Nooh Zealand

Over and Out

2006-09-06T17:44:00.000+12:00

Haven't written for a while. Well, to make it short: I am not in New Zealand any more, my 6 months are over, and they have been good. Have seen quite a few parts of the country, have met wonderful people, have found friends.

But it was time to say good-bye. And now, after 2 weeks in the "home country" Austria, I am now in Slovenia for 3 weeks. noohzealand.blogspot.com is dead, long live manooh.blogspot.com!

Heey, ab in den Nordeen!

2006-07-27T10:38:00.000+12:00

Back from the South Island.
We were travelling down there for 2 weeks after the conference in Christchurch. First we went up to the very north of the South Island, to the Abel Tasman National Park. We did a 2 days hike in one direction and then went back with the Aqua Taxi (=boat). It was amazing! The weather was really nice, and if the sea was a bit warmer, I would have gone for a swim. On the way back we saw some dolphins, too, so the taxi really paid off.

When we came back to the car, we had a flat tire. We found a guy who pumped it up again for us, and we managed to get to the next garage little after 5pm (they close at 5). The mecanic there persuaded us that we should get 4 new tires, and I think it really was a good idea. All of them were old, one already had some metal wires sticking out..

Then we continued our travel and went down the west coast. It was raining, but still it was very fascinating to see the rain forest and the coast line. And it is supposed to rain a lot there anyways. The weather was also bad when we were in the Franz Josef and Fox glacier region, so we decided not to go up there. We continued our travel over Haast pass where it was snowing and lot of people had problems not to get stuck. With our new tires (and Alex driving) we didn't have a problem :-)

We stayed in Queenstown for 2 nights, one in a backpackers, and one at the place of the people where Reinhard had worked last year. The next day, we made our way to Milford Sound. The street was closed because of avalanche danger, but opened the same day, so we only had to wait about one hour. We did a round-trip with the boat (the weather was fine again), and it was not a lot of tourists around which was great, too.
We stayed over night in the region and did a hike the next day, just up the mountain for about 1.5 hours one way. Was great, because we were up in the snow and had a beautiful view round the mountain area. I don't have any hiking shoes, so I went around with plastic bags in my sneakers. It worked fine!

After that, we continued our travel and made our way to the east coast. We stayed in Gore, and then drove down the presidential higway to Clinton and further to Balclutha. Then we went down south to the southernmost point, and back up again to stay in Dunedin. I was really impressed by the city. It seems to be one of the oldes cities in New Zealand, with Scottish history. And they have 2 really great vegetarian cafes! I checked out the muffins in one of them, and we had dinner in the other one (pizza and scones, *mmh*). We walked up the (former) steepest street in the world (not too fascinating), and Alex and Reinhard went to the chocolate factory. The weather went bad again, and so we travelled back up to Christchurch, from where we wanted to go to Arthur's pass - which we didn't do in the end because of the bad weather. We drove to the peninsula though and had some laid-back days in Christchurch. I was able to go to the SAFE office again, and to meet some friends for dinner. On the way up to the ferry, Reinhard and Alex wanted to to the dolphin watching. It was a beautiful sunny day, but apparently the wind was too strong and the sea too rough, so the boats couldn't go out. Pretty disappointing!
We did see seal pups though, who swim from the sea up a river to a waterfall, where they stay during the day. Pretty impressive. Back in Picton (where the ferry to the North Island leaves) we did a short hike up the hill to have a look around the area, and the next morning (with 2h delay), we finally went on the ferry back. We went up to Wanganui where we stayed over night and went to a very good Indian restaurant, and now we are back in Hamilton.

We live in the YWCA, have a room for us three and only pay $80 per week. Pretty cool I think.

New Zealand time is almost over..

