It's so hard to keep up with this, especially with this week being O-Week. The 'o' kind of ambiguously stands for Otago and/or Orientation... it's basically a week of non-stop partying. I've been having so much fun this week it's amazing. The first few days that I was in Dunedin it was kind of rainy and chilly, but that didn't stop any of the festivities from occurring at all.
In the beginning of the week I registered for classes, which was a weirdly different process from what it is in the US. I had to have classes approved my professors in each department of each class, and actually get them to sign off on them in person. That was a confusing ordeal that none of us really understood, but we got it done eventually. Classes here are actually called 'papers', and I'm taking 4 of them: Hinduism and Buddhism, Music Technology I, Maori Society, and Teaching English to Speakers of Other Languages. I'm pretty sure that I only have class Mon/Tues/Thurs, but I won't know for sure until tomorrow. I did that and then got my ID, and spent the next day or two really getting to know Dunedin, walking around and all that. It's really insane how so many of us AustraLearn kids there are that all know each other... we run into people everywhere. Between that and just meeting people as we've been here, I feel like I know someone everywhere I go already, and I've been here for less than a week.
Tuesday there was a toga parade for the 'freshers' (freshman), where they all dress up in togas and march down Great King Street (where I live) while the upperclassmen all proceed to pelt them with eggs. I only caught the end of it, but it was pretty great to see. Another apparent tradition of O-Week is couch burning, which is obviously frowned upon by the town but definitely still happens. Some friends and I actually participated last night... it was great, we don't really have much garbage left in our house after that... haha.
Yesterday was Cook-a-Thon, which seemed similar to Halloween. It's another part of O-Week, but all the students dress up in crazy costumes and head out to a bar nearby campus called Captain Cook's Tavern... starting when doors open there at 10am. Most kids even wake up earlier than that to start drinking, and I was actually woken up by our neighbors drinking and being loud at about 6:30. Lots of people had matching costumes, and a friend Chris and I went to an op shop and put together pretty cheap doctor's costumes... lab coats, rubber gloves, and dust masks. We didn't keep them on all day, but last night turned out to be a great night once we burnt a couch and got out to a couple bars... 'The Baa' and the 'Monkey Bar'.
Today was a great day all around. I woke up relatively early to get down to the Clubs and Societies buliding for the expo that they were having there to sign up for different things. I signed up for a ton: Volleyball, Squash, Handball, Ultimate Frisbee, and was told about a recreational Rugby team. We'll see what I stick with, but there are just so many opportunities of things to do here that I can't pass up anything. I got some coffee with friends and some lunch, and then we went our separate ways to get changed to go to the beach... today was the first warm and sunny day since we'd been there.
We put on our 'togs' (bathing suits) and 'jandals' (sandals) and amassed a pretty good crowd to find the bus to get to St. Clair's beach, which was only about a 15 minute busride. It turned out that we were definitely not the only AustraLearn(+company) folks who had the idea, and it just turned out to be one big party on the beach with everyone we knew. Almost everyone brought alcohol, and we had a great time there all day playing frisbee and jumping in the freezing cold water. Finally heading back, I made some pasta with a girl who lives in a flat next door to mine. I hung out and starting drinking and jumping around different flats before heading out with a few to the Monkey Bar for an International Students night there. We ended up getting there after they had started letting Kiwis in also, but still ran into tons of people from AustraLearn. I was there for a while before walking toward one of our friend's flats that was having a party, but we got sidetracked talking to some Kiwis and watching another couch burning. They turned out to be some really awesome kids who I'll hopefully and probably run into another time. I headed back here almost at the same time as my flatmate Steve, and we made some quesadillas and heading up to bed.
I'll have to try to actually update this more frequently so that I can actually remember everything that I've done, but it's tough with so much going on! That plus my internet only half-working because we're mooching it off of a neighbor, haha. Anyway, I'll be back on here soon...
Friday, February 27, 2009
Sunday, February 22, 2009
End of Orientation / Arrival in Dunedin
So the next night at our hostel, ours and the Blue group went to Maori Village for a 'hangi,' which is a traditional Maori meal. The presentation at the village was much more than that though... we actually watched them perform several ancient customs and songs, which were all very interesting to see. The food was great, and all of the meat is prepared in a fire pit in the ground covered with logs and leaves. It was in all a pretty relaxing night hanging around the pit outside until we left the village. Later that night, everyone drank at the bar at Kiwi Paka like the night before, but I actually stayed out for a while this time. When most of the group left to go to a bar downtown, me and a couple of other kids instead went to explore Rotorua ourselves. We ended up getting pretty lost, but had a good time exploring and ended up back at the hostel by about 2am.
