New Zealand 2009

Last night on the south island

2009-10-26T23:40:00.000-07:00

We've done a lot since the last post:

1. alissa's bday (baked her a chocolate thingy)
2. freedom camping/urban camping for free
3. freaked out that we didn't sell our car on trade me
4. we negotiated with a shady car to buy our car...he didn't want it for the amount we've asked
5. brought our car to the car marketplace (it's like a physical ebay for cars)
6. guy bought it in 4min., cash, no questions asked
7. we're staying in a cute little hostel that is more like a big house
8. bought a snow board bag that is EPIC
9. packing tonight and playing video games

yup, that about sums it up....oh wait, we stayed at another camper ground that was like an animal park.

we got to see donkeys, emus, alpacas, a baby cow (that wanted to play with us), golden possums, ducks/ducklings, and alissa's first encounter with a friendly sheep (it wanted to be scratched ..CUTE!)

I made friends with the donkey....shut up Herrera and Aaron, I know what you're thinking!

k, expensive internet+limited time= short post.

see yall in a week or so!

-jalissa

DunEEdin.

2009-10-21T01:47:00.000-07:00

Hello all.

I would like you to know that you should appreciate how easy it is for you to access the World Wide Web. New Zealand, though it might seem advanced in its wildlife saving methods, has an extreme lack of internet facilities. Oh, you could, for example, make your way to the PUBLIC LIBRARY, where they might have ONE DESKTOP on which you might use internet for $2 for FIFTEEN MINUTES!

Yeah... this town had all of 2 locations at which to access the internet, both of which cost about that much... I don't know how people live over here.

Anyways, after staying two glorious nights at Queenstown and wishing that we had worked at ski resorts adjacent to this town, (of which there are many,) we moved towards the south. That's the kind of place where one might have no access to internet for days. There is ocean and gorgeous greenery all around you, but there isn't much else. Jon and I stayed at a campground that had sheep just roaming on it and was next to the beach. It couldn't get much better than that. Then, we met people on the campground who were building a fire, and some others that had brought instruments. We had an epic night of singing by the fire. That was just awesome. And to top it all off, in the morning, we accidentally ended up herding sheep in front of the car as we were trying to drive out. No, not just 10 sheep. Probably about a hundred. Hehe. Epic. (Certain friends of mine might refer to the whole experience as majestic. And that it was. My camera simply cannot capture the immensity of the natural beauty here.)

Anyways, we are now driving north along the coast, and have reached a CITY called Dunedin, which is pronounced DunEEEdin. We got a little flustered trying to drive in the city center. After driving long winding roads for days on end, cities are scary!

So now we are staying at another holiday park, on the peninsula outside of the city, where the houses are scarce and the wildlife is abundant.

Oh by the way. WE SAW PENGUINS TODAY. Little tiny ones called blue penguins. They came in little groups to the beach and scampered up the terrain at dusk. CUTE. One of them was not even bothering to hide himself away. He just walked up the road to his favorite den. (New Zealand had already built little huts to suit the penguins in order to keep the birds coming here, and to keep the tourists paying for their meals.) We followed the little guy up the hill as we were walking back to our car. Awesome.

Ok it is late now, and I am paying to write this, so you can imagine that I might want to stop writing right about now.

Talk to you all soon!

Jalissa

5,4,3,2,1 bungy jump

2009-10-17T23:00:00.000-07:00

So we did it!

A 43m bungy jump (at the world's first bungy location!)
It was a lot of fun! Alissa did it on her own too right after me (she even tipped the water at the end a little bit!). I am really glad she did it and super proud of her because not many girls ever bungy jump! (can you tell that Jon is trying to make me feel better for nearly shitting my pants trying to make myself jump off the platform)

This bungy jump was a bit sketch though...ok a bit is an understatement. It was fucking janky. By this I mean that the thing that tied the bungy cord to you foot was only a bungy cable and a a wrapped up TOWEL! That's it, nothing else. Super scary. And now Alissa and I have a super cool t-shirt for free.

Last night, we drove up to a dark, farmland campsite and watched How I Met Your Mother in the car because it was raining. Not that exciting, but fun.

I think we might go party with Alissa's friends tonight, we will see. But right now, diner making time!

until next time,
Jalissa

Queenstown

2009-10-16T21:42:00.000-07:00

WOW.

So we're going bungy jumping tomorrow. I might pee my pants. Jon insisted that we challenge ourselves. Aahhhh! I'm pretty sure that I would never have done this on my own, so really, I'm grateful... but seriously??? You have to book it a day in advance, so they make you sleep on the idea for a whole night before you actually have to jump. That's incredibly insensitive. Honestly, isn't there a way to just do it while you're feeling brave? Forcing you to actually think about how you are willingly jumping off of a bridge is a bit mean, don't you think?

Anyways, that was today's fiasco. And that spurred a fiasco about money, since Jon said he was going to pay me back. (I have the only credit card, and you wouldn't believe how many things cannot be paid for by EFTPOS, or ATM card, as we like to call it. When Jon and I opened a bank account, we got an EFTPOS card, which, as we learned later, does not work for most transactions here. Money is such a strange thing... ) Anyways, in the process we managed to get the bungy company to let us use their internet for free. So here I am, blogging away!

Ok, where did I leave off in the New Zealand diaries...

Oh right, Franz Josef, the glacier town. So that place was cool, except that it was raining that day. But we just stayed inside and watched a movie that day. (Speaking of which, has anyone seen the movie "blow"? It's about this one guy who started dealing drugs, and how he got huge and eventually went to jail. It has Johnny Depp in it, but they weren't really focusing on showing off his body, so the movie could have been much better. )

So that night Jon made delicious dinner, and we chilled. The next day we took the short hike to the very bottom of the Franz Josef glacier. That is one majestic river of ice, I tell you. You feel very small when the bottom of a glacier dwarfs you. Jon went and saw the other glacier, the Fox Glacier. Then, on a whim, we decided to spend the night at this campground at a place called Gillespies Beach. We thought this was going to be awesome. It was not what we expected. We thought the drive there would be short, and it turned out to be a narrow winding road of gravel that took forever to get through. We thought we would be alone, but a lot of people ended up sleeping there that night. We thought we'd do a quick 3.5 hour hike, and ended up trudging through the mud and swamps for 5 hours. We thought the hike was to see a colony of seals... there were no seals. We thought we'd have a nice calm night sleeping, but we got eaten alive by verocious sandflies. The like huan flesh a lot. Jon and I have bites on every little bit of exposed flesh. Hands, necks, ankles and even that line of skin between my t-shirt and my pants got attacked. But we did make a cool fire on the beach, and then we met a German guy, whose name is Robin, who offered us some weed and then proceeded to talk the whole night about how epic the whole bonfire by the ocean thing was. Hehe. He also busted out his miniature Hookah, which we enjoyed by the fire.

That morning we got the heck out of sandfly country. They clearly wanted us there way too much. We proceeded to drive a really long distance that day. We ended up in a town called Wanaka. We liked Wanaka a lot, because it was the first real town we had seen since Nelson. We slept in a Holiday Park, and took lots of showers and revelled in the availability of the kitchen and electricity, as well as the lack of flies. Wanaka was having a spring festival they call "Wanakafest." Creative. Anyways, they had little contests for the kids, like : Best trained dog, best dressed dog and owner, best fetcher. And there was a huge bike race. All the local teenage boys were showing off their skills. They had also gotten some snow for the little kids to play in (from somewhere...),a nd there was supposedly a circus, but we never saw it. In any case, this was the place to be, so we were hving a good time watching the festivities. Then, after having to stop the urge to buy all the delicious food and all the half-off ski clothes, we finally had to get out of this haven for people who have money. That's how we ended up in Queenstown, extreme sports capital of the world. We are probably going to walk around town tonight, sleep at a campground tonight, and then do all the expensive stuff, like jumping off of bridges, tomorrow...

We will let you know how that goes!!

Jalissa

Adventures - an appropriate word for current experiences

2009-10-13T19:32:00.000-07:00

Hello friends. If we can call you friends since you are clearly uninterested in sharing your comments with us lonely travellers...

Anyways. A recap of happenings since Wellington:
- We said goodbye to Joel and took the most expensive ferry trip of my life (and the most expensive thing we did in NZ) down to south island. $215. In the process we met a car full of ex-rentals staff: David, Tim, and Digby. They had Alex with them (who is Amy's ex-roommate). Dave and Tim were on their way to buying a van, and about to do the same thing Jon and I were already doing. They were going to meet up with us in Nelson, but our phone lost Dave's number. So we just parted ways...

-Jon and I were sick of paying lots of money for housing, so when we got to Nelson, we just parked in a secret-looking place, and stayed the night in our car. Despite a security officer clearly driving past our car, we had no trouble with the law. I guess they don't really follow up on those threatening-looking signs that read: "No camping or overnight parking." We had bought a thin layer of foam from "The Warehouse" to sleep on as a mattress (already being decked out with a Duvet and several pillows, thanks to our lack of loyalty to The Park), but the comfort level in the car was not overwhelming. I managed to bruise my hip bones. I think I'm too heavy for my own skin...

