christchurch

so we got to christchurch around 8, and i had called riley on wednesday, and got a girl's voicemail, but then he texted me that talking is too expensive, and he had told us to text him when we got there, so we followed his directions, and got there, and he came outside and we told him about ejs ticket and various other things and he was like ok let's just go inside, so we just parked on the street, and took all our stuff into his flat, which is sort of like anderson but way nicer, they have 2 showers and 2 toilets and a huge common room with a full kitchen. i guess most of the dorms in that area are traditional dorms and he just got really lucky. he lives with all kiwis, 4 boys and 1 girl. there was a big 80's party that night, so everyone was running around wearing ridiculous fluorescent colored outfits.

we all showered, since we had kayaked and hiked a glacier since our last showers. then riley's friend shane asked if we could drive him home from the liquor store, so we went to the atm and got him, and came back to riley's flat, and riley was just explaining that they would have to drink in his room because they are not allowed to drink in the common room and not allowed to have glass bottles (but cans, and drinking alone in your room is fine) when his ra came in and made them pour their un-drunk beers down the sink. so then we went to shanes, in ilam (pronounced eye-lam, not ee-lam) village, where most of the ies kids live. i had a black tanktop and nothing to wear over it so riley went to some girl's room he knows and borrowed a cute purple sweater for me.

the ilam apartments are nice too, about the same setup as riley's at university hall. we sat around there for a bit, and their friend jessie came over, and then we went to get the free bus to go downtown (the university of canterbury is in the suburbs, it's very much like UR). a bunch of the other ies kids from rochester were going to meet us there, but went to a different bus stop, and then we saw the bus with them on it go flying by and for some reason it didn't stop at our stop. so after some more waiting this bus pulled up with all these flashing colored lights and loud dance music. it was hilarious, and after some deliberation we got on with all the drunk kiwi kids. that bus took us to some bar, that was not downtown where we wanted to go, so we got off and walked (and by walked i mean at riley speed, so basically jogging for everyone else) to the regular bus stop near there, and on the way found a shopping cart which riley pushed me in.

while waiting for the bus another one just went by with a 'not in service' sign, only there were people on there, including some of the other ies kids, who pointed and laughed which was really funny. finally a bus came and we paid our $2.50, and eventually got to the downtown bar area, which is really cute, it's all cobblestones and no cars, and there is this giant fireplace and big couches and stuff. 

first we went to this jazz club one of riley's flatmates was raving about, i think it's called fat eddie's, and since it was thursday, it wasn't very full at all (i guess it's super popular other nights). we went to the bathroom and then ej and i wanted to get what she had gotten at the pub during ies orientation, pineapple malibu, which tastes really yummy, not at all like alcohol. so she asked the bartender and he made it for her for $8, and i got one also. the boys and jessie and sophie got beer, gross. so we went upstairs and sat on these big comfy couches and just hung out for awhile, and some other ies kids showed up, and eventually we left to go to another place, i think called mickey finn's, where there was live music. they had free water there, which i had about 4 glasses of, and we played pool, first it was ej and me against riley and jessie, and i got a total of 1 ball in all game. although we were losing pitifully, they accidentally hit the 8 ball in at the end, so we won! then others played another game, and more rochester kids who i vaguely know arrived and we hung out for awhile, and then we were really exhausted so we went looking for a cab, there were 8 of us i think, and micah, one of the kids from rochester was looking for this big 12 person cab but we never found it so eventually we split up, and sophie, ej, riley and i went back to his flat, where the three of us slept on his floor in our new sleeping bags.

we set our alarms for 7 on friday, so we could return the rental car as soon as possible, because the lady in queenstown said the earlier we returned it the cheaper it would be (because the price she gave us was more than $100 more than the man in auckland had quoted), so riley and i went and let the girls sleep, and it turned out to be like $370, still way more than the man had said, but there's not much we can do about it now. then we took the bus back and slept till noon. riley was playing golf at 1, so he got ready and left, and we gradually got ready and took the bus to the cathederal square, the main touristey area. we walked around and shopped all afternoon, i bought 2 tank tops and a sweater, and presents for serita and jennifer, and decided i needed to stop spending money. riley met us for dinner at the main bus terminal, which is fun, it's kinda like an airport, and after wandering around forever and not finding any cheap food, we took the bus partway back to UC, and got off and found this cute little indian restaurant called taste of bengal, where the man cooked each of our things individually. the food was amazing (and i don't think it was just because we were starving).

