"Fingers Beware, These Parrots May Bite"

Spontaneity was the the name of the game this Thursday. After submitting my assignment I decided go to the aviary at the Dunedin Botanic Gardens. On my walk over there was a couple with their daughter, who at most was three years old. They were walking in front of me and the father would stop to pick flowers for his daughter and then put them in her hair. The dialogue between father and child went a little like this:

Father: "Where are we going?"

Child: "To see the birdies!"

Father: "Where are we going?!?"

Child: "TO SEE THE BIRDIEEES!!!"

Father: "What sounds do the birds make?"

Child: "SQUAK! GAW! TWEET! TWEET!"

It was much cuter in person, but I thought I would share the story. I saw them later on and the little girl was saying, "Daddy, that bird has wings! FLY FLY BIRDIE FLY!" It was GREAT.

Here are some pictures of the birds:

Spring break, here I come!

   

Although I thought this week was going to be immensely stressful with my assignments, it actually turned out to be quite a good week, with only slight stress. As of now, I am only one class away from spring break, so i'm pretty excited for 11am tomorrow morning when I can actually declare the beginning of break.

As for this past week, Dunedin has had unusually warm weather. On Monday, I wore a t-shirt to class, and on Wednesday I wore shorts. Of course, on both days the weather changed by the hour and by the time I was walking home from the library on Wednesday it was cold and raining. But once again, Thursday was a brilliantly warm and sunny day, with less tempermental weather fluctuations. I have noticed a few interesting things as the weather has gotten warmer. To begin, when walking to my class on Monday, I saw numerous shoeless and shirtless men dancing on roofs. Then, on Thursday, I saw a girl prancing around in her bikini. I admit, it has been much warmer this past week but it is not THAT warm. To give all of you an idea of the temperature, it has been in the low 60's. So, pleasant but not beach weather.

Like I said though, this week was a rather good week. I went to Chinese class on Monday, rather stressed about the week ahead, and a little moody because we were having a test. Tests always stress me out in general but the Chinese ones have been more so since they are always reading passages and translating them. We also had an assignment due this Monday and I was not sure how I had done on it. However, after going over the assignment I felt much better, and surprisingly I felt pretty good about the test too! I'll have to wait until after spring break to see how I had actually done, but that was the first highlight to my week. I have also grown to like the class a whole lot more because the book we are reading is actually really interesting and well written, in both Chinese and English. Our class discussions have also been great and I have learned a lot of Chinese history.

Although I still had a lot of work after Monday, I was in a pretty good mood. Tuesday night was the last of the five ceramics classes and I finished a teapot during that class. I was incredibly excited about this teapot because I had never made on on a wheel, and the fact that the pot, spout, and lid were made on the wheel excited me even more. All throughout class I kept on saying that the teapot looked like Chip from Beauty and the Beast and it was not until I got home that I realized that Chip was a teacup. But the teapot does look a little like Mrs. Potts. 

My teapot!!!

Wednesday morning was pretty unique. As routine, I woke up (after snoozing a few times) and turned on my little space heater. For the few minutes that it takes to warm up my room I checked my Facebook, only to find over 30 statuses about an earthquake. I have Facebook friends from elementary school, high school, and college and rarely do I see similar statuses among these groups of people and so I was relatively confused. I also did not immediately think that there was actually an earthquake since they are so rare on the east coast. Anyways, I soon found out there actually was an earthquake and was pretty shocked. My sister told me that it was not too bad in New York and described it feeling like a herd of elephants moving in to the apartment above hers.

