The First Week: Part Two

One day while walking around campus I ran into a fellow Biolan--Rebekeh Pearce. She and I were acquaintances through my friend Emily. Rebekah is here for the semester, and she also has a lot of family in NZ, so she's living with a relative for the semester. I haven't felt lonely here, even though I am often alone and don't know anybody, but it was still nice to know someone from home is here too. I ran into Rebekah one other time this week, and we'll probably spend some time together while we're both here. I'm looking forward to it.

My good friend Kim gave me a Sufjan Stevens t-shirt before I left, and I was wearing it around on Tuesday. (If you don't know Sufjan, you should stop reading this and look him up right now--he's amazing!) Anyway, I was stepping to the elevator at my apartment, and the boy stepping out noticed my shirt and shouted, "Sufjan Stevens!" right in my face. He was very excited to find a fellow fan, and we chatted about music for a few minutes right there. He was wearing an Alfred Hitchcock t-shirt, proving he is my geek-equal. Excellent. (This is picture of Sufjan, by the way, not the kid from the elevator.)


Some more about music out here, for those who care. Our tv has a channel that shows music videos, and they're pretty much the sume as in the States. I've seen Radiohead, KT Tunstall, the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, Coldplay, Muse, Fall Out Boy, My Chemical Romance, and even, The Format (how did they get over here?) I'm on the lookout for cool NZ bands to share with you, but so far no standouts.


On Wednesday, I attended a financial aid workshop! It was hilarious. I had to attend with about 8 other Americans who have US Federal loans, and I didn't tell anyone I had been working in financial aid for over a year. I just sat back and enjoyed a lesson I could have given myself. I felt very smug. You should have been there, FinAid buddies! "What is the difference between subsidized and unsubsidized?" Don't make me laugh!


Ok, so the highlight of the week was this:
For orientation they had this bbq (more sausages!) planned for a place called Long Bay Regional Park. Earlier in the week, I was not planning on going--the events can get tedious with all the undergrads. But my flatmates were going, so I decided it might be a good idea to go, get out of the city, and see some NZ sites. You can look at all the pics below, but it was beautiful! We went to a picnic area just off the sand. The beach dead ended into cliffs and rocks and some friends and I spend the whole day scrambling and hiking on the cliffs and rocks.
Here is my hiking team:
Fiona (from Scotland) and Nathan (wearing sunglasses, is from Canada) are our neighbors. That's Jesper in yellow and Michael in blue.



The bbq picnic area was next to this stream...



and here is the beach...




I'm not sure how far we hiked, but was a very long way. We had to pass over slippery rocks...






under rocky cliffs....





and sometimes we had to walk right in the water...





We went a very long way that day.


After each turn in the shore we had a conference to decide if we should keep going or turn back. We always chose to keep going... We kept going until finally we came upon an amazing discovery:
a nude beach.

That's when we decided to turn back.
We took the landlocked route this time...

(Sadly, no sheep or hobbit holes could be found.)
I took pictures the whole day, but these are the best ones... I had my camera on so much, I filled my memory card just as the battery died.

That night, there was a free concert in a nearby park, so we all went to that together as well. The Prime Minster of NZ was there and one of the winners of New Zealand Idol performe as well. The concert concluded with fireworks and a laser show set to The 1812 Overture with the army on hand to shoot off cannons. It was quite inspiring (although I had very vivid flashes of V for Vendetta in my head...)

And that pretty much concludes my first week in NZ. Up next, classes!