Yep, I'm Alive

Hey, sorry if I might have fallen off the radar for a while! I've been working at a pub in Little Wanganui (pop probably something like 25...most of whom I know personally) for the last month. That's cool. Met some amazing people...etc. etc. (if anyone's expecting a good story...forget it. I'm looking foreward to having some good yarns when I get back and don't want to give anything away.). But yeah, that was cool, and there was no cell reception, inaccessable internet lots of food and free drinks (oh dear!). I got a haircut...which I won't go into farther than saying it involved a man with no legs, about $110 and lots of drinking. Some other stuff happened, like we had a hangi, which was sweet. More later. Anyhow, after all that, I hit the road again with a couple of Brummies that shared the West Coast comforts of the Hotel with my good self. So we're cruising around...dow the west coast, now in Queenstown. It's nice here. Cold, but nice. AND: 2 dollar drinks. I don't mean to promote how much I drink as I try to be very responsible and usually succeed, but I'm on the kind of budget that would usually limit the intake of a refreshing, after-"work"(i.e. not work) beverage...so I feel like this is something that I need tot ake advantage of.

So that's just about it (in as much as it's nothing). Oh, we went spear-fishing in the freezing cold at 3AM a couple of times too. And killed some pigs. That was all good fun.
Anyway, I gotta cruise off and do something productive like watch Liam cook and abuse the germans (I haven't met anyone in the hostel yet, but I assume there are Germans and that they are in need of some good abuse). So...until I'm back in the states, assume that I'm still living.

Driving Fast and Taking Lots of Chances,

Nathan

Bob & Buller

Hmm.

South Island is super sweet. I'm not really sure what the difference is exactly, but it's like, is both Islands were salsa, then North would be Mild and South would be one of thoes crazy kinds called something like "Uncle Tom's Ass-kicking Whoop-and-holler" that has warning labels all over it. That's as close as I can come to conveying how awesome South Island is. When we got to Lewis Pass today, we had to pull over so I could slam my head onto the hood of the car, repeatedly, as a form of self-inflicted punishment for wasting (and I do mean wasting) so much time up North. Oh well though.

After saying goodbye to everyone in the Bay (including a near-tearfull parting with Glen)...which ususally concluded with my being advised "don't freeze to death", I headed down to Wellington, where I spent one last weekend with Buzz. Good times. The next day it was pouring rain with gale-force winds as the ferry set sail out of Wellington Harbor. Woohoo. The skies cleared up once we got out into the Cook Strait, which was super. Coming into Queen Charlotte Sounds absolutely blew me away...green, rolling hills with fijords winding thier way around...sweet. I enjoyed the scenery until the wind picked up to a speed where babies were being swept up and flying overboard (almost) and then retreated inside.

Picton was boring, so I hit the road and stuck out my thumb. About half an hour later, I got a ride into Blenheim with a drug-dealer from Greymouth. He was really nice, showed me pictures of his home, family, and town (including a nive video of a rainbow) and left me with instructions to crash on his sofa when I'm over that way. Blenheim was, excuse me, a total shit hole. It may have been that everyone staying at the hostel was waiting for vine pruning to start up, which depressed me on thier behalfs.

The next day I broke down and bussed to Kaikoura, which was pretty nice. Good beaches, mountains, and thousands of seals. I beat the living jesus out of a Danish guy at pool and called it an early night.

The day after that (I would use the names of days if I knew what day it was, or is), I hitched to Hanmer Springs with a pair or French-come-New Caledonian nurses, who were lovely. Hanmer Springs is a really beautiful town up in the mountains, and the backpakers was amazing! Raw wood everywhere, clean, new pans (!!!) and a nice cat that made hilarious noises. Chatted to an Austrian couple and thier baby for a while (to be fair, the baby didn't contribute to the conversation too much), then went out an experienced the teeming Hanmer night-life with Jill and Niko (British and French couple)...where we met up with the French Nurses and an Indian chick who was living is Las Vegas...of all places. There were about 3 other people at the only open pub (at 9pm)...so entertainment consisted mostly of listening to Las Vegas, now on her 9th glass of wine, telling rambling stories. I laughed until I cried. Then we cruised back to the hostel, Niko, Jill and I watched some Weeds and crashed.

Today I hitched with Jill and Niko as far as Springs Junction, just across the amazing Lewis Pass (northernmost pass through the Southern Alps)...which was gorgeous and snowy. After farewelling them, I got a ride into Westport with Mick, an ex-gold mining consultant. After a mandatory stop for pies and tea, he put on some Bob Dylan, and we cruised through the Buller Gorge, with him pointing out plenty of history along the way. ("and just over there, my dad was working on the railroad and got sandwitched between two freight cars and was keps alive by the local farmers who brought out hot-water bottles in the snow until the ambulance arrived." or (while on the State Highway) "when I was learning to drive this was an unsealed road - one way. it took about 11 hours to get to Christchurch, when the river wasn't flooded"). He gave me his number, again with instructions to call if I ran into trouble.

So yup. Tomorrow I'm headed up to Little Wanganui, near Karamea to do some WWOOFin'...which should be pretty cool. After that it's down the west coast, then off home in what seems, increasingly, like not too long of a time away!

Until then!

I'm Walking on Sunshine, Ohhh, oh oh oh! (or: Misinterpretations of Signs from the Universe)

Yee Haw!

Having recently sold my car (well, arranged to, anyhow. the deal goes down tomorrow when I get the loaf of cash itself) I'm headed down to Wellington this Friday, then to Picton on Saturday! I have some 3 or 4 or 5 WWOOF places lined up, and with the better part of $400 in my pocket, I'm going to be doing lots of hitching, and eating plenty of rice and potatoes. But I couldn't be happier.

The new flatmates are settled in, Rene and Kaoru...and they're good fun. Yesterday they caught a bunch of fish, Kahawai I think, and today we're headed out into the boondocks of Omahu to get some fresh venison off thier hunting hook-up...so tonight is a venison barbecue with sashimi hour d'ourves (...sp?).

Swine Flu (hahaha) has recently been usurped in the news by this drug-raid fiasco up on Hospital Hill (obnoxiously blocking off my morning walk). A couple of biker gangs got in a shoot-up over drugs, then a cop or two got shot and they (what appeared to be the entire police force of NZ, with some Army back-up) had the drug cartel holed up in a house. Except the "drug cartel" consisted entirely of one fifty-one year old guy. With no hostages. The police stand-off, that closed 2 or 3 schools, had neighbors evacuated in tanks, and closed off the entire hill for 4 days seemed a little silly to me, and I kept wondering why they didn't just rock in there and kill they guy, like, when he was sleeping (which you know he did over a period of 4 days) for example. But then I figured that Kiwi police probably don't get to see excitement like this very often, and they were probably loving every minute of it (aside from the ones who got shot, with all due respect). I was painting the hallway and wishing I wasn't, and every 15 minutes or so they'd have news updates on the radio. At first, it was just normal stuff, but at the point where they started sending in Kamikaze robots to blow up the garage (of the house the guy was holed up in) I started laughing. It was a good bit of entertainment, and I haven't heard a mention of the damn pig flu since. Ha!

Well, the next post will certainly be from South Island, as I now know the Universe is flowing with me. You see, last week (where I had infamously bad luck, culminating in nearly getting robbed blind by Chinese Internet Pirates) my radio station of choice, Hauraki, was playing unusually good music. I thought, incorrectly, that this was a good omen. It turned out to be, however, God's form of hold music...a sort of consilation prize for nothing else working out for me. However, this week is the debut of Green Day's new album, so I've had to listen to "American Idiot" over, and over and over. So this must be good news, and it also makes me spend a lot more time out of the house and relish the idea of being on the road, vagabonding around South Island.

Hooray!

Buy My Car, Please (or: On The Avoidance of Swine)

It's a great deal, let me tell you! A new (and here, by new I mean 20 years old, so essentially ignore that) Toyota Corolla...pristine mechanical shape with only minor cosmetic damage...!!! And for $800 US? Damn! I'm really dumbfounded as to how so many people are passing up a great offer like this, but it's obviously a crazy world so who am I to comment.

