New year new city for me

Apologies for lack of transmission over the traditional winter solstice period, I have been busy moving cities. I moved to Auckland over the weekend.

But never fear cantabs - I will attempt to keep an eye on the news down south as the blogsphere is certainly overrepresented by the obsessions of the north. I promise not to make a sudden conversion to supporting the Auckland rugby team, largely because I don't care a great deal about the Canterbury or any other rugby team for that matter. So long as they beat Auckland (joke).

I find it interesting that Auckland, Wellington and Dunedin people say Christchurch is a hard place to navigate as it is too flat. Really its easy - just look at where the port hills are and you have a clear marker of direction. But take a cantab away from those hills and they end up in many a U-turn as they lose their sense of direction. I have taken many many wrong turns in my first few days here.

I am currently staying in Avondale and it certainly has its quirks. I went looking for a pub to get a bite to eat and watch the cricket and none could be found. I enjoyed the irony of finding lots of churches instead. All these institutions aiming to save my soul and all I wanted was the demon drink! I must add I am not a big drinker at all, and this probably coloured my perceptions - I didn't feel the need to feel guilty about looking for a pub. The next day I attempted to buy a bottle of wine with the groceries only to be told the wine needed to be paid for seperately, at another counter - what is it with this suburb and the occasional drink in moderation??

I later found out this is a legacy of Mt Roskill being a 'dry' area for years and years. With this in mind I found myself quitely appreciating Helen Clark for voting against the stupid bill to raise the drinking age last year - given the area she must have had a lot of knee jerk social conservatives to deal with. Good on her for siding with sanity and effective policy over "appearance" medicine.

PS: Happy new year