On Beaches, and How They All Look the Same

Our batch of non-fried refried beans

4 September: On Thursday, we had another off day where there was nothing in particular planned. Kara wanted to check out the local Salvation Army thrift store, so we ventured down to Riccarton Road, the main drive through the area, and visited not only the thrift store, but a few books stores, a game store, and the New World grocery store. I've been working on my Santa Cruz Trains book every day since last Sunday and its getting pretty intense. Kara edited most of the material I had so far—the first three chapters—and then I corrected the edits. We also cooked our first batch of refried beans for burritos. It took eight hours, but they came out very tasty in the end. Perhaps a bit too spicy, but that's not a problem for me. It ended up being quite a long day despite the relaxation.

5 September: Friday was yet another day of wondering 10 miles to preview two apartments for rent. This time, the first house was near where the second was on Wednesday. It was a long hike and the house was terribly unimpressive despite a small stream with ducks immediately adjacent to it. It literally looked like nothing had been repaired since the earthquake. The garage was even leaning sideways! That evening, we marched another five miles there and back to a home even further away than the first house on Wednesday. It was the best we'd seen yet, which isn't saying much. But it was a zoo with people checking it out and we discovered on Sunday that we didn't get it anyway. So our search continues.

Friday morning, our homestay host returned right in the a.m. It was a bit earlier than we were expecting since she was flying in from Invercargill, a city at the very bottom of the South Island. When we weren't marching around the city, I was working on my book, starting one of the most headache-prone sections, Santa Cruz Union Depot & Freight Yard. Progress was fitful and unfulfilling.

Kara lounging on Sunny Saturday on a beanbag beside Ambrose the cat (also lounging)

6 September: Saturday was another mostly relaxation day, though I took it as a work day. The depot article became the bane of my existence this day and I worked on it for hours, neglecting my Medieval studies and Kara in the process. It wasn't a fun day. In the evening, at least, we went to a special presentation at the Uni put on by the FemSoc (pronounced "fem-sock"and meaning Feminist Society). A panel of nine local politicians and party activists were on board to discuss feminist issues and their party's perspectives. New Zealand has a national parliamentary election coming up in two weeks so the politicians are taking every opportunity they can. I did feel sorry for the guy from the Concervative Party because he was neither a politician nor a woman nor young and none of his politics matched those of the eight women who sat there beside him. I think he felt left out but when he stated his position on homosexuality, well, let's just say things were just barely saved from becoming a riot.

Containers near the city center, marking places where
buildings are at risk of falling into the road. Four stories of
containers don't seem any safer to me, honestly.

7 September: Sunday saw our first adventure on the metro transit system in Christchurch. It wasn't terrible, which is good, though the bus fares aren't overly cheap. We visited the local racetrack where a weekly market is held. It's pretty much a swap meet/flea market kind of thing but it was fun checking it out and we'll probably go back. There's no entrance fee, which is extra nice. From there, we hopped on the bus and headed to New Brighton...no, not the one in Santa Cruz and definitely not OLD Brighton in England. This one does bare some resemblance to Manhattan Beach, though. The main street and pedestrian mall was rather run down, unfortunately. Part of it was caused by the earthquake but part was just a lack of care, with graffiti on walls and other visible problems with the commercial district. The beach itself was beautiful, though, and we discovered that we're actually at the bottom end of a large bay which looks remarkably like Monterey Bay. Very strange. A short concrete pier jutted out into the ocean so naturally we had to go to the end. Not much more to see from there than from the beach, but we did watch some sorry surfers try to catch non-existent waves. That was fun. Our trip back let us pick up some more food from Pak 'n Save, so we're stocked up for the next few days. Lastly, I finally finished the article I'd been struggling with all week, and this one gets to go to reviewers afterwards because I still need some fact checking. Ugh. The trials of being a historian.

A panoramic view of Christchurch Bay.

Observations & Interesting Facts:

• New Zealand has at least eight major political parties. The two big ones are the National and Labour Parties. National is in control of the government right now and is slightly right while Labour is slightly left. Also on the left are the Green and Mana-Internet Parties. On the right, the Conservative and ACT Parties represent traditional morality and hard-line capitalism respectively. There are also two parties that are relatively neutral, focusing on specific issues: those are the Māori Party (native-focused) and the New Zealand First Party (nativist-focused).
• The term "Zealandia" refers to items specifically unique to New Zealand.
• L&P (Lemon & Paeroa) is a Zealandia soda manufactured by Coca-Cola that tastes like a hard lemon candy in soda form. Quite tasty actually.
• "Afghans" are not just peoples and blankets, they are also a type of cookie! This Zealandia treasure is a crunched up frosted flakes mixed with chocolate with a soft chocolate center and a walnut on top.
• All New Zealand paper money has a drawing of an indigenous bird on the reverse and some of the coins do too.