It has been a while since I’ve posted anything here, so here it goes. The work at the cafe at the beach retreat has finished. Easter weekend was the last weekend that I had to work there and it was quite a busy one due to the fact that it was a long weekend, meaning working from friday to including monday and on one of the days we had 37 people for a birthday party. This in itself was not really a problem, the only minor thing that troubled me was that we had to stay there until the last people decided to call it a night. This was around 1.30am if I recall correctly, not too bad but when you start at 10am it makes for a long day (granted there is a 2hour break in between). But all in all, I survived. So what is in store for me after finishing this job? Well I already have another one, I work in a bar in downtown New Plymouth during weekends. Mainly drying glasses and clearing tables, not poring drinks. Already have one weekend behind me and working in hospitality has its advantages and disadvantages. The hours are very unpredictable, one day you close at 1am, the other one at 3am, then there are the days that you finish at 4am. You never know and it all depends on the crowd. The bar I’m working at is called ‘Our Place’ and has been open for a bit over a month. It’s a restaurant / bar kind of place, more of a lounge feel to it than a regular cafe. The music is alright and the people I work with are cool.
So working weekends gives me plenty of time for stuff during the week, eg. to catch some waves. I am at the right spot for that, if the weather conditions oblige. But I haven’t been surfing all the time, the last couple of weeks I’ve also been working on a website for one of the local youth hostels. I noticed an ad for this on a job board and I applied for it and since the owner already knew me (I had stayed at this hostel before) I landed the job. I get free accommodation while working on the site. My day usually looks like this: get up, if the surf is any good in the morning -> go surfing first, afterwards work on the site.
What exciting news can I tell you that has happened… well, they filmed the movie ‘The last samurai’ featuring Tom Cruise here. And Tom has helped the local community while he was here. He bought a school some sunroofing and was a nicely seen guest in the community. And I am one of the few lucky people in this world that has actually touched one of the washing machines that belonged to Mr. Tom Cruise himself during his stay in Taranaki. Yep, his washer and dryer are now property of the beach retreat where I worked. How is that for an exciting story!
The other major event that occurred last weekend was the womens ASP surf competition. The worlds best women surfers came to visit the beaches where I go surfing quite a lot. The conditions were pretty rough the first few days but at the end of the competition the weather gave us nice and sunny days but pretty small waves. But these girls sure know how to surf and put up a good show. It also just shows that my surfing still needs to improve a lot :), these girls teared the small waves apart, waves that I can even catch, so yeah, more work to be done on my part. It did strike me how relaxed the whole event was. I can’t come up with a single sport where you don’t have to pay to watch top of the world athletes and can walk up to them and say hi if you wanted to. Well perhaps at a darts tournament. But still, you would think this was a small local event, no sir bob, this was the top of the world…
Anyhow, the weather has been going from nice summer days into rainy autumn shit. Not so pleased about that. Just taking it as it comes, one day at a time. Like the waves, one at a time…
Category Archives: New Zealand
The one involving stripping
Being in a rather remote place has its advantages and disadvantages. So it came to be that we had a booking at the cafe for a ‘Hen’ night. For those unfamiliar with the term, the party people throw before one gets married. And in this case, the kind where the ladies take their soon to be married friend out for a last night of extensive drinking and fooleries before acquiring the married status, usually resulting in a lot of noise, somehow resembling the noise of chickens trying to lay eggs, hence the term ‘Hen’.
Anyhow, we were expecting 13 hens to have BBQ in the evening. I was already being warned of the things that might unfold. The evening started reasonably quiet. We had a few guests who were there to enjoy a nice quiet dinner. We tried to put these people together, away from the table that we set aside for our rowdy bunch. We have a small shed in which we store some of our food items that is in a separate building from the cafe. As I was getting some items from the shed, I could already hear the hens doing what they do best…
At around 19h the time had come for the ladies to enter the cafe and have a seat at their designated table. It was obvious that some of them had the pleasure of consuming a certain amount of alcohol earlier that day. They also had a wide range of blow up ‘toys’ with them depicting the male reproduction system. As soon as I brought some water to the table the question arose concerning the whereabouts of their waiter. After mentioning Belgium, I was asked if I had a chocolate penis which led me to believe that the finer sense of humor would not be found amongst these hens. Granted, there were a few ladies who appeared to be sober and they took it upon themselves to offer excuses for their friends “subtle” humor. ‘No offense taken’ I said, as I am not the kind of person who gets offended by these kind of things.
The other guests in the cafe tried to enjoy the rest of their dinner and I could see them glancing at the party table once in a while after the hens appeared to have laid yet another egg. Slowly the remainder of our dinner guests started to call it a night and it was only our group of 13 to serve.
