The Circle of Life, NZ Style

Exciting things are hard to come by if you've been doing the same thing with the same people for too long! I have been absent in the blogging world for lack of anything exciting to report, but it is time for at least some meager updates.

Actually, lately I have been fascinated with this one type of customer that has been making use of the rental shop at Whakapapa. We have been graced with the visits of several people of African descent. It is obvious that they know nothing of the snow, and when asked, they will say they have never even seen snow before. Yet they speak near perfect english. Some well placed questions have resulted in the interesting fact that every single one of these guys/girls have lived in Auckland or another big city in New Zealand for at least three years, having immigrated from all sorts of African countries. That was a strange thing to hear. I wasn't expecting people of Africa to come live in a non-third-world country. I have also noticed that they are not lacking in the "bling" department. (In other words, they are wearing very expensive jewelery, not least of which were earrings the size of my fingernail that looked like real diamond, and golden teeth decorations, also known as a grill.) In my opinion, these people from Africa had to be very rich to make it to New Zealand in the first place, and they look like they are still in the money. The funniest thing is that for several days in a row now, some of these guys have taken it upon themselves to flirt with me. We were in innocent conversation about how to put on a boot or something, and all of a sudden, the guy showed me the form he filled out, point to his phone number, and said: "This is my number, can I have yours?" Let me tell you, that is a strange situation to be in. That guy in particular would not give up. He told me would only come back if I was going to be there, and he asked for my email when I told him I didn't have a phone. I'm not sure what it is about the way I look, but something but be very attractive to rich guys from Africa. I guarantee you that I am not looking my best when I am fitting people with boots at the Rental Shop in my smelly uniform, and the guy didn't have much else to go on. We never talked about anything but business, and I probably didn't make clever conversation the way some of the other staff can do with their customers. Another guy kept finding me and making me help him with his gear, finally asking my name and shaking my hand, even though I wear a name tag, and it clealy says "Alissa." I think he just wanted to introduce himself. And I am told I have a nice smile... but only by these rich African dudes. It is all a mystery to me.

Anyways, besides that, the world is a happy place. Jon told you about the Hangi, made by some of my Rentals friends. That has been the highlight of my last weeks. We really learned a lot about the people living out here in the bush. Most of the people here seem to live on farms (or near them) owned by their family and extended family. Some farms tend to be quite large because so many people are co-owning them. In Ricky's case (he's an older guy working at Rentals with us) he says one of his cousins is managing the farm. They could support themselves just by living off the land, but as Ricky says, they also want to be able to buy things from stores! Which means that I'm pretty sure Ricky is a farmer when things need to get done on the farm, but he takes the odd job (like "Rental Attendant") when he wants some cash. I haven't met a lot of people here that feel the need to excel at anything. In fact, there are plenty of really old people that are very happy doing seasonal work for Mount Ruapehu. One guy works at a gas station in the summer time, when he's not working at Rentals. What a strange lifestyle. There is an absolute lack of ambition in the corporate world. But there is also not that much desire for possession. Sure, people will spend $1000 on their snowboards, but when the money runs out from their minimum wage jobs, they'll just wait for the next paycheck till they can afford to spend again. And there isn't much worry about getting the money. If they don't have money, they always have the farm and the huge family to fall back on. There doesn't seem to be any real poverty here from what I can tell.

Perhaps the lack of ambition, though, is what causes the inability for New Zealanders to marry. Seriously. At 16, the girls here look and act fully mature, and it is likely that they already have a baby or two. But they almost never have a man. The exception is Zion (he works at Rentals), who has a pregnant girl(friend). I am not sure if they are married. Either way, they would call each other partners, like they all do in New Zealand. Even happy couples tend not to marry. I have yet to find out why that is. But, single mothers are no worse off than the rest of us. They leave their kids with someone at the farm and go to work just like the rest of us. And it's not like they are working for the money. In fact, I don't know why single mothers here bother working. Maybe to get away from the family. On several occasions I have overheard Leiana (a rentals cashier) say that she wouldn't mind working one day less so she can spend some time with the kids. She also says she doesn't need the money, and that she comes to work because she finds the environment fun. I can name about 4 or 5 girls off the top of my head that are younger than me and have children already. I am always baffled with the way people handle life here. I must become more familiar with the way they grow up.

