Gotta love him...

Even though I'm in New Zealand, I still follow the news at home. Well, at least I try to. Let me just put it this way: I read the Globe way more than I watch the news here.

This weekend was the first weekend I've stayed on campus in about a month (more to follow), so after a relaxing sleep (I didn't have to wake up to an alarm!!!) I made breakfast and coffee and sat down to try to catch up on the news abroad.

Anyways. I'm aware that tons of stuff is going on, Alaskan volcanoes, Afghan wars, AIG bonuses (woah, I did not plan that semi-alliteration), but this article in the Boston Globe was really the greatest news of the day (if you didn't click on the link [don't worry, I probably wouldn't have either] the article is called "Obama calls major economies climate change meeting." 'Nuff said).

What a guy, eh? Amid everything that's going on, he's not letting the issue of global warming go away. I have to admit, I would have completely understood if he did. He's got a lot on his plate. But no, he's not. HE'S SO COOL! This is just as important (if not as relevant) as what's going on now with the collapsed economy and such. Because if he doesn't do anything about it, then he'll be the one our children put the blame on. It's almost too late already, but now is better than never (for everyone's sake, I won't get into my pessimistic rant about how there's probably nothing we can do now to change the way our climate is heading....).

So yeah, I just wanted to share that with everyone. Just one of many reasons why our president is awesome. Gosh, it's been far too long since I could say that.

And for those of you that read this for adventures and not for thoughts (probably the majority, hehe) here goes...although this week was pretty boring.

I went to Castle Hill last weekend, again. It was a great trip, again. Nothing can really beat Castle Hill. The thing about last weekend though was that it was the Climbing Club trip of the year. So there were about 45 of us out there and we got to stay in the school-owned field station about 20 minutes up the road. The club also got two guys who are into movie making to come along and film us all day. On top of that there was a 70's themed dress code. Oh man. It was so fun. The station was a wooden cabin with a huge common area and bunk rooms. We got in around 730pm and sat around a fire and drank beer courtesy of the UC brewing society. The committee members cooked us delicious vegetarian Indian food, complete with homemade organic yoguhrt from Yan's (a climbing cluber/geology student in a couple of my classes) dad's farm.

The Cass Field Station (pictures courtesy of my awesome roomie, Brandy).

After we had all stuffed ourselves with curry, ice cream and pudding, the games began. Being the climbing club, we only really played climbing games. There was a squeeze box and table manteling. The squeeze box is a wooden box that's about 6 1/2 x 3 x 3 ft with 2x4s crisscrossing and such inside of it. You start on one side and everyone tells you how to get through it (eg go in through the top, go around the side, through the diagonal and back out through the bottom). It's kind of hard to explain without pictures, but hopefully you get the idea. Table manteling consists of starting on top of the table, and going around the underside and back up without touching the floor.

As you could probably imagine, the more people drank, the more interesting it was to watch. I went to bed fairly early, but I heard that people started climbing the rafters and such later in the night.

The next day we went to Flock Hill again.
Ahh Flock Hill is so beautiful.

A majority of the club watching Tim try the 100 tries slab. I didn't try it. This picture is at a weird angle, but his feet are probably at least 8 feet in the air and he still ahs a ways to go. And in case you're wondering, I'm in the back on the right of this picture next to the guy without a shirt.
Again, a picture of the club watching someone try an unnamed arete.

I can't wait for the video to be completed. If it's not too ridiculously expensive I'm going to buy it. I'm probably not in it, but it'll be a good way to remember this trip.

The rest of this week was pretty lousy and consisted of writing a paper on oil and getting played. But whatever. It's a new week now!

Katie, Paul, Jessie, Brandy, Ryan and Mark all went to Castle Hill this weekend but I thought I'd take advantage of the alone time to get some work done. I have a lab that's due the week after break, but I'm going to try and get it done now, and I also have to find a job. Yuck.

