Baba´s Kiwi Newsletter - 5 (english)

Baba´s Kiwi Newsletter – 5

This time: Hello from Brooklyn... a suburb of Wellington and my new home :) Yes you got it right... I finally left the hostel and moved and it feels FANTASTIC! But one after the other. Below what´s happened the last weeks:

Day 127 – 162 / WELLINGTON – UPDATES :)

ROOM SEARCH – WELCOME TO JEFFERSONS

As I mentioned last time I got a room offer from one of my customers at the Reserve Bank. She invited me to Yann´s goodbye party (french guy who lived there for the last 7 month) to have a look at the room and to meet everyone. So I made my way to Brooklyn on a Saturday evening and it just KLICKED :)

The house, with the most AMAZING view over Wellington City (some pics attached), has 8 flatmates where only one room is the „Travellers Room“. This room is a bit smaller but still bigger then the single room in the hostel and the view actually does the rest. That´s when I met them all: Yann, Abi, Kim, Jasmine, Jess, Clare, Adam and Tawanda. And as well some of their friends. I was excited right away: the house is huge with a backyard, vege garden, Sunroom included pingpong table, 2 lounges and 2 bathrooms. On Wednesdays we get a box full of vegetables and fruits. Jasmine is vegetarian and therefore we cook vegetarian most of the time... but sometimes there is meat ;). Everyone cooks about 1x week and on Sunday is always ROAST DAY :). I got along with everyone really well and said yes to the room immediately. Unfortunately an italian guy was invited as well so they couln´t give me the ok straight on the day. But it seems that it KLICKED from their side as well as I got a call the next day – they voted for me :D WOOOOHOOOOOO!!! Thank´s for crossing your fingers ;)

Here a short introduction to my flaties and what they do:

JESSICA (JESS): Is working at the Reserve Bank of NZL and offered me the room. She is turning 27 soon and plans a huge party on a boat at the waterfront. She rents it with a few other people and there will be some bands and DJ´s as well... she likes to party in general :)

KIM: She is 33 and works as a Acupuncturist. She´s a great piano player who mainly plays Jazz and Blues. Beside that she loves to go to the gym and has a great humor :)

JASMINE (JASS): Is as well in the beginning of her 30´s and works in a praxis together with a few other people. But she as well earns money with Acupuncture / Babysitting / massages and gardening. She learns to play the guitar and has a great voice. She is our vegetarian.

CLARE: With 23 she is our youngest and studies Industrial design / product design in her 3rd of 4 years. Unfortunately we don´t see her that much around as she is at Uni all the time – still know exactly how that feels... poor her. She´s responsible for our flat account and likes to play the guitar or the piano, too.

ABI (DARLING): Is 32, studying and beside that she works on a  kind of Earthquake System. They try to develop some realtime System which tells you excactly what´s happening where in NZL and what to do.  I think it´s supposed to be a kind of App for your mobile so that you always know what´s happening. At least that´s how I got it ;) Abi is originally from England but lives in NZL since she was 4.

TAWANDA (T-BONE): Is originally from Zimbabwe but lives in NZL for more than 8 years already. He is 31 and works for an insurance company. But just to get some money. He is as well an actor (plays in a few NZL shows and films) but his biggest passion is music. He is the frontman of a band of 8 people, singing, playing the guitar and writing his own songs – and those are REALLY great!!!

ADAM: Is as well 31 and is actually a builder. Which he is not really doing anymore – just if he needs money. He tries to be an artist for quite some time now and started with sand sculptures. For one year now he is mainly working with new zealand wood (like timber... and all that) and doing beautiful sculptures out of that. Unfortunately there is not a lot of success yet.

Oh yes... and we have 3 cats: Mothership (mum), Tinkerbell (daughter) and Tonka (son).

They are all great people and amazingly talented! I feel more and more inspired and the fact that we cook and eat together and everyone is telling about their day is just awesome! You obviously don´t have that when you live in your little flat on your own and therefore it is such a nice experience. There are Jam - sessions on the weekends – if Tawanda´s band needs practise or as well when some friends come over and bring their instruments. And even if you don´t play one there are enough drums, tambourines aso. in our lounge and you just join (sometimes I feel like I´m back in school in our music room hehe :)).

