Well, at least we don't need anti-malarials

It has nothing to do with the subject of my post, but let me just paint the picture of our setting this morning, because it's nice.  The sky is low and gray and a light mist is falling.  The temperature is just right for coffee on the balcony.  A neighbor is playing classical music and I catch notes here and there.  People stroll on the sidewalks below me, but the street is fairly empty of traffic.  Amiri is supposed to be washing his hands in the bathroom, but I'm pretty sure that he's doing something much more entertaining, because Arram is peering at him through the nearly-closed bathroom door and squealing delightedly.

OK, over to what I actually came here to tell you.   Finally, I have something to complain about.  There are mosquitoes.  Stupid mosquitoes.  And I'll make no 'state bird' jokes, because they're quite small.  And I suppose there aren't that many, really, but we hates them!  Because they're small, you can't hear or see them very well.  Can barely even feel them.  Until you wake up in the morning with ten quarter-sized welts all over yourself.  Maybe we're reacting badly to the bites here for the same reason that our hayfever was so bad-- it's all new.  New allergens, histamine agonists, whatever they are, things we've never built up resistance to.  Poor Amiri has had to add a new word to his vocabulary, and now comes to present me his 'itchies' for kissing just as often as his owies.

We're up on the fifth floor; I wouldn't have thought mosquitoes would fly so high to find us.  Part of the problem is that our windows don't have windowscreens.  I've been looking around, and it appears that most windows lack screens.  I have noticed a lot of ads for citronella and insecticide sprays, though; obviously we're not the only ones getting chomped on.  So there: I think we've identified another entrepreneurial opportunity.  We'll add a windowscreen manufacturing facility to our turkey farm/HVAC trade school.

Auckland seafood festival

Just across the harbor, right there in our backyard, the city put on its annual seafood festival on the wharfs this weekend.  They even floated a pedestrian bridge to connect the piers and make browsing easy.  The sky looks all threatening here, but that was just a passing squall.  Really, it was very bright and hot.  I got sunburned through my SPF 30, as usual.

Here are some of the things we ate.  First, some fresh calamari rings flavored with sea salt, lime and kawakawa.  What's kawakawa?  A local herb, claimed to have medicinal properties, but also with a pleasant flavor, somewhat sharp and astringent. 

 

Notice the starving child pleading for sustenance.

Here's a good platter.  Flame-grilled scallops--so sweet.  Then also there are some scampi.  Scampi are actually not shrimp (aka prawns), but are instead a local deep-water and heavily-armored species that lives in underwater burrows.  Here, they were flame-grilled whole, split down the center, and were served with a toothpick for digging the tail meat out.  And the black bit is a deep-fried paua treat.  Paua are a type of abalone (Can you imagine just finding abalone at an outdoor food stall??  We felt lucky).  There is a fishing limit on abalone:  you can (only!) take ten a day from the ocean.  Here, the rich black meat was minced and battered. 

 

We tried a few other things that I didn't get pictures of:  Some seared ahi tuna and a salmon kebab.  A raw green-lipped mussel on the half-shell from a bucket that was unloaded directly from the fishing boat that snagged them early this morning.  (It was salty, oddly crunchy on one end, and completely offputting on the other end due to its 'feathers'.)  And a scoop of ice cream for our big boy, who'd very gamely trotted along with us the whole time.

 

I think they both enjoyed themselves. 

Arram and his bear

Arram never took to using a pacifier (much to our chagrin on his, um, LOUDER days).  But he has developed a very strong attachment for a lovey.  It's a floppy little brown bear and it's his pal.

His bear comforts him when he's sad.

 

But I don't want to go to bed!  I'm not tired at all, honest!  OK, I'll just chew on my bear till I feel better.

And it helps him to sleep.  He grabs it, rolls over, pulls it close, and drifts off with a sigh.  He sleeps most nights with it in his arms.

Like having a butler in your living room

At the cinema, in addition to the regular theaters and the IMAX big screen, there are the Gold Club theaters.  They seat 30-40 people in a spacious area.  The seats are arranged in pairs:  two big recliners with footrests, and a table in between them.  You are handed a menu prior as the trailers start, and servers bring you food and drinks while the film is playing.  You can push a button to summon a server at any time.  Tickets are no more expensive than a regular movie in LA, and it's altogether quite a civilised experience.

Wonder

I watched Amiri today while he watched me use our new electric coffee grinder.  He was fascinated.  A spoonful of beans goes in... cover on... press the red button... whirring noise... spinning...and then mama's coffee comes out!  It's amazing!  This is a truly incredible thing I have witnessed!

