Sea of Stories

So this is part 2 of my weekend of theatre. Friday night I saw the Te Papa "First Contact" event, and Saturday night I went to another free event by the Museum of Wellington and Maritime Museum called "Sea of Stories". This was probably one of the coolest concepts for a theatrical space that I've ever seen. The stage for the show was actually different parts of the museum. It wasn't just a straight theatrical performance either; it couldn't be considering their limited space. It was a test of ingenuity that the cast and crew past with flying colors. They used the different exhibits and spaces to their advantages. A bench in front of an exhibit became a bench out on the wharf, then they'd turn the action around and the audience was sitting on the bench as the action took place where we'd been sitting moments before. It was obvious that the budget for the show was literally nothing, but they were able to make a rather cool idea out their nonexistent budget by making puppets out of paper to help tell their story in parts, use flashlights as spot lights, and the audience for sound effects.

Since the story they were telling was all about the sea, they incorporated different parts of exhibits. For instance, there was a row boat exhibit so at one point they climbed into the boat and pretended to row. One of the cooler concepts that they had for the show was the use of paper to make props. The character of the little girl had a paper doll, made the ocean waves out of paper, even a boat and a hat. Our programs for the show were even folded into origami boats. The use of paper came to a head in the end of the story when Freya (the lead girl character) tries to go to the underworld to save her father. During the last scenes she's played as a paper doll, and everything in the underworld is made up of the stories of their lives. They break so many conventions of theatre through this paper doll idea, but they completely break the fourth-wall when Freya's paper doll gets thrown to the ground and she supposedly dies in doll form. Freya blankly stares at the doll for a moment before she looks around and says "then Freya realized that the underworld was made completely of paper and she tore out the exit, going back home." It was a brilliantly devised ending to the story of stories. It was a lovely little introduction to a kind of semi-professional theatre in Wellington, and only makes me anticipate the rest of the International Festival with glee!!

Artsy-Fartsy Nerd

See, it's the Europeanse (or Pakeha in Maori)

I am an artsy-farsty nerd, and I do not regret one bit of it.  I had a choice between going to the opening of the International Arts Festival and going to a toga party, and it was the easiest choice ever.  Arts Fest hands down.  By all accounts of those who chose the later, I made the right choice.  To continue, Wellington hosts an annual International Arts Festival end of February to mid March.  The festival supports venues for all types of art: visual, literary, theatre, dance, and musical.  Tonight was the opening act called "First Contact".  It was an interpretive collaborative work that involved live dancing, singing, percussion and traditional flutes, dj-ing, as well as images projected onto the outside of the museum of history Te Papa.

Student Life

The start of another week, and the insanity of the first few days in New Zealand seem to be finally catching up with me; I am absolutely exhausted.  Luckily (or perhaps not so much) for me I had a day or so of just sitting to contend with.  Monday was orientation day for International Students, so there was a lot of listening to people at the university talking at us.  In fact, there were some points during all the talking that I realized I had no idea what was just said--it was that boring and I was that tired.  I was somewhat surprised at the disproportionate number of American students in the orientation; I think we outnumbered everyone 2:1.  This disappoints me a little bit mostly because I'd like to get to know people from outside the US.  Overall there were probably between 60-70 students there.  I met one guy from Germany and a couple girls from Japan, but they were really the only ones I got to talk to during the event.

The Bob Barker

After they gave us free lunch (I totally nabbed a plethora of apples to snack on), most of the students split.  I took a walk down to the bay and read a book for a while.  The weather here in Wellington never ceases to amaze me, but I've learned it is absolutely no use trusting the weather report because it's been wrong for the past 3 days!  When I was walking back I was taking pictures of the wharf and bay when what do I see, but a big ship with an epic paint scheme and a logo that looked rather familiar.  If anyone reading is a fan of Animal Planet, you might be familiar with the show Whale Wars.  It's a series about combating whale hunters in the Antarctic, and one of their ships is docked in Wellington Harbour for a couple days to take on provisions.

Muay Thai Boxing

Today's adventure was just a little one; I'm saving a big one for tomorrow.  Again I got hooked up with a cool free activity through Adventure Wellington, they hosted a free lesson in Muay Thai Boxing, at the local gym: Jai.  For those of you who are unfamiliar, Muay Thai boxing is kicking boxing that uses 8 points of contact: your hands feet, elbows, and knees.

The class was from 2-3 and a jam packed hour of straight cardio.  We started out full force; our instructor literally jumped into jumping jacks, then moved us into pushups, crunches, and then some other "warmups".  We were already dripping sweat by the time he got into the actual boxing portion, and not only because the studio was about 100 degrees--it was HOT today.  In keeping with his "warmup" style, there was no real transition.  He simple said, "stand like this, left forward, punch and step at the same time: huh!"

A sparring chart they had in the studio

 So through the course of the class I got to learn to do several series of punches and kicks, which the instructor would build up to.  First, you started with the simple punch, then a left-right, then a left-right-hook, and then a left-right-upper cut.  That was all without gloves.  Next we put on some boxing gloves and paired up so someone would hold the bag, while the other punched.  You did 50 left-rights in a row, while bouncing on your toes and then go into the sets.  Each set was about 20 of whatever series he told you to do.  The bag series of punches ended with a really good one.  Our instructor called it a "superman punch" you did a left-right-left-right-right then back up a couple steps, run, jump and punch a strong right.  It was AWESOME!  Exactly how a superman punch would be.

