The Never-ending Canterbury Tales

From this point forward, I think I will try to do this a bit more like a retrospective travelog/Medieval chronicle. I think it will be more fun that way and fit my style more. Plus, it means I get to relive my past days every time I write, which should be interesting. Retrospectives are all the rage in the Year of Our Lord 2014. Let's see how this week has turned out so far...

23 August: Final preparations were made for the journey to Los Angeles and the two-day ordeal that would be the trip to Christchurch, New Zealand. I should note that Christchurch is in Canterbury District of New Zealand on the South Island, roughly midway down the east coast of above Littleton Bay which was once a large volcano.

24 August: Last goodbyes to the Kennedy family. Socko Pocko, the family's oldest and somewhat ailing cat, was given special affection since this will likely be the last time we see him. The oldest dog, Zee, was also lightly praised since he, too, will be an unlikely companion when we return to the States. Kirk, Kara's dad, drove us to Los Angeles where we arrived at around 7:30pm. Niko joined us for this leg of the trip and did remarkably well during the car ride, though he did pant like a wolf for a while early on.

25 August: Niko required a vet appointment early on in the day so we traveled from our humble Motel 6 to the local vet where he was given his last medications for the flight. We then had to get him scanned at the Department of Agriculture center near the airport. His cage left for further fitting, Niko returned with us to the motel where we quickly abandoned him to eat lunch at Denny's. The rest of the afternoon was spent lounging in antagonizing wait until 3:00 when we finally had to say goodbye to Niko at the DA office so he could be properly dealt with by the airlines.

Our last meal in the US was a local Mexican restaurant with surprisingly good food and a fun theme, though the service was slow. From there, we packed up everything one last time and Kirk dropped us off at LAX airport. We got a porter to help us out—which was an excellent idea!—and he helped us get everything weighed and and unloaded. Kara's carryon was overweight, but the lady allowed it after we took out 1kg (we returned it to the bag as soon as we made it through security). While waiting to board, I called the relatives and said farewell.

The crowded terminal with people lining up to board the flight to Auckland.

The flight itself was a long 13-hour slog. To make matters worse, we had the very definition of a bloke sitting next to us and a woman who enjoyed her reading light far too much directly in front of us. The bloke grunted whenever we needed to use the restroom and he took up his whole seat and didn't like to share the armrest. The woman only turned off the light at around 5:00 in the morning US time, which was the middle of the night regardless of the time zone. Food was served around midnight (because people are hungry then) and breakfast about 10 hours later. Neither of them were particularly tasty and neither of us ate most of our meals. We had some of our own food with us, but we discovered in Auckland that no food of any type is allowed through customs. Prudes!

Entertainment in the plane was good, at least. Lots of movies, including really new ones, and some TV shows. Neither of us accomplished anything of note—I didn't even use my personal electronics on the plane once! The seats had a bit more leg room than your usual 777s but it was still crammed and there was almost no room in the aisles.

27 August: Tuesday never existed for us. We crossed the International Date Line sometime in the dead of night and any Tuesday we had was fleeting and inconsequential. We arrived at Auckland (pronounced "Oakland" by Kiwis) at 5:45 in the morning and had to answer 20 Questions on a declaration sheet, get told that we answered questions wrong by the customs agent, and then got a bag searched for cat medicine. It was a pain and we were forced to haul all our huge luggage to the domestic terminal, which was only accessible by bus. We almost missed said bus except a nice guy got them to stop and helped us load our baggage. We got rude stares from people, but whatever. Peeps got to catch a plane! We still had some time to spare at the terminal, but they had limited Wifi so I posted our first survival notice on Facebook.

The hopper to Christchurch was fairly full and the iPad finally came out to provide limited entertainment for Kara and me. We got our first view of our home at around 9:00 as we did a fly-over before landing. Fields spread out toward the towering New Zealand Alps in the west, while the city itself is a concentrated mass near the Pacific Ocean just north of Littleton Bay, mentioned above. It wasn't an overly spectacular impression, but the snow-topped mountains were beautiful and something we definitely plan to visit soon.

Out first good view of the plains west of Christchurch. Note the mountains in the distance.

Our homestay lady picked us up at the airport and fortunately had an SUV (she calls it a truck) that was barely able to hold our 350 lbs of luggage. She took us to her home about 10 minutes away where we've been staying ever since. The place is a lovely home with four bedrooms, two bathrooms, an office, a kitchen/living room, and a parlor plus a garage. None of those British crammed homes—here, they actually have space to stretch. The neighborhood is very nice and within walking distance to the University of Canterbury. She also has another homestay guest from China as well as a pet cat named Ambrose.

Since it was only about 10:30 in the morning, she dropped us off near the Westfield Mall so we could open our bank account and see about getting phone numbers. The bank account required an address but we worked something out with them so now we can receive Kara's scholarship monies. We decided to go with a Pre-Pay Vodaphone plan but our phones were not actually unlocked yet because T-Mobile stinks at giving proper directions. We went home and fixed that later in the day but had to wait until the next day to get things going again. We stopped at the New World supermarket on the way back and picked up some VERY overpriced foods there. We were told food prices were high, but things are worse than that. Except for dairy products, which are all domestic, most foods are around 50% to 100% higher than in the US, unless they are special imports, in which case they are probably closer to 200% US prices. Oh, and sales are dismally inconsequential.

Weet-Bix! Weet-Bix everywhere!
Oh, the horror! Oh, the humanity!

We also had to get enroled at the University so we got that taken care of, though it was too late in the day to also get our Canterbury Cards (student IDs). On the way back, we stopped at another supermarket called Countdown which had slightly better prices and where we discovered that bread products are sold at reduced prices late in the day. The rest of the evening was spent eating a lovely Fish 'n' Chips meal provided by our host and getting other things worked out. We've already learned a lot from our host and a few other individuals we've met along the way, so fingers crossed that things improve.

One last note, Niko made it okay and immediately fled his cage to sit in sunbeams near a window at the quarantine facility. He will be enjoying their good graces until 9 September when he will be moved to The Catery, a cat kennel with a good reputation. In the meantime, we'll be looking for housing that will allow him to rejoin us.

Observations:

• The actual New Zealand accent is midway between a British and an American accent and much easier to understand.
• There are a lot of non-New Zealanders in Christchurch, especially Indians, Chinese, and Australians.
• The exchange rate is 0.85 UDS to 1 NZD, so expensive things are actually a bit cheaper than they look, until we start using Kara's scholarship money.
• The big earthquake in 2011 destroyed much of the city, but the suburbs rebounded quickly and everything looks new and beautiful because of it. The city center, though, is still in a state of constant reconstruction.
• There are just as many American things here as British and Australian, so it doesn't feel as far away from home as living in Swansea did in 2008-09.
• Things are still strangely proportioned here. Sinks are small, toilet rooms are separate from bath rooms and they are tiny, but there are large cars, wide roads, decent-sized rooms. Overall, strange contrasts.
• Despite popular belief, people are no more or less polite than anywhere else in the world. They are just normal people doing normal things.