I am not sure if they realized before they made reservations at our cafe / campground that they would be in a rather desolate place. If this was intentional or not, I can only guess. But sooner rather than later a few girls of the gang approached me to ask if I would be willing to join in some of the activities they were trying to plan for the lucky girl. The first suggestion was for the soon to be bride to lick my chest and have a shot afterwards. I didn’t really object, who am I to reject a person from licking the accumulated sweat of the day from my chest area. But due to circumstances this idea was put on hold. After a while they realized the lack of men in the surrounding area and asked me if I could be persuaded to do a strip act. I replied to them that for the right amount of money everyone can be persuaded. I was interested on what amount they would settle for. Rather surprised was my reaction when they offered me 100NZD. I still acted a bit reluctant and this even led to them stating that I didn’t even have to take off my pants. Just dancing a bit with my chest uncovered would be enough. ‘Don’t worry about your body, we will forget it if it is nothing special, but if it is nice, we won’t forget’ were some of the comforting lines I had to listen too, all in order to convince me. But that wasn’t really necessary. Ladies, you just made a deal. A hundred bucks to show them what every beach going person gets to see for free, granted, with some additional dance moves, who wouldn’t take this offer. I assured them that I would see them at their party area after work. Never mix business with pleasure.
Well, I am not sure if I can describe the mess they left at the table as typical for a bunch of hens. That would do the chicken population injustice. It took a while to clean everything up and there were traces of their presence to be found within a 5m radius of the table. I would say it was a 5.5 on the Richter foodquake scale.
The time had come earn some more money, 100NZD to be exactly (around 53 euro at the time of this writing). They had one building of the campground for themselves to have their party and it was in full effect. I gave up counting the empty bottles of beer / wine / ‘alcohol containing drinks’. I was given a few instructions on what they expected to see, basically I was given full freedom and could use my imagination. ‘Hold on girls’ I said, I am not stupid. First the business side of the deal, show me the cash. Remember, we are dealing with a group of very drunk women who will use any excuse known to mankind to talk their way out of paying. Luckily they respected their part of the deal. Now it was my turn to do the same. I can’t even remember what song they put on to start this business transaction but anyhow… I pulled off some dance moves and started removing my long sleeved shirt, slowly revealing some skin. It is funny how I can think of some fancy moves to pull off right now. You know, we all have seen a strip act shown on TV, granted more of the ones where the female does the dancing, but during my… euhm “performance” my mind did become somehow blank, turning my choreography into not the most memorable in the history of strip acts. Anyhow, use your imagination or try to find footage of the event on youtube. Of course after the long sleeved shirt, off came the tshirt and that is where I stopped. Of course they tried convincing me that I didn’t do my part of the deal, I should also take off my pants. These are situations in which I don’t mind being the only person that doesn’t drink alcohol. I knew what we agreed upon and in the end its the word of a sober guy against intoxicated women.
There was actually one other guy present at this whole show, another guest of the campground. He of course was unimpressed (which I didn’t mind at all) and in an attempt to become popular amongst the girls gave a speech how I should really show more for that amount of money. He even told me I was a rip off and wanted to prove that he could do better and for less money. One of the girls grabbed a 20$ note out of my pants and promised to give it to the other guy if he could deliver the goods. So now it was my turn to watch an early 50 year old man take of his shirt to show off his rather convincing beer belly in front of the hens. I can honestly say that my dance moves were better than his, if he had any. And indeed, he didn’t stop there. He did keep his pants on but he approached the bride to be and even let her peek at his reproduction system. And since I was sober the whole time, I still remember the closed eyes / squinting look of this poor girl which was in stark contrast with the huge grin on the face of our 50 year old stripper. I think he should have hypnotized her a bit more with his shaking beer belly before pulling off that final move.
Sure, he had probably earned his 20$ more than I did. Maybe when I get his age I get this desperate as well.
Afterwards the bride thanked me and told me that she used to travel as well when she was my age. When I asked her how many springs she had experienced on our blue planet she told me that she was 26. I guess alcohol does make people look younger 🙂
Still there was part of the gang that wanted to see me pant-less but it was at this exact moment that they played the most appropriate song that could possibly be played… ‘You can’t always get what you want’ by the Rolling Stones.
Doing the work part of the working holiday visa
My first weekend as a waitor at the Wai-iti beach resort cafe has now been a few days behind me. And it was a long weekend as well since Monday, the 14th was Taranaki day, an extra holiday for the people in this area, but not for me.