Anyhow, that's essentially what I'm up to at the moment. Sarah and I went to her "work do" (a kiwi tradition of getting together with all your co-workers and having a great big barbecue and get intoxicated) and no one, not even the 3 year-old daughter of her boss was buying. But it'll move. At the moment, I have (let me count, hold on) $23.80 so I don't have what you would call a jam-packed schedule. I've been doing house painting (which would be lovely if I didn't have to have all the windows open in the cold weather) to pay the rent, and Glen's been out of the house for most of the past couple of weeks with a new flame in Waihi, so I've spent more evenings that I would like to admit to sitting around talking to the cat. But today we have two new flatmates moving in, a German/Japanese couple with near-unpronounceable names (Glen calls them "Zeig Heil" and "Ruv You Rong Time", respectively) so that should add some flavor to life.

But to catch up...

After the gentlemen took off from Auckland, I had a lovely, caffiene fueled midnight drive home to Napier. When I got home, Glen and I had some dinner (or breakfast, what have you) and he told me that our flatmate, Sue (who moved in to take over from Keller and Noah) hadn't been home for a couple of days. The next day, while I was out golfing with Buzz, I got a text from Glen saying that he needed me home at 5:00 that evening to be a witness, and act as backup, when Sue tried to move out withour paying rent ($185). I showed up early, and was thus, luckily, present to witness Glen jumped, yanked out the front door, and beat on the sidewalk by Sue, and a pack of her friends. To pay me back for calling the police and saving his life, Glen bought me beer.

The other weekend I headed down to Wellington with Buzz and Chris, and got to meet Buzz's brother, Kevin (and his (married) flatmates, Fred and Melissa). Kevin is a tax attorney and Fred is an acountant, so they have a lovely apartment in a high-rise building in the city, with a balcony and a view of the bay. We had a lovely night, and I had a political/automotive discussion with Fred whilst Kevin honked a duck-call at passers by down on the sidewalk and Melissa banned Buzz from her apartment for the forseeable future after some rather off-color remarks were made about the potential attractiveness of her and Fred's future children. Kevin and Fred showed me the Wellington night life, and I got bounced from my first pub after I started pretending to be a US Marine and making fun of all the ANZACs (NZ army...it was ANZAC day so I guess they all got let out of the barracks for the evening).

Other than that, I don't think there have been any too exciting happenings down here. I'm headed down to South Island to do some WWOOFing, vagabonding, romancing of beautiful farm girls and general adventuring as soon as possible (i.e. WHEN SOMEBODY BUYS MY DAMN CAR)...and I'm looking foreward to that like nothing else! Aparently I'm coming home around the 25th of June...I got a little teary-eyed today driving past the old Taradale house and re-living all the old memories, but I suppose that all good things must come to an end...and I'm really, really (I cannot express this enough) ready to get back on the road!

Anyhow, with any luck the next post will be made from a drastically different landmass from the one on which I currently reside, and I hope to have thrilling tales of daring and adventure to share!

Yippee Ki Yay!

The Inagural Enterpirse of Katz Communications NZ OR: The Depression!

Well, it's been quite a while since we've put anything up...I don't really count the last part about the jobs as that was pretty boring. But it's a nice saturday and I'm i a state condusive to having a quiet sit-down due to standard friday night activities.

We had worked out with BG that we would vacate the good old Taradale house which had served as our base of operations for so long in return for him finding us some sort of alternative acomodations. But we had just enough time before we left for one last party. For Keller's birthday, we had the crew over for a barbecue. Buzz and I made Keller a special birthday hat out of a plastic tiara and the hard-hat that came wth the kid's tool set that we got him. After dinner, we headed over to Buzz's for some drinks and to send him off to University, then off to Havelock. Keller and I got a ride into the village with Buzz's mom, who had an amazing, mellow acceptance of her son. I could never convey the nuances of the conversation exactly, but here's what I remember.

Buzz's Mom: Now, Buzz, don't get in a fight!

Buzz: I will.

Mom: Watch out after him, boys (to me and Keller)

Buzz: I'm going to kill a nigger!

Mom: Oh Buzz...

Buzz: I'll do it.

I feel like I need to say that Buzz has such a strange, calm manner about him that even though he may seem to be slightly judgemental, his overt racism is just another reason we love him, and has never been acted upon thus far. It's all good.

Havelock was lovely, though I lost my sweater. While dancing like an idiot to the terrible, terrible music that absolutely permeates popular bars, I decided that the bar managers must have a pretty good racket - more than half of the money I spent as on drinks intended to dull my senses to the absolutely awful music, and the rest on drinks to slow the coming the inevitable realization that aparently no one in New Zealand can dance. It was still god fun, though.

The next morning, Keller and I drove Noah to the bus station, from where he was off to Auckland to meet up with his family.

After a quiet week of being repeatedly fired by our evil, terrorist, turkish orchard manager (whom we took to calling "Turkish Delight" "Achmad" "Al Qaeda" and other endearing names) it was time to bid farewell, forever to the old house. We loaded up the merc like a bunch of Okies (backpacks ties to the roof, etc. etc.) and made the pilgrimage up to our new home. We settled in to our new digs - and had a good chat with our new flat mates - ex smuggler, con-man, bartender and man of the world Glen, his blind, autistic son Jess and Mooch the cat.

The Katz tribe was in town for the weekend, and we took some time out of our busy schedule to check out the Art Deco festival in town. I have never seen anything like it, or even close, for that matter. The entire city center was closed off, there were barbershop quartets on every street corner, 4 piece jazz ensembles and enough classic cars to make my neck sore from constantly looking around. Perhaps most fantastically, all along the waterfront, for hundreds and hundreds of yards people had set up extremely elaborate tents, with beautiful wooden furniture, tablecloths, sofas (all period, of course) and were lounging, playing croquet and having tea while adorned in resplendent 1930s clothing - all the ladies with long dresses, satin, lace and ribbons with little hats and parasols; gentlemen in suits or rolled-up shirtsleeves and suspenders topped by flat-brimmed straw hats or fedoras and the children in little dresses and knickers. While we were strolling along, Sarah and I stopped to listen to a barbershop quartet do a rendition of a Maori folk song until we turned and noticed an old man in full Deco battle dress shouting excitedly at Keller in Japanese while gesturing with his cane.

We gave the Katz's a tour of Waimarama beach, Te Mata peak and finally settled back at the Taradale house for a barbecue dinner, before saying our final farewells to the old abode and heading home. Sunday night saw us at the Old Church chatting over a lovely dinner and making business arrangements (Dean, if you could send out my royalty check for this as soon as you can, that would be excellent.) before parting ways, with Keller and I heading back to Glen's and Noah and the fam taking off for new adventures.

On Tuesday, after being fired several more times we signed up at Job #9, picking blueberries. Bleberries turned out to be kind of nice and realxing, compared to apples, and though we were making less money I quite enjoyed it. Friday night Glen took Keller and I out to The Union, the neighborhood pub, which I quite enjoyed - as the working men who seemed to be major patrons had a much more sensible taste in music. We were introduced to the barmaids, and the owner of the bar (all friends of Glen's), sang some karaoke, and eventually staggered home.

Last night (not actually last night anymore) I was grilling up some burgers for dinner and shooting the bull with Glen while one of the trucks at the warehousing yard next door was backing up to park next to Glen's fence. Glen had been in the midst of a fierce battle with the truckers after one of them started crashing into his fence, and was just sitting on the table, quietly daring him to hit it again. As the truck pulled out, the whole fence shuddered and there was a huge crashing noise. Glen was immediately running out of the house shouting at me to get the camera. While I filmed, Glen ran out the front door to the trucker and the manager, who were trying to straighten the huge, metal pole that had been knocked over, with a forklift. Glen hassled them until the police showed up, and took a statement. After that it was off the union again, where Noah whiled away the night chatting up some German girl, and Glen and I had a short nap on what we thought, at the time, to be rail road tracks (but later turned out to be a loading ramp aside the tracks themselvs). Good fun.

This last week has been slow on the work side of things, despite a killing in our foray into ("not" stolen) blueberry distribution. We were going to be picking kiwis today, but that fell through, as did blueberries again, so I'm counting on some ingenuity to get us some money, but we'll see how all that pans out. Two more weeks of work, then we're off to the Great South for 2 or 3 weeks, then Keller and Noah are off to Amsterdam, and I return to Glen's and hopefully some more lucrative work. We should have some good tales from down south, and I'll try to get them up in a timely fashion.

Cheers!

