19 November (again)

After that epic North Island Trip I had to buckle down for finals. I had two of them (which is half as many as most people had) and they were both at the end of the finals period and I hadn't studied since middle of October and it was now November. Studying for 5 days straight can get you on track real fast, but I still don't want to talk about it very much. I hate school here, there's too much riding on that one test.

BUT ANYWAY

A few days after finals (amidst all the goodbyes and other sappy stuff), we got the opportunity to go out to Te Anau (right next to Milford Sound) and stay with an old couple that knew a friend of mine. We rented a car and took our sweet time getting there. We turned a 3 hour drive into a 7 hour drive. We at subway on a sheep pasture, made friends with 4 year olds in a park, I learned to drive stick, tossed a football at a high school and
took a nap by a lake. Here's some pictures of that:

The place we were staying was SO NICE. The couple was super cool and overthetop generous. They run a bed and breakfast and they invited us because they weren't having anyone there for a couple days. The first day the weather was shitty so the husband showed us how to range things for a hunting rifle in the off chance that we went out hunting with him in good weather. We also set up their BluRay player.
The next day was a really nice one. They took us out on their boat and made breakfast there. We cruised around the Te Anau lake for the morning, then when we got back they seemed pretty tuckered out from treating us so well, so we took off. They also had a super awesome dog. Here's a picture from the boat, and a picture of the dog.

Now there's like nobody left in Dunedin and each night consists of three or four dudes hanging out watching TV or movies and having a couple beers.

Tomorrow, I leave for Australia. We're going from Brisbane to Sydney in six days and then staying in Sydney for a few more days. We're going to the Stereosonic Concert, which will without a doubt be off the chain. I'm not sure what else we're going to do, I get the feeling that most of us are all touristed out and just wanna relax on a beach or something. We'll have an RV, so we'll be able to sleep wherever we end up at night. I'm really looking forward to it and it'll be a nice last trip to round out my southern hemisphere semester.

A friend and I are also thinking about jetting to Queenstown when we get back to Bungy jump since we haven't had the chance yet. I've got this 2 for 1 deal that we could use and make it almost affordable. We've yet to figure that out yet though.

Sorry this was so rushed!
Until next time,

David

19 November

Approximately a month a go I posted about our epic south island west coast trip. My apologies, much has happened since then.

We got back and that very weekend the All Blacks were playing the Rugby World Cup final. They won. 8-7. The whole country went fucking nuts. The city center of Dunedin exploded. Castle St has a goddamn bonfire of couches going. It was a good night for just about everyone in New Zealand.

Shortly after that, me and two other friends hopped on a plane to Auckland. This was our epic North Island trip. We rented a campervan called the Jucy Condo. Jucy rentals are pretty clutch and come through with some great stuff. Our trip took us to the Coromandel Peninsula where there we saw Cathedral Cove and the Hot Water Beach. The Hot Water Beach is really cool because you can literally dig a hole in the sand and hot water will come up. If you dig it deep enough you can make yourself a hot tub to sit in. This happens because there is a molted rock about 2 km from the surface or something that heats ground water which comes up through the ground as steam, cool a little to become liquid again, then appears on the surface as hot water. Some of this stuff was really really hot. There was a couple that was actually hard boiling eggs in the water. Here's some pictures, the first is the cove, the second is the eggs.

After that we headed south to Rotorua and Taupo. Saw some stuff there that didn't impress all that much after the cool stuff we'd beens seeing for the past months. Rotorua has sulfur geysers everywhere so the whole town smelled terrible. Taupo was kind of nice, I took my first shower there in a public pay bathroom.

We were told that we weren't going to be able to do the Tongariro Crossing when we had wanted to do it (it's the hike that basically takes you through Mordor, it takes about 8 hours one way and you have the option to summit the mountain used as Mt. Doom in LOTR), so we headed up to Waitomo to do some caving. Here's some pictures of that:

After caving, we dipped south to get to Wellington for some night life. We made it, but were turned down from every club we tried to get into because of our attire. We figured our scent didn't help either. Living out of a campervan for 4 days and sleeping in parking lots and beside lakes wasn't optimal for hygiene. We eventually settled on a sake bar that actually let us in. There were white ladies working there that were pulling out pretty legit Japanese and talking to the Japanese customers. I was impressed.

