The Greatest Place Ever
By our second day in Golden Bay, we already had our suspicions that it was the Greatest Place Ever, and we amended our plans so that we would stay an extra night and forget about going back to Abel Tasman with the kayaking teens, who would just wear us out with their youth and vigor.
Once again, we dragged ourselves out of bed at 10am, and went back to Takaka. Since we had just driven through the day before and not stopped, we decided to go back and check it out properly. It is The Greatest Place On Earth, I kid you not. It is not only full of charming hippies with organic restaurants and food stands, but it is also home to the Best Supermarket Ever.
I thought the supermarket might be the world’s greatest when we pulled into the parking lot and there was a kid outside moving carts wearing a Cat in the Hat hat. It only got better when we entered the supermarket and not only did one person have a ridiculous hat, but ALL THE EMPLOYEES HAD THEM. Even better, the store had actual food that we would like to eat, like brie! and meat! and Branston pickle! For some reason, I turn into a 4-year-old every time I go to the supermarket and start randomly grabbing things I don’t need off the shelves. This time was no exception. We spent $115 at the supermarket, and they CARDED T for buying the Mussel Inn black beer (which he had so vigorously claimed to hate the day before). Aaahahahahaha, you only have to be 18 to drink in New Zealand and they didn’t trust his driver’s license…they made him get his passport! I am married to McLovin.
After the market, we went back to PuPu Springs, which turned out to be appropriately named. The springs were meant to be the biggest cleanest springs in the history of time, but they have now been infested with Didymo algae, or “rock snot.” Mmm, pretty. So now you can’t swim in them or even touch them or look at them too closely, or you might spread the dreaded Didymo. So we looked and left. It was a real thrill.
We ended up pucknucking again on our way back to our campsite, and taking a nice walk on another beach. On the road to the campsite, we were stopped for roadworks and the man with the sign started giving us travel advice. Kiwis are so helpful, even at work!
When we got back to the site, the tenters were still there and appeared to have done nothing but sit in their camper all day and read. ??? The mystery continues!
T was pretty hepped up about the idea of swimming in the ocean, and I gave in in an attempt to be brave. After the numbness set in, it was actually quite lovely, and it seemed to be feeding time for every bird in the bay, so they were divebombing all around us. T claimed it was perfectly normal to go swimming at this time of year in this area, which I didn’t quite believe, given that there was no one around and another camper VIDEOTAPING US.
After the swim, we tried to go to the cafe across the road, but they were too busy for us, so we ended up cooking tacos in the van. No tent for the neighbors (I am not going to spell this word anymore), because it was really windy. Or so we’re guessing…
On the way to Golden Bay
We woke up at 8am, which was the earliest we have risen yet. As far as we are concerned, the sun does not even rise before 10am in NZ and it should remain that way. We had planned to get up at 8 and then try to go kayaking, but then 8 rolled around and we found ourselves frozen in the bed. It’s clearly some kind of medical condition. We would get it checked out, if we weren’t so busy sleeping. We decided to skip the kayaking and come back a few days later.
While we were preparing to leave for Golden Bay, a funny little dog appeared out of nowhere and came over to me. I gave her the love, and suddenly she became completely fascinated with T. T is not a huge fan of dogs, and remained immune to her doggie charms even after she dragged a giant branch over to him and began to cry. My dirty stinkeye finally pulled him out of his state and he started to play with her for about 20 minutes. It was truly hilarious. The dog was nuts about T, probably because he is such a hard sell. I would have been devastated that she didn’t like me best, were she not so hilarious trying to win his affection.
After leaving Abel Tasman, we headed to Golden Bay, which unfortunately is located over ANOTHER giant hill that looks as if it will take about half an hour on a map. In reality, it takes 36 days. We cruised through Takaka, the main town in the area, and headed to PuPu Springs. When we got to the springs, we saw a sign that said you couldn’t swim, so I pushed for having lunch and coming back later. Man, the whining that came out of the man. Waaaaah, he wanted to go PUCKNUCKING. Waaaah, why didn’t I want to go pucknucking too? Waaaaah, no one’s life has ever been so hard in the history of time. Fortunately, he was distracted on our way out of PuPu Springs when he HIT AND KILLED a bird. MY HUSBAND IS A BIRDSLAYER!
As I predicted in my infinite wisdom, the whining ceased when we got to the Mussel Inn, where we had lunch. Not only did they serve delicious greenshell mussels, but the Inn is a tiny little microbrewery, so T got to eat mussels with garlic bread and drink Dark Horse black beer. Were he not driven to moan about the pucknucking for hours to come, he would have admitted that it was a very good idea indeed.
