NZ 5 - Work Life

NZ #5

Happy Mother's Day, Mama!

Stuff I've done since last time.

• It's been 5 years and I'm still having World of Warcraft withdrawals.
• More Taylor Swift
• Did a backflip
• Went on a sweet mountain bike ride
• Made some cider
• It's perfectly acceptable to walk into a grocery store while barefoot.
• Ate delicious turkey sandwiches
• Fell off a bicycle
• Read The Color of Magic, by Terry Pratchet. Great recommendation, Simon.
• Got a flat bicycle tire
• Ate a salad.
• Experienced NZ Memorial Day, aka ANZAC day. 
• I drink at least 1 cup of tea every day.
• Changed the oil in my motorcycle 
• Joining a local D&D group.
• Decided I'm hopeless on two-wheel, chain-driven transportation vehicles.
• I know every word to Justin Bieber's "Love Yourself". Not by choice..
• Almost wasted 40,000 liters of cider.
• My room got cleaned.

Video Recap

Been having trouble with the video for those of you back in the States. It should be fixed now. Let me know if it's still being lame. The only country it won't show in is Germany, soooo...sorry Lea!

Mom, part of your Mother's Day gift is this picture of my clean and tidy room. I may have hired someone to do it for me, but I'm told it's the thought that counts. Right?

That's as clean as I can manage. Anything more is just..ridiculous

Food

I'd like to clear something up. In response to a few friends asking what the cuisine here is like, I wrote in my last blog that the food in New Zealand isn't anything particularly special.
That is to say, the food isn't all that much different here, so there isn't a whole lot worth mentioning. Pretty traditional food for an English-speaking country full of mostly white people.
If I were in China, I'm sure I'd have some major differences in food worth noting.





In particular I was speaking of the restaurants and takeaways which have seemed a bit lackluster compared to Sacramento cuisine.

However, this in NO WAY reflects the meals that have been made for me in the various households that have been kind enough to invite me to dinner/various meals.
They have all been wonderful, home-cooked meals and are all miles beyond my cooking - they are a very welcome change of taste compared to my flavorless cooking.

I've had succulent lamb that fell off the bone, traditional Samoan dishes, delicious venison, kickass chili at a Super Bowl party, the list goes on.

I sincerely apologize if anyone was offended by my comment on Kiwi food. Please know that it was not directed toward anyone in particular, more at the general offerings available at restaurants and so forth.

Thursday night team dinners are the best $5 I spend all week, not to mention how amazing the food is..I look forward to those feeds all day leading up to training, and have a tough time concentrating at training because I'm so fixated on the coming feast afterward.

I guess my point is this: Kiwi friends/family, please keep inviting me over for food, those meals keep me alive - otherwise I may die from my own awful, boring, bland cooking.


Differences in Food.

While the cuisine may not be incredibly different, there are some key points that should be mentioned.

• Lamb is the "chicken" of New Zealand. It's relatively cheap and you can find it everywhere. 
• Chicken is roughly 3x more expensive than in the States. Chicken takes up almost half of my food budget.
• Fish n Chips shops are everywhere.
• The dairy here is better. Don't worry, America, we have a lot going for us, but we can't win at everything. Blasphemy, yes we can! We just have to apply ourselves.
• Meat isn't required at every meal - I know, such heathens. Their souls must be saved. Meat missionaries, ho!
• Dinner is called "Tea." Example: What are you having for tea tonight?
• Turkey is uncommon and very expensive. I've only had turkey once, and that was at someone else's house - someone who could afford a whole turkey. For someone who has eaten turkey sandwiches at lunch for most of his life, this is a bit of a life changer. For one, I am much less sleepy.
• The bread here molds way faster than at home - no preservatives.
• Most of the fruits and veggies are all grown in the Nelson area, and are super fresh. 
• People eat baked beans and spaghetti on toast for breakfast.
• I can't order good bacon anywhere. It's all undercooked and floppy, no matter how much I emphasize the word "crispy". 
• Crackers are a very common workplace snack.
• Seafood is big.

Overall, food is definitely more expensive, but that's because everything here is expensive.
Less processing, fewer preservatives, absence of factory farms, smaller economies of scale, shorter shelf life...these things all add up to higher prices - some would argue that's a good tradeoff.