We spent the next day in Wellington. Saw Parliament, went to a museum and saw a giant squid and some other stuff. Then we had to dip real hard up to the National Park, where we found out we could do the Tongariro Crossing the next day. Got in at midnight, crashed hard, woke up at 6:45, got ready for the hike, and hopped on the shuttle to the start. This was definitely one of the coolest things I've done in New Zealand and I highly recommend it to everyone who is fit enough to do an 8 hour hike of medium difficulty. There are some pretty hard parts, but you can just take em slow. We went through snow, mountains, forest to get to the end. Here's some picture from that too:

After that long ass hike, we headed North because our flight out of Auckland was in a day or so. We stopped in Hamilton where we some people we met in Samoa live and are studying abroad. They offered us some nice couches and a hot shower, something we couldn't pass up.

The next night we had to return our van by like 6 or something, so we ended up spending another weird night in the Auckland airport. We slept right next to the McDonalds. Interestingly enough, Auckland International Airport has been rated one of the best airports to sleep in. Case and point: I've spent two nights there, and one of my travel buddies has spent three nights there.

Got home sunburnt and tired, but it was most certainly an epic trip.

22 Oct

Last weekend was our big South Island West Coast Trip. The plan was for the 11 of us (that's right, 11) to leave Friday morning, head west, skydive over Wanaka, hike the Franz Josef Glacier, and kayak in Abel Tasman, all in time to be back in Dunedin on Tuesday. That was the plan.

What ended up happening is that we left so late that nobody was able to skydive because we weren't going to get to Wanaka on time. So instead we went to a place called Puzzling World. It's like OMSI, but instead of science and stuff, all they have is brain teasers and optical illusions. The whole thing was a big ass mind trip. It was well worth the stop. Here's what I'm talking about.

That's not actually what the bathroom looks like. And yeah their pants are down, but they're not actually pooping. This was right outside the bathrooms. Pretty strange.

After this we figured we'd get to the Glacier and stay the night there, wake up and do the hike. However, on our way out our van overheated. We pulled over to the side of the road and without reception, tried to figure this out.
Often times in situations like this it's best that everyone there not get involved. So while a couple people worked it out, the rest of us had a few beers and threw rocks. The scenery was damn fine too, there are much worse places that a van full of 11 people could break down.

We ended up having to stay the night in Wanaka while our vehicle situation got figured out. The van was out of commission and we needed something else. So we stayed in a hostel and had a decent night. There were hot showers, heated rooms, and a bar right downstairs.

The next day we got up, checked out, and went and chilled at a park for a few hours while we further sorted our vehicle situation. While we waited we thought of other things we could do with our day so that it wasn't a waste.
We eventually settled on quad biking at a place we heard about outside of Wanaka. And what a decision that was.
The quad bike adventure wrapped up with one guy smashing his face into his bike going off a jump, one of the girls tipping her bike into a stream and another guy falling off his bike going down a crazy hill. Despite the fact that we had a guide with us, we managed to do this. My quad muscles were sore the next day too.
This "guide" of ours was the most ridiculous man I've met in New Zealand yet. He was a guy from South Africa, who had retired from a career in stunting and monster trucking. The best word to describe this guy is "hick". He was also vain, arrogant, self obsessed, crude, racist, sexist and very homophobic - all in a sort of hilarious way. He tried to give us a lesson in psychology under the ruse that is was a part of his "briefing". The girls spent this "briefing" with their jaws dropped in shock, and the guys spent it laughing hysterically but mostly out of shock. It was a pretty fun time though and I'm glad we did it.
Here's me in my quad bike helmet, looking like the fuzz.

At this point now, we have two cars. One is a van holding 7 of us, and one is a sedan holding 4 of us. The plan is, since some people have finals they need to study for, they'll take the sedan home early and the rest of us will continue onward with the van. The sedan will split after our glacier hike on sunday.
But at this point in the adventure, it's saturday, we've just finished quad biking and we're heading to Franz Josef Glacier where we'll be staying the night. We won't be doing the Franz Josef hike though, because some falling rocks have ruined the walkway, so instead we'll be going to the Fox Glacier. No big deal, they're both glaciers and this one is cheaper for the full day guided hike.
The drive was beautiful. See for yourself.

Saturday night was the Wales v France Rugby World Cup semi final. Got to our hostel in time to frustratingly see the french win. I am not a fan of the french. Or their rugby.

The hike started at 9 in the morning and it was amazing. Our guide happened to be an American from the bay area, who's basically travelling the world and working as a mountain guide wherever he feels like. He was just in South America as well as Alaska doing glacier tours. I'm getting tired of typing so I'll just show you how awesome it was with pictures.