- After Nelson, we went North to Motueka. The main attraction here, as we found out, is a 4-5 day backpacking hike called the Abel Tasman. Though it looks like a really popular attraction, we got all excited about having found the place on a whim. We hiked for a couple of hours in one direction and then turned around and walked back. What a beautiful hike, by the way. This place is a National Park right on the ocean and the ocean views were spectacular.

- Having gone about as north as it gets on the South Island, we headed south. We stayed the night at a little "holiday park"(which is what they call a place where you can pay to park your vehicle and sleep in it, but also to have access to toilets and a kitchen) in Tapawera. This place was awesome. You could tell that the economy of the entire town (of 400 people) was being fueled by the fact that this holiday park was attracting people. We slept next door to a very cool horse, a pony and a wild razorback pig being kept as a pet. And we got to touch all of them because Jon is awesome and makes friends with people. Yes, we fed and petted a wild boar. Oh, and if you scratched his tummy, he fell over. Also, his name was spider pig. The horse was cool cuz she would get impatient with us trying to feed her grass, so she would tear fronds off of the palm tree and chew them. Heh.

- South again we drove, to Westport, where the main attraction was seals, which are apparently aggressive, and we only got to see from the cliffs far above. We passed a place that has rocks shaped like stacks of pancakes, and watched the waves spray out of a blowhole in the cliffs. That night we slept in a campground at Lake Mahinapua. We heard of this place from the guy that let us pet his pig. Six dollars for a place to stay is quite a deal here. That's how we got privvy to the free and very cheap campgrounds owned by the Department of Conservation. SWEET.

- Now we are in Franz Josef, where the Glaciers are just a 30 minute drive away. These people are ripping us off. We are staying in a Hostel for $21 a night each. LAME. Oh and also, today is the first day it has rained on us in the South island. We had been very lucky, but we are in for a week or so of some bad weather. Boo.

So far the $60 a day thing has been working well. We have been spending about that much a day, saving very little, but still able to buy food and gas. Yay! It is possible!

Jalissa

Wellington

2009-10-09T23:54:00.000-07:00

Today is our last day in Wellington. We spent the day at Te Papa, a free museum that was alright, but not as entertaining as it could have been. Also we did a lot of walking around the city. We were hoping to meet our friends here, so we could have lunch (and a drink or two), but they were lame and had to do something. We might meet up with them tonight. Joel and Jon are making dinner right now, so I figure I will join them. Oh, and we overshot our $60 limit by a good 20 bucks today. Not only did we pay for a hostel at $27 a night (each), but we also ate lunch at a restaurant, and bought food for dinner at a grocery store.

I am thinking we will have to sleep in the car a lot from now on to catch up to our budget. Hopefully that won't be too much of a problem. We hear the south island is even more isolated from the north, and judging by the place we had been living in, that's gotta be absolutely dead.

I hope you have at least as great of a night as we're going to have!
Jalissa

First day on the road!

2009-10-08T23:14:00.000-07:00

So yesterday we packed up and left our temporary home of The Park. We drove south, so a town called Palmerston North, where Joel (whom we are traveling with for a while) got us connected with Sarah and Kyra. They were travelling the same direction as us, and had a place to stay, and we ended up joining in on the fun. We went clubbing, sort of...

As all of us that were drinking that night were on a budget, (Jon and I are attempting a $60 a day fiasco) we did most of our drinking at home. We drank so much that Joel refused to go out with us because he felt he was going to throw up. Jon and I then managed to lose the rest of the group at the first bar, so we had to go home, lest we end up lost at the end of the night. But it was an awesome night nonetheless. It just goes to show that you should know someone in every town. It makes life so much more exciting and cheap. Of course, sleeping on the floor wasn't too comfortable, but we made do. (We managed to keep to our budget on day one, by the way!)

Day two started with a drive to Wellington, a massive confusion trying to find the city center, and somewhere to park, and also a $40 parking ticket for being in the wrong place for literally 10 minutes. It was sad. What with Hostel prices here, and that ticket, we did not manage to keep to the budget, despite no other expenses. We even ate only the food that we brought. This might be harder than we thought....

This is an update for Herrera

2009-10-01T18:09:00.000-07:00

Hi again. We haven't updated in a while. The highlights of the last two weeks can be summarized like this:

Jon and I took tuesday of last week off, thus giving us a three day weekend to travel around north island. We traveled to Rotorua, Tauranga, Hamilton, and Waitomo. To put this into perspective, Rotorua is about 3 hours away from where we are staying, and each of these towns is equally spread around the country. Needless to say, we did a lot of driving. But all in all it was an excellent adventure. I put pictures up on facebook, for those of you who want a visual tour. Rotorua is the cultural epicenter and biggest tourist attraction of New Zealand, from what I can tell so far. We walked around a Maori town (of which there are many), saw Kiwis at an animal park, stayed at a hostel, smelled the sulphury gas escaping from the ground all around us, etc. It was a great time! I really like rotorua. It has a very cute town center, and lots of beautiful nature surrounding it. (That goes for all of New Zealand, except for the drive to my workplace). The map shows the amount of driving that we did. We started at the southernmost green dot and made a big circle. Tauranga turned out to be a very modern ocean city. It reminded us of San Diego, with its art galleries and expensive shops on the waterfront. That was something I was not expecting in New Zealand, and it was also not that interesting, so we just had some fish and chips there and moved on to Hamilton. Hamilton reminds me of home as well. Somewhat suburban, has a mall and a city center with nightlife (I assume. We didn't see anyone making use of the bars.) Hamilton confused us because there were so many cars and roundabouts. We even got lost, and had a scare when the police sounded its sirens behind us. (Turns out they just wanted to pass us...) We slept in our car that night, which is cheaper than staying in a hostel, and perfectly doable in Gertrude, since you can lower the back seat to make a flat surface. On day three, we drove to Otorohanga, the town closest to the Waitomo caves that we would go caving in. This is also where we saw the Angora bunnies that get shaved. Take a look at my pictures for a description of that experience!

We had a great time throughout the trip, and it gave us confidence that we will be able to travel to south island in our car when we are done working here. We will have to work on our spending habits, especially on food. We spent more in three days than I make in one week. But we will figure it out in a week, when we get on the road!

On another note, Jon drove the car into a parked truck the other day. He had an adventure trying to replace the passenger side window that broke in the process. Apparently you have to fix glass related things at a place that specializes in glass. They, in turn told him that he needed to fix his door frame before they could replace the glass. They recommended a junkyard, which Jon deemed "really sketchy." It was literally a junkyard, complete with blind dog, scary guys with dreadlocks and tattoos all over, and little kids running around. As it turned out, they had an entire door, complete with window, that they sold to us for $200. So Gertrude, who is light blue, now has a dark blue side-panel on one side. She is just developing even more of a personality. BUT they did give Jon a stick shift lever too! So we can officially shift without problems now!

Also, we booked a flight from Christchurch to Auckland a few days before we are scheduled to fly home. That way we just have to drive south, and we don't have to worry about driving all the way back up for hours on end. I have a friend who offered to take us around Auckland in those days, so hopefully we will have a good time exploring that place as well.

And while we are talking about getting back to reality: I finally got in touch with that recruiter from "Athletes To Business" who wanted to find me a job after I graduated. He says he will be trying to get me interviews, so that by the time I get back, I will be able to start going to them. What a champ. I wish people were always there to help me find a job. What will I ever do when I have to do things on my own. (Yeah, Tanaka, be jealous.)

Ok guys, that's it for now! See you all soon!
Jalissa

This is Madness!

2009-09-16T21:33:00.000-07:00

I have heard of Clement's loss recently. I am speech-less; I am learning of life's sudden endings; I am learning to cherish every moment of my life, while making a positive impact on other's. Thanks Clement Tsai for the great memories we shared together! May you rest in peace, for you will forever be in our minds and heart.

Yesterday, Alissa and I drove out to Ohakune to get some lunch. We had discovered a hidden Forest Walk which was waaaayyyy kool. All those native vegetation really reminded me of how amazing nature and New Zealand really is! (Yes, New Zealand is more like a jungle in it's native state). There was a river there. It was feeding the forest with life and while carrying the dead leaves on it's trail. Life really is like a river-- you can not step into the same river twice and how each passing droplet of water or a debris is renewed. Anyhow, it reminded us of how trivial responsibility really is! It is all made up by us; we don't need to be stressed out by our something we have forged. It is also interesting to note that wikipedia deems the US culture as "need to be fiscally responsible and has the need to obtain economical independence right after college". That is the reason why no Americans really ever take a "gap year" or just run up and travel. It would be irresponsible in American culture. It made me really think how Alissa (grew up in a cultural mecca or San Jose) never really had friends that had strong oppositions for her to get up and go to NZ, whereas, I had almost offensive opposition (by friends...not parents). I remember I was talking to a friend during spring and was asked what I was going to do after college...I also asked the same. My buddy replied "preparing and saving up to go to a professional graduate school!" My response--"dunno, but going to NZ for a while, dunno when I'll come back". The response I got was "you're crazy, you're really going to take poor Alissa to NZ? without knowing what to do? you have no money jon, and a student loan, you're irresponsible". Crazy huh? I used to think I was irresponsible for coming here...now i dont.

two nights ago was an anti-ball party. The moutain had a "ball" but it was too expensive so we dressed up to go to Taz's massive party. It was a lot of fun! the theme was "ridiculous" so I dressed up ridiculous and taped a little cardboard ninja on my head. Alissa had a towel and a bra. A friend of ours dressed up like a dragon.

