Orientation

I'm finally in Dunedin after the Arcadia program orientation and a lot of travel. I've done so much in the last few days it's crazy. Today I was able to go buy some essentials and finally get the room all set up. The walls are still pretty barren but I'm pretty much moved in. So now for the recap of orientation- lots to tell...


I met most of the Arcadia students at the LA airport since we all had this group flight booked. There are 33 of us, 18 of which are attending the University of Otago in Dunedin. The others are at Victoria University in Wellington. The plane I took to New Zealand was great. It was huge and had LCD screens on the back of each seat with on-demand movies and TV shows as well as an animated graphic of where the plane was over the pacific and how long to our flight had left. I was able to get a good amount of sleep on the plane- probably like 7 hours. They served us breakfast and I talked to the people in my row for about the last hour of the flight. It was about a 12 and a half hour flight, which was shorter than I had been told.


We landed in Auckland at 6:30am, went through customs, and were greeted by our program director, Jane. We boarded busses and went to the Kiwi International Hotel- not the best of accommodation, but good enough. After we checked in I was able to take a shower before we got back on the bus. So the jet lag doesn't completely screw you up, you're supposed to go to bed at a normal time so we had a day of activities to keep us up. We went to an extinct volcano on a beach overlooking the ocean and the city. After that, we went downtown and a few other people and I had kebabs. I thought a kebab was meat on a stick, but it's actually a Turkish food that's like a cross between a gyro and a burger. They're good. We met up with the big group again and went to another extinct volcano for a look at the city and ocean again. It was raining by this time- a big trend so far in New Zealand. After that, we visited Underwater World, which is a cool aquarium that had glass walkways through and under the big tanks. There we saw a guy feeding the sting rays. We went back to the hotel for a bit and then went to dinner at a gourmet pizza place. We got back to the hotel and Jane advised us to go straight to bed. Most of us went to an Irish pub a few blocks away and had a few pints (which are 20 oz here- not that they use ounces). The pub was called Father Ted's and they had the British sitcom "Father Ted" playing, which was pretty hilarious. It was fun, but by the late hour of 10pm we were in bed.


On Saturday we drove to Rotorua after having lunch in Hobbiton, the site of the shire in Lord of the Rings. They had a tourist center about it, but the actual site was outside town so we didn't have time to check it out. In Rotorua we saw a farm show at the Agrodome (it was more like Agrobarn), which included a sheep shearing. We took a tour of Rainbow Springs, a nature conservatory park and then checked into our hotel, which is right on lake Rotorua. We ate dinner at different places. I went to a place called Fat Dog with a large group and then we met everyone at the Polynesian Spa next to our hotel. It's a bunch of natural hot water spring pools, which are really nice. The springs are caused by all the crazy geothermal activity in the area, but that also means that the whole town reeks of sulfur. After that a bunch of us went to bars (with our bus driver Mark) to watch the All Blacks game (New Zealand's national rugby team). New Zealand lost to Australia, which was a travesty. Also New Zealand lost that day in the Americas Cup- the big sailing race, which is a big deal here. It was a sad day for New Zealand sports.


On Sunday we had breakfast at the hotel and then went to the Waiotapu geothermal park where we saw the Lady Knox geyser erupt among many other cool phenomena. It's now one of only four geyser areas in the world. I went with our bus driver Mark and some people to a burger place he recommended. We then went Zorbing even though it was cold and raining. Three of us got in a giant plastic ball, they put some hot water inside, and then we rolled down a big hill. It was pretty glorious. After we all went, all the Arcadia students, with the encouragement of our advisor Jane, ran up the hill and laid down while another Zorb ran over us. We did that twice. We cleaned up at the hotel and then we were bussed over to the Tamaki Brothers Maori Village experience to see a traditional Maori welcome, song and dance, and a dinner (hangi). It was pretty cool and the food was good. The welcome was more of Maori warrior looking guys crazily yelling, sticking their tongues out, and thrusting spears at us, but it was sweet nonetheless. Back at the hotel most of us sat around the lobby and hung out playing cards, etc.


Monday was basically a travel day. We flew out of Rotorua to Wellington but our flight was delayed so we missed our connecting flight to Dunedin. In Wellington we said goodbye to the Arcadia kids going to Victoria University there. The rest of us and Jane took a flight to Christchurch and then they bussed us to Dunedin (a 5 hour drive). We stopped at McDonnalds- hopefully for the first and only time while I'm here. We got into Dunedin around 2am. I got the key to my flat and went in and went to bed- in my sleeping bag on the mattress.


The last few days I've had some more orientation stuff on campus and I've been buying stuff like bedding and other necessities. I got a prepaid phone. Aparently thats what most people do and students only text eachother because it's insanely cheaper than calling. It's not a bad temperature here- mostly hight 40's and 50's so far. The flat is cold, however, since there is no central heating, as is the case with all student flats and most older places throughout the city. We have a heat pump in the living room, which we use when we're in there and I have a little heater for my room that was left there. It's expensive to use so basically I only use it right before bed and in the morning. If I keep my door shut it keeps the heat in pretty well for a while after I've turned it off. I met two of my flatmates- Rob and Xander, both from the USA. My two other Kiwi (New Zealander) flatmates, Shayla and Maryke don't get back until this weekend since they're still on winter break.


I register for classes tomorrow and have an appointment to set up a bank account. It should be a busy day. I'm pretty much moved in now- all the orientation stuff was fun but it's good to finally get settled and not have to worry about dragging around all my luggage.


Other than that, the people are nice, the beer is good, and campus is close. That was a long first post, but we did a lot of stuff in a short amount of time and this was really the first time that I could just sit and get it all on here, especially now that I have power adapters.