bread aisle (by-nc-sa – capl@washjeff.edu)
New Zealand is an awesome country, plain and simple. We love it here, we love the people and we love the land. But oh boy, it is soooo hard to be a foodie in New Zealand. Today our desperate quest for good food reached critical mass. We HAD to do something. And we did.
Yasmin went back to Melbourne today and we decided to bring her to the airport so that we could see the giant Gollum statue that Weta Workshop has installed. Tina and Brendan were okay with us borrowing the car once more so we picked Yasmin up at Nomads with all her luggage.
It was enough time to go and grab some lunch before driving to the airport. The original plan was to show her the Burger place at Lyall Bay that has all the vegetarian burgers but when we arrived, the trailer was gone. A quick check on the internet confirmed that the place was closed (and thus gone) and will re-open on November 11th. *sigh* Continue reading
Flo and I had a great day. We met up with Yasmin, my German/Persian seat neighbour on the plane to Sydney who is visiting NZ at the moment.
First, we had coffee at Floriditas and then took the bus to the top of Mt Vic to get a good view on Wellington. Walking up there is quite…..a pain in the butt so I was happy to take the bus. The view on Wellington was great as it was sunny, only the horizon was too misty to see the South Island. Â We decided to walk back down. Had the most yummy passionfruit ice cream afterwards and made it a date to watch the fireworks together at 9 pm.
Wellington from above
View to the other side to the airport and Miramar
View into the harbour
We had Aaron and Brendan over for dinner yesterday (Tina is in Auckland) and Flo tried another one of the local beers. It all kinda started back in Germany with Peter finding NZ brewed DB draught beer in Zurich and buying two cans of it for Flo. Flo really liked it…
Since we’re in Wellington, he is really impressed with the variety of beer and started to try his way through the brands (slowly as alcohol is quite expensive). Yesterday at the dinner, our two guests came up with the idea of Flo writing a diary or even better a blog about all the beers he tries and what he thinks of them. A possible name that came up was beerflow which I slightly changed into Beer-Floh. =P I don’t think Flo will go for a seperate blog but maybe he will write about some on here… Continue reading
I know we’ve been slack with updating the blog and there are a couple of posts in the pipeline with really nice pictures BUT we have news and I thought this time, I share it right away. 🙂
Flo and I had an appointment at Vic uni today with one of the course advisors. And it helped a LOT! She really took time to get a grip of our situation, copied things for us and made phone calls. Plans are:
Flo is gonna start studying. He’s first gonna go for a Postgraduate Certificate in Information Management. It’ll take him one trimester to complete the 4 mandatory courses and then all is well. 🙂 *lol* It gives us a couple of advantages. First it is a level 7 qualification which means we then have enough points to go for the residency visa. Second, Flo can continue and get a Postgraduate Diploma in Information Management in another trimester. And then…if he’s really up for it…he could keep studing for two more trimesters and get a master’s degree in Information technology in just 1 1/2 years. O.O Do you guys know how long it took me to get my master’s degree?!? Just saying…
Also she gave me the contact details of the dean of the Faculty of Graduate Research as I should get in contact with him. Unfortunately, he was out but she spoke to the Senior Administrator who basically said it will be hard to establish a Cotutelle agreement but not impossible. As a next step, my German supervisor needs to contact the uni officially. What he needs to do exactly, I will discuss with the dean in person, hopefully soon. 🙂
Devil’s Dream Cake
It’s a bit late but since it’s been my 30th birthday, I thought I should maybe write an entry on it. =)
My birthday was a bit too soon after we arrived here to really organize a big party or anything like it. I was just happy that I wasn’t that jetlagged anymore as I found the jetlag more annoying than ever before. At 11am I met up with my “possible supervisor” from Vic uni at the National Library. The National Library has just re-opened and it looks pretty cool right now. At 11am there ususally is a tour but except for my ps (I am going to shorten possible supervisor now) and me there was no one around so we got a private tour. That was pretty sweet.
Ps and I had coffee afterwards but nothing really to discuss as I am still far away from having a thesis for my PhD. He offered to help me as soon as I know what I’m about to do but for that, I really have to get a better grip on the field. So yeah, nothing new on that front. :s
Sorry for not updating, it’s been a stressful couple of days. Flo is sick and we’re both quite jetlagged. I’ve forgotten how long it takes to get used to a different time zone. At around 4pm, since yesterday we managed to push it back to 5 pm, we get so incredibly tired that we really can’t do anything productive anymore. We did the smart thing and stayed up till 10pm on the first night but we still have these attacks of tiredness. Continue reading
This is going to be a very short update. We are sitting here with Flo’s grandparents, goodbyes slowly creeping up on us. 6 hours until take off. Minor catastrophies with the bike need to be managed, but I am confident that it will work out. I gained a lot of confidence those last few weeks that things always work out. …
Today I gave my customary “Ausstand” at work. A formal party to remember your time at an employer and meet up with fellow and cherished colleagues one last time. I chose German style bakery goodness as the morsel of choice. The shop woman asked me if I had my car close by … hmm … what car?
Somehow, with hurting arms and sweating I managed to get everything where it needed to be. Continue reading
Since my (Florian) birthday was so close to our departure date, Nina and I decided to combine those two. Have a last birthday / good-bye get-together with as many friends as we could rally. It was a great and only at times bitter-sweet evening. Continue reading
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