Hahahahahahahaha. Just 'cuz

This brings me to some differences in food services here.
I think part of the reason people here are fitter and healthier as a whole is due to the fact that there isn't a fast food joint or Starbucks on every corner.
I can think of only 3 fast food restaurants in our entire city region - Two McDonald's and a KFC.
The McDonald's here is a better quality than the McDonald's back home.
The KFC here doesn't have chicken strips - I know, WTF.


Restaurants

As with any area, there are the good places to eat, and the bad places to eat.
Zara's Turkish Kebabs - awesome.
Lone Star - waste of money.
Indian place - pretty good.
Pizza place above the theater - fantastic.
Fish n Chips Takeaways - depends.

You don't tip waiters/waitresses here, they get paid an hourly wage just like EVERY other employee in every other industry in the world, ever.
While it's nice not having to bother tipping, this phenomenon does however creates a different dining experience than many Americans would be accustomed to.

On one hand, you aren't guilted into deciding what kind of tip is generous enough to make this downtrodden and overworked person's shitty shift a little better.

On the other, because their wage doesn't depend on your dining experience, they couldn't care less about refilling your water or checking if you need anything else.

There isn't anyone making sure you like your food, or seeing if you want another banana milkshake, or if you'd like some more cheesecake, or if you want a box for the rest of your fudge sundae. (Yeah, I know, nobody takes home a fudge sundae - I'd still like to be presented with the option to do so if I please.)
It's all...very confusing.
Frankly, I kinda miss having my little waiter/slave when I go out to dinner. It adds to the experience.
How dare you let my glass fall empty, slave! Now dance, or no tip for you!


AND, since tax is included in the prices here, if your dish costs $19, you pay $19 at the register - not some stupid $22.45 or whatever.
This applies to all purchases, not just food - you pay what you see. Come on, 'Merica...this is an easy one.

Kava

Workin' for the Man

Work is going great for me.
I often come home covered in sugar and reeking of apple cider - it's delicious.


As I wrote in a previous blog, I was slated to work at the cider brewery for just a few weeks, and then move on to work at an apple orchard for a 3 month gig.
That didn't happen.

As the folks at Kaiser can attest to, I have this peculiar little talent for sticking around an office/position longer than I'm scheduled to.

I started out at the brewery on the production line - feeding bottles to the assembly line, filling boxes, and stacking the pallets. (This is most of what you saw in the video. The other stuff is harder to record)

After working on the bottling line for about a month, the time came for me to either get a few more hours a week, or move on to the next job at the orchard.
I had a chat with my manager and told her I'd love to continue working there if I could get a minimum of 3 days a week, which was just enough to live on.
Because she's awesome, my manager went to bat for me and wrangled up a position for me with the winemakers, as a cellar hand.
(This isn't the first time I've had an awesome manager go to bat for me and find some work for me - hey Jeff and Simon!)

The initial plan was for me to be working 2-3 days a week on the bottling line, and then I would work with the cellar crew at least 1 day a week.
Sweet, that would sure beat the hell out of stacking apple crates at the apple orchard.

We followed this plan for about two weeks, and it was going quite nicely.
I stacked and packed a few days, then moved a bunch of sugar around for the cellar crew on Fridays.

However, shortly after starting my new position, two employees on the cellar team gave notice that they would be moving away in a month's time.

So, pretty quickly I began working full time with the cellar crew, getting trained up to help fill the void left once the two team members moved away.
The company paid for me to get my forklift certification, and put me to work right away in learning how to do some basic tasks around the facility.
While it was a shame to see the two team members leave, the timing certainly worked out in my favor. I had just enough time to receive some training from one of the vacating employees, and had lots of work thrown my way once they left.




Cellar Hand

Nowadays I just work in my newer position as a "cellar hand",  which just means I work with the people who make the cider.

I started as cellar hand approximately two months ago, doing some of the cider mixing and forklift work. Right off the bat, it was really interesting work and I quite enjoyed it.

