Another Week in Welly

Another week has passed! Time passes quickly when I’m concentrated on school all week. This week was largely uneventful…continuation of classes. I did, however, decide to drop my music class. For all of you who know me well, this may look like a typo. What? A MUSIC class?? Never! But I assure you that it is true. First of all, I judge a class before I ever enter the classroom. Whether this is a good or bad thing, I can’t be sure. But when there is no e-mails or Blackboard posts, no teacher listed, and the building the class is held in doesn’t exist on my campus map, I have some concerns. I did manage to find it the first week, to find that it was in fact a combination of two classes: an introductory music class and a Maori Studies diploma class. From what I gathered about diploma, it seems to be a version of community college here. The girl I spoke to in class was taking the year-long diploma program in order to improve her grades and earn admission to the university. The class was also based on chants and singing, with no instruction on traditional instruments. Lastly, the grades were largely based on group work…oh, group work. My experience is that one person does all of the work, with the rest either glad to be relieved of the problem or miffed because you decided their work wasn’t up to snuff.

So, anyway, here I am with only three classes. Three. For those aware of my normal 20+ semesters along with two part-time jobs, you may feel that I am an imposter. Dropping a music class and only taking three classes? Has New Zealand kidnapped Mary and put an auto-bot in her place?!?! I assure you that I am still alive and well, thriving on the other side of the world. I have so much free time, sometimes I didn’t know what to do with myself. Then I rediscovered reading….for FUN! Since then, I’ve completed two trilogies, started on a third, a re-read a few old favorites. I am loving my Kindle, although I do miss having a “real book” from time to time. However, the ability to have all my books stored on a device smaller and thinner than a regular book is fantastic! I highly recommend it for any travelers, or those of us who insist on carrying two or three books at all times “just in case.” I won’t bore you with all the titles and my reviews and such, but certainly let me know if you would like more info, or can recommend anything really good!

In keeping with the tradition of experiencing something new every week (what else would I write about in my blog?!), Laura, Nicole, Jessica and I headed out on Thursday night to celebrate our Irish heritage…in the traditional Irish way. During the day at school, I didn’t notice a whole lot of people wearing green. It was a little strange, but I found all of them downtown later that night. I know at least a few of them were there for the majority of the day, in fact, so perhaps that explains the lack of greenery on campus. When we got downtown to Courtenay Place, where the majority of the bars and clubs are situated, we discovered a raging and unbelievably crowded “Molly Malones.” I guess we could have expected that. In order to avoid the crowds, we continued down to Boogie Wonderland...which was deserted.

But we were actually looking for Alice, the bar I previously mentioned in a past blog post. Apparently, you must walk through Boogie Wonderland and through the door marked “Toilets” in order to reach Alice. Almost as secretive as going down the rabbit-hole! There were a few people there, but it is a very small place with a quarter of the space taken up by the bar. That works for me, as I’m not one for big, raging parties. We had two drinks that were meant to split four ways (perfect): one called Pimm’s #1 Cup and the other known as Doormouse’s Brew. Pimm’s #1 Cup contained lots of fruity slices and was kind of brownish colored. I couldn’t tell you what was in it, and it wasn’t detailed on the menu. Doormouse’s Brew was a red-wine sangria, so it had a bit more punch to it. Then we delved into the fancier side of the menu for our final drink. Nicole got “Queen of Hearts,” which was a plum daiquiri in a martini glass, and had hard candy pieces on the rim. Laura got “Off With her Head,” with had a ton of raspberries in it. Jessica had “Curiouser and curiouser,” which involved mashed kiwifruit and ginger beer, among other items. Mine was “The Duchess,” and had peach slices and raspberry puree. Yum! Overall, we laughed a lot, took some interesting pictures, and had a good time. After a stop at Burger King for some late night munchies, we headed home to bed relatively early.

On Saturday, the same group headed down to the waterfront to check out Te Papa, the national museum. After a stop at Wholly Bagels, of course; the vegetarian bagel is still holding on to its number one spot. There was so much to see and read and do in Te Papa. There were four or five floors of exhibits (I lost count), and it was FREE! Fantastic! We spent a good three to four hours exploring. My favorite exhibit was photographs of Brian Brake. He traveled the world, later on for Life Magazine, and has some historical moments caught in film; monsoons in India, Mao in China, landscapes of his native New Zealand. It was astonishing and beautiful.

Today, in continuing with trying new things, I cleaned all three showers and two toilets in the house. We have a cleaning cycle, and my week has come up. I dismantled the enormous empty toilet roll pyramid that was in our bathroom window. If you need more info on this, refer to the blog entry about the toilet paper situation here. I’ve just come to accept it for now…although I will photograph the next TP tower to show as evidence. Luckily, I don’t have to clean anything for another few weeks now. Perhaps by then my lungs will have recovered from the amount of bathroom cleaner I ingested. Yuck.

Lastly, I had an epiphany of sorts this week as well (it’s been a packed one for sure!) There are material things and material people that I miss from back home. But you know something that I miss? Hugs. A good old-fashioned hug. Think about it: you hug people that you love, people that you are good friends with, people that you feel comfortable with. I came to New Zealand with none of the above. Although I now have some great friends, and it’s not like I haven’t hugged anyone since I’ve arrived, it’s not quite the same. I’ve known these people for less than two months. Hugs are more special the more connected you are with someone. It’s something I guess I’ve always taken for granted. And hugs don’t translate well over Skype (I’ve tried), and typing *hug* in an e-mail doesn’t really quite convey the right feeling. Hugging yourself, besides being a little weird, doesn’t really get the job done. So, there you go. Go hug someone now that you’ve read this!

Now that you’re back from your hug, you’ll be disappointed to read that all I have left to say is…see ya next time!