Thanks for reminding me to get my absentee ballot...

So apparently there are still people in other countries who not only love America, but are also under the misguided notion that president Bush is doing a good job. No, that isn't the punchline to some sick joke; it's true. Last night at Domino's there was a customer from Sri Lanka, wherever the hell that is, who recognized my accent and asked if I was from the USA. After I confirmed this, he went on to say he had lived in four countries (Sri Lanka, the US, Scotland, Japan, and New Zealand--I guess he couldn't count) and our beloved America was the greatest of them all. And then he said "I support your President Bush," and gave me the dopiest grin in the history of all simple-as-shit dopey grins. Unfortunately, I was not as gratified as he expected me to be, so I just shrugged and said, "Well, I don't."

Wrong answer, I guess. He suddenly became all serious and went off on a tirade about how great Bush is, and how he is a bright ray of hope for the world, and how all the presidents, prime ministers, kings, and princes of all the countries of the world wished Bush would stay in power for at least ten more years (BARF!) since they had such a great relationship with him. Ummmm.... what?

I guess Sri Lanka gets a different slant on the world news. Maybe Fox News on Steriods or something. At any rate, he concluded his speech by telling me, "Just have faith in your president. You are very lucky to have him," and grinning stupidly again. It's not my place to argue with customers, so I just smiled, chuckled, and said, "Yeah, I guess. He's not going to be around much longer anyway." Zing.

Anyway, things have been going along pretty well. As you may have read on Alexa's blog, we went for a couple hikes last week. One was in our neighborhood and it took us through some pretty wooded areas and around the back of the zoo. We hiked for a kilometer or so along the zoo's fence and were able to see inside a bit. We got to see the top of an ostrich's head, for free! Take that, zoo. The other hike was up the side of Mount Victoria, one of the highest points in Wellington with a great view of the city from its lookout point. It was also the location of the outskirts of the Shire in The Fellowship of the Ring. We weren't able to find the filming sites, but eventually we should be able to find the place where Frodo yells "Get off the road!" when the Nazghul first appear, as well as the forest the hobbits run through to get to the ferry and escape the Nazghul. Nerd alert.

Also, things are going okay at Domino's, but I'm still on the lookout for a day job so I can actually start earning a decent income. Today I had an interview at The Organic Grocer, a little Trader Joe's-esque store, and I think it went well. Besides that, about a week ago I sent an email to the zoo asking if they needed any staff for the gift shop, and when I got back from my interview today, I had an email from them saying they had job openings for gift shop/admissions. I'd prefer to work at the zoo, but I guess I'll have to wait and see what the hours are like and how soon they get back to me.

On a sad note, we are now 17 hours apart instead of 16. Sunday marked the beginning of Daylight Savings Time for New Zealand, and once you all in the US head back to standard time in November, we'll be 18 hours apart.

But I think I've rambled on for long enough. In a bit I'm going to meet Alexa in town and we're going to see Eagle Eye. It's the same as the US version, except some guy with a Kiwi accent dubbed over Shia Lebeouf. Seriously.

I was going to post some pictures, but the internet is being a jerk, so that will have to wait until later. Que triste.

In the meantime, you should all go check out this article. It's a very insightful and well-written look at white privilege and the upcoming election, using a lot of examples from the farce that is the McCain/Palin duo (or as I like to call them, Dumb and Dumber--zing!): http://www.redroom.com/blog/tim-wise/this-your-nation-white-privilege-updated

EDIT: Here's the pictures.

This is Alexa being very happy/enjoying the weather at the botannical gardens:

A scary sign along the zoo's back fence:

Wellington, as seen from Mount Victoria:

Happy Thursday!

Greetings from wet, windy Wellington.

Not much exciting has happened since my last post, but I figured I could scrounge something together to keep you all entertained. Besides that, I can't sleep. That's what happens when you stay in bed until noon. Having a night job really throws things off. The whole day is spent thinking, "God damnit, I've got to work tonight," and then I go to work, come home and watch a movie or TV for far too long and end up sleeping in the next day to start the whole process over again.

