Thanksgiving

I know American Thanksgiving isn't for another couple of days, but we are off to Fiji (!!!) tomorrow morning to celebrate my 30th birthday and will have minimal internet access. And although I am really looking forward to Fiji, I really miss Thanksgiving.

Back in October Rob told you about all the things he's thankful for, so now it's my turn!

Megan is thankful for:

1. This opportunity - in theory I worked really hard for years and earned this transfer to New Zealand in blood, sweat and tears. In practice, I did work hard, but I also got really, really lucky. That a position with my exact job description opened up two days before I sent over my resume was incredibly fortuitous. In the end all I had to do was ask for it and it was mine. I feel so fortunate every day.

2. A husband who upon hearing "Hey - you know how we have a fabulous life surrounded by the best friends you could ask for and live in one of the best cities in the world in a beautiful apartment?  What do you say we give all that up to live in a shoe box on the other side of the world where we don't know anyone?" responded with an enthusiastic, "When do we move?"  

3. All of the technology that allows us to keep in touch with the aforementioned friends. I don't know what I would do without FaceTime, gchat, Facebook, email and even this blog.

4. The friends and family who are patient enough to communicate with us using these methods - especially given the complications caused by the time difference. You all keeping in touch means the world to us!

5. Fiji!

Our home for the next 5 days.

Checking In

Life has been pretty routine lately - nothing too out of the ordinary... at least not for New Zealand.  The weather here has gotten glorious.  I promise not to post about the weather too much (especially while Chicago is having tornadoes and snow), but it's just now getting to be summer, which means it's 75* and sunny. This means we have been spending (and will continue to spend) most of our spare time outside.

Last weekend we went to Taste of Auckland with our friends Taylor (Aussie) and Sam (British). It turns out that Auckland tastes a lot like Chicago - lots of meats and wines and cheeses - but with a lot more fresh seafood.

Friday night we took the ferry over to Devonport to have dinner with the Canadians. My current dream in life is to move to Devonport when our lease is up and take the ferry to work every day.  We caught a beautiful sunset over the city on our way back.

Saturday was a BBQ with the House Hunters folks (who have since moved into a much nicer place than the one they found on House Hunters).  It was BYOB and BYO Meat and we got take advantage of their building's glorious rooftop deck with a grill and a fantastic view of Mount Rangitoto.

Today was the Santa Parade in downtown Auckland, which marks the beginning of the Christmas season here. We didn't see any Santas or hear any Christmas music, but we did see Batman.

Finally, Rob is sporting a mustache these days (also known as a "Mo") in honor of Movember, which raises money for men's health issues. It's huge in New Zealand, and at least half the men in the office are participating (including partners). If you want to make a donation to Rob's team in honor of this glorious mustache, please click HERE.

Waitakere Region and Urban Hiking

This past weekend was a bit more low-key than recent weekends have been (which meant we "only" went to the beach/ran, went to a birthday party, did a 10km hike, and grabbed drinks with friends). This was a welcome change, as things have been pretty crazy. See below or a mini photo-essay about our weekend!

Saturday Rob went trail running in the Waitakere Ranges with Chris.

While the boys were running, Clare and I grabbed a stack of books and headed to Piha Beach to hang out in the sun. Something in the black sand makes it magnetic - it wouldn't come off my backpack!

Sunday we did a 10k "urban hike" to the top of Mount Eden with our backpacks loaded down with books - we're starting to train for the 43km hike we're planning to do over Christmas break.

We tried to FaceTime into the Dolans' wedding from Mount Eden, but weren't getting good enough service. We tried again from a nearby bar, but it still didn't work. So we cheers'd to them on our own.  Congrats Dolans!!!! We're so sad we missed it!  Everything was beautiful and it looked like an amazing time. Wishing you a lifetime of happiness!

Three weddings and a funeral

Today marks three months of living in New Zealand.

Three months seems to be a big milestone among ex-pats.They tell us that three months is when the shiny newness of everything starts to wear off and the homesickness really starts to kick in. Time begins to obscure all the things once worth leaving for and accentuate all those still worth staying for.

I'm not usually one for cheesy Pinterest quotes, but this one hits me right in the feels.

Coincidentally, today also marks the first wedding we've had to miss due to our move, and I can't think of anything that better highlights what we have given up to come here.

