To Kill a Bedding-Bug

Well we know we started this blog to make y'all jealous and to live vicariously through us, but yesterday was not one we'd wish on you!

It all started several weeks ago when Gwenlli was complaining that she had been bitten. I had no such evidence, and so we assumed that they were bites from the newly de-flea-d office. (Side note: G has finished her job and is now working hard on revising for UKCAT which is in a week.)

Two nights ago we were chilling in bed with a book and Gwenlli noticed black spots on the bed sheets. We googled around and realised they are the hallmark of bed-bug faeces. Well, it was midnight, so allow dealing with that now. Let's sleep on it (!) and deal with it in the morning. Of course, neither of us got much sleep in the awareness that we were sleeping on shit. To be technical, bed bugs eat blood and they defecate blood so they're leaving smears of our blood on our sheets. Tasty.

I had some friends over for group project work (model building), but when they left we decided to inspect the bedroom. We lifted the mattresses, inspected the bed frames, and found a live bed bug in Gwenlli's bed. Incidentally it was similar to one I had found in my bed several weeks ago but had been unaware that it was a bed bug and chucked it out the window without further thought. G called Jimmi and explained the situation and apparently it always happens when new people move in. He advised us to bomb the room as that keeps it under control.

Whilst they were on the phone, I lifted the bed frames to take a closer look and saw about ten of them cotching. Luckily my freak-out was the excuse to get off the phone. Hoover at the ready and after practicing several times, I lifted the bed frame and G hoovered them up. That was the start of the hoovering. I went down to Countdown to buy some spray and bombs, came back and cooked some food. In the meantime G was getting the first high-temperature-load on of our clothes. So began the methodical procedure of moving everything out the room (checking it first) and hoovering every square inch.

We found their nest - demarcated by dark black spots all around. We found several more live ones. After hoovering, we strategically aligned the bed frames and mattresses, covered the fire alarm with a rubber glove to prevent it from going off, and started the bomb. The instructions said to wait a minimum of 2 hours. Three and a half hours later G went in to open the windows.

Fandango and Scaramouche having their first bath

In the meantime, Scaramouche, Fandango, and Jermey had their first baths. Fred and Ginger are too old for that so we put them straight in the freezer. After Scaramouche came out we put her in the freezer as we had found a suspicious looking yellow thing in her fur. Bed bugs don't like the cold, but it takes two weeks for them to go from it. During all this, our new flat mates are moving in and M asked "Why do you have bears in the freezer?" He must have thought we were cruel mummies.

Scaramouche in the dryer

Bed bugs can live up to 6 months without a feed so you have to trap them inside the mattress and ensure they slowly starve to death. I tell you, it's quite heart-breaking to think of them in there slowly rotting away but their presence is linked to sleeplessness and allergic reactions. To be honest, they're not really that bad but neither of us want them, and unfortunately it's them or our sleep :(

Scaramouche all fluffy after her adventures

So, G suggested we cling-film the bed frames and the mattresses which took about half an hour. After that, we started to move everything back in. I wanted to take the rubber glove off the fire alarm and was wary of bringing any wooden furniture into the bedroom (all of ours was bombed), so elected to use what felt like a sturdy shelving unit. Well, ladies and gentlemen, that was deceptive and I fell straight through, breaking the shelves in the process. Cuts and scrapes are up my leg but luckily not that hurt.

We also forgot to wash our duvets so slept under clean duvet cases. So, safely tucked in we're just about to go to sleep when this noise started. I barely had enough time to ask "What was that?" when the mirror fell off the wall and shattered into a thousand pieces.

So begins our seven years of bad luck.

Return of the Teddy

We've been nagged and begged, implored and demanded, to update the poor folk living vicariously through our New Zealand experience. To that end, we're back with an update!

The most important, biggest, news is that we are delighted to announce the addition of a new member of our family. She was delivered by stork last month, the sister of Fandango, she is of course Scaramouche. She is the second Welsh sheep of our small clan. This was her first photo shoot, so she was rather shy.

Since our last post, we *finally* *finally* moved into our new flat! It's lovely and spacious, and we had a really nice flatmate who spent most of her time out of the flat. She has now moved out, and we're in an interim period awaiting another couple to move in in a few weeks time. We had our choice of people, but they were the most accommodating to our vegetarian needs. Although we only met one half of the couple, he was keen to cook with us occasionally and to also store any meat in a fridge in their own room. Everyone else who came to see the flat responded to the question of food with "Oh, that's a shame. I LOVE meat".

C: So, Gwenllian, what have you been up to since we last posted?
G: Well, I've been working hard at ballet and have been doing point again. I'm about to finish working at Inland Revenue and start a month's revision period before going to Australia to do the GAMSAT. That's a 6-hour exam which will test my knowledge of science, maths, and verbal reasoning that universities at home will use to ascertain whether or not to let me be a doctor.

C: That sounds like quite a slog!
G: Yeah, that's why I'm taking the month off. Luckily my contract is ending and I have another job to see me through.

C: Oh yeah?
G: Yeah :) I'm working for a psychology professor at the University of Auckland as a research assistant. We're replicating a study done in America to determine how the parents of eating disorder patients can benefit from online resources. I'm spending most of my time at the moment writing funding applications, and finding out statistics such as how many Maori people we think will be involved. I'm really enjoying it.

G: But you got to be involved too!
C: Oh yeah :) Last weekend I entertained the daughter of the professor whilst you and she were in the living room doing adult stuff. We just watched science cartoons and played Rummikub!

G: That sounds like what we did with your parents...
C: Somehow I always end up playing Rummikub :) Mum and Don came to visit and they took us to the Bay of Islands for a four-day weekend trip to a gorgeous guest house. We will likely write up that trip in a separate post, but suffice to say it was really lovely to see people from the hood.

G: How about university? 
C: !Brag Alert! I received my grades from last semester and got straight As all around! I've just started Semester Two and have already been working quite a bit. One of my courses this semester is writing a computer model with two other people. We have decided to model desertification in a semi-arid region in response to grazing pressures. It's been a really fun project so far, and it's been great to get back into coding. Speaking of coding, I've also had a job on the side with a web company thanks to a friend from silks. It's only PHP but it's been nice to be back in the company of computer geeks. Plus, Curry Wednesday last week was brilliant (free yummy curry on a Wednesday if in the office)!

Well, that's a brief summary of the last few months. We will write up more this weekend.

Silks and Silk-abilities

Last week, after Ima's on Friday night, C took G to see DubFX after having booked the tickets on a whim several months before. DubFX beat-boxes his backing track and using foot-pedal technology adds beat-boxed layers of instrumentals and then raps over the top. We arrived at the club at half nine and watched a DJ on stage with his Mac, gradually dancing our way to the front of the audience. By the time DubFX was being chanted for, we were at the very front and had already been introduced to a very crazy fan with a hand-shake. She and DubFX had "conversation" the whole way through his set. He was joined on stage by a sax and piano player, Andy V, who gave D some much needed support by grinning maniacally and jumping up and down with his arms in the air. Apparently it was the 42nd gig in 7 weeks and D's voice was breaking and he looked to be in pain at several high notes, so as a crowd we cheered him on to the end of his set - the poor guy!

The next day, Sunday, we took the bus to Tingting's house to discuss the possibility of a hiking weekend with one of T's friends. Upon arrival we were put to work in the kitchen making dumplings. C turned out to be a natural at this, and so went round instructing everyone else in dumpling-making. Simply take your rolled flour, add some stuffing quite compactly, fold the dough, put water around the edges, press the edges together, and seal in whichever pattern you like. We were kicked out of the kitchen after half an hour because the roommate on cooking duty was grumpy at our "school-girl attitude", but who says you can't have some fun in a kitchen when you're not working for Ramsey?

We went upstairs and waited for dinner, chatting for a while until the gong sounded (in a house of 20 people you need a dinner gong). The dumplings, accompanying vegetable curry, carrot and beetroot salad and sauce were delicious. We took our dinner upstairs and discussed the trip. A four-person tent was then brought down and we quickly put it up only to be hit with the smell of damp, so moved it onto a pile of mattresses in the gigantic living room to dry out. We attached a note indicating it must not be moved, and received some strange looks from other housemates. Following some table-tennis (C) and piano playing (G), T's friend's boyfriend came to pick her up, and they very kindly gave us a lift back into town.

On Tuesday afternoon, we went to Glen Innes to meet the psych professor and he drove us to circus class. There C had her first go on the silks. It was just like the monkey bars: muscle memory kicked in and she was hanging upside down and performing the grade 1 routine in no time- a born circus natural. Looks like Tuesday nights are now silks nights for C!

Wednesday brought Python and ballet! G went to a double ballet session, and C attended a meeting of New Zealand's Python User Group (Auckland branch) and headed to the pub afterwards and had some OK beer. If anyone is au fait with beer in the Auckland area, where can we get a good pint? Not one has yet been consumed. Wine tips also please.

This week, C made spinach and kumara ravioli (from scratch), and used the remaining dough to make mushroom and walnut ravioli. The idea came from her new-found proficiency at dumpling making. G made delicious Tom Yam full of chilli and flavour, and banana, peanut butter and chocolate cookies. Needless to say, most were finished by G... C's sweet-tooth is just not up to that level yet.