Christchurch

2006-07-08T02:13:00.000+12:00

This was a busy week. We are in Christchurch since Sunday evening, and the 3-day HCI workshop started Monday morning. A lot of it we have heard again, and we again had to deal with personas, scenarios, paper prototyping and all that stuff. But it was fine, and Mark, the organizer, was really helpful with everything. In the evenings/nights, I was basically writing on my report that was due one and a half weeks ago, and I finally managed to "finish" it today. Anyway. Thursday and Friday was HCI conference. I did like it, but I was distracted by working on my report, so I didn't pay too much attention to all of the talks.. And I was very sleepy.
The food was quite nice, they have an Indian/Chinese place where I could get food, and most of the place have some vegan food. The 101 cafe was great, they have a few vegan things (even cake), and it is labelled! I liked that :-)

Tonight I was going out with some Animal Rights people in town, we were supposed to meet at a Chinese Restaurant at 7. Already late, I saw that one of the warning lights in the car was on. I showed it to Alex and Reinhard, but nobody knew what it was. After almost one hour of trying to find out more, I asked Graeme (the Englisch guy) to bring me there, and so I finally was there and could get some decent food.

After that, Sacha and I were going out in town. Awesome concert in the Dux de Lux, the power went off for a minute 3 times, but they managed to even make a good show then. After that, we went to an Iris pub live band :-))

Arrived in Christchurch

2006-07-03T19:37:00.000+12:00

First visit to the South Island!

Alex and I left Hamilton Thurdsay morning (8am was the plan, but we finally left at 10pm..) to Wanganui, where we picked up Reinhard and continued driving down to Wellington. I have slept most of the way down, partly because I haven't slept the night before (unsuccessful attempt to finish my project) and partly because I just get very very tired in cars (ask Sigi and Christian what I did most of the time on our way from Copenhagen back to Austria).

Then we stayed in Wellington for 2 days, met the 3 other guys (Daragh, Graeme, Primosz) and did a bit of sightseeing. Was a good time (did a lot of sleeping, too ;-)). We have been to the World Press Photo exhibition, which was really moving, and were to Te Papa, the national museum.

Our ferry to the South Island went Sunday morning, and the time on the boat was just great! The weather was phantastic, and it was so beautiful sitting outside, enjoying the sun and looking at the great country. The rest of the day was basically driving again, with a stop in Kaikoura to enjoy the landscape. From this spot, you can see the lake and the mountans (with snow on top) going up right from there. Amazing!

The rest of the time I did a lot of sleeping (the car effect), so I don't really know what happened on the way to Christchurch. After check-in, we went for a small tour around the city, and guess what: when we crossed the first road, there was a bus waiting in the lane. And the people in the bus were the people I wanted to meet while I am in Christchurch!! They recognized me (fortunately), and we had a little chat in the middle of the road. Great :-))

South = cold

2006-06-28T22:06:00.000+12:00

Wow. Time flies.
We are moving out tomorrow morning for our South Island trip, which means we did all the packing and house-cleaning today. I still haven't finished the report that was due yesterday, now I really HAVE (have, have!) to write it. Few hours to go.

We met the future inhabitants of the house already, a bunch of Chinese people. They managed to get a big heater for the living room and small heaters for all the other rooms. But, you know, they will have horrendous energy bills if they use them all.
Anyways. I'm going back to my report-work.

That was 20 Liston Crescent 2006. Six weeks living in backpackers, here I come!!

Happy New Year!

2006-06-28T08:58:00.000+12:00

Yesterday, Alex and me went to the Marae at uni at 6 in the morning to attend the New Year's celebration, called Matariki. It was freezing, and clotheswise I was not prepared to sit outside for an hour. The beginning was quite interesting, but at the end there was one guy talking in Maori for half an hour, so it was pretty boring. I was in desperate need of a blanket and a babelfish.

double-decker checker

2006-06-26T00:29:00.000+12:00

I tell you guys, the weekend was fabulous!
Despite the fact that there is this 8000 words report due on Tuesday, I was going to Auckland for the weekend to go to Colin and Jesse's farewell party. The two are going to India, Colin for 6 weeks and Jesse for a month, so it was the last chance to see Colin, and the last chance to see lots of other people who attended the party.

