i am having a dejavu moment.
long ago, in the days of leuven, i used to write posts as a procrastination technique. it seemed a lot healthier than continual games of mindsweeper. and it didn't really feel like procrastinating because i was still on the computer and i was still typing so i was basically just taking a formal thinking break from academia.
now here i am, back home in new zealand, and well in need of some sort of procrastination... why not say hello?
firstly, procrastination is once more necessary because im once more back at university. this time in new zealand. and this time in the middle of a literature review assignment. my literature review was the hardest part of my masters thesis back in the day because:
literature that needs to be reviewed tends to be of the sort that is a) hard to read and b) not very interesting to read.
one day, if i write something significant, something that might be reviewed, i hope that whoever is doing the reviewing will smile and think a) this is easy to read and b) this is interesting to read.
that is my goal. that, and to finish this literature review today.
Saturday, March 10, 2007
saturday 17th february 2007 the countdown finished counting down and the sun rose to shine upon us out at north piha beach. a day without wind and without clouds, a day with family and with friends. eric and i are now happily married and plenty of photos from our special day can be found at:
thank you to all those that came and celebrated with us in person and thank you to all those who sent messages and cards and thoughts on the day. we could not have asked for a more precious wedding.
Saturday, February 03, 2007
two weeks today i will have a new signature! i've been practising.
so much is going on right now and the timeline is short:
there's everyone arriving from north america in a week
there's the wedding in two weeks
there's the trip with everyone after the wedding for a week
there's enrolling in university which starts straight after everyone leaves
there's eric's permanent residency visa application process
there's our house-sitting plans
life is busy and i'm doing my best to see the lightest, funniest, calmest side of it...
two interesting facts about the above:
*i had my shortest/longest telephone conversation(s) this week when i was transferred to (insert large number here) different people at auckland university when trying to sort out the timetable clash that shouldn't exist but does...
to make me feel better? eat macdonalds happy meal for lunch and play with toy that makes cool noise.
*eric needs fingerprints for immigration purposes. we go to local police station. they will only take fingerprints if eric has done something wrong. we consider loitering. this is not "wrong" enough. only three places in auckland do fingerprints for immigration. we are in the zone for one particular police station that is on the other side of town (don't understand how the zoning scheme cuts across most of the city). they have only one person who can do the procedure (called putting erics finger on a stamp pad and then putting his finger on a card to record print). this person is semi-retired and only is available for a few hours on a wednesday afternoon. they are, therefore, booked up for a long time. second police station is not happy as we are not in the right zone but could squeeze us in "if they have to", but once again at an inconvenient time. third place is basically not in auckland and has a sneaky way of saying in the phone book it is in one far south suburb but is in fact in an even more further south suburb.
to make me feel better? well, really, when you explain it to someone it becomes too ridiculously funny that its impossible not to laugh. plus, there must be something cool to do in papakura so we will make a day of it and invent fun things to do in the car along the way.
so much is going on right now and the timeline is short:
there's everyone arriving from north america in a week
there's the wedding in two weeks
there's the trip with everyone after the wedding for a week
there's enrolling in university which starts straight after everyone leaves
there's eric's permanent residency visa application process
there's our house-sitting plans
life is busy and i'm doing my best to see the lightest, funniest, calmest side of it...
two interesting facts about the above:
*i had my shortest/longest telephone conversation(s) this week when i was transferred to (insert large number here) different people at auckland university when trying to sort out the timetable clash that shouldn't exist but does...
to make me feel better? eat macdonalds happy meal for lunch and play with toy that makes cool noise.
*eric needs fingerprints for immigration purposes. we go to local police station. they will only take fingerprints if eric has done something wrong. we consider loitering. this is not "wrong" enough. only three places in auckland do fingerprints for immigration. we are in the zone for one particular police station that is on the other side of town (don't understand how the zoning scheme cuts across most of the city). they have only one person who can do the procedure (called putting erics finger on a stamp pad and then putting his finger on a card to record print). this person is semi-retired and only is available for a few hours on a wednesday afternoon. they are, therefore, booked up for a long time. second police station is not happy as we are not in the right zone but could squeeze us in "if they have to", but once again at an inconvenient time. third place is basically not in auckland and has a sneaky way of saying in the phone book it is in one far south suburb but is in fact in an even more further south suburb.
to make me feel better? well, really, when you explain it to someone it becomes too ridiculously funny that its impossible not to laugh. plus, there must be something cool to do in papakura so we will make a day of it and invent fun things to do in the car along the way.