Anyhow, I gotta go, c ya!
Btw, canada's policy with work permits has gone ape shit crazy because of the olympics so I heard preference will be given to NZ, Canadians, australians and the english for work first. So I don't think canada will happen. Maybe Colorado? Maybe san fran? maybe japan? or stay here? or go to fiji? I dunno yet, but we'll see where life takes us as long as we do something Legen...wait for it....DARY!!!!! (that was for you Herrera).

bye

More Animals

2009-09-13T23:52:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure if I mentioned the night Jon brought home a puppy claiming it was lost. That night the thing kept puking and then eating its throw up. And in the morning it turned out that the dog just liked to roam around and wasn't lost at all. Well, that was a while ago, But Kalai remembered that incident. Last night, Kalai brought us a little baby bird that she said had fallen out of its nest and needed a place to sleep until the rescue organization would be open in the morning. So for a night we took care of little "Poo-poo." (That name was courtesy of Amy's creative mind.) We have decided Poo-poo is a girl because she is very beautiful. She spent the night with us, but when she heard family chirping in the morning, she flew around all flustered and called to her bird friends. So we took her outside and she kept calling till another bird came and accompanied her away. It was rather cute. Jon has decided that animals just use us for a nice place to sleep for a night.

Yesterday, our friend Joel, whose house we have taken to invading when we are bored, got himself evicted. The whole thing was pretty stupid. He was defending a friend against the manager who was insisting that the guy move at 10 am when he was clearly going to be at work. Joel said: "Doing that's being an asshole." And then he was told he would have to move out. I'm pretty sure Joel is the one person I would never have expected this to come to. He is probably the least offensive, most soft-spoken guy in the world. But, this just adds to the reasons why living at The Park is like living in a war between staff at the Mountain, and management at The Park. New battles strike up all the time, and Jon and I get stuck in the middle of it because I work at the mountain and he works at The Park.

Having said that, everyone here is sort of getting antsy to leave. The snow is so slushy that people opt out of going skiing on their off days, and drive to nearby towns instead. (Those are the only two options of entertainment.) There is a REAL waterfall in middle of one of the slopes, and it is not uncommon to encounter little streams, and rocks are jutting out of the snow everywhere. People are being asked if they want to end their contracts for work early because it looks like the season is heading to a close. I think they are hoping to get another month out of it. We'll see if the snow plays along. Either way it doesn't really matter for us. When there is no more work for us to do on the mountain, I'll share the hours Jon is doing at the Park, and we can have the rest of the week to travel around and do touristy things.

That is all for now!

Jalissa

2009-09-07T23:32:00.000-07:00

Funny story:
Yesterday, Jon and I were going to go skiing at Whakapapa as usual on a beautiful day off. Then we realized that our car wasn't going to make it up the mountain with the amount of gas (or Petrol, as they say here) that was in our car. No worries, we'll just stop by the gas station and get some, right? WRONG. Um, the gas station was out of gas. That's New Zealand for you. And the nearest gas station is in Ohakune, 35 km away from our current location. Here's a tip, fill up a gas can with Petrol, and carry it with you always. You never know when you will simply not be able to get what you need!

Anyways, it wasn't a problem for us. We did indeed have to drive 35km out of our way just to get gas, though. So instead of driving the hour it would have taken us to get back on track, we just went skiing on the other side of the mountain, called Turoa. Dude, the drive to Turoa is just beautiful! The road curves through all kinds of foresty vegetation. The drive that takes me to work at Whakapapa is entirely fields with sheep, and then fields of lava rocks. That's all. When I found out that the people working on the other side get to have that drive to work, I felt cheated. So we had a great time just getting there. And once there, we had a great time attempting jumps on the little terrain park. It was the perfect balance since Jon is more comfortable jumping on things than I am, and I am more comfortable skiing than he is. So it evened out.

It was a really good day. Yay!

Jalissa

The "Gangsta" Party

2009-09-05T02:03:00.000-07:00

Last night, The Park hosted a party that was gangsta themed. WOW. I never realized how removed New Zealanders are from the Hip Hop culture. You wouldn't believe how many horribly wrong stereotypes they have about "gangstas."

1. Josh, my supervisor at Rentals, calls my Hip Hop music "clone music" because all the beats sounds the same to him, and he can't tell the people apart that listen to that music. Wow is that a statement you would not feel comfortable saying in the US or what!!!!

2. Some people came to the party looking like members of the Mafia, with suits and guns.

3. Their version of Rap involves Eminem and Biggie. THAT'S ALL. I think we listened to an entire album of Eminem's music that night. I don't know any bar or club that would play music by Eminem unless it just came out and featured Akon in it. They are in love with "Gangster's Paradise." I haven't heard that song since I was 10.

4. My collection of music is apparently a bit too "Gangster" for New Zealanders. People would rather listen to Techno and Pop. (Hehe)

5. When I came to the party with Corn Rows, you wouldn't believe how many people thought I was REALLY "GANGSTA". (I was wearing the ski pants that my work issued me, and a sweatshirt). People at Rentals never stop telling me that I am gangsta. I find that very amusing. I don't even think they know what they are saying. I keep trying to explain that I am from the suburbs of California, but I don't think they care about that.

6. People threw around sensitive subjects like "dressing like a blood or a crip" and "whic gnag sign is this?" I was thoroughly embarrassed for all of us most of that night. It was awesome.

Anyways, I just had to mention that. Otherwise it was a really fun night with lots of dancing and then a hangover at work the next day. Fridays at work are starting to suck.

You all have a great day/night!
Jalissa

The Circle of Life, NZ Style

2009-08-29T00:21:00.000-07:00

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!

2009-08-23T22:17:00.000-07:00

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!!!!!

2009-08-18T00:36:00.000-07:00

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

2009-08-14T00:42:00.000-07:00

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

2009-08-10T14:55:00.000-07:00

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

2009-08-08T19:54:00.001-07:00

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!

2009-08-08T00:12:00.000-07:00

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!

2009-08-03T03:19:00.000-07:00

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

Another Trip to Civilization

2009-07-29T22:43:00.000-07:00

Here in the boonies, bad weather days are used to make trips to civilization. As most of the mountain was closed for wednesday due to bad weather, we decided against going skiing. Instead, we were going to drive to a nearby city to get Jon some contact solution. Turns out that my friend Leo beat us to the idea. He had gotten off of work at 10 am (because of the bad weather) and had come to The Park to ask Josh, our friend and supervisor at work, for a ride to Taupo. Those two somehow managed to find out where Jon and I live and came knocking at our door. They needed to fill a carload of people to make the trip cheaper. So we drove with them instead of using our own car. Interestingly enough, Amy ended up coming with us. Somehow I always end up hanging out with the same people.

Taupo gets a little boring after a while. We just ended up getting groceries and hanging around most of the time. There is a movie theater in town, so we took advantage of that and watched "The Hangover" which was actually pretty good. And that's saying something coming from me, since I tend to hate the movies that everyone else likes. I'm really glad we didn't end up watching Bruno. That would have been a huge waste of money.

Jon and I bought bindings off of Trade Me last night. If these bindings are useable, then we'll attach them to his janky board. Maybe that will suffice to make riding the little thing easier.

You can tell by my writing that I am getting bored right now. I will probably go out drinking tonight. The big event of the week is that a DJ is coming to the pub tonight. Apparently everyone has been getting sick of the music they play at the pub, so people were very excited to go experience the music. I hope to infiltrate the masses and do some hanging out. Jon has to work. I will be alone. Except for my friends from Rentals. Which is a good portion of the people living in National Park, so I really won't be alone. But still.

Yeah, sorry for the lack of news. Bad weather means life kind of stands still when you're in the middle of nowhere.

Jalissa

The Tuesday Island

2009-07-27T22:08:00.000-07:00

So, now that holidays are over, my schedule is getting a lot more normal. I have mondays and wednesdays off, which leaves a single day of work in between. I call it my island of work. Today was such a day. It was incredibly slow today, to the point that our supervisor was struggling to find things for us to do so we could look busy. Longest day of my life. And I didn't even go for a ski break because I thought I might make up some hours from all the ski breaks I have been taking lately.

So there is not much to tell.

Yesterday was the day Jon and I went to the mountain together. The weather was perfect. It was sunny and warm. What sucks is that it turns out that the board we bought off of the internet is way smaller and more broken than we expected. The bindings have probably been put together out of whatever was available. Every part is different from the next, and nothing matches. It's pretty ridiculous. The top of the board is coming off of the bottom in some parts, which is the kind of damage that takes days (and money) to fix. Not to mention that the bindings are so small that it is too hard to get your boots into them without an extraordinary struggle.