Now I have gone and spent way too much time writing this. Hope everyone at home and elsewhere is doing well.

Shout out to my mom who is back from her travels in Europe and has gotten back into her routine life and teaching job. We hope you are settling back into the working lifestyle!

Goodnight y'all!
Jalissa

We had Hungi and it was delish!

Kia Ora and hello,

Hungi is a type of ceremonial food eaten by the Maori people.
We were invited to one because Alissa works with people who were having Hungi.
Basically this is a ceremony where an animal is sacrificed and cooked in the earth, below ground, for hours. We had some vegetables, chicken, and mutton and it was awesome, full of flavor. Everyone in Alissa's work place was there having a grand ol time. Our friend taz and amy baked cakes to bring the party. The funny thing was that it was my first time driving in the night AND uphill so taz spilled some of her cupcakes in our car haha. Anyhow, the funniest thing was that, there were little 3 year olds running around where people consumed beer, loud techno music, and lots and lots of fattening foods.

I am also getting much better at snowboarding. This is a breakthrough! Yup, Im not gonna lie, I am a little jealous of Alissa's experience in NZ opposed to mine. Im not talking about the quality of the work, but just the overall experience. I know what you're thinking, the experience is what you make out of it. Well, that's easier said then done. Let me explain. I work with some of the most bossiest, bitchiest people I know. Not to mention I think Im getting screwed over due to that twat management. But, I also don't want to move out either. This is because we already got to be friends with a lot of people here, just that my work people made me more depressed than I ever was in a long time, feel alone and abandoned, and I think the work dynamic was even changing me to a more insecure person than a secure, confident person I am. We're gonna have pizza tonight, and Im going to to have to talk to the head manager tomorrow and Im quiting my job if I don't get what I was promised, at the minimum...which are my days off. Don't worry, I'll look for a job elsewhere Mom/Dad/Dana/Friends. But they need to know where my limits are.

c ya,
Jalissa

Bed bugs!!!!!

OUR HOSTEL HAS BED BUGS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So I thought NZ was a 1st world country. Our hostel isn't really going to do anything about it! Our room doesn't have any yet, but once bed bugs are in, they are "in" the whole hotel!

I guess the Ministry of Public Health does not have any regulations for these kinda things.
Basically, one room of the hotel had bed bugs. The assistant manager freaked out and wanted the place fumed, but it didn't happen. Long story short, the owner of this place thought it was too expensive to fume it, so he wanted to do it ourselves. These buggers can stay alive without feed for 18month and the eggs are near immortal. How are we gonna "get rid of these by ourselves"?

On a more cheerful note, yesterday we made pancakes! or hotcakes here. Basically we bought a ready-mix shaker thing that looked way kool. We invited our friends Leo, Amy, and Joel (the ozzie) to breakfast with us. Tom, the cynical english dude joined in later too. After some sad attempts at pancakes, we decided lounge around for a while and then grab some fish and chips at a near by town.

We drove Gertude (which took a while to start) to Taumarunui, bought some fish n chips and explored the town. Amy only bought 1 nugget and 1 potato hash, crazy! After some pretty good food, we stumbled over to the "Mainly $2" store. It was kinda kool, I can't lie.

Then, we dropped off joel, leo and tom. We then took Amy with us to Tom (the duty manager of the park who is a full Maori)'s hobbyfarm. We got way lost but got there in one piece. Man, that place is beautiful...lots of nature and stuff. Anyhow, we drove past the gate and the first thing we saw was this sheep that was staring at us. The puppies then ran up to the car and wanted lots of attention. They were lissy's favorite. Tom just got some fresh piglets and they were really cute too. They were sleeping when we got there, and woke up startled. One of them had the blanket over its head and was running around. The cows were also super cute, lissy tried to feed them but were scared of her. The kool thing about this farm is that, all the animals are free-range, organic and interact with each other. They get herbal medicine instead of seeing a vet....ever.