Thursday, January 25, 2007
rewind 2006:
i've always dreamt of going on that big roadtrip - the one where you have no job until you need one, the one where you don't really know where you are going until you are forced to look at a map, the one where you live each day as it comes until you realise you have no more tins of beans and have to get to a town with a shop...
and that's what eric and i did from january - october 2006.
and part way through eric proposed and i said yes and we set the date for february 17th 2007!
in october i headed to egypt to work on a dig and had one of the most incredible experiences of my life. i found a couple of excerpts from emails i wrote when i was there... bringing back images of life - the good and the ugly...
"at first we lost power - not the end of the world and it did come back after about 24 hours. for a time. it was down again yesterday. but then the septic tank got full so we needed to get a truck in to empty it. then the truck got stuck in the front yard spilling some of its contents... finally it made it up the drive only to dump the waste literally on the other side of the road. the stray dogs loved this of course and enjoyed coming back over to see us after having a play. this was repeated all day long so for that day the toilets were out of action. later on in the day the water mains cut out across the village. we were without water for 3 days. this caused so many people to get sick - we only had the turkish toilet but no water to clean it off with. there were girls throwing up and girls with bad diarreha so basically that toilet became offlimits pretty quickly. illness spreads like wildfire when theres no water. we do of course have a supply of mineral water for drinking but that didnt make too much of a difference. the water came back yesterday finally only to decide to break down again today. and then the power went down again when the truck trying to fix the water problem broke a line in the road. how much worse can it get? so many people are sick..."
"this afternoon im heading off to the biggest souq in cairo. its a crazy colourful place with so many different smells and sights. i love it there and am able to lose myself in the tiny alleyways of stalls. i have a way of closing out the world and not listening if i don't want to, and i can easily merge in and out of people, threading here and there, without paying attention to all the comments and calls of shopkeepers wanting to sell me their products. i actually find it relaxing, i love the sound of arabic, and i can almost escape the people despite the hundreds that line the way. "
i arrived home just before christmas and it took awhile for me to re-adjust to the western world where carpet and doors and real beds and no sand is normal...
2006 has finished, 2007 has begun...
i've always dreamt of going on that big roadtrip - the one where you have no job until you need one, the one where you don't really know where you are going until you are forced to look at a map, the one where you live each day as it comes until you realise you have no more tins of beans and have to get to a town with a shop...
and that's what eric and i did from january - october 2006.
and part way through eric proposed and i said yes and we set the date for february 17th 2007!
in october i headed to egypt to work on a dig and had one of the most incredible experiences of my life. i found a couple of excerpts from emails i wrote when i was there... bringing back images of life - the good and the ugly...
"at first we lost power - not the end of the world and it did come back after about 24 hours. for a time. it was down again yesterday. but then the septic tank got full so we needed to get a truck in to empty it. then the truck got stuck in the front yard spilling some of its contents... finally it made it up the drive only to dump the waste literally on the other side of the road. the stray dogs loved this of course and enjoyed coming back over to see us after having a play. this was repeated all day long so for that day the toilets were out of action. later on in the day the water mains cut out across the village. we were without water for 3 days. this caused so many people to get sick - we only had the turkish toilet but no water to clean it off with. there were girls throwing up and girls with bad diarreha so basically that toilet became offlimits pretty quickly. illness spreads like wildfire when theres no water. we do of course have a supply of mineral water for drinking but that didnt make too much of a difference. the water came back yesterday finally only to decide to break down again today. and then the power went down again when the truck trying to fix the water problem broke a line in the road. how much worse can it get? so many people are sick..."
