Subject: notes, part 2 Date: Thu, 18 May 2000 18:11:36 -0800 From: Tristan Heydt To: devin@tiki-lounge.com I'm hungrier than I was yesterday, which is good considering I have about 10 day's food and I'm only here for another three days. It's a long weekend; ANZAC day is on Monday. ANZAC stands for Australia, New Zealand Army Corps, and it has to do with word war one. A kiwi named Andrew said " Anzac day is when they glorify the slaughter. " I hooked up with 7 kiwis about an hour from whangaparapara hut site, niked with them for the rest of the day. They are all from Hamilton ("the largest inland city in New Zealand.") When we got to Kairara hut around 4 o'clock, they stopped for the day and busted out 3 liters of wine-in-a-bag. What a group. I continued on to Pt. Fitzroy, about 45 minutes further on. Some people look like pigs. It can't be helped. A woman on the trail yesterday was just such a person, and the things she said were kind of pig-like as well. She was warning me about the steepness and duration of the trail ahead ( I was climbing Mount Hirakimata, also called Mount Hobson; the tallest peak in the island.) What she was telling me was helpful advice, but her tone was weird, petty. Plus, I'd already come that far, over half way, did she think she was going to convince me to turn around? Anyway, I made it in about 4 1/2 hours from the peak to the ocean. I ran into a couple that I had seen in Tryphena and talked with on the ferry over. They gave me a five-minute hitch to the trailhead yesterday. I also ran into the two brits Paul and Liz again, as they were coming down from the mountain. I got a hitch just as it was getting dark last night, the last couple of miles down to the awana camp ground on the coast. I actually saw stars last night for the first time since I left New Zealand. They seemed chaotic to me -- the patterns were totally unfamiliar. There was a group of people camping on the other side of a small rise about 100 feet away from me last night, and they were being loud and annoying. But then they started singing "the gambler" by Kenny Rogers, and they knew a verse that I didn't, so I had to give them props for that. Hiking like this is sort of like playing a video game. If you've ever played "diablo" or any other good role playing game, then you may know what I'm talking about. I buy items I think will improve my speed or make the experience more fun. I balance weight, volume, cost, effectiveness. I test general-purpose solutions against specialized ones. I hike and I sleep and I look at the map and the scenery. I don't get to know what level I am or how many hit points I have, but I see how fast I go and I how long I hike each day and how much I eat. Every day I have a new mission. It's not raining anymore and the wind has picked up a little. Time to get going. I'm heading South to Claris today. Rained off and on all day yesterday. Damn it's good to have some sun! It's been out for almost an hour this morning and it's like a present. Just about everything is dry. Didn't hike very far yesterday. Walked about 2 1/2 hours South, get a short hitch into Claris (2 stores, 5 houses), ate some food I bought there and hung out with two kiwis from Kaitaia: Shane and Tim. Those guys are probably stoners. Tim was all in denim and he looked cold. Shane had the stoner laugh down pat. They were staying in a bus shelter about 1 km South of Claris. I smoked (cigarettes!) and talked with them about an hour and started South. A little while later I approached the bus stop they mentioned and a car passed me and stopped. These two guys got out and it was Shane and Tim! They walked me to the shelter and showed me around. It has windows and a door and a bench that could easily sleep two. I kept walking about another 30 minutes and a car came along and picked me up. There were two women inside: Kate and Vanessa. Kate, the older of the two, is Vanessa's mother. They were going to the same place as I, so I got a nice ride all the way to my campsite at Medlands beach. Kate's husband runs the crossroads backpacker's lodge and internet "cafe" just North of Claris. According to Kate, people often supplement their incomes from the island with marijuana growing. It can't be that hard -- I think there is one cop car for the whole island. I'm taking the ferry from Tryphena this afternoon. It's just over the ridge, about 2 hours hike or a 15 minute drive. Some general notes about New Zealand: Coins here go up to $2, so if you sit down in a movie theatre, for example, and some change falls out of your pocket, you want to find it since it's probably about five dollars. If you are into those science fiction movies where it's always dark and rainy, by all means come to Auckland in April; it's six for six so far, rain every day, no exceptions. I stayed at a hostel last night which was all good except about an hour after I went to sleep ( I slept in my sleeping back ) I woke up with bites all over my legs! WTF?!!? I put on