Goodbye Wellington

I have had a great last couple of weeks in Wellington.  I mentioned a while ago that I felt like everybody had forgotten I was leaving, but that definitely changed!!  I was totally spoilt with people wanting to spend time with me and shower me with gifts and booze.  Thanks everybody!  I had dinner, drinks and pool with Karl, Graeme, Jay and Hugh; party with the entire staff at the 10-pin bowling hall; dinner with 13 of my friends from various quarters; Heather's goodbye lunch; brunch with Christine; lunch with Karl and Hugh; breakfast with Kitt; lunch with Vicky; drinks with Kitt; and dinner with my closest Wgtn friends.

Clearly, it's also been a very busy couple of weeks.  Around all that, I finished at work on Friday, went rowing on Sunday morning, and I had to pack all my stuff up.  There was a lot more stuff than I realised.  Even after I gave heaps of it away and sold piles of stuff.  Sorry Dad!

Finishing work was a bit of a weird one.  I technically finished at 4pm, the end of my shift at Courtenay Place.  There were lots of people saying goodbye to me, and I had big knots in my stomach, but then 4pm came and nothing really happened or changed.  Nothing fell out of the sky.  I didn't feel any different.  And then I went home to get ready for dinner with my friends.

I'm going to start mucking around with my formatting from now on.  Lots more photos.

All the work events were a lot of fun.

  

 John the Gelato Maker was the most avid bowler of the bunch.

Thursday, 28 July 2011



We think he may have been the Dutch National 10-Pin Bowling Champion - "in 1945, just before the war", according to Karl.  Although in the end it was Hugh who thrashed everybody, and scored something unheard of, like 130 points.

When the five of us went out for dinner and pool, all the boys just took it in turns to beat me.  (At pool I mean, not beat me up.)  I'm a little unclear on who the winner was in the end, but let's go with Karl, it's usually him. 

Thanks to everybody who wrote me a reference, or shouted me a meal or a drink or a night out (or all of the above!).  Especially Karl, who's been incredibly generous.

Heather and me, on the day she flew out of Wellington.

Saturday, 30 July 2011

I spent a lot of time with my friends in the last four or five days I was in Wellington.  Heather has been living in Taranaki, but she's taking the big plunge and going to Japan to teach English.  She flew out of Wellington, so she stayed with some of our friends and we went out for a big goodbye lunch for her on Saturday, at Heaven Pizza.  They sell excellent gelato...  ;-)

 Zane; and Jess, Roxy, Heather, Sarah, me, and the top of Kim's head which is hidden just below Roxy.

Saturday, 30 July 2011

Kim looks quite a lot like Sarah, them being indentical twins and all, so you can just look at Sarah twice and you'll be right.

Friday night was my "official" goodbye thing with my friends.  We had planned to go to a new restaurant, Voodoo, who serve New Orleans style food.  I called on Wednesday and booked for 10 people, but by Friday I knew we were expecting at least 12.  The person who I spoke to at the restaurant on Wednesday was clearly not paying attention, so I forced my friends to call for me.  Sarah rang and spoke to the manager, who said that they actually had a private function on that night which had booked out the entire restaurant, and that my booking should never have been accepted.  They hadn't been able to call me because the clever man I spoke to on Wednesday had not written down the last three digits of my phone number.  So they'd made us a booking at Public for that night, and they had a $100 voucher for me to use at Voodoo another time. 

Public was pretty good.  It ended up being such an awesome night.  There were friends there that I made in the hostel I lived in during my 1st year at uni, current and past flatmates, and rowing friends.  Everybody made friends and started chattering away amongst themselves.



Me and Vicky on the cable car.

Tuesday, 2 August 2011



This was meant to be my awkward look.  Vicky clearly does a much better awkward look than me.

Thanks so much Dad, for driving to Wellington on Tuesday and back on Wednesday, just to bring me and all my stuff home to Rotorua.  He's also spent most of today helping me organise the pile of my stuff that was out at his work, and running round town this afternoon taking boxes to the charity shop and getting my car deregistered.

My ex-flat in Tinakori Rd.