Now you maybe get an understanding why I felt quite comfortable right from the start :)

Here my address in case someone wants to write me or check it out on Google earth :)

20 Jefferson Street

Brooklyn

6021 Wellington

JOB

Well, the 6 weeks at the Reserve Bank went by very quick. It was nice to work there and I met great new people. I attached one pic from our „Olympic day“! I made gold medals for everyone and we had a free sports breakfast for our customers. My collegues offered me to drop by whenever I´m around to have a coffee... so nice!

And I´m on job hunt again. But I can´t complain as a lot of jobs are coming up via the temp center and sometimes I even have to decline – as I´m actually still on my HOLIDAYS :) Beside that I caught a little cold and working till 1am doesn´t help that.

But here a quick overview what kind of jobs I did so far:

ACADEMY OF FINE ARTS: That is an art gallerie where private functions are happening quite often and we (me included) serve nibbles and wine. It´s quite a good exercise as the trays are really heavy ;)

WESTPAC STADIUM: I already worked there once and in September it seems there are a lot of Rugby games, functions and exhibitions coming up. Luckily the temp center planned me in already :)

TE PAPA: From time to time I´m still working at Wellington´s museum. As a waitress, kitchen hand or just to wipe and clean tables... it´s not the worst place to work for ;)

BEEHIVE: I even found my way into politics :P Worked in the parliament house for the first time (pic from last time) and served nibbles there as well... and it is always funny when I meet my customers from the bank in the evening again :)

Of course I applied for other jobs as well – but haven´t heard anything so far. I applied in a french Café: they are searching for a Barrista to cover someone on holidays again. And finally a Designjob came up :) So I tried to improve my portfolio and now fingers crossed again!!!

Beside that the challenge is to survive. But as long as I manage to work 20 – 30 hours a week without spending a lot of money it all should be fine :)

CAR

Something which found me - again... I am really lucky!!! After about 4 weeks my college Kylie (29, working with me and as well on the pic) mentioned that she and her boyfriend wanted to sell her Toyota Sprinter. And yes – I bought it ;) It´s quite old but runs really smooth and as Jody is really good with cars it still looks great. I was happy to be able to buy it from someone I know and not from some other backpackers... you never know what they try to get rid off hahaha :) Jody and Kylie as well offered already to help me selling the car in december again – just awesome!

And I managed my first drive in Wellington already – but only with company!!! Adam was so kind and we managed the flatshopping on a Sunday morning (there is a certain amount within the rent which is for food – so that´s inclusive as well :)). It really helped to have another pair of eyes especially as I always put on the wiper instead of the flasher :D

It´s fun to drive again... I missed it! Even if I won´t drive that much but a few little trips out of town on the weekends are already considered :)

So I have the pleasure to introduce you to: „Baba Black Sheep“ (Pic attached) ;)

WHAT´S ON IN WELLINGTON?

NZ Filmfestival

This month we had the New Zealand film festival in town for 2 weeks... and who knows me knows as well that I LOVE movies!!! They showed movies from all over the world for 2 weeks from morning till evening. I hardly couldn´t decide what to see but after a closer look it was quite simple: nothing subtitled (as in addition I would have to read the movie and I think english is already enough ;)) and some were sold out anyway. So was „Barbara“, a movie from Germany about a lady doctor during world war 2. What a pity – but Zoe (from Melbourne) and I decided to see „Lore“ instead which is another German war movie but in collaboration with Australia and the UK.

In addition I watched „On the road“ on a friday afternoon after work. It´s after a quite famous novel and as it is a Roadmovie I really liked it.

Unfortunately I could not really afford more then 2 movies as the tickets weren´t THAT cheap.

Preview November: In November the premiere of „The Hobbit“ is happening and even if everyone tells me to leave the city as the population of Wellington will be around double and everybody is walking around with ears and feet :) I think it might be a nice experience to be part of that!!! Brother >> think about that ;)

New Zealand´s got talent (or in Germany: „Das Supertalent“)

I´m as well still in contact with Keri and Angela (who I met in the hostel). Angela won free tickets to the New Zealand´s got talent show in Wellington and so we queued one Saturday in front of the St. James Theatre to be part of the recordings – so my famous 15 minutes are gone, too ;)

We had seats in the 2nd row and I´m pretty sure I made it on screen :) - mainly because the 4 little boys in the 1st row who were trying REALLY HARD to be recorded... well, and you know how these things go and where the show host gets his interviews from. I try to get the stream as soon as it is out.

In general I found it quite funny!!! I had to laugh a lot – NOT about the Candidates. Those were AMAZING! Almost everyone made it to the next round (which I didn´t understand in some cases) and they DIDN`T use the Buzzer at all!!! Great talented young people – I was blown away!