Later Wednesday afternoon, I presented my cultural food project on Polish food. Along with my helpers Emma and Maureen, I made six dishes; cucumber salad, pork and vegetable stew, mushrooms and sour cream, sole baked in sour cream, potato pancakes, and honey cake. I thought they tasted pretty good, and I still have some fish and some stew left over in the fridge. Food science must be one of the most intriguing classes I have ever taken. I especially love lab because we cook every week. The lab looks like any other science lab that i've been in, except it has stoves and ovens. It basically looks like a whole lot of kitchens put together with lab equiptment. The day before my presentation, I had gone to the food science library via the lab and there was a class in there taking a test. All the students had barriers up so they could not see the person beside them, and each person had pen and paper and a tray of cookies. They were all intently analyzing the cookies for their test. I hope they got to eat them afterwards. Food science is fascinating.

As for other exciting news, I received a package from my mom this week and it included some moon cakes! I love moon cake and am thrilled about Autumn Moon Festival, although I will be celebrating it in the spring. I also made a pretty spontaneous trip to the aviary at the botanic gardens on Thursday where I saw incredible birds, but I will write a separate post for that. Also, exam schedules have been posted and i'll be done with exams on October 31st! Yay!

Enthoumometha orthors hosa praxomen orthos...

As I worked (and procrastinated) on my numerous mid-term assignments I saw a conglomerate of Facebook statuses about returning to Bryn Mawr. The combination of the frosh's countdowns to move in day, customs training updates, the typical comment of "WHEN DO I GET TO SEE YOU??", and the numerous people "checking-in" at airports and those complaining about jet-lag makes me overwhelmingly miss the Mawr. I hope that everyone has safe travels back and PLEASE keep me updated on what is happening at home. And also, of course, WELCOME CLASS OF 2015!!

Cherry Blossoms, Spring 2011

Four assignments to go before spring break...

My week began with a relaxing snow day. The picture to the left shows the very beginning of the snow storm where there were huge fluffy snow flakes. I was really excited, hoping that there would be more than an inch of fluffy snow, but the fluffy snow was short lived and soon became hail and there really only ended up being about an inch... of hail.

That inch was enough to get my Monday class cancelled though, and since it was my only class, I declared it a snow day. Many other people also had all of their classes cancelled and thus they also had snow days.

Tuesday was still a muggy day out but I managed to leave the house and go for lunch with Julia. We were debating what to eat but could not really decide. Luckily a group of random guys happened to walk by saying, "Let's get Indian!" We thought that was a splendid idea and thanks to some random boys, Julia and I ate some delicious Indian food at the food court underneath Meridian (the mall). After filling up on butter chicken and naan we went and did a little shopping. I bought a new hat that has ear flaps, so my head AND my ears stay warm! This hat also happens to be in the shape of a giraffe.

Giraffe hat!

We returned to campus and I headed off to my computer science lab. This is the first week that the lab actually took me the entire two hours. The lab was not very hard, but there was pages upon pages of calculations. When I was packing to come to New Zealand, I was debating whether to bring my graphing calculator, and after much thought I had decided not to because I was only taking one CS class and I didn't think I would need it. The result of that decision was me sitting at the computer typing every calculation into Google. I have to admit though, I would rather spend two hours calculating things, knowing that i'm doing the lab correctly than sitting there for the same amount of time having no idea what to do. So generally, I was still pretty chipper after the lab. I walked home in the rain to eat dinner (left over naan from lunch) and to gather my towel before heading off to ceramics class. Ceramics that night was rather exciting because I made a teapot. I'll have to take some pictures of it next week before it goes off to the kiln.

Wednesday night was Katie's birthday and it was Gluwein themed. Katie is the kiwihost in flat number 1, and Gluwein is a type of German mulled wine. I have never heard or tried it before so I tried a sip and surprisingly it did not really taste like wine. I can't really describe what it tastes like, definitely lots of cinnamon and some citrus maybe? Basically it tasted like how a Glade apple cinnamon candle smells. It is also served warm.

I made my weekly visit to $3 lunch on Thursday with Sophie, Fiona, and Grace. They had yellow rice and lentils. Actually, I have had yellow rice and lentils every time i've gone to $3 lunch. I'm beginning to wonder if yellow rice and lentils are the only thing they serve, or maybe they only serve yellow rice and lentils on Thursdays, which is the day I go. Regardless, yellow rice and lentils are yummy.

