Two Months and Just Fulbrighting Around

Serving up Indian food at the Aro Valley Fair. A patron

asked what I was in NZ for and when I said the Fulbright, he said

I was the first Fulbrighter he'd ever met and that he was honored.

I could get used to this....It was almost as good as when someone

here told me my accent was exotic.
My new car
Just enjoying a Monday afternoon stroll on the beach, ten

minutes from my flat

Today marks two months since I arrived and I thought it an appropriate moment to reflect on some of the New habits I've developed here in New Zealand:

-Eating ice cream every night, and sometimes cake, and always a dark chocolate bar (mostly Alice and Aaron's fault. Having never been a big sweet eater before, I'm getting pretty used to this)

-Exercising, walking, generally moving about much more that I'm not stuck behind a desk all day (I'm hoping this counteracts my ice cream eating)

-Watching Mad Men, also thanks to Alice and Aaron. I never even saw one episode while in the States, but now I see what all the fuss was about

-Making my bed everyday, not living in an attic means people actually see my room

-Not flying, this is the first time that I have not been on a plane in two months in over 2 years

Now that you're getting bored, a few other items of note this week to mark my two months:

I finally defined my "research question" and turned in my proposal for the Masters by Thesis, so cross your fingers they let me skip a year and bang this out by December

I also finally made contact with the iwi (tribe) representative he seemed willing to let me in on what they're doing. The catch - he wants me to provide support to them on biofuels. Oh biofuels, I'll never escape you....

When I met a new person this week and I said, "I'm Elizabeth". They said, "Can I call you Beth?"

What? Wouldn't I introduce myself in the name I wanted to be called? This isn't roll where you then inform the teacher your nickname, I'm introducing myself. Why don't you call me Larry for that matter.

LJ's advice of Facebook stalking to make friends paid off. Finally met up with my stalkee for trivia night, where I quickly proved my worth by getting a bonus question for our team - In what century did knitting begin and the English adopted the abacus from China?

What better way to bond on a Laura Jack tip than trivia?

They say the Fulbright opens doors, well behind door number one is a fellowship position at UNESCO in Paris, reserved just for us (6 positions for all 2,000 of us). So I applied for that this week - the catch, I now need to add French while relearning English and trying to pick up Maori...

Now that I've been studying hard for four weeks, they've decided to give us three weeks off for autumn break. Although I've really enjoyed not packing for once, I'm going to pack up and head off to Auckland and the Winterless North to chase down the end of summer for the next two weeks.

The Fulbright stipulates cultural exchange as one of the goals/values of the program. Well, while I'm touring NZ over the next two weeks, Alice and Aaron are off to California. Cultural exchange = done and done.

One other small item of note - found out that Jermaine from Flight of the Concordes also lives down the street. Aro Valley = Hollywood Hills

Stay tuned for updates from the road and upcoming dates of my limited city U.S. tour in June