And can you believe that March is almost over? Holy mother. I'm almost half way done. Weird.
Lot's of love to everyone!

A(n?) Haiku

There's a tree outside
Its leaves are starting to change
I wish fall would wait

Thanks to Jack Kerouac I'm always thinking in haikus...but mine aren't half as good as his.

Procrastination

I have to write a paper. Not just any paper. A paper on oil. Oil shales in particular. And if you want to get even more specific, oil shale beds in Utah.

I chose to write this paper. I could be writing it on diamonds, or emeralds, or even oil in a different part of the world, but I figured this would be the most pertinent.

Oil shales have been out of the [local] news for a while, now that gas prices have dropped. But that doesn't mean they're not there. And that really doesn't mean that they're not quietly being assayed and pondered, and mused over and making little "cha-ching" sounds to anyone who doesn't care about lopping the tops of hills off and destroying precious and rare ecosystems.

They will make it back into the headlines. But probably before it's too late.

According to this BLM site, the US holds the largest concentration of oil shale (five times the oil reserves in the mid east), more than 70% of this lies on federal land in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming, and in Utah alone there are 12 to 19 billion barrels of oil.

YIKES!

Although the University of Utah is looking into more asthetic ways to mine this oil, they have yet to find an economically viable solution. And if I have learned anything from my most FAVORITE class (Economical and Geophysical Exploration), it's that these old farts don't give a rat's ass about anything but money.

But you probably already knew that.

So writing this paper has become a bit of a headache. It's making me so sad to think about what could potentially happen to our state and the great west. Hopefully our new prez won't see it through. He's really the only one who can stop it now.

I guess the only reassuring thing about this whole mess is that most of it is in/around Vernal. So who cares, right?

Castle Hill v2.0, St. Paddy's in the Summer and Others

Gaaaa!!! Once again I have waited far too long to update. But I'll try. Some highlights from the school week:

Thursday (the 12th) was the climbing and tramping club buy night at R&R Sports. Everyone from both clubs were invited to the store after they closed to buy gear that was anywhere from 20-50% off. They served beer and chips and of course, it was a mad house. I managed to get everything I wanted including a sleeping pad, a backpacking stove, a knife and some water-proofer.

On Friday I had a really sweet Field Studies class. We went up into the hills to do an orienteering exercise. I didn't really learn much (I already know how to use a compass and map thanks to Lewis & Clark), but I would happily go to a class that requires me to run around the woods for an hour.

So other than boring school stuff (blechhh, I am SO frustrated with school!), that was my week.

Some thoughts:
I'm starting to really like climbing. Which is good because that's all my friends seem to want to do. I've been going (on average) about twice a week. I still have those days when I really don't feel like going, though...it's not something I'm obsessed with. Some people are though. I guess there are worse things to be obsessed with, ha. And sometimes I'm even jealous. I wish I could be passionate about something. BUT. So far so good.

Last weekend I went to Castle Hill again. I went with Cliff, Paul, Dylan Katie, Peter and Mark (the last two are kiwi's we met in the climbing club). We drove there on Saturday morning and climbed all day. Unfortunately, I couldn't take any pictures, but here are some of Cliff's.
A sweet pic of some classic Castle Hill limestone. I know I've put a lot of them up, but it's just SO COOL! I was telling my friends that even though I'm having a blast now, I wish that my eight-year-old self could have come here. I could have easily spent an entire day entertaining myself with all of the caverns and climbable rocks.
Trying to get out of the deadly sun.
Cliff attempting Sorcerer's Apprentice, rating v6 or 7 (that's really hard, the ratings go [from easiest to hardest] VE, VM, V0-v15 or something. I can barely do V1s). We spent at least two hours here as a group. It's in a little inlet in a big boulder. Even though I wasn't really climbing, it was fun hanging out with everyone. Mark brought a portable iPod player and we listened to Niel Young and the Eagles all day. I hung out at the top of the boulder and took pictures of everyone. Bouldering is much more social than climbing, and I almost like it better for that. You don't get as much climbing in as you would on ropes, but you just get to chill in the outdoors and climb some rocks and cheer people on, overall very positive and a good way to spend the day.
This is me climbing a VM. When I got sick of watching all the good climbers, I would take a pad and mess around on some easy ones. The hardest part about this particular problem was actually the beginning. You can't really tell in this picture, but my feet are about four-five feet up, and there was literally nothing to hold onto until that point. You just kind of pressed your hands against the wall and hoped they stuck.

