Day 7 - 13/12/08

WOOOT!!! Today, we got into the Wellington Zoo for FREE!!!

Lol... Actually, we helped the Lions people clean out the lion's den. Since we were being so, so selfless, (as usual :D) they let us enter the zoo for free. Yay, us!!!

The day started out with Beth (Karori Lions Club president) fetching Rex and I to the Wellington Zoo. We were helping another Lions Club, which were specially formed by gays and lesbians (that's so cool!!) and the zoo (of course) clean out the lion's den. We were told to clean out the weeds cause they were blocking the lions from being seen by outsiders.

One of the first animals we saw. It posed for us :)

So, we met at the entrance of the zoo at 9 a.m. and we were cleaning the dens in to time, with the lions inside...

... Their cages, of course... :P

We also met up with two hot female exchange students. One was from Germany and the other, from Switzerland. The German girl, Petra, had bleach-blond hair and was the hotter of the two.

in addition to the free entrance to the zoo, we also got to get up and personal with the lions. Holy crap, we were about a foot away from death. I almost soiled my pants... ALMOST!!!

Awwww, that's so cute!!!

This was totally awesome...

If i reached my hand out... I would have been able to stroke it...

Does this remind anyone of the Lion King? No? Oh well...

First time ever, I lost to an animal in coolness :P

Here we are, hard at work...

And the Alpha male of the chimps had FREAKING HUGE BULGING MUSCLES!!! In the name in all that is holy and mighty, there was a chimp with toned armes!!! And you could see it through the fur!!! I was seriously jealous... Of a chimp...

Check out the arms of the one on the left... o.O

There was one chimp who was a damn poser... He posed for like... 5 shots for me... Wth...

Here he is again... On the right...

We were also so damn close to the giraffs like... half a foot away...

We saw a bird show and this parrot did this for me :D

The duck was like, a foot away from me. It was so cute!!

Anyways, Jo (Tom's daughter) took us over to her house after that as we (the whole family) were gonna have a barbecue dinner at her house.

Awww... Their cat, Bernie...
The sausages were really, really delicious. Best I've ever had.

All in all, it was a very nice day. It was the first day we SWEATED in New Zealand!!!

FINALLY!!! It felt so good!!!

My only regrete is not getting Petra's e-mail address... So, Petra, if you're reading this, give your e-mail address? Please...?

P.S. We played on Mike's (Jo's husband) computer while waiting for Tom and Anne to come.

Picture this: 3 Mbps downlaoding speed.

WHAT THE HELL!!! Super freaking fast... That's like... A gazillion times faster than our internet speed back home in Malaysia.

Shit, throw in some hot girls and I'll never wanna go back to Malaysia.

New Zealand would be too perfect by then :P

Sorry about this post having no pictures... i'll update this with pictures soon... my computer's screwing with me...

Day 6 - 12/12/08

Sorry for the long delay between my posts. I was so busy with parties and college assignments that i have over looked the importance of this blog to other people. :D Just joking

Anyways, back to my story...

It rained this morning, and it was freaking cold... Tom was worried that if that kept up, we won't be able to have our "Sausage Sizzle". Our plan was to help the Lions sell sausages to raise funds. But the rain stopped at 10 a.m. So, we continued watching the weather forecast. We watched some TV to ease our boredom.

Oh, damn... It started to rain at 2 p.m. Gary (the other Lion) called to say that the "Sausage Sizzle" was canceled. Double damn... And I was really looking forward to it.

Sigh... I settled with psyching my self up for my favorite TV show. Yea! You guessed it! Girls of the Playboy Mansion!

...And Rex went to sleep... Zzzzz...

Half an hour later, Tom took us to a place called the Weta Cave. It's not a real cave, lol... Duh.. It's a small museum where they display the props used for a few movies.


The Weta cave!!!

It stopped raining when we got there, by the way.

It seems this company called WETA was responsible for the creation and design of the Lord of the Rings and Narnia amour. Woah... Deja vu.

Anyways, they had very, very detailed and realistic busts and models of the characters of many different films. I really can't describe the amount of detail that is in each and everyone of these models they produced.

Obviously, quality comes with a price.


Creatures from the LOTR... The one on the left is the fellow who killed Gandalf...

One of the Narnian beasts... I think...
Take a wild guess as to how big this thing was... Not even close... It was like... 2 inches tall... Check out the major detail on it...


I couldn't get to see the actual thing inside, as they didn't let us open the box. So i got the next best thing - the PICTURE printed on the box!!!
The cheapest thing they sold were small rings at $5 and the biggest, most expensive thing is a life-sized model of Gullum from LOTR priced at $2,500.

The damn expensive Gullum...

What the hell!!! Only a hardcore collector would buy that.

