zaubermaus

for anyone who is curious about what new zealanders sound like, and to hear a bit of nz slang:

i guess you could also watch flight of the conchords...but that would take effort eh?

last sunday, sarah and i volunteered to plant trees on motutapu, a relatively old island connected to the relatively young island of rangitoto (the volcanic one we'd visited weeks before). motutapu used to be a thickly forested island, but the maori deserted it when rangitoto started to appear out of the ocean about 600 years ago, and (more recently) the europeans burnt down the forest to make farmland. only a few ancient trees survived.

now there is a major reforestation project on the island. they hold the current guinness record for most trees planted in one session -- i forget the exact figure, but it's over 5,000, planted by 200-some volunteers. our group, about a quarter of the size, dampened by hours of rain, managed only about 1,200 -- pretty decent, still, i'd have to say.

one group (sarah and me included) went planting in the morning, when the rain was heaviest. we braved it for a couple of hours, taking turns digging and planting the tiny seedlings and a sapling or two. one thing about kiwis, they're used to being shat on by weather with how variable it always is here. so they were staunchly cheerful in the face of the steady wet and cold, and jollily cautioned everyone not to get hypothermia (they were being serious, of course).

we headed down to the shed for lunch, looking a bit like this:

...and while the afternoon group went out to plant, we got a treat: in better conditions we'd all have planted all day, but because of the rain we got to dry off a bit and then keep warm with a hike. i didn't bring my camera, but soon regretted it. we got to see what the fruits of our efforts will look like not long from now. a grove planted five years ago boasted trees taller than me; a grove planted ten or fifteen years past was really beginning to look like a forest.

where we emerged, a road divided the replanted chunk from an unplanted one, and we saw the stark contrast, the empty and sterile farmland dotted by mournful and curious cattle, and the thick, drooping leaves of trees and ferns, birdsong, life renewing itself.

they use seeds from within a 100-meter radius only, and this summer are carrying out a massive pest destruction project to rid the island of its feral cats and stoats and porcupines and so on, so that they can introduce native birds when it's clean.

we were fucking cold and wet by the time the ferry came to take us home. but the end-of-the-day sizzle was hot, the company good, and libby, gael's friend, gave us some fudge cake. and we left some trees for new zealand to remember us by.

i am a thrill-seeker now, if you didn't know. i jumped out of an airplane last weekend (which was incredible)

-- and, what is probably more dangerous, i drove. probably for a total of 6 hours or so...now before you scoff please take a moment to remember that in this country they drive on the left side of the road. driving here is like learning to drive all over again -- especially because the controls are on opposite sides too...turn signal on the RIGHT. it's practically inconceivable. it's a damn good thing they don't switch gas and brakes (the only thing they don't switch...), otherwise accidents would definitely occur.

anyway, i was a rockstar, although every time i made a turn i had to keep telling myself "think left think left think left."

the left-side-driving thing has another interesting effect: people walk on the lefthand side of the sidewalk/other walkways here. so i am always running into people. but of course, the few times i remember to stay to the left as a walker, i inevitably come across other people who are for some reason staying to the right -- rebels? americans? idiots? who knows. walking here is hard.

my friend thomas fell into a river over the weekend when we were in rotorua. another friend zach jumped across it, and thomas wanted to do it too, but he jumped short of the bank by about a foot and fell in instead. it made me think of christina because my first reaction was to laugh hysterically at him as i'm sure she would have done too. let's face it, it was hilarious.

i saw a live kiwi bird for the first time, and one thing you should know about kiwis is they are much bigger than you think they will be from pictures. like the size of small dogs.

thomas, kirstin, zach, fabian and i went to hell's gate: a geothermal reserve near rotorua.

it takes its name from one of its thermal pools, christened by george bernard shaw, who named a lot of the other things there too. like "the infants," a spread of bubbling pools that reminded him of children at play. or "sodom and gomorra." at the end we got to carve little plaques. i love free souvenirs.