After a full day of climbing, we drove up the road about five kms and set up camp. I made pasta for everyone, and we looked at the stars and talked until we were ready for bed.

The next day we went to Flock Hill which is similar to Castle Hill but about eight times better. It's on private property, so you have to get permission to go, and it's about a 40 minute approach straight up a hill. Because of these two things, the place was empty. On top of that, it's a lot bigger than Castle Hill so there's more variety. Lastly, the rock is slightly rougher and deformed differently, so the climbing consists of actual holds rather than depending on friction.
Dylan, Peter and I on top of the first rock. We were the first ones up the hill and got to rest and enjoy the view (see below) while we waited for everyone.
Dylan, Peter and I (from left to right). **Remember, if you click on the picture you can enlarge it. Castle Hill is situated to the right of this picture, on the other side of the valley.
A sweet panorama by Cliff. The two boys and I are still in this picture. We're the little tiny dots way on the left.
A funny picture of me climbing. This was actually a really easy one, I just made a face to look more hard core for the camera. Peter is below me, spotting. That basically means that if I fall, he'll try and direct me toward the crash pad. He's the captain of the climbing club and is in a couple of my classes and is one of the funniest persons I have ever met.
Katie, Peter and Mark enjoying the sunshine. It was in the low 80's both days which was SO AWESOME!! It had been pretty rainy all week and we completely lucked out with the weather.
Packing up to go home. The light is so pretty in this picture!
And the sun sets on Flock Hill. This picture would be the perfect ending to this entry, but alas I have slacked off once again and have more to write!

This week was again, pretty boring. I haven't had my Field Studies class yet, but it will probably be cool. We're learning how to triangulate on campus. Another class spent outside in the beautiful New Zealand weather!

I guess my other classes aren't that bad, bio and structural are actually really interesting. It's just (and I know I talk about this a lot, but it's always on my mind!) my stupid geophysics class! Ugh! I cannot for the life of me tell minerals apart under the microscope. Nor do I have any desire to learn...we all know my views on oil exploration. Luckily that assignment is pretty much done. I just have to hand it in. BUT! I get to do another huge one on mine feasibility. YAY! It's all based on research though, so it shouldn't be as hard or frustrating. I just dread that class. And I usually leave the lab early because it's my second lab in a row and by that point I'm so tired and unmotivated I can't sit there. The good thing about geo labs though, is that you can always finish them on your own time. So that's what I've been doing. It's probably a lot less efficient, but whatever.

Anyway, enough of that. Just had to get it off my chest. St. Paddy's day, as you all know, was this week. It's probably the one day I wished I could be in Boston. Although it was pretty fun here too. We got all dressed up in our finest green and a group of about 15 of us took the bus down town. The bus was full of kids having a good time and ready to celebrate St. Patrick's to the fullest. When we got to town, we hopped around all the Irish pubs...pretty fun, but not amazing. The only thing of note is that it was so warm here! It was weird celebrating in shorts and a tee shirt. I'm so used to bundling up!

Well, I'm off to power yoga and am sick of writing. I'm going to make a vow to write more often. At least twice a week. Then it shouldn't be so much of a process for me, and I'll actually feel like writing more than lists of what I've been doing. XOXOXOXO

A5: In Which I Tramp With 150 Others

This past weekend was the first trip of the year with the CUTC--Canterbury University Tramping Club--called "Freshers". On Wednesday, some friends and I signed up for the trip along with roughly 150 other people. For $25, we were going to get transported to the trail and receive two meals. We knew that with so many people it would be pretty hectic, but we decided to go for it because we wanted to go tramping, and this tramp was already planned out for us.

