I Mean, Kepler Track Was Pretty Cool...

OMG KEPLER TRACK WAS BOMMMMB!!! It was like On-Top-Of-The-World type of Wonderful... like I might NEVER get over the coolness of this past weekend...

So 6am Friday morning, I met up with Alan, Mackenzie, Gray, and Dylan for our weekend adventure. (By the way, 1) Dylan is girl and 2) random cool fact about Dylan = she's from New York but used to live in Westlake Village - WHOA - on the Lindero Canyon Road side of North Ranch - Double WHOA).

We drove west for about 3.5 hours to Fiordland National Park (which is located in the southwest part of the South Island), checked in at the Vistors' Centre, put on our packs, and started our first Great Walk.

So New Zealand has these cool things called Great Walks. They are New Zealand's best/most beautiful/most popular hikes.... Basically, if you choose to do these hiking tracks, you'll be seeing some of the best scenery in the country. There are five Great Walks on the South Island, three on the North Island, and one on Stewart Island. Anyways, we were all pretty pumped because Kepler Track was everyone's first Great Walk. And MAN, it was indeed quite great...

We started off just cruising along Lake Te Anau (pronounced "tay-ah-nu"). Then we passed the Control Gates (It was basically a bridge. And once we crossed over, we were "officially" on Kepler Track - YESSSS!). We continued on along Lake Te Anau, wandered into the rainforest, stopped for a quick lunch, cruised for a couple more hours up this SUPER RAD rainforest mountain, hiked up past the tree line, almost got blown away because it was SOO Ridiculously Windy above the tree line, and then we checked out our TOTALLY NEAT view of Lake Te Anau in the northeast (our starting point) and then of Lake Manapouri in the southwest (our endpoint)... we arrived at Luxmore Hut (there are no campsites at the top) after only 5 hours of hiking, claimed our bunks for the night and then chilled in the kitchen/dining area with all the other backpacking groups. Day One = Championing the Mountains = Success. We made some dinner for ourselves, drank some hot chocolate, taught Dylan how to play Hearts, and eventually went to bed...

Day Two was awesome. And I mean, SOOOO AWESOME!! We all got up, ate some breakfast, repacked our backpacks, AND THEN we spent the next few hours Walking On MOUNTAIN TOPS surrounded by The Craziest Clouds EVER. We had the cirrus clouds that were really high in the atmosphere. We had rainclouds off in the distance (because it had rained the night before). And then we had huge clouds of fog just rolling and rising off the lakes. IT WAS SPECTACULAR.

AND this whole time we are hiking on the tops of mountains... we were literally on mountain ridges. Surrounded by lakes, waterfalls, keas, funky plants, and clouds. No Joke, all five of us were flipping out The Whole Time. Six hours of Awesomeness. It was Seriously THAT Cool.

Mackenzie and Dylan were moving pretty steadily, whereas Alan, Gray, and I were REALLY distracted by all the coolness that Kepler had to offer... Basically, I was just being obsessed with life and clouds, so yeah... I got to be pretty occupied with just existing so high in the sky... and Alan and Gray are both film majors so both of them kept alternating between filming with their video cameras and using their regular still cameras... Anyways, so we got separated from Mackenzie and Dylan a couple times Oops. But they waited by the kea birds to eat lunch with us! When we caught up with them, they were just chilling by a group of keas. (Keas are one of the few alpine parrots in the world... they make the weirdest sounds... like a dying cat. But Keas are really pretty... from far away they just look dark brown or black, but when you see one up close, you can see that it has orange feathers on the underside of it wings and blue feathers on its outer wings.) Anywho, we all sat down on top of our mountain and had lunch together and it was delicious... Peanut butter, honey, and banana all in a tortilla for me YUM :)

After our lunch stop, Mac and Dylan motored ahead and Alan, Gray, and I cruised along some more ridges together. We eventually descended and got back down to the tree line where the trees were all nice and mossy. We descended more and more back into the rainforest, crossed a few bridges, passed some little waterfalls, and arrived at Iris Burn hut and campsite only ten minutes behind Mac and Dylan. We all set up our tents, took a break in the shade away from the bugs, cruised over to this MONSTER Waterfall nearby, made some dinner, and went to bed... Yay for Day Two!!