"this afternoon im heading off to the biggest souq in cairo. its a crazy colourful place with so many different smells and sights. i love it there and am able to lose myself in the tiny alleyways of stalls. i have a way of closing out the world and not listening if i don't want to, and i can easily merge in and out of people, threading here and there, without paying attention to all the comments and calls of shopkeepers wanting to sell me their products. i actually find it relaxing, i love the sound of arabic, and i can almost escape the people despite the hundreds that line the way. "
i arrived home just before christmas and it took awhile for me to re-adjust to the western world where carpet and doors and real beds and no sand is normal...
2006 has finished, 2007 has begun...
Saturday, December 30, 2006
Thursday, October 05, 2006
where have i been you ask?
i spent the last four months working on a volcano*
i also spent the last four months learning to snowboard**
and i met heaps of great people.***
yay!
thanks guys.
and yesterday as eric and i drove home, mt ruapehu, distressed at our departure, decided to give us a bit of a farewell.
a wee cry? a wee rumble? a wee eruption!
i will post pictures v shortly.
* thanks to my ticket crew
** me and pahia even did a black diamond run
*** you know who you are
i spent the last four months working on a volcano*
i also spent the last four months learning to snowboard**
and i met heaps of great people.***
yay!
thanks guys.
and yesterday as eric and i drove home, mt ruapehu, distressed at our departure, decided to give us a bit of a farewell.
a wee cry? a wee rumble? a wee eruption!
i will post pictures v shortly.
* thanks to my ticket crew
** me and pahia even did a black diamond run
*** you know who you are
Monday, September 11, 2006
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
these days i live on a mountain.
well, not exactly. i live at the bottom of a mountain and every day i bus up the mountain to work.
if you recall (and it will be easy to recall if you scroll to the post below this!) eric and i tramped through tongariro national park in the summertime. now we are both working on mount ruapehu for the ski season.
he works in the rentals shop, i work in customer services selling tickets. it's a lot of fun working with people and dealing with customers from all around the world.
exciting adventures had so far:
i learnt to put chains on a bus.
we (staff and customers) got stuck up on the mountain when the snow closed the road and didnt get down until nearly 8pm (people had been waiting since 2pm).
i am learning to snowboard.
for those interested in the mountain itself:
www.mtruapehu.com
well, not exactly. i live at the bottom of a mountain and every day i bus up the mountain to work.
if you recall (and it will be easy to recall if you scroll to the post below this!) eric and i tramped through tongariro national park in the summertime. now we are both working on mount ruapehu for the ski season.
he works in the rentals shop, i work in customer services selling tickets. it's a lot of fun working with people and dealing with customers from all around the world.
exciting adventures had so far:
i learnt to put chains on a bus.
we (staff and customers) got stuck up on the mountain when the snow closed the road and didnt get down until nearly 8pm (people had been waiting since 2pm).
i am learning to snowboard.
for those interested in the mountain itself:
www.mtruapehu.com
Wednesday, June 14, 2006
pictures say a thousand words? since the start of this year, eric and i have tramped (overnight with packs - this does not count day walks...) over 240km! here's a bit of a view of what we saw...
we started in the summertime with our tent!
cape reinga walkway: 45km
then we journeyed into the mountains - of a volcanic variety.
tongariro national park: 45km
once hitting the south island we headed back to the beach.
abel tasman national park: 57km
we started in the summertime with our tent!
cape reinga walkway: 45km
then we journeyed into the mountains - of a volcanic variety.
tongariro national park: 45km
once hitting the south island we headed back to the beach.
abel tasman national park: 57km
the west coast has hidden surprises - natural hot pools just outside the hut!
welcome flats tramp: 34km
and then there was the 50km of hitch-hiking to the road end.
mount aspiring national park: 23km + 1000m vertical above the bushline
to stewart island on an 8 seater plane (i sat next to the pilot!) and to a place where the forest has never been touched since the dawning of time!
rakiura track: 36km
welcome flats tramp: 34km
and then there was the 50km of hitch-hiking to the road end.
mount aspiring national park: 23km + 1000m vertical above the bushline
to stewart island on an 8 seater plane (i sat next to the pilot!) and to a place where the forest has never been touched since the dawning of time!
rakiura track: 36km
Friday, June 02, 2006
ouch.
my apologies.
for the serious time lapse.
but let's be serious.
