Rotorua

Adam loves this apartment. Who wouldn’t though right, we moved half way across the world to this tiny little town neither of us had heard of. All we had were the bags on our backs, ha! If, somewhere down the track either of us try to convince any of you that we even pretended to “backpack” around New Zealand, slap us silly. (Especially not for the first 2 months). We bought a car! Can you hear how proud I am? We bought a car, my very first car, seeing as though I don’t drive, it’s pretty impressive that I’m part owner of our beautiful little bad boy! We call him/ her, we call it The Eagle! It’s almost vintage. 1988 Nissan Bluebird. We got Eagle from bird, simple, clever, amazing. The story of the car can be saved from another day, not a rainy day, we haven’t had rain, we haven’t even had clouds here for weeks. It’s like the happiest place on earth. Except for the fact that it’s not. It’s as if no one here appreciates how lucky they have it. There are buildings left empty, for lease written on every second shop window. What does that mean? There are plenty of people here to work, does it take a lot to set up a shop? Maybe it does when you apply for job after job after job and nothing. There are a lot more people look for work, than people hiring. That certainly lowers ones self esteem. This place, this town, this city is the hub for all tourism in New Zealand. Tutenaki street is the main shopping street (over statement). In the 5 blocks between work and home I must pass 5 souvenir shops. Postcards, tacky fridge magnets, hats, t-shirts. Bleugh, coffee shop, tourist, tourist, tourist. There is a town in Northern Ireland, up near Derry (not Londonderry), that used to manufacture “Fruit of the Loom” T-shirts. The factory employed people from all over, until it was closed and shipped overseas, and everyone lost their jobs. I don’t know if Rotorua has a similar history, but this town needs something other than tourists. Come to Rotorua, go zorbing, jump out of a plane, see geysers. My favourite thing to do in this town is go out for drinks with Adam. We could do that anywhere. What do the locals do? I have no idea. Work hard, and get paid diddly squat. By the way, a geyser is, as I understand it, a mini volcano, no, that can’t be right, they erupt every now and again, and sprays hot water. Zorbing is rolling down a hill inside a huge bubble, how people don’t die, I have no idea.

This is boring.

Adam loves this apartment. It is so convenient. We moved countries, with nothing except the bags on our backs, not backpacking. We had nothing home like. The apartment came with a bed, chairs and a table, a couch, tv, dvd player, washer, dryer. Very convenient. I love this apartment too. I just wish we could stay in it long enough to hang some photos, long enough to spill something on the carpet. We live right in the centre of town. From sitting on the couch to standing in the town square takes about 2 minutes. We pay less for this than we were paying to stay at the old backpackers hostel next to the hotel we work at. Sadly, after only 3 weeks of living here, we are giving our notice to vacate, we will be leaving in 2 weeks. What will our next place be like? Well for a few nights it will be the tent, can’t really hang photos in there.

Yesterday we drove about an hour north to get the beach. Mt Manganui, is beautiful, despite being a little too full of tourists. If I were still living in Melbourne, and we drove out to Rye beach or Sorrento, I wouldn’t classify myself as a tourist. So, what’s the difference, driving the same distance to the beach here, I felt like a tourist. But driving back into Rotorua I felt like we were coming home. It’s weird though right, yesterday I felt like we were coming home, today I decided it was time to move on. I don’t want to become one of those people who never hang photos, never stay anywhere long enough to hang photos. Adam calls it “getting itchy feet” it’s cute, and he’s right.