Far vel, Peter

Second friend out. I didn't cry yesterday, but now that I'm alone I found it appropriate to howl a bit while blogging. So my life shifts again. It's going towards the end of the trimester, and people are leaving one by one, some for good, some for summerbreak. I have no idea when or where or if I ever see Peter again. This weird German guy that Manuel dragged into my life. I'll miss you, brother.

Happy Birthday Regina!

My little cutie had her birthday yesterday, and amidst the blogging I forgot to create this post. BUT: here it is! Happy birthday, dear! I remember last year I was travelling home, and rang you up when I landed in Singapore. This year I'm not going back till December! Anyway, I hope you had a marvellous day, ate lots of cake and don't feel guilty at all about it. :) When I come to Singapore in January we should do an extended photoshoot, dear. I couldn't find a single one from last year with only the two of us! Ok, I'm feeling really bad about not sending you presents yet... I promised so many times to do it that I really feel all rotten on the inside, but really, I have had a lot on my mind and shedule. I hope both you and Feli can forgive me for that... *sigh*
LOTS OF LOVE! *muakz*

don't make plans

Today is Gyu Fawkes day, and yesterday there was a huge pyro-show in the harbour. It was great, almost as great as the chinese new year show last year. Or rather, equally beautiful but shorter.


Yesterday we also had our "last" party here in Welli, or rather, one of them, I suspect. We went to a huge houseparty in Thorndon, a costume party with the theme: Circus. It was wild. The house was HUGE, and they had a dancefloor surrounded by a balcony.. the rooms were lit with strange coloured light and all over there were circus posters, stands, signs.. they even had a smoke machine for one of the rooms. Talk about going all the way.. hehe. Must have taken them ages and cost heaps. Anyway, stayed there till 3 and then went to town. It was a quite late night, already started to dawn as we went to bed.

Lilya 4-ever

Sukk. Busy day today... probably tomorrow as well. I've been running ard, trying to get things in order... I'm so preoccupied with organising everything, when really there is no need to. Guess I always get a bit on the edge whenever my world is shifting. Today I watched one of the saddest movies ever... It was about a Russian girl, who was left by her mother and got caught up in human trafficing. Made me feel really sick.. I still have this feeling and I don't know how to escape it. It really happens, all over the world, right in our neighbourhoods..

Flat # 2

I've finally found a place to live. It's at the top of the cable car, a nice as room with windows and plenty of sun. The house is old but the atmosphere is quite nice, I like the place. Anyway, it's an open lease, which means that I don't have to stay there forever if I don't like it. But so far it seems great, the girl is quite nice, and I'll be living with Loïc as well. :) Wuhu! Finally! I don't care that the toilet is crap and the bathroom a bit dodgy, I've had muuuch worse: Recalling the first flat I shared with my X... the bathroom didn't have any light, the sink didn't have any pipes which meant that the bathroom constantly had about 2cm of water (we had "toilet shoes", haha), and no heating in the floors either. This is a lot better than that. I'm happy with my choice today.

Good day

Soundtrack: Kings of Convenience - I'd rather dance with you

After yesterday's sorrows, today proved to be a muuch better day. :) Actually I should have been studying hard out for my exam, but somehow I don't have the proper drive... It'll be fine though. Tomorrow should prove a more effective day (just keep saying that, Tina...)

So instead I spent the evening making Lasagna for my friends! Wuhu! And niice icecream with explicit sex talk afterwards... We know how to party.. lol Oh my god, !xobile

Oh well. better try get some sleep.

P...M...S?

I'm just sad right now.. sooo tired, had a hard night at work. Last night, Manuel decided to have a party, because he finished his last exam. (whee! Good on u manu!) Anyway, I was royally stressed out and kinda ran away from the whole thing... I had a crap as day yesterday. I had to get up at 2 to look at a flat, which prooved to be crap as usual, and because I didn't sleep enough I was too tired to study after I got back and decided to sleep. Woke up at 7pm and didn't get to do any studying again because of the party, on top of that all the ppl were giving me a hard time for working, saying that I was boring and that I should call in sick, and saying that I should give a fuck about this exam.. I am so stressed about this exam! the lecturer has a way of twisting the words in the questions so that I don't really know what it is he is asking for.. it is making me unsure and I cannot bring my dictionary because It doesn't do any good anyway.. So I ran away from the party. the whole day was whasted... Mark has left me in the search for the apartment.. I'm sick of the whole hunt now and will put it on hold till tuesday. I don't have time for this shit! Ahh....

On a brighter note:
I have confidence in this world now. It came to me on the bus. I suppose it was almost like a religious thing... suddenly, watching a traffic light on victoria street, I felt at home again. Not in Wellington(although this does feel like my home right now) but in the world. The world holds my soul at the moment, and I feel confident that anything I need will be given to me at the appropriate time, although I won't necessarily recognise it at once.. Sometime I miss having a religion to cling to, but then I have one of these moments, and it comes to me that I do have a religion. I do have a set of beliefs, I do believe in things that cannot be proved, but still it feels sooo obvious to me. It's good to have a purpose.
No regrets.

