The Grand Tour

When we first moved into Ilam we received a free voucher for the Christchurch Grand Tour ($100 value) which is a full day bus trip around the city and surrounding areas with various stops and activities. After being in NZ for a few weeks, me, Julie, Chelsea, and Laurie decided to redeem our voucher on the first Saturday of March (I think, sorry for not keeping up to date). Anywho, we woke up early and made our way to the city center at around 8:30 am and were greeted by our bus driver Owen who gave quite the commentary and kept trying to find us American girls some cute kiwi boys.

The first stop was the Mona Vale gardens in the city where we got out and walked around for a few minutes. Next was punting on the Avon River in Hagley Park. Punts are basically like gondolas except they're really shallow and close to the water. Our punter was an older Canadian gentleman who was decked out in proper punter attire with a vest, straw hat, and bow tie like someone from the '30s or '40s. He gave us a nice commentary and some random facts and history about NZ and Chch durign our ride but I think my favorite part were the black ducks. They were jet black with these yellow beady eyes and I'm telling you I've never seen such scary looking ducks in my life! They feed on the plants that grow on the bottom of the river so they actually dive all the way under water so you cant even see them and then they come back up like 30 seconds or so later. It was so funny/creepy to see these ducks popping out of the water all over the place. Before our ride was over Chelsea got to try punting which was pretty awesome and I must say she did a good job.

Our next stop was the Sign of the Takahe a restaurant that was built to look like a Scottish Castle in the Port Hills just on the outskirts of ChCh. Though the cafe was closed due to a private function we hopped out and took a walk to get a view of the city. Unfortunately it was cloudy so we weren't able to see the Southern Alps which you can see quite well on a clear day, but it was still an amazing view.

Continuing our drive though the Port Hills we next arrived at the Christchurch Gondola which has the most spectacular views of Christchurch and the surrounding areas. The Port Hills which were formed by a volcano are these steep barren hills that just look like the most ski-able bowls ever so naturally all I could think about was skiing the entire gondola ride up. Thankfully the clouds had started to disappear and by the time we reached the top we could see the Alps in the distance, Christchurch at the base of the port hills, and lyttleton Harbor on the other side.

Our last stop on the Grand Tour was Sumner Beach which is by far the best beach around here. We walked around the beach for a little while, took some jumping pictures, explored the caves which are in this giant rock outcrop on the beach, and then grabbed some delicious fish and chips, cider, and of course some ice cream. If I've learned anything about kiwis it's that they love their fish & chips, cider, and ice cream something I'm getting quite accustomed to. Sadly we were only there for an hour before we had to head back to Christchurch at around 3:00. All in all it was another amazing day in New Zealand.

P.S. I'm sorry for the horrible formatting with the pictures, I'm still trying to figure this thing out but am more concerned with actually keeping the blog up to date rather than making it look pretty. Maybe by the time I catch up to present date i'll have it figured out :-P

Events On Campus and Around Christchurch

The great thing about going to school in Christchurch is that there's always something going on. Since the first month or so of being here was the last month of summer, there were lots of end of summer parties and events.

Black Seeds Concert: The first week of being here was Orientation Week which consisted of concerts and events everyday on campus. Unfortunately they weren't free so the only one I atttended was the Amp It Up 2 concert (which I heard was by far the best). Headlined by the Black Seeds, the concert showcased some of New Zealand's finest dub and reggae bands and lasted from about noon til about 6 if I rememeber correctly. Since I'm a weirdo and of course had to download some NZ music over winter break before coming to NZ I knew all about the Black Seeds (prob NZ most popular band), Six 60, and King Kapisi the 2 other well known bands/artists that played in addition to some other smaller groups. Anywho, it was just my flatmate and Alex that went and we had SUCH a good time, one of the beset concerts I've been to (and I've been to a lot of concerts!) mostly because it was such a great atmosphere. It was at this small outdoor ampitheater on campus on a beautiful 80 degree day, sun was shining, the music was great, there was free sausages, and everyone was drinking which was so weird to go to a concert and see everyone legally drinking, and everyone was dancing just having a great time.