Updates from the Orchard

Hey gang - it's been a while since the last post but alas there's still not much to be said. We got jobs, eventually, through an Indian contractor (Jaswinder Singh) at a pack house. We met him at his office, then followed him along winding roads through, what appeared to be, the swamps outside of Mordor (the name escapes me). Low-lying fog covered the ground, and dead treesw poked up every here and there - creepy, to say the least. But after a long, long drive, we arrived at the packhouse, filled out a couple of short forms and got to work. Squash would come down an airport luggage clain-style conveyor belt, and it was our job to grab it up (fast) and pack it in big, wooden crates. You had to do it so the stems were down on the bottom, and facing out on the sides, and the squash packed in neat little rows. That went on for about 3 hours, then we took a break. Then three more, then lunch - then more squash. One of the guys we had talked to said that we did this for 12 hours a day, 6 days a week. Hooray. We got out early that day, however, and gratefully headed home. After several days of this, the squash flow (which I never understood anyway...no one in the world eats that much squah. They said it was being shipped to China and Japan, where I suspect that it was used to build houses) lessened, and we took off a day an weeded squash, under the watchfull eye of the foreman, named "Molestery McMolesteryson"...by Keller. 

All this time, Jas had been telling us that there were openings at Tumu Tumbers for workers...and that sounded like the job for us. After a good solid week or so of calling him, not being able to get ahold of him, etc. we secured the position. We showed up for work the following monday, with out earmuffs, steel-toed boots, and reflective shirts...at 4:00pm. The work, we found, was in our expertise of taking stuff of conveyor belts and packing it away. The night shift was about 15 guys or so, mostly Maori, and not to cleanest cut crowd you'd see. Although the work was fast paced (and I guess you could say "exciting"...not really though) there were some downsides to it. First of all, played OVER the noise of all the machines, which made hearing anything impossible (or so I thought) was "Flava" New Zealand's hip-hop and R&B (not the good kind) radio station. Nothing could block out the sound. Not the 3 or 4 saws. Not earplugs under earmuffs. There was no hope. Also, I mean this in the most sensetive and least racially-charged way possible, but ALL of our co-workers who were of a certain, unspecified, South-Pacific tribal heritage (hint: it rhymes with "Baori") constantly emitted absolutely the worst smell I have ever encountered. You could tell when one of them was walked by behind you. It got the the point and when one of them would come over and help me stack some wood, I'd leave and go somewhere else. 

The one night of excitement that we did have, however, was when we were driving home, at 3 or 4 in the morning, after a night of long hard work...and the car ran out of gas. We pulled over to the side of the road...and decided to walk to Flaxmere (the notorious ghetto) to fill up the gas can. However, of course, once we got to the gas station, we found that not only was it closed, but it also had to night-pay system, or posted opening hours. We tried to call a taxi, but the payphone of course didn't take coins, and only certain phone cards - none of which we had. We sent Keller back to stay in the car (to make sure it didn't get towed) while Noah and I were going to wait...for 3 or 4 hours...for the gas station to open. Luckily, after getting bored of waiting (not long, I assure you) Noah and I happened upon a way to call a taxi, and were soon on the road again. Unluckily, the car turned out to not have been out of gas, and instead have had a dying fuel pump, but that's another story entirely. 

The next week we got a call from Crasborns, the company we were thinning with, and soon we were back in the orchards...where we are now. We picked apples, peaches, pears, and more apples. Now we're in the midst of possibly unionizing for better wages, but we'll see how things turn out - supposedly things should be picking up soon enough. 

Anyway, that's the latest on out work situation. We've got a couple other stories that'll get put up in the next couple of days. Until then-

 

Palmerston North: Take 2

The last weekend, for a change of pace, a chance to try out the Merc on the open road, and to put a little distance between us and the apples, we decided that it would be nice to take a road trip down to Palmerston North (from We All Almost Die) to visit Sarah (and hopefully not get attacked by zombies or propositioned to buy meth). It was origionally going to be a big, group outing, but eventually everyone except us dropped out. Buzz got a job, which I feel like I must applaud him for...Clara ended up taking a trip to the water park with her family while Sam is unemployed and thusly opted to stay home. 

The drive south was absolutely beautiful...we were essentially the only car on the road the whole way, the clouds were stunning, it was amazing! We arrived at Palmy and had to interpret the Google Maps directions somwhat, as I had opted to ignore then thus far. After driving around town stumbling over the Maori street names, Keller let us know that he knew where we were supposed to go all a long - Noah and I were simply yelling too loudly to hear him in the back seat. We quickly located Sarah's sister's house, and pulled up outside. After we met her sister and brother-in-law-to be, we headed to her friends house.

Upon arriving at Haley and Andrew's, we settled down to a barbecue (the first of many, as it would turn out) and several bottles of the drink that would essentially come to encompass our entire weekend, Barrell 51 Bourbon and Cola. We had a very relaxing evening, delicious steaks and burgers, and lovely chats before settling down to bed.  

The next morning, while Keller and Noah were still whiling away the morning in bed, I drove Sarah to work. She wrote down the directions as we went along, and hopped out of the car with the parting words "so you have the directions...just get back on Pioneer Highway. Pick me up at 3 and we can go see the Christmas parade". Yeah. I backtrack, exactly as I remember going...but cannot find Pioneer Highway. Anywhere. Eventually I get fed up of driving around aimlessly amongst the auto-part stores that absolutely litter Palmy, and decided (instead of asking someone for directions) to go find a map. I head to the Square where I remember the i-Site being from our last go around, however, there is some sort of street fair so the roads are nearly impassible. After searching for a parking spot for the better part of half an hour, I run in and grab a map. Now armed with some sort of guidance, I make my way back to Haley and Andy's. Along the way, I notice that the first turn that I took was in fact the correct one. Why didn't I notice it? Because it was called Main St. where it crossed the road I was origionally on...and about a block down there was a little sign that said "Now Becoming Pioneer Highway". Maybe they couldn't decide on which name to use...who knows. Driving down the main road to H&A's cul de sac, I kept a watchfull eye out for thier street. However, I found myself driving out of the town and into the country side. What? I got worried that I had been heading the wrong direction entirely, because I never saw the sign for thier road. So I turned around and started backtracking once again, when I noticed the problem. A&H's road intersected with the cross street I was on at a T. Directly across from thier road was a sign that said "Alaska Rd." However, this was a trap. There is no Alaska Rd. Not on the map...definitly not occupying any physical space around the sign...no where. The sign for thier street was hidden behind a tree on one of the corners. After being made fun of by Haley for a while, we took off for the Manawatu Gorge. We stopped by Pak n Save on the way there to pick up some lunch and beer, and so say "hi" to Sarah. When we returned to our car, we noticed that gas was absolutely jetting out of the bottom. We did what any sensible people would do when presented with such a crisis...got burgers. After that we stopped by a BP, and discovered that no mechanics are open on weekends. I think that we should ignore the leak, while Noah thinks we should fix it. I argue against this on the grounds that I mave essentially no mechanical background and want to go for a swim. We decide on somewhat of a compromise, and go to Pak n Save to buy tape and (surprise) balloons - the idea being to tape a balloon over the leaky bit, thus solving the problem. We get all our tools sorted (balloons, tape, and my swiss army knife) and Noah quickly scamperd under the car, while I stand by his feet and act as a sort of traffic cone to divert passing motorists from his protruding legs. He wriggles back out a couple of minutes later with many, many broken balloons and the side of his head absolutely covered in gas. From the left he looks fine, but turn him around and his hair becomes jet black and sticks out sideways. We look at each other for a minute, and unanimously and wordlessly decide it's time for a beer, so we drive off, fuel adrip, to the gorge. 

On the way there, we discuss what may have caused the leak, and decide that it may well have been the days and days of driving through potholes and over uneven grass and gravel to get out to the orchard. So of course when we get to the bottom of the road and notice that people have driven thier cars (which we notice later to be exclusively 4 wheel-drives) over the rocky, dry riverbed to where the lowered river is actually flowing, we make the kind of educated decision that came from several months of living and functioning on our own - and drive the merc right on out there. Once we are all tired of hearing the other 2 say what a bad idea this was (about 5 minutes) we pull over to the side of the track and park. Noah promptly scuttles back under the car. Keller and I head into the river, looking for a deep spot to float for a bit. We venture upstream for a piece and come to a Huck Finn-style jetty, that we decide to investigate. We try to climb up the bank, but quickly discovered that the river-bed and the banks of the river were composed entirely of the most viscous, deep mud that we have ever encountered. Keller finds a hatchet in the woods on the bank, and I find a log that I make into a raft, and he head back to the car. 

