Hobbiton!

Today we drove from Rotorua to Matamata, which is where Hobbiton is. We paid $150 (for both of us) and had an awesome tour of the home of the hobbits. The bus ride from Matamata was similar to every bus tour I've been on, an excessively jaunty driver telling lame jokes and forty people with huge cameras around their necks. We were ultra cool and modern, taking our photos on our iPhones.

I was SO excited.

The attention to detail in the little hobbit houses was very impressive - hobbit-sized laundry on hobbit-sized washing lines. We learned that Peter Jackson hired people to walk from the hobbit front door to the hobbit clothes line, each morning to hang out washing, and then again each night to bring it back in. This was so that the paths would naturally look worn in and used. The gardens were full of HUGE (real) vegetables, which are maintained by five full-time gardeners, whose only job is to maintain the veggie patches.

Washing line, and the fake tree made of steel and polystyrene

Even though most of the hobbit houses were just windows and doors placed against the mountainside, when you look through the windows it looks as if there is a room behind them. This is done by embedding little boxes behind the window and setting them as windowsills.

so. cute.

We stopped in at the Green Dragon for a beer, which was included in our tour. The Green Dragon looks just like a hobbity (slightly Irish) watering hole, with hand carved wooden everything - tables, chairs, roof beams, everything. After getting us suitably tipsy, the tour took us through the gift shop (I love gift shops). We were restrained and only bought a couple of postcards.

I slept on the tour bus back to Matamata, where we then had a delicious lunch at the pub suggested by our jaunty tour guide. After all the excitement, we headed for Auckland. My last long drive of the trip (only 2.5 hours, thank god) but that's for another blog....

looking over Hobbiton. Those are tourists not hobbits.

Bilbo and Frodo Baggins' house, and the pipe smokin' bench. This is where Galdalf and Frodo smoke a pipe in Lord of the Rings, and where Bilbo smokes a pipe in The Hobbit.

That's the door to the Baggins' house behind my huge head and Grants small head.

xx  m&g

Queenstown

We only spent one night in Queenstown, which was good because we aren't thrill-seekers. The most thrilling thing we did in the "Adventure Capital" was look at some trout from an underwater observation deck. Better than bungy jumping I think.

See! as if that's not thrilling.

Thrilled Grant

After the daredevil fish experience, it was most definitely time for a drink. I tell you people, this country has the best wine. There's a Pinot Noir called (something) that you can only buy at bars (ie you can't buy a bottle to take home), and it is the best red wine I've ever had. 

Seriously.

 After a wine or three, we headed into town to check out the nightlife. We weren't disappointed - there's a pub called 'Cowboys' with free pool, free cowboy hats, a bucking bull, and a taxidermied bear.

Good evening.

Also the beer is this big.

 

Dunedin!

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Every ten minutes or so I say, “hey! My dad was born here!”. We drove about 4 hours from Christchurch, grant sleeping on the way and me singing loudly along to First Aid Kitt. The New Zealand countryside is beautiful and ever-changing.

We wandered down the hill from our backpackers (which was called Hogwartz, though there didn’t seem to be anything Potter-y about it), spent a couple of hours in the middle of town, had a couple of beers and really good chinese food. We went to the Dunedin Railway Station, which was beautiful, old and full of tourists.

Though there isn’t a lot to do as tourists on a budget, Dunedin is a super cute town. It was lovely just watching the town go by, sitting in the octagon (centre of town) and having a beer. Getting back up the hill to Hogwartz was a hard slog and I nearly gave up and slept on the steps of the beautiful cathedral.

Grant’s kiwi accent has had a good workout (I’m constantly telling him he cant do it in front of people). Driving up and down Baldwin Street, the steepest street in the world, was scary and hilarious (cue Grant: “thet’s a steep street bro”).  We are so relaxed and happy on this holiday, laughing a lot and taking each day as it comes. 

That's a steep street bro.

Inside Dunedin Train Station

The view from our window

It means trolley.

Having a beer at the Octagon

Party in our room

Dunedin Train Station

Dunedin Train Station

NEW ZEALAND!

My beautiful Grant and I are finally in NZ! We flew into Christchurch at 11.40pm on Tuesday, so our adventure really began on Wednesday morning (after a night's sleep in the airport hotel).
Our hire car - a Nissan Bluebird with very retro features such as a tan interior and suede armrest (not to mention the tortoiseshell trimmings) - has been great, though petrol here is $2.10p/L so perhaps we should start rolling it down the hills in neutral..

