Life has been crazy here...a blast...but crazy! There is so much to do and so little time to do it. I have taken up squash with my roomie Kelly...we play it roughly 6 times a week and it is AMAZING. It is alot like racketball...you are enclosed in a room and hit a ball against the wall. I never thought it would be as intense as it is! I am just excited that I have a cool squash racket and I get to wear my stubbies to play! I almost beat a friend of mine here that has been playing his whole life...he says I am a bit competitive and don't like to lose...who would've thought? hahaha.
I went on a field trip out to a place called Lake Ellesmere and it was terrible...mosquito city. I had to watch birds for 2 hours... My teacher thinks birds are fantastic...I thought they were dull. I had more fun chatting with my classmates about that fact that my female teacher hasnt always been a female. I will try to post a picture up so you can see her!
My friends and I went out on the city last weekend. We went to the Kiwi student bar called Mad Cow and it was insane. All the rugby players and crazy kiwis go there to party EVERY Thursday and weekend night. Yes Deb....Rugby players are most definitely a DIFFERENT breed of people! They are absolutely huge and some not so smart...but they know how to go crazy at the bars! I know I emailed this to some of you...but one of the rugby/dippies (diploma students) wrote this to international students at Lincoln to teach them to be a Kiwi...
How to be a Kiwi at Lincoln University:
1)NEVER wear shoes
2)ALWAYS walk around with your hands down your pants
3)say 'eh' and 'oy' alot
4)Yell really loud, even when talking to someone right beside you
5)Yell even when you're not talking to anyone
6)Laugh uproariously at everything
7)get drunk EVERY night of the week
Break things
9)Break more things
10)Dig up the landscaping around your dorm, makes it look more 'unique'
11)Take food from other people's fridges
12)Walk into random rooms at all hours of the night
13)Wear stubbies with boxers sticking out from under them
14)Wear the most uncoordinated clothes you can think of (you'll be normal), even when wearing stubbies
15)Break windows
16)Grunt alot
17)Drink til you pass out EVERY thursday night (so you wont be the only one awake)
1
Swerve to hit animals on the road, not to miss them
19)Take farming classes because you're actually interested in farming
20)NEVER comb your hair
21)Grow a mullet
22)Bleach random patches of aforementioned mullet
23)Break things
24)Blast crappy rap music at 4am
25)Try and act cool like the dippies...
26)Rarely take showers
27)Actually understand, and like to play, cricket
2
Pass rugby balls back and forth at random times during the day, in random places, including the cafeteria
29)Wear your collar up, ALWAYS
30)Show lots of thigh
31)Make random movies about drugs, with guys running around in tighty whiteys
32)Break sinks
33)Play cricket amongst cars
34)Drink beer for breakfast
35)Drink beer for lunch
36)Drink beer for midafternoon snack
37)Drink beer for dinner
3
Drink beer after dinner
39)Forget how much beer you've had, so you start drinking again
40)Drink a beer as a midnight snack
41)You still dont believe that 'Ugg(s)' is short for 'Ugly'
42)Drunkenly break glass bottles on the sidewalk..Then walk barefoot over broken glass... and think its normal
43)If by some unfortunate accident you birth a child, name it after a variant of a grunt i.e. Jib, Pip,Guy, etc. or a really intelligent sounding name i.e woody, scotty, etc
Quite hilarious...I must admit....that paints a great picture of what I see when I walk around my campus. The mullets are deinfitely out full force...with mul-month coming up the boys are growing it out. Some of them have some pretty mean ones growing out....shaved sides and everything!
Kelly and I got to go out and watch 2 of our friends try out for a field hockey team...its kind of an odd game but it was fun to watch! We also had our very first wine tasting! We tried 10 different wines...and I guess at Uni wine tastings...you dont spit anything out. We tried 6 different white wines, 3 reds (gross!) and a dessert wine, and learned how to start scoring and sniffing out flavors. I am crap at it but I had fun pretending to know what I was doing. They gave us a score sheet with explanations and words to describe and rate flavors. I wasnt aware that you could call a wine 'FAT' or 'Cloying' or 'aggressive'. I used the funnest words I could find even though I wasnt sure what they meant! Two of the guys on my floor are getting their degree in Oeneology and viticulture so they were helping us out.
And now it comes to my weekend in Hokitika at the Wild Foods Festival. I got out of the field trip I was supposed to go on...due to an "important time conflict" and we took off Friday evening for Hokitika. It is about a 3 hour drive and we stopped at a Fish and Chips shop for dinner. I dont eat the fish...I get chicken and chips and im telling you...chips are ruined for me once I go home bc they are AMAZING here! We got to Hokitika at 9pm and drove to our camp site. They set all the high schools, primary schools, and other open fields as camp sites for the weekend of the festival. I have never seen so many people EVERYWHERE! We set up camp and went to bed so that we could get up early the next morning.
Walking to the festival was an experience all on its own. The kegs and beer drinking began with some people at 8 am. By the time we walked down to the main street at 8:45....guys were dancing in thongs on top of cars and drinking and singing. A big thing at the wild foods festival is to come dressed up so there were tons of guys dressed in some of the funnest outfits. I even got to take a picture with Jesus! When I first got there I was pretty apprehensive about alot of the stuff so we started with the easier booths... Kangaroo and crocodile are pretty good! I felt like I was eating little Roo from Winnie the Pooh...but I got over that fairly quickly! Here is a list of the things I ate:
Punga- its a tree root
Kangaroo
Crocodile
Monteiths Black beer ice cream...it was actually GREAT!
Chocolate worm truffle
Deep fried grasshopper on peanut butter bread
a jelly shot with a cricket in it
a red bull shot with a worm in it
dried fruit soaked in Gin (gross.)
Possum leg
sangria
and yes...sheep balls. people were getting sick at the stand all day. The flavor wasnt bad...but it was the texture that got us. Well that and the fact that they popped open when you bit into them!!!
Some of the things I wouldnt eat were:
Pigs eyes in macaroni and cheese
vegetable donuts
Lambs tails, cheeks, sweetbreads, hearts and kidneys
Pickled bug sushi
BBQ'ed cows udder - the booth was called the "Tastey Tittie"
Horse
VIAGRA SLUSHIES....those were entertaining.
Live huhu grubs...they looked like big silk worms.
spicy diced intestines
There were tons of other things there...I will be sure to show everyone the brochure I got when I come home! Throughout the day the only thing to drink at the festival was Montheiths beer, moonshine and other alcohols...maybe that fueled the bravery! After being at the festival all day...sufficiently tanned and sick to my stomach...we went out to the campgrounds...hung out with everyone...then came back for the festival dance. They had cover bands playing tributes to Abba, Beegees and Joe Cocker...it was alot of fun!
There is no better way to cure a long day in the sun drinking beer than getting up early for a Brewery Tour. We got up early in Hokitika and headed over to Greymouth where the Monteith's brewery is. It was cool to see the ways they make beers...but everyone in my group was much more excited at the tasting after the tour. We got to sample 7 different beers. There was one called Radler that was lemon and lime flavored! The last 15 minutes was open bar... we got to play with all the taps and try everything.
Now I am back at school...boo. But getting ready for another field trip this weekend to Kaikoura to watch more birds and stay in a Research Center with my super cool tranny teacher. I will update next when I can!! I love you and miss you all!
and ps I totally love saying Cheers now...and Oi. They say some of the coolest things!