when internet time is $2 for 10 minutes,
and when there are glaciers to be climbed,
keas to stalk,
fjords to float through,
8-seater flights with me sitting next to the pilot to stewart island to be taken,
kiwis to be spotted,
mountains to marvel at,
games of cheat to be played,
roads to be driven,
penguins and sealions to be photographed,
and life to be lived...
well.
sometimes computer typing has to take second seat.
there is more to come. i promise.
my apologies.
for the serious time lapse.
but let's be serious.
when internet time is $2 for 10 minutes,
and when there are glaciers to be climbed,
keas to stalk,
fjords to float through,
8-seater flights with me sitting next to the pilot to stewart island to be taken,
kiwis to be spotted,
mountains to marvel at,
games of cheat to be played,
roads to be driven,
penguins and sealions to be photographed,
and life to be lived...
well.
sometimes computer typing has to take second seat.
there is more to come. i promise.
Monday, April 17, 2006
ONE
"My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree
Toward heaven still,
And there's a barrel that I didn't fill
Beside it, and there may be two or three
Apples I didn't pick upon some bough.
But I am done with apple-picking now."
Robert Frost: After Apple-Picking (1914)
TWO
a maths problem for someone mathematical to solve:
each day i wear a bag that i put apples into. once when i was bored i counted how many apples it took to fill that bag. 100. once my bag is full i put it into a big bin. it takes about 20 bags to fill that bin. eric and i fill the bin together. over a day we would average about 9 bins. our record was 11. weve been doing this for 5 or 6 days a week for nearly two months now. thats a lot of apples eh?
how many?
heh.
THREE
so my orchard days are drawing to a close. its been a good experience - weve met lots of fun people from all sorts of walks of life who are all picking apples for very different reasons. weve worked in the hot sun, the rain and nearly in a frost (apparantly it was nothing like a frost but there was snow in the mountains behind us, i could see my breath on the air and the apples felt like ice cubes - or ice spheres i suppose). its been fun - ive learnt all about apples (how they sunburn and bruise and get punctured from stems and grow 1mm a day) and will never see them in the same light again! i will also never buy an apple from a supermarket again - they are in bad condition there! for casual work the pay is decent too - wed average $15 an hour easily, if not more like $18 an hour which isnt bad at all for my first experience on an orchard.
two days left! then eric and i head down the west coast to experience some real west coast wilderness and rain!
"My long two-pointed ladder's sticking through a tree
Toward heaven still,
And there's a barrel that I didn't fill
Beside it, and there may be two or three
Apples I didn't pick upon some bough.
But I am done with apple-picking now."
Robert Frost: After Apple-Picking (1914)
TWO
a maths problem for someone mathematical to solve:
each day i wear a bag that i put apples into. once when i was bored i counted how many apples it took to fill that bag. 100. once my bag is full i put it into a big bin. it takes about 20 bags to fill that bin. eric and i fill the bin together. over a day we would average about 9 bins. our record was 11. weve been doing this for 5 or 6 days a week for nearly two months now. thats a lot of apples eh?
how many?
heh.
THREE
so my orchard days are drawing to a close. its been a good experience - weve met lots of fun people from all sorts of walks of life who are all picking apples for very different reasons. weve worked in the hot sun, the rain and nearly in a frost (apparantly it was nothing like a frost but there was snow in the mountains behind us, i could see my breath on the air and the apples felt like ice cubes - or ice spheres i suppose). its been fun - ive learnt all about apples (how they sunburn and bruise and get punctured from stems and grow 1mm a day) and will never see them in the same light again! i will also never buy an apple from a supermarket again - they are in bad condition there! for casual work the pay is decent too - wed average $15 an hour easily, if not more like $18 an hour which isnt bad at all for my first experience on an orchard.
two days left! then eric and i head down the west coast to experience some real west coast wilderness and rain!