The Grapes of Wrath

Over the last week, we have both been busy bees indeed. Last Saturday, C was slaving away on her assignments, and G went to ballet as usual. Then in the afternoon, G went to Glen Innes to meet the psych prof and someone from her ballet class (who also happens to be a postgraduate psychology student) for a silks class, i.e. climbing and swinging and posing on long silk ribbons hanging from the ceiling, circus style. For G, this was a completely new experience, and given her lack of any considerable upper-body strength, a challenge.

The class started with some 'gentle' warm-ups, which included doing press ups. Then the class moved on to the silks themselves, and learned how to climb them. It's similar to climbing a rope, where you have to pull yourself up with your arms, but the silks have to be arranged in a specific way around your feet, which allows you to climb, but also saves you from falling off/dying if your hands slip. Climbing the silks was hard, so it wasn't done for too long. Then there was learning some different knots for your feet which allow you to do various moves, and trying some poses, which were elegant when demonstrated by the instructor. The class finished with a gentle wind-down of push-ups, chin-ups, carrying other people across the room with bent legs and handstands. G did not fully recover until Thursday.

On Sunday, we were feeling a bit worse for wear following a night out with Linda, but this could not hold us back as we were meeting Tingting to go to One Tree Hill, another extinct volcano a few miles out of the city. First we went for brunch at Olaf's cafe in Mount Eden, where poor C had some issues with vegan options (which Tingting very determinedly resolved), but once we got our food it was tasty, if a little on the pretentious/rip-off side. We then made our way in T's car to One Tree Hill, which used to be an important Maori settlement. We arrived in the midst of a dog show, so watched the adorable dogs parade around the ring to commentary from a less-than-enthused adjudicator.

After best-in-show, we made our way to the top of the hill, where we admired the views of Auckland (you could see for miles around). There used to be an old tree at the summit, but this was cut down by Maori activists to protest injustices perpetrated by the NZ government. Strangely, there is a 'towering obelisk' at the top of the hill, a monument to a British aristocrat's admiration of the Maori people. That's right, not a monument to the Maori, but to some white colonialist's admiration of them. On the way back to the car, we saw a tiny metal plaque on the side of the hill. The plaque said it was the true monument to the Maori people who lived on the hill, and that that the chief used to live on the summit, probably where the obelisk stands now.

On Monday, G started her new job working for Inland Revenue. There is an initial training period of 9 weeks, and much to learn, but everyone seemed very friendly and helpful so G finished the week with good feelings about her new post. On Monday night, we had Mel and Kate over for dinner, and C made a delicious kumara risotto, finishing off with some vegan coconut ice cream (yum) from M&K. On Thursday, our landlord returned from Thailand. and informed us that he would no longer be keeping our current flat, so we would be moving to our other flat by the end of April. We'll believe it when it happens! G also got some good news on Thursday- the psych prof think he's secured some funding for G to be a research assistant on one of his projects which will be a study of parents of eating-disordered children. It sounds like an exciting project, so G said that she'd be interested.

On Friday, we went for dinner at Ima's, an Israeli restaurant that C found through one of her classmates, to celebrate the end of a good week, with G staring her new job and C finishing assignments. We had a small mezze to start (small=really not small) which consisted of olives, hummus, tahini, fried lemony cauliflower, aubergine, tomato, pita, and other assorted goodness. G then had fried halloumi and C had a vegan dish- we couldn't stop praising how good the food was! Unfortunately we ordered some red wine which was less than drinkable. It was an NZ wine from Hawke's Bay, which tasted nothing like wine- we could barely swallow it without gagging. We apologetically sent it back, and we chose a different one, this time it was almost acceptable, but G still couldn't finish hers. Although the wine was a disappointment, we'll definitely go back there, as the food was heavenly!

The Perks of Being a Wallclimber

Friday night. G and C head to Juice Bar in Parnell, for an amateur burlesque night with Mel and Kate who we know from Rainbow Youth. The show was packed and the drinks a rip-off, but it turned out to be a fun night nevertheless. Most of the women on-stage clearly hadn't been doing it for long, but it was nice to see people of all shapes and sizes get up and strut their stuff. It looked like they were having a lot of fun, so in the interval when the troupe's instructor asked who wanted to have a go, of course we volunteered! Unfortunately by the time we made it to the stage, they had run out of feather boas, which seemed to be used in about 50% of the moves. We bravely carried on without boas, executing each turn and move with utmost grace and finesse.

On Saturday, G finally awoke to the message she had been waiting for. Apparently she was 1.2% below the mark required to gain entry to medschool in 2014. This was disappointing, but G resolved to work even harder and do better next year, take some different exams, and review her uni choices. Also this way she gets to spend another year out in this beautiful country with the lovely C, so it ain't half bad! G then went for Saturday morning ballet class, leaving C at home to get on with her essay on biodiversity policies in NZ.

The psych professor met us at Glen Innes train station just after lunch, and we picked up a speech and language therapy PhD student on the way to the climbing centre. C had climbed before, but G had no prior experience so wasn't sure what to expect! We had an induction from the friendly instructors, and were then left to try for ourselves! The professor seemed to be somewhat of an experienced climber, scaling the walls upside-down. The student was Muslim, so would be climbing fully covered, in loose garments, which reassured G a bit, as if the student could climb in her clothing, it couldn't be too difficult!

We both climbed three walls each, starting with the easiest. G seemed to take to it well, so we progressed onto a slightly harder wall, which we both completed. The final wall was a bit harder. C managed about half before returning, as her arms and legs were unable to bend the sufficient amount to reach the next marker! G attempted the wall, falling off three times, but eventually managing to make it to the top, which she was very pleased about. Post-climb we all had coffee, C got into a heated religious debate, and we were both invited to go along to a circus skills (trapeeze, silks etc) class the following weekend. Why not?

Sunday was a lazy day, the highlight being the purchase of a new laptop for C and Bananagrams. C met up with a friend from Imperial, and they had some compsci chats over a few pints. On Monday, G and C cracked on with work, C finalising and submitting her first essay in seven years, and G reading a paper for the psych prof about how to best promote self-caring to the parents of eating-disordered children. He is hoping to replicate the study in NZ, which would be great to get involved with.

Curry cravings set in by late afternoon, and we set out to Dosa Plaza, to see what they had to offer. C had a hot and sour soup and masala dosa, and G had a paneer tikka combo. It was rather delicious, and definitely more flavoursome than Raviz. We then went home and had a productive evening, C excitedly setting up her new laptop and G doing some more reading, whilst indulging in our new Father Ted addiction.

Great Barrier Island Part 4 (as told by C)

Today we would be measuring carbon and salt-marsh species in Whangapoua (Wh in Maori is Ph). We headed to a white sand beach: pristine and beautiful. From the beach one group laid out a 500m transect (tape measure) through the salt-marshes and into the mangroves. We took it in turns to leapfrog down the transect, laying out a plot, and recording the two dominant species along with an estimation of their cover.

The work was fairly tedious because there were only a few species present, and getting a look at ground level involved much squishing. The carbon measuring (which groups did in turns) at every plot was much more interesting! Luitgard (lecturer) stuck a device over the soil which records the influx of carbon, R stuck a thermometer in the ground, I took the GPS, and S made notes.

The mangrove forest was really fun: squelchy and muddy and smelly, a great end to the data-collection / work part of the trip. It was time to head back to the beach. We had waves to catch! We all "tog"ged up and ran into the sea and spent about an hour swimming and playing in the waves - it was lovely. After dinner (potato curry) we got dressed up and went to the pub. There we played pool, darts, spoke random languages, and had a really great evening. In the bus on the way home we serenaded Sandra and George with "Teenage Dirtbag" and unloaded to head to the jetty to see the bioluminescence of the water.

Due to Y and I being particularly keen, we got onto the jetty just as the boat owner was heading home. Not knowing he wasn't one of our group, I accosted him about not climbing in other people's property. He turned around and I apologised profusely, and he offered to take myself and Y on a boat ride to see the bioluminescence more clearly. The wake of the boat glowed silver, and the sides and into the lake were all silver: it was really stunning. Back on the jetty, a group of us hung out and star-gazed, finding the southern cross amongst other things.

The next day we started the drive back to the ferry terminal, but stopped off en-route to go to the hot springs. On the path to the water, we saw a Morepork - New Zealand's last surviving owl - and it was so sleepy and looking at us, blinking, clearly not happy to have been disturbed! At the spring we were warned not to put our heads under-water as we could contract amoebal meningitis and die. With that message ringing in our ears, we plunged into the pools and carefully had a relaxing time.

Back on the road we stopped off for ice-cream and petrol and then back to the ferry. I had a good old nap for the first couple of hours, but was awoken by a very powerful smell of chips. Heading downstairs I enquired as to whether or not they had any, to be told I must be hallucinating! Later on people started getting beer, so I headed downstairs to get one for myself, to have the following conversation with the barman:

- Are you from Newcastle?
- erm... no...
(random guy: isn't that quite insulting?)
- where are you from?
-  london
- south london?
- the insults just keep coming!