10 Things to appreciate on a rainy day

1. I don't have to go out if I don't want to
2. I can sleep till 5 ish
3. Having beers in the morning after a long night of work
4. Two wonderful flatmates
5. Being given the perfect opportunity to stay indoors and STUDY!
6. I will save money because I don't want to go shopping
7. Lots of friends live in the same building
8. If I get bored I can actually tidy my room
9. Croissants and cheese
10. I don't have to work tonite

Flat

I wish I could find a flat soon! I'm getting a bit tired of searching for a flat. I now know how to decifer flat adds:
Magnificent views = on top of a steep hill far away from supermarket
Large windows = Freezing in the winter
Suitable for up to 5 tenants = 3 at most!
Preferred tenants: Young profs = Old geezers with snug jobs
People have this image of what a student is like.. loud, messy, destructive, lazy... I don't really want to lower my standards, just because I'm now a student. I know I'm being demanding, wanting a mint flat without moist damage or shit-coloured walls, but I guess in reality we've got to be quite lucky to find something that will suit everyone. I passed on the one I liked cuz Loic didn't like the rooms. Ok, so one of them didn't have a door.. so what. I saw potential in that flat.. Just keep looking then. I've spent several hours flathunting this week. Maybe 2 hours revising for my exam... It's no good.

Goodbye Lene...

Gosh, what an unproductive day it has been today.. We had Lene's sendoff yesterday... :'( Wasn't feeling that great this morning. It is the official start of the leaving-season... ***SIGH*** She's the first one out, going travelling with her family for some days and then just coming back here for a few hours before leaving, so won't see her again in NZ. I'll miss you, babe. All the good times. Memories.

I miss myself the way I used to be at a certain point in time. At the same time, I do not wish go go backwards.. Strange dilemma. Have been working both Friday and Saturday night, now it's Sunday morning, and I'm chillin' with some beers before heading off to bed soon. Been a quiet night, thank goodness. Today there was a bunch of us who had like an official sendoff dinner for Lene. Damn, I hate these dinners. Novembers suck. This year I'll be saying goodbye to 4 friends: (cronologically) Lene, Peter, Elisabeth and Manuel. I hate saying goodbye to ppl. It's been a year and a half already, and I still miss the first people to leave Welli after getting to know them. All the small memories from when Feli and Regi were here... As I was sitting on the bus yesterday I was thinking about how different places in Welli reminds me of different ppl. I'll list them for you :)

Circa Theatre, Downstage and Bats Theatre: Felicia and Regina
The church on Dixon/Willis: Feli
The church on Church St: Regi
Espressoholic: Jo, Feli, Regi and Kuni
The Malthouse: Kunihiro!
Lambton Quay, outside Supré: Go
My room on 3rd floor in Vic house: Trong. (I miss u as a neighbour, Trong!)
The bench outside Pipitea/Havana: Anette
The Norwegian Consulate: Lene
The water purifier in Vic House/every shoe shop: Joanne
Strawberry fair: My girls ;)
Civic Square: Geeta
Shitty Okey's/the couch: Manuel
The bench on Manners and Willis/Lyall Bay parade: Peter
The bench in the Botanical garden: Elisabeth
Michael Fowler Centre: Travis
Te Aro: Tarz

There's more but I should go to bed.
Mmmm, memories. I carry you all in my heart.

2000 words in 12 hours.... a bit drained and terrified that this is a shit essay... Exam tomorrow! Whoa.. wish me luck... Tuesday! Can't wait for tuesday... maybe finally some shopping??

Wide awake

It's 8:15 am now, and unfortunately I'm wide awake. I have to sleep soon! I've slept about 4 hours the last two days... It's quite worrying. Work last night was quite interesting.. I had to kick someone out, and there was HEAPS of work to be done.. I don't really think about it, but I basically go for 8 hours doing physical labour.. Which to me is quite all right. Think about all the ppl all over the world who do physical labour, and if they're lucky they get paid $1 a day.. I'm working with a Somalian guy called Dayib. I really like him, he is nice to talk to, and he tells me about stuff that I'm curious about. He came here from Somalia about 2 years ago, and I'm learning lots of stuff about Somalia, about how he views his religion (it is Ramadan now), just things that you wonder about but don't talk about. He is a very strict Muslim, which to me is a bit frightening, but it is also really interesting to learn what it's all about, and he doesn't seem to hate people that are of different religions (not that I think that Muslims do, it's just an observation). I'd like to go to Africa sometime. It's nice to meet new people.