Totally could not sleep at all that night. It wasn't that cold for me in the tent in my sleeping bag, the grass was really soft... so I have no clue why, but I pretty much got no sleep Sunday night. Kinda weird but whaterror, we all got up at 7am (AHH! It was SO COLD that morning and the sun wasn't even out yet) because we wanted to pack everything up and leave at 8am... because it's supposed to take people eight hours to get to from Iris Burn to Rainbow Reach (our endpoint) and we wanted to have enough time to hike to Rainbow Reach and catch a shuttle at 5pm.

We packed everything up and headed out of Iris Burn around 8am so yay, that worked out pretty well... Mackenzie was leading our group for most of the day and so she got to set the pace for us. MACKENZIE MOVES SO FAST! She seriously walks SO FAST! And she doesn't stop or slow down EVERR... So basically, we were moving like machines. It got to the point where I couldn't even fathom stopping or slowing down... like I Could Walk Like This Forever... so Why In The World Would I Want To Stop? Okay, I mean... we did stop for breakfast on the trail and for lunch by the lake, etc... but other than that, we just kept moving through the forest like some unstoppable hiking force, It Was Awesome... I thoroughly enjoyed moving that fast for such a long period of time. Anyway, all the native flora and fauna was looking especially delightful that day, Lake Manapouri was all sweet and sparkly in the sunlight, and the trail to Rainbow Reach was pretty easy so Day Three = So Good.

Cool Things about Lake Manapouri (pronounced like"man-na-pour-e"):

- You can drink the water straight out of the lake. So when we stopped for lunch, I got to fill up my water bottle with a bit of Lake Manapouri, SWEET!

- In the Fellowship of the Ring, at the end of the movie, when Boromir tries to take the ring from Frodo/when Merry and Pippin get captured by orcs/when Frodo and Sam leave for Mordor by themselves.... that was all filmed at Lake Manipouri. This Is Awesome. Basically, New Zealand = Middle Earth (plus Pandora, plus Ferngully).

Since we had been moving so fast, we got to Rainbow Reach at 2pm... meaning that 1)the last section of the track only took us six hours (instead of eight) and 2) Alan could take the 3pm shuttle (instead of the 5pm shuttle) to get back to the car and then pick us all up. Total Success! While waiting, we all just lay around on the grass in the sunshine. Man, that sunshine was so glorious. Honestly, the weather for the whole weekend was seriously perfect... we had looked up the weekend forecast before leaving Dunedin and it said that it would be raining, windy, and cold and so we had all prepared ourselves for crazy weather conditions but instead, we totally lucked out and got the best weather ever!!

We headed back to Dunedin (I got to drive for part of the way... Driving on the left side of the road YESSSS), took showers, and then Alan, Gray, and I went to this kebab place in town for dinner that SO DELICIOUS! Annnnd after that, Alan and I watched some Lord of the Rings because 1) we are in New Zealand and 2) Dylan has all the extended versions YESSSSS.

Really really really great weekend. Kepler Track was SO SICK.

I am So Pumped for next week/semester break because I'm going with friends to do two more Great Walks - Routeburn Track (up in Mount Aspiring National Park) and Abel Tasman Track (on the northwest part of the South Island)... It Will Be Awesome.

On the more regular side of life, I have some homework for this week and a paper due Wednesday (slash tomorrow)... Sweet Life/I heart the library.

So The French Guy Finally Showed Up

Monday morning (yesterday), I had just finished with my shower and I was getting ready in my room when TOTALLY OUT OF THE BLUE Muhammad shows up. Okay, well, it wasn't totally out of the blue because DUH he is living here too... and also because Danielle (my Kiwihost) went to the UniFlats office about a week ago just make sure he hadn't died or anything. Anyway, they told Danielle that he would be back in New Zealand sometime around March 22th. I guess since yesterday was March 22th, Muhammad was right on time, NEAT. I don't really know the whole story, but I THINK he was in Paris for a month, no big deal. ALSO, it might be important to note that Muhammad is from Algeria, not France. Also, he wears cologne. That was the first thing I noticed about him. Other than that, he is just your average dude. Oh, and he's finishing up his masters in law slash he is supposed have his thesis finished by June. So yeah, cool stuff, that's Muhammad. On the random down side, I don't even know if that's how you spell his name... might be Mohummad or Mohammed?? Who knows... Basically, this dude is super mysterious.

Other than that... the weekend was pretty low-key. I was kinda sicky so it was really nice that I got to sleep-in in the mornings and wake up in my comfy bed. Got a lot of homework and readings done. Wrote a paper that is due Thursday (I know, I finished a paper a whole Five Days Before It Was Due! WHOOAAAA!! Go Me =]). Hung out with friends. Went to the flea market. Got a boy shirt at the thrift store. Went out to dinner with cool peoples. All in all, I think it was a nice balance of Relaxing/Getting Better and Being Productive.