this crazy strong bug repellent (95% Deet, it melts plastic) and went back to sleep. I was fine when I woke up, no new bites. I must have carried some little buggers over with me from the island. I took a ferry across the narrow channel from Auckland to devonport, which is really still part of Auckland. I'm almost named after it and it's also almost davenport, a town I lived in in Iowa. Devonport is touristy, but I don't mind. I'm having dinner in a restaurant called Manuka. The waitress in pretty, I can see a tiny amount of her belly. They serve you water in a clear glass wine bottle when you sit down. It's a nice touch. I must go on about the waitress a bit longer. She had a 90's hyper-real comic book face; long and thin, ears swept back, blue eyes large and wide set. Her nose was average sized, but pointy. Her hair was straight, long and blonde. She was thin and I could see just a hint of bicep in her upper arms, which were quite lean. She was wearing form-fitting dark blue jeans with no belt and a tight short-sleeved orange top. She was also wearing a black patterned top under the shirt, and it only showed for about 1/2" at the bottom of the shirt, leaving about another 1/2" of skin between it and the blue jeans. She was lightly tanned and the bottom half of her seemed to move about 1/2 second out of phase behind the top half. I watched her as much as I dared. Her breasts seemed slightly larger than what you might normally consider proportional to the rest of her frame. The wire on the bottom and middle of the bra showed clearly through the two tops. The bra was black. At this restaurant they also serve you a small bowl with a lid, inside there are large brown sugar crystals. I already had coffee today, so I didn't need the sugar. I went to Starbucks. I understand that for someone in my demographic this is basically verboten, but the only other way I know to get coffee to taste good around here is to stay out in the bush for four days with no hot anything. Then even instant coffee tastes good. Non-geeks, you may wish to to avoid the following section and skip ahead to "the bit about the coffee..." This morning as I was eating breakfast at the hostel, I saw two young asian girls in matching day-glow yellow ultraman jackets. One had a gameboy; I could not see what game she was playing, though I could hear the sounds from it as her friend shouted advice at her in some language. Then, a tiny boy came jumping back and forth across the room at great speed. He made a noise that I can best describe as sounding lust like those little creatures in "Half-Life" that run around for a while attacking stuff, then explode. Everything except the explosion sounded just like that kid. The bit about the coffee was mostly a lie. There are many places that sell good coffee in Auckland, but I was curious what Starbucks would be like; how it would resemble Starbucks in America. The answer is it's virtually identical, the only difference being the people behind the counter. Weight again. I'm convinced I'm not going to need the wool pants and sweater I brought. I'm waiting for Wellington to make up my mind for sure. I should get rid of "Different Seasons" as well, but I was reading "Apt Pupil" and I wanted to get to the part where he shoots everyone (the end, as it turns out) before getting rid of it. I read it and then I read the first page of "The Body" (movie version: "Stand By Me"). A mistake this was. I don't want to get rid of the hook now until I finish reading that story -- it's just too good. I am definitely sending home my Cd player + CD's and headphones; too much weight and I hardly listen to it. I gave my "San Francisco" mug to 'stony' Shane and Tim of Kaitaia. Thank God for England. If it hadn't been for them colonizing every chance they got, there woudn't be nearly as many places to visit overseas that don't require me to learn another language. My sarcasm aside, it's one good little thing out of a lot of bad big things. Colonization was big business for a while though; if England had laid off, would another country have just picked up where they left off? Schedules make me antsy. When many variables are at work and I have to catch a ferry to get to a hostel to get my bag to get to a train station, I get nervous. I don't miss anyone. Maybe I will more after more time has passed. Maybe it's because I know I will see them all in a couple more weeks. I miss very little about my previous life. I'm not exactly happy or content in New Zealand, but it's keeping me interested. Saw a old electronics surplus store today and went inside. Inside, I saw a Micro-Amplifier with Exciter Control and a Correlator. The two guys working there played a game of chess with surplus electronic parts as pieces, while bad german-sounding techno played. Behind the store was a cemetery. On a tombstone, I read: "Duncan Matheson, beloved husband of CATHERINE. Died accidentally while rigging schooner 'three cheers' built by him. March 20th, 1825.