Christchurch really is an amazing sight. The 2010/2011 earthquakes have all but flattened more than half the city, with every second building in the midst of construction work or abandoned and dilapidated. Reminders of the earthquakes are everywhere, lopped trees, walls being held up by shipping crates, closed roads and an abundance of fluro yellow vests. I've been moved by the impact of the earthquakes, not just the fact that a whole city has been close to ruined, but by the city's ability to bounce back. Pop-up shops, quirky artwork and sculptures and brand new buildings are everywhere. One of the coolest things we have seen is a shopping mall called Re-Start which is constructed out of shipping containers!

Christchurch Cathedral. That scaffold is where the spire stood.

A common sight, random bits of surviving rubble

Weirdly enough, another common sight. These guys are everywhere!

The Re:START Mall

We started our day at the botanical gardens, which were lovely but not thriving, and not many flowers were around. The rose garden was quite pretty, with lovely red, pink and peachy orange roses abound. We met several ducks at the botanical gardens and saw two really big fish.

The prettiest part of the gardens..

We went to the museum today and 'oohed and aahhed' at Maori wood and bone carvings, woven baskets and an awesome 8ft canoe carved from a tree. There were also some gorgeous artifacts from early European settlers, such as hand made shoes, a penny farthing, spectacular crockery and vases, and furniture.

The 7 year old in me just exploded with excitement. Spectacular dolls house.

Shoes (for people with very small ankles apparently)

We also drove through Lyttelton and Gordon's Bay, a few kms out of Christchurch. The scenery was gorgeous. Grant pointed out that there were no safety railing and a 100km/h speed limit while winding around the cliffside, so we drove slowly and slightly in the middle of the road. We went for a walk along the coast (freezing cold), and drove aimlessly down a road that eventually led us to some sort of Christian summercamp...

These are taken about half way between Lyttelton and Gordon's Bay

 
Tonight is our last night in Christchurch, tomorrow we are heading to Dunedin, where my dad was born. So far we are relaxed, impressed, and crazy excited for the next couple of weeks exploring the land of the long white cloud :)

Happy chappy!!

Have I found myself yet?

I will come home from London fatter. I have put on weight here because the food is all carbs and I haven't made any effort to diet or excercise or order the salad. I will come home from London with an extra 5kgs, and an extra notch on my belt.

I will come home London fatter- bigger, wiser, fuller.  Not only fatter, physically, and full of pastry and pie and wine and croissants, but fatter, emotionally. Fatter, intellectually. Fatter, in my heart and fatter in my mind. Full of learning and knowledge and streetsmarts and independence and love. I will come home knowing that I can travel alone. I will come home knowing that I can sleep alone, for days, weeks at a time. I can spend time with strangers, and I can stand up for myself when I feel uncomfortable.  I will come home with a new understanding of where I was before I left, how scared and trapped I was in a beleif that I could not be a whole person without other people.

When I left I talked about wanting to 'find myself'. In hindsight I don't think this is really what I was looking to do. I think my goal was actually just to prove that I could do it - or maybe to see what it was, that I could do. I also think 'finding myself' included a couple of 'mini-goals'.

The first goal of my leaving Sydney was this - get over Cale. As rudimentary as that may be, that's what I needed to do. Not just him - the person- but the hurt. The attachment to the relationship and the hurt from the break up. I needed to leave Sydney and be by myself, not find myself. I needed time to think for myself and challenge myself. I don't know what it will be like when I get home. But I do know that my feelings have changed significantly. The hurt is not so deep and the anger is not so acute. The break up is starting to feel far away now, and instead of devastated I feel a calm sadness, and only when I think about it, which is not so often.

I was surprised at how much I missed Grant when I left. This, was the second goal of my leaving; figure out how I feel about Grant. I needed to be sure that the relationship I was having with Grant was not an extension of the devastation I was feeling over Cale, or a comfort I was seeking because I did not know how to be alone. I needed to be sure that the feelings I thought I was having weren't just projections, or imaginations. I needed to figure out why, if I really was falling for Grant, I wouldn't commit to a relationship with him. Why I kept having fleeting attractions with other people, why I wouldn't let myself just fall. All of this is very obviously inextricably related to goal number one. I wasn't 'over' my relationship with Cale, I wasn't ready to embark on another one. I was still crying often for the hurt and abandonment, I was still scared to be alone. I still wanted to understand what went wrong with Cale and I - this took up space in my heart that needed to be free for Grant.  The last three months, As I have felt freer and freer of the hurt and dependence and anger for Cale, I have lay awake at night thinking about what this means for me and Grant. I have missed him and his sea-blue eyes more than I dreamed I would.

I honestly cannot say what will happen when I get back to Sydney, with Grant and I, and I won't tell you exactly how I feel about him (because I think I should tell him first). But it feels good. We always said that if it felt good, we would go for it.