Baldwin Street take two happened on Friday. I went with Jose who had never been before. It was finally sunny out, and it wasn't all that cold. We climbed the street again, and not only did it seem shorter the second time, but it was also much less tiring, probably because I was not carrying a weeks worth of groceries. This time around Jose and I both planked on the street. I had to seriously try to not roll down the street. It is really that steep. After Baldwin street, Jose and I went grocery shopping. I did not need much as spring break is in a week, but I caved and bought a little jar of Nutella. I did mention that it has been pretty warm the last two days or so, but apparently not warm enough because my Nutella kind of froze just sitting in the cupboard and is rather unspreadable at the moment. However, I did make Nutella oatmeal, and that was delicious.

Early Saturday morning I made my way to the Unipol for my ride to my Kiln Fired Glass class. We got to see the pieces we had made the week before and although I was generally happy with the results I was slightly disappointed about two of the pieces because they were mixed up with some other peoples. One of my plates was matched with someone else's plate design and the designs fused together. It was okay though, and I did not mind too much, but the other plate that was fused with another piece had a lizard on it. Instead of having a red background, the lizard was fused on to a blue and orange speckled background. As a loyal Mawrtyr, this bothered me a bit more, and I spent the rest of the class making dishes with lizards on it. Like I said though, I was generally pretty happy with the results and my other pieces came out looking nice. 

Momona Studio is next to a sheep farm. Not surprising, but cute

Pretty sunset before Rail Jam

Later that night, Gaia and I went to the Octagon to see the Rail Jam. Basically 30 tons of snow was shipped in from Wanaka (a town about 3.5 hour away from Dunedin) and was put on an 11 metre half pipe in the middle of the Octagon. There was then a competition with many people skiing and snowboarding down the pipe doing tricks. It was pretty crazy but fun to watch. 

Rail Jam!

Crowd watching Rail Jam

Afterwards, we stopped by at Savoury Japan for rice balls. We didn't eat them right away as we also wanted to get Rob Roy's Ice Cream. I don't remember if i've blogged about Rob Roy's yet, but even if I had, it is worth another blog post. Rob Roy's is the best ice cream deal in Dunedin. A single scoop, is actually like... 3 or 4 scoops. You can get two flavors in a single scoop and it costs $2.40NZD (apprx $2.00USD). The first time I went to Rob Roy's I got a single scoop, and could not finish it. Now, I just get the children's size, which is the perfect amount. I had a children's size hokey pokey on a cone. I believe hokey pokey is a New Zealand flavor. It is vanilla ice cream with bits of hokey pokey. Read more about hokey pokey here. Anyways, it was yummy, and hokey pokey is crunchy.

Ice sculptures in the Octagon

I went back to Gaia's house where we ended up talking for about four hours. It was one of those classic Bryn Mawr moments where you and some friends finish dinner and are like "Come over for a few minutes" and it turns into this elaborate conversation that goes on and on for hours and hours. It was great. We also consumed our rice balls. Now, as my clothing slowly dries on my balcony, I am starting to realize how close spring break actually is, and how much work I actually have in the next three days. I suppose I should go do some work now.

One Big Happy Family

School is in full swing and I can now confidently say that I can make my way to classes without getting lost. I realized that it is now nearing spring break and I have not introduced you to my flat mates yet. I thought this would be a good time to do so.

Jose is an entertaining, sugary juice imbibing actuarial scientist from Mexico. He makes delicious enchiladas and can often be found drinking sugary juice or eating Tim Tams.

David, a physics major from Portland, Oregon is quite an excellent guitarist and beer expert. He is also very good at making tasty fried rice in large gallon portions.

Mike hails from Florida, but unlike Jose, David, and I, he is not a study abroad student. He is an international student here at Otago studying management. He is serious about lasagna, and about SoGo. SoGo is short for Southern Gold and is cheap New Zealand beer. He also made the best garlic knots I have ever had.