We began the drive back to Haley's house where a disheveled and petrol-drenched Noah hoped to take a shower before Haley left at 3pm to get tea for Andrew and his fellow cricketeers. We neared the town center, only to find massive detours in place for the Christmas parade. Following tradition, we got lost and all begin screaming at passers by, fellow drivers, and whatever civil engineers designed the streets of Palmy. We finally got to Haley's to discover that she has left. Needless to say, Noah is upset. However, it is time to pick up Sarah from work, and Noah looks foreward to showering at her sister's. With Sarah aboard we arrive at Emma and Kevin's, and Noah hops straight into the shower and Kevin comes out to take a look at our gas leak. After jacking up the back end in a precarious manner and writhing around under there for a while, Kevin tells us that he can see the leak, but the fuel hose will need to be replaced - which requires a mechanic, all of whom are closed for the weekend. He went on to say, however, much to our excitement, that he could call AA (Kiwi AAA - not the support group), tell them that it was his car and they'd have it fixed straight away and for free! He phoned them up, but came back with a somber expression on his face. "They said that it's too dangerous for them to fix a gas leak in such hot weather, and that we'd have to have the fire department come by and drain the tank first." The Kiwi consensus was that the call the the fire station would end up costing us $300, so we decided to stay in Palmy for the weekend, and fix the car early Monday and head home then. 

Sarah promised us that that night we were going to get a taste of the Palmy nightlife and meet some more of her friends, so we waited for Haley to come pick us up and we were off. 

We had a couple of celebratory Barrell 51s with Andy as his team had won the cricket game, and then took a cab to a flat of thier friends. In the cab, on the way there, the driver told us about a cabbie in Christchurch who was stabbed to death the night before - and explains that the company told the drivers to be extra cautious. He is visibly shaken. Upon exiting the cab, while everyone is exchanging pleasantries with the driver, I (kindly, in my thinking) advise him to "try not to get stabbed." Andy thinks that this is hilarious, but no one else does. The flat was almost straight out of Animal House - decorated in the standard bunch-of-guys-in-a-flat style (i.e. messy). We were greeted by two of Andy's friends who we had met the previous day, and were also introduced to the various other guests. Half of the ones I remember was Ben, an absolutely massive and genuinely friendly Maori. The other half consisted of a girl who had, at one point in her life, met several guys from Iowa. She thought that it would be appropriate (as they were from my homeland) to tell me all about them, and was pleased to the point of mild cardiac arrest when I informed her that I had heard of Des Moines. After "several" more drinks and an absolutely hilarious but slightly risque act of comedy from Andy, we headed off into town - just a couple of blocks away. As we neared the bar, we passed a group of guys sitting around in thier cars on the side of the road who started making cat-calls and shouting general unpleasantries at the women we were with. Enboldened by the bourbon I turned and began shouting back at them, until Sarah came back and led me away by the arm saying "you're going to get yourself killed". 

Murphy's, the irish pub and hopping night bar, was absolutely packed when we arrived. The standard friday-night-"Irish"  band was playing, and playing pretty well. I ordered a round of bourbon, the plan being to while away my inhibitions to the point where I could dance like a Kiwi. In contrast to standard American dance, where one physically dances (fairly intimately, at times) with a partner, the hip NZ style is something I can only describe as the "stereotypical white person dance", where people dance in groups, sort of milling about, but all in the stereotyped "white" way. 

We finally began the search for a taxi home after a couple games of pool (and much humiliation, on my part). We stopped by Jester's to get pies on the way, and it was truly astounding. A hot, freshly made pie at 3am after a long and wild night is more than endorphins alone can cope with. I was euphoric beyond belief. We finally secured a cab, and had just settled in for a nice quiet ride home when the driver tuned to Andrew. "You don't remember me, do you?" When Andy replied to the negative, the cabbie went on "We went to school in (NZ town) together. Is that your brother, Scott back there too? I remember (now talking to Scott, while driving) that in (long ago)th form you stole my tennis ball." This was atleast 15 years ago, and it was clearly something that really stuck with the poor guy. 

The next morning, asising from bed at the crack of noon, I settled into the sofa in the living room where everyone was gathered, slightly haggared looking, recounting the previous night's events. Haley mentioned being nearly assaulted (spit on, atleast) by an angry midget, something I had forgotten or been absent for. I was very amused. On the way out the door, Andy asked us if we needed anything from the store. We told him no, and he asked us "but if I make a feed you'll still have some, right?". His feed turned out to be sausage, bacon, eggs and toast, all prepared on the barbecue ("there's no clean-up" was his explanation). I had earlier been expressing my longing for an American diner-style breakfast, and was overjoyed. Well fed, Keller, Noah and I took off with Andrew to watch some of a neighborhood cricket game. The major thing I noticed, and what kept me entertained, was the relaxed feel of the game. Hardly anyone ever set out in a dead sprint. If the ball was a little too far away, or the run to the far wicket looked risky, they happily just stood where they were, or make a half-hearted attempt before turning and jogging back to thier origional position in a nonchalant sort of way. I decided that cricket was, more or less, my kind of sport. Andy dropped us off at thier place, where we grabbed Sarah, and after saying our goodbyes, took off for Emma and Kev's. 

We arrived pleased to see that our car had not exploded from the gas leak (a fear of Emma's) and noted that the 2 liter or so jug we put under the drip was nearly full. We saw our last Palmy sunset (particularly intense, and fairly stunning) in a park after having enjoyed a dinner of fish and chips. On the walk back to the house, I explored the facets of my distaste for the every-day use of corrugated iron (nearly everywhere - fences, rooves (roofs?), sheds - along the road we were on had soem sort of corrugated iron feature). Kevin gave us the name of a good mechanic in town, and after rejecting my offer of the gas that had leaked from the merc as a gift of thanks, he and Emma retired to bed, and we soon followed suit. 

Monday morning came, and it was time for us to be heading home. After a breakfast of toast and marmite (for me and Sarah...honey for Noah and Keller) we said farewell and headed to the garage, where we left the car for about half an hour. We used the time to get another Jester's pie. Walking back to the garage, we stopped by a sporting goods store. Idly pawing through merchandise, we noticed that cricket bats can cost over $400, and I quickly reversed my earlier decision: cricket is definitely not my sport.  

We were back on the road, heading home, after getting the car back (repaired, but only mostly as we would find out later) having enjoyed a great weekend. 

So that was that...tuesday work was rained out, so we had a much-appreciated 4-day weekend. This weekend my fam is out - and we had a lovely morning tea with Bian, Wendy and BG. Next week may be our last week of thinning...before we either take a break or move on to stonefruit or grapes. If we work Christmas/New Years we get 1.5x pay and one day of paid vacation, so working may be a nice thing to do for the holidays - but I'm ready for some more time off to take another little trip. 

Right now I'm lying in my luxurious Queen-size bed (made from an ingenious conjoining of two single beds) and thinking of creative and entertaining ways to cut off out neighbor's electricity as I lie awake listening to the thumping bass from her techno rave. Wish me a good night and us luck...we'll be sure to get out there more and have many more adventures and exciting tales to tell! 

Jobs: Take 3

This all happened a while ago, but I noticed a distinct lack in blog posts and as the house is clean and it's a monday (thus nothing to do and drinking is out of the question) I thought I'd catch "everyone" up. 

I'm not going to go into the details of our brief employment at Mr. Apple, sufficeive to say that Carl (the American owner) and Reuben (the Brittish foreman) were probably the 2 people in New Zealand with the worst buisness efficiency, managerial, motivational and orgazational skills. 

However, once again, BG swooped in to our rescue. After showing up at Mr. Apple one day, we went on a soaking wet (from the rain we worked in for most of the morning) journey around Hawke's Bay in search of better employment. This tour included a visit to Tony (which BG pronounced "tiny"), a retired orchard owner who lived in a massive Spanish Mission-style mansion, and the Puketapu Bar. Anyway, at the end of the weekend we had work with Crasborn, a group that handles apple contracting at lots or the orchards around town. 