We spent the last hour on the front deck chatting and watching Auckland grow bigger as the sun set. We docked, said our goodbyes, and G came to meet me at the ferry terminal.

All in all: a bloody good trip!

Great Barrier Island Part 3 (as told by C)

Wednesday morning was the usual breakfast, make lunch, pile in van. This time, however, we drove to meet an esteemed ecologist: Mr Ogden. His thick Yorkshire accent made it hard for me to follow what he said, I was too busy enjoying his voice. He led us through the peaty bog and told an anecdote whilst we waited for Janet and George to find the place for us to core. We would be looking at the charcoal contents of the core to gain a history of the island.

The area we were in was originally marine, but excessive burning of the vegetation meant the topsoil had slid down and ended up filling in the area. This in turn meant that salt-marshes and wetland forests started to form. The plant species we would be recording tomorrow were introduced - three types of rushes. There was also plenty of sea-spinach which is delicious and would have made excellent sandwiches.

At the coring site we were introduced to the equipment as Janet introduced us to the coring process. After she had extracted the core, she asked if there were any willing volunteers to get their hands dirty. Of course, I was the only one who stepped forward. I held the corer and posed for the photo that George took (core-nography) as she rotated and scraped it into a piece of pipe cut to size. Other people then had their chance to push the corer into the ground and extract the boggy earth.

After coring a couple more times, we headed back to the accommodation to begin extracting information from the cores. We split into two groups and were given one core each. We then sub-divided into four groups and cut the core four-ways. Every 2cm we scraped a tea-spoon's worth of peat into a beaker. After this we added bleach to the beakers and shaked them around and left them to bleach.

During the bleach we headed upstairs for a lecture on statistics (not before managing to squeeze in another game of bananagrams!). After the lecture, the samples were ready and we began to filter the bleached solutions. This involved plenty of water, so the other S in our team took to running back and forth refilling everyone's bottles. Y and I were on one bucket, and S and R on the other. Two other people went upstairs to start counting the charcoal. We finished filtering just in time for dinner (chickpea curry and rice) and another game of bananagrams!

That evening we spent counting charcoal by pouring the solutions into channels, placing them under a microscope, and clicking a counter every time we saw some. The first solution I examined had so much charcoal in it I almost broke my thumb. This high level of charcoal means that humans had definitely arrived by this point in time. Throughout the world, the arrival of humans at any particular place is always coincidental with high levels of charcoal in samples. Wherever we go, we slash and burn.

As the charcoal was being counted, we started to make graphs of our results. At first we tried to use the computer to draw the graphs, but it was configured to the person's tastes and no-one else could use it. Also, Excel is not intuitive in producing histograms. S and R therefore hand-drew this beautiful graph replete with illustrations of rats and waka (the canoes the Maori used to get to NZ). My histogram was upside-down, back-to-front, and very badly shaded in. However, it got the message across and was almost exactly the same as the published data so that was quite exciting.

The other group presented their findings to us, and we to them, and all-in-all Janet was very pleased with the session: it was the first time this had been done and so no-one was sure it would work. Bed on a high!

Great Barrier Island Part 2 (as told by C)

Tuesday morning was greeted with a lovely breakfast, during which I managed to shock several people in the dining room by having marmite and peanut butter on toast. Apparently marmite is an acceptable level of weird, but peanut butter takes the biscuit. We met on the lawn after breakfast and had a quick induction as to the plan for the day and bundled in the van kitted up and ready to go. S was eager to show me hebe (a type of flower) and we were looking out the left side of the van when suddenly we met the cliff. Someone else had been driving on our side of the road so George was forced to swerve. The worst part of it? The offender didn't even wave.

S, R, B, T, George and I said our goodbyes to the other groups and headed into the bush along the Perimeter fence. The fence was specifically set up to prevent rats from entering the sanctuary, but unfortunately rats have managed to re-enter (probably by swimming across the sea from ratted islands). For those of you who don't know, rats are a biodiversity nightmare in New Zealand and (next to humans) are almost single-handedly responsible for the major decline and slow recovery of (now) extremely rare birds. George has also proposed a theory that they are responsible for spreading fires which have a bad effect on plant life.

Great Barrier Island's vegetation is split roughly into four zones. After a fire, very scrubby fire-loving plants such as manuka (tea-tree) start to grow. Then a succession starts with kanuka (also tea-tree). Then fast-growing woody plants such as kauri start to take over, which then succumbs to shade-tolerant plants such as tawa and kohekohe. This is visible across the landscape where in the gullies lie the forest and on the ridges (the less fertile land) the manuka and kanuka. We were taking measurements to understand this landscape. We were also collecting data to see how effective the predator-proof fence actually was.

Over the course of the day, we took every other data point (so roughly every 100m) with B and T and collected data from about ten places. The first part of the day was spent climbing up the steep hill using the fence to hoist ourselves up. At one point we fought our way through cutting grass only to find on the other side the forest floor was so steep we wouldn't be able to collect anything! The second half of the day was easier, although we encountered some mean manuka and ended up covered in scratches. Due to the path we took, we ended up walking back to the campsite, took a swim off the jetty, had some tea, and hung about waiting for the others to return.

This gave me time to review the vast number of plants in my repertoire (at least fifteen) with the patient S. After dinner (plate of salad with a mound of tofu and berry smoothie for dessert), we played bananagrams before having the next lecture. We were also introduced to the work to be performed tomorrow: coring a peaty bog to count the charcoal to determine the arrival date of humans.

Great Barrier Island Part 1 (as told by C)

It's been a week now since I came back from Great Barrier Island, and I've had much uni work and computer-y things to be doing. In addition, I didn't want to post about such a beautiful island without accompanying photos. Alas, I have none, but if my "official photographer" comes through, then post I shall.

G was kindly enough to walk me to the ferry terminal at half six in the morning, helping me to carry one of the bags. The class boarded the ferry, and I secured myself a comfortable seat on the deck and fell asleep for a good few hours. Almost suitably refreshed, the heavens decided to open and we were forced to the shelter just behind the engine room. That did not go so well. My soon-to-be-roommate, S, spent the next hour and a half puking. I sat out front groaning and moaning for a bit until I spotted GBI and instantly became excited for the week ahead.

We piled off the ferry and into the vans where we slowly made our way to the accommodation, stopping half a dozen times for George, the lecturer, to point out various things about the landscape through which we were driving. When he talked about plant species, I was at a complete loss as to what on earth he was saying. Back in the van, I reassured myself that I wasn't alone as other people had no idea either! We learned that during the last glacial period, the sea was around 180m lower than current levels, which meant 18,000 years ago, GBI was attached to the Coromandel peninsula.

We were staying at a Christian camp in Orama, where we sorted ourselves into rooms, convened to be inducted, and then waited for the dinner gong to sound. Upon the first peal, we assembled en masse in the dining room (our group and several others also staying there) and waited for grace to be said. The food was delicious - vegetable nut roast and chips. When I asked for the vegan option, I was greeted with "so you're the vegan" to which I smiled broadly and said "yes, thank you for cooking for me". It seems politeness and enthusiasm go a long way in the world of catering: my meals and puddings became progressively better over the course of the week!

That night, we met upstairs in the ad-hoc lecture room to hear George give an overview of the week and a brief history of the island. He introduced a few of the graphs we would be expected to produce and at the dendrogram he asked if anyone had seen one before. My hand slowly goes up. "Only the computer scientist has, then". That was encouraging. I don't know my plants, but I do know my graphs!

The next day we had breakfast, made lunch, and headed to Glenfern Sanctuary just south of Orama. There we had a 15 minute lecture on the sanctuary and what it's for and then hiked up the hill to overlook the landscape. At this point, I declared Y my official photographer! We had previously been separated into groups and given equipment, including a plant identification book, and so as a group (mine with George) we headed towards the big kauri tree learning plants as we went along. Turns out my group - S my roommate and R - were pretty well-versed on their plant ID already. George's other group was B (probably knows every species in NZ ever) and T (also not bad). So, guess who got picked on? After two hours of "alright, sweeeeeet Caroline doo doo doo, what's this one?" I had a pretty good idea of how to identify ten plants. Now, that doesn't sound a lot, but I had to not only learn how to ID then, but I had to remember the names - names which my ears had never once been privy to!

Everyone reconvened at the giant kauri with a treehouse so we went 4 at a time across the rope bridge to look out over the forest canopy. S pointed out a giant Knightia Excelsa from the kauri - the leaves of which, fairly obviously, look like green swords. We ate lunch and then watched George unsuccessfully try to core a tree. He eventually succeeded, a neat demonstration of how unpredictable field work can be!

We were split off into groups again and S, R and I broke through the bush to the first data collection point. This was in practice for the full day tomorrow. We were using a heavily altered PCQ method, a plotless data collection method (the proof for which is heavily mathematical and the paper was written by computer scientists. too many integration signs for my liking). This entails sticking a stick in the ground which has two bits of plastic you set perpendicular to each other. They demarcate your quarters. First thing:

• Record the aspect by orienting yourself in the direction you think water would head and take a bearing.
• Record the slope by sending R down the hill and looking just above her head (she's shorter) through the inclinometer and trying to read the results whilst keeping it steady and both eyes open (quite tricky to get used to!)
• Record all saplings around the stick by yelling "OI! S, what's this?"
• Record the height by looking up and guessing. Democratically decide based on the average of all three guesses.