Anyway, about other general stuff in life...

Food + New Zealand + Theresa =

1) I AM OFFICALLY OBSESSED WITH OATMEAL... I think it started about three weeks ago and it is DEFINITELY still going strong

2) It has been decided that... Nutella is good with everything (except with silly things like soup or roast beef)

3) Red Curry is my favorite curry

4) Peanut butter, honey, and banana sandwiches are SUPER tasty

5) I know how to make stir-fry

6) I can make tacos

7) I know how to marinate meat... for example, I marinated beef in soy sauce last week =]

8) When I go grocery shopping, I always buy apples... Why do I buy apples?? Well, because APPLES RULE... and I am always out of apples

9) I thoroughly enjoy eating ice cream on a cone... especially while in motion... mainly walking... it is indeed most excellent

Basically this is all super exciting because I am kinda sorta learning how to cook... slash cook different things... and because food is delicious.

Extreme Gardening

Okay so last weekend....

Paul and Tim left Friday morning to go hiking/tramping for the weekend so they dropped me off at the airport. Flew from Dunedin to Christchurch to Hamilton. Took a shuttle to the city. Found my hostel. Dropped my backpack off in my room. Got some lunch and wandered around the city. To clarify, Hamilton is less of a city and more of a town because cities are more dense. (Explanations: Physically, Hamilton might be the size of Westlake... but Hamilton is only 1/3 ofWestlake's density - therefore, Hamilton = town.) Anywaysss.... Hamilton seems like a very nice place. I went to the Waikato Museum which was really cool/informative/fascinating/free. And then I walked to the Hamilton Gardens. Yay exploring! Eventually, I made it back to my hostel and, because of some previous nights of sleep deprivation, I went to bed super early. Sleeping is seriously the best... Just Saying :)

Next day, I trekked over to the Transport Centre (yeah I know, UK English...) met Callie-from-Minnesota, Rachael-from-St. Louis-but-goes-to-school-in-South Carolina, and Dan-our-leader/guide-from-Auckland. I guess three more people were supposed to go volunteer with us but they never showed up... they're Aussies, go figure. So the four of us headed up to Hunua Ranges to start our weekend.

Things That I Learned About New Zealand/Hunua Ranges On The Drive Up And During The Weekend:

-Back in the day, tectonic plates were maneuvering themselves around and New Zealand decided to break away from Antarctica and Australia.

-Randomly, during all this plate tectonic motion, the land mammals weren't too keen to hang out in New Zealand... which is why, New Zealand has no native land mammals (minus 3 species of bats). So New Zealand was just full of plants, birds, some small reptiles (but no snakes, Kathleen), and bugs... and all these living things evolved harmoniously BUT they didn't develop any instinct for/protection against predators.

-As a result, when Maori, Pacific Islanders, and Europeans started to settle in New Zealand and when they brought rats, cats, pigs, goats, deer, possums, stoats, weasels, etc etc etc with them, all the native plants and birds were getting eaten and the forest was cut down for logging and the whole ecosystem of Hunua Ranges was being destroyed :(

-So now, in order to save the ecosystem/promote biodiversity/protect Hunua Ranges, there's no more logging and a whole lot of pest control... meaning that I got to help out with the pest control part :)

-Basically, there are a whole bunch of bait lines and every 100 meters or so there is a bait station full of bait. When an animal eats the bait, the bait prevents its blood from clotting. So there's no immediate death, but the animal will die eventually. Every week, a group of local volunteers run along the bait lines and check on each bait station. However, these bait lines aren't on actual trails and they are VERY VERY OVERGROWN and some haven't been cut for over a year.

So this is what we did: We hiked along the main track to the start of the bait line. Then we journeyed into the bush and did some extreme gardening to make the jobs of the bait-line-runners a little bit easier. We did one bait line the first day (Saturday) and then we did two bait lines the second day (Sunday). The bait lines were pretty steep and overgrown so it was a lot of hard hard work. All in all, it was totally worth it though... carrying gigantic gardening scissors, blazing trails, learning about all the different plants, learning the sounds that different birds make, finding pig tracks, getting super muddy, finding rare ferns, etc. (Dan got REALLY EXCITED over this fern we came across. It was a King Fern and apparently they were almost wiped out and they are really rare. It was only the second time in his life that Dan had seen one and he was seriously ECSTATIC, like he spent ten whole pictures taking a bazillion pictures of A PLANT... PS. Dan (no joke) knew the English name, Maori name, and characteristics of EVERY plant and bird that we saw so he got to educate us and enlighten us with all his knowledge of nature.)

