Days 19, 20, 21 and 22- Back to Tauranga

Well, I haven’t been updating every day, but twice a week isn’t too bad, right?
I apologize for the delay in this post. Homework and other things have come up. This chronicles the past 4 days.

Wednesday was an uneventful day- nothing but lectures and homework. Thursday was my busy day again, but was much enjoyable than the week before- it was less tiring, and more interesting (in terms of lectures and labs). Speaking of tiring, I sort of unintentionally have taken myself completely off caffeine. I decided this year to get rid of soda (cola, pop, soft drinks, call it what you will) for lent, something I have never been able to do. So far, I have been doing quite well in the process. For the first week or so, I would drink tea 2-3 times a day to keep me going, but I can’t get it to taste good here, and it stains my teeth pretty significantly, so I stopped drinking that as well. I don’t drink coffee or energy drinks, so those are out as well. As a result, there is no caffeine in my system, and hasn’t been for about 7 days. I think I am fully ‘detoxed’ now, and I feel… peculiar. I do miss the caffeine, but at the same time it is nice to know that the energy I have is my natural energy. I don’t ever crash, I don’t have as many weird caffeine tics or random blurts of speech. In any case, it feels pretty good. I do think I’ll go back to caffeine when lent is over, but for now I am doing a little experient with how my body feels. I will say one thing- there is no way in hell I can stay up past, say, midnight. I have become an early sleeper, but still not an early riser. As a result, I sleep like 9 hours a night. The sleep is nice, but I think to really be effective I will need soda again in a few weeks.
So, Thursday. After labs and lectures, a few of us just met outside and decided have a little get together in someone’s room to commemorate the start of the weekend for most of us. We had a few drinks, and some people decided to go downtown. After they left, we moved to the RA’s room (not my RA, mind you) and talked there for awhile. The RA, Koji (from japan) is a limnology student. I am studying marine biology, or biology of the sea. Limnology is freshwater ecology, so naturally the two have a bit in common. Well, after getting on the topic we start having the nerdiest conversation ever, in the presence of a few confused and probably bored non-science majors. He showed me a report he wrote, with responses something like this from my side:

“This is… which lake? Oh, I see. That’s a big one. Wait, you only had one sample point? Oh, you could only afford one? Hmm, you’ll have to buy more buoys in the future. Wait, is this the thermocline? Wow, okay, I see. And this one here, this graph? Mixing? No way! How many times a year does this lake turn over? Holy crap!”

Anyway, as you can see, it was an extremely gratifying and at the same time useless conversation between two eager science students who’s nerd centers had been amplified by knocking back a few cold ones.

So, on Friday a few of us went downtown to go get bus tickets for Auckland next weekend for something called “Polyfest”, which is a festival of all the pacific islander cultures in the Auckland area (and there are A LOT). We booked our tickets and were walking to the grocery store, when my friend Zia got a phone call and had to go back and change tickets. I went with her, and then we walked around downtown a bit looking for a bus. While downtown, we stepped into a secondhand bookshop and browsed through it, buying a few old books. I have since made a list of classics that I have to read- something about being in an old bookstore with another person who loves dusty old literature sparked my love of reading again. I got 2 cheap random books (one I had never heard of, a captain’s journal of some kind, and a mythology book). After we got back, I got some work done and then we all went out to an irish pub for some hanging out. Funny story: On the bus ride to downtown to get our bus tickets earlier in the day, we met a random girl on the bus who worked at the irish pub. She told us to come over, and we said we would. An hour later I am walking with my friend Zia to the bookshop when I see her across the street, dressed as a cop. I am confused at this point, but as I am crossing the crosswalk she hands me a ticket. Needless to say, I am bewildered but take it anyway. I read it, and of course it is a promotion for the pub (money off of a Guinness). Later that night we walk there, and are the only people in the pub, aside from the bartender girl we saw earlier. We order a drink, play some pool (at a perfectly round pool table, quite weird) and talk. She gives us free food, and each a lottery ticket. I won a Guinness T-shirt! After a few hours, we leave and head home.

Saturday was another trip to Tauranga, just like last weekend. Before we even hit Tauranga, though, we went to some waterfalls, called McCleary (not sure if the spelling is right) falls. We hiked trails through rainforest, and found some really spectacular small waterfalls. Once we had gone through there, we went to the large falls- which is really a massive rock formation. I have pictures which I will put up, but the place was astonishing (and probably pretty boring to the kiwi driver Anna that brought us). There were massive boulders sitting under pools of water, just sitting there, for God knows how long. The rocks were polished smooth from the running water, and stones boulders and pebbles were all smooth. The entire formation was perhaps 60 to 70 feet tall, from top of river to bottom of falls- but it occued in a step pattern so as to not make it one large fall. One of the most interesting features of this area were that there were perfectly cylindrical indentions into the rock, apparently from flowing water from previous millennia. Imagine a solid rock ground, on which you stand. It is smooth and complete- all one rock. You go ahead, and see a perfectly circular pool 2-3 feet across or more, and one and a half times that deep. It is an almost perfect cylinder. At the bottom lie smoothed pebbles. One thing I will say about the rocks here- they all look fake. Go to your local miniature golf course that is jungle themed (Jungle Rapids for you Wilmingtonians) and look at the fake plaster rock. Well, that is all real in NZ- none of it is fake, though it looks it. After spending a few hours at the falls, we headed to Tauranga.
We started off by visiting a rose garden, which was stunning. Afterwards we went near the same location as last time: We went to the mount this time- which was a daring hike. The mount is about 700 feet high, with sheer cliff faces. Where the mount isn’t sheer cliff, it is extremely steep. The paths are perhaps a foot and a half wide, with maybe another foot of error space on the side before you fall off. There are no handrails, or anything else. It was exhilarating.
It was pretty intense, but the view was incredible at the top. Imagine this (soon you won’t have to, because pictures will be up): surrounded by sea on 3 sides, with clouds barley letting rays of raw sun get through. Beyond the water are rising peaks as far as the eye can see. It looks like heaven.
Once we got to the top, we saw 3 guys with very large packs do something I didn’t expect- fall off the side of the cliff. They were parasailers, and once their parasails were inflated with wind, they just hopped off the side of the mountain and cruised all around us. It was a pretty awesome sight. Once we got down the mountain (and felt like we were hiking through the shire) we went down to leisure island, where the blowhole was last week. This time I brought a camera, but the weather was much nicer, and the blowhole wasn’t acting up like it was before. We climbed all over the place, to the edge of the sea and back again. Climbing there looks treacherous, but it is, like I said last week, very easy and fun.
After leisure island, we went back and had fish and chips in the same place we got it last time (and for under 3 bucks USD, mind you!). We drove home (it was night by this point) and stopped once we got over the mountain to see the moon rise over the hills. Once we got back we hung out with my friends Talana (NZ, part Maori, cook islander, Samoan, and about 3 other things), Estee (NZ), Andrew (Again, Canada) and Zia (Italy). We made fun of Estee, because she can contort her body to look pregnant at will. I enjoy the company of these friends, because we constantly bash on each other (Estee on Talayna because she is Maori, Talayna on Estee because she isn’t very bright, me on Andrew because he is Canadian, Andrew on me because I am American, and, well, Zia just kind of watches), all in good fun. Another exciting weekend- they seem to be becoming the norm here.