Alternately titled “Misadventures in Meetup”. Now that I’ve semi settled in to Auckland, I’ve been trying to find ways to keep myself busy in a place where I know no one. I think people like me are the main reason meetup.com is so popular. I may or may not have joined 20 meetup groups in Auckland so far….go big or be bored, right?
First up, a co-ed walking/hiking group, who I was meeting for an evening walk through the Auckland city center, along the coast, past the Prime Minister’s house and the Auckland Museum, and ending at a bar/coffee shop. I met a lovely English girl around my age who had just relocated to Auckland as well. She was living in a backpacker’s hostel and looking for work as a teacher. We chatted over how expensive things were here and how odd it is to be in a new city and not know a soul. But of course, no meetup is complete without obnoxious boys who try to hard at everything. You know how male dolphins will separate a female dolphin and force itself on her? The guys of meetup have tried to employ this very technique, but aren’t as smart as dolphins. The girl and I are trying to see the sites on a walking tour, yet everywhere I look there’s an obnoxious guy in my face wanting to know what I’m up to this weekend. Socially awkward guys of meetup, GET A CLUE. The more you press us, the easier the decision will be for us to block you before you can send 10 unanswered messages. Anyway…besides the annoying boys, the walking tour was nice
Next up was an all-girls outing, yay! Now I’m not normally a fan of the zoo, but I am a fan of making girl friends here. So on a nice sunny day, I ventured 45 minutes across town on a bus to see an elephant that had just arrived at the zoo. I met 11 girls from meetup, and all of them were so fun! We took the obligatory group and “fun” photos on the way in–nothing like meeting a group of strangers and trying to look like we all belong together after having known each other all of 60 seconds!
We had a lot of fun, lots of laughs during the day. We stopped mid-afternoon to have lunch at the zoo cafe, which was really nice. And we saw a Kiwi bird!! I feel like as a proper NZ’er, I should know a lot about Kiwis. But I failed at step 1: identifying a Kiwi. Kiwis are apparently very very shy and nocturnal, so they’re in a dark quiet enclosure inside, and you can’t walk quickly or make any loud noises. And even still, it’s not guaranteed that the Kiwis will be out and about. Someone pointed at a giant chicken-sized bird excitedly, and I thought aww how cute, someone’s never seen a chicken before. But no, as always I am the jerk, because it turns out Kiwis are chicken-sized birds with reeeeeeally long beaks. Who knew! So…I’ve officially seen a Kiwi, NZ might as well give me residency already. Other highlights of the zoo trip were learning that a firefox is a real animal (and a super cute one at that!), seeing a wallaby for the first time, seeing a tasmanian devil and learning that they’re actually just large rodents, and crawling through the tunnels underneath the meerkat enclosure. What’s that you say, they’re made for 8 year olds? I’m not afraid to push an 8yo out of the way to poke my head up into a meerkat colony.
The Auckland Zoo is highly recommended–it’s quiet, has really nice landscaping, and you can get a lot closer to the animals than at other larger zoos. It’s not too expensive, at $28/day.
Now to continue my touristy NZ weekend! Besides the beaches in Europe, where can you find men in the shortest shorts possible before being indecent? That’s right, a good old rugby game. I joined yet another meetup group to watch the NZ All Blacks vs Australia’s Wallabys (yes, that is their real name). I never knew that Australia and NZ were so competitive! Everyone in meetup was so excited to explain all the rules and nuances of rugby to me, and to tell me why NZ is the greatest country on the planet, and why Australia is the armpit of the universe compared to NZ. We went to a local pub that was showing the game on the big screen, and people were crammed in to watch. Rugby is actually a really fun sport to watch, as the action almost never stops. Peoples eyes can get gouged out, they can lose a limb, and they’d still be playing. American football, I’m looking at you to learn a lesson about not having downtime! There were NO commercial breaks except at halftime. Can you imagine such a sport??
The All Blacks are famous for their pre-game Haka. Just take a minute and go look at that picture. A whole team of muscly men do a tribal dance to intimidate the other team, complete with yelling, tongues, crazy faces, and throat slitting motions. It’s really fascinating, and it brings all of NZ to a standstill watching. The game was really intense, with NZ losing in the end. The general consensus was that all of NZ would be in a bad mood for the entire next week or so–rugby is so ingrained into people’s lives. Oh, and I noticed that the All Black’s office is next door to mine in the same building, so I’m hoping to get lucky enough for a player sighting sometime soon!
All in all, it was a nice weekend. Sometimes being a tourist can be fun, if you’ve got the right crowd with you to explore! And watching the game definitely made me a fan of rugby–I absolutely have to go see a live game now!