African Festival

On the 2nd weekend in the new flat there was an african festival happening in the San Francisco Bathhouse and Tawanda had the pleasure to open it solo. He had about 30 minutes time to introduce the audience to his own songs and except from Jasmine the whole flat was there to support him – well done Tawanda!

The Art Show

The next weekend we were out to support our other male flatie: Adam had 5 of his sculptures at the Art Show (which is a big Art Exhibition, mainly for painters) in the TSB Arena. After he sneaked me in on a Thursday after work (and I was able to see everything BEFORE the public :)) we went all together on the Sunday, too. Unbelievable! There was so much to see and I was happy that I had 2 days to see it as after one hour you weren´t sure anymore what you like and what not! Unfortunately Adam didn´t sell one piece and in addition he didn´t make it to one of the competitions in Auckland... so that means to search for a job again to get some money.

Olympics

The Olympics were a big topic here as well. In the bank you could win 10 free coffee´s from me if you guessed the total medal amount of New Zealand right... and guess who won: Jess J (no, no faking from my side!)

I was asked every morning how Germany is doing after I decided to put it on the daily updated list. Therefore on the list was: New Zealand of course, Australia (as the enemy) and Germany... and from now on I got comments like: „Who cares how many medals Germany gets?“, „I thought you are russian!“ and „Germany must be good in shooting... because of the war...“. All for the fun of course ;) I had some great weeks and think NZL did really well! If you think that there are only 4 million people in this country... just calculate how many medals Germany would need to win to get the same amount population wise... puh!

FOOD

Not much to say... I did my „Thimble dumplings with cheese“ (Kässspatzen) now for 8 people as well :) and I have to admit that it wasn´t as much work as I expected hehe ;)

If someone knows a nice and traditional Roast would be helpful – thanks in advance! Because some Sunday I´m responsible for the Roast as well :)

WEATHER

While the days get shorter in Germany you could definitely feel that it´s getting warmer here and the sun is up earlier. Spring is coming :D Ok, really slooooooooooooooooow but at least!

Beside that it was raining a lot the last weeks – which didn´t bother me at all while working. And as it STOPPS again it isn´t a problem at all ;)

Maybe you got the message on the news that after some decades the Tongariro Volcano was trying to say something. It didn´t really errupt... but had a kind of hick up! It was enough to have a bad smell in Wellington in the morning thou. It´s hard to imagine that just 3 month ago I did the crossing and actually walked on it. I hope it calms down again so that we can do the crossing again in summer... which would be great – then it looks completely different :)

No heavy earthquakes in Welly anymore... which I appreciate!

THE WAR

Still a big topic here is the war. Maybe because this country is so young and everyone is really interested in the european history. I never spent much time thinking about the war (in school of course) till I arrived here! I get a lot of questions about it as well – sometimes I can´t answer them – and I learn a lot about my own country I actually didn´t know. Pretty crazy to travel to the other side of the world and finally thinking about your own history...

I was asked quite a few times if I have a problem with beeing german. Sue, who I covered on her holidays at the bank and who is from england, even told Kylie to not mention the war as I´m german. As I found out about that I actually couldn´t stopp laughing – never expected something like that! :)

BACK FLIGHT

Yes – the flight back to Germany is covered. My agency in Germany managed to change the booking and get me a seat. It seems it goes back to Germany on the 25th of February 2013... just after paying additional 260 Euros. I think I might discuss that again with Air New Zealand! But better than paying a whole new ticket ;)

ALL BLACKS

On the 8th of September Maren, Keri and me managed to get tickets for the All Blacks vs. Argentina game in Wellington :) So looking forward to that one – to finally see the HAKA live! I get better and better with the rules as well but the boys have to improve a lot till then... on the weekend we have hardly beaten Australia.

That´s it for this time...

Today I´m actually heading back to the South Island but just for the weekend. Jenny had her 73rd birthday and I decided to bake a cake and spend the weekend in Blenheim. Great to get out of the City and while I´m cruising through the Marlborough Sounds with sunshine in my face I get reminded of what I´m actually doing here and what I came for – I live my dream :D

I hope you are all doing well. Babyproduction continious as I heard and as well other interessting messages arrive. Pls keep me posted ;)

Thanks for all the nice emails I get! I really appreciate that and hope you don´t mind that the answers take long... I´m just too busy ;) Cu next time!

Kia ora – Barbara

P.s.: English Version is READY at the same time – take that ;)