Chinese Lantern Festival: Went to the Chinese Lantern Festival in Christchurch one night to celebrate the Chinese New Year with a bunch of friends which was pretty sweet. Victoria Square was illuminated by hundreds of Chinese lanterns and displays of all shapes and sizes. There were vendors selling a bunch of different things one of them being coconut toast which was quite delicious. There were also 2 stages with live entertainment which was really cool (except for the group of teeny bobber girls doing karoke to some horrible pop song) and a fireworks display to comemorate the event. We had a great time just like every other night in Christchurch and continued our evenign by heading to Fish n Chips to dance the night away.

ENSOC BBQ: I also attended my first infamous ENSOC BBQ which was nuts. The theme was jungle fever so Alex and I got dressed up, put on some war paint and headed out to experience our first ENSOC BBQ which was as crazy as everyone says it is. Basically it's a 2 hour drink all you can eat all you can free for all with a live band and about 1500 students dressed up in crazy outfits. Needless to say we had an absolute blast and ended up meeting up with some of our friends once we were inside. The next bbq is tomorrow and the theme is time machine so we're going out now to find some cool costumes, can't wait!

A Typical Week Spent in Christchurch

Just to give you an idea here's what my typical week looks like when I'm in Christchurch.

Monday: 2 classes from 11-4, relax, cook dinner, get organized for the week, relax/hang out with friends/do whatever I want because I don't have class the next day

Tuesday: sleep in, no class, go grocery shopping, maybe do some laundry, do my online quiz due Wednesday, maybe some homework, take my time cooking a nice big dinner, relax, hang out

Wednesday: sleep in, maybe some homework, class from 3-5, dinner, whatever, LOST at Julie's at 9:30 (unfortunately NZ is behind a few episodes), bed at a decent hour

Thursday: class from 9-11, nap, homework/chill/beach/whatever because i have nothing the rest of the day, dinner, bed at decent hour

Friday: class 10-12, maybe nap, whatever, cook a big dinner, start celebrating the weekend in our flat or a friend's flat, sometimes dinner number 2 thank to Emir anywhere between 1 and 4 am, or lay low watch a movie and hang out

Saturday: hangin out, grocery shopping, maybe go into christchurch or Riccarton Mall, watch a movie, have people over to our flat, catch the bus into town, go to SOL Square (bar/club central in Chch) dance the night away, come home, dinner number 2 complements of Emir

Sunday: sleep in, relax, online quiz due Monday, maybe some work, relax


As you can see life in NZ is really chill and all about relaxation and enjoying time spent with friends with some occasional work. Honestly Kiwis and Aussies are the most relaxed people ever, it's awesome. As for all my relaxation and chill time this is what i typical do/do with friends: watch movies, watch Planet Earth, download music and movies on the hub for free, personal reading, just hanging out with friends, write, organize, cooking,whatever sounds appealing.

Sidenote: My grades don't transfer back to Geneseo, only the credits. Not that that means I'm going to take the Kiwi attitude and calculate my grade to figure out the minimum grade i need on tests to pass but it's sweet not having the additional pressure of grades.

Akaroa and First Week of Classes

First off, my apologies for not keeping this updated. I've been so busy having fun and travelling that this has fallen to the wayside. However, I have been taking notes and writing in my journal so I won't forget a single moment. I'll try to catch you up as quick as possible.


Akaroa: My first trip outside of Christchurch was a day spent with Julie and my 2 flatmates Jacob and Alex in Akaroa on the Banks Peninsula. We arrived after an hour and a half bus ride and hired kayaks to spend our afternoon kayaking around the harbor on a quest to find some of the rare Hector dolphins which Akaroa is known for. The weather was just as beautiful as the scenery which consisted of turquoise water, clear blue skies, and grassy mountains and hills surrounding the harbor. Jacob and I shared a kayak, swapped life stories, and thoroughly enjoyed singing I'm On A Boat (something that's been occuring quite often recently since I've been on so many boats). After an hour and a half or so of kayaking we decided to get out at this little rocky beach and climb up the side of one of the hills to get a good view. After climbing over a small electric fence and passing a few cows/bull we got to the top and turned around for a spectacular view. It was absolutely stunning and I was quite disappointed not to have my camera on me. Thankfully since it was the first stunning experience and landscape I had encountered in New Zealand I don't think it's something I will ever forget. After we walked back down and found some awesome seashells and paua shells on the beach we hopped back in our kayaks and paddled against the current back to the village still in search for some dolphins. Just when we had about given up hope b/c the village was in our sights and the dolphins are usually found out at the other end of the harbor by the sea, 2 dolphins swam right up to our kayak about 3 feet away. It was absolutely one of the coolest experiences of my life! I was totally in awe and incredibly excited since one of the main things I wanted to do in NZ was swim with dolphins in the wild. The pair continued to swim alongside us at a further distance for about 15 minutes, ah it was just so cool! By the time we got back after about 3.5 hours of kayaking we were exhausted and starving. We got the most amazing seafood lunch at this little seaside restaurant and had our first taste of Monteith's Crushed Hard Apple Cider which we fell in love with. Luckily for me hard cider is a huge thing here and it's sooooo gooooooood! After lunch we returned to Christchurch exhausted, sunburned, and overjoyed with our awesome day in Akaroa.