That night was the All Blacks v Australia match. All Blacks won, and it was awesome. They're playing in the final tomorrow night, and if they win, you better bet this whole fucking country is going to go nuts. This is going to be THE place to be in the world. And if the french win, i don't think anyone is going to be happy except the french. Nobody likes the french.

The next day, 3 of our travel companions left for Dunedin, while the rest of us prepared ourselves for the long drive up the west coast to Abel Tasman National Park. It was a 9 hour drive and I'm giving mad props to our driver who took us the whole way there and actually was the only one who drove the whole trip. Fucking great driver.

Once at Abel Tasman, we went straight for a hostel we had heard good things about called The Barn. It was 7:30 when we rolled in there, and apparently their reception closed at 7:00. There was a sign on their closed door that said, "make yourselves at home and we'll see you during regular open hours". We walked around and found that all the rooms were unlocked. So we made ourselves at home. We cooked in their outdoor covered kitchen and played drinking games with the Brits that were also staying there. Another pretty good night.

The next day we went sea kayaking. Our guide found a deserted beach where we stopped and he made everyone coffee. Nuts. Coffee on the beach? Never heard of such a thing. Time for more pictures, hope you're ready.

These pictures were not taken by me because I didn't bring the camera on the kayak. But they're pretty sweet pictures.

After kayaking half a day, our guide drops the bomb on us that we have to hike on our own the 6 miles back to civilization. So we took our leisure time getting back, since the day was so gorgeous and the weather was perfect. The Nelson area (which Abel Tasman is a part of) has the most sunny days per year than any other part of New Zealand. And it was damn sunny the day we were out and about on it.

The next day we spent 12 hours getting home. I don't really have much to say about that. We took some really cool piss breaks and stuff. All in all it was a good trip.

On Wednesday, I leave for the North Island with a couple of friends. We're going to see some really epic stuff. On the list of things to do will include the Hot Water Beach (where you literally dig a hole in the sand and it becomes a hot tub) and Mt Doom (it's not actually called that, but its the mountain from Lord of the Rings).

Til next time,
Peace out.

And remember, you don't stop playing because you get old, you get old because you stop playing.
Don't ever stop playing.

DFook

10 October

It's been almost a month since my last post and I'm sorry to anyone who's foolishly still reading this.

Thursday will be my last day of class here in Dunedin. After that I will have my finals on the 8th and the 10th of November. That's right, a solid month after lectures ended.

Until then I'll be spending my time travelling around New Zealand. We're going to drive up the West coast this weekend into next week, stopping in various national parks to see the sights and do some things. A few friends want to skydive over the Franz Josef Glacier park, I'm sure that will be amazing. I haven't decided if I want to beg for money to do it. From the glacier we'll be driving up to Abel Tasman National Park, then coming down through Christchurch, effectively driving the perimeter of the entire South Island. This West Coast drive is famous for being ridiculously gorgeous and I'm super excited to be cruising through it. I'll have to make sure to bring my camera charger. I hope this memory card is big enough for everything I'll want to photograph.

After that I'll probably start my studying a little bit for the few days I'll be back in Dunedin. At some point towards the end of October we'll be heading back down to the Fiordland to hang out with a family that became close friends with one of my good friends. They offered to take us in for a little while and take us on some super cool adventures that rural kiwis do. Some of the things I remember mentioned are hunting and hiking. It sounds awesome. While we're down that way, a couple of us might try to make our way back to Queenstown and do the Nevis Bungee Jump. I'm not sure I'll like leaving New Zealand without doing it anymore.


