haha, we cross the dateline, so we go back in time). Our time in Samoa isn't as structured yet, but we have plans to stay for the night on one of the islands and then ferry over to the other where we'll spend the majority of our time. The weather in Samoa is around the 90 and humid right now, so we're going to be spending a lot of time on the beach and swimming. We hopefully will go kayaking, snorkling, cave diving, and much more. We've managed to book one of the least expensive trips of all our friends, and we're really excited about that. We'd leave Samoa on the 24th of April and arrive in Auckland at 12:40(AM) on the 26th. The last day, Sunday the 26th, we're spending on a bus from Auckland down to Wellington, arriving back in Wellington at 8:00pm.
I'm extremely excited about this trip and could not be travelling with a better group. Brian and Chris are tons of fun to hang out with, so we should have a blast.
After a couple hours of planning that out Stephen came over and we played a game of scrabble and watched "Clueless." I ate left overs for dinner and ended the night playing speed scrabble with Chris and Stephen.
Now I'm attempting to do some homework, but also trying to update folks on what I've been up to. It was another long weekend here in Wellington and I feel over eager for this break (which won't be for another couple of weeks) because I'm so excited about the plans we made. I'll be celebrating my birthday in high style, on the beach in Samoa.
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