The next series we did was kicks.  It was the same idea with the bag: partner up and one holds the pad while the other kicks.  The idea behind the kick was that you pivot up on your left toe, drop your right arm down as you kick with your left foot toe pointed.  Although, you don't kick so much with your foot as with your ankle.  I was a lot better at the kick than at the alternating punch, but boy did it tire you out.  It was especially hard when he had us doing multiple kicks in a row: one-two-three.  He even had us switch over to the bag and kick 10 times in a row!  It was really grueling.  After that set we got to so some combination punch kick stuff though, still totally threw me off.  I kept having to think about all the different things he was telling us to do: "always keep your none punching hand by your cheek/chin, hook with your elbow up, and twist your right toe when you hook left."  It was a lot, but to go along with our superman punch, he taught us a superman kick as well!  It was a left-right-kick-kick back up run a couple steps jump and slam a kick in.  It was hard but boy did I hit that bag hard!

In keeping with his intense workout we had just as bad as a "cool down": more situps, pushups, and then you had to hold someones feet as they went from a situp to standing and doing a left-right punch.  Luckily at the end he let us stretch it all out.  Boy was that a work out for me!  I'm definitely going back next weekend.

Adventure Wellington

So now it's time to play catch up with all the stuff I've been getting up to the last few days.  My last post was all about my first day in Kiwi-land, so now I'll have to expound upon the things I got up to the last couple of days.  Boy, living in the future is tough!!


On Thursday I went out in the morning with Amy, had to go and exchange some money as well as try and find: a phone, pillows, blankets, and some other random things.  So first, Amy had to go the bank I followed her downtown, stopped in and exchanged some money (exchange rate is about $1 US= $1.2 NZD), and then wandered out while she was talking to the bank people about something.  I had seen a place that sold phones earlier called Vodaphone.  I went in and checked it out, there was a cheap pay as you go phone for $49+ $20 top up on minutes, BUT it came with 2500 free texts on the sim card, and since that's how I mostly communicate I thought it was a good deal.  I had wandered out, checked out some other phone stores down the road, and it looked like theirs was the best deal so I went back and got the phone.  It is the tiniest, flimsiest thing I've ever seen: it feels like a toy phone.

Toy phone, not real phone do not eat!

So got my phone set up and then realized I had forgotten to ask Amy for her number to call her and meet up again.  Unperturbed I adventured out into the city alone, going the direction I was fairly certain we had come.  Along the way I looked for a place that would sell me a pillow or two.  The girl who exchanged my money at the bank had told me that a place called Farmers would have the things I sought to I went in search of that store, found it and also found that the blankets and pillows they had were ridiculously expensive.  I mean seriously, $29.99 for one pillow??  Luckily for me I spotted a double pack of pillows for the same price, took it to the counter where the man at the checkout said they were actually onsale as a 2 for 1, with an additional 30% off if you spent $30 so I went back and grabbed another double pack.  Four pillows for less than $30 seemed much more reasonable.  As I aimlessly wandered out of the store trying to find the street I knew I stumbled across a Salvation Army.  Score one for extra cheap things!! And it just so happened to be on the street I was looking for (5min walk from my apartment), so double win.

And So it Begins

Greetings all!  I welcome you to accompany me along this wild semester in Wellington, New Zealand.  I hope to keep this blog thing up fairly regularly as a sort of record of my adventures.

I was bored waiting for my delayed flight

So I guess I can start off just with my trip thus far.  I'm on day 3 of being in Wellington and the things I've done so far!  First off I got off the plane in Auckland and immediately was assaulted by this wave of humidity.  It was just kind of lightly raining, and I had to walk from the terminal I arrived at to the Domestic terminal, which was about a 15 min walk outside.  Now I could've taken a free bus to the domestic terminal but hell, it was 70 degrees outside and I'd just sat on planes for the past 16+ hours, who cares if it's raining?  Everything was ridiculously green, and almost tropical looking.  Lots of wide brimmed leaves and large frondy bushes with big flowers.  I was pretty damp by the time I got to the domestic terminal, but it was worth it.

View from my room

The flight to Wellington was only an hour, but who do I sit next to?  Why an American woman who's son works for WETA and has met Peter Jackson.  I spent the entire ride just talking with her about WETA's amazingness and she told me about the castle Peter Jackson lives in north of Wellington.  Apparently it's a legitimate castle with towers and everything.  Insane.  Hopefully I can worm my way into WETA and get to meet some of their awesome designers or even happen upon an actor or two!!

I got picked up at the airport and dropped at my apartment complex, which is essentially just a string of buildings right next to campus.  There's about six flats per building with five people in a flat.  It's a typical suite style, everyone has there own room and then there's the kitchen, living room, and bathroom.  As soon as I got in though I met up with one of my flat mates, Amy from the UK, and she and took me out to lunch (I was starving!!) and then went to pick up some groceries at the local chain store called New World.  I'll do another post about that later.

This was on my bullitien board: fits me PERFECTLY

After that it was just kind of a unpacking day; I got in at 2:30pm (local time) but was so tired.  I made myself stay up til about 10 so I wouldn't have horrible jet lag.  As it so happened, our other flat mate Jeff, he's the RA in the building and a kiwi, was around so I just sat down and was chatting with him.  He seems like a really good guy, super chill, and an industrial design student at Massey.
Well that's for my first day.  Pretty sure I've recovered from jet lag so far!  I'll post some more later =D