Classes: So as compared to the typical 5 classes per semester in Geneseo, the typical course load in NZ is 3-4 classes and it's even possible to take 2 and still be considered a full time student. I'm taking 3 classes: strategic management, international business (referred to as IB which always makes me laugh bc it makes me think of the IB in Geneseo) and marketing research, all of which are counting towards my degree back home. I have 2 classes on Monday, none on Tuesday, and 1 on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday…it's great and my earliest class is 10 which is even better. Only 1 of my classes requires homework which is 2 online quizzes per week. Other than I have 1-3 tests/projects per class and a final . Since there are 25,000 students enrolled class size is about 100-120 for all of my lectures. I'm shocked at how small the campus is for so many people. Honestly it doesn't feel that much bigger than the Geneseo campus. It's definitely bigger but not nearly as big as I expected it to be. Since class sizes are bigger, there's fewer classes, and some buildings have more than 2 floors the campus is quite compact. Unfortunately people don't go to class as casual here as in Geneseo ie: no sweatpants and t shirt combos. However heaps of people (guys and girls both) go to class barefoot and on skateboards and long boards .

Lectures are pretty boring just like back home but what's really nice is that all the lectures and powerpoints are posted online before class which makes note taking so easy. In my 2 or 3 week (I cant remember) I had to give a group presentation in this huge lecture hall in front of my 115 classmates which was pretty nerve racking but it's over now and I don't have that much to worry about for the rest of the semester. I've also taken 1 test which unlike home was quite formal. It was like taking a Regents exam in high school-had to arrive early, bags had to be left at the front of the room, exam booklets, pencils, and answer booklets were laid out every other seat and it was timed. Also exams are all at night and not scheduled during regular class time.

Something random: my group memebers thought it was crazy that I've never seen a bear, they think they're all over the U.S….they don't have bears or really much other land wildlife besides birds here oh and possums which are actually quite cute and fuzzy compared to the scary nasty variety of possums we have back home.

Orientation and Things I Learned in my First Week

My first Monday and Tuesday were spent at orientation which was actually quite enjoyable and entertaining even though it started at 9am both mornings. We were provided with breakfast and a delicious lunch. I continued to meet lots of really cool people, most from the U.S. and actually met some people who knew some of my acquaintances at Geneseo and possibly knew some of my friends at other schools in the Northeast...who would have thought I'd encounter so many small world experiences in NZ. I discovered that Kiwis are quite humorous and very entertaining to listen to. For example, the police officer who spoke to us was really chill, sarcastic, and basically mocking the police system which was pretty hilarious. On the first day we were sent on a scavenger hunt to get to know our way around campus which is beautiful by the way. The Avon river (more like big stream) runs right through campus which is very pretty and there's lots of trees and nice landscaping on campus. i was actually surprised at the size of the campus, it's quite compact for having 20,000 students, I can walk to all my class within 10-12 minutes and its mostly just walking from my flat to campus. So yeah orientation was quite painless and I spent the rest of my week getting settled in, meeting more people, and exploring the area.