Back in March, I had dinner with a friend and she mentioned that she would probably get married in 2014. That night I panicked to Rob. I'd considered all the day-to-day stuff that we'd be missing, but with how expensive plane tickets are, moving to New Zealand meant missing out on a lot of the big stuff too - weddings, births and even deaths. That evening we made the decision to move to Vancouver - primarily for this reason.

Later on that night I received an email letting me know that the New Zealand office wanted to talk to me, and within a few weeks everything had changed. 

In May, my sister got engaged. I was thrilled to be there for the celebration and super excited to take her wedding dress shopping the month before leaving. She plans to get married in May 2015, and we promised to be back for it.

In October, the friend I had dinner with that night in March also got engaged, and this was much harder. We sent them a bottle of bubbly so we could toast over FaceTime, clinking our glasses against the screen of our iPads. They plan to get married in October 2014, and we promised we'd try our damnedest to make it.

But anyone who has been involved in a wedding knows that the wedding is just the icing on the cake. We're still missing out on engagement parties and bachelorette parties and dress shopping and bridal showers.

A few weeks after our friend got engaged, Rob's grandmother passed away. Contrary to the title of this post, there was no funeral, so the discussion of whether to fly back for it never came up. But much like weddings, the funeral itself is just the tip of the iceberg, and physical presence means so much more than words.

In just three months, we have missed so many things. My cousin had a baby in September, and we won't be there to meet him at Thanksgiving. Another friend is due with her first baby in April - and we won't be there for that either. And too many things have happened that demanded a hug and quiet comfort, which we couldn't provide.

Despite all of this, we don't regret our decision to move. We love our new home and have so many adventures to look forward to. At least for us, the shiny newness of this place doesn't seem to be wearing off any time soon. We are thrilled for this opportunity and if we could go back and do it all over, would make the same decision every time. We have each other, so we're not lonely. You could even go so far as to say that we're ridiculously happy.

But damn if we don't miss you all.

A Kiwi Halloween

Halloween has always been one of my favorite holidays, and I moved to New Zealand knowing that it is not as big of a deal here. What I did not realize is that it is not really a thing at all. On the 31st, not a single Kiwi wished me a Happy Halloween. There are no witches in shop windows and not a single one of the parents I know mentioned trick-or-treating. One store was already setting up for Christmas before the day was over.

We got invited to a Halloween party at a bar, and they had a costume contest, so it seemed like a pretty safe bet that people would get dressed up. Of course, we didn't get this invitation until 2 days before the party, so we had to act fast to pull something together. The way that the timing worked out kind of made it feel like a Project Runway challenge.

We went to the nearest costume store half an hour before we had to be somewhere else, so we had 20 minutes to shop and didn't want to spend more than $50. Then we had just one evening to put it all together!

I'm a unicorn! Rob was a dragon, but didn't want any pictures - it wasn't a very good dragon.

On Friday we rushed home from work, quickly got dressed and headed out to the costume party. On our way there, we did not see a single other person dressed up, and were slightly unnerved when we arrived to the bar to find a bunch of non-dressed-up people standing outside. When we got inside we saw a couple people in costume, but they were almost all employees of the bar.  There were some other patrons in costume, but nearly every single costume was either a dead something or a zombie something. There were a couple dead brides and grooms, a dead cheerleader, a dead ringmaster, etc. Not a single person was wearing anything quite so bright and cheery as a hot pink glittery unicorn.

From top left: Us with our friend Katie, aka Grumpy Cat; My sister Erin, who coincidentally was also a unicorn this year; an epic Dragon vs. Unicorn battle - I'll let you guess who won

Thankfully, we are used to standing out a bit on Halloween, so took it all in stride. Hilariously enough, my Project Runway version of a Halloween costume took second place in the costume contest. Last year, when I painted my entire body blue, I only came in third.

This is what 3rd place looks like in Chicago.

Of course, last year I was something dead/zombiefied, so the Kiwis probably would have crowned me the Queen of Halloween. Next year we'll know better - maybe go as a unicorn and dragon after the epic battle?

On Halloween night we watched our annual scary movie. This year Rob chose Black Sheep, which is a horror film about zombie sheep in New Zealand. Imdb's plot description is "An experiment in genetic engineering turns harmless sheep into blood-thirsty killers that terrorize a sprawling New Zealand farm."  To give you an idea of what this movie was like, I leave you with an image from our trip to the grocery store yesterday.

Mmmmmm... sheep hearts