From lunch, we went up to Whaririki Beach, which is at the end of 6km of unsealed road and a 1km jaunt through even more farmfields. We are so totally screwed when we go to immigration, I promise you.
This time, unlike the ‘waterfalls’, it was actually worth it. The beach is a giant stretch of the most stunning rolling dunes you have ever seen, which are made up of this really fine and warm and soft pale sand. It was like walking through heated velvet. We wandered the beach for ages and I took all kinds of bizarre shots of the sand, and accidentally found a giant seal in a cave. A boy had walked over to it, and I heard a weird yawp. I thought the kid was just mucking around, so I walked over after he left and almost walked right into a giant seal that was obviously just waiting to attack me and eat me for dinner. T noticed another seal in the far corner of the cave, waiting to get him next. Later, we found a giant carcass that T thought was a cow, which had clearly been gruesomely killed by the evil seals.
We spent ages at the beach, and I was really sad to leave. The sky had gotten really dark just before we got there, so the light made everything seem much more dramatic than it would have been in the sun. Cara, you understand about ‘the light’, so you will know what I mean.
From there, we tried to go to Farewell Spit, but weren’t allowed to walk on it. Instead, we looked at it from ANOTHER field full of cow and sheep poo, and pretended to be impressed.
Then we went to the campsite. This was the best one yet, if I do say so myself. And guess who found it? Not T, if that’s what you’re thinking. This one was on. the. beach. And not like that scary book about the end of the world on the beach. It was backed up right up to a beautiful deserted beach that stretched for miles and miles.
The last time we were on such a lovely deserted beach, I was completely paranoid about being eaten by a croc and dying a grisly death, so this time we were quite happy to take advantage of this crocodile-free zone. The beach was full of some of the greatest shells and rocks I’ve seen yet, and I tried not to steal them, I really did. Some just jumped into my pockets and THAT’S THE STORY I’M TELLING.
After our romantic walk, we came back to the van and made dinner. We ate more delicious dips and breads on the picnic table outside our camper, and moved inside when the bugs began to swarm and feast on my flesh. We ate a mediocre pumpkin soup and some cheese sandwiches, and then spied on our neighbors (I just spelled that with a U. Kill me now.) for a while.
The neighbors (I just did it again) were an older couple in a much bigger camper van than ours. Suddenly, at about dusk, they pitched a tent outside. What was the point of this? Why rent a giant camper, if you are going to sleep outside? (This is when my grandmother and other delicate eyes must AVERT!)
STOP READING HERE, DELICATE EYES!
We wondered whether they were going to have dirty tent sex. We wondered this not because we are perverts, but because we know people who have fallen prey to this behavior and they ended up with a BABY! We thought of warning the neighbors (good God, a third time) about the dangerous risks of acting in this way, but T figured that they were probably too old to worry about it, while I thought they might have been doing it with that specific goal in mind! Either way, we never saw who was sleeping in the tent or what happened, because it got too dark. We will never know the answer and it will torment us forever.
Brewery, winery, grumpery
TRAGEDY! We awoke to discover that my hairdryer appears to have kicked it in NZ. Either it has died forever, or it refuses to work in the campervan. Either way, it means my hair will be WILD for the next few weeks. Medusa, you’ve got competition, baby!
From our adorable campsite, we drove to Nelson. Unfortunately, I had not fallen asleep until 5am, so life was seeming increasingly less adorable with every passing hour. However, it was T’s turn to drink and my turn to drive, so I did my duty, suffering in near silence.
We got to Nelson, where T decided to begin his boozing at the Founders Brewery, which is inside some kind of funny heritage park. I was a little weirded out until I saw both a BLAT and a veggie burger on the menu, and then my stomach made the decision that the place was okay. T got the redhead beer, fittingly enough, and I drank water, being the responsible teetotaler that I am.
After lunch, we decided to check out the town. I’m sorry to report that there ain’t much to report. Nelson reminded me a lot of Launceston, in Tasmania, and that’s not a great endorsement. It seemed nice enough, and we spent a few hours in an internet café before hitting the road for the wineries.
Our first winery, Waimea Estates, was closing ten minutes after we arrived. Unfortunately for T, it meant he had to down his wine very quickly. After 10 minutes of awkward silence with the woman serving us, we left—paying nothing because he only tried three beers. Great success! The next one, Seifried, was Austrian and the oldest winery in the area. The woman there was much more talkative, and helped T through about 8 tastings. He liked three, and we ended up buying a Gewurtztraminer, which is pretty popular in the area, but we had never heard of, being so ignorant about wine that we aren’t even able to sniff it with accurate pomposity. We hadn’t liked too many of the others we tried, this one was super delish.