I went to Auckland in the morning by bus. It was a double-decker bus and I had one of the front seats. Which was great :-) Good spot to take some photos..

Finally arriving in Auckland, I went to help at the SAFE stall. Was quite encouraging I have to say. So many people have not heard of battery hens before, they have no idea where their food comes from. The response was really good, people were interested, listening and could see the benefit of making different decisions. The best discussion was with one guy who said that he would always buy the cheapest, but after talking to me for a while he wasn't that sure any more. I got him by asking him if paying 1$ less is also that important when he goes out to have some beers..

After the stall, I went to Alice and Billy's place. They are so generous and let me stay over night at their place every time I come up to Auckland. I was going for a walk with Alice, her sister Sue and her dog (can't remember his name..). Billy was watching the World Cup in the meantime ;-) After that, I went to get some food for the potluck party in the evening. I then cooked and watched TV at the same time (works quite well), and then it was almost time to go to the party already!

I forgot to bring my camera unfortunately, but you know, sometimes it is better to enjoy the situation anyways. Ended up talking with Jesse for quite a while. He is planning to live in Taiwan next year, what I find very exciting. Hope that it is easy for him to be vegan there. Not everything I heard was positive..

I almost forgot dancing that evening (too much talking ;-)), but I had at least a few minutes of dancing with Colin at the end of the party.
The food was of course aweseome, did not know where to start :-) Pizza, spring rolls, sushi, salad, carrot soup, bread and beetroot rice (by manu), fruits, chips and dips, pie, and and and. Marvellous :-))

I wanted to go back to Hamilton early in the morning, but I managed to sleep until 9:30, and when I finally was back in the city centre it was 11am, and the next bus left at 1. So I decided to walk around and have some food and chill out a bit more. The bus was a bit late, and after arriving in Hamilton and walking home for about 50 minutes, I was back home at about 4:30. Report is still waiting to be written..

Anyone who wants to write a report?

Cooking instruction

2006-06-21T10:36:00.000+12:00

Did you ever want to know what the best way to peel a potatoe is?
Then have a look at this video:
How to peel a cooked potato in one shot

Otherwise, dont :-)

By the way, I had my first and last exam yesterday, YAY! Was not too worried about it and it went ok (I hope). They have a very strict system here. You are allowed to bring pens and a bottle of water, nothing else really. And you need to have your student ID right next to you. If you need to go to the toilet, one of the supervisors is guiding you to the door (and they write down who went for how long). You are not allowed to leave in the last 15 minutes of the exam, I was lucky to being able to leave right at the beginning of this time. I had choir rehearsal right afterwards, and I came home 2 minutes before I was picked up for it.

The chor is part of a theatre performance that tries to make aware of the wetlands in the Waikato area, funny thing. Dress rehearsal today, performances the following 3 days.. I'll try to take some pics today.

The final countdown

2006-06-18T10:59:00.000+12:00

You might have realised that I start writing blog entries when I should REALLY do sometihng else. Well, right now I should finish 3 projects within 1 week or so, plus an exam on Tuesday. Fun!

But, you know, by the end of this month we will have moved out of our house, we will be travelling down to the South Island, we will attend a conference, then travel around for 2 weeks, and then it's only 2 weeks left before we are on the way back to Austria.

Strange feeling..

Welli Weekend

2006-06-18T10:35:00.000+12:00

Haven't written about the AR conference weekend in Wellington yet. All in all: it was fabulous! I met so many people, was stuffed with vegan food, didn't get more sleep than 5 hours per night, an learned a lot about Animal Welfare / Animal Rights in New Zealand/Australia.

I went there by bus. Left Hamilton Thursday evening at 10. Unfortunately the bus was crowded, and I only got one of the seats in the middle. I was hoping to have 2 seats so that I cold get some sleep. But no.

Anyways, I was in the bus trying to find a position where I could at least doze a bit - which was really hard. The bus stopped every now and then, either to stuff more people into the bus, or to give the crowd a chance to go to the toilet and buy some refreshments. The man next to me was so kind to change seats for the last 2-3 hours, and so I could at least lean my head against the window for a while.

