"One day when the boss get hungry, guess who's gon' be on the plate?" -Sebastian from "The Little Mermaid"

It is 44 degrees right now.  With the windchill factor, make that 36.  As much as I hate the sticky Baltimore heat, I could use a little bit right about now.  I had grand plans to go see one of the film festival movies tonight, but to be perfectly honest, my sweats and slippers called, and I answered, "yes."  Meanwhile, Brad and two of our housemates are at a rugby game probably freezing their tails off.  I considered becoming an indignant feminist when Rich asked Brad and Craig, "Do you two wanna go to the rugby match for a guys day out?  I have 3 tickets."  But then I remembered that I know nothing about rugby.  Because I'm a girl.  (Kidding!)

Yesterday however was a much nicer day and Brad and I decided to get out of the city and head out to the peninsula.  Dunedin is located at the base of the peninsula, so it's just a short bus ride out on a coastal (very coastal, like I-sure-hope-the-bus-driver-is-paying-attention coastal) road.  Ideally you would drive your own car so that you can stop in all of the cute little seaside villages, as well as keep your eyes peeled for seals, albatros, and if you're quiet and patient enough, yellow eyed penguins, the rarest in the world.  Brad and I want to rent a car when it gets warmer and make an overnight out of it, but we thought it would be fun to visit the village of Portobello for a day trip since, like I said, the bus goes directly there.

I'm not exactly sure how I got it into my ever-hopeful peabrain that Portobello would be full of things to do.  Maybe it the cute name.  However there was kind of a whole lot of nothing.  We got off the bus and watched a few tumbleweeds blow by before seeing a sign for the aquarium, 1.8 kms up the road.  Come on feet!  One of the things I love about New Zealand is that even if the things you planned to do turn out to be a bust, you still have the most beautiful scenery, and just a simple walk makes the trip worth your while.

View of Dunedin from the peninsula

One of many bird sightings

Portobello: bustling metropolis

"There's no fence... the sheep can just walk on the road Brad!" I needed this demonstration to understand what a cattle grate was.

So cute!  I think they could just roll over the cattle grate if they were clever enough.

I wasn't laughing so much at this photo idea, but at Brad trying to get the sheep to look up by going, "CLOODLE OOODLE LOOO!" much like a certain character in "True Grit" :)

About 30 minutes later, we arrived at the aquarium/marine study center.  While I liked that it was very research-oriented (you could see Uni students actively working), I have been severely spoiled by the Batimore Aquarium.  The coolest thing I saw was a 6-foot long blue eel, but I really wanted to see their resident octopus who hid on me.  How inconsiderate of him!  And before we knew it, we had seen everything in the aquarium.  Wah-wah.

If you're seeing this, consider yourself lucky because I have a feeling foamy is going to ask me to take it down soon.

The 6-foot blue eel is right along the wall... click to enlarge.

Small sand shark

seahorse

shark nursery

 Like I said, pretty much anywhere in NZ is beautiful, so there's really no such things as a bad day trip, but this was pretty close.  The main highlight was feeding my apple core to a horse instead of carrying it to a trash can.  Unless we wanted to wait another 4 hours for the next bus back to the city, we had to catch the one waiting when we got back from the aquarium so we didn't get to go out to eat or anything, but we did get a Cookie Time afghan chocolate chunk cookie- it's hard to explain, but I'm pretty sure their made in Heaven.  20 grams of saturated fat never tasted so good!

We hit the grocery store to buy some veggies (an effort to make up for the cookies) and I nearly forgot all about the lame aquarium until I saw this:

"Unemployment is capitalism's way of getting you to plant a garden." ~Orson Scott Card

While not finding a job yet has been frustrating, I would be lying if I said that waking up at 10, taking 2 hours to drink my coffee, then going into the city to check out museums, see movies, and go shopping all followed by several episodes of Dexter season 5 is not the worst thing that's ever happened to me.

Brad and I moved into our apartment last Saturday, and so far we are loving it.  We are sharing a house with 5 others.  One kiwi, Flo, who is a student, her Scottish boyfriend Craig, an English guy Rich who works construction, and two Korean chefs H.H. and Kenny who work nights and we hardly ever see.  Everyone is really nice.  Brad and I have a furnished bedroom with a fridge, microwave, toaster, kettle, flat screen TV and unlimited wireless internet (a rare treasure in New Zealand).  We share the full kitchen, 2 bathrooms, and laundry with everyone else.  Flo, Craig, Brad and I have gone out once, but mostly play Trivial Pursuit and drink Speights.  Life is tough.