Then, for each quarter:

• Find the nearest tree with a trunk over 5cm diameter at breast height (DBH).
• Measure and record the distance to the tree and the DBH.
• Record its species and the species of the next nearest >5cm DBH.
• If a tree fern was actually the nearest >5cm at 1m tall, record its species (and measure it if >3m tall).
• Guess which species looks like it will take over when the tallest tree dies.

After we had successfully performed the method for the two test samples, we sat by the river chatting for a bit, and then headed back down along the stream to the Glenfern house. We drove home via the bottle shop and several people bought some alcohol. Considering we would be spending all day in the bush, that seemed like a bad idea to me so I abstained. Back at the camp, we had time to freshen up, and then it was dinner time again. Coconut curry and rice, yes please!

George gave the evening lecture and talked about where the various groups would be the next day - ours was completely different to what everyone else was doing and he warned us that our path would be arduous. We socialised for a bit and then headed off to bed!

One Hundred and Thirty (roughly) hours of solitude, or Gwenlli's Week

Good evening. I return to the land of blog, bearing more news of Auckland life. Last week, the wonderful C was away on a University field trip, uncontactable and untraceable, and I was left to my own devices. Being an amazing girlfriend, I awoke with her at 6am on Sunday, walked her to the ferry terminal and waved goodbye, got completely lost on the way home, and finally returned to bed. I got up a couple of hours later as I had arranged to go to the beach with Tingting. This occurred, and we had a most pleasant time at Mission Bay, the closest beach to Auckland. Mostly we sunbathed and chatted whilst drinking iced coffee, until T kindly let slip that I had moved to live in a hotbed of volcanic activity.

Yes, I know. I really should have looked up where I was going to live before making the decision. Alternatively I should have taken Geography past year nine. Turns out Auckland is just one big volcanic catastrophe waiting to happen, and the fun part is, they don't even know where it might erupt! Although I love to be kept on my toes, this was taking it a bit far, and I had a mini freak-out. Very quickly I realised that this was futile, and I can't exactly do much about it now I'm here, so I will just say: if I get erupted I LOVE YOU ALL. Drama aside, volcanoes have made the landscape here pretty stunning, and T took me up Mount Eden later in the day, a dead volcano just outside of town. The ascent is pretty steep, but once at the top there are stunning views of the Auckland area for miles around- mountains, sea, more volcanoes...

On Monday, I received a job offer and three interviews. This was a welcome change from the soul-destroying job-search, and I decided to go with the offer. I will be working for Inland Revenue in a customer service capacity, which is pretty different from everything I have ever done. Although my passion in life is working in healthcare, I really wanted to do something different whilst in NZ, and this job fits the bill. One of the most enjoyable aspects is that it is Monday to Friday. That's right. No weekends/nights/stupid hours. I can be a normal person for a few months, for the first time in my life. Yes, yes... I know what you're thinking.

Throughout the week, I was stressing out about my medical applications. The deadline for offers was fast approaching, and from desperately stalking chatrooms I gathered that most people had heard back. Every morning I would go to my laptop, heart rate would increase, then annoyance at lack of messages would settle in. Also, I was waiting to hear when we were to be booted out of the flat into our intended place. A couple of times I got told I would be moving the next day, only to be told later that it wasn't happening. I was happy staying put for the time being, so the complete lack of organisation/communication between landlord and his missus was forgiven.

During the week, I did some reading, went to a few ballet classes, had a friend over to watch a film, and went to a meeting of Auckland Uni's campus feminists. I also cooked a lot, including a delicious tofu, coconut and kumara curry, and loads of spinach. On Friday, I was invited by a psych prof at Auckland Uni (who I met for coffee the previous week) to attend a meeting of students that he supervises, as we share some research interests. The meeting was full of lovely people with some fascinating research projects ranging from disability technologies, to blood-spatter analysis, to wellbeing, to S&M.  There was also an impressive spread of vegan food, and at the pub afterwards the prof invited me and C to go rock climbing the day after. Let's do it!

I returned from Glenn Innes, where the psych campus is situated, and arrived at the ferry terminal just in time. I was walking along not recognising where I was when C ran up to me out of nowhere. There may have been some joyous squealing involved, then we walked back to the hotel to get ready for a burlesque show with Mel and Kate which was starting in an hour's time. Before I go on any longer, I will give C a chance to write her version of last week's events, but there is much more to tell since our reunion!

The Chop-It

Hello dear people, and apologies for not having written all week with an update on C's head! Mostly we've just been settling into life, and haven't had much out of the ordinary to talk about. C's head is fine - G taped a sock to the headboard to prevent that pesky thing from striking again.

This week C has been focusing on her first essay in over seven years - it's been taking a lot to get back into the flow of things! On Sunday we had some friends over for a movie night, and finished watching "Milk" - a really beautiful film about the first gay man to be elected into public office in the US (and shortly thereafter assassinated).

On Tuesday we went to Whitcoulls to buy a Rubik's cube because C had tried previously to solve the cube in the local cafe, and had failed miserably at remembering how to solve them. To that end, she has re-remembered and has now spent a good few hours teaching G how to solve the cube. G's not quite there, but we assure you she will be come next week!

Tuesday also happens to be one of the vegan lunch days at uni - $5 for a buffet of really, really delicious food, so we headed into uni for a change of scenery and a nice meal. On Wednesday G had a meeting with a psychology professor at the university. They went for coffee, the first cup G had on campus which vaguely resembled coffee at all. They discussed all things psych, and he was most impressed so has emailed her some readings, and hopefully she will be able to attend some meetings that he has with his postgraduate and PhD students, which is really cool!

Later in the evening, we had Tingting over, and G made pakoras from Alex's delicious recipe, and C made a Thai curry (both of which were most tasty). We then watched Velvet Goldmine - a film loosely based on the life of David Bowie which has one of the most epic soundtracks. The story is not so great, but the music is fantastic!

Thursdays are the only days that C has uni, so she went in for nine, and attended lectures until three. The day was broken up by heading to the vegan lunch with some new-found friends. In the meantime, G had a job interview which was incredibly strange and pointless--the woman asked questions from a questionnaire, and then filled it in online... Seems like they could have, y'know, just emailed it over! G then headed to meet Mel for coffee, and then ballet, whilst C went to a talk by Generation Zero - a group of like-minded individuals committed to reducing NZ's carbon footprint to zero by the year 2050.

Today (Friday), C went to uni to pay for the field trip on Sunday, and then off to the outdoors shop where she spent a good long time chatting to the sales assistant as to the best bag to buy. He was a most condescending individual, but put up with half an hour of barragement, so kudos to him! Back at the hotel, the essay was driving C rather up the wall, so she went to have a bath and chopped all her hair off. By all accounts, it's not terrible.

Here's a picture.

C's off to Great Barrier Island for a week on Sunday, so there will be a special blog post. Hopefully there will be pictures if she remembers to take 'em...

The Fire, the Twit, and the Headboard

Let us take you on a journey, weaving through 2/3rds of the emergency services, culminating in a resolution to never sleep with our heads to the wall again...

G had a job interview on Friday morning, leaving C at home, unattended. As C got up, she managed to hit her head pretty hard on a corner of the bed's metal headboard, but thought no more of it and got on with her uni work. G's interview lasted the morning, and on her way back, she took her first NZ train journey, which was a far less exciting prospect after a 45 minute wait.

At around 4:30 in the afternoon, our noses picked up on a smoky, plastic-y aroma. It became gradually stronger, until we could no longer ignore it. Around this time, just as C was about to get into the bath, the fire alarm in the apartment went off. We were reassured by our other flatmates that this was a normal occurrence, and that we did not need to vacate, so we uneasily stood around as the smell of smoke became stronger. Peering our over our balcony, we could see some smoke coming from the far side of the apartment building next to us, so we decided that it didn't seem serious enough to leave the building. 

A couple of minutes later, the alarm changed to a louder, more urgent sound, involving a man's voice on repeat saying "Please leave the building now, follow the fire wardens to the nearest exit". This was becoming a little scary, so we grabbed our bags and left (even had we wanted to stay, the alarm was way too annoying for our ears to bear). The corridor stank of smoke, and we made our way to the fire exit. Being on the 13th floor, we had many fights of stairs to make our way down. Eventually we emerged into the open, into a crowd of people standing outside the hotel. There were fire engines and ambulances going past, and there seemed to be a lot of activity on Hobson Street, the street parallel to ours. 

We tramped over to Hobson street, where around ten fire engines were parked. Firefighters were emerging from a smoky building, and some were in a cherry-picker hovering above. As the smell of smoke subsided, we made our way back to the flat, where the fire alarm had thankfully stopped. C finally had her bath, but afterwards started feeling unwell. At around 8pm she started complaining about feeling sick and dizzy, experiencing a painful headache, and pain around her left eye. She was very unsteady on her feet, so G gave the hospital a quick call, and was told to bring C in.

