Finding My Fix: Chronicles of a Travel Junkie

So I left off with the Nature Reserve, so now you get to hear about the killer ducks. I can’t remember the name of the town, but at this town, we got off highway 1, and followed signs that stopped telling you which direction to go at the most inconvenient of times. They sent us about ten different ways, through some neighborhoods with old people wandering around. The funny thing was, I think I should probably point out, is that there was a sign that cautioned us that we would be heading into “urban area” soon, but all we could see were the same sort of quarter acre lots you would see in the US “suburbs,” with quarter sized, but well maintained homes on each. I’d hate to find out what a New Zealander thinks a suburb is. One thing I have to give Kiwis kudos for (one of a good number of things actually) is the fact that no two houses look alike. I have seen absolutely no cookie cutting anywhere. Maybe it’s there, but they’ve kept it out of my view.

And now the story of the killer ducks….

We finally found the lot, back off the main road, passed a construction crew with one out of place worker with billabong shorts, a T-shirt, and dregs, and passed a flock of funny black and blue birds with orange beaks walking along the road. Lucky for us, the road was paved, but strangely enough, the parking lot was not. We were the first visitors of the day, and to reward us, the nice man at the desk gave us each a complimentary bag of duck food. Little did we know those bags of duck food would be the end of us.

We strolled unsuspectingly out of the visitor centre, and onto the lawn, and were headed for stop number one, the whosiewhatsit bird species. Next thing we know one nasty little black duck came up from behind and gave my mum a warning peck on the back of her leg. He struck again in the same place. And Mum took off at a quick pace for the safety of the kiwi house. I took my chances and headed for the bridge over the duck pond. The doomsday duck army came waddling after us. They laughed their evil laugh at us as we gave in and spilled duck food by the cup full into the water of the pond.

If you don’t believe me, I have photographic evidence of them, the little buggers!

So… once free of the evildoers, we took a look around at the eel pond, but saw no eels, and a bushwalk in some of the last remaining natural in-tact bush. The “worm of wisdom” as the reserve’s mascot seemed to be, told us on a sign tacked to a tree that mud fish lived in that bush. They’re the kind that burrow in the mud when the water dries up. We saw water, but we saw no mud fish. And of course, we had to get a look at the kiwis in the kiwi house, but all we saw was the black and white image of the kiwi on the kiwi cam. Oh, and I managed to scare a poor innocent owl by pacing back and forth in front of his cage. Poor thing, I just thought it was funny to watch his head go back and forth. We survived the second onslaught of the ducks by clapping our hands and making a lot of raucus. What I was not able to stop was a bird landing on my shoulder, or well, my arm which I happened to bring up next to my head when I realised I had entered the cage of the birds that would land on your head. We got out of there pretty quick.

Sorry to leave you in the lurch again, but since I have no phone here at the moment, I have to do all my planning with people via, “let’s meet at such and such a place at such and such a time.” This time it’s Stafford House at 7, and since English is not the first language of most of the other international students I have befriended, it takes time to make sure everyone understands.

I am mildly bored which can definately be dangerous when your closest friend is 7000 miles away. So I figure I’ll write some more in order to give me something other than laundry to do. I’m writing from a computer on campus now.

So Levin. We stopped in Levin about 4 minutes before five and were excited to discover that at five, the parking meters became free, but were dissapointed when we soon found out that the reason for this was that in Levin (and in most of New Zealand for that matter), everything closes at 5pm. Restaurants are few and far between, and most don’t opperate the way restaurants in the U.S. opperate. It seems that quite often they are cafes or you seat-yourself style or a combination thereof. We stopped in one souvenier shop that happened to still be open, and I attempted to ask a man where we might find a “restaurant to eat dinner.” The man was definately confused. Until I repeated the word restaurant, and he said in his kiwi accent, “oh, a restaurant, right! There’s one down there a ways, and there’s one right across the street there. It has Chinese food and European food.”

We went to the Chino-Euro restaurant and ordered burgers. Mum’s was a pineapple burger that consisted basically of coleslaw and a grilled slice of pineapple. Mine was a “vegeterian burger” which meant it had pineapple, beet, tomato, and coleslaw. We had our dinner that ended with a heated conversation about the death of pets and how my mother hired a hitman to kill my lizard when I was about 14. We were crying from laughter.

Now, I think I might point out that here in this country, though friendly, the people are very quiet and reserved compared to Americans. I have heard only one person shout in any public space aside from myself of course. And men don’t hassle women, at least not in the areas I have walked, and at least not to the extent to which men in the states do. Men definately look at women, but they don’t make any noise about it. I have gotten one line from a kid who looked to be about high school age. “She’s fine” is the American translation of what he said after I passed. It sounded a good bit more like “she’s foin,” but once you get used to the accent, it starts to make sense.

I have become much more comfortable in the last few days at speaking at an audible tone, the way I speak in the U.S. I have to admit that the first few days I was getting quite tired of people looking at me confused, wondering if I was speaking a different language. Speaking in Spanish was much more comfortable, so in fact, that’s what I was doing, chattering on in Spanish, because that way at least if I made a mistake, it made no difference, and no one could understand me anyway. When two English speakers can’t communicate, it can be quite frustrating. I’ve gotten over the frustration, and am finding it ammusing when I leave people in the dust with my fast-talking New York injected speech.

So anyway, we took our laughter teary faces with us and got back in the car and drove on to I don’t know what town it was, where we stopped at a motel for the night. As is customary in New Zealand hotels, it had no central heating, and had instead, a space heater and electric blankets. I got the lucky blanket that didn’t work, but it turned out all right anway. Talking to the owners of the motel, we found out that they used to get more American travelers back before 9/11. Now most of the North American tourists they see are Canadian. This might explain why a few people have told us they thought we were Canadian; because they don’t know we sound the same. Some Kiwis have also told us that they’ve a few Canadians were insulted when asked if they were Americans. Well humf to you too, Canada.

The owners also told us that they used to fly the flags of South Africa, the US, Canada, the UK and a few other places. The American flag got “pinched” (stolen).

We headed on southward and found our way to a beach on the Tasman Sea that has a Maori name and starts with a P. We parked ourselves in front of a “bowling” field (yet another thing to have to ask about later), and made our way to the beach. So now I’ve put my fingers in the Tasman Sea! And I have eaten Chowder while looking out on the Tasman Sea. And my Mum has asked a Kiwi whether or not your supposed to tip waiters (you’re not), and what exactly is bowling (it’s a game somewhat like bacci ball if that’s how its spelled, where you throw a ball to try and hit other balls). “Ten pin bowling” is what they call the game we think of as bowling.

(As you can see this trip has really turned into more a time for figuring New Zealand out than for any real vacation). And I think I will stop now before I get to the Nature Researve and Wellington (the last 2 places). It makes me sad to leave the computer which is at present the most secure link I have to America. But I have laundry to do so I don’t smell when I finally meet my roommates.

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All tact aside: IN SIXTEEN EFFING HOURS START FIVE EFFING MONTHS ON THE OTHER SIDE OF THE EFFING WORLD!!!!!!!! (not to mention 15 months of almost non-stop travel) I have decided this WILL change my life, for the better! I ... [Continue reading this entry]

While I'm on a picture posting frenzy, I think I'll include a few of Costa Rica, the country that got me hooked to this whole travel thing. I staid there for a month if I didn't already tell you, and ... [Continue reading this entry]