I actually didn't work tonight, though, since I needed the night off for the training at WestPac Stadium. It seems similar to my job at Domino's in that I'll spend most of my time standing behind a counter, taking people's orders and money in exchange for food. Unlike Domino's, however, this job actually requires a bit of skill. You see, we are legally bound to not serve alcohol to visibly intoxicated persons, as per the Major Buzzkill Act of 1989--at risk of a $2000 fine--so I'll have to carefully discern which customers are intoxicated. Finally, my college education will be put to use!

At any rate, I start this weekend, working a rugby game on Saturday and a football game on Sunday. While on the subject of jobs, I've also put in applications at an organic grocery store and The Warehouse (New Zealand's version of Wal-Mart, minus the unethical business practices and dirty stores) so hopefully I'll have something productive to do during the daytime.

I guess that's about it for this update. More of a "I'm still alive, whoopie!" update than anything, I suppose. I don't really have any pictures for you, except for this one of some odd-looking fellows I saw waiting for the bus at Courtenay Place. They seem strangely familiar...

Whoever they were, they looked pretty serious about catching the bus.

Watch out for the wild seals. They're so wild!

I know it's been a while since my last post. I know you all spend every waking minute on this website, repetitously clicking the "reload" button in hopes of finding I've written a new post, so I'm sorry about that. But on the bright side, I have a job!

Preschool, kindergarten, twelve years of grade school, and four years at a private university (from which I graduated cum laude). So what is my glorious job here in Wellington, you ask?

Wait for it...

Wait for it...

I work at Domino's! Yes, that would be Domino's Pizza, the same one from the States. Awesome, no? On the bright side, minimum wage is $12.00/hr here in New Zealand. Also, my job isn't that difficult. I stand at the front counter and take orders from customers, either in person or on the phone. The only difficult part is how absolutely boring it is when there's no customers. Oh well. Alexa and I also have part time jobs lined up at WestPac Stadium, the local stadium for rugby, soccer, and other events. They'll text us when they need us for an event, so it will just be a few times a month.

Other than that, things have been going well. Saturday we went for our first hike. We went to Te Kopahau (don't worry, I can't pronounce it either) reserve and hiked 5-6 km along the Coastal Track. It should've been 8 km, but Alexa was whining about all the walking so we headed back early. Psh. It was really scenic, like everything else in this country, but the real highlight of the walk was seeing wild fur seals. Not in cages, not part of a zoo exhibit, but just wild fur seals hanging out on the rocks. They weren't what I was expecting, though. For starters, they weren't jumping through hoops or balancing rubber balls on their nose. What the hell, fur seals? Where's the entertainment? Actually, if it weren't for the fact that the seals occasionally rolled over to get more sun, I wouldn't have even believed they were alive. Lazy, lazy animals.

Seeing the fur seals just wasn't enough, so on Monday we went to the Wellington Zoo to check out even more animals. It was a typical zoo, but a nice one. The animals all had plenty of leg room and most of them were in "natural," habitat-like exhibits rather than cages. The coolest part was the twilight exhibit, an indoor exhibit featuring a walk through a foresty area lit only by a few red lights. In there we got to see two Kiwis (they're nocturnal), which are the most ridiculous-looking animals I've ever seen. I wish I could've taken a clear shot of one, but it was too dark. They also had a few Tuatara, a species of lizard that has the longest longevity in the animal kingdom. Scientists think it might live to be two hundred years old, but can't be sure since no one has studied them for long enough to find out. Plus they haven't evolved or changed since dinosaur times, so they're pretty much modern-day dinosaurs.

Anyway, I think that's about it for now. We're about to head out to walk around the city and see what we can see. Picture time!

This is Alexa crossing a "river" at Te Kopahua and thinking that she's going to fall in. Oh no! Don't worry, she made across the roaring, six-inch-deep and two-feet-wide river unharmed.