We don't see that kind of stuff in the states. Anyhow, g2g.
bye, jalissa

I'm scared

There is a new virus going around. Y'all have been listening to me talk about getting the flu(s) going around here, but this is different. There is a virus that makes you throw up repeatedly every 10 minutes for about 4 days, and you also have diarrhea. I have heard horrendous stories, and the thing is extremely infectious. It is only a matter of time before we get it. And I was just starting to feel like I was getting better...

In other news, Leo the Korean guy is going home in a week. He has booked his flight and everything. We at rentals will be sad to see him go. He is really a good time.

Shout out to Jon Herrera, who is back from his ARMY training, and chillin' out, trying to lose his six pack again. We missed you pal. You should probably stop having your life planned out and come hang out with us already.

Other news is lacking today. Work was average. There were not a lot of customers, so it was a good time to hang out with fellow workers. Yeah... that's about all....


I'll write more soon.

Jalissa

Back to Square One

Guess what? I'm sick again. As in, I was barely over the last remnants of my cough, when I started the whole cycle over again with a congested nose! So if I'm unlucky, I could be sick for another 2-3 weeks. I stayed home sick today. Ugh. Hopefully there is something I can do to alleviate the symptoms this time around.

Anyways, yesterday, Jon and I went skiing. That is, we both took out snowboards. We had a good time boarding with Amy and Leo. The two of them are hilarious. They are always quibbling about one thing or another. Mostly because Leo is so unshakeably confident, and Amy tries to put him in his place. It's a bunch of fun to be around. I am getting much better now, and only falling a little bit. We were going to hike to the top of the mountain, but the winds were so strong they actually closed parts of the mountain, so we felt it best to leave that for another day. Hiking to the crater of the volcano (Mt. Ruapehu) entails taking the lifts as high as possible, then hiking upward for about an hour. Then you put on the ski gear you have just carried up and enjoy a really long ski down the mountain. I really want to do it, but I want to wait until I can go with someone who has done it before. Maybe right after a big storm, the snow will be nice, and we can plan a trip up there.

At the end of the day Jon did something to his hip. I am of the opinion that he pinched a nerve because he is describing the pain as radiating from his butt all the way down his leg. He once dislocated his spine, so it doesn't seem too far fetched to assume that that injury influenced this one. Anyways, I think he will feel better in a day or two. The only injuries I incurred while on the snowboard were really bruised and swollen knees. I landed them one too many times on some really icy terrain, so I will be walking like an old lady for a day or two. Good times. But snowboarding is fun. We are learning pretty quickly. The next step is to start doing jumps!

Laters!
Alissa

Pictures are on Alissa's Facebook

Hi,

I have come to the conclusion that working at "the park" does not offer to experience different cultures, challenging work environments, make new friends, ride the mountain all day long, and eat a variety of different foods, but rather, "the "park" offers all three of these plus another color of experience. Personal growth.

I am a naive, self-less, innocent, and ignorant tapeworm. How can I describe myself as self-less and a tapeworm in one sentence? Let me explain. I have just learned that Jon is portrayed to be this hard working, little asian boy that cleans other people's poop. That is fine. I still have two UCSD degrees, I know who I am. The problem seems to appear when people... certain people take advantage of that. Then, this little self-less tapeworm decides that other people's scolding (for the sake of being mean) becomes interternalized, activating this tapeworm to feed off my positive energy. This makes me feel malnourished in the mind and spirit, and I get sick, real sick. But for all those academic savants that took their biology degree one step further and studied parasitology might know that tapeworms spread like a plague (or to be more modern, spread like swine flu). Then, I overgeneralize. I spread the tapeworm's eggs to other people, by interpreting innocent people's simple, honest criticism as a personal attack. I hold these quasi-vendettas and let it explode inside me, further awakening more tapeworms inside of me. I am regressing into an anti-social, cynical, being. The more I allow these adjectives to latch onto me, the more other innocent and honest people become confused and start to become anti-social and cynical towards me. I am starting to hate people, help from others, and the ability to enjoy anything.

I had this tapeworm for quite a while now ( I think...maybe right at college? before? this year?). I don't know. But like a real tapeworm, it didn't really occur to me that my spirit and mind was being destroyed untill I really feel bad. I thought something was wrong sure, with little outbursts here or there, but like a real tapeworm, you just think its a minor papercut cold...nothing major.