Other highlights of the weekend:

-On Saturday night, there was a speed shear competition at the Red Fox Tavern in Maramarua. It was probably the biggest redneck/hick (no offense) event I have ever been to. BUT I did get to witness someone shear a whole sheep in 39 seconds!!!!

-On Sunday afternoon, on the way back to Hamilton, we stopped in Pokeno, a tiny town that is only known for their ice cream. So my lunch that day was three huge scoops of ice cream - Hokey Pokey, Mange Rizzle, and Mint Chocolate Cookie. So Good, So Creamy, So Delicious.

-Air New Zealand gives out water, then coffee, then cookies, then more water, and then candies. This happens even on their short, one-hour flights and I've decided that I really like the amount of attention that Air New Zealand gives to my tummy. It is Quite Nice.

I got back into Dunedin on Monday night (shout out to Paul who was really great and picked me up at the airport) and went over to Gray's flat because it was his birthday and everyone was there. Tuesday was class, frisbee in the rain (torrential downpour/it was raining SOO hard), stir-fry dinner at Alan's, and homework. Wednesday/yesterday was class and then just hanging out with everyone for St. Patrick's Day!! Today/Thursday, I was printing out some notes for lecture and I looked down and my backpack had disappeared. Yeah, SOMEONE STOLE MY BACKPACK... with my wallet, and my computer, and my life. In a nutshell, I was ready to kill someone. Granted these murderous feelings and thoughts were all in the heat of the moment, but DUDE, I was so furious. And just as I had reached a certain level of anger that only a very few people have ever seen (which, in general, I think is a good thing)... I turn the corner (I had been pacing around the building looking for any trace of my backpack) and there it is, right where I left it. The weirdest???? Turns out this girl had picked up my backpack, thinking that it belonged to her friend... and when she realized her mistake, the girl returned it. This girl was seriously apologizing All Over The Place and I was just totally relieved and I told her not to worry about it and we went our separate ways.

So yeah, my brief period of panic = gone forever and it's ALL GOOD and I am so happy that I've got my backpack. And now I have loads of reading to do - YESS.

The Catlins...

So two weekends ago (March 5th-7th) I got to explore a coastal, rainforest-like area called the Catlins. Basically, the Catlins is a bunch of nature-awesomeness that is all conveniently concentrated in the southeasternmost corner of the South Island. And since we love nature, we (Paul, Tim, Mackenzie, Liz, Alan, Mike, Jenny, and I) departed North Dunedin Friday morning in Serena and headed off to the Catlins. (It took longer to get there because we got lost slash ended up in Gore slash took a more scenic route because we were not in any rush, yay for seeing more of New Zealand!)

And what did we do during our weekend in the Catlins? Well...

When we arrived Friday afternoon in the general region, we checked out Waipapa Point which was SWELL because Waipapa Point = lighthouse, ocean waves, tidepools, seaweed, seashells, sea creatures. Also, good story... Paul was sitting on a rock on the oceanside-edge of the tidepool when he got totally decked by this huge wave. Like you saw Paul on the rock. You saw the wave hit the rock. And then Paul just DISAPPEARS. Yeah, just like that... He landed on some smaller rocks that make up the tidepools so he got cut up a bit but, no worries, other than that he's totally fine (meaning that it's pretty hilarious/ridiculous/amusing).

After Waipapa Point, we made some lunch and then headed over to Slope Point... which is the southernmost point of the South Island. (Some parts of the South Island are referred to as the "Deep South." This is amusing because New Zealand is not Alabama/Texas/Georgia/etc.) Honestly, Slope Point was pretty rad... probably just because cliffs/being high up + the Pacific Ocean is just a really really REALLY GREAT combination of things.

After Slope Point, I was getting really tired (I was really sleepy and tired all weekend - I think it's because we were driving around so much...) and so was everyone else. So we found a spot at Curio Bay to camp for the night. (P.S. falling asleep + listening to the ocean is another Really Great combination) After dinner, we watched to moon rise over the ocean and Tim played the guitar for everyone. This was So Good and the moon was really cool... it was all red at first and then it rose higher and higher over the horizon and it lightened up to orange, and then yellow, and then white. I had never seen the moon rise over the ocean before. It Was Super Neat. It was as if the moon was slowly wiping out all the stars in the sky.