I started working on Friday but it was pretty quiet so I only worked a few hours. But Saturday and Sunday were pretty busy. They kept telling me that it is usually not this busy. And the girl that I am replacing was working alongside me as well. And we were both busy. Ah well, so much for getting eased into the job. What is my job, well, working at this idyllic beach resort which has a cafe. The cafe part is leased by Marta and Kevin, an Argentinian lady and a New Zealand guy. Marta started hiring backpackers to work in the cafe since it is part time and it is too far for locals living in New Plymouth to ride out there to work (well, it’s not that far, but for the amount of hours it is maybe too far for some). Which is good for me I suppose. I actually found out about the job by coincidence. One day I went to the surf beach, and just as I was starting to put my wetsuit on, I asked a fellow surfer about the conditions out in the water. It turned out that she was from Germany and when the topic of work came on the ‘table’ she told me about this cafe that she was working at that needed a replacement for herself. So I found the job ad on a backpacker board and applied.
I met Marta the next day and I could start during the weekend that was coming up. I have had no real cafe experience, but I’ve served customers before, being inside a waffle stand on markets. Similar enough.
It went pretty well, a few mixups here and there. The biggest problem I have is running around with a tray full of cofees that are filled to the rim of the cup. Not always without spills :/. And then there is the cash register. Not all of the food items and drinks are preprogrammed on their own distinctive buttons. There are 5 or 6 items that have no button, and I don’t have them all in my head yet, together with their price. But that will work itself out.
Other than that, it is alright. Lots of running around, feet definitely hurt at the end of the day. But the location is really nice and not a lot of tourists come around, mostly locals, which is nice as well. Since it is part time and I only work on Friday, Saturday and Sunday it gives me the rest of the week to go surfing or do some exploring. Well, last week it has been mainly surfing…
I am living in one of the houses of Marta and Kevin which is located in Urenui, a small town about 30km of New Plymouth and about 7 minutes from work. The town has a pub, a library and a supermarket… that’s basically it. And no cell phone reception for my phone provider. And no internet at the house, and no TV reception. So a pretty remote feeling.
Not very helpful when you find out about an earthquake in Japan and want updates on tsunami warnings. Everybody was a bit worried on what awaited us, but in the end it was only a 10cm wave that hit the very north of New Zealand.
We heard about this on the radio. When Kevin came over during the weekend, he brought a working satellite decoder and we could see some of the footage of the Japan quake / tsunami. Unbelievable, it makes the Christchurch quake look like a minor event. Simply incredible.
It gets to you more after experiencing a big earthquake yourself. Although what I experienced was absolutely nothing like what has hit Japan. You all heard about the Richter scale right. Well, the scale works as follows, each increase by 1 means a difference in intensity of 10. So, if you have an earthquake of 4.0, this is 10 times less strong as a quake of 5.0.
So, to put in perspective, the quake in Christchurch that I witnessed was a 6.3. The Sendai quake in Japan was a 8.9. That is almost 3 points on the Richter scale apart. So, the quake in Japan was about 600 times as strong as the Christchurch one. My head starts to spin just thinking about how that must have felt. And they have aftershocks in the magnitude of 7.1 etc. Sends shivers down my spine. But that tsunami, nothing can stop that. Shocking. Every time they show the footage, it doesn’t matter how many times I have seen the footage before, I can’t seem to believe what I see.
And a volcano erupted in Japan as well. Hope this is not a sign of what is to come for the nice volcano that I see here every day.
So what can I say, I write down stuff on my blog about small annoyances here and there and they are just that, small meaningless annoyances. All these events make me realize I should be even more thankful for the things I have and can do. Not that I wasn’t thankful before, don’t get me wrong.
Hang in there Japan.
Moving on
What is left in Christchurch for me, that’s what was spinning through my head after the quake…
Not much I realized. I had actually had a job interview on the day before the quake hit. I was suppose to have a trial day on Friday, to see if I had what it take to do the job. This was for an IT company as a web developer. I guess it was not meant to be. The quake happened on Tuesday… needless to say, I didn’t have my trial day on Friday. The office of the company was downtown, close to cathedral square, right near all the mayhem.
So, the house I was living at was unsafe, no job, no city, aftershocks, no sewage system for a few weeks, meaning doing your ‘business’ squatting over a whole in the ground or wait for the city to distribute chemical toilets. I guess the obvious thing to do was leave the city. And so I did, but not without a somehow ‘bad’ feeling. Part of me didn’t want to go. I had great flatmates, a cool landlady, almost a job… man, that quake couldn’t have hit at a worse time. There is never a good time for an earthquake…
I was just lucky that nobody I knew got hurt and that I didn’t go to the city center that day. If I landed a job one week earlier I would have been right in the middle of the mayhem. So I should not complain at all. But I felt I was bailing out, taking the easy way out, leaving the people I knew behind to clean up the aftermath of the quake.
