Hello!
It's been a while since my last post. I've been caught up with life and such, and I've also been too lazy to sit down and pump one of these out. Also the video took forever to make.
Per usual, everything is sunshine and rainbows here, and that is not meant in a sarcastic way. I've been here 8 weeks already, but it's felt more like 3 or 4 weeks, tops. Roadtrips, rugby, motorcycle, sight- seeing, working, exercise... it's all pretty perfect.
Things that Happened Since Last Time:
- Played rugby.
- Met another American. Sup, Vance!
- Crushed my motorcycle license test. (Bet you read "crashed my motorcycle")
- Got my motorbi- excuse me, motorcycle license.
- Moved a lot of hay bales.
- Discovered The John Butler Trio
- Got a real bed. Goodbye cot.
- Cooked food.
- Apparently Cam Newton is a good Quarterback?
- Started watching the show, Hannibal. Gives Dexter a run for its money.
- Soldiers captured in Iran? That's no good at all. Gonna have to go hop on the newsfeeds now.
- Continued swiping right on Tinder.
- Made a spreadsheet. Felt good.
- Defiantly drove on the right side of the road. Because 'Merica.
- Bought groceries.
- Finished watching Deadwood. Go away, Skyler/Mrs. Bullock!
- Really missing Chipotle. If you come visit me, bring a Chipotle burrito - I'm serious, don't come without one.
- Got a tour around Nelson-Tasman.
- Gained some weight back finally!
- Did two backflips.
- Went white water rafting.
- Joined a touch rugby league. It's co-ed.
- Drank some beer.
- Watched my mates play rugby on TV.
- Started saying "mate" instead of buddies.
- Trimmed tomato vines for 8 hours.
- Plucked leaves off grapevines for 12 hours.
- Learned that "face only" pics on Tinder are not a good sign.
- Got rejected for 12 different job openings.
- Found that a college degree doesn't mean too terribly much.
- Played 30 seconds in a 7s tournament.
- Sprained my ankle after 30 seconds of playing in a 7s tournament.
- More barbecues.
- More beach visits.
- Checked my bank account balance...
- Worked on the assembly line at a cider brewery.
Video Recap
(volume is important for the rafting section)
The Third Hog
Riding a motorcycle is totally awesome.I now have a New Zealand driver's license, with my picture on it and everything. It's pretty legit.
I certainly don't look like your typical biker, often wearing brightly colored tank tops and rugby shorts, but that's my style yo!
The max speed limit in my area is 100kph (I believe that's the max legal limit countrywide) but most of the areas are 80 and 60kph.
Richard, the guy who sold me the bike, said it's not a great idea to go over 80kph for extended periods, so I take some of the slower back roads instead of the main highway. No worries, I drive slow anyway, as most of you know. The Third Hog hurries for no one.
Luckily, her speedometer is in MPH, so I know how fast I'm going in American. For the sake of the police here, I do the conversions in my head when I check my speed.
The bike seems to like a nice cruising speed of about 40 mph or 60 kph, so when I don't have anyone behind me, I cruise around that speed.
Dad, if you've seen the video above, you're likely jealous of the scenery and roads I ride on every day. Yes, they do rent Harleys here.
In all, I'm having a blast with the bike. It reminds me a bit of the ole' Danger Ranger.
She's a bit older, she doesn't have the biggest motor in the world, and she's not the fastest on the road, but she has the heart of lion.
Rugby Updates
First off, our team is nicknamed the Wizards - super awesome.
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| Team Hat |
I've been asked by multiple people about how my rugby has been going out here, and some have asked about the level of play here - it's awesome.
Others have asked whether or not I'll be a starter - to this, I answer with a resounding "I have no clue."
I'm not sure where I'll fit in with the team here yet, as far as position and playing time are concerned anyway. It's not something Coach and I have discussed yet, and I'm sure he's waiting to see what I've got - frankly, so am I.
Both flankers on our team are also on the regional representative team, which is basically a regional allstar team, so they will be tough to beat. Gonna give it my best though.
If that doesn't work out and I am a reserve for two allstar flankers, then so be it - I'll learn a ton from them. And who knows, if I work hard enough maybe I'll find another position on the field.
Overall, rugby is going well. The skill level here is definitely a step up, but I think I'm doing alright so far. Still working on shaking off the cobwebs, but it's starting to come back. I'm not playing with my normal confidence yet, but that will come back with time.
