A Sweet Story

So Henry has a nickname for all of his kids, his dog, pretty much everybody.  He calls his wife Pet, his kids are like Grub, Fat, etc.  But when he first met Marion he called her Steve.  Never called her Marion, just Steve.

Well this was the 50's and Marion's friend thought that was the worst thing she had ever heard and so she told Henry, "Her name's NOT Steve, it's Marion!" and then he never called her Steve again.  Just Marion, or "Pet", his other nickname for her. 

Well, they had their first baby, a boy, and Marion named him Glenn.  They agreed that their first girl she could pick the name also, but when it came time to name a second boy or a second girl, Henry could choose their names.  When their second boy was born, they were in the hospital, and the nurse asked her what the name was and Marion said, "I don't know, Henry hasn't told me yet."

Henry said, "let's name him Steven".  Then he said, "I used to have a mate named Steve.  Good chap."

These Days

So, I brought Teri to the airport and she flew flew flew away home on Monday.  And now I am staying with Henry and Marion, a 70-something couple who live in Thames, New Zealand.  They are pretty much the nicest people that I have ever met.  I promised Henry that I would help him all day today with whatever chores he needed done, and so later we are going to build some pallets and I get to use a nail gun!  Marion really likes to make sure her guests are comfortable and so she's always asking me tons of questions, like, "Would you like Pork Steak or Beef Steak?" and I don't know what to say!  What if Beef Steak is twice the price of Pork, or what if Pork is Henry's favorite?  What if I choose wrong?  I can't live with that kind of pressure and so I say, "Oh, I don't know Marion, anything is good for me, whatever is fine, you choose."  In New Zealand there is a phrase for this type of attitude and it is, "Please yourself."  Which I don't like saying.  Because it sounds too much like "Suit yourself."  Which kind of means, 'Your decision is the wrong one and we both know it but go ahead because you're too stubborn to listen to me.'  But people say "Please yourself" to mean, 'hey, do what makes you most happy, I'm proud of you.'  Or something like that.

Anyway, Henry built this house in the 60s and it's really cool.  It's situated at the top of a humongous valley and there are zillions of windows so you can see the whole valley from the dining room, the living room, and all the bedrooms.  He purposely put all the bedrooms along the valley so that they would all have sun.

Henry loves The Far Side.  Marion makes me eat breakfast and make solid decisions about my next phase of travel, which is the South Island of New Zealand.  She drives me to the post office and the information center and we collect millions of tourist books and we go through them and try to figure out the cheapest way to get to Christchurch.  I think I might really miss it here.

Posting these photos for two reasons. 

1. Wow it was snowy when I left Minneapolis.

2. Haha there was an upturned grocery cart in front of Ben G's house. Miles from the nearest grocery store.

Best. Mocha. Ever

Scotts Epicurean Cafe, Hamilton, New Zealand

I'm Gonna Miss this Girl

I tried so hard to make her stay

but her appetite got in the way

"Don't go home" I pleaded hard

"But I have to, because I'm a tub of lard

My butt is big my thighs are fat

I eat my breakfast from a vat

 Do you think I can survive

On tiny portions and stay alive?"

The End

Rugby!

We went to a rugby match tonight!

As far as I can tell, the object of the game is just like American Football.  You try to get the ball across the line for a touch down.  If you don't make it you can kick it through a goal post.  If you make it you can kick it through the goal post for more points.  But, these guys wear no helmets or padding.  The ball is still in play even if they are tackled.  If you tackle a guy, all the other players run up and make a big poop pile, and then the ball comes out of the poop pile and they can still try to run it in.  Once, the ball was in a poop pile for over two minutes, and then it came out, and yep, still in play.  Sometimes the ball goes out of bounds and then gets thrown back in, where the guys give eachother a boost, to JUMP up and get it so their team can have the ball.

Sometimes the ball goes flying into the crowd and once, the guy next to Teri caught it!  That's like catching a puck or a baseball!  But you have to return it.

Rugby is a big deal over here.  There are the "Super 14" teams, which are made up of 5 Aussie teams, 5 South African teams and 4 NZ teams.  These teams play eachother from February to May and then the "All Blacks" is the main NZ team.  Some of the Super 14 players form an All Star team to make up the All Blacks.

The crowd heckles, but the hecklers are actually pretty polite.  The following are some of the things they yelled at the players, and yes I was taking notes:

"That's against the rules!"

"Honestly that's rubbish!"

"Wanker of a call!"

"Couldn't catch a cold!"

"Shoulda kicked it when you had the chance, man!"

"BORING!"

"Go back to boring school!"