A coffee grinder, from our perspective, is of course an entirely mundane little luxury without much importance in the grand scheme of things.  But a two-year-old doesn't have the years of experience that we do and can't grasp the role of a coffee grinder in the context of the larger world.  Therefore to him it's nothing short of a marvel.

I kind of feel like New Zealand is my coffee grinder.  Objectively, I can recognize that there's nothing inherently that special about it.  It's just a small country, among many others in the world, where people live and work and clean their houses and some days are good and some days are bad.  Life here is exactly like life everywhere else in the world.  But that realization doesn't matter to me.  Regardless, something knocks me out every day.  Whether it's the little birds who visit our balcony or the way the clouds whip across the sky, I feel like I'm seeing our new home through fresh, innocent eyes.  And it feels good.

Plunket

The kids had their well-child checkups today.  It's an interesting system here:  if the kids are sick or need immunizations, they see our family doctor.  But for well-baby visits just to check that they're growing and developing appropriately, they see a Plunket nurse.  Plunket is a family-support program.  They employ nurses, obviously, and also organize neighborhood playgroups and put on parenting classes.

The boys both behaved like wonderful little gentlemen for the nurse (OK, Arram cried when she examined him but he has a thing about strangers).  They both got clean bills of health and we were congratulated for doing right by our kids. 

Amiri is 15.35 kg and 96 cm (33.8 lbs and 3 feet 2 inches), just about the 50th percentile for both.  Arram is 9.81 kg and 75.5 cm (21.6 lbs and 2 feet 6 inches), at the 75th percentile for both.

The post shop

Can I even tell you how cool the Post Shop is?  My mind still insists on calling it the Post Office, and yes, it's the place to buy stamps and ship packages.  But it's so much more!  I have had the best experience every time I've been there.

You form a queue, which is always short, and go up to one of the windows.   At any window, at any time, the clerks can help you with:

• Mail
  
• Banking:  Each post shop is also a Kiwibank
• Government applications, like applying for an IRD number or for housing assistance
• Paying your utility bills
• Renewing your driver license
• Registering your car
  
• Notary
• Prepaid credit cards
• Stationary, magazines, and calendars
• Insurance
• Western Union
  

Slide! No, swings! No, flower swing!

I took Amiri to the playground on the north side of Victoria Park.  He had big fun.

 

 

 

  

Later, I asked him what his favorite toy was.  He couldn't decide.  He loved them all.

Good answer

I just put Amiri to bed.  Even though he's a big underwear-wearing boy, we ask him to wear a pull-up at night because sometimes it's difficult to make it to the bathroom when you're sleepy.  So as usual, tonight he got changed, and then began to carefully arrange his underwear on his bike. 

"Why are you doing that, Amiri?"

"Why not?"

Delivered so offhand and nonchalantly, I couldn't argue with that.  The bike will wear underwear tonight.

Zip cars and bikes for hire

In nearly any shopping/cafe area in town, you'll see bikes like these.  They are do-it-yourself rental bikes.  Just call the number or go online to give your credit card number, and you'll get a code to unlock your bike.  Keep it as long as you want, for four bucks an hour.  You can leave it at any bike kiosk, not necessarily the one you picked it up at.  They even come with helmets (by law, you must wear a helmet on your bike).

Those bikes are great for sightseeing or for window-shopping along the entire stretch of Ponsonby Road.  But what if you've got some real errands to run?  Those baskets don't hold that much.  Well, you can rent cars in a similar program.  Available zip cars are seeded in specific slots in carparks all over the city.  Once you've gone online to verify your drivers license and enroll in the rental program, you can call in at any time to get a code for keyless entry/ignition on a nearby car.  Use it for as long as your need, and then drop it off in the nearest open approved space.  Yet another convenient option for the car-free!

A night on the town

We got a babysitter last night.  We found Amanda online and she's a friendly nineteen year old from Mount Eden.  Amiri shook her hand like a proper gentleman when they met.  Arram started to cry when she picked him up; I guess his stranger-danger is starting to kick in.

With the kids in her capable hands, we went out to dinner just down the street at one of the nice restaurants we always pass.  It felt really good to be out on our own, just the two of us... a chance to connect and have fun together.  Remembering that we're not just parents.  We stayed out until the extreme hour of 11 pm and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.

And here's the icing on the cake:  the restaurant was (almost) free for us!  I have started doing some mystery shopping here, just for a lark and to learn about new stores.  I was assigned to shop that restaurant and give lots of feedback about its appearance, food, staff, etc.  In return, most of our bill will be reimbursed! 

