As a German in New Zealand one thing you quickly realise when it comes to shopping is the difference in opening hours compared to Germany. This information might be a bit outdated but a as far as I can remember in Germany most shops are closed on Sunday. But on the other hand most shops are open until 8pm. Here in New Zealand most shops are open seven days a week but most of them close already at 5.30pm, which makes after-work shopping almost impossible. Sure, there’s always the weekend where you can do your shopping, you might think. But since after-work shopping is not really possible, everyone does the shopping on the weekends. As a result the malls are usually packed on Saturday and Sunday which makes shopping a pain. Personally, I prefer the German way. On Sundays I can sleep late and then during the week, when I’m in work mode anyway, I do all my shopping after work.
By the way, this is written by a person who hates shopping in general.
Yesterday I went with friends to the Ellerslie Flower Show in Manukau (no, not in Ellerslie). To be honest I expected something more like our national garden show in Germany where they grow real gardens, build lakes and so on. The show was more like an exhibition with big tents with things ranging from ‘what’s that supposed to mean?’ to ‘that’s quite nice’. Around the tents you could also buy plants, garden furnitures, fireplaces (?) etc.
The ticket was $30 and it’s definitely not worth it. I mean it was interesting to see what the Flower Show is like because it always seems to be such a big event every year. But paying $30 for a few nice flowers, lawns, and a big nursery/market garden is a bit too much. Anyway, at least the Burger afterwards at Burger Fuel was really good.
A few days ago I realised that more and more people are finding my website through Google in search for “german bakery auckland”. If you type this phrase in Google I’m listed on rank 5 and 6. I guess the reason is the article I posted about this German bakery here in Auckland. Those visitors would’ve probably expected to find the details of the bakery. For the records and all the Aucklanders who want to indulge in good German bread here is the address:
Diehl’s Bakery – Best German Breads in Town!
5/65 Hillside Road, Glenfield, Auckland
Opening hours:
Wed – Fri: 7.00am – 2.00pm
Sat: 7.00am – 1.00pm
Phone: 0-9-443 7992
The good thing about Auckland is the fact that whenever an event is coming to New Zealand you can be pretty sure it´s in Auckland. This time it was the science fiction and comic convention Armageddon. The convention itself is actually a New Zealand thing and it´s having its 10th anniversary this year but the guests were quite international. Although I watch Star Trek I wouldn´t call myself a Trekkie but what Armageddon had to offer sounded quite interesting even for me. They had a lot of video game consoles, comic book and model stands there. Apart from the new Xbox 360 I wasn´t really interested in that stuff. To my disappointment you weren´t able to try Microsoft´s next generation console yourself. All Microsoft Australia had to offer was a presentation that showed some scenes from first person shooters. The product manager said the Xbox 360 will be released beginning of next year in Australia. Someone should´ve told him that he´s in New Zealand…
Anyway, my real interest was actually in the Q&A panels with stars from different movies and TV series. It all started with a King Kong panel with three guys from Peter Jackson´s special effects department Weta Workshop/Digital. Although they weren´t allowed to show us any footage from the movie (apart from the trailer) they gave you interesting insights into the problems you´re facing during such a film production.
The next panel was with John Rhys-Davies, better known as the dwarf Gimli in Lord of the Rings as well Indiana Jones´ sidekick Sallah in Indy 1 and 3. As veteran stage actor who had played in more than hundred movies he had many cool stories to tell. When someone asked a question he got totally carried away but it was always interesting and funny. He couldn´t really tell anything new about Indy 4 but assured us that when it happens it will be the best Indy movie of all since Lucas, Spielberg and Ford wouldn´t do it for the money but for adding something new to the world of Indiana Jones. Ok, not really something new…It was interesting how he criticised his latest movie´s story and script without even mentioning the name. It was pretty clear that he was talking about the Dungeon Siege movie which is based on a Microsoft video game and produced/directed by the infamous Uwe Boll. This guy takes one popular video game after the other and turns them into really really bad movies.
After this panel there was another one with an actress from Star Trek: Next Generation (Gates MacFadden or Dr. Beverly Crusher for those who are interested) which was also quite interesting and entertaining. I wonder if the actors never get tired of answering the same questions over and over again. But from what they said they just love the contact with their fans and also to catch up with old friends and colleagues.
The last thing on my programme was a comedy show with Dean Haglund from X-Files. Now you might think either “Who the hell is Dean Haglund?” or “a comedy show?!”. To answer question one: Dean played this blonde, long haired computer geek Langly. He was part of The Lone Gunmen and helped Mulder and Scully out on a few mysteries. To answer question two: Man, this guy is really funny! He did kind of an improvised X-Files comedy show with some people from the audience and I must say that I haven´t had a such a good laugh for some time.
All in all it was a very good deal for just $15 (you can hear the German speaking…) and I would definitely go to another convention like this. But that doesn´t mean I´ll dress up in a Starfleet uniform the next time. I´ll leave that to the real die hard fans. And hey, how often can you say that you got poked by Boba Fett´s laser gun.
It was quite windy last weekend here in Auckland. Actually, it was more like a storm. A saw everything from branches to recycling containers on the streets. On my way back home from work there was this tree which had fallen down. It’s on Sandringham road (for those who know Auckland). Luckily, no one got hurt and this guy had his chainsaw already there. He didn’t seem to be too happy about me taking photos of him though.
Last weekend I went down to Mt Ruapehu with friends to try skiing in New Zealand. But for a warm up we went to the Snowplanet north of Auckland. This was my first indoor skiing experience ever and I didn’t have very high hopes. If you can hire your gear including glove ski pants etc. which is quite expensive. One hour of skiing plus gear comes to $43. The run is about 200m long and has two platter lifts which take you up in about 90secs. Going down the hill at average speed on skis take about 20secs. Not the best ratio if you ask me. This situation is different for snowboarders. There are quite a few ramps and jumps.
Anyway, back to the trip to the real mountains. We stayed in Ohakune which is about a 20 minutes drive from the valley station. We checked the weather report early Saturday morning and it wasn’t looking very good: Visibilty around 50m and wind. The funny thing was that the weather down in Ohakune was actually really nice. We decided to drive up to the valley station and check out the conditions. Unfortunately the weather report was right. Also the snow was quite slushy. So we went back to Ohakune and after lunch straight into the spa pool. On Sunday morning it was even worse. If I remember correctly all lifts were closed anyway so we decided to drive back to Auckland.
So my first skiing experience in New Zealand didn’t really happen. Well, you can’t really count the snowplanet. Mt Ruapehu is a 4-5 hours drive from Auckland and not even knowing if you can actually ski or not can be quite frustrating. I don’t mind a bit of fog or snow storm but the weather down there can change from one hour to the other completely. I heard that it’s much better this week but a 4-5 hours drive to find out if it’s true is a bit much.