Yesterday, though, was definitely the best day of orientation. We woke up pretty early to leave for our caving trip at Waitomo, which was definitely one of the most fun and unique things I've done in my life. There were a few options of what type of caving we could do, and I ended up getting the 'tubing' one. We actually were only tubing for a few minutes of it, but that wasn't even the highlight of the trip. We arrived there and took a van to a site to gear up in wet suits/boots/helmets, and with a group of about 15 of us, we all hiked down to the cave. We climbed in and started trekking through the flowing water in the cave. Not very far into the cave we were already able to see the world-famous (largely due to Planet Earth..) glow worms, which were incredible. With all of our helmet lights turned off, they looked like tons of bright stars across the pitch black cave.
In the cave we had to hike over many obstacles and sharp rocks, walk through water up to our chests, crawl through extremely narrow passages, and even swim through parts that were deep enough that we couldn't reach the bottom. At one point we grabbed some inner-tubes and chained together to float down the water with all of our lights turned off, staring at the amazing glow worms in silence. Somewhere in the middle of the trek, our guides stopped and served us some hot sugary lemon drink along with a candy bar to keep our blood pumping through the cold water. All in all, it was an insanely awesome trip.
We had a great lunch in Waitomo at a second Kiwi Paka site and took a group photo before bussing back to our own hostel. We had a free afternoon to hang out there, which is spent in the pool that is heated by the geothermal springs with a bunch of others from our group. We had dinner there and hung out at the pool drinking there for a while, before heading out to a bar/club downtown with almost everyone to celebrate our last night of orientation. The Lava Bar was a lot of fun, especially since our AustraLearn group took over the dance floor and had a great time with each other before parting to our seperate universities.
I woke up early again today to have breakfast and make it to our last info session at PolyTech before getting over to the airport in Rotorua. There wasn't a long wait there until we boarded our small prop plane to Wellington, where we transferred to Dunedin. I hadn't necessarily expected it, but Diane (my au pair from when I was very young) was waiting for me at the airport with her kids. It was great to see her there and finally meet Maddi and Jess, but it was a short visit. I'll without a doubt be able to get up to Wellington at another time while I'm here, though.
After finally landing in Dunedin, we found all of our luggage and were divided into groups to board the vans based on where our flats were in relation to each other. The vans actually dropped us off right at our flats which was very convenient, and we were able to get all settled. I'm now living in a flat with four other students, two of which were both in the AustraLearn program with me. Steve and Caroline are both from the AustraLearn program, while Rachel is a student here from Illonois, and Sara is here for the semester from Norway. They're all great, and I'm definitely going to have a good time here this semester.
We didn't do much other than get all settled in our flat here tonight, other than picking up a few groceries and beer. We hung out and said hi to some other kids we knew living in flats near ours, drinking and listening to music. I really should get to bed now, though, as we have an orientation actually from Otago at 1oam on campus. I'm ready to get those classes picked out...
Yesterday, though, was definitely the best day of orientation. We woke up pretty early to leave for our caving trip at Waitomo, which was definitely one of the most fun and unique things I've done in my life. There were a few options of what type of caving we could do, and I ended up getting the 'tubing' one. We actually were only tubing for a few minutes of it, but that wasn't even the highlight of the trip. We arrived there and took a van to a site to gear up in wet suits/boots/helmets, and with a group of about 15 of us, we all hiked down to the cave. We climbed in and started trekking through the flowing water in the cave. Not very far into the cave we were already able to see the world-famous (largely due to Planet Earth..) glow worms, which were incredible. With all of our helmet lights turned off, they looked like tons of bright stars across the pitch black cave.
In the cave we had to hike over many obstacles and sharp rocks, walk through water up to our chests, crawl through extremely narrow passages, and even swim through parts that were deep enough that we couldn't reach the bottom. At one point we grabbed some inner-tubes and chained together to float down the water with all of our lights turned off, staring at the amazing glow worms in silence. Somewhere in the middle of the trek, our guides stopped and served us some hot sugary lemon drink along with a candy bar to keep our blood pumping through the cold water. All in all, it was an insanely awesome trip.
We had a great lunch in Waitomo at a second Kiwi Paka site and took a group photo before bussing back to our own hostel. We had a free afternoon to hang out there, which is spent in the pool that is heated by the geothermal springs with a bunch of others from our group. We had dinner there and hung out at the pool drinking there for a while, before heading out to a bar/club downtown with almost everyone to celebrate our last night of orientation. The Lava Bar was a lot of fun, especially since our AustraLearn group took over the dance floor and had a great time with each other before parting to our seperate universities.