This stuff actually is helping us both understand the details of why boards are usually built the way they are. Knowing what's wrong is a really good way to learn about the equipment that we are investing in. The problem is that it took us an actual monetary investment to learn these lessons. So we were pretty bummed yesterday. We are either going to have to buy a whole new set of stuff and try to sell this janky board, or we'll at least have to buy new bindings and get the board fixed up. As staff, I do get a 50% discount in the workshop. The guy there said a full tune would cost us $26. That seems like a reasonable price to pay for a real wax, sharpening the edges, and gluing the parts of the board back together. This would mean that Jon would have a relatively short board, but according to the internet, it is still within the range of sizes that a person of his height would have. The plus side would be that we could ditch it after he has trashed it for a season of beginner riding. We could just carry the bindings home with us.

So despite amazing weather, the riding was not that great. I'll rent Jon some stuff from rentals until we get this board fixed up. In the meantime, he's getting really good. We're getting some speed going down some of these runs, and despite some gnarly falls, he is fearless. What I really want, though, is to find some people that we can ride together with. We are still searching for the right combination of people to do this with. It's hard to have fun when you are skiing with people of different skill levels. Especially if those people aren't necessarily invested in hanging out with you. It's hard to convince people to go out with you if that means they have to sacrifice their ski time to wait for you. In the end, I got a snowboard and started riding with Jon because that put us on a more even level in terms of riding skill.

We are going skiing again tomorrow, but it looks like the weather is going to suck. We'll see how that goes...

Jalissa

One Sunny Weekend

2009-07-26T03:38:00.000-07:00

Friends, the most remarkable thing happened on Mount Ruapehu this weekend. We had sun. Several consecutive days of it. There were even shadows. It was beautiful. I went on a ski break during my work today. Unfortunately, the snow that was on the slopes was no good (remember the days of rain on the mountain), so I skiied on ice the whole time, but nontheless, this was a completely different experience from the days of zero visibility. The mountain is beautiful. I will have to make a serious effort to take some pictures of it tomorrow.

So far, I have not been on too many ride breaks. Today I went with Amy and a girl named Carla. Carla is the slacker at Rentals. She has nothing good to say, and she brings the rest of the group down most of the time. She is also a typical girl. As an example, lets take today's ride break. The moment I got off, I bolted out the door and got ready as quickly as possible. I wanted to use as much of my free time as possible to explore the mountain. So, I stood there waiting for Carla. Ok, I tolerated that. She was probably just not used to speed-dressing and speed-ski-fitting. (By the way, I am now a certified salomon ski technician. Which means that I know how to adjust bindings. But it sounds cool and I have a certificate!) Then, it turns out that Carla neglected to mention that she basically doesn't know how to snowboard. So I do a turn, wait for Carla, do a turn, wait for Carla. At this point I was irritated because I had made it clear that I was a good skiier and that I wanted to use every second of my ski break to actually SKI. I thought she might have realized that she might be a burden if she was going to snake down the hill. Next thing I know, she sits down in the middle of the slope and takes the bindings off of her snowboard. Long story short, the binding wouldn't go back on the board, and riding down the hill was no longer an option. I was not about to help this girl at this point, since I was wasting precious women minutes. (You crewbies will appreciate that one.) Being the angel she is, Amy was very patient with Carla, helped her try to put the bindings back on the board, and eventually even walked her back up the hill so they could take the lift down to rentals to fix the board. I ended up taking off down the mountain and skiing on my own for the rest of the break. Lame. I'm no fan of skiing alone, and I don't think I will ever be. But it was better than waiting all the time.

Now that I think of it, I think I had such little patience with Carla because I have been spoiled with the attitude that comes along with being on a rowing team. I was used to girls who understand when they can and cannot contribute, who go out of their way to do the work that needs to get done, and who try hard even when they think they can't do things. None of these things were the case with Carla, and I don't think they will ever be.

So, in the future, I will be making sure to take ride breaks with other people. I have previously taken a ride break with a Korean guy named Leo. He's a hoot. You can tell that he is quite The Shit in Korea. The guy has an aura of confidence that cannot be shaken. Plus, he tells hilarious stories of his womanizing ways, and his unshakeable good looks. What makes these stories so funny is that he tells them in complete honesty, without any attempts to humble himself. Example: "Before I had my girlfriend, two girls liked me. A Korean one and a Japanese one. The Japanese girl was very cute. But I chose the Korean one because she was more beautiful. Girls like me. I am very confident and good looking." Man, I just can't stop laughing when he says stuff like that. Anyways, Leo is a decent skiier. Still, he doesn't really ski with his feet parallel, so he is still much slower than I would like to ride. Once, when the weather was really foggy but I had a ski break with Leo, we took out snowboards instead. We are equally bad at that, so we had a good time.

Speaking of snowboarding, I am going to the mountain with Jon tomorrow. We both have the day off, so we are taking advantage of his (and my) season pass. We just received the snowboard we bought for him in the mail today. I hope the thing will be ok for him. I am always afraid of the permanence of buying ski equipment. What if you spent hundreds of dollars on a piece of crap? How do you know it will perform its duty? (For example, I took out a pair of skis today that had absolutely no edge. For you non-skiiers, that means I was unable to make proper turns and just ended up sliding down the mountain at breakneck speeds.) In our case, its ok, since we really didn't spend too much money on the board. As soon as Jon gets better, he will probably outgrow it anyways. Maybe we can pimp the thing out a little before we sell it again. It really looks janky. And I mean JANKY. The bindings look like they were made of spare parts. And they probably were. But in some ways, I enjoy the idea that Jon's board has character. Not like the rest of those kids who buy a slick new board without bindings for $600 on sale, and spend about that much for boots and bindings as well.

Tomorrow, Jon and I will meet up with Taz (who is both a Rental Attendant and a Housekeeper at the Park) and her boyfriend Josh (who is a cook or kitchen aid on the mountain and at the Park) and probably Leo, to go skiing with them. We will see how things go. I might just end up taking out a snowboard if there are enough of us who will be stuck on beginner slopes tomorrow. Who knows, I might get good at boarding!

Good night y'all!
Jalissa

Did you see penguins fly into a window last night?

2009-07-23T21:03:00.000-07:00

Apparently, most of the patrons of "the Park" has.

This incident happened last night. Last night was my first shift for "Night Audit/Porter". Basically, I transform into this night manager that looks after the park and patrols the circumference of the hotel until 2AM. The job is legit--I get paid, I get free drinks, play computer games all night, and have random drunk citizens entertain me for hours on end. Until, of course, a penguin shaped rock gets tossed into a window.

Let me explain. After the shift, I went straight to bed. Why? Because I had work at 9am. Duh. Surely, after such a quite night, or so I thought, there would be no police cars in front of the park in the morning right? Wrong! During my shift, I somehow managed to miss this maniac try to get into the park because he got kicked out of the bars. Good thing he was only trying to get into his own room. Anyhow, this enraged drunkard decided that it was a good idea to chuck a rock that closely resembles that cute, cuddly, flight-less bird into a window. Somehow I missed that last night. But no worries, I am not in trouble--at least not now. Now, as I zombied my way towards the reception office this morning(closely resembling an animal myself--a five-fingered sloth) Malcom, the kiwi manager, asked me "aiy Jon, havya seen en penguin flie into a wendow laast niaght?...go have-a looky there mate" and there it was. Bam. A broken window and a fucking penguin.

The other night, Alissa, myself, and the rest of the park had some free dinner and "heaps" of drinks from the owner. The restaurant was a very modern-conectpual artified room, with remarks painted on the walls such as "save me save me from myself" and "when they've found me, i was dead for a month" or something along those lines.

The place was called the projection room, and had a large projection screen outside that exhibited some disturbing scenes.
The dinner itself was a fusion asian food and some goolaush (spelling?). The asian fusion wasn't that very good, but it seemed very very very expensive.

I know, I know, we haven't put up any pictures yet, but they should be on their way.

dunno, what to expect tonight,

bye,
Jalissa
oh btw, i have a snowboard coming my way now for $130 + shipping yay!

It's Been A Month!

2009-07-21T18:37:00.000-07:00

So we've officially been in New Zealand for 4 weeks. In the meantime we are quite settled here. We have our steady jobs, our home, and our car. Wow. It's crazy how far you can come in 4 weeks.

Speaking of our car, We were out driving it the other day, and we took a look in the trunk. It is full of things that the previous owner just couldn't take back to germany. Man, it was like opening a treasure chest! We found some of his camping clothes (for some reason this guy liked wearing green things. Maybe he hunted animals while camping), a pillow, complete with pillowcase, a sleeping bag, a length of rope, a large towel, a tent, and all sort of other fun stuff! He also left us with stuff like windex, an alarm clock, and sandwich bags. Seriously, when you're living on a budget, these things get very exciting. We left most of the stuff in the trunk. I hope to get excited again the next time I open it! Our car is doing well. It seems to be a little unhappy that we keep starting and stalling it, though. It now needs to have the accelleration pumped before it will let us turn it on. Grumpy little bugger. In terms of gas money, it costs about $1 per km, so we pretty much pay 30 bucks just to get to the closest town. In other words, we should be saving up if we plan to travel with our car after the snow season ends.