It started to rain when we got out of the Weta caves. Damn... The weather was screwing with us... Damn you, NZ weather!!!


The weather screwing with us...
Anyways, we were also "treated" to some NZ traffic jam on the way back... It wasn't as spectacular as Kuala Lumpur traffic jam, but we were moving along quite slowly, nonetheless...

During that time, my keen sense of observation made me notice a few things :
- That Tom's car was a Suzuki Baleno
- His gear shift, compared to my retarded car, was damn smooth. There wasn't a single sound coming from it when he changed gear... Wow...
- Tom loves to drag gear 1 until about 40-something kph, then drag gear 2 until about 65 kph. That was cool and impressive. My car can't even accelerate anymore when I'm at 20kph in gear 1.
- I love to crap when i have nothing else to say. Like this portion for instance.

Oh by the way, one of our team members had to go back to Malaysia this morning - Sze Ting. Apparently, she had been sick since we got here.... So, her symptoms were lack of appetite, vomiting, panicky, fever... and... Did I mention panicky?

Sigh, like I told Wan Qi, it's like losing a member of the family.

On a happier note, our dinner theme was - onions. Lol... Funny, right? Well, it all began like this...

As i said earlier, we wanted to have the "Sausage Sizzle" but it was royally screwed by the weather. Well, it seemed that Anne had already sliced up all 16 onions we bought before we were informed about the "Sausage Sizzle" being canceled. So, we were left with 16 sliced, smelly onions to cook with.

As usual, Anne worked her magic and produced 3 delicious dishes, all made with onion as one of the ingredients: Onion soup, Potatoes and onion, and lamb chops and onion.

Dinner was wonderful. (as usual)

During the clean up, Anne had a brain-blast of how to dispose of the left over onions. (of course we didn't finish the whole lot...) Apparently, her daughter was having a barbecue the very next day. We could just give it all to her!!! Yay!!! Problem solved!!!

But the idea came a few hours too late...

Day 5 - 11/12/08

What the hell!!! It was freaking cold this morning... Even under the thick blanket I had, I still felt freezing...


By the way, a strange thing happened this morning... Rex and I got out of our rooms at THE EXACT SAME TIME and we were BOTH wearing long sleeved shirts.... Weird, huh?


Oh yea, I did the laundry by myself. *Claps hands* Awww, come on, people!!! It's a really rare occasion!!! I was so proud of myself that i took a picture of the hanging clothes, which, might I add, I hung all by myself too. :D


Here it is...


Anyways, enough of my laundry ordeal... Today was freaking windy, like 40 km/h type winds or something like that. Tom went out to get his daughter's 7 seater - a Mazda MPV so we could go out with two girl exchangees from Australia (Elly and Dannielle) to Te Papa and a wool mill. (I hope they're hot :D)


Ah, damn... They weren't free... Oh well, Rex, Tom and I went to a place called STANSBOROUGH, where they specialized in harvesting wool, spinning wool and producing stuff made out of wool. It seems that they were the ones who made the cloaks for the Lord of the Rings and Narnia films. Those cloaks that Frodo and King Caspian wore came from the company we were at.



STANSBOROUGH...


The moment we were in the front door, we were bombarded by barks which cam from a cute little dog.

Here it is.. AWWWW!! IT'S SO CUTE!!!


But it was cool, as he (or she, I don't know as I couldn't see under it) was only doing his (or her) job - protecting the shop with his/her cute barks. Not a bad strategy, "cute" the bad guy to death.


Anyways, we went on our way with a tour of the place. We got to see how wool was made and spun. We got to watch a short film about the sheep they rear and the machines they used. (The sheep were so cute!!!) The machines included the loom and several others. (Can't remember the names of the machines, though...)


The loom... Dum, dum, dum...


We were at the gift shop before we knew it. They sold many different items made from wool...


Well, duh. Imagine if we went through the whole WOOL factory and at the end the gift shop was filled with stuff made out of... Say... PLASTIC or artificial FIBER... That would be just plane weird. The tour guide would be like: " And here we are at our gift shop. Feel free to try on our clothing made from cotton, because we ran out of wool... At this wool factory..."


Anyway, they sold a lot of stuff, ranging from teddy bears... Awww!!


To neckties... Oh my god! What the hell is that!! The neckties they were selling were damn ugly! It was bright red and furry... Like a red, furry monster... Argh... I was too afraid to take a picture of it, in case my camera lens cracked at the sight of that monstrosity...


To wallets, which were quite good. The problem was that everything in there was really, really EXPENSIVE. Yea well, they ARE made from real, pure NZ wool. The teddy bear cost $90 and the ugly tie was at $75. The cheapest item there was a wallet at $70. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a cheapskate person... As a rule of thumb, when I travel, I see prices as dollar for dollar... But even then, they are really expensive...