I woke up early again today to have breakfast and make it to our last info session at PolyTech before getting over to the airport in Rotorua. There wasn't a long wait there until we boarded our small prop plane to Wellington, where we transferred to Dunedin. I hadn't necessarily expected it, but Diane (my au pair from when I was very young) was waiting for me at the airport with her kids. It was great to see her there and finally meet Maddi and Jess, but it was a short visit. I'll without a doubt be able to get up to Wellington at another time while I'm here, though.
After finally landing in Dunedin, we found all of our luggage and were divided into groups to board the vans based on where our flats were in relation to each other. The vans actually dropped us off right at our flats which was very convenient, and we were able to get all settled. I'm now living in a flat with four other students, two of which were both in the AustraLearn program with me. Steve and Caroline are both from the AustraLearn program, while Rachel is a student here from Illonois, and Sara is here for the semester from Norway. They're all great, and I'm definitely going to have a good time here this semester.
We didn't do much other than get all settled in our flat here tonight, other than picking up a few groceries and beer. We hung out and said hi to some other kids we knew living in flats near ours, drinking and listening to music. I really should get to bed now, though, as we have an orientation actually from Otago at 1oam on campus. I'm ready to get those classes picked out...
Friday, February 20, 2009
Kia Ora
Man that was a lot of traveling. I made it here to New Zealand! I flew out of Phili on Tuesday, 2pm to Los Angeles where my connecting flight to Auckland was. It took me a while to find the right gate since it was in another terminal, but I knew I'd found it when I got there. There were tons of college students hanging out at the gate, all getting to know each other and obviously excited to get down to New Zealand or Australia.
Our flight took off at 7pm, and though it took us about 13 hours to get to Auckland, we arrived at about 5:45am... on Thursday. The time difference did seem a little weird on the first day, but it really wasn't too bad, especially since I'd slept a pretty good amount on the plane. Our flight was a group flight with mostly kids going to various schools in New Zealand or Australia through our program, AustraLearn. I did, though, sit next to a girl who had just graduated college and was going to Wellington to visit a friend... instead of getting a job.
Anyway, after getting to the airport in Auckland, we all got our bags and went through customs and waited by several busses for everyone to arrive. I hung out there talking to people until about 6:45, which is about when we finally left for Rotorua. We made a couple of food/bathroom stops on the way, but got to our hostel in just a few hours. In all there were 3 busfulls of students... 2 who are going to UOtago, and 1 going to UAuckland. We all, though, through AustraLearn, got to Rotorua for a fun orientation weekend at our hostel, Kiwi Paka, in Rotorua.
Once at Kiwi Paka, we all threw down our bags and went straight for a lunch that they had provided for us. After that we loaded back onto the bus to go to an informational session on New Zealand at a place called PolyTech. After about 2 hours of this, we headed back to Kiwi Paka where my bus got to be the first to learn the 'Haka,' which is a traditional Maori war dance. It was definitely a lot of fun... I got to act as our "chief," and we all put on the traditional Maori dress and performed it in two competing groups. Ours was without a doubt the better...
After scrubbing off the face-paint, I went on a walk with a few people to check out the local hot springs and boiling mud. They were pretty interesting, but smelled terrible, like sulfur. I came back here before them so that I could (finally) shower before having dinner with everyone. Some people stayed out after dinner to drink at the bar at the hostel, but apparently almost everyone was in bed by about 10:30 anyway beacuse of all the exhaustion. I'm just now starting to get over my cold that I had when we got here, so I decided to get right to bed last night. It wasn't too hard for me to nod off, especially since I was one of the lucky ones who somehow got his own room at the hostel.
I woke up this morning at about 7:15 to go and eat breakfast, and afterward went back to PolyTech for our last info session. After that, we all got bussed to a live sheep show... which is actually much more entertaining than it sounds. We saw 19 different breed of sheep, and got to pet them all and even watch a man sheer one. A sheep-herding dog did some funny tricks with them also. I was even picked to go on stage with a few others to feed a baby lamb.
We came back to Kiwi Paka for lunch this afternoon, and then quickly were taken to our next activity. We were able to choose between a hike, luging, or zorbing. I knew without a doubt that I had to try zorbing, since Rotorua is the only place in New Zealand (and one of the only in the world) where you can do it. Zorbing, in simple terms, is rolling down a hill in a huge water-filled rubber ball. Awesome. I'm defintely glad that I chose to do it, and will hopefully be able to try out luging some other time while I'm here.
We just got back from that a little while ago, and have a few free hours before heading off to a 'hangi,' which is a traditional Maori feast. And all this before I've even gotten down to the university yet...