A wild fur seal, wildly scratching his face before going back to wildly sunbathing on the rocks and being wildly lazy:



There were a lot of these funny signs at the zoo with silly cartoons warning visitors not to do certain things. This one is my favorite, but you can see all the rest in my online album:


And here's a link to my facebook album again. I've added pictures from Te Kopahua and Wellington Zoo, so go check them out: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2021490&l=499de&id=49800204

Wellington!

We're in Wellington! This is our fourth day here. We arrived Monday, spent two nights in a hostel, and yesterday we moved into our semi-permanent accomodation.

The drive from Rotorua to Wellington was long (about six hours or so), but scenic. Despite it being incredibly rainy the whole way down, it was very cool seeing such a diverse variety of ecosystems in a relatively small span of time. We started off in the thermal rainforests of Rotorua, then drove past the massive Lake Taupo. After that we passed through Tongariro National Park, home to Tongariro Crossing (one of New Zealand's Great Walks), Mount Ngauruhoe, and Mount Ruapehu (both mountains used to represent Mount Doom in the Lord of the Rings films). This was the hairiest section of the drive, which involed zipping around incredibly sharp bends, often without any guard rails between the Corona and certain death in the form of a multi-story drop. Fortunately I'm an awesome driver and we lived through it. As we came out of Tongariro National Park we found ourselves in the midst of a vast stretch of desert-like plains, which eventually turned into grassy grazing land with a spectacular view of some snow-capped mountains. The last part of our trip took us along the coast of the Tasman Sea (the body of water between Australia and New Zealand) and ended in Wellington.

Now that we're in Wellington, the rainy trend has continued for the past three days. The weather seems almost identical to Galway's. Wind and rain, wind and rain--hey, is that the sun?--wind and rain, wind and rain, etc. Other than that, it's been great. It's a unique city, narrowly wedged between a mountain range and a harbor. The downtown area is very compact, and the suburbs sprawl over and through the mountains. When we get a chance we're going to drive to the opposite side of the bay to get a better view of the city, and then I'll be able to show you guys some awesome pictures.

As I mentioned, we found accomodation in the form of a room in a shared apartment building. Shared accomodation is fairly common around here, and it involves us having our own bedroom, but we share a bathroom, living room, and kitchen with the other tenants. Apart from the crazy and loud domestic dispute I just heard a few minutes ago, it's not bad!

We also started our job hunt today. Alexa was more successful than I was, picking up a couple promising leads at two clothing stores. Most of the places I wanted to work weren't hiring. All I found were two places that might hire me around Christmastime, and a "I don't know if we're hiring, but I'll give your resume to the manager!" I don't think I've heard the word "no" this much since I was six and asking my parents for drug money.

I'm not too discouraged, though. I only checked in book shops, so I just need to broaden my scope a little. I sent in online applications for Westpac Stadium, the local rugby stadium, and BP2GO, a chain of convenience stores attached to BP petrol stations. Ooooh. Aaaah.

Anyway, I think I've written enough. On with the pictures!

A lonely tree on the shore of Lake Taupo:




The deserted plains we came to after exiting Tongariro National Park:


A nice view of a valley full of grazing fields with snow-capped mountains in the distance:



My next post will go into more detail about Wellington, including pictures. Hopefully they'll be bright, sunny, rain-free pictures. And hopefully I'll be employed.

Also, here's a link to the online photo album I promised so you can see even more pictures. I'll link to my current albums in every post, so you don't have to worry about keeping track of it. http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2021490&l=499de&id=49800204

A new car, hotsprings, and a brief but insightful look at the Maori language.

Spooti tahooti rama rama ding dong. That’s Maori for absolutely nothing.

So, a lot has happened since my last update. We acquired our used car. It’s a Toyota Corona, like the beer. It’s 1990. 18 years old, baby. No anti-lock breaks, no airbags, no power steering, and certainly no CD player. Let me back up to the third item, though. No power steering. Some of my older readers are probably familiar with this, but for the rest of you let me explain what that means: it means you have to steer a two ton hunk of metal with nothing but your own arm strength and a greasy steering wheel. Yes, it’s as awesome as it sounds.