I'm sooo busy right now, so I'm sorry to all of yous who are trying to get me on MSN, trying to arrange lunch, trying to talk to me and stuff. I've got a test today, a huge test tomorrow, one essay due by Friday, another essay due on Monday and an exam on Monday. It's a lot... Come Tuesday morning after work, I'm finally going to be able to relax again. Gotta go and try to sleep now. Hopefully I can.

Drowning in assignments

Soundtrac: Technohead - hippie

Today I spent the day in Petone, doing field research for my hostel-assignment. Damn, that place felt lonely.... longing for something that it didn't have. I just wanted to go home after 2 hours.


: the view from... close to the place where I'm building it. This is Petone. The city centre, anyway.




It was a gorgeous day, however, and I actually found a suitable spot to plot my environmentally sustainable hostel. Whay!


This is a sad promenade... it's almost as thought the town has lost something that it once had, and is longing for it.


So, after wandering around for a total of 4 hours, I feel like I know what I need to know about the place. I don't know why ppl would want to come here though, even though there is an absolutely awesome hostel, the town hasn't got much to offer. Strange choice by the lecturer...





I want to go back over there!
Welli, my babe, I'll never leave you for Petone.

Quiz-night

Guess who won the international student's quiznight? that's right! I, Elisabeth, Manuel, Christiaan and Loic .Haha, it was good fun. We had an awesome team name: the Hoff. In the end we came in 8 points ahead of the second team (and yes, there were more than 2 teams..) Manuel even won us two mugs of free grog, and Eli almost won us two more. :) After that we went home and I baked too many buns... We still have some, they're not doing too ok. :D

Good news!

Soundtrack: Snap - The Power

I've got a job! I'm now working two nights a week at the YHA in Wellington, as night manager. It's not at luxurious as it sounds though.. most of the workload is doing the laundry, and then on top of that I'm responsible for about 300 sleeping ppl, secruity checks every now and then, late comers and check-outs in the morning. I think that two nights a week is quite appropriate, possibly I'd go mad if I had to do more laundry than that. On the good side, I get to walk ard with a walkie talkie and feel veery important (snort). ^_^ Oh well, we'll see. Maybe I'll try to get another job on top of that, preferably during daytime. But hey, I'm saved! No more saving (although I really should be concerned about my spending anyway.. heh).

bored

Yesterday we had dinner with all the Stafford-people. 'Twas nice to just sit and talk shit for hours while waiting for food.. We were supposed to meet up with Loic and some ppl, but since it took 3 hours for the food to be served we didn't make it. Oh well, it's not the last chance. Tuesday is the international quiz night again! the goal is to do better than last time!
It's been a while since I was this bored... It's Saturday and since I'm sick I decided to stay home. So, I thought it would be a good idea to call up some friends at home maybe, but guess what. No one in Norway is at home today. Not even mum!

I surreder. I'm gonna read the last chapter of marketing that I wanted to read in bed before falling asleep.

a HUGE pep talk to myself (and to you guys as well)

Make promises to yourself that you can keep, and keep them. Be true to yourself. Start where you actually are today, and take it one step of the time. Don't make plans that are unachievable. don't pursue visions and ideas that will in the end lead to unhappiness. Work hard to reach goals that you perceive as important for your development. Cry whenever you feel the need to, there is no point in holding back. Don't be afraid to show your friends that you care for them and love them. Don't think that love is something that is reserved for everyone else but you. Let go of your fears that are keeing you back. Live in the moment, look to the future, remember the past. Don't compromise your own needs to accommodate the needs you believe that other people have. Don't rely on other people for your happiness. Believe in karma, live by the golden rule. Good things will end, but good things will come. Don't keep yourself down. Everyone chooses their path in life, don't depend on someone else to find your path. But don't be afraid of walking where other people have walked before, if you're going the right way, any path is the right one. Live where happiness lives. Treasure small moments, but don't get caught up in them. Laugh when you say hello, cry when you say goodbye. Follow your instincts. What you need will be given to you when you need it. Trust life.

Travel itinerary time

I finally got round to ordering my trip next year, and already stuff was almost booked out... thank goodness that I had the sense to do it now and not wait. So, not confirmed yet, but I'll probably be going to Germany for a week to see Manuel's place n surroundings before heading for Singapore to see my friends(!) and then onwards to Melbourne and then back to good ol' Welli. It's a familiar route, but I really don't mind seeing Melbourne again, I'm thinking of doing the last year of my studies there even. Ugh, so much planning!!!

Other than that: It's SPRING!!!

Late Happy B-day, Feli!

As usual I'm a bit late, and you'll have to wait for the stuff to reach you.. have faith! Have patience! I did not forget!

I hope you are having an awesome time in Korea, dear! :) Can't believe how fast time has flied since we were all happily living together in Vic house..

Big Birthdayhug from Tina.