Into the Mountains

There are plenty of mountains you can climb in life and, for that matter, in New Zealand. It can be a figurative mountain of overcoming obstacles, reaching your goals, finding happiness, insert-life-cliché-here, or the actual mountain of going almost ninety degrees up through a narrow path of rocks and mud just for the sake of it. This past weekend I experienced both kinds. One I gave up half way through and the other one I carried it out until I saw the view from above.

Let´s begin with the mountain I turned my back to. The fabulosity that are my flatmates suggested that we should go do some hiking in a well-known Mount around Christchurch, Mount Somers. Despite being quite suspicious about the whole thing - and firmly asking what such hiking would involve - I was assured it would be a pleasant walk in tracks made for normal human beings to explore. Little did I know. First of all, what some people describe as hiking, I will from now on describe as unnecessary self-torture. Second, to my own gratification, I did manage to go through the most normal part of this involuntarily self-inflicted pain for about one hour to reach a waterfall and have lunch. 

Lunch time

Lunch spot

However, a sadistic group decision was made regarding the next spot to go which just happened to be up, through a very inclined path of rocks, mud, dirt and vegetation. I endured my Tarzan moment for ten minutes and realize that I could just tell Mother Nature to go take a hike herself. Hence, I waved everyone goodbye, turn myself around and, at that very moment, I could not be more proud of myself for having the courage to be, well, a quitter.

Path way to hell - the beginning

 

As for the second mountain, the figurative one, it was waiting for me back home and this time I was ready for the challenge. The problem with this mountain is that now I´m not sure how to get down from it. When your skin becomes so thick from the rocks and falls of the way, you just don´t know how to behave when you are actually able to stop and admire a perfect day in the horizon. After you allow yourself to take those minutes of pure contemplation regarding what you just accomplished, you start thinking about the implications and consequences of such a view and how nasty the ride downhill might get.

And because all of this needs, of course, to have a moral lesson to it, I have become empirically certain of two things this weekend: first, it is okay not to like or be good at something that you supposedly should be. In my case, I am not keen on sports and I am definitely not a fan of high levels of wilderness around me. Give me a civilized city park with pretty trees, a well-kept grass and a towel to lie on and I am happy but ask me to go hike a mountain and I´ll turn around and go take a nap in the car while everyone else get their grove on with Mother Nature. Second, no matter how hurt we might get, there is no other way to live but to forget the risk and take the fall. The pure laugh of happiness you shout to the sky after a great moment in your life is always worth the pain you may have to endure afterwards. No regrets right?

But in the end, what really made my day was entering a little flower shop in a small down of New Zealand´s southern island and listen to Fado on the speakers.

A little bit of routine

Today´s post won´t be a literary masterpiece as I only wish to share a little bit of my daily routine from home to work. It´s a 10 minute walk with the usual company of a ray of sunshine coming from above and my own thoughts by my side (usually the thought of getting skin cancer because once again I forgot to put sun screen to face a sky deprived of ozone layer).

My house

The garden of the house

The way to work

University of Canterbury´s Kirkwood Village (aka Concentration Camp)

National Centre for Research on Europe

Yes, that´s how a national centre on something looks like in the outskirts of Western civilization. Take that Brussels!

One Lake, Two Mountains, Twelve Days

It´s hard to believe it has been less than two weeks since I arrived in New Zealand. This is so because after only twelve days here, I have already lived through situations I never thought I would and I met people I feel like I have known for years due to a level of trust and openess that appeared so effortlessly. And this weekend was the culmination of such a disbelief in the passage of time.

On Saturday, just like last weekend, I went on a trip with my adoptive family. This time the destination was Lake Tekapo, about three hours from Christchurch. It was an awesome trip among valleys, mountains, sheeps, horses, dears, pretty little towns and finally the lake itself which is known for its water's vivid and unique shade of blue. Few times in my life did I find myself so compelled to dive my naked body into such a heavenly made place. Unfortunately, the presence of minors and elders, plus New Zealand´s very strict and highly punitive laws on natural preservation made me constrain my urges for public indecency. Besides, enjoying a Portuguese pic-nic, followed by a self-contemplation moment of being right where I belong while sitting on a rock at the shore of the lake with the sun in my face, was more than enough. Even if my clothes stayed on.

But no, this was not enough. From there we went to the top of a mountain with a breathtaking view and a Portuguese girl from Porto working on the mountain´s café – proof that the Portuguese can even reach a little town with about three and half inhabitants lost in the very end of the world.

That same day, back in Christchurch, the night was calling so I and some friends went to the top of a close by mountain to see the city lights. While there, despite a freezing wind on my face, pitch black all around and a dying fear for being kidnapped by aliens, having someone holding me tight to numb the cold and witnessing that night skyline right in front of my eyes, made me feel exactly the same way I did at the lake – blessed for being in that very place in that very moment with those very people.