Finally, my delightful personality began to wane, giving over to my less-than-charming side, which is most aptly described as Satanica. T and I started fighting about his navigation skills, which he still maintains were superb and I think were marginal. We tried two different caravan parks before we finally found one we liked, a million miles from anywhere. It was called Old Macdonald’s Farm, I kid you not, and as soon as we got there, I slept for an hour in the sun while T cooked us a stirfry.
When I awoke, we ate and then I started and finished Water for Elephants, to T’s dismay. I liked it even though it almost made me cry repeatedly, though that could well have been due to my extreme exhaustion or my propensity to cry at anything, including radio advertisements.
NZ roads are just adorable
The next day, we awoke to more brilliant sunshine and headed to a nearby nature preserve for some picnicking and hiking. In the parking lot, we met a very chatty couple who spends half the year in Nelson, and the other half in England. I wanted to ask them why they didn’t spend the whole year HERE, but I thought that might seem rude, when it is simply obvious.
We made our little picnic and headed to a very green and open clearing in the preserve, which had a couple of campervans parked there. We ate our lunch on the very well manicured grass, and after my mandarin, I went to go wash my hands. There was a woman already in the bathroom, using the tap, so I waited tor her to finish. She gave me a few suspicious glances, and then left. I began washing my hands when she suddenly returned. She stood in the doorway and muttered something at me. I didn’t hear her, so she gathered herself up to her full height and yelled, “ARR YEW PUCKNUCKING HERRRR?” I have never been more terrified. I nodded and ran away as fast as I could.
To escape the wrath of the screaming woman, we started our walk into the woods. It was very cool and green, as you’d expect, and we saw two ‘waterfalls’: one which was more of a mossy wall with water dripping down, and another at the end of another clear watery pool, hidden behind greenery.
We decided to check out Havelock next, because T needed cash and it was meant to be quite cute. While we were en route to Havelock, the traffic was stopped for no apparent reason, and a bunch of people got out of their cars to wander. There was an elderly gentleman who was making his way back along the queue of cars, explaining the delay. He got to us, and told us it could be5 or 10 more minutes, he wasn’t sure which, and then told us all about his family in Connecticut and Boston. I contemplated bringing him with us, because he was so entertaining, but then he scampered back to his car and the traffic started back up. We wandered Havelock for a little while before we discovered there was no ATM, and not much to Havelock. Thus, it was on to Picton, the nearest town with an ATM.
It should be said that I was driving on this day and that I am obviously the most masterful driver who ever lived (this is when my mother will try to convince you that I learned this remarkable ability from her. DO NOT BELIEVE HER. She is not to be trusted). It is very difficult to drive on the wrong side of the car on the wrong side of the road on roads that refuse to remain straight. What we didn’t realize about Picton was that to reach it, we had to drive along the Queen Charlotte Drive, a ‘scenic route’. In NZ, ‘scenic route’ apparently means ‘road that is guaranteed to make you spew chunks’. And so we wound around and around and around the Queen Charlotte Drive, glimpsing occasional views of the gorgeous aqua water in the Marlborough Sounds, and trying not to careen off the side to bloody, mangled deaths.
The good news was that Picton had both an ATM and a library with Internet. The bad news is that there wasn’t much else, so we had to get BACK on the Queen Charlotte Drive of Doom. T had found a good-looking campsite in our brochure, so we headed there. He promptly fell in love with the proprietor, who gave him freshly baked banana muffins, causing him to declare her ‘adorable’ about 500 times until I showed him the back of my hand.
The campsite was in the middle of an enormous valley, and was on a farm. The ADORABLE woman had given T directions to yet another waterfall, so we trekked through numerous fields, over electric fences, past some bored-looking cows (is there any other kind?) and into some more woods. The walk, which T had promised would be ‘quick,’ took far longer than I expected and grumpiness ensued. The waterfall, as I expected, was merely a trickle of water. I contemplated throwing T into it, but then realized I would have to drive the van for the next two weeks on my own, so I let him live another day.
Finally, we made it back to the campsite, where we had some lovely baba ganoush and some not-lovely hummus with pita bread and some of our newly bought wine. We played Scrabble again, and T used the wine to distract me from my game, which shall not happen again. Scrabble Mary does not lose. We cooked brie and apple sandwiches and went to sleep underneath a larger sea of stars than I think I have ever seen before.