Don't get me wrong, I was very grateful for my position on the bottling line, as it worked around my rugby schedule and afforded me the ability to pay my bills.
However, the work in the cellar is far more interesting and intellecutally stimulating - I could feel my brain turning to mush on the assembly line.
The cellar work requires a good deal of thought and a certain amount of problem solving skills, which is much more in my wheelhouse. Who says Business majors can't function outside an office!?

Initially, my new position felt like I was just scurrying back and forth between big tanks, connecting and disconnecting hoses, hooking said hoses up to pumps, and getting my socks wet.
Now, with a few solid weeks of experience under my belt and a bit more understanding, I can accurately say that I am just scurrying back and forth between big tanks, connecting and disconnecting hoses, hooking said hoses up to pumps, and getting my socks wet.


I started off shadowing one of the girls who was leaving, learning how things worked and how to do some basic stuff. My first few days were spent filling in for another employee while he was away on vacation, so we were doing his tasks for a bit.
During this part I was actually adding in the flavors and sugar and making a finished cider - way cool!.
I helped make over 30,000 liters of cider, some of which I packed and loaded the next day on the bottling line - it's not so boring when you are packing a product that you actually made.
This is not what I'd be doing the rest of my time, but it was a good initiation into the whole process - it piqued my interest.

Essentially I was just running around with that dumb, eager face I tend to wear when I'm doing something new and exciting.

My responsibilities with the cellar crew can vary, but the main ones include receiving juice orders, inoculations, chaptalisation, and tank cleaning.

I'm going to attempt to show you how the different parts of my job fit together chronologically as the cider is produced, as I feel this may bring some clarity to it all.
I was very confused in my first couple weeks, but it's slowly piecing together for me now.

Fair warning: I am taking the terms, processes, and slight bits of knowledge I've gotten from work, and piecing them together with internet sources to fill in the gaps so I can write this up for you - I'm learning a lot!

Juice Orders:

Very simple. A truck pulls up in the morning with roughly 13,000 liters - close to 4,000 gallons - of pure apple or pear juice, and I hook it up to a tank and pump it out.
While the juice is being pumped into the tank, I get a sample from the truck driver and take it into the lab and do some analysis.
I check the juice for its pH level, test the sugar levels, the density, and it's specific gravity - no idea what specific gravity is, I just read a chart.
These tests are recorded on a clipboard as a record of incoming juice so we know what we've got.

So Sciencey

Innoculation and Chaptalisation

Once we have enough juice, usually at the end of the week, it's time to get the fermentation process started.
This starts with the innoculation and chaptalisation, which is a full day's worth of work.
Essentially, this is where we take the juice orders that I received a few days earlier and turn it into wine.

"Chaptalisation" means I add tons - literal tons - of sugar to some 50,000 liters of juice, and "innoculation" means I babysit some yeast before it starts the fermentation process.
I use the forklift to lift 1-ton bags of sugar up and into a big mixing tub, pump a few thousand liters of juice in, mix it up, then send it to the wine tank.

The big white square is a 1-ton bag of sugar

This process can be repeated anywhere from 4-6 times in a day, depending on how much sugar I need to add.
I run a test and do a few calculations in the morning to figure out exactly how much sugar I need to add - down to the nearest 25kg increment.

25kg increments....all added by hand. Yuck.

During the day while I am mixing the sugar, I also tend to a vat filled with adorable little yeasties.
The sugar and yeast go in separate vats, but I work on them at the same time, alternating between each.
The yeast has to be brought down to a specific temperature in gradual increments - hence the babysitting - while adding nutrients and hydrating it along the way to keep it happy.

Once I've finished adding roughly 5 metric tons of sugar, I pump the yeast back into the main tank and let it go to work on fermenting the place.

I'm nowhere near to understanding the entire cider-making process, but I know that my portion of the work is done approximately two weeks before we bottle and ship it out.
Because I am fortifying the yeast with so much sugar and aiming at a higher alcohol level, I am technically making "apple wine" which then gets diluted into cider at some point down the line.
So since we're actually making wine, this process is called Chaptalisation - but whatever, that's a ridiculous word anyway.
The point is this: I'm adding a bag of yeast into a lot of juice and throwing shitloads of sugar at it to keep it happy.

Making a blend

This is the part where I actually make the cider.