After that, we headed down to Te Papa, again. But this time, we were going to see something really spectacular - THE COLOSSAL SQUID!!! When they said colossal, they (the Te Papa people) really meant humongous-ly gigantic! It was about 4.3 meters in length. Imagine this, if we were to cook this monster, the octopus rings that would be made out of it would be as big as car tires...



The colossal squid... From the bottom up...

The colossal squid... From the top down...

The special thing about this colossal squid is that it had tons of ROTATING teeth at the end of it's arms. As shown below... (actual life-size)


We took a couple of pictures outside Te Papa...



Then, on our way home, Tom surprised us with accelerating downhill again... THIS time, in a Mazda MPV. If that's not enough for you action-enthusiasts out there, he also did a miniature burnout at one of the traffic lights. When I looked back, I could actually see a black strip of tire marks on the spot we just left.


I swear by the time I get back home to Malaysia, I would be saying :" MOM!!! Why are you driving so slow?!" Even though she's doing 110 km/h...


Upon reaching home, I did the ironing all by myself. Again, because I was feeling so proud and light headed that I've done another completely normal thing all by myself, I took another picture of the ironing board... I don't really know why I did that... I think it was somewhere along the lines of - can't find anyone to take my picture while I pressed the clothes... So I'll settle for the next best thing - a picture of the pressing board.


Argh... Still bright at 8 p.m. Don't know when I'll get used to this...

Day 4 - 10/12/08

I woke up at 6:15 a.m. this morning and saw that it was already really bright... What the hell, I'm soooo not used to this...


Plan 'A' :Tried going back to sleep...


Failed miserably...


Plan 'B'!!! : Go JOGGING!!!


I jogged until the end of our street and found out that it was too cold to do shit... (In other words... Failed miserably too...)


Anyways, enough about my feeble attempts to do some exercise...


Tom surprised us, yet again by saying that we would be going to see the local cathedrals. This time, we took the bus and learnt that we (Rex and I) would be taking the bus into town sometime in the future... That was really bad news as I was lost the moment I came down from the bus we took... Luckily, Tom was with us this time and professionally led us to our first cathedral - Saint Paul.


At first glance, Saint Paul looked like a boring, white p.o.s. But when you enter the door, all thoughts of - What the hell am I doing here? Or - Shit, a boring place... - just vanished from my mind.


We were greeted by B-E-A-UTIFUL wooden architecture of the church.


Breath taking stained glass windows dominated both walls of the church, for example:

There was also something that i have never seen in a church - A GIFT SHOP.


I mean, what the hell is a gift shop doing in a church?! Is this a place of religion or a shopping mall?!

They sold jewelry, FOR GOD'S SAKE!!! No pun intended :D


After take a few shots, most of them too dark to see, for example...

We were on our way to the other church - NEW Saint Paul. It seemed that the one we were in was the old one which was turned into a tourism spot.


Ahhh... That would explain the gift shop...


Anyways, apparently the 'OLD' Saint Paul got toooooo "retarded" for them and toooo small to fit the ever growing population of Christians in Wellington. So, they decided to build a more modern and way, way larger 'NEW' Saint Paul. Inside NEW Saint Paul, the main door was larger, the main mass room was larger,the stained glass windows were larger, the Christian Cross was larger...


Then.... Then... That's just it... 'NEW' Saint Paul was only just larger than 'OLD' Saint Paul. It did not have better design, nor better seat... Heck, even the stained glass windows weren't as beautiful... Besides the fact that 'NEW' Saint Paul has a really huge organ, is larger, and noticeably whiter (almost everything in it is white, by the way), everything in 'NEW' Saint Paul pales in comparison to 'OLD' Saint Paul.


Outside... It was huge... And white...



Inside, the art work was large, and white...

The really, LARGE organ... It was like... 8 meters tall... I think...

After trying to close our mouths because we were awe-struck by the size of the organ,
we had some lunch and headed to the National Bank Museum which was a stone's throw away. In there, we saw a ridiculously built machine, built to measure and calculate the economy or something like that... Sad to say that this machine, called The Moniac Machine, actually WORKS!!!


The Moniac Machine...


It had water running through it and the amount of water running in each container is suppose to represent a different aspect of the economy and indicate the amount of money going in and out...(Yea, i didn't understand what I've just said either...)


We also saw something that made us think that NZ was very rich. For example, they had $500,000 worth of ripped, yeah I said "ripped", ripped up money.


They even had a MILLION dollars in 50 dollar bills...