On Saturday morning, I walked to the University car park rubbing sleep out of my eyes. I didn't go to bed late the night before, but I'm pretty sure it's the earliest I've woken up in a month (7:00 am). I set my pack down and watched the rest of the group trickle in with the same looks of fatigue on their faces.

Around 8:45 our main mode of transportation--Party Buses--rolled in. Now, when I write Party Bus, I intend to capitalize it. Party Bus is a company that usually transports students from Uni to downtown Christchurch on the weekends. The buses are fully equipped with bad dance music, strobe lights, and [on Friday and Saturday nights] alcohol. I have yet to take the Party Bus down town, but I'm sure I will at some point. Anyway, anyone can rent a Party Bus for any occasion. CUTC rented two to take us 2 hours west to the Southern Alps. Specifically Arthur's Pass. You could tell the drivers were probably a bit jaded because the early hour didn't stop them from blasting techno and smoking cigarettes the whole time. I'm surprised he didn't turn on the strobe light.

When we got to the trail head, we were told that there were three options to tramp. The first was the Extreme (!) option. It involved a seven hour bush-whack that went entirely out of the way. The second was the Stream option. This option had participants taking the most direct route up Andrew's Stream. Although it was direct, the cons included a lot of scrambling up and down large rocks and guaranteed wet feet. The last option was just the normal track. A three-hour hike on a trail that went up and down and was said to be the easiest.

Our group decided to take the track because (a) we didn't need a club to tell us that we were extreme, and (b) there was no way in hell we were going to get our feet wet when it was only 50 degrees and cloudy.

About 15 minutes up the trail we had only gone about 50 yards. This is because there were so many people it was like driving in rush hour: stop and go. So we took off our packs and stopped for another 15 minutes. Even though we were dead last, we knew it would be more fun to keep a steady pace than to stop and start all day long.

I know I've said this countless of times, but the scenery was absolutely breathtaking. We were on a narrow path in woods so thick you [literally] couldn't step off the path. The ground was spongy from day old rain and layers of dead leaves, muffling most sounds. The trees were covered in some sort of black lichen causing them to look burned, but since they weren't, they were in full foliage and the contrast was striking. Speaking of contrast, the trees were also covered with fine mint green moss--akin to cotton candy. Occasionally we would come across bright purple fungi--they were shaped like mushrooms but without stems (on a side note, we began the fungus section in biology today and our professor told us that the fungi in New Zealand are infamous to mycologists. They come from all over the world to look at the amazing specimens. A blue fungus is even featured on the 50 dollar bill...next to the queen hahaha). And due some other type of decomposer I have yet to learn about, a lot of the dead wood on the ground had turned a deep blue. The red rock in Utah is amazing, yes, but it finally has a competitor.

As we were hiking, we passed and picked up other members. Since most of us had just met, we talked about anything and everything to pass the time. From "most embarassing moment" to "how did you get your name", nothing was left untouched. Thus, by the time we got to the campsite, I felt like I knew these 10 or so kids for more than a couple hours.

After about 2 1/2 hours of hiking, we descended into the valley to walk along the stream. Tall (waist-chest high) grasses replaced the trees and the silence was cut with the rush of water. We stopped when we met up with about 50 other students sitting on the trail. They filled us in on the whole "the captains are looking for a good spot to settle down" plan. So we dropped our bags and sat down for a well deserved break. I even took the time to get some light shut-eye while the sun was still shining. Luckily, the chosen spot wasn't too far, so we walked over when the time was right and set up our tents. Between 8 of us, there were three tents. Two others brought their own and [thankfully] my friend Cliff let me borrow his. The ground here was also covered in grass so my choice of not borrowing pad didn't end in a sleepless disaster.