In case I don't get on here and blog for awhile again, I'll outline for you lonely readers what the rest of my trip looks like.
After that time back in the Fiordland I'm trying to be back in Dunedin for at least a week before my first exam so that I can effectively cram a whole semester of two classes into my brain. After the liberation of completing finals I'll be immediately leaving for the North Island, where a friend and I will be cruising around looking at cool stuff. Most notably, the Waitomo Glow Worm caves and Mt Doom (from LOTR). Of course, there are also a bunch of other things we'll be checking out, since we'll be out for around a week.
Then once we're back, I'll have about a day to start getting my departure affairs sorted out before I'm off on another adventure to Australia. It'd be kind of silly to be in this part of the world without getting to that country. There we'll be driving from Brisbane to Sydney (which is only about a 10 hour drive, but we'll be taking our sweet time getting there). In Sydney, all four of us have tickets to the Stereosonic concert, which is a giant electronic musician show with some of the biggest names of the genre. I know it's going to be off the chain.
I get back from Aus on the 30th and I'll have just a few more days in Dunedin as I leave the country for reals on the 4th of December. I'll be flying out of Christchurch to Nadi, Fiji where I'll have a nice 5.5 hour layover. Just enough time to get some souvenirs so I can pretend I spent real time there. Then I'll be flying to Maui where I'll be spending some quality time with the grandparents. They're getting kinda old and I missed the family vacation to Maui this summer. Since it's on the way home, I figured I could stop there for a little while. I'm sure I'll be real tired from all the travelling and fun that I will have been having in that past month, so these old folks will be just my speed.
I'll be back in my favorite place in the world, Portland Oregon, on December 10th. I know it's not going to be as good as I remember it, because frankly the last time I saw the place it was sunny. And though when I think of Portland the faces of all the people I love come to mind, I know that I won't get to immediately see them when I arrive. The ones that really count will be there, no doubt, but the others will be off at school still. Maybe my parents were right in telling me to stay an extra month out here, not that I'm complaining I guess.

But before any of the cool stuff I mentioned can happen, I need to finish two lab reports. Just two, and there's nothing else. I guess I have some other minor stuff that needs to get finished, but for the most part, that's it. Wish me luck.

Hope October treats you all very well.

David

19 Sept

Sorry it's been a super long time since I've blogged anything.
Actually that's not true, my Willamette class just started last week so I've done two "blogs" through that recently, just none here.

I just got back from Milford Sound in the Fiordland national park. 8 of us went on this trip and we rented two small sedans to do it. We stayed one night in a hostel in the actual sound, then left the sound and camped the next night next to a river in the Fiordland. We made our own meals each day, and managed to see some super super cool stuff. Every day was an amazing adventure. Since it's currently the offseason, the place isn't very crowded so it felt like we had most the National Park to ourselves. It was pretty sweet. Milford Sound is probably one of the coolest places on earth.

The first day we got into the heart of the Fiordland (this place is actually pretty big, takes around an hour and a half maybe to drive from the Sound to the edge of the Fiordland) and did a hike up to a summit. At some point along the way we crossed the snow level and we found ourselves hiking through snow covered paths. There were no tracks to follow, as the snow was fresh and undisturbed, and no view at the top because the clouds were too thick.
That night we walked from our hostel (the only one near the Sound) right out to the edge of Milford Sound and stayed there until it got dark. It was a scary walk back, but it was totally worth it.
The second day we checked out the warm hostel (remember it's just turning to spring right now so things are still pretty chilly here, think mid-March) and went on a cruise through the Sound. The cruise took about 2.5 hours and took us all the way out to the mouth and you could see the vast ocean that Australia was hiding somewhere behind. During the cruise I had myself a little scare when I looked at the ingredients of a bar I had just eaten and noticed that I had somehow missed the fact that peanuts were an ingredient. Then I thought I was going to die. I informed my friends about it (but not of the possible severity of the reaction) and they sat with me for awhile to see how I progressed. After like 30 minutes nothing had happened yet and I started to think I was somehow in the clear. We got off the cruise and went to find lunch and still no reaction. Strangely enough, throughout the day I experienced no reaction at all except a slight tinge in my side for a few hours. I honestly have no interpretation for this and am still dumbfounded about the whole thing. But I'm very happy that I'm still alive.
We then did a hike that one of the girls with us said was super cool when she was last there, though it might be different because of the snow everywhere. Turns out we couldn't do much of the hike at all because the snow elevation was too low, and the walk out to the closed off area ended up being over feet and feet of snow on shrubs, making it actually pretty dangerous. Someone would be randomly falling through the snow every few seconds, and my foot even got stuck once and needed a couple people to help me get it out. Nobody sustained any serious injuries so it was alright. Since there was a lot of snow there we stayed for a while and had some snow fights and rolled some massive snow balls down the hill. We also got to watch more than a few avalanches roll down the mountains surrounding us.
Then we hit Lake Marian (I think that's what it was called) and sort of spontaneously went on a 3 hour hike. The trail wasn't really a trail and would go from super steep climbing-with-hands hills to jumping down from ledges to slopping through mud in a matter of minutes. We started to worry that we were cutting it close with time and everything since it would be dark in a couple hours. Not knowing exactly how much farther we had to go didn't help either. But we eventually got there and the view of the Lake was amazing. We had each shed probably 3 layers throughout the hike and at the lake shed another couple and one guy even took all his clothes off and took a dip into the lake. Sounded pretty cold. After resting there we headed out.
We camped next to a river that night. It was really cold. It warmed up though since we had 4 people in each tent laid like sardines and packed for warmth. Dinner that night was mostly cold.
We came back the next day. One the way we stopped at a place that makes some pretty well known meat pies. They were good. I also snuck into a public bathroom that charged a $1 entrance fee (right? what the hell is that?). It was a pretty good trip.
Here's some pictures of it. I haven't even put these on facebook yet. I'm excited to see what other people have.