There are other goals that I have achieved since I've been away, that I didn't even set. Since I am one of those people who adds things to a 'to do' list after I have done them, just so that I can cross the off and feel accomplished, I had better let you know what these are too.

I read now. For pleasure. Before I left Australia I had probably read about 3 books in the past 5 years for pleasure. I pick up a book, read some of it, put it down, forget about it, and pick up another one in a couple of months, only to repeat the cycle. It became very frustrating because I can only tell you what the first two chapters of any book on my shelf are about. I had sort of accepted that this is just a trait that will always be a part of me, I am just not a reading person. How ridiculous.
Somehow; since I left Sydney I have read six books. In three months. I even finished a book I wasn't enjoying, because I felt determined to finish it. This is something I have learned to do and I'm not even sure how.

I have slowed down. I am so much less anxious and so much less worried. This is a difficult thing to explain but I notice it often. For example if I miss a bus, instead of panicking, I just wait for the next one. If I run out of money, instead of bursting into tears, I just calmly decide what I can do to figure it out. If I have nothing to wear... ok, I still kind of have a tantrum if I have nothing to wear, but that's normal I think. I bite my nails, so. much. less.

I wonder if I have found myself, I think maybe a bit. At the same time I don't think yourself is really something you ever can really find. But I've figured some shit out, and I don't think I'll really know the full result til I get home.

xx

London Still

I took Ellie to Piccadilly Circus the other night. Dear sweet Ellie looked like a little squirrel in headlights, staring up at the buildings and lights like she had never seen a billboard before.

"London's... real... big" she said slowly.

I took her hand and pointed at landmarks, different musicals, theatres, and buildings, as she stared with wonder. People just can't help loving London.

We went to some clubs and we danced with some German girls. We drank and danced and go back to our hostel in time for the free breakfast buffet at 7.30am.

Yesterday we watched a movie called 'The Happening'. If you haven't seen it, and are a fan of "so-bad-it's -good" style action thrillers, I highly recommend this one. All you need to know is that it is about killer trees.  We then watched 'Poseidon' - This didn't quite cross from the bad to the good category, but it was still worth laughing at.

Today I am going to take Ellie to not-so-big-ben, and Westminster Abbey. I will upload some photos tomorrow. It's nice to have a friend here, and it's made me realise that I have begun to feel like London is familiar to me.

I really do love it here, and I love showing it off :)

Not much to blog about at the moment, except maybe that its also worth a mention that today is one year exactly since Cale walked out. Which is momentous, because it marks a big change. I feel happy about the changes and choices I have made in the last 12 months (well, the majority of them). I feel like I have grown and moved on and adapted and matured. It's been a really huge year, a really painful and testing year, and I am patting myself on the back. LIKE A BOSS.

xx

To-ing and Fro-ing

So far I have emailed my travel agent five times.

1- Can you please book my ticket for the 12th April.
2- Wait, can you make that the 15th?
3- Wait, I'm having second thoughts, can you not book my ticket at all?
4- Yes ok, I've decided for real, book it for the 15th.
5- No, wait, I'm not sure again. Can you hold off again?

This is what I am affectionately calling the the 'to-ing and fro-ing'. This here, is a confession, because So far I have only confessed this string of emails to one person. I feel so resolute, each time I decide I am coming home, and then something makes me change my mind.

The first time it was on Friday. I was out at a pub on my own, and I had had about 2 pints of beer. I sat at a dodgy bar talking to the bartender. I told her I was going home in a couple of weeks and I began to explain why. As I became more and more intoxicated, I became less sure. Suddenly I thought 'I am making a huge mistake. I called Ellie, very close to a panic attack.

The next day, after having told my travel agent to hold off on booking the flight, I felt ok again. I was back to wanting to go home, and felt sure. I pushed any silly ideas about regret and mistakes and wasting my life out of my head, and went back to my email, told my travel agent yes, ok, get me back on the plane.

The second time I told my travel agent to hold off, was about 30 minutes ago. Following an email I got from my job agency. They are interested in interviewing me for an event management position in their office. I got the email and went straight into panic mode again. Back on the phone to Ellie I again struggled with the idea that I am making a huge mistake. I could stay here.

So much of me wants to go home.
So much of me doesn't.
How does a person make that decision?

I know that everyone has an opinion. I know that only I can decide. I know that the practicalities of staying are becoming very obvious - if I do not get some paid work in the next couple of weeks I have no other option than to come home.  I know that if I come home I will always have that bit of me that wonders whether maybe I should have stayed.

I don't know what to do. So much of me wants to be here and so much of me wants to be home, feels like I have done so much and experienced so much. There are things and people at home that I don't want to be away from anymore, I don't want to wait for anymore.

This is becoming a very hard decision, one that I really thought I had already made.