I finally arrived in Wellington at about 7am, Friday. I had some time before the conference started, so I walked to the venue and took some dawn photos. It was just great. Dawn is a good time to arrive in a nice city :-)

Finally at the conference venue, I was asked to be the official photographer (after they have seen my cam, hehe). I still had to prepare my 5min talk, so I used the rest of the time before the official start to do that. Went fine in the end.

The 2 days of conference were full with a tight programme, only interrupted by tea and lunch breaks. Which meant a lot of cakes, cookies, and all the other food (I'm still impressed as you might see ;-)). I got a lot of information about NZ Animal Rights groups, about the current situation in the country (visualised with really sad and shocking video/photo footage).

The conference was also good for me because I am currently working on a NZ version of the "Why Vegan?" booklet by VeganOutreach and I could contact people to get photos and other resources for it. Didn't succeed in finding someone who would support the project financially. But it is too early to ask for funding anyways..

I knew that OdESSA was playing in Wellingon on Friday, and those of you who have read my blog will know that I kinda had to go there :-) Actually it was 4 of us going to the concert where 3 bands were playing. The OdESSA people still recognised me, and they even wrote me a message on mySpace the next day (hihi).

Saturday evening, the conference people had dinner together at an Indian restaurant, and we went out after that. So not a lot of sleep that night eigher. Which was ok because the hall where some of us slept was not too fancy. We didn't have running water Sunday morning, the toilet was not that nice then I must say..

Sunday was the day where different Animal Rights groups had their member meetings. I attended the meeting of SAFE, the group I am mostly working with. Good meeting, nice to see that there are activists in all the small rural places around the country. One woman went vegan this weekend. She is living on a farm somewhere in the middle of nowhere, she will have a hard time telling her husband about it I guess..

After the meeting we went to a farm sanctuary outside Wellington. The weather was not too good, but I still enjoyed it a lot. I am a big fan of the pigs I must say. Really friendly and easygoing animals :-)

On the way back to Hamilton I had 2 seats and could actually sleep a bit. And we arrived half an hour earlier, so I could manage to walk home before it started to rain heavily. Yay!

Oh yeah, big thanks to Wolfgang for commenting my photos :-)

Flick Flack Flock

2006-06-18T09:58:00.000+12:00

Hi guys!

Have you ever heard of Flock before? No? It is new browser based on the Firefox code, which does a nice job easing your (aehm, my) Internet addiction. It has a nice system of saving favourites (aka bookmarks), which you can share online (using del.icio.us, for example). This is cool because I can have the same bookmarks on different computers. I can upload photos to my Flickr account and write new blog entries directly from the browser.

It is still a beta version and it still a bit buggy (couldn't set up my Flickr account while using the uni cache), but I think it is worth to have a look at. What I don't like is that is uses Yahoo! as primary search engine, I'm just so used to Google..

Enough advertisement now.

Blogged with Flock

Wellington, here I come!!

2006-06-08T14:54:00.000+12:00

Yesss, I am leaving today for a weekend trip to Wellington. It is national Animal Rights conference weekend, which I am very much looking forward to!
I realized pretty late though that I cold tell something about the Austrian situation there, but I managed to get 5 minutes of time to speak in front of all the people. Yay!!

That means: I have to prepare stuff..
Seeyaa, and have a nice weekend guys!

Speech recognition is art.

2006-06-08T14:51:00.000+12:00

We had a meeting with Bill today, about our speech recognition project. I kinda like the information that we came up with. Geek art *hehe*.

Corrections of profile information

2006-06-08T14:32:00.000+12:00

I have changed my profile information a little bit. It was really cold the last few days - probably not as cold as the current European summer (haha), but at least you guys have warm houses! Did I ever mention that insulation is not a well-known concept in kiwi-land? During the day, it is warmer outside than inside. During the night, it is just cold and damp everywhere.