Try not to be too jealous.

Love you guys,
David

6 Sept

WUT UP GUYS???

It's been a long time since I last posted here. I'm too lazy to look at the last post to see where I left off, so I'm gonna just go for it.

Just got back from Samoa on sunday night. It was a super crazy epic week. The only dark spot of the trip was that on the last day I had some pretty severe sunburns. Like they were bad enough that some sores opened up on my face and started oozing pus and shit. I think they also got infected. It's all good now though, I'm almost through my bout of antibiotics and my face is starting to look normal again (as close as it gets at least).
While hiding from the world and feeling like a leper, I think I got to the bottom of how this happened to me. I had been doing a real good job of putting tons of sunscreen on everyday, paying special care to my face, neck, shoulders and vitiligo spots, but for some reason I woke up friday morning really fucked up. My reasoning leads me to conclude that I was probably somewhat burnt on my face before the events of thursday, which caused the burn I got thursday to be that much more severe. But so on thursday, our crew went on this waterfall/river hike. We met up with a local guide and hiked upstream a river. Along the way we would encounter these amazing waterfalls, and if you know anything about stream morphology you know that waterfalls create deep pools where they land. Furthermore, if you're into it, you'll note that deep pools are save to jump into. That's exactly what we did. We hiked all the way up this river, stopping at every waterfall to jump off rocks into the water. The highest jump was somewhere around 50 feet (the guide was nice enough to do the conversion for us). It was probably the highlight of my week. The thing is, I think swimming in these pools and jumping off these waterfalls caused the sunscreen I had applied earlier to wash away/rinse off. Then the half hour hike in the sun back to our starting point and the two hours I spent in the sun later took heavy tolls on my face.
Couple this intense UV bombardment with the years and years of skin damaging steroid and cortisone treatment I've done to my skin, the end result, I believe, is a pretty gross face. On my journey home from Samoa, I wore a Vailima (the local Samoan beer) hat to cover my forehead, and sunglasses to cover my eyes. I got the name of a nice pharmacist in the Samoan capitol of Apia from the family we stayed with thursday night, and she gave me some antibiotics since my face really wasn't looking so good, and some cream that would help with the eczema as well as kill the bacteria in the area. Now, roughly 3 days after waking up to that terrible sight in the mirror, my face is almost back 100% and I have a new appreciation for my handsome appearance. ;)

Anyway, sorry to be a buzzkill with that. Mom, Dad, Kristi, if you're gonna worry about me you might as well stop now, because there's nothing you can do from there. It's all taken care of anyway.

Here's a picture of our crew in front a waterfall.

Other than that epic journey chasing waterfalls, most of my time in Samoa was spent on a beach. It is, after all, an island in the tropics. We stayed in a place called Taufua Beach Fales. The fale we slept in was literally feet from the water. The staff that ran the place was on giant extended family and they were super cool. At first they seem a bit cold, but once you start joking around with them and they realize that you have a sense of humor they're super fun to hang out with. I don't think any of the staff were younger than 35 either, so it was all one big party. They would drink with us, play games with us, by the end of our stay there, they were one of us. There were probably around 100 guests there at a time and every night everyone was on the resort deck, speakers blasting having a good time. We met some really cool people at Taufua.
One day, one of the Taufua staff named Tele, challenged us all to a game of rugby. There were about 12 American guys there at this point, so we all took on the 5 staff members who felt like playing. Now, if you know anything about Samoan guys you know they're huge. Long story short, they kicked our asses and everyone was sore the next day. I actually wasn't so sore, though I took some of the biggest hits from these brown buses, I think my Aikido training way back in the day taught me how to fall gracefully. This was the second most awesome thing I did in Samoa (the first obviously being the waterfalls). The Samoans wanted to play again the next day, but my friends all pussied out, citing sore bodies and cut up feet (from beach rocks and shells). I was down to play, but it would've been even worse if the same 5 Samoans showed up and we had half our force. I think I really like rugby a lot, I'm just not real good at it.
A few times at Taufua they had a Fiafia or firedance. Here's some pictures of that. I think this is Tele in the pictures.