Today, the owner of the Park is taking out all of his staff to dinner. I get to come along for the ride. (I love the perks of Jon's workplace!) I'm excited to finally meet the actual owner of the place. We've met everyone else so far. Plus, he must be pretty cool if he's taking his entire staff out to dinner with him. Oh, who am I kidding, he probably lives next door.

I have been laying in bed for way too many hours a day lately. Even when I have work, I tend to feel like just crawling into bed and sleeping after I get home. Today I did not have work. (Mondays and wednesdays are my off days... I think) Since the weather is pretty miserable right now, I had no desire to go anywhere, and I spent all day in bed. It was awesome. I can breathe through my nose, and that's all I ask. Swallowing still hurts though. Hopefully this will go away soon.

Speaking of work, it has come to my attention that my last few entries made it sound like Jon was being worked to the bone. I think I made that sound a little more extreme than it really is. He is working about 40 hours a week, just like me. It's just that his hours are a little more randomly scheduled. And he is getting paid for every hour that he works past 32. So there is definitely incentive for him to do the work.

Oooh. I also looked into the whole idea of working at a ski resort in Canada. It would work! They are looking for applicants right now. The cool thing in Canada would be that there are ski resorts as close as 30 minutes from Vancouver, BC. And several of them are hosting events for the Olympics. The process of applying for work is the exact same as what we went through for working in NZ. We would need to get a Visa, and a "social insurance number." We've done all those things before, so I can't imagine there being too many difficulties that we have not already hurdled. This time, though, I would look for a job on the mountain that is closer to what a mechanic does. Or, there is this one job where I would basically have to ski around carrying stuff and blocking off places that people can't ski in. I wouldn't be averse to that either. Jon could find some real work in the city, and that way we could both get what we want and still live in the same place. Plus, we could take a car with us across the border. Then we wouldn't have to buy one. Not that we would be far from the rest of the world if we lived in Vancouver. Not like National Park...

Ok, I'm getting ahead of myself. I am still at the beginning of my journeys in New Zealand.

....GAH, excited!

Jalissa

P.S. Shout out to Chelsea, who thinks that turkeys are far away. Whatever that means. Dude, there were turkeys just hanging out at Lake Natoma, remember? (just kidding Chelsea. You too get props for going to another country!)

We're STILL SICK!

2009-07-21T01:15:00.000-07:00

I suspect this to be the swine flu.

Everyone at work is sick (from what I hear) and half the people at the "park" are sick.

I feel like I am slowly recovering, but Alissa is still a bit sniffly.

Anyhow, yesterday, I finally got the hang of driving a stick (excitement!)

Unfortunately, our gear shift lever is still a bit broken.

I know that Lissy has told you all about the flu pandemic that is sweeping the whole landscape of national park, but I 've decided to be redundant. Anyhow, the last couple of days were pretty interesting. First off, we went to the town of Taumaranui to go shopping. We took the park van and also kidnapped Amy along with us. We did our business of changing ownership of the car, eating lunch, and grocery shopping. For lunch, we ended up eating some fish and chips which were delicious, but without any tomato sauce so it was a bit bland.

BTW, tomato sauce = ketchup - vinegar and high fructose corn syrup + real sugar and real tomatoes. So it's quite yummy. Sunday night was a huge party. The theme was "garbage ball". Therefore, people created costumes using garbage bags. This became quite a kodak moment filled with creative costumes: people with garbage top hats, garbage pants (ironed together), garbage dresses, garbage bling, garbage ties and shoes, and the occasional garbage underpants. I worked that night so it wasn't too fun. Anyhow, I can't believe I am still sick and so is Lissy. But on the bright side, I just bought a snowbaord with bindings for $130 off of an eBay knock off so I should be getting more and more snow time. There is a party tonight, but I don't think we will be going to that either--alissa is sick and as aforementioned, my symptoms are substitutive to the ones I had yesterday to the sinus headaces I have today.

I feel this week will be awesome though!
c yall soon,
Jalissa
ps. shout out to Julia, who is going to a far-away land labeled as Ghana. I hope you make it out alive. And please, we can do without such novel overseas gifts as malaria, yellow fever, billharzia, and/or civil corruption or guerilla warfare, thanks.

Sick and In Bed

2009-07-18T13:39:00.000-07:00

Today I called in sick to work. Some nasty bug has been making its way through the masses, and no one has been spared. Two weeks ago we were still laughing about who got sick and who didn't. At this point, everyone has had it. I've been a little sick for a week now, but it was mostly congestion. Then, just as I thought I was on the road to health, I got hit HARD. Yesterday my mucous was bloody, so I knew the battlefield (my throat) was getting destroyed. My throat feels incredibly sore today, and not being able to breathe through my nose isn't making things much better. My mouth is dry and my nose is runny. The skin on both is cracking. Ugh. Jon looks like he is getting better at this point, although he wasn't feeling too great all day yesterday.

I can't help but wonder if this is not the swine flu that we are all getting. Seriously, no one got out of getting sick. And that's what they say about the swine flu, right? That what makes it so dangerous is that humans don't have the immune system to avoid getting it. But once you have it, it's just the regular flu. So for all I know, I am now under the influence of the dreaded disease. I must admit, that makes being sick a little bit more exciting.

For now, I will lie in bed and hope that rest will make me better. I can use the time to explore my options for the future. I was talking to some Rentals people yesterday, and they gave me the impression that all of them have some kind of plan for the future. Considering that most of the people working here literally have NO money saved up, I was a bit surprised. (Those of us who came from far away places have tended to be 25 or older, so I just figured they had been working long enough to save some money. But so far, everyone I talked to literally has to save up if they want to be able to afford anything more than this week's rent. How do they live like that?)

So, about my future. It is pretty clear that leaving New Zealand should be the way to go. I hear that fruit picking is extremely lucrative, but that won't be happening until after spring is over, which is a long time to wait around here with nothing cool to do. Plus, there are some other good options. For example, how cool would it be to work at the Olympics in Canada? It would be another foreign country, there would be snow again, which is awesome, and we would be smack dab in the middle of extreme athletic performance! Plus, mom or the fam (or anyone from the US) could come visit me at minimal cost.

Speaking of which, did I mention that Jon Stenstrom came to visit me here in National Park? It just so happened that the bus he was taking through the country was making a stop at my house. But they had had a long night before they got to National Park, so we just talked and went into the hot tub. Then Jon and I went to bed. We had to work early in the morning... ew, I disgust myself. Just for that statement, I am going to do something irresponsible today.

ANYWAYS, back to the future. (I crack myself up!) So, applying for another snow job would actually appeal to me. I've had a good experience with it so far. I do not think Jon wants another blue collar job, so he will be seeking a real job or a place that will pay to further his education. I will probably be applying to some real jobs as well. Maybe. I don't think I'm ready for anything steady just yet. This travelling lifestyle is getting to me. But I did find out that being a ski instructor is actually a shitty job. I was going to get trained to be one, until I found out that they rarely get a full day's worth of lessons scheduled to them. Often, I see ski instructors chilling in the staff room. Basically, they get a couple of hours worth of lessons, and in between, they have to sit around with nothing to do. Plus, the pay is little better than mine, a.k.a. minimum wage. And they have to deal with miserable kids all day. I think my job is better. The one thing I WOULD like to do, is deal with the machinery at a ski resort. Maybe drive a CAT (the snow flattener thingy) or work on lifts that have broken down. I'm sure there are lots of cool things to learn about mechanical things on a ski resort. I could learn a lot that way. I'm sure the pay wouldn't be great, but it would be one way to gain experience in something closer to my field.

Ok guys, Jon just came in and told me he got sent home for being sick. I think a nap is in order for both of us...

Jalissa

It's Payday

2009-07-15T23:54:00.000-07:00

Hey all!
Do not worry. The earthquake/tsunami actually hit the south island. We too heard about the fiasco on the radio, but did not experience it ourselves.

On another note, it looks like the management at "The Park" where we live, and where Jon works, wants him to start doing more work in the kitchen and at the bar. (This is not including the night-manager work he has already started doing.) I think that will be a nice change for him, since those will both be jobs involving customers and creativity. Not bad. Plus, that's two more things you can put on a resume in case of need. He's getting a lot of experience from this job. We are starting to like Jason (the guy who originally told us to go find work for Jon elsewhere) a lot more. He has gone from absolute douche to quite a nice guy. A nice metamorphosis to undergo.

Not much happened today. Work was uneventful. I am going to start asking for more ski breaks. I heard the snow today was just awesome. Even the sun came out for a little bit!