C was seen by a lovely nurse in A&E. We explained that C had hit her head earlier in the day, and about her symptoms in the evening. C was very unsteady on her feet, but wasn't too unwell to cheekily ask the nurse for room service (she took it well and brought us some juice!). Three hours later, after being thoroughly checked by the lovely nurse and doctor in A&E, C was discharged with a diagnosis of concussion. G was given some info on what to look out for, and we were home just after midnight. C was forbidden from sleeping with her head to the wall to avoid the horrible headboard, and we both went to sleep, safe and sound in the knowledge that a typhoon is supposedly headed our way tomorrow. 

The Great Flatsby

So, yay, we're here, writing this from our thirteenth-floor suite. We appear to have acquired more stuff since our last move two weeks ago, which makes absolutely no sense because we have, in fact, acquired nothing. C's theory is that gravity is particularly strong in London, due to the sheer density of the city, which means that squishing clothes into a rucksack is easier.

Anywho, with our excessive amount of luggage, we met Tingting at 8am outside the hostel, and she drove us over the new (temporary) residence, where we were kindly helped in keeping the lift open by a bemused hotelier and up to the thirteenth floor! Upon arrival, it seemed that the room in which we were to live was currently being slept in, so we dumped the stuff in the living room, and headed out again: back to the hostel (for the last time), playing a variation on that "I went to the supermarket and I bought..." to keep our tired minds awake.

We checked out, grabbed a mushroom and walnut burger from "Revel", a really nice biker-run-esque café, and back to the thirteenth floor. The lovely French lady moved her stuff out of the room, and into the room of the partner, we sorted out beds and sheets, etc. C sat down to do a bit of work before heading to uni, and G job hunted.

C met her "lab" partner at uni, and they spent several hours reading literature on the Maori's effect on New Zealand's forest ecology. It turns out there's a huge debate in NZ literature over when humans first settled the islands, and scientists have attempted to answer those questions with pollen, charcoal, and other methods for measuring observed vegetation changes. However, at the same time as all of this, there were disturbances in the climate - becoming cooler due to atmospheric effects (along with volcanic eruptions) and so the question is now: were humans or climate change responsible for the changes in vegetation? Seems rather poignant and fitting in with today's current debate.

They then discussed Japan (his origins), the UK, and NZ, and the debate around cats wearing collars: turns out, if you change the bell on your cat's collar every month, the cats can't learn how to move so the bell doesn't jingle, so the birds can get away from those evil predators.

When C got home, G headed to Rainbow Youth to meet Mel and pick up some DVDs. Turns out Linda's been having words and we're all going to Family again this weekend! At least we have a few days to brace ourselves this time. In the meantime, C had a bath (!) and headed to Countdown supermarket to get some food, and came back and made some pita. We curled up and watched "The Worst Witch" with Tim Curry. It is so 80s! Halfway through, we removed the base of the bed and put the mattress on the floor - the bed was so worn we felt as if we were beginning to sink through it. Then, to sleep, to sleep, perchance to dream.

A Room of Two's Own

To fully experience a new city, it is important to ensure that one attends a local, established establishment on a Saturday night. With that in mind, we agreed when asked by some Generation Zero-ers to go to Family, a notorious gay bar. There are three separate rooms at Family: two upstairs (separated by a pinball arcade), and one downstairs through a narrow, UV-lit corridor. The entire evening was incredibly surreal. From the karaoke room, you go next door to hardcore electro with suspect middle-aged dancers on stage, and even more suspect loner middle-aged man in baseball hat and polo-shirt, and wander downstairs to a sticky-floored room with the tempo changing every 30 seconds, so attempts at dancing turn into a confused melee of unsynchronised bopping and hopping.

Although between us we only had three G&Ts, the next day we awoke extremely groggy, finally emerging at lunchtime to head to a Hawaiian-themed "Gentle Stretch" class (apparently the previous week's theme was Lord of the Rings) at G's dance studios. The class was very stretchy but not always so gentle, the first half dedicated to gentle hip-swaying and arm-waving to traditional Hawaiian music, followed by some "OK, now do the splits" exercises. This was deservedly followed by a corn fritter/avocado combo for G (here they put avocado with everything- it's amazing), and a tomato-y pasta for C, with a side-order of books.

C spent the afternoon reading papers for her course, occasionally complaining about badly-drawn tables and getting excited when actual maths was featured. G read and got confused about flat viewing times. So. Many. Viewings. It was then time to go and meet Jimmi, to discuss the room that we hoped to move in to. This turned out to be a very strange encounter.

We met J at his other apartment, which is situated in a hotel in Auckland Central. He began by hurriedly sitting us down in the lobby to inform us that we would have to live in his hotel apartment until the room we were originally interested in became free. Once his friend could move out (in approximately 1-2 weeks' time), we would be able to move in. He would let us have the room in his hotel apartment for the same price in the meantime, as he needed someone for the room and would be out of the country for a few months from Monday. Additionally, the two current flatmates in our newly-proposed room would move temporarily as well: the male would go and live with the Thai chef who rents the second room in our original flat, and the female would share a room with his partner. We both looked at each other- was this for real?

J began by showing us around the hotel. It's a very pleasant building, with two gyms, a sauna, indoor and outdoor swimming pools, outdoor giant chess board and tennis courts. We then went to the apartment, which was lovely- plenty of light, with our own separate double room and bathroom. There were four burners in the kitchen, a comfortable living area with huge TV, small dining table and balcony. We met J's partner, who would continue to live in the flat while J was away, their adorable 20-month-old daughter who is going with J to Thailand, and another flatmate. We spoke about contracts and questioned everything thoroughly. He seemed very genuine, and just quite desperate to get someone to rent his room before he left the country.

We went and pondered things over some Indian food. It was a very decent flat; by all accounts we would be getting a reasonable deal with no additional letting costs, and J didn't seem to have anything to hide, despite the complexity of the situation. He was also happy for us to pay a bond when we moved into our intended flat, once his friend had moved out, and seemed fairly lax about signing any binding contracts (he said that it was up to us whether or not we wanted a contract). If he is a scammer he's definitely doing it wrong! We decided to say yes to both- what's the worst that could happen? Still slightly baffled, we found some dairy-free sorbet and walked back to the hostel, hopefully for one of the last times.

This morning, we met J again, and signed an open-ended, flexible contract (yes mothers, before you ask we read the small print), and received one key. We will receive the other key tomorrow from Parny (J's partner who seems very lovely), pay our first week's rent, and move in! Here's to our last night in a hostel for as long as we can help it!

The Portrait of a Lad(y)

Breaking news: we *probably* have a place to live! Neither of us are getting our hopes up until our bums are firmly planted inside the flat, clutching the bit of paper that says that we're allowed to plant our bums inside the flat, but all things considered, this can only be good news.

The potential property is in the centre of town and a couple of minutes' walk from C's campus. It has four burners, a bathtub, is fully furnished and has plenty of space. There is one other flatmate- a Thai chef who is out at work from early 'till late, and a balcony overlooking the city. We are to meet up tomorrow evening with "Jimmi", who we will be renting from, and sort out some paperwork. Fingers crossed, toes crossed, arms crossed, legs crossed... If everything looks legit, we should have somewhere by Tuesday!

We're both becoming a bit madder with each day spent in the hostel. Last night C was rudely awoken by shouting drunk man next door (G slept soundly through- silicone earplugs are a miracle), and we're both very eager to leave the less pleasant aspects of hostel living- corridors smelling of BO, people smelling of BO, in fact, just mostly a lot of things to do with BO and annoying shouty people at 3am.

C started uni on Thursday. She attended two lectures on environmental policy and governance, and research methodology. She was given assignments and papers to read, and spent most of the day familiarising herself with the literature. G went to ballet and applied for some more jobs. The following day, G had an interview with an agency, and spent an hour being grilled on her past, present and future occupations. She decided to walk back over the Auckland Domain, a huge park featuring a hill with some oak trees scattered about. It was a beautiful sunny day, which took away some of the stress of flat/job-hunting.

As C was immersed in her papers, G went to view another flat to keep our options open. This was above Whitcoulls, so couldn't be any more central. It was nice enough, but the viewers were told they may have to vacate at any time as the owners were trying to sell the flat. No thanks! G got some lunch in town (hummus, avocado, salad, mango chutney and cashew nut sandwich and a CRONUT just because).

Later on in the day, we went to the first gathering of Generation Zero, a collective of young people dedicated to campaigning for a zero-carbon New Zealand. We spent the first part of the evening pasting posters to whatever we could find (excluding the more obvious no-nos, still not sure if what we were doing was strictly legal). The posters featured a large portrait of Kim Dotcom's face (C-"who??" G-"the guy from Megavideo, etc") with someone asking him "Why are you so sweaty?" in reference to global warming. We're not really sure why they chose this particular individual for their poster campaign, but we think that Kim Dotcom must be a popular cultural icon in NZ as everyone seemed very enthusiastic about him.