Anyways, I managed to get cold a couple of times, which resulted in me being sick, wich finally resulted in me having to take antibiotics. Hurray. But I can stop taking them after tomorrow. Yay!!

Oh, by the way. The small red thingy on the picture is our heater. No central heating or something, plain-vanilla as it gets.

Love is in the Air Guitar

2006-06-05T14:05:00.000+12:00

Have you ever attended an air guitar contest? No?
Well, I have. You might have heard that the Air Guitar World Championships take place in Finland. For that event, there are nationwide tournaments even here in New Zealand! I have attended the final for the Waikato area. It was not too exciting (and probably no world champion around the contestants), but at least fun to watch :-))
I have been there with a bunch of Germans, Kiwis and an Irish. There were live bands playing in town (much like every week), and we listened to 2 of them after the air guitar thing.

Deer farm visit

2006-06-05T12:45:00.000+12:00

Guess what, starting to write blog entries after quite a long time of blog abstinence is hard! But to avoid working on my paper, I'll do anything :-)

So, there is my recent story:
Yesterday I have visited a deer farm. Logan invited me to see the place where he grew up, and as I've never seen farmed deer before, I was keen to see it. I was invited for lunch, so we left some time in the morning to be there on time. The farm is in the south, in a village called Aria. Unfortunately, I forgot to bring my camera, so I cannot provide any self-made images of the trip (I was hopping mad because of that!!).
Anyways, we were driving south for about 1 1/2 hours, the weather was not too good, but also not too bad.
We passed the closest supermarket about half an hour before we arrived. Then we passed a lot of fields with sheep and cattle on them, before we finally arrived on the farm. Logan's parents were already awaiting us, lunch was ready. His mum put a lot of effort into providing vegan food for me, incredible! She even bought soy milk and soy cheese for me!
In the afternoon, we drove along the fields and watched the animals. Haven't worn gum boots for a while, but it was fun walking around in the mud (hehe). One of the deer was held as a pet for many years, but the owner had to move and could not keep the animal, and so it is now living on the farm. She (can't remember her name) is still very confiding, and so we were able to pet her (haven't stroked a deer before!).

Logan also showed me the apparatuses used for weighing, removing the horns, sheering and tuberculosis testing. A lot of it was very shocking to me. Efficient work seems to be the most important thing, no idea if animal welfare plays any role. At least they are using anaesthesia for removing the horns.. The dogs are kept on chains ("they are working dogs!"), and deer is brought to the slaugterhouse when they are 10 months old (the pet deer is 19 years old and will probably live for another 4 years..). And they love (possum and rabbit) hunting and fishing.

I often can't understand how animals can be seen so differently. The farmers family is really nice and caring, and I was so warmly welcomed there. Even my vegan lifestyle was not a problem! But then, non-human animals are not a lot more than things for them. A lot of people seem to forget (not be aware of) the fact that humans are not the only ones who feel pain. Weired..

Back to yesterday. We stayed for dinner there, and I could take a whole bag full of fresh apples and kiwis and a pumpkin with me. *mjam*

Definitely worth the trip. Thanks Logan for the invitation!!

Oh brother, where art thou?

2006-05-01T08:27:00.000+12:00

My middle brother (is that proper Englisch?) has his own blog now, too. Quick-n-dirty design of the page by me ;-)

Back to life, back to reality

2006-05-01T08:10:00.000+12:00

Sorry that I did not write for so long. I wanted to write a cool posting about our fantastic holiday trip, and I wanted to upload the pictures to it first. But, you know, we have 1 1/2 DVDs full with images, and sorting them out is a LOT of work. I will do that somewhen. Later.

The trip was really cool. We were travelling Coronmandel and the Northlands. That means: basically a lot of travelling, a bit of hiking and swimming, a lot of watching and picture taking.

