Rhinovirus

It has been a relatively uneventful week, as the cold I mentioned in my last post became a really big pain-in-the-butt. Darn rhinovirus...

Picture courtesy of Google. I don't think there are rhinos in New Zealand, but there is rhinovirus, so I couldn't resist this picture. :)

I did manage to make strata for the second time though, and it tasted good despite the sickness, and on Saturday I was able to do some neat things. As you may be able to guess by now, I made my usual trip to the farmers market. This week I went with Grace and Julia, and we went mostly for breakfast. I had a savoury crepe this time, and while it was absolutely delicious, I still think crepes should be sweet. My crepe this week had lamb and veggies, cheese, and egg.

After the farmers market, Grace and I went to the Otago Museum to see the All Blacks exhibit called Hard on the Heels. We stayed for some time and learned a bunch of Rugby history.

Picture mosaic of All Black pictures in infamous fern shape

We then headed to Olveston, a house built between 1904 and 1907 for a wealthy merchant named David Theomin. Although the tour seemed a little odd in the beginning, because there was only me and Grace, it turned out really well and we learned a bunch of interesting facts about the house. The house did not look really big from the outside, but the inside was HUGE. An English architect had built it and everything inside was meticulously designed and was absolutely beautiful. Every room fit in perfectly and had just the right number of pieces of furniture. I found it amazing that they had pieces from all over the world. There were things from Japan, Iran, the United States, Europe, and many more. It is said that Mr. Theomin traveled a lot and brought much of the things back from his trips. Many things were also shipped, such as their two ton pool table. What amazed me most was how everything was brought over by ship, and how expensive it must have been. We also learned about Mr. Theomin's daughter, Dorothy. She enjoyed hiking and photography. She was an analytical chemist and she also wore pants! This was a big deal back in the early 1900's.  She sounded like a pretty cool lady. The other really cool thing was that I played a 1908 Steinway and Sons grand piano. It is 103 years old but they have kept it tuned and in pristine condition and it sounded great. There are also over 250 paintings in the house. One of the paintings was a replica, but cost 250 English pounds. A school teacher around that time earned 50 pounds per year, to give you an estimate of how much this painting cost. Olveston was really neat, but they did not allow photographs of the inside, so here are some I took of the outside.

On another note, I finally have plans for spring break! I have only recently started calling it spring break (i've been calling it mid-semester break) because it was hard to imagine spring in late August, early September. The plans are for Julia, Ellie, and I to go to Ellie's house up in the north island. Ellie is Julia's kiwihost. The three of us are going to take a bus to Christchurch, and then fly to Wellington. We are staying in Wellington for a day and then flying up to Auckland. Ellie lives on a cow farm just south of Auckland and we will be spending a few days there. Spring break is less than 3 weeks away!