Postscript

I forgot yesterday that I took a short video at Maungawhau's crater.  This might give a better sense of its depth.



Mom--Yes, dandelions, I think.  I didn't see any flowers on the prickly tree, though.
Liz--It looked like a kitty up close.  Sunning itself on the fence.  But I agree that the photo makes it look rat-like. 

Monga-Foe

When the boys went to bed for their naps this afternoon, I hopped on the bus and went exploring at Mount Eden.

You walk up the road a way, and then have to climb across a stile into the nature preserve area.   I was looking forward to seeing sheep inside the fence, but the sign seems to indicate that they don't need the sheep to do their natural landscaping anymore since they planted a new kind of grass.

Although it looks like this contraption, which I'm guessing is a sheep-waterer, is still in operation.

I climbed and climbed, way up, to the top of the hill.  The highest (natural) point in Auckland!  It was a really hot day and I was glad I'd brought some water with me when I reached the top.

Below are views to the north and east.  You can see other green parks rising up out of the city.  The one with the obelisk is One Tree Hill.

 

Mount Eden is actually a volcano, as are the other sticking-up green parks.  The crater is very steep and deep.  There are numerous signs requesting that we stay out of the crater, because it is sacred to the native people and also a valuable archaeological site that they don't want damaged.  So when I saw this guy, I tsk-tsked to myself... hmmph, rules don't apply to him, eh.  But then I saw that he had a garbage bag and was picking up errant bits of wind-blown trash.  And when he got to the bottom he shoved the rocks around with his feet to erase the name that some other disrespectful tourist had written.  I forgave him. :-)

This meadow is the site of an epic battle between warring iwi (tribes).   I can just imagine eight or ten fierce Maori warriors crouching in each of these mini-craters and waiting to spring out at their enemies.

This tree attracted my attention because it's so unpleasant.  This tree never gets invited to the parties.

And on the stone fence surrounding the park maintenance building, is a whimsical little stone decoration.  As Amiri says, "Kitties say now, now.'

Pepper man hooked us up

At the market we always stop at the booth where the dreadlocked blonde guy sells peppers, cucumbers, and live orchids.  I let Amiri pick out the peppers and the guy always makes friendly little jokes about what a good helper he is for mum.  I respond that the little boy always picks good ones, since there isn't a bad one in the lot.

I'm sure the merchant recognizes us as regulars.  This time he gave me an elegant bouquet of tropical flowers on the house.  Aren't they pretty?

Coordinated!

Our little boy has gotten quite good on his bike.  Here he is executing a flawless turn without even using his feet!

A summer stroll

We received a notice that a package was being held for us at the central mail-sorting facility over in Grey Lynn because we had not been home to sign for it when the postie came by.   I could have taken the bus, but it was such a beautiful morning that I decided to walk instead. 

I started the day out on the right foot by doing a good deed:  helping a couple to push their stalled car out of the intersection.  Then I walked past the New World market, and then up Franklin Road.  WAY up.  It was a really steep, long hill!  I said hello to the many homeowners working in their gardens (aka yards) who greeted me warmly as I walked past.  I turned onto Ponsonby Road.  Ponsonby is a rather bohemian suburb and Ponsonby Road holds many one-of-a-kind shops and funky restaurants.  I saw a taqueria, fittingly named Taqueria, and a burger place whose name caught my attention.

The walk back after picking up my parcel was much faster since it was all downhill.  I went a total of 8.6 km!   And when I got home, we all went to the farmer's market.

Amiri: once an American, always an American

(He's just showing you his owie.)

Landscaping

Amiri loves our little trips to the plaza next door.  Running, exploring, looking at boats, riding his bike.  Fun stuff.  This time, we played sword-fighting with palm fronds.

Amiri calls the white landscaping stuff at the bottom of the trees 'popcorn'.  I told him they are rocks.  Turns out I'm wrong, though:  they're crushed shells.  Isn't seaside living cool?

Shhh. It's naptime.

Just lately, Amiri has been refusing to take his nap in his bed, instead preferring to construct a campsite on the floor between it and the window.  Note the placement of the lion, which has always been a popular pillow.  The blue fleece blanket was a gift from our real estate agent:  while she led us on a tour through the apartment, Amiri took her hand and apparently stole her heart.

Arram, on the other hand, loves to sleep in the bed, especially if he's snuggled up next to Mama.

But does the alphabet song sound the same?

"NZ" is pronounced "en-zed."

Since it is late and I am feeling vaguely ill, that is all.