Nothing is major yet. But even papercuts can turn into a severe wound if untreated. But at least I see this pain now. Without misdiagnosis.

I finally see myself unhappy and finally realizing that not doing anything by succumbing to defeat or even just hacking it through and telling myself "to suck it up, pussy" won't do.

I see an opportunity now, but I can't let this one pass for the life of me. No more dumping in the already filled grave of opportunities. I am unhappy now, but I have the power and amibition to be happy. And no more personal defeats. I am staying here at the park, and if I can find another part-time job to supplement my income, let's do it. I don't believe in swear words. I call these impact words and emotional catalysts. Fuck you world, give me all you got. I will skull fuck you!

Whoops, it's been a while!

So, I haven't updated this in a while. I apologize to those of you who sit by your computers eagerly awaiting the next entry.

On thursday night (full moon), we had a Rentals party. Jon had to work as night manager, so he missed this one. Anyways, it was quite an experience drinking with people you knew were going to be around for the next few weeks at least. I have never before been in that predicament before. On one hand you want to socialize and become close to the people you work with. On the other hand, you do not want to make a fool of yourself and have to face those people the next day. The amount of liquid courage that you take in must be carefully measured. Luckily everyone at Rentals is on the same page as me. We all just wanted to have a good night and get a little drunk. But the dancing was a little awkward. It was clear we all wanted to let loose, but there is that little bit of worry in the back of your head that says not to do anything stupid. Plus, people here don't really dance, as I explained previously. So we sort of stood around in a circle... It's hard to explain but definitely not the same as at home. (Also, the party was in a garage. I have never been to a party where it is cold enough to have to keep your clothes on. I hadn't even thought about that difference. Just wait till you get into that situation. It's wierd.)

I had driven the car, which I have named Gertrude, to the party. Turns out Alissa didn't think about this problem. I don't mean driving drunk. Don't worry, I drove home the next morning at 6 AM, barely getting home early enough to catch the bus to work. No, I mean that driving in the cold involves a whole lot of things that I have never done before. I learned that you pour water over the windshield and side windows of the car to melt the ice. I learned that you have to start the car while pressing the acceleration, otherwise it stalls on you. I also learned that you have to let the windows defrost on the inside for a really long time before you can see anything. And I definitely backed out of the one way street with the drivers door open and my head sticking out, so I could see at least some of what was behind me. I think that was the scariest thing I have ever done. For some reason, we made it out of that situation alive and without a scratch on the car. That was quite a miracle. But it did take more time than I had expected, so when I got home, I literally had ten minutes before the bus was going to take me to work. I had to work feeling dirty and hung over all day friday. No fun. And my coworkers didn't make the place any livelier. What a day.

Lately the weather has been sunny and amazing. Jon and I had an awesome day skiing on wednesday. Turns out that it was a good idea for us to ride separately in the morning, then meet up and ski together in the afternoon. If we ski together for too long, I get antsy because I am not going fast enough, and Jon interprets my behavior as anger... basically that is a no good situation. So that day, I took some time with some guys from work, trying desperately to represent skiiers and do a cool jump. The snowboarders were not impressed. They we doing flips. I was trying not to fall. After that, I tried to take Jon down what they call the Waterfall Express. It's a blue run but can be icy and mogul-y at the end of the day. He said it was a little out of his league, but I thought he was doing fine. He is improving a lot lately. We also enjoyed skiing with Dan the bartender at the Park, and Josh and Taz, other Woofers. Taz quickly got frustrated and went back to the beginners slope after a couple of runs though. Still, overall, a great day.

This weekend is also sunny, so the day is busy busy busy. I will be getting no ski breaks tomorrow. But monday will be another day of skiing and sun! I am super excited for that! Yay!