Miriam’s sister contacted some friends in Nelson and asked if Andrea and me could stay there for a few days to get our thoughts away from the quake. I still had all my stuff at the house in South Brighton that I needed to pick up and I also needed to visit some friends who I couchsurfed with during my first week in NZ. They were so kind to let me use their postal address for some paperwork and there were some letters waiting for me at their house. First up was picking up my paperwork. My friends house was pretty much unaffected by the quake, they live at the south western end of the city. All of their family and friends were alright as well.
On the way to South Brighton I took a road that led us close to the city center and it became very clear how bad this area was affected. Houses that were completely destroyed, walls of buildings completely gone, like they became a puppet house for giants. Well, you’ve all seen it on TV I suppose, my words can’t describe it really. But it was just a glimpse what I saw, it was impossible to get to the city center, the army blocked off all roads leading to it. Not that I really wanted to go downtown anyway.
Grabbed all my stuff out of the house, said goodbye to the landlady and a bit later Andrea and I took off for Nelson. I couldn’t make it all the way to Nelson on the fuel I had still left in my gas tank. Filling up was necessary. This was easier said then done, there where huge lineups everywhere, some places were already out of fuel. After passing about 4 petrol stations and saying ‘we will take the next one’ a couple of times I finally lined up at one that didn’t have that many cars. They asked people to only put in 50$ of petrol, I didn’t need that much to top up my tank.
The road to Nelson was one I had driven before, my second time already, so I knew what was ahead. Stops were kept short as we would arrive at the town during night time. And I don’t like riding at night time on twisty roads. It was 22.45h when we finally made it to our hosts. The following days were just relaxing, letting the stress of the previous days flow away. Stephen and Linda and their son Fergus, the people who we were staying with were really nice and we were very lucky and pleased that we could stay there.
After a few days I decided to head off to Wellington, to meet up with Jesse, a friend I knew from my time in Vancouver.
The ferry ride was pretty smooth, the weather was actually quite nice, so that meant almost no waves on the cook strait that separates the two main islands of New Zealand.
I was going to determine in the next few days if Wellington would become my next base of operations.
I knew that Wellington was not renowned for its surfing beaches, and yes after a few days I was craving already to hit some waves. The weather was sometimes pretty rough in the city, lots of wind. There were also two earthquakes while I was there. This all added up to give me the itch to leave. Not that it is not a nice city. There are lots of cool restaurants and coffee shops and there is plenty of things to do.
But it just is not for me right now. I needed to justify my surfboard purchase and Wellington is not the place where this could be justified. I also visited the Weta workshop, the company that was responsible for lord of the rings, district 9, avatar and countless other movies. Almost could I be tempted to buy a limited edition district 9 gun.
These people certainly know what they are doing. It should be great being able to work for such a company. Perhaps this should be my career change.
Anyhow, so I went further north, north west to be exact, to a region called Taranaki and a city called New Plymouth. This is where I am writing this right now. The last couple of days have been filled up with surfing and searching for a job. Yes, Taranaki is renowned for its surfing, so I am in the right place, and autumn is also the right time for some good waves around here.
Job wise… well an IT job will not be in the pipeline. The city is comparable in size to my hometown, and IT jobs there are hard to come by as well. But I found the next best thing, a part time job working in a cafe on a beach retreat. I will work Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays leaving the rest of the week free for road trips / surf excursions.
Oh and by the way, Taranaki refers to the giant volcano that you can see from all over town. And volcanoes means black sand…
I guess I traded the earthquakes for a giant volcano. What are the odds of this thing erupting… right ?
Earthquake continued
Actually I forgot to mention how I got my car back on the day of the earthquake, I had left it on the other side of a bridge and walked over the bridge to walk to the house. In the evening Ina dropped me off at the bridge again where I crossed again to my car. Apparently there was a bridge further down the road that was still intact (the one on Pages Road, leading to New Brighton). So I decided to try and reach it. This was easier said than done. There were many people on the roads, almost like morning traffic in Belgium on the way to Brussels, just painstakingly slow, but there was a reason for this. There were parts of the road that had transformed into a big mud pool. There were cars that already got stuck and everybody was taking turns to cross this muddy section. There were two tracks in the mud and they were deep enough so that your car would sink away and make the bottom of your car scrape the muddy ground in between the tracks. This is actually what happened to a nice old Corvette that had to go through this mud patch two cars in front of me. It was a nice antique corvette and was pretty low to the ground. Too low to risk getting through if you ask me. But he went in full throttle and managed to make it. So it seemed. Now it was my turn. Adrenalin started to rush, one single sentence in my head, scrolling like a LED banner… don’t get stuck… don’t get stuck … It’s a lot of pressure, especially when you know there are more than 100 cars waiting in line to cross that section. I floored it as well, 1st gear, quickly on to second gear and just fly through. I had enough speed to pull through, I slowed down quite a bit but the wheels had enough traction to get me out of there. I never looked behind to see how others were doing :-). A bit further I saw the Corvette, it was struggling with its transmission. It must have gotten damaged during his full throttle maneuver. I passed him but was not yet near the bridge. First there was more water to cross. I guess this helped to clean the car from the mud patch. At first it was not too deep actually, so that was alright.
