The garden, to my mind, was positively Edenic.
Wildflowers and carefully fostered breeds alike tumbled over one another, tendrils brimming over the edges of their plots and reaching down from pots hanging above.
The technicolor blooms, set against vivid green blades, saturated the air with their heady perfumes and sent me back into the park awake and rejuvenated.
The Auckland Museum sat on the hill just above the Garden, and it did not disappoint.
Fascinating, well-curated exhibits on Maori and other Pacific Islander cultures featured weaving works, tools, canoes, and even a full-sized long-boat and Marae (a Maori meeting place and house of worship).
I took in a Maori cultural performance within the museum's theater and delighted in the singing and dancing of the native performers.
I did not,however, take much pleasure in the inconceivably rude behavior of my fellow audience members, who felt perfectly at home chatting away throughout the whole show. At one point, I had no choice but to shush the pair beside me, who immediately shut up, looking rather abashed and somewhat scared. I meant business.
My actions endeared me to the girl on my other side, Christine, who I chatted with after the show only to discover that she would also be attending the Auckland CouchSurfing cocktail event that evening. We agreed to meet there, and she went off for a tour, while I wandered off to further explore the museum. I left an hour later and decided to make my way back through the center of the Domain and, doing so, stumbled upon even more stunning displays of floriculture, with the city's skyline as the backdrop.
As I continued on, I reached what I thought to be a solid stretch of forest, until I saw another pedestrian emerge from a trail I hadn't even noticed. Figuring I had nothing to lose, I proceeded down the path myself. Five minutes in, faced with a seriously brush covered path, my city-girl instincts kicked in and I wondered what I was doing, wandering alone down an unfamiliar, dark path, having no idea where it led.
Then I remembered I wasn't exactly in a major crime capital. Pressing on, I emerged onto the city streets unscathed shortly thereafter, walked down to the water's edge, and back through the CBD to my hostel for some lunch.
That evening, I went around the block to the weekly Auckland CS Spanish-speakers' meeting. About fifteen people attended, and the party began in the apartment of the organizer, but the number of people and the lack of air conditioning in they stuffy, top-floor flat forced us to move downstairs to the landlord's bar, which he allowed us to use despite its being closed that night.
I spent the next hour or so chatting in Spanish and, after the wine had set in, English, with a lively group including Jordan, a lovely girl and good friend of my friend James (henceforward referenced as Kiwi James) who had surfed my couch in back in NYC, and Cesar, from Buenos AIres. I also got chatting with the owner of the bar, who informed me that he rented the back rooms to prostitutes to ply their recently-legalized trade. When I balked, he even showed me the rooms, decked out as they were with red satin sheets and salacious artwork!
As the night wore on, I became anxious to move on to the CS weekly drinks session, where I had intended to meet a few people. Cesar, two of his friends, and I drove over and found that a good forty or so attendees still remained. Christine from the museum had already left, along with Thomas, another friend of Kiwi James who I was scheduled to CouchSurf with the following day, Fortunately, the person I had most come to see still lingered.
Noelle, from Barcelona, had posted on the CS boards looking for a travel buddy to explore the North Island with for the next ten days or so, and we had arranged to meet to see if we made a good fit. We hit it off and decided to give it a trial run, taking a trip up to the Bay of Islands that weekend.
In the meantime, I had two days to kill. On the first, I went twice into the bohemian neighborhood of Ponsonby, once for lunch and once for a yoga class. Besides finding myself somewhat out of shape, I also discovered the fascinating penchant of sculptor John Radford for putting parts of buildings in parks, so that they look like they have just emerged from beneath the ground.
When I returned to my hostel, my roomie offered me a bag of toiletries and clothes that she intended to leave behind. She had worked in New Zealand for six months and had accumulated more than she could tote back with her to France. Knowing that I would soon have a car trunk to store and port as much stuff as I needed, I gladly accepted about half of what she had discarded, including a bounty of sunblock-- of which I can always use more-- and a adorable pair of boots and jeans that would prove particularly handy considering that New Zealand was having its chilliest summer in years and I was sorely under-packed for such weather. Over the next 5 weeks, I wore those two articles of clothing more than any I had brought myself. Thank you, kind French girl.
That night, Thomas for CS picked me up and took me to a dinner party hosted by a friend of his. We had a delicious Spanish omelette while discussing our travels and then moved on to another CS party out in the suburbs. Then it was back to his house where I had my first night of couch surfing, sleeping on two mattresses on his living room floor. Thomas made for a great first host: sweet, accommodating, informative, laid-back, and Kiwi to the core. Mostly Maori, in fact. Oh, and very spontaneous. As I fell asleep, he headed out to the gym at 2am!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
Location:Auckland, New Zealand
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