One of the All Blacks was voted the 3rd hottest sports person in the world.  Daniel Carter, #10.  He played tonight on the Canterbury Crusaders team.  He even models underwear.

Here's a poop pile, those guys just wait for the ball to pop out and then they run with it again!  Look how good our seats were!  I guess the closer you are to the field, the cheaper the tickets.  Craziness.

After the game, the players come out and sign autographs.  We got to meet some of the players!  (It rained during the game and so that's why my hair is jacked.)

In this next photo, first check out the gun show, and then look up to the guy's ear.  It's called "cauliflower ear".  When you're in the poop pile, your ears and the ears of the guys on the opposite team get sort of squished together because your heads are clunking over and over and then you end up with inside out ears.  Google it.  ICK.

Can't Talk Now-- Too Much Going On:

I stole this line from my sister Kelly, who, when visiting International Falls, sent her friend back in Portland Oregon a postcard with a cutout of the arrest section from our Daily Journal.  It had reported that one of the residents had their mailbox bashed in with a baseball bat.

Gotta love lil' local newspapers.

It's Getting Hilarious up in Here

Little turd:

BIG turd:

actually, it's a sock

Nails, I Hardly Knew Ye'

Look at these suckers!  Long, luxurious nails!  That NEVER happens to me.  But somebody said in the sun and humidity your nails grow.  Anyway, I couldn't stop staring at them every single day.  Plus I'm super tan right now (for me) and that made it worse.  I guess my head was getting too big and I needed to be knocked down a peg because all of sudden one day the middle one ripped, and I lost the ring I just bought for $120 that looked so nice with the nails.  You can kind of see the rip in the photo.  So now I'm back to my boring old self.

p.s. The ring is found and being mailed to me here in New Zealand.

Funny Money

This is just a slight complaint.  Something somebody should have asked me about first.  Before they made it the NATIONAL MONEY of Australia.

Below, in a terribly out of focus photo, you will see, from left to right, the American Dime, the Australian five cent piece, the Australian 2 DOLLAR coin, and then the American Nickel.  Now, why is the 2 DOLLAR coin so small?  So people will lose it and then other people will find it and then be super happy? 

Now, spend a month in Australia, and get used to the tiny 2 dollar coin and the larger 1 dollar coin.  Proceed onto New Zealand where their money is the EXACT opposite.  Below, on the top row, we see a New Zealand one dollar coin, smaller as it's supposed to be then the larger 2 dollar coin.

Bottom row: Australian 50 cent piece, which is HUGE, then the Australian one dollar coin, and lastly the Australian 2 dollar coin.  Can anybody make sense of this for me?

(**Interesting to note that the Australian 50 cent piece still has a picture of Lady Di and the Prince of Wales on it.) 

On my first day in Australia, I bought something for $5.80, (let's say...) and gave the woman a $10 bill.  She handed me a handfull of coins.  I need my change, I say.  You've got it, she says.  Oh, you gave me just the change, I need the bills, I say.  Then she explains that I have all the change.  Of course I was hugely embarrassed, and thus began a month of carrying around six pounds of coins in my purse.  Not realizing of course that there's like $50 in there.

New Zealand

OK so I'm here for reals now.  We stopped on the way to Sydney for a little layover.  But now we got picked up at the airport by Henry and Marion from Thames, which is about an hour and a half north of Auckland.  Now we rented a car and are in Rotorua.  They have a lot of thermal activity here and such, so we're here for two days and then we're going to see a rugby match in Hamilton between the Chiefs and the Chargers, or something like that.  bla blah blah then we go to Waitomo Caves and then Teri goes home on Monday :(

boo hooooooo sob sob sob

I'll be all alone until I meet up with Summer in Thailand around April 17th or so.
Why am I scared of being alone?  Because Teri makes all the plans that's why.  She finds my computer mouse when I lose it and decides where we're going.  Now it's up to me.  I'll probably do a lot of sleeping.  I'm sick again too.  Here comes another frowny face.  :(

I must be totally worn out or something.  Looking forward to relaxing on the south island of New Zealand.  Here they call it N. Zed.

Also they put the 'e' sound where the 'i' goes and vice versa. 

Tennis  = Tinnes

Peeing in a Wetsuit

As I mentioned before in this earlier blog post, whilst sailing on the Spank Me, I didn't want to use the on-board disgusting bathroom and neither would you.  What other options is a person left with?

One:

Pee in the ocean.  This time of year, however, most reputable companies require their patrons to wear a stinger suit at all times in the water.  This prevents death by jellyfish sting.  So, more clearly, your only actual option is to pee through your stinger suit into the ocean.

One Size Fits...Most?