But once I crossed the bridge into New Brighton it became really deep. There was a motorcycle that tried to go through, a chopper. His engine almost submerged. He had to stop and push his bike after it had given up. You can’t turn a bike into a jetski unfortunately. But yeah, it was not a piece of cake with a car either, I am sure my exhaust was submerged, but that doesn’t really matter, as long as the engine can suck in air instead of water it can still do it’s thing. I made it across here as well and it was smooth sailing to the house.
The day after the quake. Miriam was scheduled to work. Since she is a nurse she is one of the few that actually work in situations like these. Instead of blindly going there we tried giving the hospital a call to see if she was required. My phone was the only one with some power left but I seemed to have lost signal during the night. We took the car out for a spin to see if we could get a signal somewhere else. When we were about to give up we managed to make the call and she was advised to stay put. They would call her (or me since I had a working phone) if the situation changed during the day.
Ina, my landlady, and Andrea just hung around the house, trying to make the best out of the situation. We had a fire going in a small portable BBQ and were able to boil some water and have a cup of tea. Some neighbors joined in on the fun and stories were exchanged.
After a while I recieved a txt from Miriam that said to go to her mum’s house. She had electricity and her grandparents had running water. Andrea and I were thinking of going but first we did some work at the house. We placed a big wooden board in front of one of the broken windows and fortified the archway that separated the kitchen from the living room by placing a large wooden beam in between and jacking it up with a car jack. One of the neighbors who is a builder came later that afternoon to take a look at this archway. It wasn’t well constructed before the quake and now it had only gotten worse. Not a place you wanted to stand when another shock trembled the ground.
There was still no running water or electricity but we managed to connect a phone to the landline and were able to make calls which was very handy since cell phone traffic was unreliable. Txt message arrived with huge delays, calls usually didn’t reach the other end. I called home and reassured that everything was alright.
After all the tasks were done I contacted Miriam’s mother Rosanne and a bit later Andrea and me were on our way to her house.
She lived in a suburb to the north west of the city center. A good 15km from where we were. And boy, do those 15km make a big difference. Gradually the roads got better and better to eventually show no signs of quake damage. On the way we passed houses who were affected by flooding and liquefaction but again these disappeared pretty fast.
At Rosanne’s house there was electricity and it was here where Andrea and me saw the first images of downtown and as you all know, it was not a pretty sight. It also quite a different picture from what we saw in our own neighborhood. In South Brighton there was a lot of damage to the roads, and flooding and all that, but houses were still standing.
It appeared that downtown there were almost no buildings upright and if they were, the were in really bad shape. But the sewage system is damaged everywhere and everyone is advised to dig a whole in a garden to do nature calls. It could last a couple of weeks before toilets can be flushed again.
The rest of the day was spent watching a movie and doing some grocery shopping, trying to de-stress. Stores were open in this part of town. We did feel the occasional aftershock but this time you could actually hear it coming. You heard the rumble before the actual ground started shaking. We called it a night pretty early since none of us hardly got any sleep the previous night.
Earthquake
The day started pretty relaxed. Had a little chat with my brother about the surf and shipping costs of a wetsuit. By then it was around 10am and conditions looked pretty good for a surf session. So i made my way to Sumner. The waves were pretty big and i was still struggling to reach the back of the sets. Lots of wind, a pretty strong current. I was pretty exhausted and called it a day at 12.20. I really need to get back into surfing rhythm, getting back some strength in my arms. On the way back I decided to stop at the surf shop to get some fins for my board. Just as I payed with by bank card, after entering my code and waiting for the approved signal it happened. The ground started to rumble. I looked at the sales person. We were just standing still, hoping it would be a small one but it kept on going. At that point we rushed for the door and went outside. There was lots of noise of all the surfboards that shook around, boards fell on the ground but the building stayed intact. Not long after that, another big shock. Damn this is not funny. Almost everyone was outside. I didn’t know if my transaction went through or not, at that point I did not really care. This could be sorted out later. I looked at the road and you could see it ‘inflating’. There was a pileup of water underneath the surface and you could see the road bubble up. There was a small shuttle bus that tried to continue riding but one of its wheels sank away.