Kinga is my kiwihost and the only other girl in the house. She studies management and Spanish, works at a coffee shop, and plays soccer. She also speaks four languages, English, Spanish, Polish, and Hebrew. She is lots of fun, and fun sized, which generally translates to a lot of fun. As of very recently (last Friday), Kinga has become an aunt. Her niece is adorable.

So after reading about my flat mates you probably think my flat is very food oriented. While that is true, it is also because most of our hang out time together happens in the kitchen while making food. Generally speaking, we're one big happy family of avocado loving, constant food making, crazy toilet paper using people. I haven't said much about toilet paper as it is usually not a topic of interest but we do go through toilet paper quite quickly. I believe it is the second most common thing we run out of, after avocados.

Also, I am going to use this post as a shameless plug for all of you to send me mail! :)

Flat shaped mail goes to:

Jenny Chen

3/777 Great King Street

North Dunedin

Dunedin

New Zealand, 9016

Packages go to:

Jenny Chen

c/o University of Otago Flats
105 St. David Street

North Dunedin
Dunedin

New Zealand, 9016

Thanks!

Oh what fun it is to run down a sand dune!

Saturday morning began with a speedy walk to the Unipol (the university gym) for a ride to my Kiln Fired Glass class at Momona Studio, near the Dunedin Airport. Our instructor, Lorna, introduced us to many methods of making glass including fusing and slumping and we made pieces with leaves, wire, confetti glass, and enamel. I made a few tiles and a few plates. They are all being fired this week so I hope they come out looking nice.

On our way to the peninsula

After arriving home at around 2:45PM, I made myself some lunch, which was left over curry and headed over to flat 5 to watch a few episodes of Entourage with Fredric and Tucker. Fredric then drove us, and one of his friends from school to Sandfly Beach which is on the Otago peninsula. We went right around sun down and the beach was beautiful. To get to the beach we had to go down a very steep sand dune, which was incredibly fun to run down, but climbing up in the dark three or four hours later was rather tiring. 

On the beach we saw many sea lions, as can be seen in a previous post. We also saw two yellow eyed penguins. Actually, because of the yellow eye penguins, I almost stepped on a sea lion. I spotted a penguin and pointed it out to Tucker who then decided to go climb the rocky/grassy hill to get a closer look at them. I followed him thinking that it'd be fun to climb the hill too. To get to the hill we had to cross a bunch of rocks and as the rocks were wet I was looking for nice big ones that wouldn't move so I would not slip. As I went to step on a large brown rock I thought, "Hmm, that rock over there has quite a lot of fur" and then suddenly I realized it was actually a sleeping sea lion. I decided not to go any farther because I thought if I woke it up and it saw that I was only about two feet away from it, it would lurch at me and I would have nowhere to run as I had just crossed a bunch of rocks. I turned around to walk back to the beach only to realize that I had already walked by another sleeping sea lion and had just managed to not notice or step on it. The rocks were probably laden with sleeping sea lions and I very carefully found my way back to the sandy area of the beach, making sure every rock I stepped on was shiny and wet and not furry. By this time Tucker was already up the hill chasing after the penguins but when he came back he noticed the sea lions as well and decided to take an alternate route than to walk by them again. 

If you look really closely you can see Tucker scrambling up the hill to see the penguin

By then, the sun had set and the moon was slowly rising. The moon rose out off the clouds and illuminated the sky. On our very steep climb back to the top of the sand dune we all kept on looking back at the moon.

Right before the moon appeared

The moon!

Three ladies and a tramp

'Tramping' is what Kiwi's call 'hiking' and I am excited to say that I went on my first tramp in New Zealand this past Friday with Sophie and her friend Fiona from England, who is here visiting. After a relatively long week with multiple assignments due, I set out Friday afternoon to look for people who were interested in going on a hike. I went by Sophie's flat to ask if she wanted to go hiking, and as I did so, she invited me to go on a hike with her and Fiona to the reservoir. It was a perfect coincidence as the reservoir was where I wanted to go too. The three of us set out for what became a pretty amazing afternoon adventure.