 

OK so fast forward.  We were off the Spank Me and on Reef World, where we stayed overnight in the lap of luxury.  Our private room had crown molding for Gosh sakes.  BUT, when the ferry that brings the day-trip people from the Mainland to Reef World is there (from 11am to 3pm), we were not allowed to use our awesome private bathroom, inexplicably.  Instead we had to use the disgusting ferry bathroom.  Not much better than Spank Me, and so here we are back to my pee story.

During my entire first dive (wearing the neon blue stinger suit pictured above) I was completely unable to go to the bathroom.  Oh and by the way, after all the one-day people left and it was just Teri and me on the boat (the only overnighters), I saved a nice darker-colored Stinger Suit off the rack so I wouldn't be stuck with that gross neon-blue getup again.  Also I hung it in the wind so it could dry properly from use the day before.  There's nothing worse than putting on a wet used stinger suit.  Anyway.  On the second day, on the second dive, I had to pee really really bad.  I had to pee the whole entire dive.  But listen, after 32 years of telling your body "Don't pee in the pool!" it's really hard to revert back to "it's OK now, go ahead and pee in the pool".  When we were almost finished, and approaching Reef World at the end of the dive, I realized that I would have to use that gross ferry bathroom if I didn't take action soon.

I got to GO.

OCD got the one-up on tradition and I decided to go.  Unfortunately it was in the staging area where they teach you scuba skills before you go on your dive.  I let it all go.  Standing there on a metal platform thing, in the ocean, waist-deep, I started peeing.  And I kept peeing.  And peeing.  And peeing.  I pretended it was taking a long time to get my fins off.

People were starting to wonder what was up with me.  I lied and told the gorgeous red-headed dive instructor that I needed to "do that thing with my hair", where you smooth it back in the pool because it's messy from swimming.  But in truth I was still peeing.  For what seemed an hour.  Teri was ready to get out, and was looking at me funny like 'let's go' (and by the way she was not in danger of getting in the pee at all, she was in a different area.  I'm not a total jerk.) 

Then suddenly I jumped!  Right behind me, and by the way I'm STILL peeing, were two other divers with their goggles right in my butt.  They were also returning from their dive.  I was so embarrassed because I felt sure they could see the pee cloud around me.  And also I felt bad because, well, you know.  But I wasn't done peeing yet!  I tried to move around as much as possible to disseminate the pee, and I tried to do it so that they wouldn't know what I was doing.  I was sure that they were.  Kind of like, "oops, sorry, didn't mean to be in your way, NOTHING funny is going on...heh heh...."

I WAS forced to actually do "that thing with my hair."

Later Teri and I cried laughing because I finally admitted to what was really happening and she said she was wondering why I was so surprised when the other divers arrived, and also why I insisted that we go snorkeling immediately after we got out of the water from diving, and then why I was done snorkeling after 30 seconds.  (Rinsing!)

So Here Is What I Learned About Wombats

Wombats are generalists, meaning they'll eat a variety of foods.  (A koala is a specialist, only eating eucalyptus leaves.)  They dig holes under the ground and live in burrows.  They have the same cartilidge plate in their butt that a koala does, but where the koala uses his for sitting, the wombat uses his for protection.  A shield.  They can run 40-50kph!!  So if a dingo is chasing them, they start running!  And then stop!  And the dingo gets knocked out.  Also they sleep in their burrows with just their butt sticking out.  So the dingo can chew and chew at their butt all it wants, but the wombat will not feel it at all.  And the dingo gets nowhere.  If a dingo happens to get into the burrow, the wombat lets him.  He lays on his back, very still.  Now the dingo gets all the way on top of it to go for the jugular.  At the last minute the wombat uses it's strong legs to KICK! the dingo up into the air and knock it out on the ceiling of the burrow (or hopefully crush the skull.)

Plus they are cute!  I got to hold this little guy, named Tonka.  His mom was hit by a car, and a passerby checked to see if she had a little nugget in her pouch, and sure enough, there was Tonka.  He is being raised at the sanctuary.  He is 12 months old and bottle fed.  In the wild the wombat stays by the mother for 2 years.  He was so sleepy!  He fell asleep twice in my arms.  And then they were bottle feeding him they had to shake him awake a couple times because he just dozed off.  While eating.

So Here is What I Learned about Koalas

Of course a koala is a marsupial, which just means that the babies develop mostly in the pouch, and are not "placental" mammals.  They are born a naked jellybean, only 2 inches long, and possessing two claws, which it uses to make its way to the pouch, where it will spend the next 6 to 7 months turning into a real koala.  The opening of the pouch on a koala is downward, as opposed to a kangaroo's upward facing pouch.  But the two teats inside swell up and prevent the baby from falling out.  However if the baby is unfortunate enough to fall out, the mother does nothing to help it.  She will let it die.