Here's some things I learned in my first week of being in New Zealand:

• Kiwis love their bbq and by bbq i mean a sausage on a slice of bread with"tomato sauce" a different form of ketchup...i think i ate a free sausage everyday for lunch for the first week on campus
• You can almost always pay in exact change. Tax is included in the shelf price so whatever an item is marked as is what you pay and almost everything is in nice round numbers and if a price is uneven they round up or down. Coins are 10, 20, 50 cents, 1 dollar, and 2 dollars and bills start at 5...the money system here is such a beautiful thing-I LOVE IT
• Lemonade means Sprite, not real lemonade...it took me until 2 days ago to hunt down some real lemonade which was a miracle. Unfortunately I drank nearly all of it which is going to require another trip to Pak N Sav (a newer bigger, better, cheaper grocery store that we have to take the bus too)
• K-12 is required to wear uniforms. It's so weird to see tons of kids dressed in different school uniforms all over the city and on the public bus system once school is out.
• Eggs aren't refrigerated but dog food is, very strange
• Paper is longer here which means longer essays, darn
• Prostitution was recently made legal
• Drinking in public is legal and perfectly acceptable except for in some restricted zones like the city center
• There's a hole in the Ozone above New Zealand (learned this the hard way with a little burn, and lots of peeling which is weird b/c i never peel)
• Nutrition information is recorded in ENERGY with units of kJ (kilojoules) as opposed to calories...makes me feel so much better about consuming energy rather than calories
• They have nearly every flavor of chips available Ex: chicken, lamb and mint
• CADBURY IS HUGE!!!!! MY FAVORITE CHOCOLATE...I'M IN HEAVEN! Also Whittaker's the famous chocolate company is a NZ company...chocolate is great here!
• Iced coffee has ice cream in it! Kiwis love ice cream

First Weekend in Christchurch

So my first night in New Zealand was spent hanging out with my flatmates and meeting lots of neighbors in the block across from us that all of our windows face so people are always shouting back and forth across the balconies, there was even mention of creating a zipline. I've met so many people in the past 2 weeks and had to introduce myself so many times that I was tempted to make a shirt that read:

Hi my name is Erika

I'm from NY

NO NOT NYC

I'm here for 1 semester

I'm studying Commerce

It's nice to meet you

What's your name again?

That's basically what the first few days consisted of over and over and over again, but it was awesome to meet so many people especially from all over the world.

Since I stayed up until midnight my first night I didn't experience too much jetlag but I had absolutely no conception of time which i think was mostly due to losing a whole day during flight-i just didn't have a wednesday and also going from winter to summer really threw me off..i'm still getting used to the fact that it gets dark at 9:30.

During the day i got my room all set up and went grocery shopping at Countdown which is about a 15 minute walk from my flat which was quite the experience. Everything was so foreign and confusing because certain things go by different names Ex: granola =muesli and all the American brands I'm used to buying of course cost so much more than all the NZ brands b/c of the cost to import them. One of my favorite thigns so far about New Zealand is that they're HUGE into Cadbury chocolate...my favorite kind of chocolate if you didn't know. So cadbury eggs are everywhere and every other type of Cadbury chocolate imaginable, and its cheap. I'm currently eating a bit of Cadbury coconut rough chocolate....itss soooo goood. Today in my strategic management class I learned that NZ is the biggest exporter of dairy products in the world and they have a dairy products surplus of about 90-95% so yes NZ dairy products are really good...which makes for really good chocolate :) Also, theyhave Kiwifruit Chocolate which is really good. It's funny, since New Zealanders are called Kiwis, the call kiwis (the fruit) kiwi fruit. We found this out by having a conversation about eating kiwis (the fruit) w/o distinguishing btwn kiwi and kiwi fruit which led to some serious confusion with our Kiwi friend.

For our first Friday night in NZ I went into "town" (downtown Chch) with Julie (from Geneseo), her flatmate Laurie (from WI) and our friend Katharina (from Germany). We had a blast but were surprised to find that it was pretty dead, apparently Friday isn't that big of a going out night, most people go out for happy hour and then save up their energy for Saturday which is big. We had some Pavlova(a traditional NZ dessert) at a little cafe then continued on to a small bar called the Bard on Avon Ye Old English Pub ( there's a river that snakes around Christchurch called the Avon River pronounced with a long A like Straford upon Avon as opposed to the Geneseo short A version...confusing me even more). It was really nice though, there were 2 guys called Oliver and Topia playing these sweet acoustic covers-they were great! We also made quite the impression on Kiwi rockin a mullet who loved to talk about BBQs, quite a character...veryyyy entertaining. We then proceeded on to another bar where we were treated to some delicious free appetizers, some of the best I've ever had. The best thing about going out in New Zealand is there's no cover charges and tipping isn't customary so we had a night on the town for $17 USD which was awesome!