This is what happens when Brad tries to buy bedding.  It was not pretty.

Before...

Definitely before...

View from our deck

...and after!

More after

Now wasn't that worth the struggle, Brad?

Front door

Kitchen

Kitchen

The job hunt hasn't been entirely fruitless however.  I did land a week-long job at the University doing a space survey.  No, I'm not working for NASA.  I go around several buildings on the campus with my little clipboard and mark off how the rooms are being used, if the lights are on, etc.  And I get a name badge.  You can imagine I will look pretty intimidating between the clipboard and badge, so hopefully someone will notice me and hire me as a secret service agent.

I've also had 2 job interviews.  One was at Pier 24 restaurant which is a beautiful new resort right on the beach.  While I don't have any waitressing experience, I think I may have tricked them into considering me for the position anyways.  I'm supposed to find out by the end of today if I got it or not.  Yesterday, I went for an interview at a retail store and wanted to run out after 2 minutes.  The owner was a huge snob who proceeded to ask me if I was planning on going away on the weekends (umm, yea) and then drilled me about whether or not I had applied for other jobs (umm, yea) as if that was any of her business.  Needless to say, I don't think they will be offering me the job, but that is no loss.  Cross your fingers about Pier 24... I hear Elton John in staying there when he plays Dunedin in November!

So finding a job has been the main focus, but in between I've been enjoying taking the 13-minute bus ride to the beach:

The big building is Pier 24 Restaurant

My seal impression

And also enjoying the city in general:

Peep hole into a movie theater in a cool little mysterious pub we found...

Chocolate sculptures... that seagull looks delicious...

Cptn. William Cargill monument

This is only 1 in a series of 3 hilarious ads... more to come.

As a side note and bonus, I got to Skype with these guys today:

Miss you!

 Wish my luck on my new career in the secret service with NASA doing surveys!

“It is not the mountain we conquer but ourselves.” -Sir Edmund Hillary, First Man to Summit Everest (and a New Zealander)

While research tells me that Edmund Hillary was born and raised in Auckland, I would bet he trained to summit Everest by walking the streets of Dunedin.  The hills here are killers, and Hogwartz is on a steep one for sure.  By the time I leave this city, I’m going to be in amazing shape.

View of Speights brewery at the bottom of the steps

            In fact, Dunedin has (literally) the world’s steepest hill on Baldwin Street.  And what do the kiwis do with this hill I ask you?  Why race giant candy down it to raise $50,000 for charity of course!  The Jaffa Race happens once a year and you can buy a ticket for $1.  The number on your ticket is then taped onto a marble-sized Jaffa candy (kind of like a round M&M or giant Sixlet).  25,000 of these babies are released at the top of the hill and the first 5 down win the grand prizes: $1000 grocery and/or gas gift certificates.  Now I imagined the candies rambling peacefully down the hill while children squeeled with delight.  However it was quite different. It began with a rumble and the next thing I knew there were Jaffas going freakin’ everywhere.  The race lasted only 30 seconds but by the time they had passed my hair was blown straight back and there was a trail of fire left on the street.  Awesome.

Side view of Baldwin Street

They have the best view in the house.

This will give you and idea of how steep the street is.

The filmographer

It was not, in fact, the winning ticket.

Here they come!  Click this picture to enlarge and check out the people shielding their faces.

...and there they go!

Fallen Jaffa candies.  Yes, kids were eating these.

I wish I had jaffa candy sweeper on my resume!

                On the way home, we took a detour through the city’s botanic gardens.  Even though it’s winter, they were still beautiful.  They also had a large collection of birds (in cages; boo, but still beautiful).  However, our favorite ones were in the wild.  They’re called kereru and look just like pigeons only they weigh about 50 lbs and when they hop from branch to branch the tree looks like it’s in pain.

Golden pheasant

Azaleas

The beloved kereru

                    Our last stop was to The Otago Museum.  We only spent about an hour or so there, but I really dug it and want to go back when I have more time.  They had a lot of natural history exhibits, 2 great photography exhibits, and a whole section about human history that included an 1877 cast made of a Japanese bound foot… ewww.

These things still swim in Australasian waters... creepy.

A child jumping on Brad.

Sir Edmund Hillary's mug when he was on Everest

You can add your own caption to this.

            The more time I spend in the city, the more I like it.  All of these cool attractions with green, rolling hills in the background is an awesome balance of urban and rural.  Now I just need to balance spending all of this money with getting a job… wish me luck!