I've got a math midterm due this week, and a philosophy essay due next week. I think there's also a couple lab reports I should turn in soon. It's gonna be a busy week, but I had a pretty relaxed on last week, so I can't complain too much.

Love you guys (if you're taking the time to read my ramblings, you deserve my appreciation).

David

22 Aug

Hello, friends. Coming at you from a sunny Dunedin. I think it'll be good enough that I'll be able to run outside today, and not inside on a treadmill that cuts me off after 30 minutes (not really complaining though). Kinda crazy that just last weekend we were snowed in. This weather is like bipolar or premenstrual or something. Just can't seem make a decision on what season it is right now.

The other day I found out that the french guy that we almost beat the shit out of for saying some really bad things about America (like I had decided to leave out the shit he said about 9/11, which he probably should've been punched for) is actually neighbors with my cousin (that other asian guy from my school) and a bunch of my friends. In fact, my cousin's girlfriend lives WITH him. And he agrees; the guy is a huge asshole. I discovered that he lives there when I was walking by and saw a guy a recognized, politely said "'sup man" and kept walking, ONLY TO REALIZE THAT HE WAS THE FRENCHIE FROM QUEENSTOWN!!!!. I silently, tucked that little fact away within my brain, unsure of whether or not he recognized me, but he should ever feel like following the, "I will find you, and kill you" remark he had shouted in parting to my friend, I think he's in the wrong neighborhood for it. There are a lot of Americans on that block, and I think one other french person: a girl (who is also our friend and knows about the incident and sided with us. lol.).

This past week was pretty uneventful. With the cancellation of school on monday (due to snow hahaha) I got out of two of my four weekly lectures (only 4 last week, this week I have 5 because of the alternating schedule my math class has). Throughout the course of the week I then decided that I didn't feel like going to my other math lecture or my other philosophy lecture. I went to the tutorials (which are kind of like labs, or tutor sessions), but I realized on friday that I had gone to NO LECTURES that week. I had been to every tutorial and also my physics lab, but I had totally skipped all lectures. At the end of the week, I also found out I had managed to noticeably increase my grades in all classes. I'm not sure I've figured out how school here is supposed to work...I guess if I get good enough grades, I don't really care. In any case, I now have a B-something in physics (up from a C-something), a B(minus probably) in math (up from a C) and finally actually have a grade in philosophy (but I haven't gotten my essay grade yet, but it's probably better than a C). Yay for my adequacy!

I'm super duper excited for this weekend. On saturday I'm going to be waking up at 6:30 am to walk downtown and get on a bus. That bus will take me to Christchurch (a 6 hour drive) and then fron there I'll take some good old public transportation to the Christchurch International Airport (CHC). Since I have a few hours in between my flight and my bus arrival I'm hoping to check out some of Christchurch and see if any of the earthquake damage is still real apparent. Could be real interesting actually. Anyway, from CHC I'll be headed to Auckland, where we'll be hopping a plane to Apia, Samoa for the week. See what I didn't tell you is that this weekend is the start of Spring break (or midsemester break for those of you who get confused by Spring in August). My friends and I are going to spend a week on the warm beaches of Samoa, living in Fales. Here's a wikipedia picture of a Fale for your visualization convenience.

Try not to be too jealous.

The place we're staying has everything I could ever want. Free coffee, tea, bananas and mopeds are available to rent. I don't think I'll want to leave. There's even tennis courts nearby, but I don't think I'm going to feel too much like hitting when I can explore this tropical island instead (perhaps on a moped).

Samoa is on the other side of the international dateline too, so I'll be back in the same day as the US, actually behind you guys in time, rather than 19 hours in the future.

But before all my dreams of riding a scooter named Sasha around an island in the sun, cruzin with my crew can be realized, I have to get through this week. But even this week won't be so bad; I'm in New Zealand LOL. So here's to you mom and dad, and here's to this.

Catch ya'll on the flippity flop, in some flippity flops later.