New Home

Last weekend, Stephen and I packed up our stuff, cleaned our place from top to bottom, and lugged our boxes and bags about 100m, around to the other side of the house. Our new flat has the same square footage as the old one, but the layout is much different and in our minds better. We also get direct sunlight. Which as we all know, in the cool and rainy winter is absolutely wonderful.

A Week of Water

Last weekend was Stephens' birthday. Friday was pretty quiet, but Saturday, with lovely sunshine and no wind, we decided to head down to the beach with a picnic and $40 to learn to surf. We did pretty well for first timers, though halfway through I could no longer push myself up with my arms as they'd turned to spaghetti. Apparently I need to do more pushups at home. But it has been decided we will be back to do it again.

On wednesday we went to see the Ellerslie flower show. It was simply a huge trade show with a flower theme. There were a number of garden 'examples' by various local and regional landscape designers, organizations, and architects. As well as 5 or 6 tents with mysteriously long and sinuous line-ups leading into them. It was amazing how long a lineup people were willing to get into in order to get into these tents where there were no flowers, just vendors selling things! Oh well, to each their own. After seeing the displays, watching a marching band, and touring the garden sculptures we decided to head home and make dinner.

This past weekend we went sailing. A couple of friends of ours had given us a sailing trip here in Christchurch as a wedding present. So we called up the company and organized it for last Saturday at 9am. Amazingly the weather was dead calm when we woke up at 7am. Quite a rarity for Christchurch. Nor had the wind picked up by 9am when we got there. In fact the wind didn't start up until around 11am, by which time we were puttering about in a small harbour across the bay from Lyttleton (the port we had left from). Despite not being under our own power for the entire time, we listened gleefully to the stories Mike, our skipper, regaled us with. The time he saw orcas leading their baby into the bay. The time he found a box full of money just floating in the pier, just below a foreign freighter crawling with police and customs officials (he and the boys divied it up and went to the pub to celebrate). And even older stories about the war and more. It was a great trip and absolutely wonderful to be out on the water again.

I know pictures of our flat have been requested. However, at the moment it is not in the best of states to be photographed. So I will instead include a layout plan to allay any nagging desires to know how we live.

Best wishes to you all.

Cheers,
Erin

First Impressions

Well, we've been here 4 days now and the place is really growing on me. Christchurch is a really neat place and although we haven't taken any "tourist" time yet, I'm slowly feeling more and more comfortable. We have a house, with furniture and a full fridge, all we need is a phone and some regular internet access. Internet will be and is the most expensive thing here. For one month with 3GB (yes, only three) it costs 50$. Apparently having only one cable linking the country to the rest of the world makes for some expensive connection costs.

Some other random differences I've noticed include;
- driving on the opposite side of the road (of course we all knew that - but when you try biking that way, you'd better be extra bloody careful, on the way back from getting our bikes I almost rode out into oncoming traffic because I was looking the wrong way - hasn't happened again since)
- all toilets are low-flow toilets
- the gulls here are tiny little guys with creepy eyes; they also act like very forward ravens, when we were eating lunch at a cafe outside, they would go right onto tables once people had left, pulling food right off the plates
- Japanese restaurants are everywhere (and yes, they have okinomeaki), second place goes to chinese/thai/korean restaurants
- The bus system is awesome; tomorrow we're taking the bus to a nearby town for their weekly farmers market - you can go anywhere
- People speak with funny accents (though I suppose since we're in the minority we do)

Stephen had his orientation over the last two days and will officially start on Monday (your Sunday I believe). I still have to track down my supervisors and talk with them, I think I'll be officially starting on March 1st, but will be able to get going sooner than that hopefully.

The rest of the day awaits, so I will head off to meet it. I wish you all the best and will post some pictures as soon as I can.

Cheers,
Erin