Of the almost 700 varieties of eucalyptus, the koala eats about 70.  There is not a lot of nutrition in the eucalyptus leaf, and since that's all they eat, the koala has almost no energy.  Its brains are pretty small.  They are stupid, slow and sleep 21 hours a day.  But so cute!  (See above).
Eucalyptus is toxic, even for the koala.  In order to not be poisoned from the leaves, the koala has a bacteria in its stomach to protect it.  A baby koala is not born with this bacteria.  How does it get there?  Well, I'll tell you:

They eat their mom's poop!  Diarrhea poop!  Normally the mom koala takes about a week to digest one eucalyptus leaf, because it moves so slowly through the colon.  It comes out dry like a rabbit turd.  When the mom has a developed, ready-to-come-on-out baby in the pouch though, her body AUTOMATICALLY smooshes the leaf through faster, creating diarrhea, which the baby eats, (made easier by the fact that the pouch faces downward and it's face is practically right in the way).  So -- after the baby spends 6-7 months in the pouch, finishing their development, they are ready to eat some poop and get their stomachs ready for eating eucalyptus leaves.  Then the mom just poops and poops and poops and the baby eats it for 6 weeks.  Then the baby climbs onto the mom's back and lives there for 12 months.  Now the mom figures the baby is ready to be on its own and so she claws and bites at the baby if necessary to make it leave.

The End!

My Musings on Australian Roadways, However Inaccurate they May Be

It seems to me that nobody really speeds here.  And I should know, because Teri and I rented a car and traveled two motorways, for a total of 14 hours.  If you look at a map of Australia, we covered about one millimeter of it.  If my sarcasm is lost on you, what I'm trying to say is I probably don't know what I'm talking about, but here it is anyway:

They seem to have cameras everywhere for speeding.  They take a picture of you and just mail you the ticket.  Back in Minnesota this doesn't fly because people have argued and gotten attorneys and everything, more or less to say just because you have a picture proving that I was speeding (or running a red light) doesn't mean I really was speeding (or running a red light).

When you get to the age where you're going to get your license, you have to have a big 'P' posted on your car.  This stands for 'Provisional' and means you can drive, but not before you have a certain amount of hours practice and you can only go, say 80kph instead of the actual speed limit, whatever it may be.  Then when you're done with your RED 'P', you get a GREEN 'P', and then you need so many more hours, with fewer restrictions, and then you have to pass a written test. 

You get an allotment of 9 points and then your license is taken away.  Speeding ticket?  3 points.  Anybody in the car not wearing a seatbelt?  3 points.  Etcetera.

All over the roads there are signed warning against sleepy driving, like 'Yawning? Power Nap NOW.' and 'Nap Area Ahead' and my personal favorite: 'Don't Sleep and Drive'.  There are billboards with photos of bloody terrible accidents that say, "Slow Down, Stupid."

All this in the name of saving lives.  (Take a cue, America!!)  Anyway, so here you'll be driving the speed limit, which on the most busy highways is only 100kph, or 60mph.  Anyway, you're the fastest one.  Most people drive UNDER the speed limit. Yes we saw a few jerks fly by, but for the most part, everybody is pretty chill on the road.  

So, the other day, Teri and I were driving the Great Ocean Road, which is similar to the Pacific Coast Highway in California in that it follows the coast from Melbourne westward and is surrounded by beautiful scenery.  But apparently it is a high accident area.  Suddenly all of the traffic was stopped.  We saw that a police officer had pulled everyone to the side of the road.  We waited in line, wondering what it was all about.  Turns out he was giving EVERY SINGLE DRIVER a breathalizer. 

I thought that was so awesome.  I asked if I could take a picture and he was like, "absolutely".  The policeman was really good natured and was totally OK with us laughing the whole time.  He said that in Australia they don't need to have any "probable cause".  If you're driving, he can pull you over and give you a breathalizer.  I say that's brilliant.  I don't know the statistics and I don't do research on my opinions, EVER...but it seems like that's a good way to keep your nations' roadways safe.

"Backpacking"

So yah.  When I quit my job and sold all of my furniture and clothes, I had to really minimize what I would need for traveling.  I would be gone for a year or more hopefully, visiting warm-climate countries and therefore needing only summer clothes.  Easy, right?  Not really.

Even when you cut your wardrobe down into what you consider to be nothing you have too much.