The little stream by the trail

I would guess that the trail to the reservoir is about 20 minutes away, but to be honest, I was enjoying the hike so much that I did not really keep track of time. We first walked alongside a little stream. The trail was covered by a lot of trees with lots of foliage and was rather cool. We then went up a few stairs and had a little walk on a road before connecting to the next trail that took us to the reservoir. The trail seemed to have been cleared recently and was quite a nice and level walk. It became a little steeper right before the reservoir but the extra effort was worth the view when we got there. The water in the reservoir was a nice shade of green and the water was entirely still. There was a narrow wooden board walk that led to a little white house. It was very scenic.

I also introduced the idea of 'planking' to Sophie and Fiona. I then demonstrated on the boardwalk. It was my first plank! 

Since it was still early in the afternoon we decided to wander a bit farther. We followed the trail around the reservoir but we eventually ended up at a road. Instead of going farther we back tracked a bit and went up a side trail to see if we could get to the top of something to see the view. The trail that went up was pretty steep but we stopped multiple times to plank on things. The steep trail was also wet and muddy and I kept on thinking of how I will probably slip and slide the entire way back down. After we passed the really steep section and realized there really wasn't a look out point, we headed to a different trail and ended up on a hill. The hill had amazing view of the city and we could see the reservoir where we had just been. We could even see the new rugby stadium and the water.

The reservoir is the little patch of water in the background

There was a little patch of rocks at the top of the hill and the three of us sat down to rest of a while. We then decided to be even more adventurous and take yet another route to go back. There was a road at the top of the hill and we thought that it would probably be a little more direct and definitely less steep and muddy. We jumped a fence that separated us and the road, only to find a sign on the other side that said:

We did not know what was hazardous about the hill we were on, and the trail leading up to it definitely was not blocked off. Other than the amazing view, there was a large tree, some rocks, and some rabbit droppings on this hill. Nothing seemed to hazardous to us...

As we walked down the road, we saw a nice big tree and we climbed it. The pictures of me on the tree are on Fiona's camera and have not made it my way yet, but above is a picture of Sophie and Fiona on the tree. Next to the tree was another interesting looking tree fixture. This is where I owled for the first time. You can read about owling here. 

As we walked down the road we realized that we did not really know how to get back to the uni because, well, we didn't really know where we were at that point. We saw a man walking his dog and decided to ask for directions. 

Me: Hi, excuse me, where does this road lead to?

Nice man: Where are you trying to go?

Me: Back to the university.

Nice Man: Wow, you guys really walked... 

And so we realized that we were about an hour away from the uni, but the directions he gave was were pretty simple. It was basically to keep on walking on the road until you got there. We had a little conversation with him and found out that he had just returned from a trip to New York City. He was telling us all the places he had been, including Times Square, and "5th street". I had never heard 5th Ave called 5th street, but I thought it sounded really cool.

The road that took us back to the university

After getting back to town, I went to the grocery store to pick up a few things so that I could make curry for dinner. Back when I lived in HCA (Haverford College Apartments), my room mate Asha and I would eat a lot of bell peppers. And bell peppers are delicious but are also one of those outrageously expensive vegetables in New Zealand. It took me about a week to realize that without my bell peppers I didn't really know what vegetables to eat so I just started buying whatever vegetables looked the best and were cheapest. The dilemma then became, what do I do with these vegetables? Answer, either curry or strata. As I had just made strata a week ago, I decided to make curry, an boy did I make a whole lot of curry. It was quite delightful though and I have enough to enjoy it for many days. 

All in all, it was a great day with great weather and great adventures. Hiking made me think of those Outdoor adventures back at Westover. Hopefully I'll be able to go on a backpacking trip with the tramping club soon.