All postered out, we headed to "Bungalow8", a bar that does free food platters for groups of 5 or more. Giving the deep fat fried meat options a miss, this sadly translated to bland nacho chips with salsa for the two of us. The ale was nothing special- our quest to find decent ale is so far unfulfilled. This aside, we had a truly enjoyable evening getting to know the other Generation Zero-ers. C made another Jewish friend and G had a fascinating chat with a PhD student about his research analysing brain signals in neonates. On the way back we picked up some tasty vegan wraps from the Kati Grill on K-Road, and enthused about things to come.

The Night Before Coursemas

(... continued from the last post ...)

Amidst all the rain, C received an email from the really nice flat we applied for that our application had been declined, and we couldn't find out why. This had been expected, so we shrugged, told Nat, and hurried to the university shop to buy an umbrella. We've decided to try again for flatmates, in parallel with finding a 2-bed with Nat. The law of large numbers and all that.

We headed through Albert Park (very pretty, with lots of big, old trees), and onto Queen Street, where we split: G to go to ballet, and C to carry onto Ponsonby for another house viewing. For most of the way to Ponsonby, it rained heavily, then all of a sudden, it was brilliant sunshine, and the brolly dried off almost instantly. It was about 1km up a fairly steep hill, and then down an un-sign-posted street (Google Maps, thank you), and C was ten whole minutes *early*.

... long pause to let that sink in ...

The house was lovely: very minimalist, with big open spaces, and the bedroom would be unfurnished, save for a wooden rack type thing that would only really be suitable for hanging clothes. Of course, the huge suitcase stuffed with hangers got lost en route, so it would be quite impractical. Having said that, we are getting desperate, and the house was nice, and well located, so we expressed an interest. There is also a vegan cafe on the same road the house is on, so C popped in to get some cake.

We met back in the hostel, and tried the cake. Truly, it was vile. A quick google later revealed it's a raw vegan cafe. Still, at least there might be a job there for G: teaching people how to bake properly... C got engrossed in finishing "Requiem for a Dream" (the book), and G job hunted. We arranged two viewings for the evening, which were conveniently in opposite directions. The first was *completely* unfurnished, so we turned around and walked out. The second was right downtown, we'd be sharing with a chef who is out from 11:00 - 00:00, and we had a good long chat with the person we'd be sub-letting from. He was a really nice guy, and very helpful and chatty, and we didn't feel like we'd be murdered in our sleep, so we put in an offer.

Then, finally, to retire to the hostel for some well-earned food (C walked 9 miles!) and the first half of "Almost Famous", and to sleep for the first day of uni tomorrow... only to be awoken at half two in the morning by a really loud, drunk couple... thank goodness for G's earplugs.

Neverwhere

Dear loyal readers, we apologise most profusely for our lack of posts as of late - our actions have been somewhat tedious, and the mere act of committing them to pixels was an unbearable thought.

So, yes, we are still in the hostel, with no end in sight, no magical wand to whisk us into a place of our own. On Monday we went to a flat viewing, but there were so many people vying for the place (it was quite nice), we thought that we didn't stand too much of a chance. After the viewing, we went to Raviz, a curry house. The papodoms arrived with no chutney, the onion bhajis and pakoras were virtually identical, and completely tasteless. Then, C's vegetable jalfrezi arrived, and turned out to be sauce-covered paneer, with extra cheese grated on top. To add insult to injury, they were out of large bottles of Cobra (so we had two small ones instead!)

On Tuesday we took a walk to Parnell, where we went to a really, really lovely house with a potential flatmate who works for Amnesty International. We are still waiting to hear back from them, but have hopes that they may want us yet. We also went to an evening flat viewing of a place that was very dark and dingy, with about 30 people viewing. We turned around, and decided to try to get the stairs out of the building. We wound our way to the very bottom, to be faced with a fairly impenetrable fire exit. We turned around, and found a lift on the third floor to take us down, but were unable to activate the lift without a swipe card. Several minutes of hitting the "open door" button to no avail later, and someone on the ground floor finally called the lift to rescue us.

Yesterday we went to the university in the morning to sign up for some of the clubs and societies. We had a good long chat with one of the admins for "Generation Zero", a national group of young Kiwis who lobby the government for environmental legislation. Then, free vegan semolina pudding (delicious!) at the "Sustainability Network" stand. Free pens from the Green party (can you see the theme here?), and then free tampons from the feminist society. Two book club memberships later, and the skies opened down.

The weather here seems to be fairly unpredictable. You wake up, and it's nice and sunny outside, but then suddenly it rains, and it's freezing. Just when you're all bundled up in your scarf, it's suddenly beautifully sunny again, and the sun looks at you as if to say "Me? Nah, man, I've been here the whole time." 

To the Nice-House

As a couple of avid readers, our e-book readers form an integral part of our travelling lives. So, when C's Kobo packed in - frozen eternally on a page (thankfully not too raunchy) of Royal Flash by George MacDonald Fraser - and would not respond to charging, touch or prayer, there was no alternative but to return the 7-day-old neonate. Fortunately, with excellent customer service from Whitcoulls' and 45 minutes later, C had a brand-new, hot-pink Kobo, and was eager to make up for lost reading time.

Priorities must be satisfied, and we made a beeline for the nearest cafe with Wi-Fi, which happened to be the Strand cafe in an arcade just off Queen Street. Here G enjoyed some delicious eggs Florentine with mushrooms, and C a corn dog with avocado and assorted salad and a side-order of a newly set-up e-reader. After running out of internet allowance (how time flies..) we headed back to the hostel, where C read and G applied for some jobs in the city. 

Becoming hungry (again- Auckland does wonders for the appetite), we went in search of an Indian restaurant to satiate C's curry craving. K-Road is full of south Indian and veggie curry houses, but they had all decided to be closed on a Sunday. As if people need days off?! Pah! Thankfully, our favourite (and only) Lebanese cafe was open, and we ordered our usual falafel wraps. After around 20 minutes, we became suspicious as we had seen other customers being served, (and eating what looked suspiciously like falafel wraps), but were yet to receive our orders, so G went to enquire under the guise of ordering some water. The kindly yet absent-minded owner smiled and nodded, and we assumed all to be well. 

Ten minutes later and our wraps arrived. We decided not to mention the lack of hummus (an integral component of the falafel wrap, I'm sure you'd agree) and started munching away. The falafel was freshly prepared and crisp, and rather enjoyable. Ten minutes later, the owner came out with a bowl of hot hummus (which tasted of not much other than hot chickpea) and a plate of pita, apologising for the omission. Our annoyance about the wait turned into feeling a bit sorry for the man, as his memory was clearly not the best, and he didn't seem to have anyone else helping him. 

Tummies filled for the time being, we headed to Rainbow Youth for their weekly I.D. meeting. There we played some team-building games and met some new folk, and chatted with folk we'd met the previous week. A few of us (including Linda, who wanted a mention here!) decided to go and watch a film at Ting-Ting's house. We decided on "Milk", and took our first kiwi bus-ride to T's house in Parnell. 

We both feel at this point the need to emphasise how wonderful T's house is. It's a huge, sprawling 21-bedroomed, vegetarian house, with enormous kitchen and dining area (six gas cookers,we noted), one ballroom-sized living room including table tennis table and three pianos (which G promptly tried out), and another cinema-esque TV room. The garden was beautiful, and had an area devoted to home-grown vegetables. Sadly, there were no rooms available (yes, we asked). We watched one-third of "Milk", and participated in cider, beers and discussion. Then, at our 10 o'clock curfew, headed back to the hostel to get some rest before resuming flat-hunting on Monday. 

Vanity Bear

In the midst of all the flat hunting, the bears were having adventures of their own. After one night in the new hostel, G and C headed their separate ways: G to ballet, and C to view yet another house. The bears decided the time was ripe to put to test their latest invention: Bear-a-chuting.

With Fandango safely taken care of (she was in the suitcase as Jeremy had been on the lash the past few nights), and G and C absent, Jeremy led the other bears to the edge of the table (we can happily assume this was J's idea - Fred and Ginger are getting on a bit, and their adventurous days are far behind them). For days now they had been stealing bits of clothing and piecing them together to construct the 'chutes. They neatly concealed them in Fred's bum (he's a puppet), and put the keyboard on their laps to fool us into thinking they were studying.

What we thought the bears were doing

Jeremy was eager for the other bears to go first. (May we add that this is all known after coming back to the hostel to find a huge mess of clothes that neither of us could possibly have created. Jeremy still denies it, but Fred and Ginger broke after the first round of questioning.) Coercing Ginger into a 'chute made from a pair of old leggings, Jeremy pushed him to the edge and urged him to jump. As Ginger hesitated, J got bored, and pushed Ginger squealing down to the ground. Luckily Ginger landed safely at the bottom, although a bit dazed.

J looked at Fred, and Fred resigned himself to what was to happen. He was much more dignified, and jumped off the edge of the table, tartan 'chute in tow. Fred and Ginger started to help each other climb back up the table, but Jeremy yelled at them to stay there and take a picture of him. Even the prospect of jumping from such a great height could not dampen Jeremy's vanity.