We started there, much to our satusfaction. The foreman, a short, dreaklocked-and goateed guy from Northland, Rod, is absolutely hilarious, and even tells us how much the contract rate is! We're making wages all right, but the professional contractors, George, Atui, and Leroy are each making about $25 an hour - so we'll hopefully be making a little more money soon enough. Woohoo.

Jobs: Take 2

Yippee and hooray! We start work tomorrow at "Mr. Apple," or one of their orchards, owned by a college mate of my uncle Tom's... We didn't end up working at D&D as you may deduce... they were generally flaky and "tosspots" as the kiwis say... So we are just that much more stoked to FINALLY BEGIN WORKING OWOOOOOYEAA!!!!!!!! 

We have been pretty busy lately anyways, as there is always some urgent work to be done at our swimming hole at the river near our house, and continued tribulations concerning the back lot, phone bills, and the Mercedes. We discovered that the only real problem is that nobody seems to know where the keys are- One day BG came by, and we decided to push it away from where it had been sitting... it's the heaviest car ever made, ever. Anyways, today a locksmith came out and removed the ignition, he should have a new key back to us in a couple days!

Plans for Thanksgiving are underway, we are hosting an educational celebration for those unfortunate kiwis who have never had thanksgiving dinner.

Chur chur!

Allow Me to Introduce You...

...to the newest employees of D&D Agricultire and Contracting! We start monday and work our way up to 13 hours a day, 6 days a week in midsummer. BG is coming by tomorrow to fix up the Merc (edes) with us, and we'll be on the road, sweet as!

Halloween, Guy Fawkes, Continued Unemployment and Me Tearing Up Over Memories of Ron Paul

Since the last post we have comfortably settled in to the life of unemployment. Jobs are looking up, as we have gone from being told to "phone back in 2 weeks" to "phone back in a couple of days".We actually were were granted an audience with the mysterious and Arabic "Bubbly" (the only name that is listed on the job site) today, which went slightly awry. More later.

While we were enjoying the sun and lovely warm weather, Halloween snuck up on us quite effectively. Our Kiwi mates Sam, Sarah and Clara (with Buzz sadly in absentia) took us out for an exciting night on the town. First stop was the birthday of one of thier fellow classmates (Tim) at the EIT (local vocational school). The taxi dropped us off outside (what appeared to me to be) an empty warehouse. He followed the sound around to the back, and found what turned out to be Tim's garage/warehouse/house. We were imediately unsure what made us the most uncomfortable, the location, the mix of fairly sketchy (or "dodgy" to use local slang) attendees, the mysterious beverages, in coffee mugs, offered to the girls (imagine my joy at recieving a nice, cold, capped Tui) or the haphazard mixing of halloween costumes among party goers. I ended up chatting with Jonathan, a teacher from the EIT who worked on Lord of the Rings before we made a hasty departure to Ahuriri and hopefully a more legitimate scene. On the walk there, Sam pointed out to us (reenacting the events while he spoke) the spot where he had been hit, riding his bike, by a logging truck. As we reach the Thirsty Whale, we recieve an explanation to a previously inexplicably Kiwi phenomenon. There is a fair contingent, in New Zealand, of guys who get ahold of mildly sporty cars, adorned with what appear to be debris from a drag-race collision (spoilers are certainly the most popular) and drive around town screaming out the windows. Sarah explains to us that these people, whom we had called (most graciously) "assholes" were in fact "Boy Racers" ( not something I see to be very cool sounding...) and all park thier cars at one place in town, which we happened to be walking through. They undowbtedly smelled our American Fighting Spirit, and let us pass unhindered. Upon arrival at the Thirsty, we see that (nearly) the only other patrons are members of a community netball team who are (of course) all wearing costumes. We decide to have our drinks outside, and after, on a trip back from the toilet where Sam was accosted, violently and passionately, by a middle-aged woman dressed as the devil, to leave. We strolled along the scenic Ahuriri waterfront and over the hill to the Cri - the bar under out old hostel. I decide nearly immediately upon entry that drunk people in halloween costumes and an endless source on enteratinment (the man dressed (convincingly) as Jesus being a case in point). We have a couple of drinks and play some pool, before heading to the uniquely rocky beaches of Naper, via the all-night burger stand (naturally). After an exciting (and heated) discussion about hemispherical differences in the nighy skies, we leave the calm (cold) serenity of the beach to catch our cab home. However, our cab does not show. Ever. Neither did the second cab we called. Or the pair of cabs after that. We eventually split up, with Sam, Keller, Noah and Clara taking one cab home, and Sarah and I sharing one what I assumed was a meth addict (but not before being engaged in an animated discussion of American politics by a shockingly well-read drunk).

The next day, we were informed by Sam that Guy Fawkes' Day (the 5th of November) was coming up, and a fairly major holiday in New Zealand, with fireworks and barbecues and what have you. After shedding (what turned out to be one of many) a tear for Ron Paul, we headed into town with Sam and Clara to get a barbecue, fireworks, 3 kilos of ground beef and several cases of beer. The 5th found Noah and Keller watching the election while I cleaned the house. Buzz came over in the early afternoon and togethor we set about the task of lighting the grill (charcoal, of couse). After going through nearly a whole packet of fire-lighters, dumping the coals (alternatingly accidental and intentional) on the ground, smoke, burns, and much boisterous advice from Brian over the backyard fence, we get the grill lit and throw on the first set of lovingly hand-made American hamburgers. By the time that Sam, Sarah and Clara show up, the burgers are hot, firewords blazing, and nearly all flammable foliage on our property set ablaze (albiet in a controlled manner) by Buzz. 

We awake the next morning, and after seeing off our guests, we depart to Hastings and our first job interview with (the now infamous) Bubbly...but not before exchanging words on the new president (sadly not Mr. Paul), the upcoming All Blacks game, and ongoing plans to deface our new American flag (bought and flown by me) with Halley and Brian. We board the bus only to realize that we forgot 1) money 2) the map 3) the address and (to make matters complete) 4) Bubbly's phone number. Hooray. After arriving in Hastings with a generous (hahaha) 90 minutes to reach our destination, we get a map from a hotel and head to 91 Stock Rd (I'll spare you the suspense by saying here that the actual address is 41 Stock Rd. Bear in mind that we do not know this until we return home). We walk down (what seems like) mile after mile of dry, humid highway bevore turning off into the orchard-laden outskirts of the city. We notice along the way that nearly every several meters there is a horribly mutulated fowl of some sort (usually duck). We reach Stock Rd. with a meer 5 minutes to spare, only to realize that we don't know which way to turn. This would ordinarily be no problem as we could simply check the address numbers to see where we were, but due to the distance between mailboxes (hundreds of feet) and the convoluted system of RD (Rural Delivery) numbers used by the New Zealand Post, it takes us the better part of 10 minutes to realize that we are going the wrong way. After turning around and retracing our steps, we are almost 30 minutes late. It is almost 3:00 by the time we reach the non-existent address, 91 Stock Rd. We continue to 77 in search of our destination , before turning around in frustration (quite likely only one street number away (thanks again to the non sequential numbering on RDs)). 

So here I sit writing this, with a slight headache, sore legs, and a tired head. Tomorrow I launch what I have dubbed "The Unrelenting Crusade for Jobs" and will not rest until I am out of the house and gainfully employed. Everyone here is very excited about Obama (Brian (we assume) left a copy of the Dominion Post on our door, with Obama taking nearly half of the paper's coverage, while the NZ Herald had a similar feature). I reminisced over the od photos of the old Ron Paul truck and I, needless to say. 

All's well here, and looking up. 

Six Curious Tales

The first Monday in our house, our landlord, BG, came over to pick us for sailing. He tells us that he goes every monday to get rid of "Mondayitis" as we get into his Land Rover. After picking up the outboard, petrol, and some pies ("in case we get lost out there in the ocean") we get to the dock. We unload all the gear and travel down the gangway to the floating (or, more accurately, sinking) dock and begin to load up the boat. After some trouble with the outboard and the sinking dock, we get underway. The weather is beuatiful, and BG tells us that the bay is not usually this windy, so we picked a good day to come out. Noah takes the tiller while Keller, BG and I raise the sails, then we all settle down to some of the meat pies BG brought along. We through a couple of fishing lines out the back of the boat, lay back, and relax. As we get back into port, BG's friends from the RSA (Retired Serviceman's Association, I think) meet us at the dock, and we spend some time sitting on the dock, drinking beers, and shooting the bull with them. 