We soon made our way to the parliament building, where we had a tour of the whole building. It was quite sad as they didn't let us bring our cameras in. It was because they didn't wanna reveal government secretes or something like that... What the hell?! I mean, if you wanna be so secretive, Y EVEN BOTHERING HOLDING A TOUR?!


The government's funny! :D


By the way, they had a government building called the 'Beehive', which looks nothing like a beehive...

They should have called it the Glass Dome or something cooler...


So, yea, we had a tour of the it-had-lots-of-government-secretes-so-let's-not-let-them-bring-their-cameras-in-but-give-them-a-tour Parliament Buildings. And after that, we were allowed to watch a debate by the 'government people' (Again, no cameras were allowed.... Pfft... As if we wanted to take pictures of bald spots...) from a balcony overlooking the court.


Rex and I found out that NZ's debates were as childish and useless Malaysian debates. In fact, it highly resembles a debate we had in our school once. You must be thinking: it can't be that bad, he just compared the adults doing the debate to high school children... Well, sorry to burst your bubble but... Yea, it was THAT BAD.


Anyway, they were throwing arguments here and there. Mocking laughs were heard as other people were trying their best to present their facts to the Chairperson or the opposing team... And a fat, jolly guy sitting in the middle was snickering every 5 minutes for no apparent reason... All in all, it was a very funny experience. The thought of grown men acting like 10 year olds is funny, no matter the setting! :D Words such as: ' Shit, bullshit, cowcrap, stupid, silly, dumb, babi' all appeared. Super hilarious.


Feeling sleepy but highly amused, we headed home for a nap before the "Christmas Dinner" with the Karori Lions Club.


Fast forwarding to the dinner itself, the Karori Lions Club consisted mainly of the elderly, over 50 or 60 age group with nothing better to do (joking, in case there are people who are sensitive to this age thing), with the exception of Tom and Anne's daughter - Jo.


Even though they were old, they were undoubtedly a group of very lively people. They could even dance and sing. A very different thing from what I'm used to seeing in Malaysia. Usually, in Malaysia, once you're over 60, you might be lying on a bed somewhere, using all you're effort and will power just to swallow your spit... Either that or you're having trouble keeping your pee in.


There were 2 people I liked the moment I met them - an Irish woman named Alice Mac-Something (Sorry, forgot her name), who was super witty and an old, tiny man who told the funniest jokes. (Again, sorry, but his name just slipped my mind.)


We had a fantastic dinner, courtesy of the Karori Lions Club of mainly meat.


Thanks for paying for us, guys!!! We really appreciate it!!!



The best picture of the party... Cause I look hot in this one... :D JUST JOKING!!!

Damn tired

Today I'm not gonna put up any post as I'm freaking tired... Gonna sleep early... To all my fans out there ( if i have any) I apologize for not being able to satisfy your reading needs :(

Day 3 - 9/12/08

Crap.... It rained today... =.="

Just typical shit... Say that you wanna do something the next day and wished it wouldn't rain... The rain just keeps coming...

I ended up reading Harry Potter books for an hour (nothing to do...). Then, all of a sudden... Tom surprised us by Bringing us up Wright's hill.

At the peak of Wright's hill, we were treated to a fantastic, bird's-eye view of Wellington city (for the third time). We also saw a big-ass hole in the ground at the peak of the hill. It seemed that a long time ago, this hole housed a big-ass gun-like cannon, which could shoot a shell (a big-ass bullet) across the sea, just short of the South Island. Wow... That's like, one... two... three... Many, many miles...

The big-ass hole... Minus the big-ass cannon...

Anyways, we headed to the National Museum of NZ - Te Papa!!!

It was nothing like what I have ever seen before. For one thing, it WASN'T BORING!!! Woot!!! Finally a non-boring museum! It was really interactive and i instantly knew which exhibit was my favourite... There was an exhibit called "The Wall". It's basically a wall (Duh) made out of plasma TVs or whatever, where you can put digital photos on it. You could even use a "torchlight" thingy and move, rotate or animate the pictures. The best thing was that, opposite the "Wall" there were like 12 30-something inch wide screen TVs which acted like a giant I-touch - YES!! It was TOUCHSCREEN!! - where you could pick and send the pictures or videos to the "Wall".

What the fuck, man!!! It was damn fun!!! We spent around an hour playing with that thing! It was like a freaking drug!!! 

Even just scrolling through the pictures was UBER FUN!!!

This is one half of the whale bone...

... And this is the second half. It's freaking huge!!!

Argh!!! Giant, man-eating shellfish!!!

At the end of the day, we had tons of fun at the "indoor park" (my nickname for Te Papa).

My parent's Skyped me today. We ended up talking about random stuff under the sun... LOL

That night, Rex and I noticed that we didn't need our jackets any longer... Looks like Summer's just around the corner :D