Sidenote: When you get IDed you have to show your passport it's show strange. What also weird is not getting IDed most of the time because the drinking age is 18. And what's even weirder is seeing school stuff sponsored by alcohol and getting coupons for bars and alcohol during orientation and enrolment. Also, all the on campus clubs try to entice students through free alcohol, it's pretty funny. I actually joined the engineering club called ENSOC which is basically a huge social club, hundred/thousands of ppl join just for the free BBQs and parties and they have a few other events and bus trips planned to places I'm looking forward to visitng.

ANYWAY, we spent our beautiful sunny Saturday exploring the city of Christchurch. First we got our metro(bus passes) then we walked around downtown , and got some ice cream which was mixed with fresh fruit right there at one of the vendors in the square. The city center is really pretty and filled with a bunch of vendors and there's lots of neat little shops and restaurants and cafes and bars. We went into Chch Cathedral which was beautiful and did the tower Climb which was really neat. It's 134 steps up this tiny spiral staircase (which reminded me a lot of Ireland), I was so dizzy by the end but the view overlooking the city was worth it! We then went home, had dinner, got changed, and went back out with some of our flatmates and friends into the city to dance the night away.

I spent Sunday at New Brighton Beach with some of my flatmates and our new friends from France and Switzerland. Although it was cloudy we still had a really fun time and played soccer or football on the beach which was a blast. We saw a couple getting married on the pier which was really cute, and reminded me that it was Valentine's Day which i completely forgot about, like i said i had absolutely no conception of time, and still don't b/c the who sun setting so late and the fact that I've been so busy and haven't even had the need or want to look at the time. When we got back that night we celebrated Vday with a bottle of champagne and the chocolates Mom sent me off with-THANKS MOM YOU'RE THE BEST! After that, finally went to bed early in order to be prepared for orientation that was to follow the next day.

My Flat

When we got to campus we were shown to our "flats" aka apartments which are part of the campus and about a 5 minute walk to the actual class buildings. There's a bunch of different "blocks" aka apartment buildings located around a central quad which is a really nice place to hang out for people and ducks alike (there are ducks everywhere!). Since all of the international students are placed in the Ilam Apartments, I'm surrounded by people from all over the world which is really cool but the majority of international students are from America ( my 2 non American flatmates are calling it the American invasion). Anywho I ended up in a pretty diverse flat which is great. Our 5 person flat is made up of me, Alex a sophomore from UVM who is here for 1 semester, Jacob from Montana who is getting his second degree at the University of Canterbury (from now on referred to as Uni Canty or just Uni), Emir from Paris who is doing an internship here at the Uni for 1 year, and Rebecca who is originally a kiwi but has been living in Australia for the past 7? years. We each have our own bedroom which is nearly the size of a double dorm room from back home and the beds are definitely wider than Geneseo beds which is sweet! We have 2 bathrooms which each have their own shower so we designated a boys bathroom and a girls bathroom which is quite convenient. We have a fully furnished kitchen and a living room with 3 couches, and a small flat screen tv. But my favorite part is the balcony, even though it looks directly at another building (as does my window which my desk is in front of) it's soo cool! We've had a few dance parties on the balcony already which is always a fun time. One thing that's different than at home is that there's no screens on any windows because there's barely any bugs here. Other than the extremely loud humming of the cicadas I've only seen a few flies which is soooo nice. I can just leave my winow open all the time and not really worry about bugs-can't do that at home! Oh another fun fact, all of the flat buildings are solar powered; when you open a window the heat turns off...very eco friendly here in new zealand. But yeah, I love my flat, it's awesome....and Emir is a realllly good cook! By the way, I'm going to come home speaking French (or with an improved vocab of useless french slang) and cooking Tunisian/ Arabic/French food...last night we had some delicious crepes! So far the only problem or slight downfall that I've encountered while here in NZ is the fact that the 3 boys i live with love Sardines...our fridge smells GROSS, but I think i can live with that minor misfortune.