Tuesday, while coming home from an evening run to the video store for more episodes of "House" (we've watched this show to the point where we routinely have medical sounding conversations in an attempt to convince passersby that we are doctors) we run into our neighbor, Halley, her (or possible someone else's) children and an Arabic man we assume (falsely) to be her boyfriend. Halley is nearly falling over drunk, but we manage to have a casual conversation as we hear through the park home. At our driveways, she invites us in for a beer, and despite many (made up) excuses on our behalf, we accept. We have a seat in the living room with a Tui apiece, and talk about the neighbothood, music, the othe rneighbor, Brian (whom Halley refers to as "Old Brian") and the colony of aroused, feral cats that live and under our back porch. Her cat, Sambo (guess what color he is), had just had a batch of kittens (as well as a startling sexual revelation) after suspected late-night activites under our house. The kittens are brought our by her daughter, as well as a new beer for me, and are AMAZINGLY cute. The kids get put in bed (via a process of Halley yelling at them to go to bed), and our Arabic friend, who is attending the Polytech school outside of town gets up to leave. After he's out the door, Halley turns to us and says "Who the hell was he? I'm glad you guys came over, because he just followed me home.". A couple days later we met the Arabic guy again, and he seemed very nice. Who knows what was up that night.  

Wesnesday, Mike (our Real Estate agent) came over to check the damage report. After going through the kitchen and living room, we got to the garage.

"Know what that's for?" he said, pointing to an old fridge in the corner. "That's the beer fridge! The kiwi women don't let the men keep all thier beer in the kitchen fridge, so they get another one just for themselvs!"

After traveling through the upstairs, Mike asks us if all we've got are single beds, which  we confirm this to be the sad truth.

"Ah, that'll be OK," he says, "until you bring some girls home. You know the rule? If she's good lookin', she gets to come here, but if she's ugly you've got to go to her place. That way you can get out real fast in the morning. If you let her come here, you'll have all kinds of trouble gettin' her to leave in the morning." He pauses to let this sink in, and as we head downstairs, adds one last bit of advice "Never wake up next to an ugly woman. It's the worst thing you can do.".

Thursday our neighbor, Brian (Old Brian) came over to give us a friendly warning (unrelated to the previous night's meeting) about the feral cats living under our house. We tossed around ideas for repelling them, and he explained garbage and recycle pick-up to us (surprisingly complicated). He asked us if we had gone on any tours, and when we responded to the negative, he said "Well, I'm not doing anything today. I'll be back for you around 1." and took off. At around 1:30 (Kiwi time is unsurprisingly relaxed) he came by, and took us off to the "Taradale Boobs" (formed by the legendary 1931 earthquake that leveled the city and brought the surrounding region (priviously under the bay) up 2 meters (the flat, irrigated unpopulated plaines giving rise to the region's vitriculture industry)) which he said "could not have been shaped by man". After the boobs, we drove around the town to the Mission winery (oldest winery in NZ) and on to Westshore for a look at some shipwrecks. After that was The Hill (previously the center of town, when most of the present suburbs were underwater), with the gun battery from WWII, derelict Hospital (which Brian helped to build) and old prison, converted to hostel. Once we got home, Brian took us over to Halley's house (she was gone) and shook us a ton of grapefruit out of her tree (with the standing offer to come fetch him to shake the tree for us if we wanted any more). 

Friday, I was sitting around the kitchen looking for food in the morning when i was startled by a loud knock at the door, and looked over to see BG. I let him, and, as per usual ignoring any greeting, he said "The rule is, I bring the cake, you make the tea." while handing me a paper bag. He berated Noah for sleeping in so late (Keller woke up and joined us for tea and cake) and gave us a couple of numbers to call for work.

Saturday evening, our friend (perhaps "mate" is the proper term) Sam came over for a movie. He played us some Kiwi death metal, and we played him some Dave Matthews. We watched Saving Private Ryan, then headed out to Billy's (the local Irish pub) to play some pool. We listened to the live band for a while, and ultimately decided to head to the Thirsty Whale, an upscale party bar in Westshore. We take a taxi there, and experience the hospitality of the kiwi cabbie yet again. We headed into the bar, only to find that there was hardly any space to move - the entire (large) building was absolutely packed. Sam pushed his way in, yelling over the music "This looks like kinda a slow night, usually it's much more packed!". We danced, drank, screamed along to Sweet Home Alabama with Maoris, and learned the requirements for calling yourself "Dodger" (if you're curious, you're name has to be Rodger, as opposed to Roger, with no "d") before taking a cab home and gratefully crawling into bed. The next morning, Sam took off for a day with "the missus" (what he continually, and to my great enjoyment, refered to his girlfriend as) and we settle down for a day of movies and pies.

More to come as events warrant - BG promised us that if it snowed in the mountains we'd take off a weekend and head up there, so we'll see what happens.

Housin'

We moved into the rental house yesterday, if you haven't heard... I know it's been a while since the last post, but we've been busy/sitting around.
We're getting internet and phone service in the house pretty soon, so I'll write more then, but for now, we're settling in and things are awesome. We met our landlord B.G. today, he's a 68 year old kiwi guy who grew up in the bush, he's deaf and has a wooden leg. He kicks arse!

More later... also, tons of pictures OTW.

Part II

We left the hostel to get dinner from the grocery store. On our way there, we see no people. None. I am convinced that some grizzled old man is going to jump out of a doorway and say something like "None pass this way! You will be doomed like all the rest!", or that we have accidentaly stumbled onto the grounds of a nuclear test site. Noah is convinced my fears are unfounded. As we reach the supermarket, my fears that P. North is controlled by demonic forces is realized as we pass car upon car, parked in front of the store, with people "sleeping" (dead, I think) in the front seats. On our way back, we pass a scruffy man carrying a child (whom he probably just finished consuming raw) 's bicycle. Oh dear.
After returning, we head into our room, and find out where the other guys were. They were (we assume) out drinking in a gutter. As we walk in, one rolls out of bed and says, to Keller, "Lawry? Are you still up?" to which Keller replies that he is not, in fact, Lawry. This prompts much apologizing, and the man falls back asleep. Keller and I crawl into our nice, warm sleeping bags and fall asleep. Later, Lawry (we assume) stumbles into the room. and into bed. He screams at his friend to stop snoring, then begins to make noises that I have never heard another human being make, asleep or awake*. I manage to fall asleep, though I do wake up periodically during the night in fear of the rapture. The next morning, I awake to the unprecedented sight of Noah not asleep. His bed is empty. I get up, and head to the kitchen where I find him huddled over some cereal like a Holocaust survivor. He tells me that, finding no blankets in the hostel, he was forced to sleep under a pile of his clothes and nearly froze to death (due partially to the window being open). He said that he slept for 2 or 3 hours before gettig up at 5am to take a hot shower. As soon as is possible, we depart from the hostel, leving it's rotund owners and irritating decor (hundreds upon hundreds of little wooden signs hanging around with cute little sayings like "There are no strangers here, only friends we haven't met" on them) behind. After hanging around P. North (slightly less creepy during the day), my purchasing of a new hat, and eating "American Hotdogs" sold by a guy going to Massey University (just out of town) - who also offered us his opinions on good bands, places to work, and music festivals (The only quantity he knew of was "heaps" - and he used this word to describe anything and everything (i.e. "It's heaps fun" "heaps of people" "heaps good music" etc. etc.)) we headed to the bus terminal - headed to Napier and hopefully orchard work. The bus ride took seemingly forever, but we arrived at Napier and checking into an Art Deco hotel turned hostel - very nice.

Tuesday, Keller and Noah slept until, roughly, the end of time. A construction crew outside our window is jackhammering the pavement apart, and we all agree that this is soothing compared to the snoring from the night before. We made some calls about jobs, houses etc, and did another puzzle. I start describing the pieces as people - based on thier appearance (i.e. a short man, a dancing morgan, and bright angel, etc. etc.) which irrates Noah to no end. We finish the puzzle except for the 5 missing pieces (in 2.5 hours) and decide that we will never do a puzzle not freshly out of the box ever again. That night we head downstairs to the bar. It's not very crowded, and we get a chance to watch the other patrons. They are: "Suity", a 32 (he announced this) year-old buisnessman in a suit and tie, who was boisterously intoxicated and bought round after round of drinks, a younger guy with a goatee and turtle-neck sweater who would alternate between grinding on his male friend and making out with (we presume) his girlfriend. We played copious amounts of pool while enjoying the "2 for 1" drink special. We had a brief discussion of the merits of different beers (Keller favors Tui, Noah Export Gold, and I Waikato) but arrived a the mutual conclusion that they are all delicious.