The highlights for me:

Sand dunes: heaps and heaps of sand, endless. And right next to the dunes: the 90 Mile Beach. Incredible! Swimming and sand boarding.
Cathedral Cove: one of the most beautiful beaches I can imagine. And hardly any people there. Quiet, blue water, sandy beach, ...
Costal walkway: 3 1/2 hours walk in one direction, not a lot around besides nature and beautiful views and beaches. Relaxing and just amazing.
Kauri forrest: looking at the oldest tree of New Zealand. Pretty big, pretty tall. And natural forrest all around it. You don't get to see something like this in Austria.
Cape Reinga: the most northern point of New Zealand. The end of the world :-) Where 2 seas fighting about the direction of their waves..

Lauren has put her photos online already. So have a look at them before you complain ;-)

Short message

2006-04-18T08:22:00.000+12:00

On the trip through the Northlands. Has been great so far, and we will do a ship trip today. Big hello from Reinhard to the world, too :-)

Hell yeah!

2006-04-14T00:11:00.000+12:00

After an HCI lecture full of students presentations (and Reinhard listening), and after visiting all outdoor shops in town failing to get leather-free hiking boots, and after fetching Primoz (Reinhards colleague from Wanganui) from the bus station, we went to a place called Hell Pizza.
It's a funny pizza place. Probably not too different from Domino's or Pizza Hut, but
1) they have their very own style (pretty dark)
2) they have a vegan pizza on their menu!!!

You can guess that I had to try that one :-)
It was good, a bit too hot for my taste though, and not too many vegetables on it. Have to remember that you can put avocado and refried beans on a pizza..

I will be away for the following week. It is Easter break, and we will be travelling the north of North Island.

Current mood: good but VERY tired

Muffin says: Good morning!

2006-04-14T00:06:00.000+12:00

Yes, the morning started just great today: Lauren was baking muffins, and she tried my Egg Replacer powder for them. And so I had vegan muffins for breakfast!

They were very delicious, and the other flatmates did not even notice the difference to the last muffins with egg in them. Should have taken a picture..

Weekend achievements

2006-04-11T22:38:00.000+12:00

Got up at 6 on Saturday (after the party the previous day!)
Went to Auckland
Attended the Subway demo
Watched Ice Age 2 in the cinema
Went to bed at 8:30
Slept for at least 12 hours
Bought vegan shoes
Ate a vegan sandwitch & a big chocolate Easter egg (Lauren helped a bit)
Made it back home to Hamilton

Friday night castle

2006-04-11T22:29:00.000+12:00

Last friday was the night of quite a few concerts in town. Big thanks to Sam for telling me about it :-)
And so we (Alex, Justin, Sam and me) made our way into town to see what was going on. We went to this place called The Castle. I haven't had a concert like this before. There were 3 "stages" (in two of them the bands were on the same level as the crowd), and after one band had finished on the first stage, another band started on the other stage. All that was basically happening in the same room. Interesting.

Was a good evening. The music was cool, but did not completely fascinate me - maybe I am just not enough into punk (yet?).

Vegan Vittles

2006-04-11T17:16:00.000+12:00

Yesterday, after choir, I spent the rest of the evening and bits of the night to create a simple webpage. Alice had asked me for help, and as she has given me a place to stay in Auckland, it was clear that I wanted to help. I thought that I could do this in about an hour time anyways. I needed more time. Had to take and edit the picture(s), and I am not an experienced XHTML/CSS programmer at all.

Anyways. There it is, the work of a few hours:
www.veganvittles.co.nz

Feel free to comment :-)

Shoes for 2000 NZ$

2006-04-11T16:26:00.000+12:00

Did you ever spend 2000 dollars for shoes? No?
I did. And I did not even know that I did.

I went to the SAFE store on Sunday to buy some shoes. There is not much to select from - at least if you are female with 40/41 European shoe size-, but I still found shoes that I liked. Which is very exciting, because it is my first pair of shoes that are explicitely vegan: no humans or other animals have been abused for my new shoes!

I was paying with the credit card and did not even look at the receipt. The lady in the shop had told me the price before anyways (198$). But then, on Monday, Amanda from SAFE contacted me that there was something wrong with my payment. I had paid more than 2200 dollars!!

Guess who is glad that Amanda had a closer look :-)