It took about an hour to get comfortable with driving on the left, and as for the lack of power steering, it will probably take about the whole year to get used to that. Other than that, driving here is actually quite fun. The speed limits are high and the views are amazing. I literally wanted to pull over to take pictures every 2-3minutes. If I did that, though, we’d never make it anywhere.

Now we’re in Rotorua, a town on the way to Wellington. We realized that we weren’t spending our money fast enough so we decided to come here and spend it on all sorts of wonderful things like parks, hot springs, and petrol (that’s gas). Petrol is really expensive. Really, really expensive. I don’t want to hear any complaining about gas prices in the States as long as I’m here. What I do want to hear is, “Hey Eoin, here’s some money for petrol!”

But seriously, Rotorua is a cool area. The geothermal activity has made the landscape unlike anything I've seen before. The area is filled with geysers, hot springs, lakes that are unusual colors due to their chemical composition, and other things like that. As an added bonus, the whole area has the delicious sulphury smell of rotten eggs.

I’ll let pictures do the rest of my talking for me. Tomorrow we’re continuing on towards Wellington. Until then, take care. Or as the Maori say, “Rahiti rahiti smell my feety.”

Okay, they don’t really say that. Anyway, on with the pictures.

Mount Tarawera, the volcano that erupted in 1886 and buried the town of Te Wairo:



A couple cool pictures from the geothermal park we went to, Wai-O-Tapu:




(Once I have more online time I’ll create an online photo album, so there will be a lot more of these. I just don’t want to bog down my blog with a bunch of photos).

We've arrived!

We're here! There's not much to say about the flight. I can't make it sound too terrible otherwise none of you will come visit me. But in all seriousness, apart from United serving three different varieties of dog food for all three in-flight meals and all the movies being in Spanish, it wasn't bad.

Auckland is nice. It's pretty much a city with skyscrapers and all that jazz, but the look is mixed up a bit with a few antique-looking buildings thrown in here and there. And, of course, the Sky City Tower, which is pretty much New Zealand's version of the Space Needle.

This is what it looks like (the picture isn't crooked; the tower is):

In the foreground you can see some boats. Auckland is called the City of Sails Masts.

Also, you guys don't have to worry about me getting homesick for the States. During our wanderings we found no less than four Burger Kings, three McDonald's, three Starbucks, a Wendy's, a Borders, an EB Games, a Foot Locker, a Dunkin Donuts, and even a Denny's. In a truly American fashion, most of these places are within three or four blocks of each other, which is convenient just in case you can't walk that extra hundred feet to squelch your Big Mac craving.
Check it:

Apart from sampling Auckland's finest cuisine, we were pretty productive today. We opened bank accounts, sent in our applications for our IRD number (the New Zealand equivilent of social security), and started the process of acquiring a used car. Hopefully we'll wrap that up tomorrow so we can begin our journey towards Wellington. Of course, it may be a very short journey ending with our car wrapped around the trunk of a palm tree. Hey, I can't be expected to drive on the wrong side of the road for the first time without a few minor bumps.

That's about it for now. I'll update again when I can.

As a parting gift, here's an awesome little anecdote:

On the way back from checking out cars, we took a shortcut through a park. As I was coming out of a little bathroom they had there, I spotted Alexa taking my picture. I know, she's weird. It can't be helped. But it gets weirder. A woman was walking by, and when she spotted Alexa snapping the picture, she took off her headphones and said, "That's so cool!"

Alexa and I didn't say anything, and she continued, "Everytime my boyfriend comes out of the bathroom I take his picture and whenever I come out of the bathroom he takes a picture of me! I've never seen anyone else do that before." Yeah, probably because you're fucking crazy, lady.

As it turns out, she's from New York. But seriously. I can't make this stuff up.