Today we are hopefully headed out on bikes to look at a house we might rent, and enjoy the lovely weather and beaches around Napier.

Peace,

Nathan

*Not even Corey. I'm serious.

We All Almost Die (OR: The Dancing Morgan)

After Noah and Keller went skydiving, we headed out of Taupo for Turangi - which is a small town on the southern edge of Lake Taupo and (were are told this by most of the residents) the "Trout Capital of the World". We stayed at "Extreme Backpackers" which was owned and managed, inexplicably, by a 70 year old couple. Checking in took longer than perhaps would have been expected because the old man - Roger - was "deaf as a post!" (his words) because he "had grey hairs" (his words as well - while pointing to his head). Attatched to to hostel was a climbing wall, which was where we occupied the remained of our afternoon. We determined that a key element of rock-climbing is being light - as the main patrons were kids under 10 and small (-er than normal) Chinese women. We did OK though. For dinner we cooked up some burgers, which attracted the attention of a fellow countryman - a younger guy from Cleveland (whom we called "Cleveland") who came over when he "noticed someone grilling burgers and knew they had to be Americans.". We had a lovely talk with him about the NFL, Major League baseball and, in passing, US politics. We collectively began to work a puzzle waiting for our after-dinner rice pudding to cook. This drove us all into a towering rage as 1) there were many missing pieces and 2) most of the puzzle (over 2/3) was either a)blue sky with no clouds, b) out-of focus grass or c) water the same color as the sky. We go to bed tired and angry.

We woke up the next morning with an hour before check-out. I take a leisurely shower, and head back to the room, only to find the owner and cleaning lady (whom Noah informed us was the crack-addicted estranged daughter of the owner) puzzling over why we are there. We think that this is not puzzling at all - until we reach the unanimous decision that it is actually daylight savings time. Oops. We eat a breakfast of oatmeal, which prompts me to have the realization that bioling oats in water is clearly something God never intended man to do. We go for a walk along the river and see many, many people fishing and doing a resplendent job of not catching anything. Back in town, Noah passes out on the ground, and I get the Sunday edition of the NZ Herald. It turns out that the "Sunday" in "Sunday Edition" actually means "Stabbings, arson, and melodrama". "Edition" still means "edition". Inconveniently, this is the only day the herald comes in a readable form (stapled together like a oversized magazine - rather than the normal, senselessly awkward pages, one of which could be used to sail a small ocean-going vessel). We get on the bus and head to Palmerston North. Upon arrival, we are tired and decide to bee-line it to the hostel. We head to the hostel, but at some point decide that we are on the wrong road and turn around. We repeat this procedure several times, before heading back the origional way - only to find that the hostel itself was roughly 10 feet further from where we first turned around. The downside, is that the hostel is boarded up, and (upon further inspection) looks like a meth den. We head to the only other hostel in P. North - Peppertree Lodge. We did not know this then, but in ancient Maori folklore, a Peppertree symbolizes the enterance to Hell. We are checked in by a woman roughly the size and shape of a mailbox (the big blue ones on street corners back home). In stark contrast with the other hostels, this is inhabited solely by elderly women. We wonder where all the other guys are.

I gotta leave this here - time on the computer is running dangerously low and dinner's ready. The stunning conclusion tomorrow.

Peace and love, Nathan

12000ft.

Skydiving was awesome, check out the new pics ------>
We got picked up from the hostel by a limo, and rode to the base near the airport. We watched a movie of some one's jump, and then got a short briefing before getting in our sweet jump suits, meeting our guides, and getting in the plane. There were about 6 or so other people in the plane... I jumped first with Mac, and Noah was second with Henk. Jumping out was the craziest thing ever. Just crazy. Then you are blasting through the air, face toward the ground, for about 40-45 sec. (we jumped from 12000 ft., but for $100nz more, you can go to 15000, where apparently you can see the entire country... coast to coast in all directions. We still had an amazing view- it was ridiculously high up.)
Then the guide pulls the chute, and you get to float to the ground over a period of about 8 min... amazing views all the way down.

Next chance you get to go skydiving, I heartily suggest you go. (Our jump was $220nz each, about $155us)

Woo!

Yesterday, we hiked out past Huka Falls again and fished for prawns... we caught 9 in like 4 hours... it was fun though- prawns are very tricky! After making delicious delicious stir fry, we hiked back t0 the trailhead where there was a hot pool to sit in and watched the stars. On the way back, we saw a possum... the most dangerous animal we've seen so far [rabies!]
Anyways, after we got back, I rented a bike and rode on the walking trail to get my broken camera that I left at the prawn place, it took about 25 min... on the way back, I found the bike path, and decided to take it: AWESOME! It took almost an hour, but the trails were amazing, and I got to take a bunch of pictures. Got back to the hostel, made tons of stir fry, yum. After I'm done writing this, we're walking to the McDonald's to steal sugar and make rice pudding.

Yee-haw!

Jumping out of planes

We didn't end up skydiving the other day because of weather conditions, but tomorrow is the day! Woo!

What's that smell...?

Friday: We wake up in Tarunga, excited to experience one of the more anticipated towns on the trip. We stop by the front desk of the hostel and ask what is good to see in the town, and the super nice and enthusiastic (almost to the point of being creepy) guy behind the counter tells us "that we all look like very strong, fit boys and we should take a hike up Mt. Manginoui and then have a dip in the hot springs at the base of the mount. Before we go to the mountain, we take a walk to the flamboyantly yellow Pack N Save supermarket to get some food for the next day or two. It is on the way home that we realize why everyone is so nice in New Zealand...because all of the assholes live in Tauranga, while we were walking back to the hostel a van drove by with a bunch of twenty something year old guys yelling randomly at us, our luck didn't change much later in the day when we had all kinds of weird sexual gestures and obscenities yelled at us. The hike up the mountain took about twice as long as it should have because Keller and I were so fixated on catching the sheep that we would walk up part of the mountain than chase the surprisingly agile, furry, little animals down it. The view from the top was beautiful the weather was perfectly clear, you can see some of the pictures on Keller's Picasa account. We hike down the mountain (much faster going down), just as torrential downpours move in. We ran over to the hot pools, no digging this time, just $6. Delicious fish and chips again for dinner.

Saturday: After having numerous sexual gestures and swear words yelled at us the previous day, we decided that we were done with Taruanga, we took the short bus ride to Mt. Manginui, were we stayed at some surfer hostel, we were greeted unenthusiastically by the front desk girl, she showed us around the hostel, making sure to let us know that she was really hungover so we would get the abbreviated tour. We took another hike the mountain, this time right through the sheep pastures and watched the sunset. We have another swim in the hot pools and head back to the hostel, we called it a night early because of our early bus ride in the morning, and not wanting to binge drink with a bunch of trashy surfers. I was woken up multiple times that night to the sound of beer bottles breaking and people screaming and puking right outside our room.

Sunday: We leave the hostel to catch the buss to Roturua or "Rotovegas" as the same hungover woman behind the counter of the hostel tells us as we are leaving. We have a nice easy puke free bus ride to Rotourua. As the bus pulls in we are greeted by a nice quite city. We stumble off the bus pondering what about this city could possibly be anything like Vegas (we still have no idea). We check into our hostel Cactus Jacks, whose front desk person acted less happier to see us than the woman at the last hostel had. We walk around the hostel and realize we are in what looks like the set to a really bad western movie, all the rooms have different names such as the "shit house" for the bathroom and the "saloon" for the entertainment room. There is a central courtyard that has weird cowboy memorabilia nailed to the walls. The rooms are creepily decorated almost as if they were trying to cover something up. Wanting to escape the creepiness of the hostel we venture into the city and after having dinner we go walk around town and notice a building with 10+ pool tables inside, we go inside and the owner lets us play for free enjoying that fact that we can do something that doesn't cost money besides just sitting in our hostel, we play a good 3-4 hours of pool. We go back to our hostel after double checking that the doors were locked we slept (uneasily).