Our group gathered up some more people and walked back down to the river bed to occupy ourselves before dinner. We ended up playing a variety of camp games as three of us were previously camp counselors. I was quite proud of our ability to entertain ourselves.

Dinner was provided by the club and consisted of couscous ("the rice so nice they named it twice!") and a mixture of fresh and canned vegetables. Although bland, it was filling and we were all grateful to have a nice hot meal prepared for us. I was really impressed with the club's guess on measurements. Cooking for 150 people can't be easy, let alone having to carry it all in and prepare it over a fire.

After dinner we played some more games (namely, charades), met some new people and happily crawled into our sleeping bags.

The following day was quite similar to the first. We were given the stream option or the track option. Again, we didn't feel like getting our feet wet so we chose the track.

Coincidentally, though, my shoes got soaked about 10 minutes before we reached the campsite the day before. There were trenches all over the grassland and I didn't see one and stepped right into it. My shoes never dried so I decided to hike down in my Chacos (extreme sandals). Even though I hike in them all summer and feel very confident in them and myself, other people didn't and constantly asked me if I was going to be ok. Not my friends, but people I didn't know. I would have appreciated the concern, if it was genuine. The thing about any extreme outdoor sport (climbing, tramping, skiing, etc) is that a lot of people think that they're better than everyone, and that the gear you use represents how extreme you really are. For example, many people will choose to buy a $500 ski coat over a $150 one because it's a well known brand. Just one of the many reasons why I choose to ski with my parents--they don't judge me based on what I wear. I found this was really apparent on this hike, and you got it from both ends. Take "Bob" (not his real name, of course) for instance, who kept telling me about his $500 Gortex hiking boots and how he was going to hike down the river instead of the track so that he can actually get some use out of his $500 Gortex hiking boots. We all knew it's because he didn't want to go up and down hills, he probably would have gone on the river anyway...but he had to let us know he was hard core because he had $500 Gortex hiking boots after all. In conclusion, this whole "gear=extremeness" attitude is annoying and I'm sad to see that it extends past the States. Just because I don't own top end stuff doesn't make me ignorant or bad at a sport, and conversely, dropping a lot of money on great gear isn't going to make you any better. So, sorry to rant and ramble, I just had to get it off of my chest. Where was I.....?

Oh yeah. The hike down. It was about the same as the hike up. I decided to give everyone some space though so that I could have a quiet walk by myself. It was a lot warmer and sunnier the second day, and I really enjoyed the peacefulness of the area. Woods still amaze me as I've never really spent much time in them. I love open spaces, but I'm becoming much more keen on thick forests.

I reached the bottom around noon and a shuttle transported those of us who were down to a much larger river to practice river crossings. Many of the tracks in New Zealand require multiple river crossings--and by that I mean rivers that are about 30 yards across and can be as deep as your chest. The correct way to cross these raging waters is with a large group standing in a line parallel to the shores. You hold onto the backpacks on either side of you with the heaviest/largest person upstream to break the current and attempt to walk across. I decided to just watch as I didn't feel like submerging myself in glacial melt for the hell of it. It was pretty intense and props to those who did it. Most of the groups ended up losing their footing and floating part of the way...backpacks and all. I can't say I felt like I missed out.

After a barbaque of sausages (falafel for the veggies) and white bread (what a surprise! every BBQ I've been to has consisted of sausages and white bread) we loaded back into the party buses. This time we were all ready to dance, and dance we did. Pretty much the entire ride consisted of most of us in the aisle of the bus grooving to dance music while epic scenery flew by.

We got home around 6pm, and unsurprisingly went our separate ways, showered and went to bed. It was quite a weekend. Although it was only an overnight, I hadn't been tramping in so long I was beat. But in a good way. It felt so good to get out and move.

The rest of this week has been pretty dull. I did go dancing on Monday though which was really fun. We learned how to Modern Jive and Salsa. Other than that I've been focusing on school. It's finally starting to pick up which is such a bummer. I generally enjoy school, but here I feel like it's such a nuisance. It's been such a vacation so far and thinking about school makes me dread getting up in the morning. Haha, oh well.