Got up for the sunrise the next morning (Saturday morning), ate some breakfast, packed up Serena, and headed over to McLean Falls... which we preceded to climb up. Essentially, we were hanging over a 72 foot waterfall. It was HUGE. After that, we went to Cathedral Caves... these were really really really neat. To get to the actual cave-area, you have to hike through the rainforest and then you walk along the beach until the caves appear. Going through the different caves was all pretty nuts (plus only two of us had flashlights) and then, penguins appear Out Of Nowhere. They were really little and super scared of us, but seeing them was so UNEXPECTED and it just blew my mind and they were really cute. After exploring the caves, we just messed around on the beach for a bit and eventually headed back into the rainforest... and back to the car... and then to another little rainforest... where we checked out another waterfall. I was SuperSuper Tired at this point, but Alan/Tim taught me/us a cool little trick to use when photographing waterfalls, etc. so That Was Neat.

After that... we found a place to camp for the night, made some pasta for dinner, played some catchphrase, and then everyone just chilled hardcore until it was bedtime. The next morning everyone - except for Paul - missed the sunrise, but we got to look at his pictures that he took by the water and they looked marvelous. After breakfast and such, we went to check out Jack's Blowhole. Pretty nuts to be honest. Because there's the ocean. And then there are the cliffs by the ocean. AND THEN there's a gigantic hole in the middle of these cliffs. And inside this gigantic hole is the ocean. The Ocean is the coolest. Yay for nature. And tides. And erosion.

After Jack's Blowhole, we went to Nugget Point. It was awesome. We were so high up -- like walking along the side of a mountain with the ocean (and sea lions) down below. When you stand at the tip of Nugget Point, it's as if you're standing on the very edge of the world (...I dunno, I think you'd have to be there to fully understand what I'm talking about... but that's the best way I can describe it right now).

So after seeing all these cool sights, we had some lunch on the beach nearby and I found some real pretty seashells :) And after that little break, we all headed back to our homes in Dunedin.

Good times/good weekend. After I got home and showered, etc... I went over to Tim's because it was his birthday. Ate some delicious tacos/guacamole/fries and was just hanging out.... So for some randomness: Tim's Kiwihost is Tamati. The first time I met Tamati, he asked if I was Indian. And I was like No, Sorry. I'm half Filipino.... The second time I saw Tamati, he asked if I was Indian. And I was like No, I'm just half Filipino... So on Tim's Birthday, I saw Tamati for THE THIRD TIME and he asked if I could speak "Filipinese." SO RIDICULOUS. So I kinda laughed and told him didn't know much Filipino/Tagalog... so yeahhh... but DUDE, Filipinese???? ....Seriously?

Anyway, the rest of last week was pretty much just schoolwork and sleep-deprivation (and some hanging out with friends). And then I left for Hamilton/Hunua Ranges/my volunteer weekend on Friday (March 12th) and I just got back tonight/Monday (March 15th). But its late and I have class tomorrow... so even though Hunua Ranges was Quite The Adventure, it will have to wait until next time.

Brief Flashes of Genius and Technological Advances

Three things that made today awesome =

#1 School Books:

My textbook for my Theories of Social Power class is $80. At both Whitcoulls and Paper Plus (New Zealand’s versions of Borders/Barnes and Noble), it would be $84 dollars. Yeah, textbooks are expensive everywhere but THIS BOOK IS ONLY 165 PAGES. Super small, like as big as The Little Prince or Tuesdays With Morrie. Anyways, I am a total nerd but basically, we will be reading every chapter in that book and I learn better when I’m reading from an actual book/a printed version of an article (instead of reading something off my computer screen). So yesterday, I went to all the used bookstores around Dunedin and I couldn’t find it. But my professor said that she would put one hardcopy of the book on reserve in the library. SO THIS IS MY PLAN: Plan A = I could borrow book from library, take notes, save trees. Plan B = OR I could just copy the whole textbook. It cost 10 cents per paper and since these pages are small, I could copy two pages on one sheet of paper. 165 pages = 83 sheets of paper = $8.30… I mean, I don’t know if I’ll go with Plan B (because honestly that’s a lot of time spent at the copy machine and a lot of paper/trees) but I feel darn pretty clever for coming up with that solution by myself.

#2 Lunch:

Got home from my first class and I was thinking about going for just a regular nutella sandwich (= nutella smothered over a warm, slightly-toasted piece of “multigrain-honey” bread). I had been eating this a lot this week. Basically, my diet has been revolving around these sandwiches – simple and tasty. But today I decided to spice things up: Cut up an apple + Sprinkle with brown sugar + Mircowave for 30 seconds + Add to regular nutella sandwich. Yeah, I know, THIS WAS SUCH A GOOD IDEA!!!!