I didn't really pack my bag until the day I left, and so I ended up bringing WAY too much stuff.  I couldn't get my bag zipped, and brought an unexpected additional carry-on bag.  I flew to Samoa with a backpack filled to capacity, a tote bag brimming with heavy books and my purse/laptop bag stuffed with everything that couldn't fit in the other bags.  "I'll just trim the fat along the way," I thought.  Try as I might, I couldn't imagine my life without each and every item in all three bags.  "I'll just make sure to use the same dental floss each time, and then I can throw one of the three out, and that will make more space," I reasoned, as my clothing expanded in the humidity, making it harder and harder to zip the bag shut.  "I threw away some receipts today!" I gleamed, believing that surely now I could illiminate the tote bag. 

Since February 2nd, I have strapped my backpack onto my back a total of three times, and that only mostly on principal.  Otherwise, the cab driver grabs it and throws it onto a wheeled cart, and I push it around.  I have carried it like an awkward, heavy, handle-less suitcase back and forth from hotel lobbies to rooms, lifting it's 19 kilograms with my low back and not my knees.  Every time someone else hefts my backpack into the trunk of a cab, Teri laughs at the idea of me "backpacking" Australia, never actually putting the "pack" on my "back".

As far as 'trimming the fat' goes, in Sydney, I finished The Thorn Birds, and parted with a skirt and a sweater.  In Airlie Beach, I tossed that old embarrassing straw hat that Melissa Kasprowicz loved so much and a paper-thin white shirt that had become stained from sunblock.  However, I bought pajama pants, a pair of shorts, and a new hat.  Every time I think I'm making weight/space headway, I buy a T-shirt or acquire some new "needed" toiletry. 

The point of this whole story is that I finally broke down yesterday in Melbourne and bought a suitcase.  It's a lovely forest green hardcase number by the makers of CATERPILLAR truck and tractor accessories.  I'm terribly angry about it because at home, I have an AWESOME hardcase suitcase that my aunties Julie and Debbie bought for me for my graduation 15 years ago and another smaller suitcase that works for a nice carry-on.  I should have scrapped the backpack and just brought those two.  After all, Teri has been easily and without effort wheeling around her two suitcases for five weeks and doesn't have to spend 6 minutes on the zipper, trying to force them shut like me and my ol' backpack.

So, new suitcase.  $200.  Yah, everything is way more expensive here.  Aveda face cleanser, travel-sized?  $25. 

And then I threw all caution to the wind and went fancy girl shopping.  Made me feel like a real traveler --more than a stupid backpack ever could.  And I spent money, wooo DOGGEY.  Coulda lived in Thailand for a month on what I spent.  But it felt goooooooooooood.  So good.  Take that, backpack!

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou

Teri heard, "Teri?  What should I do?"

And when she turned around, this is what she saw:

But the truth is, I wasn't asking what to do with that long long long arm.  I was asking what should I do about having to go out in public in that get-up.

This is for You, Ross

A Japanese lesson!!  There's probably lots of useful phrasology in there, I would think.

The Spank Me Cook

This was our cook on the Spank Me.  He did a great job, truly.  And a NICE guy.  Seriously.  In fact, we met him in the dive shop the day before.  He was applying for the job, and they hired him the next morning at 9am.  I just wanted to illustrate, or I guess show you his butt crack:

 

Which we were subjected to for four straight days.  On top of his head sit 37 red dreadlocks, four of which liked best to sit square on his forehead, no match for the hand sweeping them back once every 30 seconds.  On top of his bottom, the same board shorts.  For four days.  Never a shirt, never a different pair of shorts.

One night, Teri went down to her bunk and noticed a gassy smell.  This wasn't unusual, but it was stronger than normal.  So she mentioned it to the 23-year-old skipper.  He mentioned it to the cook, and that was about it.  We went to bed.  That night, the poop smell was particulaly strong coming out of the toilets, and so I didn't notice any accelerated "natural gas" smell.  At about 6:30am, when Teri was waking up, she heard the sound of repeated matches being struck, but not ignited, and then the Cook cursing.  She considered getting the heck out of there, but was too sleepy.  Another strike, and then nothing.  Then, BAM!!! 

The above picture was taken from my bunk.  So you can see we were sleeping right by the gully.  Gally.  Whatever, the Kitchen on a sailboat.  During the explosion, Cook singed all of his arm hair off, and got burned.  Turns out the gas was leaking all night long (like Teri tried to tell them).

I'm going to count that among my many near-death experiences.

Conversation over Wine Reflecting on Conversation at the Train Station

Teri and Kady: "hahahaha HAAHAHAAAAAhahahaa"

Teri: "Next stop: Cameltoe.  But I'm already there."

Teri and Kady: "hahahaHAAAAAHAAahahahhaahaaaaaaAAAHAAAAAA!!!"""  laugh laugh laugh