In the past few weeks we've been training for 7s, and we had a tournament this weekend down in Christchurch. A 4 hour van ride in the morning, 5ish hours of playing, and 4 more hours in the van going home. The trip was full of typical rugby roadtrip shenanigans - dirty jokes, bare asses, disgusting farts, beers, and a healthy dose of bathroom stops.
I managed to get 30 seconds of playing time before getting hit by a ghost sniper and spraining my ankle.
I am currently nursing my sprained ankle as best as possible, in hopes of being able to strap up and play in the club nationals next weekend in Wellington.
Fingers crossed!
If not, I'll be watching the boys play from afar on TV.
Regardless, it felt GREAT to be back out on the field with the ball in hand. I am 100% certain that I am a happier person when I have rugby in my life.
Living Situation
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| Could you tell that dudes live here? DominBro's pizza, Brotein, AminBros, and Blender Brottles |
I'm still in the same apartment, but we've had a bit of rearranging in the recent weeks. Vance, the other American guy, showed up two weeks ago and has been sharing the living room with me. We each have a bed in opposite corners of the room, and it works out quite nicely.
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| My half of the living room. I'm a tornado of cleanliness and organization. |
While this living arrangement was all fine and dandy, the time has come to change. Chile moved out the other day, and I am taking over his room.
I will have my own private room for the first time in...5 months? No offense to K-dawg and Vancy Pants, but it will be nice to have my own spot again.
No longer do I have to tell Tinder girls that my room also has a kitchen and a front door in it...not exactly sure why I told them that in the first place. Maybe so they'd know where the kitchen was, and then where to find the exit?
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| Look, Mom, I cooked! |
Found some work!
None of the restaurants would hire me because I don't have any experience. I blame sexism.
A temp agency specializing in white collar work told me they only place people with at least 2 years' experience in secretary/admininstrative work. They wrote me a nice long email explaining the situation and thanking me for all the time I spent registering in their database.
All I saw was "Sorry, but go f#@k yourself."
Greenhouse Worker
I got 1 day's worth of work in a tomato greenhouse. It was shit work, and I absolutely hated it - but it allowed me to pay a week's worth of rent. They said they'd call me if they liked my work and wanted me back the following week - they must have lost my number, because that was 3 weeks ago... darn.
Like a woman who's bitter after not getting a call back from a guy, I'm a bit bitter that I wasn't called back after my tomato vine trimming job - it's the principle of the thing. I thought I did an okay job trimming 3 leaves off a branch, moving to the next, and repeating. I really gave it my all! And after doing this several thousand times, I really thought I was getting the hang of it. We had some good laughs, seemed to have so much and common, and they said they'd be in touch...
Guess not.
Well, suck it, greenhouse growers. You missed out on an overqualified, whiney, white collar worker with sweet thighs. Bet you're super upset!
Vineyard Worker
A week or so later I worked in a vineyard for a day and a half. This work was similar to the tomato greenhouse, but even shittier.
It was similar in the way that I was very slowly and meticulously hacking away at crops. It was different because the vineyard has you bent over all day in the sun hating yourself and questioning your life choices.
Most vineyard and orchard work is on contract, which means you get paid for how much crop you pick or vines you de-leaf. For fast workers, this can be kinda lucrative.
Those who know Travis, know he is not a fast worker..
Each row of vines is over 200 meters long and took me roughly 4 hours to get through. Each row got me close to $40 worth of pay. So that's $10 an hour, which is below the $14.50 minimum wage here.
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| This is half way... |
After a day and a half, I'd had enough and resolved to tell the boss the next day that I was done. I had another temp job lined up, so I didn't really need this one anyway.
On the third day I showed up to hand in my paperwork and tell the boss thank you for his time, but I wouldn't be working there anymore.
He basically told me he was happy with it, because I was too slow anyway. Plus my rugby got in the way. So at least the break-up was mutual this time.
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| The one positive is that I got to wear rugby shorts. The shoes came off shortly after this picture. |
After all that BS, things started turning around.
Cider Brewery - Bottling Line
Thanks to the efforts of a teammate (thanks Sione!), last week I was brought on as a casual worker at a small cider brewery, working on the bottling assembly line.
The name of the company is Redwood Cider, which is the maker of Old Mout Cider (in case you ever see it/hear of it). They were recently bought out by a company called DB brewing, which is a subsidiary of Heineken. No, I don't get discounts/perks. Besides the perk of getting a paycheck.
So far I've gotten 5 full days' worth of work, and depending on the status of my sprained ankle, I may have a few more days this coming week. This is great news because it means I am able to pay this month's rent and buy groceries. Score!
The people are all pretty cool and sociable, which makes a potentially monotonous job much less monotonous.