#3 On-Campus Internet:

Finally conquered the internet in the library… and subsequently, on the rest of campus. So now when my internet doesn’t work in my flat (which is often = lame), I can bring my computer to the library and figure out my life. Not that life is terribly hard to figure out, but having access to Google, email, and Wikipedia is really nice. (Plus, I’ve got to get familiar with the library’s online database for paper-writing and researching purposes, etc etc.) It’s SOO NICE to be able check my email before midnight.

Cheers.

First Week of School

It hailed today. No Really, It Legitimately Hailed Today.

Okay, so after being in New Zealand/Dunedin for a couple weeks, I feel like it's about time I started sharing some general observations about life...

1. Asian tourists are the same everywhere.

2. On the other hand, it is unnatural for people, who are obviously ASIAN, to have New Zealand accents. (This seriously might be on my Top 5 Things About NZ That Takes Getting Used To...)

3. Dunedin is part-city/part-college town. The college town part of Dunedin is just like any college town in the U.S. Except that the legal drinking age is 18 years old. Except that there is a bar on the university campus (right next to the central library). Except that the all the furniture (couches, armchairs, benches, tables, etc) is moved outside because students party on their front lawn.

4. People walk around barefoot all the time. Even when the beach/harbour/coastline is at least two miles away. Even when going to class. Even when there's broken glass on every sidewalk in North Dunedin. I feel like this last thing is really not the smartest thing to do. Whaterror

5. Besides the whole "broken glass on the sidewalk" part, Dunedin and the rest of New Zealand seem to be pretty litter-free. COOL/Yay for the Environment. The weird thing is trash cans (rubbish bins) are very rare... you usually have to hold onto your trash until a rubbish bin magically appears.

6. If a guy is...

a) wearing "Stubbies" (aka short shorts)

b) has an braid like Anakin Skywalker

c) has any hair style that is or slightly resembles a mullet

d) running/exercising with a backpack on (not a camelpack, but a regular bookbag)...

He is from New Zealand. Hands down. No exceptions.

That's all I've got for now... moving on to Daily Life in Dunedin slash Coolness...

- I live half a block away from campus... ten minutes max to class/library/bank

- I live next to the Leith River (which also runs through parts of campus).

- I can see and hear the Bell Tower from my house. (It's a very old/historical/famous building at the University of Otago).

- My room is in the front of the house and so my window looks out onto my front lawn and Montgomery Ave (my street). I really really really really really really really really really really really like this part of my living situation because... Whenever friends come by to visit or say hello or wake me up, they bang/knock/throw stones at my window and when I open my window for them, they just climb into my room. This is the best. It always makes my day :) :)

- I live very close to lots of people from AustraLearn and the campus is pretty small, so I run into a lot of people everyday. Rarely Rarely happened in Boulder, so this has been pretty nice.

- No bike. No skateboard. I Walk/Run/Jog everywhere around town. Everything is very close which is nice.

- First week of school is good so far. Three classes = five lectures and two tutorials per week = No classes on Monday or Friday = super nice.

- Awesome Purchase #1 = textbook for my New Zealand Sociology class! Originally $98.99 at the University Book Shop. My classmate got a used copy for $70. I bought it at Hamblyn's Quality Secondhand Books for only $40!!

- Awesome Purchase #2 = The Backpack! In the U.S., new backpacks are about $450 and secondhand packs usually go for $150-$250. So I was talking to a friend today about where I could potentially find a used backpack and his friend overheard us talking and she popped in the room and was like No way, I've a backpack that I'm trying to sell! Turns out this girl (she's American too) JUST bought this backpack right before she left for New Zealand - she already had another backpack and decided that she didn't need this second/new one in NZ after all. It was brand-new and she only used it once (on the airplane as a carry-on). So I checked it out, liked it a lot (it's a good size for me, 39 liters, and has the features I was looking for YESS), and asked her how much she paid for it. She said she only paid 150 US dollars. So then I offered her 150 New Zealand dollars (which is really only 103 US dollars) for the backpack and she took it and It Was A Deal! SO PUMPED!!

Got class at 10am and 1pm tomorrow/Thursday and I still have to finish some readings. And then Friday I'm going to the Catlins (in the Southland region of the South Island) for the weekend so that should be a really good time :)