Jeremy at the start of his jump

He hurtled through the air, as ungracefully as ever, Fred and Ginger dutifully snapping photos as he fell. As he landed, the bears heard the girls returning and hurriedly scrambled back up to the table top, doing their best to feign innocence.

Ginger trying to take a photo of Jeremy

Luckily for the bears, G and C were too distracted at the time to notice: G ranting about having been accosted by a militant vegan woman, and C freaked out by the fake lobster balls the girls had prepared for lunch (again from the Chinese supermarket). The bears breathed a collective sigh of relief, unknowing that they would soon be found out!

Flatspotting

On Friday morning, we had to vacate our room at K-Road City Travellers by 11am, which also happened to be the time that C's university orientation began. We miraculously managed to pack up all of our belongings, which seemed to have increased in number since arriving one week ago. After this no small feat, we legged it down the road to the next hostel (BK Hostel) with our bags in tow. C had to go to uni by this time, so G took care of checking in and out.

G had a leisurely morning, reading in Western Park until it was time for the first viewing of the day at 12:30. This apartment on Ophir Street was quite spacious and pleasant, however there was the same old issue with the beds, and the balcony overlooked a motorway. The estate agent was a lovely, grand-motherly figure, who wished G “Doll” well in her mission of finding a place to live after G declined the apartment.

In the meantime, C was down the hill at her university orientation. The lecture theatre was cosy, and there were at most 50 people in the room. The heads of department spoke briefly, and then the entire faculty staff (it seemed) were introduced: the technical aides, the financial advisers, the career advisers, and even the kitchen sink was rolled out to be introduced. The affair was lovely, and it was really nice to see that everyone felt at home there, and kept insisting that we ask questions any time. Afterwards, we went upstairs for pizza (or in C's case, orange juice), and C had a chance to meet some of her fellow students. Everything was over within an hour and a half, but it was a very good briefing for what to look forward to over the next couple of years.

Outside the uni, C received a call from G, and they rendez-vous'ed in an Alice-in-Wonderland-themed cafe for an avocado sandwich, with freshly-picked basil from the garden, and soft, luscious chips with sweet tomato ketchup. We raced down the road, dropped off our bags at the hostel, and carried on racing to the next viewing at the marine end of Queen Street. The flat was a mess, it looked like C's room as a teenager, and had a strong aroma of mouldy rubbish or gone-off milk. Having said that, the ceilings were incredibly high, which gave the rather small space an aura of grandeur. It would just-about manage to fit four people, so we will go back next week to view the place when it's not such a tip.

The next viewing was in the same area, but not for a few hours, so we hung around the docks and watched the sea and read our Kobo's for a bit, and then went to the final viewing of the day. G and C walked in, looked each other, and went “YES”. Homely, spacious, 4 burners, fan, 2 double bedrooms, gorgeous decoration, and basically everything on our check-list had a big mark in the box. We expressed interest to the estate agent, and she said she'll email our application forms on Monday.

We met N at the bus station (he had been unable to make the viewings for the day) and gave him a round-up of what had happened, and showed pictures of the spotted flat. He seemed keen, and so we went home buzzing. On the way home, we were given apples by the Krishna-consciousness dance that was happening on Queen Street. G grabbed a subway, C a falafal wrap, and we headed back to the hostel, to fall into bed and sleep.

The Nat in the Flat

Day one of flat-hunting with our new flatmate Nat commenced with a viewing in some student accommodation. The flat itself was lovely, spacious and airy, with a lot of natural light. However, the bedrooms were only singles, without much privacy, so we decided not to apply, although it was nice to know that there were flats out there that weren't as heinous as the ones in Zest. En route home, G grabbed a take-away mushroom and walnut burger, and we both grabbed a smoothie.

Later that day, we had a 1630 viewing at a house in Grafton, so we filled the time until then arranging more viewings! The house was a 20 minute walk away from the hostel, past a Jewish cemetery, over a motorway, to a part of town we'd never visited before. The house was quite old, and had a very wooden demeanour. For a house, it only had two cookers, and there were cobwebs and dust everywhere. There was very little natural light, and the beds were singles in massive rooms. The sofas were ripped and faded, and N declared that we could get a lot better for the same money. However, we were almost convinced to apply for the place as the agent was named “Fab Wang”.

Together we walked to the next viewing, but arrived there with half an hour to spare, so we went to “Columbus Coffee” which was just closing up, but G got an ice coffee with cream, and C got an ice coffee. We hung around on the steps outside a local church, drinking our coffees and chatting. Eventually it was twenty-five past, so we headed down this incredibly steep hill to the next flat.

The flat had a lot of natural light, and a balcony, it was by far the most pleasant place we'd seen so far, but again the rooms were only singles, and there were only two cookers. We mentioned this to the agent, and she told us about a flat which met our criteria and told us to come for a viewing the following day.

N invited us to a gathering of the mini queers at “The Eagle” on K-Road. We went down, and passed a very pleasant evening with some local Kiwi students. The guy sat on C's left was an hilarious barista who spent a good while explaining where all the good coffee beans could be found in the city. That coffee grinder we brought over needs putting to good use! The guy on G's right was an accounting student, and we had some good chats about the university of Auckland's support network.

We passed a very delightful evening, and left on a high after having persuaded the room of students that pandas are a conservationist's nightmare (sorry Ling-Ling!), and that millions of pounds would be better spent on saving species which are vital to the global ecology / food production systems, such as bees. We grabbed dinner at the Chinese food court, C had a very intense discussion with the nine-year-old behind the till about the best dinner to have (eventually deciding on a dish we can't pronounce), and G opted for veggie satay.

An Offer They Could Refuse

We began the day with a sense of optimism and anticipation. Today we would hopefully get a place to live! We received an email from the agent of the tiny, but lovely, studio that we would hear back during the day after his meeting with the owners. With our fingers crossed, we took the morning off flat-hunting.

Sick of eating in restaurants and cafes, we headed down to the Chinese supermarket to get ourselves some salad ingredients. We quickly prepared a tomato, cucumber, ginger, onion, spinach, lime and chilli salad, and G added some craved-for vegetarian sausage (which C had deemed as "revolting" and the Italian guy had described as German sausage left out for a month) to her own plate.

After brunch, G was eager to try a more challenging ballet class, and C was excited to start swimming again, so thus we began to fulfill our first Auckland resolution to GET FIT! G greatly enjoyed her Russian-style class, and met C outside afterwards, who was half dead after an intense swim. Almost back at the hostel, C got hungry, so we stopped at "Revel" to fill her up. She chose a rather delicious mushroom and walnut burger, and we got told that we have awesome accents. We also got handed a Cookie Monster toy for no apparent reason. This can only be a good thing.

Back in our room, we received an email telling us that the owner of the flat had decided to go with another applicant. Disappointed, we resolved to start looking again, but this time with an accomplice! Nat, one of our new friends that we met on Sunday, had expressed an interest in flat-sharing with us, and so we expanded our search to 2-bedroomed apartments.

In the meantime, we received another message from a vegan looking to flat-share, widening the choice of available properties. G booked us in at another hostel down the road, as we have to leave this one tomorrow. We spent the rest of the evening trying to arrange viewings, and feeling pretty bummed out.

The bears are a bit bummed too, but Fandango, ever the optimist, is sure that we will find somewhere amazing soon. Fred and Ginger are hounding us for a room of their own, but we have stressed that this is quite unfeasible, whilst Jeremy's location is currently unknown but likely to be one of the seedier clubs on K-Road.

The Agrarian's Nephew

We came out of the studio, turned right, and were within seconds on the university campus (another bonus to the studio). C had a meeting with her tutor, and so we went directly there. After discussion, C had to swap one class for another due to timetable clashes, and it turns out the computer systems are difficult for both novices and old-hats.

The tutor was unable to swap the classes, and so sent C to the student services centre. There, they said that C had to go home and do it a different way. En route home, we stopped into an off-license and bought some quintessentially Kiwi beer: Tui. Back at the hostel, we opened a bottle each, and C proceeded to try to swap the classes, for which she was presented with a confirmation page for $4333. Thanks, but no thanks. A swift email to the tutor, and "Stuart" was able to swap the classes. G was less than impressed with the Tui!

We quickly filled in the application form for the studio, and then tried several times to send the email (the internet connection here is flaky at best), and managed to send it just as Gareth, G's cousin (who she had never met before), called to say he was outside. He picked us up in this vintage BMW, with no power steering, and a very heavy clutch. We girls ride in style! He took us to another flat viewing, and came inside whilst we were shown around.

The proposed living space was a huge, unfurnished, loft, which we were shown around by a very bored mid-20s girl (who just so happened to be called Caroline). For this unfurnished loft, we would pay the very (un)reasonable rate of $370/week. We then sat down and had a brief chat with the previous and current tenants. From left-to-right: lawyer at Phillip Morris, fighting plain packaging for cigarettes; civil engineer at AU; lawyer; mumble neither of us understood. We made small talk, but both of us felt very unwelcome, and the second we got back in Gareth's car, proclaimed "NO!"

