Birthdays for People who Make Things Happen

As mentioned in my last post, I am a planner - I pride myself on making things happen. I largely credit this trait for us being where we are today. A lot of people talk about wanting to move abroad, but not many people follow through on it. That said, I feel pretty comfortable making the blanket statement that most fellow ex-pats we run into are also people who make things happen.

This past weekend we attended two birthday celebrations planned by ex-pats, which means we had a pretty busy weekend.

Friday was our friend Katie S's birthday, and she wanted to do a Silent Disco Flash Mob. For those of you who don't know what that is (as I didn't before I was in one, here's Katie's description from the invite:

  

"In short, it's a form of flash mob where people dance to their own music (with headphones on) at their own pace in a public area all at the same time."

So me, Rob, Katie and a bunch of other people met up at a bar after work to build up some liquid courage, headed over to Aotea Square, and danced our hearts out in public. Unfortunately I don't have a video of this, but highlights include Rob jumping around like a crazy person and our friend Drew doing the electric slide for a full 5 minutes. For those of you who are curious - I was dancing to "Valerie" by Amy Winehouse and "Party in the USA" by Miley Cyrus, and Rob was dancing to Skrillex.

From top left: Silo Park; lamp cut from jade (I want it!); biking past a container painting; parked at a photo contest; entries in the photo contest

 Saturday and Sunday we celebrated our friend Mike's birthday. Mike is a Kiwi, but his girlfriend Kalli is American, and she planned an entire weekend of activities. Saturday afternoon all the boys got together for a whiskey tasting at Sam Snead's House of Whiskey. Then we all met up together for some dinner, drinks and dancing. But we couldn't stay out too late because Sunday morning we took a 4-hour bike tour through Art Week. Finally, we met up with some more friends for brunch by the harbour with bubbles, and then headed straight home for a nap.

A kinetic sculpture that moves in the wind

A work colleague commented that I have more going on than she does every weekend even though she has lived here for years and has tons of friends. I replied that we don't know very many people yet - but obviously we know the right ones!

An exhibit in the Britomart train station with letters people wrote to those they love - these two were my favorite.

People write what they love about Auckland on the chalkboard and artists depict it in paintings.