But today is payday, so there are lots of parties happening. I will be going to the one being hosted by some guys from Rentals. This is the first time i am going to let myself be seen to them in a socializing setting, so I'm a bit nervous. Man, first impressions scare me. Maybe because they are so important in shaping your relationships with people... Jon will be coming with me of course, but I have a feeling he won't be staying long because he is feeling a bit sick.

Off to have a good time! You guys should comment on our posts and let us know how you're doing. I haven't heard from people in a long time!

Jalissa

Happy Valley

2009-07-14T19:19:00.000-07:00

It's been a few days since the last update... let me fill you in.

Jon has now attempted to fix the car's shifting thingy using super glue. We haven't checked the status of that procedure in a while. It's been a really busy week for both of us, what with the swarms of visitors coming to Ruapehu for skiing during the holidays. The holidays will be over after this week, so we will actually have some spare time in the near future. On the one day off that I was supposed to have, it turned out the mountain was closed due to high winds. That meant that everyone else was getting paid for 2 hours of work they were not doing (and I was not), AND I couldn't go skiing. So I ended up joining the many others in a Van to Taupo. Jon had to work so he couldn't come. Amy and I stuck together, though. We had a great time since Amy got excited over every little store we encountered. As it turns out, anything you could buy here (and by "here" I mean "anywhere in the middle of the North Island of NZ") is incredibly expensive. I thought I would buy a set of long underwear, since I am lacking in that department, but after I saw that the cheapest ones would cost me about $60 for a top, I figured I could probably make do with the clothes that I own. So that was a good day.

For the first time ever, Jon and I had a day off together yesterday. For some reason, there is never a dull moment when we go on adventures together. We figured, this would be a great opportunity to introduce Jon to the mountain, and get him started so that he would be able to go skiing on his own if I was not available to go with him. We got up at 8, took our time getting ready, and got on the 9:30 bus to the top of the mountain. The weather was pretty nice, not blue skies, but definitely a decent snow day. Of course, a day of good weather during the holidays means MASSIVE crowds on the mountain. I was glad I wasn't working.

We got Jon a season pass for $200!!!!!!!!!!! (mostly because I said he was my fiancee...) Julia, note the lack of accent on that e. Does it bug you?
Anyways, that price was about half as much as we were expecting. One day on the mountain costs $83, so this season pass will pay for itself by the third use. Pretty sweet, eh? We had previously bought Jon some snowboard boots for $30. Some guy who was only passing through town had put up an ad in the rockclimbing gym next door, selling his stuff. It was definitely good timing. So all we needed was a board. I am officially allowed to take out anything I want to use from rentals without charge and without question because I work there. So I got my skis and boots, and when I asked our supervisor, he turned a blind eye and let me get Jon a board for free as well. What a cool guy.

Ok, so far it looks like all is well. We happily take our gear to the slopes and start the first run. The beginner's area is called Happy Valley. This is the most deceptive euphemism. Happy Valley is crammed full of people who have never seen snow before, who came unprepared to the harsh winter conditions of a mountain, and who cannot control the movements they make with limbs that are attached to foreign objects. Crammed is an understatement. There is a person sitting standing or stumbling about every five feet. The line to get on the lift took so long it was actually more fun for us to walk back up the hill after we had finished going down it.

Jon and I were happily making our way through the crowds, when all of a sudden, visibility was massively reduced by fog. It all went downhill after that. The fog became wetter and wetter, and soon we were skiing in the rain, our goggles fogging up so badly we couldn't see through them anymore, not that we could see without them either. Despite bad weather, we were determined to have a good time, and after having some lunch, we went out again for some last runs. We then got on the 3:00pm bus that would take us back to National Park. It is there we got the bad news. The bus was delayed because of accidents that had been caused by customers. 3 accidents had to be cleared before the bus was going anywhere. We were told to seek shelter in one of the staff lounges (mind you, we are taking staff buses to and from the mountain). So, Jon and I head to the Rentals Building, where we loiter for a long long time. Had we been smarter, and stayed in the cafeteria, we might have made it down the mountain as customers, but we were lumped in with the rentals crew because that is where we were staying, and so when weather conditions caused cars to continually crash going down the mountain road, we were forced to wait. They wanted the customers to get off the mountain first, since they would be more likely to panic.

In the end, after numerous false alarms, we were finally allowed to get on a bus. Outside, it was beautiful. It was snowing in massive amounts, and 5 inches of powder were on the parking lot cement. Jon and I had to stand on the bus that inched its way through the treacherous conditions. Somewhere in the middle we switched buses because chains we no longer needed. We got home by 9:30 pm. What a day.

Today at work, I learned that all that beautiful snow had turned to slush. Ten cm of snow had vanished overnight due to warm conditions. After all that misery, there wasn't even any powder to enjoy. Worst storm ever.

Things Are Off to a Good Start...

2009-07-08T02:52:00.000-07:00

See that picture? That is the shifting mechanism of our car.
Yeah, we broke the car.

I was teaching Jon his first lesson in manual cars, we were happily bumping and stalling along (ok, a little frustratedly). When all of a sudden, the darn thing just popped off! It looks like a good whack with a hammer will be able to reapply the shifting stick to its rubber base, so don't worry. We didn't buy a faulty car. The whole thing just came as a bit of a surprise.

So after the test drive, we went out with our friend Amy.
This is a picture of Jon and Amy sitting at a table in a restaurant/bar called "Basekamp." We had pizza with lamb, minty yogurt sauce, potatoes and pumpkin pieces. It was pretty good, actually.

I'm so proud that I am actually uploading pictures now. Here's one from July first. Canada Day. Most of those people in this picture are the people Jon works with. They are what we call the Woofers, or people that work at "The Park" for free accommodation. Three of these people were European travelers just passing by for some good skiing. We are wearing those hats because they came with the bottles of Canada Dry that we consumed that night.

Ok guys, ta ta for now.
Jalissa

NO WAY!!!!!

2009-07-06T23:59:00.000-07:00

Um, Jon and I own a CAR now!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We just bought it for $1200. There are cheaper cars out there, but most of them fail their inspection tests and can costs hundreds of dollars to fix. This car is in excellent condition, and it will be newly registered as of tomorrow. WOOT! Now we won't have to beg people for rides anymore! Getting a ride has proven to be the most painful experience here. No one has a car. But now we do!!

And we are also poor. Until Jon or I get our first paycheck. Which will be soon. But until then, I will either bring bag lunches to work, or go hungry. And no more going out.

Anyways, as this is the first time I have ever owned a car, I am very excited.

Did I mention that they drive on the wrong side of the road here? Oh, and the car's a manual.

I will be teaching Jon to drive stickshift tomorrow. On the wrong side of the road. OMG.

Just had to mention this bit of news. *flails arms around excitedly*

Ok, have a good night!
Jalissa

Nice people.

2009-07-06T21:47:00.000-07:00

So.
I woke up at 5am to work today.

Nothing exciting lately due to school holidays. I just met some pretty kool peeps.

The new Chef is from Netherlands-- he is a boarder, caffeine and burner addict, and is really kool.

The bar manager is Dan--an aussie from Fresno and grew up in Reedly (my place of birth)! He doesn't like how the kiwi's choice of drinkerage is smirnoth ice.

Today, we went to Ohakune to get our IRD's. Problem: we don't have a car yet!
So we got in a little difficulty and arguments over this topic, but at the end, the general manager (who I initially thought was a jerk) rented his van to us!

Ohakune is a cute little snow town and is also the carrot capital of the world.
Everyone there was really nice and sooo helpful.
We got our IRD"s applications in and now we're just lounging around till dinner time.

We promise to post up pictures soon!

love you all,
Jalissa

And the Working Craze Begins

2009-07-04T00:15:00.000-07:00

Hi all. Alissa here. I just feel like I haven't written anything for a while, so I'll give you a little update on my new lifestyle.

I work from before the lifts open until after they close. That's actually not too bad. The usual work day is 8 hours long. Usually there is a rush to rent skis in the morning, and a rush to return them right as all the lifts close. We have all learned that efficiency is key, since slow work means a daunting line of customers waiting to be helped. No one likes angry customers...

Around one pm, there tends to be absolutely nothing for the rental staff to do, so to get around paying us, they send us out skiing! I went on my very first ski break yesterday. Absolutely amazing. Getting out of work to go play in the snow (for free!!!) in the middle of the day is such a great thing. More people should have this work schedule. Then, at the end of two hours, it's a relief to get out of the cold and into the warm rental shop. It totally rejuvenates you. Sadly, the mountain is not entirely open yet. The ski patrol staff is working hard to get snow packed and to block off hazardous areas, so hopefully the rest of the mountain will open soon.

Oh by the way, the strangest phenomenon happens here. People (mostly foreigners from countries like china) have started to rent skis at any part of the day. Literally, at 2 pm, two hours before the lifts close, people are paying good money to ski just the last part of the day. I remember when I was a kid, that kind of mentality wasn't going to fly. We got up at the crack of dawn to beat the rush and get our gear faster then everybody else, and we left only after the lift stopped taking people up the mountain, so that we got the most out of our money. Didn't we mom?