On another note, Jon's workplace is becoming more and more unbearable. There is this woman called Sarah (the one who hired Jon in the first place) who is absolutely insane. She seems to have mood swings and randomly finds it appropriate to yell at the Woofers or at people living at the Park for no reason. The other day, she simply terminated the contracts of three people because she thought she smelled weed on their breaths. She made a lot of enemies with people who are working at the mountain, and the word is getting around not to live at the Park. Worse yet, she makes Jon's workday miserable. He is considering finding work elsewhere because his day is filled with getting yelled at and doing mundane work. Plus there aren't a lot of people to hang out with during the day, so if you get stuck with Sarah, or an otherwise unbearable personality, working just becomes a living hell. I told him I would see if Rentals is hiring, since at least four people are leaving mid-season, and it seems like their places must get filled.

Anyways, that is the status as of now. Y'all have a good weekend. And remember me, 'cuz I'll be fitting people with boots all day.

Jalissa

So Much to Tell!

Before I forget, I uploaded a bunch of pictures on my facebook profile. There will probably be more to come. I will not upload any here for now. It takes way too long.

Anyways, lots of things happened since I last wrote an entry. On thursday night, there was a DJ at the pub. Everyone got all excited about this monumental event, and it was not to be missed. Since we didn't want to buy beers for $7 a bottle, Amy, Leo, Joel, Jon and I had a little pre-party with our own beers. We played Kings Cup. Jon had to work as night porter that night, so he only stayed for a little bit. We had a really good time. Then we went to the pub, where it seemed like everyone was hammered. It was a bit overwhelming. I was a little surprised at how people dance here. I guess I could have guessed that people here don't listen to dirty rap songs in bars like they do back home. Instead it was techno, but with a strangely slow beat that I was having trouble doing anything but jumping up and down to. Also, people did a lot more of what we back home would call the white person's dancing. They jumped back and forth and made motions with their hands and all that. I saw little or no grinding, of which I was expecting a whole lot more. Overall, there seemed to be a lot less of the sexual nature to dancing that there is in bars back home. I was really intrigued. Also, I went home pretty early because I had to get up in the morning.

Friday was a really bad weather day. I was sent home at 10 AM because the rental shop was so empty. I took a nap the whole rest of the day. Jon and I used our car for the first time though! We drove the new housekeeping manager, Kalai, who is from India and is really cool, to Taumaranui because she needed to do some grocery shopping. I learned that our car is pretty weak and must be shifted into lower gears when going uphill. That was a bit scary to experience.

On saturday, Jon had no work during the day, but was unable to come to the mountain to ski due to really bad weather. This was a day that both of us were getting really antsy about being stuck at home all the time. We decided that being social was a necessity to our survival here.

Sunday, I went on a ski break despite the bad weather. That was a bad idea. Literally it was like strapping on skis and a blindfold and trying to ski down the slopes. You couldn't see a thing. We were a bit scared for our safety, so we had to take the lift back down the mountain to avoid falling off a cliff. (They don't really block off unsafe terrain as diligently here as I have experienced on other ski resorts.)

Yesterday, Sunday, was also Yuri's surprise birthday party. Yuri works with us at Rentals, and so does her boyfriend John. They met at Rentals last year, or so I was told. Anyways, John planned this big dinner at the Station Cafe for about thirty of us (most of the people work at rentals). She had no idea that we were all going to be there to surprise her, so she was a bit overwhelmed when she saw us. I think she was really flattered. Dinner was very expensive, but also one of the only places here that has served us palateable food. I'm glad to know that someboady here knows how to cook. (Ok, that's unfair, one of the cooks at the Park makes good food as well. It's just that he likes his meat and potatoes a little too much.)

So after Yuri's party, a lot of us went to the house where the Woofers live. Woofers are people like Jon who work for accomodation. We came to NZ too late to get to live in the cool house with them though. They were having Beer Olympics there last night. You had to come with a teammate of the opposite sex. We then proceeded to have tournaments of drinking games. It was all planned and organized. We had a good time!

Today was our offday. Despite a long night last night, we got up early so as not to miss the bus to the ski resort. We were under the impression that the bad weather in the morning would subside as the day went on. Sadly, they closed the upper mountain just as we were on our way to the resort. So we rented snowboards and rode down happy valley a bunch of times. I am getting sick of that place. We made the best of it though.

The Park is beginning the tradition of playing movies on a projector on monday nights, so we joined th rest of the residents and watched a movie tonight.

We are tired now, so it is definitely bed time. Good night!

Jalissa