Our flight took off at 7pm, and though it took us about 13 hours to get to Auckland, we arrived at about 5:45am... on Thursday. The time difference did seem a little weird on the first day, but it really wasn't too bad, especially since I'd slept a pretty good amount on the plane. Our flight was a group flight with mostly kids going to various schools in New Zealand or Australia through our program, AustraLearn. I did, though, sit next to a girl who had just graduated college and was going to Wellington to visit a friend... instead of getting a job.
Anyway, after getting to the airport in Auckland, we all got our bags and went through customs and waited by several busses for everyone to arrive. I hung out there talking to people until about 6:45, which is about when we finally left for Rotorua. We made a couple of food/bathroom stops on the way, but got to our hostel in just a few hours. In all there were 3 busfulls of students... 2 who are going to UOtago, and 1 going to UAuckland. We all, though, through AustraLearn, got to Rotorua for a fun orientation weekend at our hostel, Kiwi Paka, in Rotorua.
Once at Kiwi Paka, we all threw down our bags and went straight for a lunch that they had provided for us. After that we loaded back onto the bus to go to an informational session on New Zealand at a place called PolyTech. After about 2 hours of this, we headed back to Kiwi Paka where my bus got to be the first to learn the 'Haka,' which is a traditional Maori war dance. It was definitely a lot of fun... I got to act as our "chief," and we all put on the traditional Maori dress and performed it in two competing groups. Ours was without a doubt the better...
After scrubbing off the face-paint, I went on a walk with a few people to check out the local hot springs and boiling mud. They were pretty interesting, but smelled terrible, like sulfur. I came back here before them so that I could (finally) shower before having dinner with everyone. Some people stayed out after dinner to drink at the bar at the hostel, but apparently almost everyone was in bed by about 10:30 anyway beacuse of all the exhaustion. I'm just now starting to get over my cold that I had when we got here, so I decided to get right to bed last night. It wasn't too hard for me to nod off, especially since I was one of the lucky ones who somehow got his own room at the hostel.
I woke up this morning at about 7:15 to go and eat breakfast, and afterward went back to PolyTech for our last info session. After that, we all got bussed to a live sheep show... which is actually much more entertaining than it sounds. We saw 19 different breed of sheep, and got to pet them all and even watch a man sheer one. A sheep-herding dog did some funny tricks with them also. I was even picked to go on stage with a few others to feed a baby lamb.
We came back to Kiwi Paka for lunch this afternoon, and then quickly were taken to our next activity. We were able to choose between a hike, luging, or zorbing. I knew without a doubt that I had to try zorbing, since Rotorua is the only place in New Zealand (and one of the only in the world) where you can do it. Zorbing, in simple terms, is rolling down a hill in a huge water-filled rubber ball. Awesome. I'm defintely glad that I chose to do it, and will hopefully be able to try out luging some other time while I'm here.
We just got back from that a little while ago, and have a few free hours before heading off to a 'hangi,' which is a traditional Maori feast. And all this before I've even gotten down to the university yet...
Monday, February 9, 2009
T-Minus 7
Hey to anyone willing to actually read this...
Leaving for New Zealand in just one week! To anyone who doesn't know, I'm studying abroad for my spring semester of '09... at the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand. My semester there technically finishes June 24th, but who knows when I'll actually be back in the US. I'm going through an American program called AustraLearn, but without anyone else that I know. I've travelled solo like this once before when I went to Israel the summer after graduating high school, and it was such an awesome experience that it made up my mind about having to seize the opportunity to study abroad while in college.
My winter break has become way too long for me, and though I've been working at the coffee shop saving up money, I've been anxious to be doing something rather than hanging out at home. I'm extremely excited to be leaving so soon, and I can't wait to see what my trip has in store for me.
Anyone who wants to (and should!) keep in touch:
Skype - arzeller
Email - arzeller@gmail.com
Pictures - http://picasaweb.google.com/arzeller (there'll be a link set up on the right side of this page)
Leaving for New Zealand in just one week! To anyone who doesn't know, I'm studying abroad for my spring semester of '09... at the University of Otago in Dunedin, New Zealand. My semester there technically finishes June 24th, but who knows when I'll actually be back in the US. I'm going through an American program called AustraLearn, but without anyone else that I know. I've travelled solo like this once before when I went to Israel the summer after graduating high school, and it was such an awesome experience that it made up my mind about having to seize the opportunity to study abroad while in college.
My winter break has become way too long for me, and though I've been working at the coffee shop saving up money, I've been anxious to be doing something rather than hanging out at home. I'm extremely excited to be leaving so soon, and I can't wait to see what my trip has in store for me.
Anyone who wants to (and should!) keep in touch:
Skype - arzeller
Email - arzeller@gmail.com
Pictures - http://picasaweb.google.com/arzeller (there'll be a link set up on the right side of this page)
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)
