Update

i wanted to truly experience life as a kiwi so i went "hard out" and...walked around town barefoot. it doesn't sound like much but where, in america, would you walk around barefoot downtown? most signs say "no shirt no shoes no service." not here. i successfully went into the library and grocery store shoeless. needless to say my feet were black at the end of the day and i left marks on the shower floor. it was exciting.

our house is getting very crowded these days. one "eccentric" person after another. there is a huge confrence in town with someone comparable to the dalai lama so we have several buddhists staying here. most of them are nice, quiet people, then come along the dogmatic ones who immediately start trashing america. i'm getting slightly tired of defending my country. the fridge is getting too full and we didn't know how good we had it when it was just us here. but we did have a good old kiwi bbq one night (pictures below). bbqs here aren't steak or chicken, it's green-lipped mussels, whole fish, sausages, etc.

we took off for a weekend and went to lake rotoiti to backpack around the lake. we camped at a campsite the first night then backpacked the next day and camped outside a hut that night. since jon is a big guy, there wasn't too much room in the tent for our bags so we kept some of them outside, with the scent of food in them... we were up all night as animals tried to get to our food and scratch at our tent. we would make noises so they would go away but the scariest thing about it is was not knowing what was out there, just hearing scurrying and running. luckily there is nothing in the wild here that would hurt a human, unless you count wild pigs.
we woke up the next morning swarmed by sandflies. these are slightly bigger than fruitflies but when they bite they itch 100 times more than a mosquito. there were so many of them it sounded like rain on the tent. we managed to escape and hiked for a while to a swing bridge, crossed a river, and headed on to another hut just in time to happen upon a water taxi which we took back across the lake. we are so lucky to have places like this just a short drive from nelson.

Pictures
Below are some random pictures including our trip to Lake Rotoiti, a BBQ party at the house we're living, and a "stag do" (bachelor party) that Jon went to for one of his co-workers where they played paintball.
Enjoy...

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