I woke up at 4:45am so that I could be ready in time to be at the airport at 6:00am. I finished packing my bag at about quarter past five only dad came in a “weighed” my suitcase to see if it was under the 14kg limit. He decided that it wasn’t (we don’t own scales in out house) and I agreed with him so I took all of my clothes out of that suitcase and put them in a bag without wheels which technically should have been lighter. So I was all set, had packed absolutely anything that I may have a chance of needing in another country and I went to the airport pretty much totally high because I was so excited! Got to the airport and checked in. Turned out that I could have taken my bigger and easier to carry suitcase because my bag only came to 12kg! I was pretty pissed off at that. I had to wait around for a bit between checking in and going through customs because our plane flight wasn’t for another hour. So I just sat with mum and dad and talked non stop. Finally it came time to say goodbye. I didn’t want to say goodbye because I'm really not very good with the emotional stuff so I ended up saying quick goodbyes about five times because I didn’t want to leave them. But I did and I GOT TO GO DOWN THE STAIRS! Most people don’t know what I’m talking about here but every year I go to the airport to say goodbye to Grandmama going back to Hong Kong. And she has to go down the stairs into customs that we are never allowed down because we’re not boarding the plane. But this time I got to go down the stairs while my parents stayed up the top! It was very exciting :)
I got through customs fine but the whole time I was semi-freaking out because I didn’t really know what I had to do and I was worried I would be pulled up for doing something wrong i.e. not putting all my
liquids in the zip lock bag, or having the wrong things in my luggage. Good thing I had AJ with me because otherwise I would have had no idea whatsoever on what to do! I got through safely (phew!), waved one final goodbye to mum and dad up the top and boarded the plane. I sat next to AJ with a window sit which was of course directly behind the wing :( The plane flight was average I guess, probably because I have been on four plane flights in two years so I'm sort of used to it. But I was still pretty exciting! The sea was boring of course (its so flat!) but when we got in view of New Zealand it was amazing! Almost the entire west coast of the South Island is mountains, called the Southern Ranges or something like that. So the first glimpse we got of New Zealand was these huge mountain ranges. Now I’ve been to the Snowies in Australia but seriously, next to New Zealand’s mountains, those Snowies look like hills. The mountains of New Zealand are tall and jagged and capped with snow. They are totally free of any hint of human life; they consist of just rocks, trees and snow. And that’s it. No roads, no houses, no nothing. And there is so many of them! In Australia we have maybe two or three big “mountains” next to each other, but in New Zealand there is heaps of them all just sitting there! They really are so beautiful.
Anyway, we arrived in Christchurch and it was raining. And it was cold. I’m talking 7°C sort of cold. Which is cold. We loaded up the buses which took about an hour, the entire time of which was spent outside with a thin cardigan on in the cold. But I liked the cold because it reminded me that I was in a different country, because there was no way that Brisbane could ever have these temperatures in summer! We drove through Christchurch to our accommodation, which was quite nice! Christchurch has a big English influence on it so a lot of the houses were old English style. They were quite pretty. Christchurch is totally flat. It was built on swampy grou
nd and that meant that there are absolutely no hills whatsoever anywhere in Christchurch. It was a little odd at first actually. And I would say that the tallest building in Christchurch would be no higher than about six floors. They don’t actually have a city as such like we have in Brisbane. And there isn’t much residential estates either. All in all, Christchurch is pretty small compared to Brisbane. Keep in mind that the entire population of New Zealand equals to that of the population of Sydney alone. So New Zealand is small. So anyway, our accommodation was very nice with about five people to a room. I was with AJ, Camilla, Renata, and Neville when she came two days later. Everyone sort of didn’t really know each other then but we all felt part of the group and we were all excited to be in New Zealand finally! Dinner was good, cooked by the teachers like every dinner on tour. I was on cleanup duty and let me tell you, washing up 90 plates by hand is not fun! We went to bed with the heater on full blast and got a good night’s sleep.
I got through customs fine but the whole time I was semi-freaking out because I didn’t really know what I had to do and I was worried I would be pulled up for doing something wrong i.e. not putting all my
liquids in the zip lock bag, or having the wrong things in my luggage. Good thing I had AJ with me because otherwise I would have had no idea whatsoever on what to do! I got through safely (phew!), waved one final goodbye to mum and dad up the top and boarded the plane. I sat next to AJ with a window sit which was of course directly behind the wing :( The plane flight was average I guess, probably because I have been on four plane flights in two years so I'm sort of used to it. But I was still pretty exciting! The sea was boring of course (its so flat!) but when we got in view of New Zealand it was amazing! Almost the entire west coast of the South Island is mountains, called the Southern Ranges or something like that. So the first glimpse we got of New Zealand was these huge mountain ranges. Now I’ve been to the Snowies in Australia but seriously, next to New Zealand’s mountains, those Snowies look like hills. The mountains of New Zealand are tall and jagged and capped with snow. They are totally free of any hint of human life; they consist of just rocks, trees and snow. And that’s it. No roads, no houses, no nothing. And there is so many of them! In Australia we have maybe two or three big “mountains” next to each other, but in New Zealand there is heaps of them all just sitting there! They really are so beautiful.Anyway, we arrived in Christchurch and it was raining. And it was cold. I’m talking 7°C sort of cold. Which is cold. We loaded up the buses which took about an hour, the entire time of which was spent outside with a thin cardigan on in the cold. But I liked the cold because it reminded me that I was in a different country, because there was no way that Brisbane could ever have these temperatures in summer! We drove through Christchurch to our accommodation, which was quite nice! Christchurch has a big English influence on it so a lot of the houses were old English style. They were quite pretty. Christchurch is totally flat. It was built on swampy grou
nd and that meant that there are absolutely no hills whatsoever anywhere in Christchurch. It was a little odd at first actually. And I would say that the tallest building in Christchurch would be no higher than about six floors. They don’t actually have a city as such like we have in Brisbane. And there isn’t much residential estates either. All in all, Christchurch is pretty small compared to Brisbane. Keep in mind that the entire population of New Zealand equals to that of the population of Sydney alone. So New Zealand is small. So anyway, our accommodation was very nice with about five people to a room. I was with AJ, Camilla, Renata, and Neville when she came two days later. Everyone sort of didn’t really know each other then but we all felt part of the group and we were all excited to be in New Zealand finally! Dinner was good, cooked by the teachers like every dinner on tour. I was on cleanup duty and let me tell you, washing up 90 plates by hand is not fun! We went to bed with the heater on full blast and got a good night’s sleep.
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