Monday: We decide we don't want to risk another night in the Cactus Jacks so we go to the Hot Rock Hostel. Deciding to investigate the weird sulfur/sewage smell that seemed had been lingering in Rotorua at times, we find the hot spring park, which was basically a tiny and extremely smelly version of Yellow Stone, that had everything from geysers to hotpools that you could stick your feet in. We decided to go to the bar across the street from our hostel for dinner after finishing our meals and a beer or two we decide to defend America's honor and test our new found pool skills from the night before on a few British guys who had been beating everyone in the bar at pool, and claimed that it was team pool night and they were "keeping things social" by making us play them. They make us pay the $2 pool table charge to play them and they proceed to beat us soundly 3-4 times. An hour or two later and about ten dollars poorer from rematching the British guys so many times we leave the bar really pissed off.

Tuesday: I wake up and my first thought is how pissed I still am at the British guys for beating us so many times the night before. We decide to get out of "Rotovegas" and take the bus to Taupo the self proclaimed sky diving capital of the world. Up to this point on the trip we have been having a problem with too much farting in the extremely small hostel rooms which ends up lingering. To solve the previously named problem Nathan proposes a "fart jar" that you have to put 10 cents in every time you fart in the room. Unfortunately the jar didn't really work and turned into an all out ban on farting the in the hostel rooms. We decided to get out of the room cause there was already over a dollar in the fart jar after about 20 minutes, as Nathan was climbing down from the bunk bed Nathan smacks his head on the glass light fixture and it splits clean in half shattering all over the floor, luckily no cuts this time.

Wednesday: Woke up today to the smell of cigarette smoke lingering in our room from the people who decided to smoke right outside the window that we had left open to reduce the lingering fart smell. After making a generous portion of cowboy toast, we decided to take a hike the the Huka Falls, which ended up just being intense rapids. We decided to walk past the falls to the Honey Hive, which was a bee house and Meadery, which had just burned down due to arson. We trekked even further to the Prawn Farm were you can fish for prawns, unfortunately we got there too late and was told the fishing was closed. Budget pasta for dinner tonight.

Excuse my poor spelling/punctuation everyone who knows me knows that its not exactly my strong point.

Ow

Woo- so sorry it's been a while since last update... I'll do a quick recap of the last couple days:

Monday: Got bus passes that take us down to Wellington, but we can get on/off at whatever city we want. We hop on the bus and head to Thames. We had a pretty relaxed rest of the day, got pizza and watched James Bond at the hostel. Became good acquaintances with the host, who always greeted us with a friendly "hi chaps"

Tuesday: Took a shuttle to Whitianga, a small town on the Coromandel Peninsula. The hostel was right on the beach, and the weather was great. We have time to run to the store before it got too dark, and made copious amounts of stir-fry and rice. I ate until I couldn't anymore.

Wednesday: Woke up, had some of Nathan's signature omlettes (tasty cheese, avocado, and onion). We rented some (crummy) bikes from the hostel for $20, and rode through some beautiful hills about 18 km to Hot Water Beach. We walked down the beach and hung out until low tide, when you can rent shovels and dig a hole near some rocks where hot spring water apparently bubbled up. We got the shovel, and started digging. At this point, the water is still pretty far in, and waves keep destroying our holes. Just before we are about to lose hope, we walk down into the surf and bury our feet, only to find that we are being very badly burned! Yay! So we set up a routine of digging about an inch into the sand and sitting there until a freezing wave comes, or our bums are scalded by hot water. After the tide comes back in and we are sufficiently sandy and cut up by sharp rocks, we decide to call it quits and ride back, because we realized that we forgot to pack lunch. Noah broke his Jandals. The ride back turns out to be harder, and by the time we get back to the hostel, Nathan is so tired that he slices his thumb while cutting cheese. The hostel guys were helpful, we got a ride to a woman's house who then took us to the local clinic, and they put a nice baseball-sized bandage on thumb. By that time, we are almost delerious from lack of food, so we walk to a restaurant and eat the most delicious and deserved burger of our entire lives. We slept hard.

Thursday: Had cowboy toast and budget beans* for breakfast, and mess around until the shuttle came to take us back to Thames (the ride back was rather twisty, and the german in back only asked us for a bag to puke in once), where we get back on the Intercity bus to come to Tauranga. The hostel guy pointed us in the direction of a fish and chips place, where we ate delicious fish and chips with tomato sauce (ketchup.) wrapped in newspaper (we can't escape from Sarah Palin). Tomorrow we're going to hike up Mt. Maunganui, and visit the hot springs there, where we won't have to dig so much.

Will post pics later, probably...
cheers




*Budget (brand) beans cost $0.65, and they are my favorite thing ever... tomorrow we are going to try budget spaghetti.

real post tomorrow morning

how's the economy doing over there? hostel owner guy gave us the hand signal for "flipped over"....
I'm out of computer time now, so i'll do a full one tomorrow

In Auckland (Or: In Japan, or China...or Samoa...)

We got in at the airport Friday (...), all fairly tired. We successfully pass through many, many, many checkpoints (bio-security, security-security, customs, immigration, etc. etc.) and catch a shuttle to the hostel...Auckland Central Backpackers. We find that we cannot check in until 13:00 (haha) and spend 8 hours sitting around, essentially. We open accounts with BNZ, which was a omen of the ease and simplicity with which tasks would be accomplished here. We also got mobile phones...only to find out the phones that cost less than a hundred dollars were out of stock...but we were instructed to come back "in the afternoon" by the sales-girl, who gave Keller excellent service. We returned in the afternoon, but: no phones yet. We (Noah and I) suspect that the girl just wants to see Keller again. (We eventually got our phones the next day).

Saturday, we ventured out to Kelly Tarlton's, an underground aquarium and penguin habitat. We hitched a ride with a tour-bus driver going to pick up his fares, who would become our first glimpse into kiwi indiosyncracies. We were waiting for another passenger (who never showed), when the driver looked at his watch and announced "Well, I guess I have time to roll a quick joint." (which turned out to be tobacco based). He went on to encourage us not to take up smoking, but excused himself for the habbit by saying "I'm too old for sex, and I can't drink." He is my favorite person we've met so far.

We notice that there are enormous populations of Japanese, Koreans, Chinese and Malasians here. Perhaps more so than the population of brit-decended kiwis. (It's only the 3rd day and already Keller is getting tired of my Japanese tourist impersonation).

Today, Sunday, we walked to the Auckland Museum, which was fantastic, then returned home after doing some shopping (three words: "Budget" brand beans) for under $13NZ. Now we're of to make some Thai Lamb sausages and, of course, the beans.

Sweet as,

Nathan

The Journey Over

Wednesday

4:00 pm: Entered US security after long, long, long goodbyes. Keller's thermos looks like a bomb on the x-ray. Everyone at the airport, including TSA agents, are nice. Uncomfortably so. Plane ride to LA is fine.

7:00 pm: We are waiting in line at the Air NZ desk at LAX to check in...we have 45 minutes to make our flight.

7:15 pm: Noah's visa is rejected...bug the situation is righted.

7:30 pm: My visa gets red-flagged by the NZ terrorist watch list (I don't know why...I promise). The agent calls Auckland to get an override code, but their computers are down.

7:45 pm: My visa is accepted. Hooray. We get on the plane.

8:30 pm: The captain gets on the PA to tell us the the plane is broken (not in those words) and that repairs are coming, but at a time he cannot ascertain.

9:00 pm: We take off from American soil for the last time in a year.

...we go crazy on the plane. I am abused to no extent by the Kiwi flight attendants. My dinner comes with no fork and no crackers. I eat my cheese by itself and my beef with a spoon. For breakfast, I order the fruit plate. I receive the cheese omlette (which was actually pretty good), but end up covering in in sugar instead of salt. Still tastes ok...

Yeeee-haw!

Today's the day! Saddle up, boys, time to hit the road (or the air)!

Giddyap!

The Woods

Lets go! I'm done with the woods, man!

Herro

This blog is where the 3 amigos will post news about their crazy New Zealand adventures.
Today is Sept. 5th- we just booked a hostel in Auckland and are busy getting packed and super stoked to leave.