Comes Sunday and a Portuguese/Brazilian barbecue gave me the necessary energy to pack everything again and move to a new place closer to the University. A lovely kiwi house with flatmates from all over the world (United States, Canada, Ireland, Germany, Malaysia, China, Bangladesh). By the end of the day, looking around at my new room and having the overwhelming sensation of being on the edge of starting a new chapter, I sat down, looked at my fingers and starting counting again for how many days I have been here. Still in disbelief.

Internship: First Day

As I drop off the bus in an early Monday morning to face my first day of internship I can’t seem to avoid this feeling of ‘I am doing the right thing?’ As I walk among huge trees, listen to birds singing and approach a village of brand new bungalows where my office is located and University classes take place (the 'joke' around is that we are in Auschwitz because it sort of looks like a fancy concentration camp), I think about the contrast this is from the Brussels reality I wanted to escape – dirtiness, the smell of pee and the adoration of a child's statue holding his little penis. And boy, with this nature overload all around me, I sure escaped all of that but... was it a good decision? 

Will I really take something what out this besides spending all my money and live in New Zealand for six months? I’m not getting any younger and I can't keep doing internships for the rest of my life, especially of the unpaid kind. Who the hell cares about the relations between an old and sick Europe with a far far away land of forty million sheep and a bunch of hobbits obsessed with a ring? As these questions take my mind by storm and make my heart squeeze a little with the uncertainty of what the future holds, I have no other option but to enter the door and get started. There’s no turning back now

Oh and I just discovered my office is next to the Department of Sport Sciences which has a constant traffic of pleasant-on-the-eye looking guys dressed in black sport gear. My very own personal All Blacks view for the next months. Not too shabby I'd say.

(pictures of the University campus coming soon)

First Weekend

I think the main reason why I still don’t really believe I’m actually in New Zealand it’s because since the minute I landed, I have spend most of my days speaking Portuguese. Five days after arriving I’ve been practically adopted by a Portuguese family (I hope I don’t screw-up the adoption process!) and Brazilian people here seem to grow on trees. So, my first weekend in Christchurch was a mix of beautiful kiwi landscapes, traditional Portuguese and Brazilian food and my first night out in New Zealand. So let’s start from the beginning.

  

Faith had it that in my first week here, Friday would be a national holiday. Therefore, my adoptive family took me on a day trip to Akaroa which I could try to describe but I think Wikipedia does it more accurately than me: “Akaroa is a village on Banks Peninsula in the Canterbury region of the South Island of New Zealand, situated within a harbour of the same name—the name Akaroa is Kāi Tahu Māori for 'Long Harbour'.” In my own words, it’s a beautiful place about 80km from Christchurch with a drive there just as amazing as the destination. In New Zealand you really have the impression that Nature allows humans to live here and not the other way around.

Following the trip, I was invited for a meal at my referred adoptive family's home. An amazing house at the top of a small mountain, with a breathtaking view decorated with Portuguese traditional symbols and laughs all around. Whenever I find myself in the privilege position of living such moments – like this rare opportunity of being inside a kiwi house which, on top of that, is filled of memories from my own country – I always stop for a minute or so, fix my eye on the horizon and engrave that brief period of time in my mind because those are the small moments I will always want to remember (especially when I’m broke and I need to remind myself why I keep living like a nomad). And because a great trip and two great Portuguese meals in a row weren’t enough to make me feel welcomed in Christchurch, Sunday was occupied with a freaking delicious Brazilian homemade meal.

As for the night out, I will leave that for a post dedicated exclusively to kiwi habits of going out and please be hold of a very recently developed analysis on new-zealander’s relation with alcohol.

Getting There: Part II

Woody Allen once said that 80% of success is showing up. I think this motto applies perfectly to friendship too.

Taking Off

I was off to a very good start when I arrived at Madrid airport to be received with open arms and a big smile by a friend that went there just to say goodbye. Her positive attitude towards everything and bright take on life was exactly what I needed to stop breathing like I was having contractions and about to give birth. I told her at the airport that words couldn’t express how much I was thankful and touched not only by the fact that she cared enough to go there but also for all the help and motivation she gave me while not leaving me alone in the four hours I had between flights. So, my sweet Agata, if you are reading this, know that your gesture means the world to me.

Up in the Air (see Getting There: Part I)

Landing

After seeing my very own Ethan Hawke (people if you don’t get the reference, go see Before Sunrise) for the last time when he was already far away and I was still stuck in a immigration post disclosing my most dark motivations to move into this fine country, I finally pass the arrivals’ doors and didn’t even get the time to “aawww” that dramatic farewell moment. I had just received a message on my cellphone, in Portuguese, saying ”Sofia, wait for me at the airport, I will pick you up!” and a few minutes later I heard someone shouting my name. Gotta say it felt pretty unsettling to cross the entire globe, see the sign “Welcome to New Zealand” and seconds later hear my name out loud in my own language. It was Lena, a very nice Portuguese lady with whom I have been in contact for the last weeks through Facebook, who lives in Christchurch with her family. However, it is only unsettling first of all because you don't expect to find someone from your own country so far away from it and second (and most important) because you really don't expect someone who doesn’t know you to be willing to pick you up from the airport for the sheer sake of wanting to help you. Even more so when, from that moment on, you are so welcomed and immediately treated as a family member.