About two weeks after I do the chaptalisation and innoculation, the juice has fermented into wine and is ready to be mixed into cider.
Making a blend is relatively straightforward. I follow a recipe that specifies how much of each ingredient I'm supposed to add, and I mix it all in a big tank.

They don't have me make the real complicated blends, since I'm still a rookie.
The blends I make are usually comprised of 4 or 5 ingredients, which are typically dissolved in water before being added into the cider. The ingredients are based on a gram/liter measurement, so I do a few calculations based on the volume I'm working with and, voila, I have the correct amount I need.
At the end, I take a sample into the lab and run a few tests - with a real life chemistry set! - to determine if I need to alter the cider's acidity or sulfur levels.

Once I'm done making the blend, roughly a day or two later a big transport tanker shows up and takes my my 10,000 or so liters of cider to another plant where it will be finalized and bottled.
Apparently some of the flavors we make don't get sold in New Zealand, so we don't bottle them at our plant.


Tank Cleaning

No, I'm not making meth

Tank cleaning is basically using a big water pump to run some chemicals through the tank's system for a while.
I use caustic soda to do the cleaning, and then run citric acid through to neutralize the soda, then rinse it out with water - just think of it like using household cleaning products, but the cleaning products are on steroids.
Caustic soda is very corrosive - but it gets the job done - so we have to wear rubber overalls, rain boots, long rubber gloves, and glasses while we are handling it. See above picture.
Depending on how dirty the tank is, the process could take anywhere from 45 to 90 minutes. The time also depends on how fast/slow I am on any given day.
Sometimes I have to clean up after a filtering, which leaves this big pool of nasty sludge at the bottom of the tank. Pretty gross.




Other Work Stuff

There are lots of other little tasks that need to be done, and I do them throughout the day. Adding some nutrients to tanks, cleaning assorted equipment, and so forth.
One of the chemicals I add on a daily basis is Potassium MetabiSulfite, but we just call it PMS. I giggle every time someone says it.
Three weeks ago I added the wrong ingredients to a tank and almost caused it to go to waste. Luckily, the chief cidermaker was able to work some magic and save it.
I was getting ready to pack my bags and start job hunting again...


In all, I couldn't have asked for a better job during my time here in New Zealand. I'm doing something COMPLETELY new, I like the people I work with, and my hands are constantly dirty and developing callouses - I like it.

The bottling line was a million times better than working in a vineyard or in a greenhouse, and no matter how bored I got stacking cider boxes, I always reminded myself of that fact.

Working in the cellar is simply a blessing on top of another blessing - I barely feel like I'm going to work, it's that interesting.
I get to drive forklifts and lift heavy things with them - man stuff.

The brewery is a quick 20 minute motorcycle ride from my apartment, the scenery around which is comprised of vineyards and sheep, which never gets old. I "BAAA" at the sheep as I drive by.

Best of all: there are often cakes, savouries, cookies, or assorted candies on the breakroom table.


What's more, I really enjoy drinking the products that I make.
News flash: I don't enjoy beer. I drink it for a buzz, nothing more.
I do however, enjoy cider. And it gets me buzzed.
Don't worry, I'm not going to turn into a cider-holic, I'm too big of a wimp when it comes to hangovers to become a hardcore drinker.

Rugby

Post-game shenanigans

Our team is currently 8-0, with another 10-12 weeks left in the season. The seasons here are real long, 16 weeks minimum, and any after that depend on playoffs.

I was starting earlier in the season due to some lineup shuffling/absences in the first few weeks, but that has all settled back down now.
I usually come off the bench with about 20 minutes to go in the game, which is a typical substitution time - lots of boys are gassed, and it's a good time to put fresh legs/Hogs on the field.

My play is getting better as I gain some of my confidence back and force myself to play like I know I can. It's taken a while, but I'm finally starting to get comfortable with all the drills and systems we run. Just the other day, Gus said, "Bro, from our first 7s practice til now, whooo, you've come a long way."While some may see that as condescending, I see it as a major compliment, because it's the truth.

I managed to score my second try this season. It was a bit lucky, but hey, I'll take it. Unfortunately whoever was in charge of recording the game didn't capture
the last 20 minutes, so there is no video evidence. However, the picture below proves that I did in fact find my way to the try zone.

