Phase Change

When we were in Thames, Alex got a call from Nicky, a tech recruiter in Wellington. He seemed optimistic about Alex finding work in software in Welly, so we started moving south right away.

We set up camp for the first weekend in Mangakino Recreation Reserve in the center of the North Island. We parked on a dirt road between Lake Manaetai and the sunburnt Mangakino golf course. The weather was warm and breezy. Alex wanted to prep for interviews in a quiet spot for a couple of days, and this was an ideal spot.

While Alex got to work, I took a walk to explore the town. Mangakino was founded in the 40s to help build the dam system for power. It was bustling back then, but once the construction of the power system was completed, the place shrunk down to more or less to one stop light, a Four Square supermarket and a fish 'n' chips.

On my walk back to Alex and Patty, I saw a yellow labrador in the distance off its leash heading my way. I was excited to say hello but as I got closer I discovered that it wasn't interested in meeting me. It wasn't a dog, either...

When I got too close for comfort its hoofs broke into a sprint, crossing the street and off in the direction of the fish 'n' chips.

At night I got alex to put his studies away and come out and play.

When we got down to the Wellington area we established our home base at the Ngatitoa Domain. It was comforting that the setting was pleasant because this time was probably our most stressful since the first week in NZ. We have become damn good at living on a shoestring, but food and fuel are expensive and by the end of February we were rapidly burning through the remnants of our savings. We needed money and we had no idea where it would come from. It was a time of uncomfortable awareness of the reality that is always true: good, bad or otherwise, we have no idea what's to happen next.

We got to know the Ng Dom well. We stayed there about three weeks, a record length of time that we'd stayed any single place since we left the states. It had a public toilet, a water spigot and a quiet beach, all of this for free. We couldn't ask for a better hold-over home to soothe our anxieties of the future.

My woes were put into perspective by our one-footed oyster catcher neighbor...

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If my favorite sea-side friend can survive with only one foot in this big-bad world, I could find a job in Porirua!

The grounds at Ng Dom are maintained by one man and his jack russel terrior, Sammy. Where the man goes, Sammy dutifully follows.

We found a network of trails that go along the coast and by this row of adorable boat houses.

At one point during these weeks, Patty's battery started to die out of nowhere. We had to have her jump started several times in a matter of a few days and we began to worry there was a problem. This was ultimately resolved by a mechanic giving her a close look, tightening some wires and giving us a long, full charge.

What was more interesting than the battery was getting stuck for a weekend. There is another "domain" down the road from Mana in the next suburb over, Plimmerton. We were in the midst of driving a rotary on our way home from a grey-water dump when Patty stalled and wouldn't start again. A couple driving home from a wedding helped us push her into a park 100 meters away. It was a Friday and garages would be shut until Monday morning, so we got as comfortable as we could and stayed put.

Sunday was a series of soccer games from 8am to 5pm ranging from teams of sharply uniformed eight-year-old girls to full-grown men. During this span we were crowded intimately among a constant revolving circus of mini vans and pony tails. This motivated to cut out for a five-mile run along the coast away from strollers and side-line sausages.

When Patty was up and running over these weeks of hunting, we spent a lot of time in the library in Porirua scanning the web for jobs. On a whim I remembered I could be qualified to teaching swimming and I applied to three pools in the area. A few days later I heard back from one. That afternoon I had an interview and I left with a job.

I started working the following Monday. Fear evaporated into celebration. Small as it might be, we had an income on the way. It was time to look for a place to live and get Patty ready to get back on the market.

We looked for bus routes and trains that could get Alex to Welly and me to Eastern Porirua with reasonable ease. We narrowed down areas and searched the "flatmates wanted" section of TradeMe, NZ's Craigslist/eBay. There were only three possible places at the time, and one of them called us back. We now live in Titahi Bay with Sarah in her three bedroom house on a hill in a quiet neighborhood.

Just a few days before we moved in, Alex got a contract position as an iOS developer in Wellington. (Yay!) He started on Friday and moved us in on Saturday morning while I taught lessons at the pool.

While we wait to get paid, we've entertaining ourselves with library books and jig saw puzzles. We have a growing list of when-we-have-money-we'll-buy items: clothes without holes, haircuts, etc. But we'll have to wait to splurge a few more days. 

It has taken me ages just to get this much out and I still have more I could say. To sum up, the gist of our overall news is this: we'll be living here, relatively stationary, until the end of July. In August we plan to push off for new adventures for the rest of 2013. 

This is a time to lay low and collect travel funds. We are already experiencing culture in NZ from new angles than we had on the road. My hope is to post in the future about things we notice from our American/French perspectives that incite my fingers to type. 

Do you have any questions about what it is like to live here? Maybe you can spark my imagination on something to examine? Just a thought.

Until next time, big hugs and bisous. I miss you, Berkeley.