Gareth drove us to a parking spot, and we got out and went to "Mexico", in Ponsonby, for some dinner. There we had delicious guacamole (avocados are ubiquitous here), and C had a quinoa, coconut, carrot salad, G had a chickpea taco (a.k.a. falafal), and Gareth had meat. We all partook in a carafe of sangria :) During the meal, C asked Gareth if any of his uncles were physicians (we wanted to name the blog post after "The Magician's Nephew"), and he said he has a farmer uncle. Well, that was good enough for the pun!

After Mexico, we went next door to a very nice bar, which charged through the nose for what we would call singles, but here are doubles, of Laphroaig and a Heineken. We chatted about life in NZ, and made plans to go visit some more of G's family in Wellington.

After C almost fell asleep on the table, Gareth kindly drove us back to the youth hostel. There, G received a text from "Todd" saying that the other house-mates were "keen to offer" the place to us if interested.

Flat (Studio) Land

On Tuesday morning, first light had not yet broke when we awoke at 0600. We cleaned our teeth with the most delicious baking soda vegan toothpaste, made coffee, and proceeded to flat hunt. G texted "Todd" to arrange a viewing at his town-house for the evening, and then phoned "Mike" to arrange a viewing at a studio in the city centre.

We then spent a bit of time reading: C "Confessions of a New York Taxi Driver", and G "Farmageddon". We checked our emails again, and a minor panic ensued when C received an email from the admissions tutor, indicating that there were serious timetable clashes and could she please come in to sort it out. That meeting was arranged for half three.

G went to her first ballet class in months, which was taught by a friendly Russian-trained South American lady called Ione. There, she put to good use her questionable Japanese skills by chatting to a Japanese lady, as well as refresh some basic ballet technique. Hopefully this will become a frequent occurrence (the ballet, not the Japanese!)

In the meantime, C was brushing up on details of the course that she didn't want to drop. The noise outside the window is pretty heavy, so the noise-cancelling headphones she got for her birthday were delightful to study with!

Afterwards, we met in town for lunch, and ended up in Nando's, where after we'd ordered and sat down, realised that we needed to be at a flat viewing in ten minutes! We called "Mike" and pushed the viewing back by half an hour. It was a close call, as C had ordered a mayo-free burger, only to have her burger covered in mayo. (This seems to be a recurrent theme out here.) G was disappointed, as her favourite mushroom and hallumi burger wasn't on the menu, so made do with avocado and cheddar instead!

We made our way up a very steep hill to where the studio is, and met "Mike" outside. He was a very friendly, amicable middle-aged Kiwi who just-so happen to be an Anglophile! The studio itself was lovely, very small, but very fung-shui. Some enjoyably hideous art (think bright green splatters of paint across one of the canvases, framed above the table). The bed was behind the sofa, the kitchen behind the other sofa, and a reasonably-sized bathroom. There were four hobs, which facilitates the amount of cooking we do, and a good-sized table for C to do uni work.

Noticing a Waitrose bag on the floor, C exclaimed "There's Waitrose in NZ??" Mike laughed and said, no, he goes to the UK every two years, and we had a good old chat about the Cotswalds. Although small, it felt very homey, and we both liked it immediately, and so expressed an interest.

Bleak House

As lovely as our hostel is, we decided that we couldn't stay there forever and should probably find our own place before C starts Uni. On our way into town for breakfast we picked up some listings from an agency. Over breakfast (delicious smashed avo on toast and Americanos) we pored over the list and arranged some viewings for noon.

The first set of viewings looked promising from the outside: standard new-ish high-rise, centrally located, and potential for a good view. From the off, the prospects sharply diminished, as the bored-out-of-his-head agent took us to the first apartment. The feng-shui could not have been worse.

A dimly-lit, narrow corridor led us to a room more fitting for the cramped conditions of a third-class living quarters on a cruise ship of the early 1900s. The bedrooms consisted of moth-eaten, worn-out mattresses, narrowly surrounded by peeling walls, with one cupboard which would strain under the weight of a hanger.

The living room was marginally better, with cigarette-hole-ridden sofas, which the home-owner refused to replace, and a TV-set the Antiques Roadshow could have got tuppence ha'penny for. No more than one person could move through the doors at a time, leading to a ridiculous kissing-gate affair, made even more so by the fact the bathroom could only be viewed when the bedroom door was closed. The tumble dryer was hoisted upside-down on top of the washing machine, suspended by duct tape and the good grace of god. In short, the architects have a lot to answer for.

Trepidatiously, we made our way to the next viewing which was in the same block. One of the other people also viewing the flats had mysteriously vanished. The next flat was slightly less terrible, but only slightly. By the time we made it to the third viewing, G politely made a very British apology about getting deja-vu, and we hurriedly excused ourselves.

Recovering from our harrowing experience at a local (and delicious) Lebanese cafe, we quickly decided that if we were to find a place that we like, a change of criteria would be necessary. To that end, we began to search anew, scouring "Trade Me" (a popular NZ trading site) for potential flatmates willing to accept us, the bears and the uke. The quest continues.

Prideshead Revisited

On Sunday, we had a lie-in, and woke up at the unearthly hour of 0715. We emerged for breakfast and had morning coffee on the balcony. The previous day, C had bought coffee and a cafetiere from the Indian supermarket. En route, she was approached by a scam artist with a sob story about an old lady who had switched the terminals on his car battery, and needed just $31 to reach his $200 to pick up his brother and sister. It never materialised why he couldn't just turn the battery around, but hey.

On the balcony was an Italian, a Spaniard, and a Chinese man, who were all very lovely and interesting. We are convinced the Chinese man works for the South-East Asian tourist board, as he never stopped talking about how amazing South-East Asia is. Both of us left wanting desperately to visit Thailand and Vietnam!

We came back to the room where C read for a while, and G learned to play the Bare (Bear) Necessities on the ukelele. G found on the Internet the only fully vegan shop in the whole of New Zealand, which just so happened to be down the road from the youth hostel. Karangahape Road, or K-Road as it's known, is one of the most eclectic streets we've ever encountered. It has a strange mix of Chinese and Indian supermarkets, South-East Asian cuisine, several gay bars, a few seedy gentlemen clubs, vintage clothes shops and a handful of Middle Eastern places.

So, we sauntered to "Cruelty Free", and after 15 minutes of fawning over their selection, we bought some cookies, toothpaste (which is lovely), coconut water, and shower gel. We even put in a request for the best vegan sausages, by Veggie Deli, whose range they already stocked. We then explored the Chinese supermarket to buy some cucumber and carrot for the picnic we attended in the afternoon. In the supermarket, there were dried fungi of all kinds, very strange-looking vegetables, an entire fridge devoted to tofu, several fridges devoted to pork, and some oddities in between.

We then tried to find some hummus, but sadly couldn't, so ended up buying a huge takeaway box of the stuff from the Lebanese cafe. Then, back to chop up carrots and cucumber with the bluntest knives ever encountered.

We headed to the Rainbow Youth centre (the organisation in charge of running Pride) for a picnic in the park. There we met some lovely people, and had a jolly good afternoon. C even met a fellow Jew with whom she played Jewish geography (Hasmo boy from Edgware... c'mon!) and G found a kindred baking spirit, who had the wacky notion of vegan chocolate and avocado cake, which is apparently a winning combination! Recipe swapping will surely ensue.

Pride and Prejudice

We landed in Auckland on Friday, and were greeted by some very cheery passport control officers, who completely ignored our customs declaration which stated that we may be carrying "medicines, restricted substances, illegal drugs, drug paraphernalia, or illegal publications" (G had some painkillers). They did however find time to scrub clean C's hiking boots, and wish her a happy birthday!

We emerged into bright sunny daylight, which was welcome following 24 hours in virtual darkness, and found a shuttle service straight to our hostel. The shuttle driver kindly decided to unload someone else's rucksack with our luggage, which we eventually managed to return. The hostel is lovely, the beds comfortable- perfect for passing out after a long journey.

After our (8 hour) nap, we took a night-time stroll around the city. There are trees everywhere, lots of international restaurants, and a ship-shaped club in the middle of the street, pumping out such 90's anthems as "Barbie Girl" and "Baby one more time". We aren't sure if it was a cheesy pop night, or whether it takes 20 years for music to reach these distant shores (given the number of skateboards, we'd guess the latter).

The following day, we explored the city centre. C bought a Kobo e-reader, as the death of a third Kindle put an end to brand loyalty. We purchased SIM cards and had working phones again by the afternoon. Yay!

In the evening, we made our way down to Ponsonby Road, to witness the Auckland Pride parade, passing a Christian stall proudly displaying a scale model of Noah's Ark. Sadly, the event was disappointing, as there was too much time between the floats, so people got bored in between, which ruined the atmosphere. C and G attempted to provide enthusiasm and whooping, but to no avail. We later found out that the theme was "Time", which explains why many of the floats had been vaguely space-age-y for no apparent reason.

The swim team had an original display, with space-age swimmers divided by rope lanes swimming down the road to loud music. There was a man dressed as a giant dinosaur, a retro ambulance, and a heart-warming family float with very cute enthusiastic children and toddlers dancing on top with their parents.

We left the parade after an hour or so, as the waiting around was a bit of a downer. We later found out that the parade had been held up due to attacks on the Israeli float.