And just because there isn't any video evidence doesn't mean I can't describe every single excruciating detail of my score to you. Muahahahahaha!

It was our scrum, roughly 20 meters out from the try zone, about 15m from the right sideline. I was playing #6 so I was on the short side of the scrum, nearest the sideline.
Our scrum half decided to take the ball right, my side, and have a go at beating their flanker and winger in front of him.
I looked up, thought, "Why did he go this way? Did I miss something? Shit.." and then sped off to follow him and do my duties as a support player - support.

With about 10 meters to go, our scrum half did a chip kick - where he kicks it up in the air in front of him, runs under it, and then attempts to catch it.

During the process of attempting to catch his kick, our scrum half collided mid-air with an opposing player, and the ball tipped backward, right into my hands.

I caught the ball at a dead run, right in front of the goal line, and dove into the corner of the try zone, touching the ball down as I sailed over and landed out of bounds.
In rugby you just need to touch the ball to the ground with any downward pressure, no part of your body actually has to be in the try zone, which is why I was able just touch the ball down as I flew over the corner.

After I landed I looked up to the ref to see if he was going to give me the score or not - it was a tricky 1-2 seconds to process, and he needed to consult with his assistant referee to confirm the score.
Before the ref made the call, our boys were already running over and yelling "That's a try, no doubt about it! Yeah Travvy boy!"

So yeah, I basically just caught a tipped ball and fell over into the try zone. Whatever, still counts.

A Kind Gift

Susie is the wife of our team sponsor, Charlie, and she's a saint of a woman. She is always around the club supporting us, helping at fundraisers, making sure we're fed, asking us about girls, and so on.
A while back Susie and I had a conversation in which we discussed different things we liked to bake.
We discussed our favorite desserts and treats we liked to indulge in every now and then.
After our conversation, Susie insisted that I copy down a brownie recipe she really likes.

...Problem...

I might have been slightly less than truthful when I said that I liked baking. What I should have said was that I enjoy watching other people bake things for me to eat.
The only time I ever bake is when there is no one around to do it for me and my sweet tooth is throwing a tantrum of epic proportions.

Every few weeks Susie would ask me if I'd used that brownie recipe yet, and every time I would give her my standard excuse: I don't have any baking pans.
This simple, yet carefully crafted excuse worked like a charm.
It implies some amount of intended effort, while invoking memories of youthful irresponsibility and the accompanying nostaliga, and drives it home by conjuring up a paternal sympathy because the hungry, young, bright-eyed traveler can't afford anything more than chicken and rice, let alone fancy baking pans.
It's an emotional gold mine.
In all honesty, I had little to no intention of actually baking something for myself - baking is like cooking, except it's not a meal so I still have to cook afterward too.


Down the road I had a plan to subtly suggest that she just invite me over to bake the brownies in her well-equipped kitchen, which would most certainly turn into me sitting and drinking a glass of milk while she did all the baking.

However, either by a thoughtful and kindhearted gift, or by a thinly-veiled and shrewd nod to my bluff, Susie put an end to my golden excuse.

At the next Thursday team dinner, Susie leaned across the table and asked me if I'd bought any baking pans yet so I could make the brownies.
I told her no, and gave my best bashful facial expression, complete with baleful blue eyes and everything.
Nothing.
She wasn't fazed.
I knew something was coming.
But what?
She smiled kindly and said, "Good. I bought you two pans, a cookbook, and some dark cooking chocolate."


Well, bluff called.

Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go fire up an oven and try to create something in it.

That's all, folks.

That's all I've got for this time. I know I said I'd try to make these shorter but more frequent, but I failed on that. Now that I'm working 40 hours a week and have rugby most evenings, my time is a bit more limited. I typically write these over a couple weeks, and eventually piece the bits together when I sit my ass down and do it.

As usual, thanks for reading, you know how much I appreciate it. I'm starting to run out of minuscule events in my life for me to expand upon in great detail in these blogs, so feel free to throw some ideas my way. Otherwise it's just going to be more ramblings about my job, how I received a baking pan as a gift, or how I paid someone to clean my room...all very exciting, but difficult to write about.


Thanks!

Hogs Wild