Anyways, rentals is probably the coolest place to work, not only because of the awesome setup, but because of the attitude. For some reason there is just an awesome mix of people, who really infect everyone with their positive attitudes. We can often be found dancing and singing to somebody's iPod being broadcast by speakers. I think the customers quite enjoy watching the performances. But we also work hard when things need to get done. I'm surprised with the type of people that work at rentals, since I was originally of the opinion that these people don't have very high standards for their employees. Nope, they just know how to pick 'em I guess.

I will hopefully get used to working actual 8 hour days again. Getting up early sucks. But other than that, I think Jon and I will definitely make ourselves a little niche over here in NZ.

Goodbye all.
Jalissa

4th of July!

2009-07-03T20:55:00.000-07:00

Happy Independence day everyone!

Well, I(Jon) only have about 30min of break so gotta make this one short.

Today, I (Jalissa) woke up at 5:25am to work. Right now is 4:00pm.

We cleaned, transformed into Paul Bunyan once again, and then went to the recycling center (its gross).

Also, we got two new general staffers: two czech republican girls. I guess they were shooed off yesterday, but my boss called them in part timers (they never have their things together).

Anyhow, I got the Overnight Manager job as confirmed, and been promoted once again to Assistant Shift Manager at the Bar and Assistant Chef.

I have to work till late tonight and I am already exhausted...I don't get to see Alissa often and prob. wont see each other as much I'd like to :( . I already miss her lots.

I guess them kiwis celebrate Canada Day, but not a single person has heard of or cares about the 4th of July (American) here at all!

g2g, c yall laterz,
-jalissa

My second day off work, but not really

2009-07-02T21:14:00.000-07:00

Hi all,

A brief on last night--I had work from morning till evening and was assigned additional work for pay. During this time, I've met an Aussie named Dan. I've found out that he grew up in Fresno and raised in Reedly! (we pretty much bonded over this fact!). I've also found out that he was the bar manager, so he hooked us up with free booze over the night.

That night, I was called in by the general manager (he wanted to "chi-chat" with me). I've suddenly remembered that this guy was still wishy-washy about me staying. Knowing this, I thought he was going to tell me to leave; thus, I did what any normal blue collar worker would do at that particular incident--I shit my self, figuratively. To my astonishment, he, however, has given me the option of being promoted from a "general staff/house-keeper/bartender/kitchen hand/Paul fucking Bunyan" to Overnight Manager. That's pretty sick, and I hear the pay is great! We will see though, because there is another girl who is more qualified than me (she's a paramedic).

The park had a party last night, and I've ended with some racial profiling from a drunk dude. That's ok though, I can't cause a commotion so I backed away, but I feel sorry for the guy. Why you ask? He was uglier than the potential offspring between Kelly Osborne and Marilyn Manson. Surely, you can imagine what this hick, redneck might have looked like; and surely, he will have a lesser chance of procreating than the endangered Giant Pandas with out any reproductive gentilia.

Then we went to sleep.

Alissa is working right now with the left over lunches I've found in the other rooms the other day. I started the day with some muay thai and workouts. I was soon summoned. TO WORK AGAIN ON MY OFF DAY! It's pretty chill though, Im getting paid.

Also, two nights agao, we've decided to go to the bars. Why? Because it was CANADA DAY! what's canada day? it's like our independence day, but basically, they didn't work for it (haha just kidding). We have a friend, Taz, who is Canadian so she got all excited about it. At the pub, we've met some German and Dutch people who wanted to play kings cup with us. We've also did this with Candian Clubs, which are whiskeys in ginger ale. We've also got some gnarly hats with it.

Well, that's about it. I have a meeting tonight and meeting tomorrow. Looks like I (jon) will be working 60-70 hours of week now.

bye, yall.
Jalissa

First Day of Work

2009-07-01T00:12:00.000-07:00

So I had my first day of work today! These next two weeks will be busy for me, as it is New Zealand's school vacation time. The slopes will be packed, and I will get scheduled to work 6 days a week until they go back to school. That's ok with me. I do get paid after all. Plus, I have a season pass that I can use in the middle of the day, when no one is renting or returning their gear. I think my job will be really chill. The people kept reiterating that we should remember that we're all here to have fun. Everyone here knows they are employing a bunch of rowdy kids, as they use the phrases "beer money" and "more time on the slopes" as incentives for everything. I quite enjoy it. A hard day's work entails retrieving boots and skis of the right sizes and chatting up customers and other staff members. I also now really value the fact that I am working indoors, as I had a chance to see the ski lift operators shivering in the brisk winds today. Oh, did I mention the SWEET free gear?

Other perks include 50% off the food in the cafeteria, 10 free ski lessons, 10 days of rentals for 90% off, 50 % off a season pass for family members ( I am going to get Jon one of these!), sweet deals on mountain gear of all types, and other perks I am forgetting. All in all, I am happy to be working there. Poor Jon got a taste of my misery today, as it was his first day OFF work on my fisrt day of work. He had to stay home alone (like I had to for the last few days...) Hopefully we will be able to maneuver our schedules to accomodate our off days a bit. I do want to travel some more!

Talkto you soon!
Jalissa

The Adventure Never Ends

2009-06-29T14:51:00.000-07:00

My apologies for missing yesterday's blogging, but I assure you, this story is worth the wait.

Yesterday, Jon and I had decided that we needed to get to Ohakune (the closest town) to get ourselves a bank account. I need to have a bank account before I start my job on Wednesday, otherwise I don't get paid. So, the moment Jon gets out of work, at 3:30, we check when the bank closes (at 4:30) and we book it out of our house to go hitchhike the 35 km to Ohakune.

About five minutes after we got to the street, a guy picks us up. He is a young looking man, who was traveling to his home all the way from Sydney, where he works, and so has probably had a long drive from the nearest airport. He wasn't going the exact direction we were planning on going, but said he would take us as far as he was driving. After we got in we told him the story of how we needed to get to the bank before it closed, and he ended up driving us all the way there. That guy was really chill. He said he used to do a lot of hitchhiking, so he likes picking people up nowadays.

Ok, so now we are in Ohakune. We get a bank account, no problem. The town is pretty cute and we decide to stay and have a bit of food since neither Jon nor I had had lunch. By the time we were on our way back home, it was getting a bit late, and the sun was beginning to set. We figure there will be no problem finding a ride back home. Off we go, holding up our thumbs on the side of the road, walking and talking all the while.

We soon leave the town. No one has picked us up yet. The speed limit sign on the side of the road says 100km/hr. This is now a freeway. Cars are whirring by us, and the hopes of us getting a ride are slim. We talk about it, and we figure we could make it to the crossing the guy from the car earlier was talking about in about 2 hours. No problem! We keep walking.

As the sky gets darker and it begins to drizzle, we are forced to rethink our decision. If we are not going to get a ride all night, (and we had learned our lesson about getting rides in the rain,) then walking home would take 7 or 8 hours. Time spent in complete darkness and probably ice cold rain. We turned around. At least in Ohakune, we could probably find a place to sleep.

We don't get too far before there is a tow truck on the side of the road. Jon is brave enough to ask for a lift, and the guy laughs and says sure, after he gets the dead car up on the tow truck. He is actually headed back towards National Park, after he brings his cargo to Ohakune, but he would stop short of National Park by about 19 km. We don't want to get stuck walking 19 km home, so we let him drive us to Ohakune, and then we get out.

In the end, we paid a shuttle $60 to drive us home again. It felt like a cop-out after all we had gone through to get home, but was totally worth every penny. Moral of the story: Jon and I probably should get a car so we don't have to risk our lives every time we want to run an errand.

I hope you enjoyed that experience. For the last two days, the mountain has been closed to skiiers because of extreme windy conditions. As a result, everyone is hanging out at home, and the internet is really slow. It has taken us 30 hours to download a movie we want to watch, and it's still not done downloading. We did hear about one kiwi movie that we want to watch called Goodbye Pork Pie. I am told it is about a kiwi and an aussie trying to cross the country in a car with no money. Somewhat appropriate.

Don't worry mom, we won't drink too much! I hope you are enjoying your last days at home before the big trip to germany! Love you!

Jalissa

Sunday Morrrnin

2009-06-27T21:07:00.000-07:00

Sunday mornin and the rain is fallin.

Anyhow, it is 4pm-ish right now after a long day of cleaning people's puke.

Last night was the kiwi's "mardi gras"..yes on a sat night. It seems like they like to call everything mardi gras.

We, however, went to an anti-mardi gras party because the actual mardi gras was far away and way expensive.

The night was pretty kool, we went to a house party of my fellow co-workers and got dominated in beer pong..somehow.

Btw, if we haven't told you, Air Newzealand is wonderful: it has a dvd/movie picker/screen in front of your eyes, free booze, friendly staff, and lots of leg room. Not to mention pretty ..ehh.. mediocre but" better than your average flight peanuts", food.

The beers here are good, except for this 20pack we bought to play pong with--it was like a corona and budweiser hybrid.

Not much happened today, everyone is hung over. I think we're going to take it easy and watch a movie or something tonight.

until next time,
Jalissa

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2009-06-27T17:49:00.001-07:00

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The Tides Turn!

