Not every weekend can you say that you have toured a beautiful city, seen a live rugby game, and been forced into becoming a hitchhiker. Fortunately (or unfortunately!) that was my weekend summed into one lovely sentence.
Christchurch. A group of us decided to go up Friday afternoon after classes to Christchurch so we could have time to explore . Friday afternoon at around 2 PM we began our (long) drive into Christchurch, and slowly dropped people off at where they were staying for the night--ah the joys of a 12 person van! That evening one of my friends and I just decided to walk around the town, it was really beautiful. We got to see the huge cathedral in all its moonlit glory, the fountains, the stars.
Saturday was the day of the game. In the morning we woke up and had breakfast (reheated chinese food...it was a bit difficult to stomach at 10 AM!!) and spent the morning running around from the Botanical Gardens, to the Saturday market, art shops, and the modern art museum. Now, I don't understand most modern art--something about staring at two trees, one in a blue circle one outside a red square just doesn't appeal to me or my senses emotionally! But there was a large room dedicated to photographs from around the US...it was pretty intense to go around and see photographs-everything from death row prisoners to nuclear power to farmlands. It was dually interesting to see our culture from another perspective!
The game that night was absolutely KILLER!! There is something about watching live rugby, seeing the haka, painted faces, and screaming for the All Blacks that was exhilerating. Ten times more awesome was rushing out onto the field after the game and getting our tickets signed by our favorite player--number 19. We loved him.
After a mere 4 hours of sleep, it was time to get up on Sunday to go checkout of our backpackers and drive back to Dunedin. My friend and I were joking that the 5 hour drive back we would just sleep away and erase the drive from our memory. Little did we know that our van was going to break down on the side on a crazy highway, we would have to trek through the rain to go to a house to ask for help, and then proceed to hitchhike--standing on the side of the road with our bags, drenched in the middle of a storm, trying to get a ride 300 km back home. This is the story in brief, but now that I am home, in dry socks and a blanket, I am content to say that I learned a lot of common sense today, am thankful for the wonderful people here who helped us, and am RIDICULOUSLY happy to be home!!!! ♥
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