My car was still in the parking lot of the surf shop and was now being threatened by water. Time to move it. I tried to find higher ground. I rode the car over some lawns of some office buildings on search of some higher ground. i parked around the corner but the water kept on rising. I needed to get out of there. After seeing multiple cars venture through the water with a lot of struggle (engines almost entirely submerged) I did not want to risk going the same way.
But it was clear I needed to get away since the water kept gushing out. I made a quick look around and noticed that the way i had come through was actually the best way to escape and get to higher ground. So i turned the car around, rode over some traffic islands, got submerged a bit, rode illegaly on the opposite side of the road (who was going to stop me right?) and made it to a high road that could lead me back to where I am living, south brighton. There was a lot of traffic, everybody wanted to get home. The road was damaged everywhere, huge cracks that could easily swallow one of your tires, liquifaction that raised sections of the road.
In order to reach south brighton one has a choice to cross one or two bridges since their runs a river on the side of town. When I reached the bridge it was clear to me that this was not going to be easy. The road had sunk knee deep on both sides of the bridge. No car could get over it. Lots of people parked their car on the side of the road and walked to the other side. I decided to do the same.
The traffic was horendous and since my navigation skill around town are not perfected yet this seemed the best option.
Once I reached the other side there was a huge pool of water on the road, again about knee deep. Lots of flooding everywhere. I managed to walk through some forest to reach the main road leading to where I live. Again with puddles of water everywhere, like the ground became one giant mud pool. 
A car pulled up asking me if I needed a ride somewhere. Since I needed to walk about 2km I hopped in the car and got dropped off close to home. In times like these everyone tries to help each other, everyone has to go through the same shit so a helping hand is always appreciated. Now the final short walk home. The houses looked pretty much well intact. One of the neighbors chimney fell off the roof creating a big hole in the ceiling but apart from that most houses seemed ok…from the outside. The house i am staying at was standing upright as well. A broken window here and there, huge cracks in the driveway. Inside lots of broken glasses, an almost empty fridge since a lot of its contents were now on the ground. Tv on the ground. A few more cracks in the ceiling (remind you it had already sustained some damage from the september quake).
I quickly had a peek at my room. Since i don’t have a lot of stuff not much could fall down. My camera was still in the same place, phew… One of its lenses had fallen on the ground but it looked alright. An external hard drive on the ground, a few racks on the ground but nothing major. Nobody was home. I knew this as I managed to get a txt from one of my flatmates. The landlady went to check up on her mother together with one of the flatmates. They arrived after I started the cleaning operation. Oh yeah, aftershocks all the time, rumbling the already shaken house causing me to run outside a few times. These aftershocks are not as bad as the big one, but then again the 6.3 quake is technically also an aftershock of september’s 7.1 quake.
After a while Ina, the landlady and Miriam, one of my flatmates arrived. Immediately the exchange of stories etc. They had been at the house when it happened. We continued cleaning up and also got the bbq started. Granted, not a great timing for a bbq but it is outside and since the furnace in the kitchen is electrical we had no other option. Still no word from Andrea, another flatmate. Luckily she arrived shortly after…what a great birthday present for her :(. She was in the center of town near cathedral square about 20 minutes before it happened. Luckily she took a bus out of there and it was on the bus that she experienced the quake, on her way home. Again, aftershocks gallore. Almost every 10 to 15 minutes, a bloody aftershock reminding us that the earth is still in charge. Everyone started cleaning up their rooms and the rest of the house. Ina had just finished ordering her bookshelves in her room from the september quake. Now everything was on the ground again. Around 7pm I made a quick phone call home to tell them I was alright. I thought they didn’t know the news of the quake, they did. I could not make it very long, preserve prepaid minutes on the phone :(, but still glad I could get the message accross, I’m ok. In the evening some of Andrea’s friends arrived to celebrate her birthday. She had prepared some snacks for everyone. And of course the aftershocks didn’t want to miss the party.