after that we went back to riley's and then went over to shane's again, only it had been raining all day so the walk was a bit less enjoyable. we played oh hell for awhile in shane's room, and then went out to the dining area and played this game called snowball with 2 of the other kids who live there. it's kind of a combination of telephone pictionary, and it's really funny. we went back around midnight, because we had to get up fairly early for our tour the next morning. we weren't too thrilled about it, because we didn't want to spend another $100 and we could've just hung out with the ies kids, but we couldn't get a refund for cancelling within 2 days. 

the tour was called the christchurch big 5, and included the international antarctic center, willowbanks nature reserve (both of which i visited with p2p), a wildlife cruise, a ride on the christchurch gondola, and a tram ride. unfortunately the city busy we were taking to the meeting point was late, but we called and they said to get on another bus leaving at 10, so we did, and while waiting the tram people looked at our vouchers and gave us tram tickets. then we found our bus, which took us to the antarctic center (and i'm pretty sure we were the only ones under the age of 60 on the bus). at the center (i mean centre), the lady at the desk included a hagglund ride in our ticket, even tho i don't think we were supposed to. we walked around fairly quickly, and watched the little blue penguins being fed. then we went on the ride, which is the amphibious vehicle they use in antarctica. it was fun, we went up really steep hills, around curves, over a big crevice, and through a lake. 

after that we got on another bus to willowbanks, which was not that exciting, we walked around and saw a lot of birds and some other animals, and went in a dark building to see kiwis, but it was so dark we couldn't really see them. then we were planning on eating lunch there, but when we came back to the entrance a bus driver was like 'hurry we have to meet another bus at 1', even tho they had told us to meet at 1 there, not 12:40. so we got on the bus, and met another bus at the square, which took us past the gondola, to lyttelton, the port of christchurch which is over a mountain, which you have to take a tunnel to go through. the town is really cute, but it was raining (all day) and we were starving by that point. luckily the boat had a snack bar and we each got chips for $2, and they gave us free hot chocolate. we saw some dolphins (the main focus) and some birds and a sunken ship, and then sophie was feeling seasick so we sat with her inside (it was raining anyway so i was happy to be inside) and all 3 of us fell asleep ha ha. 

after that, the bus driver told us that we wouldn't see anything from the gondola (we could not see the top of it through the fog) and that we could probably get a refund, or if we wanted to he would drop us there. we said it was ok, and stayed on the bus back to the square, where we texted riley and got on the tram, where we each got another ticket. riley was playing basketball but said he'd meet us as soon as he could, so we rode the tram all the way around twice. we got off at this building with all these art shops (which used to be part of the university of canterbury until it moved out to the suburb of ilam) but they were closing on 10 minutes and things were expensive so we just wandered and got free fudge samples at the chocolate shop.

we also saw a chinese lantern festival in a park that we went by which looked identical to the on in auckland we went to the previous weekend. we then went to wait for riley at the bus terminal and he got there right after we did. we told him about the lantern festival, and how there was really good really cheap food at ours, and then i gave him my second trolly ticket, and we did another loop. riley really wanted to see if the prime minister was at their lantern festival like she was at ours, but we did not see her. we did find all the food though, and i got some noodles and a pancake thing, and we stood under a tree and ate. then we took the tram the rest of the way around, and stopped at kfc for $1 milkshakes on the way back to the bus. 

when we got back to riley's we were tired and wet and decided to just watch a movie. for awhile we were just hanging out in riley's room and his flat-mates addi, casey, and ben were in and out, and they are hilarous. casey, who is in the room next door told us some story of like, how to leave a bar by bashing the mug over your head so the handle breaks off, and then holding the handle up to your head like a phone? and then he showed us this explosive white powder he makes from like isopropyl alcohol and hydrogen peroxide, and i am now slightly concerned for riley's safety living next door to that. casey also had a light up candy cane in his room, which he said he can plug in his subwoofer so it lights up with the music, and a collection of hats, including a real police hat which he stole while being interrogated about "drunk walking". 

when we asked why there are so many kfcs here, casey told us "because that's all the maoris eat...that's why the maori women have beards, because the chickens are so pumped full of hormones" and we died laughing. they call the maori people "black" here, and they sort of fill the role of black people in the us.

eventually we watched juno out in the common room, which was really good, although i fell asleep through part of it. then we got all packed, and went to bed. in the morning our cab, super shuttle, came right on time, and we had plenty of extra time at the airport. we had a minor freak-out when we tried to check in at the domestic terminal and our flight was not listed, but the lady at the desk told us it was at the international terminal, because it was coming from japan and just stopping in christchurch on the way to auckland. that was a little annoying because you can take liquids on domestic flights but not international, so we all had to put all our toiletries in ej's checked suitcase, but other than that everything went fine. the flight was really nice because it was international, so we all had personal tvs, and i had all 3 seats to myself again. we took the airbus back to school and arrived around 11 am. the end.