We start work at 6am, and finish by 2:30pm - it's pretty sweet.
There are 3 positions I work on the assembly line. We rotate every hour.
1. Bottle loader - I load bottles onto the assembly line. It requires the IQ of a monkey, yet somehow manages to be quite challenging at times..
2. Box filler - I whip up a cardboard box in record time, slap it on the conveyor belt, fill it with bottles of booze, and send it off into the sunset.
3. Box stacker - I pick up boxes recently filled with booze and sent into the sunset, and stack them on a pallet. This is the best station, because I get to use a machine that spins the pallet around which can be quite fun.
I'm basically a pro at putting bottles into a box and stacking said boxes on a pallet.
Strangely enough, the bottles must have adapted to this fear, as fewer bottles broke with each subsequent day. The bottles are learning.
After doing some quick and dirty math, I figure I touch about 4,000 bottles and handle close to 1500 boxes over an eight hour shift.
It's pretty interesting working in a manufacturing setting, which is entirely foreign to me. As my eyes glazed over while stacking boxes, I started remembering efficiency formulas and metrics from my operations classes and starting measuring my work - it kept me occupied.
I also got to see how useful slack time is in a production setting. In my classes and simulations I always pushed production to 100% and never allowed for slack time with the mentality that anything below 100% was due to laziness - work, you lazy dogs!
Now I see that slack time is very important - machinery breakdowns, delayed deliveries, sneezing, reaching down to tie my shoe, running to the bathroom... very important.
If I'm ever a project manager in the future, I will have a time slot dedicated to bathroom time.
Starting in late February, I've got a 3-month gig stacking apple crates at a local orchard. Again, this employment was arranged by a teammate - thanks E! - and will provide me with a nice steady income for a bit.
Learnings
After spending so much time in college getting a business degree, I've always envisioned myself working in an office doing...I dunno, business stuff. It's pretty cool living and working in a rural area where white collar jobs are few and far between, because it's forcing me to do things completely out of my comfort zone.
I'm no stranger to manual labor, but it's real interesting working with people who do it for a career.
It's certainly a different breed from your office workers and store clerks - more bawdy banter, taking the piss out of each other (giving people shit) and less political correctness. Kinda like a rugby team at work. I'm getting to see how an entirely different sect of people live and work, which is a really cool experience.
Working these jobs is also a good reminder that I don't want to do manual labor my whole life. While I'm young and exploring the world, it's no problem - I kinda like having callouses on my hands. But when I'm a bit older and want to settle down, I better use my degree to get something a bit better.
In the meantime I'm pondering getting my forklift license so I can be more valuable in my jobs/job search out here. I like driving tractors, and forklifts are pretty much the same thing, right? Career advancement!
White Water Rafting
The guy who's responsible for landing me here in New Zealand, Ant Holder, took Vance, another American named Miklos, and myself on a white water rafting trip the other weekend.
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| From left to right: Miklos, Vance, Raft Guide Matt, Ant |
When Ant called to invite me along, I told him I couldn't afford the $160 it cost. His response:
"That's fine, you'll just do some work for me and be my slave for a while. I already booked it anyway."
To a guy who is largely unemployed, this was an awesome deal.
We asked for the guide that would give us the wildest ride, and our guide, Matt, did not disappoint.
The rapids certainly got our adrenaline going and extracted from us our best manly grunts and roars while dominating nature's powerful forces.
The slow spots in between were filled with ridiculous conversation, ribbing, and other assorted man stuff. MAN STUFF!
And of course I took my GoPro.
Touring the Countryside
After the rafting, Ant took us to a lake not too far away, which was pretty incredible. It's a big area carved out by glaciers up in the mountains which made for some pretty sweet views.
There's a ton of hiking trails and backpacking to do out in this area, and I certainly plan to conquer a few of the available paths. I mean, if you come to New Zealand and don't do any backpacking, what's wrong with you?
And here's a few pictures of another place Ant took us to a few days before the rafting trip. This park was about an hour away from where I'm living.
Pretty much everything in New Zealand is postcard-worthy. The trick is learning to only take pictures of the super nice stuff, otherwise you'd be standing around taking pictures and never moving.
Sprained Ankle
Yeah, I know. I'm bummed too.
I got in the game with 2 minutes left.
Woo! Finally back in a real game, time to show what I can do!!
Touched the ball, made a short pass, hit a ruck, then the sniper struck..
After 30 seconds of play, the ghost sniper sighted me in and squeezed the trigger - I went down like a ton of bricks - a very attractive and graceful ton of bricks.