And now I'm off to class. All day. Yay!

Adventures three and four: Castle Hill and the Rangitata Rafts

I have decided not to recap everything I do now because (a) it's boring and (b) I can't remember everything that's happened over the last week and a half and (c) school's started so who really cares about what's going on in all of my classes all of the time? But I will do my best to stay as informative and detailed as possible.

As the title suggests, two really cool things happened this week. The first occurred on Sunday when we decided to risk missing out on the sunny weather in Christchurch and head to Castle Hill to go climbing. I say risk because there is no way to get a weather report for Castle Hill. There is a web cam one can look at, but there's no telling how the weather will change by the time you get there. Anyway, on Sunday the weather seemed nice so Jess, Cliff, Katie, Paul and I threw three crashpads, five backpacks and five climbers into Jess's Subaru and drove an hour to Castle Hill. When we were almost there, a cloud of doom seemed to be lingering directly over the valley. However, we decided not to let that phase us and drove in. It was raining a bit when we got there, so we ate some food to see if we could wait it out. We could.

The thing about Castle Hill is that the climbing is technically called "bouldering". When you boulder, you don't use any gear, just crashpads (exactly what they sound like). You just do one or two moves to the top of a 10-20 foot boulder and then climb down. In regular climbing, you use a lot of gear and it's not good if it gets wet. And thanks to New Zealand's neuratic weather, the rock in Castle Hill dried quickly once it stopped raining, so we were able to get some great climbing in.

Castle Hill is not only a world-class bouldering site, but the filming site of [part of] Lord of the Rings, and most importantly (to me at least) the "spiritual center of the Universe", according the Dalai Lama. Pictures are the best way to describe what he means:
The view walking toward Quantum Field. To give you an idea about how big the biggest rocks are, click on the picture to enlarge it...the smallest rocks are maybe ten feet high, maybe taller. Of course we didn't climb the huge ones shown here. These structures were just so powerful as you were walking toward them...it was really really neat.
This is Spittle Hill, to the left of Quantum Field. These are more the size of climbable rocks.
Getting closer! The square things on the backs of people are the crashpads. A man came up to me and asked me what exactly it was. I suppose if you have never seen one before, it must look pretty funny.
Paul and Katie on top of the first "problem" of the day. Bouldering routes are called problems because they're very puzzle-like. Even though they're short, the moves are very hard and it can take multiple tries to get to the top.

Castle Hill was the most serene and peaceful place I've been to. Even though we were climbing and working hard it was still very meditative.

So this week classes started. I'm enroled in Structural Geology, Geophysics, Biology II and Field Studies. It's only been a week, but so far so good. I guess. Geophysics is actually really boring. It's all about resource (eg oil) mining. Necessary, yes, but not something I'm terribly interested in. And it doesn't help that the professor just reads off of his slides the whole time. But (!) as I said before, it's only been a week so it might pick up. All of my other classes are way cool. For my field studies class, we have a week long field trip during our three week mid semester break. Awesome-ness!

This week I also signed up for clubs. I'm in the climbing club, the tramping (kiwi for hiking) club and the geo society (to, y'know, get in with the department). All three do what their name implies plus heaps of partying. Of course. This is New Zealand after all. Right now the plan is to go on the first tramping trip of the semester next weekend.

So classes blah blah blah...no one cares, I know.

Saturday, (yesterday) was the second adventure of the week. I went white water rafting down the Rangitata River, which is south of Christchurch. For a bit of money, we got transportation from and back to campus, lunch and dinner, and of course an amazing run down the river. We did two class fives (rapids are ranked from one to six. One being ripples, six being unrunnable)!! Again, pictures are worth way more than my words.