it's suddenly very cold here, and apparently we are about to get the worst storm in 10 years. i went to this international barbeque thing anyway today, where we saw them shear a sheep or two...too bad i forgot my camera...anyway, we just got back and there's intense wind outside so i'm hiding out in the library for a little bit hoping it will clear up enough for me to walk home without breaking my umbrella. also, it's warm here, and it's not all that warm in our apartment. and i haven't got internet there. i think i'll be able to make do with just the internet on campus and it'll save me about $100 overall if i can...

alan lightman is coming here. he's going to be giving a lecture as part of a science-humanities symposium they're doing in october, and is also supposed to deliver one lecture in the literature and science class i'm taking.

we saw romeo and juliet the ballet version the other night (both of my roommates are dance/psych majors). it was good, although it was also three hours long. that's a lot of ballet. i went to see another play on my own last night -- still nobody wants to come see plays with me. it was pretty cool, it was created and performed by a group of 11 girls aged 16-22 with a company called MASSIVE that did the same thing with a group of boys not too long ago. singing, dancing, stories from their diaries about growing up in auckland. this is a very multicultural city and the show highlighted that -- a vietnamese girl born in hong kong grown in auckland, a half-chinese girl, a samoan, maori, kiwis (white new zealanders), etc. i actually had emailed the company a little while ago telling them i'm interested in this sort of thing and asking if they had any opportunities for me to work with them, and i'll be meeting with one of the artistic directors (or something) sometime soon. so that might turn into something cool. i hope so, because there isn't really a student theatre scene at the university to speak of, not much, but there's a lot of culture and a lot of new theatre happening in auckland. i hope i can get involved in some of it.

i climbed a volcano today and it was flipping sweet. actually, here, they say "sweet as." originally i thought they were saying sweet ass but it was actually the option that makes even less sense.

you take a ferry to rangitoto, which is the most recent volcanic island here, formed about 600 years ago. and you hike up to the crater, which is absolutely huge, and not bare like i expected it to be but full of vegetation and just impossible to capture the enormity of it on camera. and then up to the summit, a bit past the crater, from whence you can see a far-off view of the auckland skyline, and sailboats, and so forth. it was raining and sunny alternately on the way up -- "alternately" is on a scale here that is totally foreign in the states, the weather changes ridiculously quickly, on the weather channel they don't really forecast only tell you what it's like right now -- but this turned out to be perfect because when we got to the summit the sun came out and there was this giant rainbow over the water and over auckland. gorgeous.

it's also kind of a strange little island, because before wwi, new zealand got nervous that somebody was going to invade, and so they started fortifying. amped it up during the war and during wwii, and rangitoto was one of their main spots, because of the great 360 degree view it's got. submarine nets, minefields, cannon, the lot. and of course nothing ever happened. nobody ever invaded. the remains of some of these things are still there.

it's a relief to be exploring during a non-tourist season. the weather is not bad, especially if you are used to pittsburgh -- it's basically like autumn in pittsburgh, except the weather changes more quickly and is more unpredictable -- and there's so much to explore, so the relatively small number of tourists who are here get spread out all over i guess. europe was so insane with tourists, especially italy. it was so crowded with tourists in italy that it was essentially not really enjoyable -- italy was the least favorite leg of the trip for all of us.

stuff is still really expensive here, though. i've just resigned myself to being painfully in debt to my parents when i get home -- i mean this is despite the fact that the program is almost completely paid for by my chancellor's scholarship/other scholarships. i save as much money as i can by never eating out, getting cheap groceries, not drinking in bars (a pint's usually $6 or $7, mixed drinks can be twice that), washing my clothes in the sink...but everything you do costs money and there is just so much to do here. when am i ever again going to get the chance to see the nz rugby team play the australians? or the royal new zealand ballet perform romeo and juliet? go skydiving in THE place that started it all? see a cave full of glowworms? i have to do it while i'm here. it's not like europe, where it's likely i'll be back many times. nz isn't really close to anyplace else or on the way to anywhere. so this may be it.