They say life is about the journey and not about the destination. Flying from Lisbon to Christchurch made it literal to me.

The Road Log

Lisbon – Madrid: 1h

Madrid – Dubai: 6h

Dubai – Bangkok: 6h30

Bangkok – Sydney: 8h30

Sydney – Christchurch: 2h30

(if to this numbers one adds the waiting hours in airports, it all comes to the lovely conclusion that crossing half the planet will take about 44 hours)

Getting There: Part I

My mind likes to wonder when it has nothing useful to occupied itself with and waiting hours at airports make for the most fascinating opportunities to do so. In other words, being bored brings my over-thinking nature to dangerous levels. So, while in Dubai, I turned my laptop on and I wrote the following:

Somehow, when I look around and realize I am sitting in Dubai’s airport at four o’clock in the morning reading Lonely Planet’s wise words on New Zealand, a gift given to me by a polish friend in Spain, while I wait to board a flight which is still going to stop in Thailand and Australia before finally reaching my destination, I can't help but to smile. Even though I am only half-way through a forty-hour odyssey of airplanes and airports and I am tired, hungry and smelly, I smile. Granted, I am in a constant state of financial bankruptcy, I have no ties to anywhere, I am single and I say hello as much as I say goodbye. But I smile.

A few hours after I wrote this short pearl of philosophical self-wisdom, life decided (for once) to prove me right. As I was about to pass the boarding gate, I notice a guy looking puzzled at the screen displaying “Casablanca” instead of “Christchurch”. In a sarcastic impulse, I shouted a “don’t worry, they just assume New Zealand and Morroco are not that different so there’s no need to change this; you are in the right place”.

Following these not-even-that-funny initial words and discovering that we were both doing Dubai-Christchurch (he was a new-zealander native of Russian father and Irish mother, returning home from a six-month training in the French Army), we spend the next twenty-four hours almost uninterruptedly together submerged in time zones, endless distances, economy class chairs, airplane food, waiting lobbies and security check queues. And so we laughed, talked, said nothing, complained, praised, watch movies, laid our heads on each other’s shoulders, hold each other’s hands and carried each other through an exhausting journey. The whole thing, even the ending, felt like I was living my very own Before Sunrise moment with a less eloquent and wit dialogue but with all the essence of a perfect encounter between two strangers.

By the end of it all, I knew we both had served as a perfect support to the other (at least he was to me). Above all, I knew that as soon as those wheels opened and touched the ground, we would go our separate ways. After 24 hours of constant contact, we would never see each other again. Nevertheless, while still way up high, with his arms around me and his body warmth making me fall asleep, I couldn’t help but to realize that New Zealand had already given me something I would never forget. And I smile.

On the Run

Let me start this first post the way I usually start writing my travel journals: by looking at my packed bags at the entrance of my house, ready to leave for the airport in a few hours, and thinking: ‘what the hell was I thinking?!’. Butterflies have taken my stomach hostage and the negative side of being an extremely organized person kicks in – my mind is exploding with all that can go wrong. As I am one of those persons to which life likes to play sadistic pranks and nothing ever goes well on a first attempt, I can only imagine what waits for me from the minute I get to the airport. 

I have came to realize that when you tell someone you are about to move to the other side of world alone, specially if you add that you are going to do an internship in a city recently destroyed by a earthquake, there are, virtually without exception, two possible reactions: those who assume a skeptical position and do not understand why you are doing it and those who light up their faces with a sincere smile on the prospect of such an adventure and say "go!".

So, the invariable question I get from skepticals is: why? They do so with a mist of shock and attempt to restore what must be a momentaneous deprivation of a sense of sanity on my part. I was asked this so many times that I developed a short and yet effective answer: simply because I can. Yes, such answer does not help to improve their assessment of my mental health but it is the most honest I can provide. 

My motto in life has always been that I might end up working in the local supermarket of my parent’s village but at the very least I will try and be who I want to be. I rather fail in my attempts to get where I want to go than to not try to get that at all.

So, that’s what I was thinking before the last minute panic invaded me. Truth is, I am about to board a flight to the most distant country on Earth from my own and I have no idea what lies ahead or what will I end up doing next. And believe me when I say this uncertainty scares the shit out of me. But I’ll be damned if I don’t face it straight up.

I will do my best to keep the blog active on a regular basis for the next six months. For now, wish me luck!