It got dark around 9pm and not long after that the group dispersed and prepared to get some sleep. We set some pots and pans outside to collect some water as it was going to rain. Every drop counts when there is no running water. Miriam, who has a separate sleepout in the garden of the house, was hosting Ina and Andrea. My car was offering to be my host. Nobody was keen to sleep inside the house. Well, I think I managed to rack up a total of 1hr of sleep. Courtesy of my car being not the longest of station wagons but more importantly the aftershocks… By 3am there had already been over 50 aftershocks. So an average of 5 an hour. I don’t think anyone in the whole of Christchurch closed an eye. The radio kept me company during most of the night, looping the same messages over and over with the occasional update. It was a live broadcast and lots of people send txt’s to the broadcasters asking for song requests or giving live updates on what was going on. Some interviews with geologists, members of the government, police and regular folk. Also a constant repetition of the death toll. After a while I had enough of the news. Luckily I had some earplugs, it lessened the sound of the aftershocks. I will never forget that sound though. Deep rumbles shaking everything around you, turning the ground into a giant wave. Luckily I can surf.
More to follow….
Christchurch
After having visited friends in Nelson I decided to work my way back to Christchurch. On the way I stopped at a place called Blenheim where they where looking for people to work in vineyards. I stopped at a hostel and asked them about jobs. The person responsible for the job placements wasn’t around but the lady behind the counter promised me that he would call me back. On to the next hostel where I booked a bed and asked for jobs as well. Again, it was unsure but they would find out more later on the day. Alright then. In the evening I didn’t receive any call and didn’t get an update from the hostel I was staying at. Not really a problem. The next morning the whole hostel got up at 5.30am to start working in the vineyards. Almost everybody except me that is. I was kind of glad that they didn’t call me to work. I am getting too old for this stuff :). So I packed my bags and continued to Kaikoura.
Browsed around a bit, looking for surfshops, scouting for waves and in the back of my head constantly asking the question… Do I want to stay here for a while… Can I find work here ? That’s the thing. I was not too sure on where to base myself in New Zealand. I don’t want to travel around as much as I used to, at least not now. I first want to work a bit, with the option of being close to a beach so I can get my surfing back to a for me acceptable level. And I have come to the conclusion that seasonal work is no longer a job for me. So that leaves either jobs in IT or jobs in hospitality etc. Anyhow, more on that later.
Since Kaikoura did not seem like a suitable place for me I moved on to a place called Hanmer Springs, since someone mentioned it to me and I had never been there before. There are some hot springs there but unfortunately they are of the paying kind, and the resort-like/man made kind. Well, I guess the springs itself are authentic, but they turned into a 8 pool theme park. At least that is what it seemed in my eyes. But I must admit, I did not enter the springs, I didn’t feel like spending 18NZD on the thing. But Hanmer Springs is a nice little town with a ski hill, of course of no use now in the middle of summer. I did a small walk to the top of a local hill which had some nice views of the surroundings.
The next day I kind of had enough of the Hanmer Springs experience. I kept feeling this urge to go back to the coast, find some waves, buy a surf board. So I made my way to Christchurch but I didn’t stay very long, I decided to go to Akaroa. A town about 80km south of Christchurch. Again, somebody told me about it and it sounded good, so why not. The road to this quaint little town is motorcycle heaven. But this can be said of many New Zealand roads. Lots of curves, nice asphalt, a few hairpins here and there, simply a joy for motorcycles. And yes, there are quite a few on the roads. Can’t blame them. Unfortunately the hostel I booked only had a bed for one night (I initially asked for two). They offered free bikes so I took the opportunity to wander around a little bit. But New Zealand is not Belgium. The roads are not perfectly horizontal. Add to this that it is full on summer and you can picture me struggling getting up to some hill, panting and sweating. This Belgian needs to get in shape :). But the views are worth it.
Again a nice little touristy spot, but not a place where I would like to work for a while. But in the evening when I wanted to use my laptop I found out that I had left my charger some 200kms away, in Hanmer Springs. Not cool. I was not very keen to ride back to Hanmer to go get this stupid thing.
So next day I went to Christchurch and decided that this would become my home away from home for a while. The plan, work, save, surf, preferably in this order. The backpackers in the city center don’t have a great reputation so I decided to spend a few days in a hostel at New Brighton, which is situated near the beach. On my way over there they were repairing the roads as a result of the earthquakes they’ve had here in the past few months. Now all road construction sites have a speed limit of 30. I was cruising at about 45. Of course a cop rode towards me in the opposite lane. I spotted him and slowed down to 30. He made a U-turn and came after me. Just what I needed, another story for my blog, with a hefty price tag… that’s what I thought. The officer told me that I had to ride 30 before seeing a cop car, not after :-). He asked me for my license and I showed him my international one. He asked how long I was staying in NZ. I did my story and after having a good look at my license he decided to give me a warning. If you ask me, he probably didn’t want to do all the paperwork. Guess it was my lucky day. I also mailed back and forward with the Hanmer Springs hostel owner and luckily there was someone going to Christchurch that was willing to take my charger along for the ride.
