www (Windy Wicked Wellington)

At the moment, I am sitting at my desk in He Wharekura-tini Kaihautu o Aotearoa - The Open Polytechnic of New Zealand. Yes, I have found a temporary job working in data entry for their enrolments department. 'Enrolments Officer' is my official title. Pretty cruisy (but very tedious) stuff, they even have a table-tennis table, pool table and dartboard for us to amuse ourselves with.. Nic has also found a job working as a PA for the CEO of the Hutt City Council. What's more, Nic and I have now moved into a flat for a couple of months while we're working, just to save a little more money (and maybe lead a little more of a homely existence rather than sharing a room with 6 others and a kitchen with 30 others - in the last hostel here, Rowena's Lodge, this was quite a problem as there was only a total of about 6 forks and 1 decent-sized saucepan that didn't leak!) The flat we found, funnily enough, is on Adelaide Road. Our other flatmates (a Swede, a Canadian, a Sri Lankan, a Fijian, and another Australian - very multicultural!) seem pretty cool so should be a chilled time here in Welly.
It was great meeting up with Nic again when I arrived on the 30th. And what a great city Wellington is! Not sure what I find so alluring about it, maybe it's simply the fact that it is the closest thing that I've found to a city, as I know them, since arriving in NZ. Who knows. All I know is that Wellington is one of the windiest populated areas in New Zealand - it is almost impossible to get though an entire day without a breeze, if not strong-to-gale-force winds. The weather the past two weeks has been fantastic though, with minimal wind and maximum sun (although we had a bit of a downpour this morning, it's clearing up quite nicely)! Shame I'm stuck inside on a computer most of the day. The good thing about this time of year around NZ (especially in the South Island) is that it doesn't get truly dark until around 2200hr or later and it gets light well before 0530hr, so plenty of sunlight. Earthquakes are also a nice little addition to the character of this region, through which the Wellington faultline passes from Wellington city to Upper Hutt - in fact the New Zealand Parliament Building sits directly atop the faultline which, as one author points out, many people find no fault with. I have yet to experience an earthquake, but apparently this time of year is when they are most likely to occur so we'll just wait and see.
About a week after I arrived, Andrea passed though Wellington on her way up to Auckland for her flight back home, after having been away for about 11 months. We met up and had a necessary 'last pint', and again it was fantastic catching up with her.
Since I've been here, I haven't done much touristy stuff apart from heading to the lookout at the top of Mt Victoria, only about 300m in height. We have taken in a few films at the cinema too, including Borat - hilarious! I hope to do and see a lot more in the coming months. Our plan at the moment is to spend around 3 months or so here before taking off around the North Island. Again, plans seem to be changing all the time so that's not necessarily indicative of what will actually happen. An update will be in the works shortly after the Festive Season has ended.

Photos still coming.

Photos:
1. Tug-of-War at the Polytech's Xmas party. We lost :(
2. 0640hr, waiting to board the Bluebridge ferry to Wellington
3. Posing in the rain..
4. Why do I do these things?!?
5. A passenger taking in the fresh air and views
6. For Ryan
7. Floating balls.. well I never.. Wellington
8. Beach against the city.. Or is it a city against the beach?
9. The view over Welly from Mt Vic
10. Cute little guy loves sunbathing in the Polytech carpark