Tunnel Beach

On Sunday, my flat went to lunch at Juni's host-family's house. On the way there, we went to Tunnel beach, which is this beautiful beach surrounded by cliffs, only accessible through a tunnel one of the early settlers dug through the rock!

On the sign right at the top it says "Tunnel Beach walk- 20 minutes downhill- 40 minutes uphill". It was pretty accurate!

After the beach we went to the Dunn house and had a wonderful lunch. They are coming over on Saturday with the two girls (10 and 12 and so much fun) for Nanette's 21st birthday dessert. I was going to make it Nanette's 21st / Beckie's 20.5 (May 22) birthday... but then Alex said, "Beckie just wants attention!" So, it remains Nanette's 21st.

Crazy weekend!

Last weekend was so hectic!

A few of my friend were in this 48 hour Film Festival, where you have 48 hours to write, cast, film, edit, and produce a short film- my barbershop quartet agreed to do a scene with them for the opening credits, for which I had to write music late late on Friday night. Then on Saturday morning we went to the Otago Harbour where we were shooting a lot of the film on a family friend of Logan's huge yacht. The weather was beautiful and we sang relatively well, considering I had just written the music. Then, I got my rugby stuff together and met the team to drive to Carisbrook stadium [The House of Pain]. We had the honour of playing at the professional stadium, which was great! I also got to start on wing, which was also great because these are some of the best woman rugby players in the world! The team we were playing against was the Woman's A team from "Pirates Rugby Football Club". These (wo) men were HUGE, especially the fullback (#15). Depending on the play, it was up to me a few times to tackle her. The first time I attempted this she sent me literally flipping though the air! I did a complete backflip and then summersaulted on the ground for a good 5m. I wasn't hurt, and I think she did end up dropping the ball forward, so I suppose the tackle was even effective, but these girls are BIG! I am remembering to keep my mouth guard in!

Later, we had Clubbies at the team clubrooms where the premier A teams (my team) wear all black and fancy scarves or ties. I had to do my rookie jug scull (Rooking is an ongoing process here) for the scarf: drinking an entire jug of beer at once! (In the interest of my liver most of it was spewed back up shortly later - classy I know). Later that night they made us do another skull as well. All in all there was a lot of alcohol consumed that night. We had a team lock-in in the change rooms after the fancy dinner. We got to dress each other up in costume- and Olive dressed me as "Little Bo Peep". In the pictures there is one of the Backs singing "Build me up, Buttercup" for the judges. Yes, these are some of the most talented rugby players in Otago, NZ and even the world, and this is what how ridiculous we looked in costume!

I got home at around 10pm because we had just had so much alcohol at which time wise people just told me to go to bed, and so I felt better in the morning.

Queenstown (and Milford Sound)

Lately I've been really busy doing lots of assignments and lab reports. It turned out that there was a break in the flow coincidentally last weekend. My flatmate and her boyfriend are both pilots and Xander wanted to practice, so Laura and I got a private 4 person airplane ride to Queenstown. We left on Thursday afternoon into some fine weather, and got back on Sunday. The view out the plane windows was just fantastic - central Otago is breathtaking! Then we got to the mountains, and they were really spectacular. There are all these bright blue lakes and rocky-ish type mountains... which are really impressive to the Americans. Its awesome, they're like "Wow check out the SNOW on the MOUNTAINS!" At the same time, I'm thinking how lame NZ snow is, but its still fantastic. The area near Queenstown was used in a few major LOTR scenes, and its pretty recognizable. How random is it to go somewhere and feel like you've been there before? Except for the part where they edited out the entire town, etc.

On Friday, we had a nice relaxing day - I walked around Lake Wakatipu and picked the exact location of where my wedding pictures will be (the photo with the bridge over the water!) . Laura and I went jetboating on the Shotover river which was really moving from high rainfalls previously. We also went up the gondola and were able to see the entire town and mountains from above- we hit it right at sunset, which was great. We then Luged partway down the mountain, which was great fun.

On Saturday, Laura and I went on a trip to Milford Sound with a little tour van. It was worth it for the drive there alone. Along the way we stopped for numerous lookouts and scenic photo spots. We also saw Lake Te Anau (2nd largest in NZ, the largest being Taupo -I've also been there, 3rd is Lake Tekapu - been there as well!). Along the way we stopped at a bird sanctuary with some really rare birds. In NZ there are no native mammals, so the birds expanded their ecological niche and so there a lot of fat birds who don't fly with no natural predators. The scenery is like nothing else - so spectacular! Milford Sound is one of fifteen fjords on the west coast that are all protected in Fjordland National Park, and it is arguably the most accessible and photogenic. We got onto the boat, and there were just ~10 of us on this huge boat! The boat went up and down the entire fjord. Its something else to see mountains plunge right into the water. There are also many waterfalls because it is always raining on the west coast. (although we had perfect weather)

Saturday night, we went to town in Queenstown. Its a party place, but don't worry I used my rugby skills to ensure I could fight off any kind of attack. (haha) Also, Krystle's boyfriend is 6 foot 3 and he's protective of his friends. But it was mostly me.

On Sunday, we all flew home, and I thanked Xander for his excellent flying by throwing up in the plane. Classy.

Pictures are being nasty and not uploading. Will try again later

Its weird. Just now, I realised that I have effectively started my life over somewhere else. At the beginning, I thought about home a lot, wondering what other people were doing and if they were thinking about me. Since coming back from the vacation to the north island (which I still have to write about!) my life has been completely hectically full with school, assignments, friends and social things. And then there's my rugby team and choir, and training for running still. I never watch TV, and I barely check my email, becuase I'm actually too busy!