These were all taken by Vince, who works for Rangitata Rafts.
This is the base lodge, where we ate lunch, learned about the river, picked up our gear, took (hot!) showers and ate dinner. It definitely didn't look like this when we went...it was raining. But you get the idea (beautiful).
This is our boat. From left: me, the two Swedish girls Hannah and Sophia, my friend Elise, our guide Steve, and my friends Robert and Simon. This is before we got in the river.
Heading down the river. It's too bad it was cloudy because you can't really see in these photos that the color of the water was aquamarine. It is a glacier-fed river, so it's almost completely pure.
The boat celebrating our first class five.
Another rapid.
Everyone scouting the rapid.

Ok, ok! Best. Sequence. Ever!!! We were the last boat to go through the last class five. As we were nearly halfway down it, we saw that the boat ahead of us had flipped. In order to avoid a terrible collision, Steve pulled us off into an eddy. Right before it was safe for us to go again, he warned us that we would be re-entering the rapid at a bad angle and that there was a good chance we would flip too. Ok, now look:
We did what they call a "dump truck": everyone fell out but the guide. Now all of the other guides owe Steve beer.
So that was pretty neat. And if you're ever in New Zealand, I highly reccomend doing this trip. It was really cool.

And that's about it. Today we went to the beach and just relaxed. Tomorrow school starts again. Which is weird. I thought I was on vacation! Haha. Hopefully my weeks will still be as great as the last one. Even with school.

Well, I know that most people who are reading this (if anyone actually does, haha) do it for the information on my happenings and whereabouts and such. I hope that it is enjoyable. However, Northeastern not only requires us to keep a journal, but will not accept "a laundry list of day-to-day activities." Oops. I have a feeling that I haven't been reflecting much. So (spoiler alert!) at the end of each blog entry, I'll include some reflections. I won't be offended if you don't read past here. I won't be offended if you do. Because let's be quite honest here, I'm not going to write anything deep and dark and hand it in to Northeastern University. They would just use that information against me. They'd probably charge me for it! Ok...enough ranting.

Reflections, reflections. I guess the biggest thing for me is how much I don't realize I'm "studying abroad." Don't get me wrong, New Zealand is absolutely amazing, but it's not that culturally different. I just feel like I transferred schools again. But to somewhere very pretty. "But what about your Kiwi flatties?," you might ask. Ha. They're 18-year-old boys with accents. They play video games and watch movies all day. I guess going to school in Christchurch is sort of like combining the laid backness of California, the scenery of Hawaii, and the accents of people born and raised in Dorchester (you know they're speaking English, but how do they make it sound so different?). Everything American is included, from McDonalds and Pizza Hut, to Grey's Anatomy and America's Next Top Model, even Barack Obama stickers can be seen on cars and around town. And I guess it doesn't help that Ilam Village is crawling with Americans. But I am friends with other nationalities too. Canadians, Saudis, Swiss, French, Swedish, Malaysian, Indian, even people from Lousiana!

I was reading through the journal requirements and one of the questions it asked was "how does it feel to be a minority?" I honestly don't. And I guess that's the only thing I have to be bummed about here. The only time my nationality is brought up is when people want to talk politics. And by talk politics I mean they're really happy we finally pulled our heads out of our butts and voted for someone competant. It's embarrassing and humbling. I never realized how much people do look up to America. How much they rely on us. How much they care. They teach us in school that we're a great country, but I didn't know they taught it in schools across the world. I got into a conversation with a friend from Canada, and he made me feel like the world was on my shoulders. The way he felt about America. He really made me personally feel guilty that we lead the world into such a mess, but he also made me feel overwhelmed with the responsibilty we have. It's strange. So I guess the biggest difference I feel is that I need to pay attention to world events, I can't take our country for granted anymore, and I need to be proud. Because a lot of people are counting on us. And we can't have a society that's not proud of that. Maybe our actions have left nothing to be desired over the past decade or so, but we still need to lead with our heads held high, otherwise "excrement is going to hit the air conditioning" (KV jr).