Tuesday, March 14, 2006
happy birthday dad and caisey!
where to begin, where to begin? okay the plan of attack for updating you all is as follows: today i will tell you day one of me and eric's 4 day journey up through tongariro national park with some help from my diary. then on another day i will tell you about our current employment on an apple orchard. and then on another day i will tell you about our abel tasman walk (which actually doesn't start until tomorrow).
day one:
"i sit just outside the oturere hut and when i look up I see mt ngarahoe! how serene and grandious - this weather, this scenery but most importantly - the vibe... it began on wednesday night as the sun dipped below the horizon, mt taranki rose from the mist until he dominated and cast his shadow upon the plains. then turning to the east, the full moon rose between the saddle of tongariro and ngarahoe, a bulb of glowing light separating and joining the mountains with a strange pulsing luminescence...
i felt like i was walking through a calender setting of new zealand's most beautiful landscapes - a boardwalk taking us across a meandering stream that trickled and moved at will... and then onwards and upwards to the dreaded satan's staircase - a 50 minute vertical climb and clamber over rocks and up to the saddle the moon had easily sauntered over the night before... the south crater lay eerily quiet and flat - a moonscape with a brown lake steaming with gas. on reaching the red crater - a detour was in order and we walked to the peak of tongariro - my tribe's mountain - my mountain - the first mountain i have ever climbed! upwards and into the land of mordor, the land of the orcs. i could picture it all so clearly - the landscape so desolate and smoking, so alien, the plateaus, the desert rock and sand, the harsh environment with no plant life, no animal life - the only life? small specks of people following a windy track to their final destination...
then we turned, downwards passed the incredible emerald lakes - downwards along a steep ridge and into an even stranger and bold landscape of large rock formations shaped like lions and apes, turtles and weird creatures - all frozen to stone at some time thousands of years before. everywhere was sand - moving and shaped into rivers and torrents, trickles and pools. boulders dumped unceremoniously by volcanic giants that still showed their power behind me. these boulders stood tall amidst the sand, proud and yet abandoned and deserted and cast into a land of dirt. the rocky desertscape continued but finally oturere hut appeared...
walking through this area - through the saddle of ngarahoe and tongariro, up tongariro, around the edge of these volcanoes, and through the pass between ruapehu and ngarahoe was a humbling experience and i would gladly walk it again."
where to begin, where to begin? okay the plan of attack for updating you all is as follows: today i will tell you day one of me and eric's 4 day journey up through tongariro national park with some help from my diary. then on another day i will tell you about our current employment on an apple orchard. and then on another day i will tell you about our abel tasman walk (which actually doesn't start until tomorrow).
day one:
"i sit just outside the oturere hut and when i look up I see mt ngarahoe! how serene and grandious - this weather, this scenery but most importantly - the vibe... it began on wednesday night as the sun dipped below the horizon, mt taranki rose from the mist until he dominated and cast his shadow upon the plains. then turning to the east, the full moon rose between the saddle of tongariro and ngarahoe, a bulb of glowing light separating and joining the mountains with a strange pulsing luminescence...
i felt like i was walking through a calender setting of new zealand's most beautiful landscapes - a boardwalk taking us across a meandering stream that trickled and moved at will... and then onwards and upwards to the dreaded satan's staircase - a 50 minute vertical climb and clamber over rocks and up to the saddle the moon had easily sauntered over the night before... the south crater lay eerily quiet and flat - a moonscape with a brown lake steaming with gas. on reaching the red crater - a detour was in order and we walked to the peak of tongariro - my tribe's mountain - my mountain - the first mountain i have ever climbed! upwards and into the land of mordor, the land of the orcs. i could picture it all so clearly - the landscape so desolate and smoking, so alien, the plateaus, the desert rock and sand, the harsh environment with no plant life, no animal life - the only life? small specks of people following a windy track to their final destination...
then we turned, downwards passed the incredible emerald lakes - downwards along a steep ridge and into an even stranger and bold landscape of large rock formations shaped like lions and apes, turtles and weird creatures - all frozen to stone at some time thousands of years before. everywhere was sand - moving and shaped into rivers and torrents, trickles and pools. boulders dumped unceremoniously by volcanic giants that still showed their power behind me. these boulders stood tall amidst the sand, proud and yet abandoned and deserted and cast into a land of dirt. the rocky desertscape continued but finally oturere hut appeared...
walking through this area - through the saddle of ngarahoe and tongariro, up tongariro, around the edge of these volcanoes, and through the pass between ruapehu and ngarahoe was a humbling experience and i would gladly walk it again."
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