Wanted.

So I've just been to see that film 'Julie and Julia' with Amy Adams and Meryl Streep (LOVE) about a woman who cooks all of Julia Child's recipes in a year and writes a blog about it.

The film is a bit too long and the blog lady Julie is a whiny, self-absorbed bitch, but Meryl is of course splendid and all the food (and Paris) looks absolutely delicious.

Now I am sitting at home in my beige, IKEA-furnished, studenty apartment on an unassuming street in Auckland's CBD, listening to drunk Asians yelling and wishing the following:

1. I was in Paris, or at least Europe. Anywhere with cafes tucked along cobbled streets, or a place with more "cul-cha" than some over-blown reggae and a love of biodiversity (except for you, possums. Fuck you).

2. I was the kind of person who felt inclined to cook tasty dishes rather than having an essentially raw diet of vegetables, gratefully complemented by the heat from my liquid-staples of tea, coffee and beer (tragically room temperature).

3. I had a (preferably attractive, single, male) friend who was doing an apprenticeship in cooking ("Chefery"? "Cheffing"?) and needed someone to taste all his work and whom he would still find curiously alluring despite their consequently ballooning waistline.

Know someone like that? Give them my number. Now.

This is Amy Brewer. Bon appetit! x

Work hard, play harder.

So the last month has been spent principally in Auckland, mostly because the weather's pretty crap and rainy (REALLY rainy) but also because there's loads more work here than in Edinburgh (I've probably written more essays in the last four weeks than I have since I've been studying at the 'burgh). But they're mostly on interesting topics, and not too long, and of course the more work you do the less you have to worry about final marks, because there's more opportunities to learn from mistakes etc. S'all good bro.

Anyway, in between all that work malarky, here's what I've been up to:

I've been exploring the city more, checking out K Road, which is like the Camden/Carnaby St (of the old days) equivalent, with some art-school/indie cool coffee shops and vintage stores, and I also went down to the viaduct last weekend, which has some nice Southbank-like attempts at bars and restaurants. The last time it was sunny Mark and I went to the island of Rangitoto (half an hour away on a ferry) which is basically solidified volcanic vomit, if you will. There's no shops or anything but you can easily clamber up to the summit over a load of black volcanic rocks and get an awesome view out towards downtown Auckland and other suburb-y bits. We got sunburnt doing so, and enjoyed Tim Tam-wiches at the top.

So I've spent a fair bit of time with Mark, and also a gang of Europeans who live in his building, as well as with Colleen (we just seem to get on really well, despite being fairly opposite kinds of people: Colleen has this charming, magnetic personality, is super skinny, likes writing children's literature and stops to smell road-side flowers, whilst I look on with one eyebrow skeptically raised). We've been to art galleries (Colleen and I disagreed with NZ on what it had voted its favourite painting), formal dinners (I'm still unclear on why we were subjected to a recorder recital), done a lot of drinking (wine in a box = inevitable disaster), done kareoke (Colleen and I were marvellous as Oliva Newton John and John Travolta respectively) and won pub quizzes (Mark's obsession; last week the team came 2nd and 3rd...).

Lovely friend Carlton has also been in town for the last month with Mamma Mia!, and it's be awesome to see so much of him and to meet and hang out with his friends in the cast and crew of the show. Carlton, his marvellous friend Mick, Mark and I have had several heavy Sunday nights (Monday being Carlie's day off) that have been a lot of fun, and Carlie has also been regularly feeding us poor studends on Monday nights (cue large amounts of beef and potatoes, oh yes). I went to Kelly Tarltons, a sort of underground, faux-Antarctica with penguins, with Carlie and his equally lovely friend Darren a few weeks back, and last night was 'band night' where the cast of Mamma Mia! did some non-Abba numbers in the pub opposite the theatre, which was great. Carlie is a lot of fun, plus it's nice to have a familiar face in town, tho at times it's made me a bit homesick.

I've also been hanging out in the flat with my flatmates too, the American girls mostly, despite their high-pitched giggling and squealing, which is kinda fun. They decided they liked me because I'm British and therefore funny...

I went to little JJ's second birthday party, which was cowboy themed, and helped Rachel ice cactus-shaped biscuits and a boot-shaped cake. They had a real pony which was awesome too, tho JJ seemed most excited about the helium filled cow-print balloons...

My band has got itself back together after our singer was in hospital for a while, and it's fun to hang out with the guys and jam again...

I've done yoga at this Hare Krishna (!) place a couple of times with friends Olga and Jessica, the latter of whom is unfairly flexible (like most of the other people who like to balance and bend on coloured mats in a hot dark room of a Thursday night). Let's not pretend, my favourite part is lying in the dark at the end and the free meal afterwards...

I went to an 'alumni host family dinner' the other weekend, where a woman who used to go to Auckland Uni fed three of us international students, which was jolly, a bit like dinner with yer grandparents but never say no to a free roast, eh?

So there we go. But y'know, although all these things have been fun, I won't lie, I'm pretty damned bored of Auckland and wonder what I'll do next semester. I'm sad that most of my friends will be leaving in the next couple of months and just feel like NZ is a pretty average place. I know there's lots of beautiful scenery, and I shouldn't judge until I get to the South Island, but the things I really like - good food, art galleries, museums, movies - are kinda lacking. Everything's very spread out here so you can't bar-hop, for instance, or there's only one good thing of its kind. I'm a city girl, I don't care about scenery!

I also think I'm struggling a bit because I haven't really got my teeth in to anything - no Bedlam, no Fresh Air, for example. I find it hard not having a centre of focus like that. But that's probably my own fault. Here's hoping there are some bloody exciting people arriving next semester, or I'll need a really engrossing job or something. I wonder also what summer will bring... (more on that next time.)

Anyway, enough whining. I hope you're all well. A x