Cold water will sober you up real quick
I should have mentioned in the last section that the day we went wine tasting was about 90 degrees outside. Initially, we thought this was fantastic, but as I continued to dehydrate myself in various ways, it soon became apparent that it was too hot for us, as well as for the pinots.
After the craptastic English pub (and I’m not being mean here––T agrees it was crappy), we went north to Havelock. We couldn’t find the place we wanted to stay, so we followed a road into the hills for approx 375 miles. When you’re only going 35 miles, everything seems longer. We arrived at a campsite that had a sign saying the owners weren’t around, but we should pick a site. We did, and then we went ‘sploring. Behind the campsite was the most beautiful clear river I have seen in a long time (though it is entirely possible it seemed this way because I was not only still a little tipsy, but also sweaty and dehydrated).
The owners were down there, basking in the waning sun and SWIMMING in the cold, lovely water. They also had not one but TWO English pointer dogs, but only one was interested in love, so the other was dead to me. They told us to swim. Being obedient, we did. It was glorious. Don’t get me wrong–it wasn’t warm, but on a day like that, warm is totally unnecessary. The only problem was the BUGS, which appeared in a new form: sandflies, which suck blood from your body as YOU SIT THERE AND WATCH THEM. Bastards!
After swimming, we enjoyed a delightful and romantic dinner of spaghetti O’s and hot dogs, and a game of Scrabble that I clearly won because I am Scrabble Mary. It should be mentioned that this campsite was very quiet, with only us, some Germans, two other sets of women, and a tent with two teenaged girls who were either high, bored out of their minds or socially stunted, because they played hide and seek and played skipping games for ages.
T’sssh shoooo luckeeee
After leaving Hanmer Springs, we planned to go to Blenheim. What we didn’t realize when we made this plan was that we were leaving Hanmer Springs rather late and that the drive would take approx. 47 years to get to Blenheim. By the time we arrived, it was getting late. Things were closing and we were grouchy. We couldn’t find the motorpark we wanted, and after a spectacular argument (which was of course all T’s fault), we continued on. We found another one, but since I’m 99% sure there were murderers lurking inside the dingy bathrooms waiting to slit my throat with rusty knives, we hightailed it out of there, to stay at the Top 10 tourist park in Blenheim, which was also far from ideal. Why, you ask? There were PEOPLE there. Lots of people. Close to me. People make me twitch. This is never a good situation.
The next day we woke up, had some breakfast and got out of Dodge. The deal was that T would drive and I would winetaste. It sounds like a terrible deal, but it was really okay–mostly for me, and I make the rules. So we started hitting wineries. We went to Cloudy Bay and Allan Scott, where we purchased a pinot gris. We went to a little one whose name I forget, and we tried to go to Hunter’s, but there was a bus tour of doom so we screeched out of there as fast as we could. Then, since I was starting to see double, we decided to do just one more. Little did I know that the final winery would be the one that broke me. The woman working there, Sara Rogerson, was completely delightful and adorable, and the wines were too. I don’t know how many I tasted, but we bought three, and by the time we left, I’m pretty sure I could no longer stand, though T says I was okay. I just remember everything being fuzzy and swaying.
We went straight from Nautilus to an English pub where we ate overly fried food and nachos, in a desperate attempt to soak up all the delicious wine. It worked, kind of. The moral of the story is that Tsssshhooooluckeeeetohavemeeeee.
Unemployed and homeless
When our friend Cara quit her job to move to Shanghai, people would ask her how she was doing. She would reply, “I’m unemployed and homeless!” with a degree of joy I can’t quite describe. As of last Friday, T and I can now say the same. (This is the point at which my father begins to weep.)
Let me preface this section by saying that New Zealand is one of my favorite places on earth, tied only with Ireland and Cambodia. It’s entirely possible that I could have a terrible time here, but I find it extremely unlikely. And so, when we arrived in Christchurch on a spectacularly sunny day, I was pretty happy. Then, the girl from the campervan company bounded out of the car to greet us, and when I said the weather was gorgeous, she cried, “It’s totally cranking!” At that point, the happiness turned to bliss and I tried not to cry with joy.
