Tattoo Thoughts & A Day at One Tree Hill

It was soon the first weekend in September, and Emma and I started it out by almost getting tattoos. I’ve been planning on getting a second tattoo to commemorate my time in New Zealand, and Emma and I got stoked when we saw that one of Auckland’s discount websites was offering a really good deal on tattoo work. Well, we found out why once we walked to the tattoo parlor and saw that the place was basically a small dump ran by two scummy minions. Needless to say, we decided against getting any permanent body alterations done there. For now, the tattoo work will just have to wait until I’m back in The States and have the money to spare.

Still, I did find an awesome design! It consists of the celebrated Maori New Zealand symbols the Koru (spiral) and the Hei Matau (fish hook), drawn together to create the outline of a bird. So, overall, the design as a whole represents: new beginnings, change, transformation (spiral); strength, determination, peace, prosperity, abundance, good luck, safe journey over water (fish hook); freedom and voyage (bird). I think it perfectly captures what this past year has meant for me. =) Anyway, when permanently altering our bodies didn’t work out that afternoon, we opted for a more casual day and rented movies instead. I Love You Phil Morris and Lincoln Lawyer both proved to be entertaining enough.

Emma and I spent some time at the French Market on Sunday morning until she needed to pick up some family from the airport. I chose to walk home from the market, a little bit of a trek since the market is held in the suburb of Parnell. It was actually really nice though. I went through a couple of parks on the way home, made friends with a random cat that wanted some attention, and took photos of places that I don’t often see on my usual routes around Auckland. The photos attached were taken at Albert Park, my favorite park in central Auckland. Later that morning, Emma had a few people come by to look at our flat since Daiana had previously mentioned to us she was planning on moving out.

Daiana and I played a few games of checkers (in which I got my butt whooped). Then, I had a group Skype date with my mom, my brother, and my sister-in-law’s mother Laura, which was nice. In the afternoon, Jess came by and picked me up from the flat and took me to one of her favorite spots called One Tree Hill. Within minutes, it was easily one of my favorite spots as well! The park consisted of beautiful rolling green hills, walking paths lined with bright yellow daffodils, a monument, a breathtaking viewpoint, an ice cream shop, AND sheep!

Now, yes I have seen tons and tons of sheep while traveling around New Zealand (not a surprise when the country has 16 x more sheep than it does people) but I have never been somewhere in which the sheep are just wandering around freely without fences or gates. I must admit I got embarrassingly excited hehe. =) I mean…it’s not every day you get to hang out with adorable little sheep! I kept trying to sneak up beside them to get pictures, but they obviously knew what I was up to because every time I sneakily moved forward, they casually crept backward. Cute little buggers! Besides harassing the sheep, Jess and I got an ice cream and then walked all around the park. It was just so gorgeous!

We walked all the way up the center hill to where the monument and the viewpoint were located (a very large tree apparently used to sit on top of the hill, hence the name ”One Tree Hill” ). The view from the top was really stunning, properly capturing Auckland in all of its glory. We stayed there for a while, taking in the sights and admiring the view. Straight below the monument, you could even see where people had arranged some very large stones to spell out messages regarding the Rugby World Cup games. Loved it. After leaving One Tree Hill, we stopped off at Jess’s house for a bit, said a quick hello to her dad, then met Emma and Kat at Ponsonby Food Court for dinner. Once again, it was a really great weekend in New Zealand & the next weekend was even better, as it was the opening of the RUGBY WORLD CUP!!! =)

Cheers,
Ash

Future tattoo

Albert Park

One Tree Hill

Long Bay, Office Prankster & Buffet Blunder

On the last weekend before September struck, Auckland was fortunate enough to receive a random heat wave in the middle of Spring. Emma and I took full advantage and drove out to one of the nearby beaches called Long Bay. To my surprise, it was absolutely beautiful! I had no idea that such a stunning beach was so close to Auckland city! I went for a long stroll along the shoreline, wrote in the sand, climbed over some rocks jutting out into the water from the rugged cliffs, took plenty of pictures, then sunbathed for about an hour. After the beach, Emma and I drove back to town, went to a restaurant on the harbour called Snap Dragon, and spent the afternoon sitting in the sun, drinking cider and watching the passersby below. We ended the day with dinner at Fatimas in Ponsonby and watching a movie at the flat. It was pretty much a perfect Saturday in Auckland =).

The next week was also quite good for the most part. One of Emma’s friends Ren stayed at our flat for a couple of days. I hadn’t met her prior to then, but she and I got on as though we’d already known each other for years. Such a sweetheart—I absolutely love her. I also met up with my British friend Sandra one night. After getting Indian takeaway from the food court near her place, we chilled at her flat with her flatmate Victoria, Vic’s boyfriend Sam, and their other flatmate and his girlfriend. Vic and Sam had walked in with a HUGE bucket of movie theatre popcorn. When I asked what movie they had gone to see, Vic responded, “Oh, we didn’t see a movie. We just got popcorn.” Haha…love it. I honestly don’t know why I never thought of doing that before! Brilliant.

At work one day, we had the opportunity to sign up for free “Wellness Assessments.” So, besides low blood pressure (now I know why I get dizzy every time I stand up quickly after sitting) and apparently needing to gain a little bit of weight, I was happy to find out that I’m quite healthy. On my way walking to work another morning, I found a random $5.00 bill on the ground. Score! I thought it was going to be a good sign for the day to come, but I was wrong. As it turned out, seven people were missing from work once I got there, leaving a team of 2 of us as opposed to our normal team of 9..eek! After a crazy day at work, I bought some chocolate caramel ice cream from the Asian mart next to my flat and treated myself to a delicious concoction of ice cream topped with sprinkles, marshmallow-filled cookies, and Hershey’s syrup. Yummm. The next day at work was eventful in a different way.