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| Kankle |
I hit a divot in the field while backpedaling for a penalty and sprained my ankle. The ball was on the other side of the field, nowhere near me. Sigh...
My teammate/roommate, Gus, couldn't help laughing as he recounted watching me crumple to the ground unexpectedly right next to him, for no apparent reason.
Everyone laughed.
I laughed a bit too.
But hey, it's not the end of the world. I heard a pretty loud crack when I did it, which really worried me at first. But after examination, it doesn't seem to be anything worse than a grade 2 sprain. The trainer said that even though it's a pretty bad sprain, there's a 50/50 chance that I'll be able to play in next weekend's tournament - even if that is a bit optimistic, I'm hopeful.
Update: Sadly I was told by our physio (trainer) that I will not be fit for the upcoming tournament this weekend. The good news is that I'll be ready to rock for 15s season.
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| This picture is before they put the boot on me |
My real concern is that I'm not reppin' America very well at the moment. Don't worry, Ole' Red White and Blue, I'll make you proud next time.
Trusting Kiwis
New Zealanders are ridiculously trusting.
Here are a few Examples:
Example 1. I went to pick up Gus' car from the shop, and when I told them I wasn't sure how he intended to pay for the services the mechanic said:
"Ah, just have him come in later this week and we'll sort it out."
Example 2. You pay for your gas - they call it petrol - AFTER you pump it. "Hi, I just pumped $30 on pump 13. Now I'd like to pay for it."
There is absolutely nothing stopping me from pumping my gas and taking off.
Some gas pumps have little signs on them saying "It's wrong to steal gas."
I try to never use this word outside of gaming but....LOL
I asked the station attendant what was keeping me from just driving off without paying.
She asked why anyone would do that.
I paused for a moment, then told her that was a very good question and left it at that.
Example 3. I went to the hospital ER to get some crutches as my trainer instructed me to do. Upon arrival I showed the nurse my trainer's paperwork - which gives me healthcare coverage - and asked for some crutches.
The nurse said it would probably be a 3 hour wait to see a doctor and go through all the steps. I didn't want all that. Neither did she.
Instead, she left the room and quickly returned, handed me some crutches, made me promise to return them, then shooed me out of the room before anyone noticed.
No name, no phone number, no address...no personal information.
There's even a note on the crutches that reminds people to return them when they are done.
These people might be nicer than Canadians..
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| Awesome |
I think part of the trusting atmosphere comes from the fact that everyone around here knows everyone. So I guess if you did something dickish, they'd know how to find you, so maybe that's the deterrent. Whatever it is, I'm loving it.
Gaining Weight!
Finally!
When I left the Philippines, I weighed in at 82.5 kilograms, which is 181 lbs in American. Last week I weighed in at-
...Drumroll....
86.5 kilograms, or 190 lbs in American.
Wooooo! All aboard for the Gain Train!
I know, I know, 9 pounds isn't THAT much. But after 3 months of precipitously losing weight in the Philippines, this is a nice change of pace. The last time I lost weight that quickly it turned out I had a serious stomach disease, and we don't want that again.
My goal is to get 200 pounds. We'll see.
I'm not where I want to be yet, but it's certainly a step in the right direction.
Another positive is that I'm way more fit than when I arrived. So not only am I bigger, but my cardio fitness is also way up - sweetness.
I'd say I'm a bit above the fitness level I had when playing for Sac State, but after training with these guys, I've learned that I have a bit more to give than that. It frustrates me that I had more potential to give back then, but oh well.
Again, not where I want to be, but getting there.
Fifteens season starts in 8 weeks. 8 weeks!
I'm also in an 8-week challenge with a few of the boys on the team, trying to see who can make the best improvements in their training over 2 months.
This sprained ankle may be a little setback, but I'll get back on the horse soon enough.
I will make America proud.
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| Worked the bar during some horse races |
What's Up?
I'd love to hear from those of you that are keeping up with my escapades, I quite enjoy reading emails from friends and family back home. Judging by the number of views these blog posts are getting, I might not even know some of you that well, but I'd still like to hear from ya'.Send me a suggestion to write about, a question about New Zealand, or even just send me a short message with something stupid you've done recently.
I'm not homesick by any means, but a taste of home now and then is always a good thing. It may not look like it, but these entries/videos take a good amount of time and effort, and I'd love to sit back and hear about someone besides myself for once.
My email is: Trevelyan18@gmail.com
Or shoot me something on Facebook.
Alright, that's enough from me.
Hope you enjoyed, look forward to hearing from you.
As always, thanks for reading.
See ya next time.
Hogs Wild
