Bees, Trees and Kiwis

So.

New Zealand.

Its pretty fantastic. True story.

Things are well under way here and, Geology homework aside, everything is great! The weather, more or less, refuses to dip below 70 and when it's hot the wind keeps things cool.

About that wind. It never stops. Ever. The windows in our rooms are designed to only open part way which is great for all sorts of reasons but nothing gets you out of bed like a good gust of wind slamming it shut come 3 in the AM. Going down the harbor you see people riding bikes at 45 degree angles leaning into the wind (this gets absolutely hilarious between gusts).

I've been spending more and more time in libraries lately: city libraries, university libraries, research libraries, quiet libraries, loud libraries, libraries that serve drinks. The on-campus library at University of Victoria is currently my favorite for one reason alone; they have so many books that they simply started lining them up on the floor. At first I just thought it was messy, but when I saw bookends on either side I knew that this library and I were going to be great friends. Every row, between shelves on the floor there are little lines of books when they run out of room on a shelf, labeled and organized. It just goes to show what I've been telling my parents all along:

The floor is the biggest shelf in the house...err..library.


Directly up the hill from our dorm building is the Wellington Botanic Gardens, go ahead, Google it. You know you want to. It is absolutely gorgeous on 6 or 7 different levels. The upper parts of the garden are all natural foliage just left to grow with oodles of noodling paths running through it. In a week of going at least once a day I haven't taken the same route twice, which is wonderful. Anyways at the top of the garden is a tree, a magical tree.

Imagine, if you will, wandering along a quiet path with some friends when you happen upon a tree. As you walk past this tree, you notice it has been manicured and trimmed to form a perfect cylinder and then just before you turn away it does something really weird.

It says, "Hello."

If that doesn't make you re-read the labels on your medication I don't know what will. Turns out that this tree has grown together at the top to form a very sturdy web of branches that you can walk across, sit on and view the whole city from. It really is pretty magnificent. Of course, there are a few holes in the web, most of which I promptly found (and fell through). It has turned into the premier place to meet people. So far we've encountered just about every variety of south pacific culture there is and scared even more varieties of tourists.

Speaking of tourists (I am not one). (Really). We've become something of a tourist attraction ourselves. Be it a game of good old fashion American football or just throwing a baseball around, we manage to gather an audience. My favorite is playing catch under a near by cable car and watching everyone scrambling in the windows to pull out their cameras. Kiwis love baseball.

They love cricket too. Cricket is something that I don't understand. At all. I spend a good 2 hours trying to watch a game and all I got out of it was that there is a very specific way to wipe the ball off on your pants. I will admit that it is probably the best dressed sport out there; all collared shirts and khaki pants and trendy hats and whatnot.

I actually have nothing to say about bees in this post, it just rhymed with kiwi and tree.

I do have something to say about birds. Today I saw a bird going after a grasshopper and I wasn't sure which one I was supposed to root for. Comments? Suggestions? Theories on the social paradigm represented in the struggle for food?

Speaking of food.

Curry. So much curry you wonder what the plural for curry is. Wellington (which is where I am) is one of the stops where the group is fortunate enough to have some sort of dining facility to prepare meals. However, this means we do not get to control the menu which apparently means that we are to eat our bodyweight in curry. All varieties of curry: lamb curry, rice with curry sauce, vegetables with sauce and more lamb curry. Our chef is Welsh.

I don't get it either.

I miss Mexican food. A lot.

A kiwi introduced me to an interesting new dip for your potato chips: cheese & bacon. Weird, right? The taste isn't all that interesting one way or the other but the texture reminds me of old jello.

I cannot for the life of me get over how many things are free here. There are free concerts every night in the Garden, and they're really good and they're packed every night. All of the museums are free, the cable car service is dirt cheap and so are the taxis. Four bucks American can get you anywhere in the city in a taxi. Even the auto insurance is free (my parents would love it). There was a free reggae festival serving free food; free delicious food, mind you. They had watermelons cut in half and filled with assorted fruit, like a fruit salad in a bowl you could eat.


Pictures are taking me longer than I thought. This has nothing to do with my being unable to locate my connector cord for my camera. Nothing at all.


Well I think this is a sufficiently aimless and long winded post for now so stay tuned for more kiwi adventures! Coming next time: Kiwi slang!!

Cheers!

The Wayward Hoover

P.S.
I am missing the Superbowl and this makes me sad.

Edit ::
This is a really long post, should I make them shorter? Should I post more? Should I just please, for the love of all that is good, stop rambling?