She took us to check out our new home for the coming three weeks: a Toyota Hiace van with all kinds of exciting stuff like a table! and a fridge! and a stove! T was overwhelmed with nostalgia for his boyhood, when he used to caravan around Europe with his family, and I was excited for ADVENTURE. I may have grown up in Maine, but I didn’t have much camping adventure as a kid–probably because my parents were from away. My Iowan mother can shuck an ear of corn in less than ten seconds and my Masshole father can hate the Yankees with the best of them, but camping just didn’t happen in our house. The van seemed perfect, except for the fact that it’s 58 feet off the ground and I have to run and hurtle myself into it, which sometimes doesn’t work as planned.
And off we went, into the horizon with our Wendekreisen rental van. We bought some fruit and veg at a veg stand and drove off toward Hamner Springs. I was like a dog in the car, sticking my head way out the window and bouncing around with excitement. The road took us through all kinds of stunning mountains and valleys and past streams and rivers and all the kinds of beautiful wildlife you imagine in NZ.
We arrived at the campsite and plugged in, and then I saw them: BUGS. Bugs look at me like Britney looks at public bathrooms–with nothing but burning desire in their eyes. I suddenly realized that this camping idea wasn’t going to be all I thought it might be. But we cooked our Annie’s mac-n-cheese (sent all the way from Maine to Melbourne to NZ) and hot dogs and slept until ten in the morning (I told you T was reliving his childhood!). Once I got the thighs out of reach of the mozzies, all was good.
The next day, we went off to do some walking, and again I made a novice mistake. Invigorated by the FRESH AIR! and GREENERY! I thought it was a good idea to take the long walk through the woods. Inevitably, the signs vanished halfway through, and we were left to guess which way to go by investigating the moss on the sides of trees. We barely escaped with our lives. After the walking, we went to the Hanmer Springs to soak in some water. I’m still not sure why we did this, apart from the fact that the town is famous for its springs. Neither of us seemed particularly keen on sitting in 40-degree water when it’s 30 degrees outside (that’s Celsius, kids), but we rotated around the pools until we got all good and pruny and wicked, wicked tired.
We decided to try to drive from Hanmer Springs to Blenheim and skip Kaikoura. T drove around the windy mountain roads as I operated the iPod and its speakers, which I bought in a stroke of genius, knowing the radio here might be spotty and we don’t have cassettes to play in the Toyota Hiace. Let me tell you this: the only thing that makes T prouder than knowing his wife has the song “Welcome to the Jungle” in her iPod is realizing she knows all the words and will sing them at the top of her lungs at any possible opening.
Going, going, gone
You probably read the title of this post and thought I was talking about leaving Melbourne. Ha. I was talking about my sanity in the days before we left Melbourne, obviously.
In our last week in the city, it seemed as though the gods were conspiring to make our last week in Melbourne so hideous that we would never regret leaving. And I think it may have worked.
It started with our guest bed of doom. A bunch of people wanted to see it, but never showed up. Then came Damien, who said he wanted to see it, never showed up, but then called to tell me he was trying to find a way to get it to his house. T and I organized with the beautiful man buying our washer to find a way to get the bed to Damien. Then Damien called and said he wanted to come see the bed again, and never showed. Then we heard nothing from him for 24 hours, when I got an email saying he didn’t want the bed now. So we put the ads back up and immediately got an English girl named Liz, who not only wanted the bed, but wanted it NOW. She was going to come get it that night, but her friend’s ute wasn’t big enough. So we organized with the washer guy again to bring the bed to her house, when she suddenly disappeared as well–this time with no warning. So T spent all of Wednesday organizing with the lovely Swedish girl to have her come pick it up. By the time she came to fetch it, I was ready to burn the frigging thing.
Then there was the man who was meant to come steam clean our carpets 3 hours before our inspection. First, he was going to come at 1, then 12.30, and he finally showed up at 1.30 and tried to tell me that he couldn’t do the job. The man probably weighed 200 pounds and had a rat tail to die for, but I swear I would have wrestled him to the ground myself to get him to clean those damned carpets. I didn’t have to go that far, because I gave him the stinkeye and frightened him into it in the end.