So. Now for an update. Last weekend we went out to a soft-shore and sampled benthic organisms out on the Otago peninsula. It was quite nice. Then my rugby team won 98-0. The benefits of having 3 world champions on my team. Then, we had this club lock-in with kegs where basically the idea was to get us absolutely hammered. This was effective. All the teams (4 mens and one womens team) were given themes to dress up as... ours was Chapelle Corby: an Aussie ex-model turned drug dealer who was arrested in Bali a few years ago. So the girls all dressed up as models- in prison uniforms. It was pretty hysterical. Then, on Sunday and Monday I wrote a 4200 word ecology report and a 2000 word microbiology paper-both wer due on Monday, so I had two days of straight writing, without sleep. It was wonderful for my health, but I probably did very well on them. Somehow I've developed the ability to really perform under pressure! This is bad, as it will probably pave the road for more intense procrastination in the future.

Four girls in my choir have formed a barbershop quartet, and of course, I got the bass part! Its hysterical, and we really are quite good. The choir is doing some concerts in Wanaka (west of here near the mountains) on May 19th weekend.

This week I basically went to rugby, got muddy and wet, slept, and hung out with a few friends. This weekend, we took on the inbred sheep farm girls and the big Maori girls from Invercargill at home, but they went down 24-12, we didn't have some key players, but it was a lot of fun anyways.

Today I've basically been at the library working on an essay and soon I'll be making dinner for my flat!

I'll post some random pictures too... as per the usual. These are all from the first few days of the trip- Wellington is the city in the day, and the nighttime pictures are from the countryside outside of Plamerston North.

BACK!

It was an effing trip of a lifetime, people! There are way too many details to explain right now, but I have had the most amazing time of my life.

The north island of NZ is beautiful- we saw beaches and rainforests, glow-worms and rainbows, waterfalls and gysers, geothermal lakes and 90-mile beach. We stayed the night in Wellington, Palmerston North x 2 (with Nanette's friends), Rotarua, Auckland, Paihia, Sam's farm, Auckland (with Nanette's friend Ben), and Christchurch. We also visited many other places and I can confidently say now that I know much of the North Island. If you ever get the chance, go there, I can't even describe how amazing it is to drive up to Mount Doom, or to stand in the same woods as Frodo and exclaim "Get off the road!" I haven't even uploaded pictures onto my computer yet, but when they get up I will begin to put some of the better ones up. Between the three of us who went (my American flattmates Nanette and Laura) we have over 1000 pictures. So therefore they will not appear here. However, once back in Canada, please bring me some food and a comfy chair and I will talk you through all of them.

Will be back later, but also wanted to let you all know I'm back and I'm safe.

Love Rebecca

Tn5 is the devil

Question: What is 31 pages long?
Answer: My stupid microbiology ab report.

It was due at 5:00pm, so have no fear, I handed it in at 4:58 and then had a lovely chat with my professor who came to pick them up. It was a little sad because I actually had to pull the allnighter, so I was in recovery for a bit of last night.

Today, I'm going to go to the the Fahmah's mahkit again because strawberries are still in season, and then apparently I'm supposed to go to this "Legendary Keg Race" beginning at 12 noon. Apparently you have to put the Kegs on wagons and drink at all these legendary places in Dunedin, in teams, in costume. My team is going as 1980s aerobics instructors, so I'll just wear some running tights and rugby socks scrunched down... and then of course the side-ponytail.

On Sunday is my friend Tim's 21st birthday party: Part II. We're meeting in the botanical gardens and having a lovely afternoon of: (directly quoted from the fancy invite):

"Petanque, Croquet, Pink Champagne and Cucumber Sandwicheds".
Ladies: summer frocks
Gentlemen: if its not tweed, its not a jacket.

Isn't that hysterical? I don't think I've worn a summer frock in my life. It sounds frilly and pink.
And tweed? All I can think of is Mr. Ross... and his tweed jackets.

Pictures: Botanical gardens- and the aviary.

More pictures and pompous profs.

Yes. I do take many pictures of myself! But I really was here... Not adept enough at photo shop to have edited myself into here. Besides... look at the waves... soooo shiny, and soooo beautiful... we wants them, precious.

Ok and this IS exciting. The guy who discovered Two-Component Systems is my "Topics in Microbial Genetics" prof! That's pretty sweet, eh? For those of you who don't know or care what I'm talking about he is very famous and internationally renowned and I knew the name Clive Ronson was ringing a bell for some reason. He's definitely the typical self-absorbed pompous high-class ivory-tower type with very distinguished facial hair, but it somehow makes it that much more awesome. His belly precedes him into class and he goes on something like:

"Well today we AHH going to TaHHk about my little contribution to science. For those of you who didn't know this (as if it was 2+2 = 4) I discovAHHH-ed the 2-component system. And at that time, of course, we didn't know we were naming an entire paradigm of science..." *smug smile*

We actually learned more about his time at Harvard discovering the genetic sequences involved than about 2-component systems themselves. Good thing I already learned about them sufficiently in Genetics 304 back at the U of A.

Pictures have anyone convinced yet?

Mary, I haven't figured out yet if I can bring back sand, but I think probably not if they count as soil- if so then I'll have to bake them into cakes... or something more sneaky. Maybe Alias could give me some ideas...