The next day I met up with the girl that brought my charger with her. I actually met up with her several times afterwards as well and it is thanks to her that I have now found accommodation in Christchurch. Since hostels are quite expensive and that rooms are usually shared with 7 other people I started looking for a room in a house. I had called a few places but most of the times, the rooms were already rented out or I didn’t get a response at all. But when Liga (my notebook adapter courier) introduced me to some of her friends I found out that they had an empty room in the house that they were staying at. They asked the landlady and I could visit the place the next day. I liked what I saw and the landlady didn’t mind renting it out to me, so the deal was closed.
Now I am renting a room in a house in South New Brighton, walking distance from the beach. I bought a surf board today and intend to make good use of it.
And oh yeah, occasionally I look for work 😉
New Zealand
Oops, I did it again! Another working holiday visa that is. This time for New Zealand. So on the 25th of January I took off from Brussels airport, early in the morning to go to New Zealand in style. Ok, the plane from Belgium to London was nothing special. But lo and behold, the plane taking me from London to Sydney was the very impressive Airbus A380, spankin’ new. Nothing beats a fresh plane.
But of course, the plane can be as new as you want, it’s where you are located in the plane that is important and there my friends was the catch. They placed me just after the kids section, you know, usually the section that separates first class from second class, where all the babies and families are placed. Bugger, I knew what this meant… crying, yelling and a whole lot of other noises. Needless to say that I hardly did any sleeping, not that I’m very good at sleeping on a plane anyhow. The plane came equipped with a massive library of digital entertainment and even a webcam installed on the tail of the plane !! Say bye bye to the waiting game to actually start using the movie player. As soon as you set foot on the plane, you could start enjoying the digital library.
Anyhow, 13 hours to Singapore, a quick 1hour refueling stop and then on to Sydney, another 11hour leg. Not something you want to do every week. In Sydney I had a 9hour layover, so I had booked a bed in a hostel downtown. Too tired of hardly sleeping on the plane I just went to bed and tried to rack up some rest. Apparently it was Australia day, but to be honest, I could not be convinced to go out and join the festivities after being ‘on the road’ for over 28 hours.
Morning struck and my final leg to New Zealand was about to begin. A relatively short flight to Christchurch (+/- 3hours). The weather was already in the upper twenties centigrade so quite a change from winter time in Belgium. Not that it bothered me too much.
It was straightforward to go through customs and immigration and I got my entry stamp and am now allowed to stay for a year in New Zealand on a working holiday visa. The last one that I can claim since I am getting too old for this stuff and since Belgium has only 3 countries with whom it has working holiday agreements, Australia, Canada and New Zealand. Better make this one count I suppose.
In Christchurch I found a place to stay through Couchsurfing. My great hosts gave me tips, food and a great base to start arranging boring stuff such as setting up a bank account, getting a tax number, getting a sim card, looking for a car, looking for work …
The easiest is the sim card, just pay 5 NZ dollars, and you have one. No forms to fill out, nothing, just pop it in your phone and you are set. Too easy !!
Bank account, pretty easy as well, just make sure you have a NZ address. Same with the tax (IRD) number, which you need when you work. Then the lookout for a car. I wanted a station wagon since I am thinking of surfing and having the option to sleep in the care when needed. What can I say. Every car that you see has something wrong with it. At least the cars in the price range that I am looking for. I was not too keen to buy a car off some backpackers since they are the ones who generally tend to skip maintenance on a car. I’m not saying every backpacker does this, but just, I preferred buying a car owned by a local. So after a few days of looking at cars I finally settled on one, an old 1990 Ford Laser 1.5 manual. Owned for it’s entire life by an old lady, and now owned by a middle aged Belgian visitor. Let’s hope I don’t run into too many problems with this one.
Then ordered some third party insurance and I am ready to hit the road. Insurance is actually not that bad, 200 NZ dollars for 9 months of third party insurance. I guess it doesn’t hurt being over 30 🙂
After all these things sorted out there is only one thing left to do… find work. I did apply for a software development job in Christchurch. Was called in for an interview at the recruitment agency. They asked me to provide some references which I still haven’t done yet. Not actually sure I want to stay in Christchurch and not even sure I want to commit to an IT job. Will see what I do.
So where am I writing this ?? I left Christchurch and went to Nelson, where I visited some of my friends that I met in Australia a few years back.
Yes, this was before this blog’s existence, but it was also on a working holiday visa ;-).
Will stay in Nelson for a couple of days before I move on to Blenheim and scout some work opportunities there.
Goodbye working holiday visas, Europe here I come 