At the same time all this was going on, I was dealing with the Australian Post Office, which is a BEACON OF EFFICIENCY. My mother sent me a package which arrived on Nov. 16. I got a notice telling me it had arrived on Nov. 21. I went to the local post office, where the package was meant to have come on Nov. 21, to be greeted by vacant-eyed Barbara, who I’m not even sure realized she was working in a post office. She half-heartedly looked around for the box, then told me it probably went to the other local office. It was 5pm, after all, and she wanted to go home. Since T and I were leaving Melbourne forever the next day, I implored her to look harder. Even the stinkeye did not work on Barbara (perhaps because she was legally braindead). She called at 6pm to tell me she had found it! It was delivered last week, and I picked it up then! I told her that was a DIFFERENT PACKAGE and she replied, “Oh, that’s why the tracking number is different…”
The next morning, I called the AusPost phone number, to be informed that the package had indeed been delivered to the other office. T and I went to ship our 10 boxes, and I told Barbara the box was there. She stared at me blankly when I asked if she could call and confirm, and then asked “What do I do?” Um, try DIALING THE PHONE AND SPEAKING INTO IT. The guy I usually deal with was helping us with our boxes and made an actual effort to find the box, but still had no luck. I ended up going home and speaking to Jose at AusPost, who put me on hold while he talked to both post offices. Then he told me no one knew where the box was. At this point, our inspection was in about 90 minutes and we had to be out of the apartment forever. Suddenly, my helpful friend calls. IT WAS THERE THE WHOLE DAMNED TIME, which is what I had suspected all along. He thinks they should have an eye test…I think they should just put Barbara out to pasture.
So, the world (or Melbourne) is full of creeps and morons…and that’s what I learned last week. The end.
Too little, too late
I work from home, meaning that most days I get very little human contact. As T will tell you, some days I don’t leave the apartment–and even worse, on some days, I don’t leave my pyjamas.
This has meant that I have become one of those excessively (and perhaps even terrifyingly) friendly people. I get overly excited at any form of communication and talk way too much (even more than normal, which I know is difficult to imagine). I have made “friends” at the post office and the gym, and at my myriad holistic doctors. And of course, I have made a handful of friends on my own, but only a handful.
Suddenly, now that we’re leaving and selling all our stuff, I have met about 800 people with whom I would like to be best friends. There was K, the new girl at T’s office from South Africa, who sat next to me at the trivia night. And F, also from T’s office, who bought our fridge and HAD A CUTE DOG. There was L, the stunning Kiwi girl who bought our bed. There was beautiful N from Sri Lanka, who bought a bunch of our picture frames and our phone. There was the charming and gentle man from Ireland whose name I forgot, who came with some English fool who bought a bureau and some other stuff. There was S, the unbelievably helpful Indian man who bought our washer. And last night, there was D, the sassy Swedish nanny who bought our guest bed and hugged me when she left.
I’m a little sad that it took us leaving to unearth all these cool people and now I will see them again. On the flip side, they helped make our departure more entertaining and smooth, and without them, I would definitely have lost my damn mind.
Of course, T always looks at the bright side. Last night he told me, “At least now I can say I had a Swedish nanny in my bed!” And that, of course, is what’s important.
My Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
There are some days that make you glad to be alive: days that you don’t want to ever end, which are full of joy and sunshine and happiness. Yesterday was not one of those days.
It started when we went to bed the night before, when it was too hot to sleep with the doors closed, so we opened them. Thus began the mosquito infestation, wherein I had mozzies chomping on every inch of my body, draining me of blood. So I moved to the living room and I slept on the floor. It was not comfortable.
I awoke at sunrise to a scorching beam of light and multiple welts all over my body, including my face. I was not cheerful. Then I got an email from the ^%$@#@ who was supposed to be buying our guest bed, saying he changed his mind. And we’re moving in three days.
After soaking in my own sweat and trying to wash it away, I took the tram to the Chinese consulate. It takes 45 minutes each way to get to the Chinese consulate. It was 100 degrees yesterday. The trams are not air conditioned. I sat across from a man who stared openly at my breasts as though they were giant blocks of ice that he was going to rub all over his body. I restrained the urge to punch him in the throat. On the way back, I sat next to a large sweaty woman who smelled strongly of cured meats. I restrained the urge to throw my body out the window of the moving tram.
With Chinese visas in hand, I came back into town and tried to spend the $50 gift card that T and I won in a trivia night this weekend, because we are fountains of useless information. I found some shorts at Target and a shirt at Myer. Together, $50! Hooray!
But no. The guy at Myer charged me full price for the shirt, and then charged me sale price, so I got charged twice on the gift card. Sales boy gave me a $20 gift card to cover the difference, but when I tried to use the new card at Target, they wouldn’t take it. So I had to go back to Myer, where it took AN HOUR to sort it out, only to go back to Target and buy the stinking shorts. My feet were so sweaty that they started to blister in my flipflops from the friction, squirting blood and pus for at least 50 feet (aren’t you glad you read this post?) and I ended up walking home from the tram barefoot. Then I took a 17-hour shower.
Did I mention it was 100 degrees yesterday?
No one’s life is as hard as mine.