Brent, one of the guys I work with, is known for being the office prankster. Well, I made the mistake of leaving my computer logged in and walking away for a few minutes. I came back to find that Brent had sent a couple inter-office instant messages from ‘me’—a mild one to Jess that read “hey you smell” and a far worse one to my friend Hamish that read “HEY HOTTIE!!! ARE YOU HUNGRY??” Haha. Oh Brent. That same day, a group of us ventured out for an unexpectedly entertaining lunch at this sketchy Korean Barbeque Buffet down the road from work. When I say ‘entertaining,’ it is not meant in a good way. We were all excited for a cheap, all-you-can-eat buffet, but soon realized that we should have just paid more and gone somewhere else.

We were fairly unsure about what we were eating the entire time, and at one point I literally started gagging on a piece of mystery meat purely because of its sheer length going down the back of my throat while still trying to chew the rest of it in my mouth. Hamish jolted from the booth thinking I was going to spew and Simon just looked at me from across the table and calmly asked in his strong Kiwi accent, “Not enjoying that, eh?” Ahh man…quite disgusting, but it made for a good laugh when all was said and done.

Oh, and to add to our already wonderful buffet experience, an extra $2.00 “leftover food” charge was in place if you didn’t clear your plate. Regardless of the leftover food policy, Simon couldn’t bring himself to consume any more of the incredibly unappetizing food on his plate. So, with the statement, “I’m kinda over it, eh,” he used his napkin to cover up an entire plate full of food. Phil stepped in by using his debonair charm to sweet-talk the Korean hostess and, as a result, she didn’t end up charging us for the unfinished food. I guess having a tall rugby player that ladies go gaga over can be quite helpful sometimes haha.

Cheers,
Ash

Movies, Mr. Vintage, Surprise Package & Confession

The following week marked the last week of August. Besides my usual day-to-day activities at work, I also trained with Chhaya since I was to take over some of her responsibilities while she was in India for the next 6 weeks. A few highlights of the workweek included celebrating Karlene’s birthday with brownies and cream cheese balls, having lunch with Jess, Kezia giving me one of her AMP shirts to take back to The States with me (what a sweetie), and Ervin bringing in a terabyte of memory for me to get as many movies off of it as I wanted (awesome). The only downfall of the week was having to say goodbye to Chhaya before she left for India. I just love her =).

My evenings after work were fairly low-key—cleaned around the flat, went to the gym a few times, watched How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days with Daiana one night, Juno with Emma another night, then Bad Teacher on my laptop the next. I quite enjoy movie nights; I kind of started to miss them since most of my nights in Napier were movie nights with Sonja and the Frenchies. One evening at the flat, I felt the inexplicable urge to cook and consequently whipped up a meal for Emma and me. It turned out to be the best alfredo pasta I’ve probably ever made. Yummmm. That same night, the Sky Tower was a brilliant beaming red; naturally, I had to get a photo. Daiana strolled down the street with me so I could get a picture, and we stopped off at Starbucks and chatted for a bit before she headed to meet a friend.

That weekend was really nice and laid back too. Sontsa had sent me a package that I needed to go collect from the Ponsonby post office. After somehow standing at the wrong bus stop for almost 30 minutes, Emma came to my rescue and drove me there instead. The package Sontsa had sent me turned out to be the perfect little scrapbook filled with photos, quotes, and inside jokes that flawlessly captured our most memorable moments together in New Zealand. I was beyond excited—SUCH an awesome gift!!! I will cherish it forever =). After the post office, Emma and I read the newspaper over morning brunch at a café in Ponsonby, then went to a well-known New Zealand t-shirt store called Mr. Vintage.

Mr. Vintage is just a small store, but the shirts are awesome and the place itself is full of humor, having comical writings strategically placed all over the shop. They even have a thing called “Lucky Dip” where you can grab any random sealed t-shirt bag out of this bin, pay half price for it, and see which one you end up with. I definitely plan on getting a few Mr. Vintage t-shirts before going back to The States. The rest of the day was spent working out at the gym, blogging, Skyping with my dear friend Kate back home, and THEN randomly deciding to divulge a dirty little secret that I’d been keeping from my mum (and many others back home).

You see, one particular photo of me that Sontsa included in her scrapbook was of me standing by the side of the road, holding a cardboard sign that read “Dunedin.” Next to the picture is the perfectly-chosen quote: “Friends don’t let friends do stupid things…alone.” Haha. Yes, that’s right, I finally disclosed to my mum that Sontsa and I had basically hitchhiked our entire way through New Zealand’s south island =D. I know, I know…hitchhiking is dangerous, rah rah. However, unless you have actually lived in New Zealand for any length of time, I honestly don’t think you can truly appreciate the fact that hitchhiking in New Zealand is completely different from hitchhiking elsewhere.

Don’t get me wrong, it took some serious convincing to get me to do it in the first place. However, after our first hitchhiking experience of getting picked up by two awesome American girls from Oregon, I was hooked. From there, we met a few other fellow travelers that were really nice and helpful, as well as lots of really cool local Kiwis. The ages of people who picked us up ranged from mid-twenties to mid-seventies. We never had a bad experience, always met great people, and saved tons of money. Hitchhiking is so common in New Zealand.

For instance, our first couchsurfing host in Queenstown lived in an area called Fern hill, which was about a 30-minute walk uphill from the town center. An Aussie girl who lived at the house told us we should just hitch rides up the hill instead of walking; she apparently hitched her way up the hill every day, sometimes even multiple times a day. So, Sontsa and I took her advice, easily hitched rides, and never had to walk up to Fern Hill again while we were in Queenstown. =) Anyway, not to worry; I won’t be hitchhiking anymore. It was a really fun, new experience at the time though =).