2009-06-27T00:00:00.000-07:00

Things have changed since we last informed the world of our status. Yesterday, the lady that was in charge of hiring Jon came back from her vacation. After much confusion and conflicting stories, we finally found out today that she wasn't planning on sending Jon away. The guy who had told us that Jon wasn't needed had said that without asking her first. THIS MEANS THAT WE STILL HAVE FREE HOUSING! AND JON HAS A JOB! (probably at the expense of that guy's friendship, but who needed him anyways...)

Benefits that come with working at "The Park":
- Half price internet. (Good deal)
- Free dinners. Even for me, and that's cool.
- Connections to get free toilet paper, shampoo, towels, etc.
- Free laundry!
- Free rides to the nearest town once a week. We don't even pay for gas! And believe me, this is important. All business must be conducted far away since there are no stores where we live.
- Feeling special.

So, now I feel like the lazy one. Jon is out chopping wood and making the world a better place while I'm inside my cozy little apartment trying to stop my nose from bleeding. (See, Herrera, I mentioned the nosebleed!) Now that we don't have to pay for anything, our main expense is going to be food and beer!!

Today we took advantage of being friends with the staff at "The Park" by joining them for a ride to Turoa. This place is a one and a half hour drive away from National Park, where we live. Yes, one and a half hours. Turoa is a cute little city where we went to a woolworths for food and a hairdryer for me (wet hair in the cold is no fun). Jon and I decided that we would buy anything that was completely different from the stuff we are used to buying in the US. So, we left the store with "Lime Milk" and "Rough Rider Condoms." The bright green milk is really just milk with sugar and lime-ish flavor. I think I'll let Jon drink that after he works out. And as for the condoms, we haven't tried them yet, but I will have to disappoint you all. I probably won't be updating you on their quality.

We also FINALLY got the adapters we needed to charge our computers and our phone. (oh by the way we have a phone!) So now we won't have to bug all the americans at this place about whether they have an adapter and whether we could borrow it. Speaking of which. There are really not a lot of americans here. I probably know of 4. Apparently, there are a lot of germans, but I have yet to meet one. The girl that ended up having an adapter for us to use turned out to be Japanese by ethnicity but living in San Francisco.

Just so you know. New Zealanders don't refrigerate their eggs. When in Rome... Needless to say we are trying this new method of egg-retention. We shall see what happens to our 30 eggs.

Sadly, the Bank was closed today. It's not supposed to be closed on saturdays, but what do I know. Now I have to find another way to get to the next town before I start work on the 1st. Argggh. I smell another attempt at Hitchhiking.

Anyways, there's a party tonight. We gotta go.

Jalissa

Things you must know as a traveller in NZ

2009-06-25T17:40:00.001-07:00

Today, we learned some valuable lessons that you must know as a car-less traveller in New Zealand.

One. Apparently getting a ride on a bus or in someone else's car is unlikely.
Two. Try Hitchhiking!
Three. Don't bother trying to hitchhike in the rain. As we were told, no one wants to pick up a wet person in their car, especially if they've got nice leather seats. (Mind you, this was after we stood in the rain for quite some time. We only ended up asking someone for advice because we thought the thumbs up sign might not be the symbol for hitchhiker in NZ.)

So, getting out of town today didn't happen. Sad day.

Last night we were at the bar next door. There was a live band called "spider-pig." Very original. People who work on the mountain got today off so last night the bar got very crowded. Jon and I figured we would join the rest of them. We go tthere at 6 pm. We left by 9 because we got too tired. Darn Jet-lag! Anyways, we met some quite interesting people. One of them, Jordan, is a local in these here parts. He introduced us to a bottled version of whiskey and coke, or bourbon. He was a hunter ( or at least that's what we understood him to be) and he said he could get us a job painting in Auckland. I think we will try our luck elsewhere.

We met another guy, whom we shall call the cynical english dude, or Tom. This guy is very upset that there is only one bar to go to. Although it sounds like he comes from the middle of nowhere himself. He is also working as a rental attendant, so I will probably be seeing much more of him. He is living with a friend, another John. That guy seems nice but all we talked about was how he had already worked up at the Mountain for a year. He's going to be watching my every move making sure I do things right.

I give Jon all the credit for meeting people at bars though. Sneaky bastard.

Oh yeah, there's also this french guy that was very stereotypically french. He was quite the smooth talker and had no shame. He was planning on working on ski mountains for 1.5 years in a row. That's a lot of winters.

Ok, we're stuck here today. so hopefully something will come up to entertain us.

Laterz!
Jalissa

Day One:The Job Search

2009-06-24T21:53:00.000-07:00

See that map? Yeah, there is one square road attached to the highway. We have put a little symbol where we live. Literally, you could walk around the ENTIRE town in 15 minutes. Today, Jon did one day of "work for accommodation" which was really 3.5 hours of work, and then they sent him home. Basically, they are not going to give him any more work, so we either have to pay for the whole apartment (with my measly minimum wage job, which, I am told, will sometimes be unreliable pay if the mountain is closed for a time and which wont cover much more than the rent for the apartment anyways), or figure something else out.

After Jon came back, we went around the entire town asking if anyone needed to hire ANYBODY. Verdict: No one is hiring anymore. There is still some hope up at the ski resort itself, since the people the ski resort hires tend to be flakes who never show up, or who aren't reliable. We just met a guy today who chose to leave this place once he found out how small it was. Another guy was saying that the department he was working at was missing about 4 of the people it hired. Maybe we will be lucky enough to encounter a freshly open spot. Still, everyone has been saying there is no shortage of people looking for work.

The weather's nice here though! It's sunny and cold, but beautiful. Thanks mom for giving Jon the purple long underwear. It is being put to good use. Luckily our apartment is keeping us warm, and the water here is free because it comes straight from the mountain. We are taking showers all the time. We have unlimited internet, but unless we can get an outlet converter soon (from a nearby town, I hope), our laptops will run out of batteries.

Ok, it's off to the bar(s),

Jalissa

We're here!!!!

2009-06-24T00:38:00.000-07:00

So, we have arrived in Ruapehu safe and sound. There were no problems getting here. It has just been an overwhelming amount of traveling. After the 12 hour flight (in a 747 with personal TV's and lots of leg room, and free alcohol!!!!!)during which neither of us slept more than an hour or two, we got to Auckland at 5 AM. We took a bus to downtown, where we caught the bus to Ruapehu (another 6 hour drive). Now that we are here, we are exhausted.

Unfortunately, it turns out that this town is really just a block of housing, mostly full of hostels and lodges for skiiers. There are only 2 bars, and there is no bank or grocery store. The closest town is a 25 minute drive down the mountain. The only way to get down the mountain is to find someone with a car to take you, since the train doesn't run on weekdays, and there are no buses. Apparently hitchhiking is quite common.

We did hit one bump in the road. It turns out that "The Park," the place we are staying at for the moment, failed to tell us that they had already filled their "work for accommodation" spots. This leaves Jon out of a job, and it means we will have to pay for our housing. Kind of a problem. He has already applied to work at the bar next to our housing, and we will be looking for jobs on the mountain itself tomorrow. Not to worry! We will figure something out. We have already gotten an offer from a guy from england to find a house to live in at a cheaper price. Who knows, maybe that'll work out.

Tonight, we are just pooped. It's time to go sleep...

Jalissa

June 20, 2009

2009-06-21T01:19:00.000-07:00

I will make this a bit short because we're a bit sick.

So, we've stayed at Frau Kispersky's house (for you non-German aficionados or non-Germans, it means Ms. Kispersky's) for a couple of days.

It was really nice to hang out with Alissa's mom and alissa's friends: for example, we had dinner with her girl scout friend, Sandra, and went to some frozen yogurt with two of her high school buddies--we've also hiked with Alissa's mom for about 3.2 hrs!

Anyhow, lissy got a fever and i got some gnarly sinus infection so we're sick and going to sleep at my madre's casa. New Zealand is only 2 days away so we're gonna rest up.

BTW,
a shout out to Anna because we've missed her Anna Day. I am sure we'll catch an indigenous penguin at the southern shores of south island and fry it just for her...ok im kidding, we'll get a kiwi bird instead.

I bet Jon h. is crying right now so ill have a shout out to him too.

btw, we got bus tix from auckland to national park for hellza cheap.

c yall soon,
jalissa

June 18th, 2009

2009-06-18T13:43:00.000-07:00

Well,

I am sitting in Alissa's mom's place right now making this blog thingy.

Anyhow, moving out was a pain (ESPECIALLY BECAUSE SOME OF YOU DECIDED TO LEAVE SHIT THERE AND THE NEXT DAY WE HAD DRIVE ALL THE WAY FROM BAKO TO DISPOSE OF IT)

but anyhow, we're just getting situated to go to New Zealand, Auckland in what? 4days? June 22nd?

It'll be be pretty gnarly and LEGEN----wait for it---DARY!!!

Come check us out on a regular basis for some crazy adventures.

Until then, WHAT IS UP NEW ZEALAND!