Choppers, Zed and Fish and Chips.

Well I'm finally getting good at this. I have my own computer using free WiFi in the library just down the street from where I live. I'm only going to be able to use this set up temporarily though. I'm probably going to get a job in construction in a couple days.

A note on Christchurch.

The city center is all but destroyed. There are just a few high rises still up and those are condemned. The entire area is cordoned off so that no one can go there. The only thing still there is the central bus depot which is weird because you can ride the bus into the middle of what looks like post-war London. The people are taking it really well but the lawyers haven't let them back in yet to rebuild, which is causing many people to be upset. People generally seem to feel like nothing has been done. They're generally right. Only now are the work crews starting to make their way into the central city. Most of the reconstruction effort has been concentrated on the residential areas thus far. The jobs are mostly in this industry so I'll probably end up working for City Care or one of the other big reconstruction firms. The other option is going to that cushy (if not minimum wage) lifeguard job. That would mean giving up caving and tramping on the weekends though.

Speaking of caving, when they do a major cave rescue drill here they get to ride on Iroquois helicopters. Think of Wil Orndorff in a Vietnam movie and that's more or less a practice rescue. The cavers here routinely use choppers because they can eliminate two days hard tramping in 10 minutes. The caves are mostly on the western side of the south island. It is really rainy there so their trips get cancelled on a routine basis. Tramping is a really big deal here too. If you haven't figured it out yet tramping is hiking. I also catching myself calling the letter "Z" zed a lot. It's weird because I say it in my typical red neck accent. This gives my ZN friends a laugh.

Everything is much more relaxed here. They charge you $9 to register your car and it can be done at any post office. It took me 5 minutes. I bought it off a caver, Jonathan Carr. He's more or less the Mike Futrell of the far east. Total badass. I also had my first foray into fish and chips yesterday. They eat it with tomato sauce which is like ketchup but less sweet. It's the cheapest lunch you can get at $5. You don't tip here either so if you come visit don't try to tip the cab.

I also went out to New Brighton Pier the other day. You can probably google an image of it. Its really nice with a very severe landscape. I'll probably roll out to the port today and check over there for shipping jobs before I do construction.

We had a major electrical storm here the other day. When I say major I mean like a normal storm by VA standards. That being said it was all over the news. If you saw it I promise it was no Derecho.

Well I'm going to go finish up insuring my car (which is $300 a year even for a stupid backpacker... WINNING).

Dan "Joker" Crowder the Kiwi Adventurer