"Minnesota, that's by Oklahoma, right?"

My flatmate (Arely) can make friends with a rock. It’s true. She could befriend a blind, mute, deaf person on the street if you gave her a couple minutes. It is common for us to go out on the weekends, or to the grocery store, or to a coffee shop, or to the mall, or whatever and have Arely disappear on us, only to turn up a few minutes later with a new friend in tow. Fortunately, this works out well for the rest of the flat, because we often get to meet people and do things we probably wouldn’t do otherwise. One of these such things is Monday night dinners. You see, Arely (the Texan) had randomly met a kiwi couple holidaying back in Texas one day, and of course, they are now two of her very best friends and just so happen to live in Dunedin. So, every Monday night they and some of their friends, have a group of people over for dinner. Usually, just Arely goes and comes back full, happy, and warm (they have a fireplace in their house!). Yesterday, however, Arely came into the flat before it was time to be picked up with some happy tidings—we too were invited to a wonderful warm dinner. I couldn’t be more excited.

As we sat down for dinner, I waited for the impending doom. Sure enough, as soon as the spoon went into the casserole, they all looked right at me as if in unison, and one of them asked, “So Kelsey, where are you from?” This is a question I hear a lot, and don’t get me wrong, I love telling people where I’m from—I even made my flatmates sit down as I made a slideshow of my pictures of Minnesota and my family just to show how much I love it. However, when you live with a person from California and another from Texas, you get to watch the excited glow take over people as they badger them with questions about movie stars and cowboys. On the other hand, when I say I’m from Minnesota I either get a blank stare, a you must be warm here then, or a (and this is the absolute worst) where is that? Unfortunately at dinner, I got a combination. The silence after I said I was from Minnesota was deafening, everyone seemed to have stopped eating mid bite as they blankly stared at me, trying to figure out if I had just made some weird M word up or I was telling the truth. Finally, someone had the gall to say, “hmm Minnesota, I’ve never heard of it, where is it?”

I promise, I wasn’t mean, and it’s not like I even expect anyone to know where my state is—I hardly know the regions of their country so why should they know mine. But like I said, I had the Californian and the Texan snickering on either side of me, and my state-pride was clouding my rational expectations of what they would know.

I tried to softly and calmly explain that Minnesota was a part of the Midwest; it bordered Canada and the great lakes. To my surprise, this did not help them geographically whatsoever. This time eyebrows shot up in shock and then down in confusion as they thought. Then I got, “Wait, if Minnesota is in the mid west why is it by Canada? And aren’t the great lakes in New York?”

Again, I tried to explain the Midwest region, bringing in Chicago, and all the other states immediately surrounding it. Suddenly, relief, the host laughed and pointed at me. I was so happy, they finally understood where I was from!

“Ohhhhh, so Minnesota is right next to Oklahoma!”

I hope I didn’t sigh out loud too forcefully. No, I explained, Minnesota is not by Oklahoma, Texas is by Oklahoma.

They looked at each other, the confusion bubbling up again as one of them decided this matter was important enough for a map to be found. For some reason only the pregnant lady could get the map, so I watched guiltily as she slowly pushed herself up from her chair and power walked out of the room, carrying a big map of the world with her as she came back. Me and my flatmates—who had joined the MN cause—pointed out where Minnesota was, and I’d like to think they silently oohed and ahed at its majestic shapely beauty. I felt a little proud of myself, even if they hadn’t known where Minnesota was before, at least they knew now, and I was here to tell them just how wonderful it was!

Of course, the next question after where Minnesota is, whose answer took about 15 minutes, is what is famous in Minnesota? I talked about 10,000 lakes, about winters, camping, and outdoors things. I may have over-exaggerated a bit (or a lot), but hey, I was competing against Hollywood and gun country here, I had to represent! All I can say is the tourism department of Minnesota should be mailing me a check in the mail, because I think a few kiwis will be taking their holidays to the Midwest come this summer.

After the humbling episode of dinner, we attempted to play one of my favourite games, Apples to Apples. If you’ve never played the game before, it’s rather simple. Someone reads a card with an adjective on it (clean, beautiful, philosophical, etc) and everyone puts a card from their hand down that they think matches (or funnily mismatches) that word. Cards in your hand are people, places, and things. So for example, I could have Hellen Keller, cabbage, Crazy Horse, JFK, choir boys, and pro wrestler in my hand at the same time. I may choose to lay down cabbage when the word is philosophical and hope that it is so random it makes the judge pick it for kicks and giggles. Get it? Ok, now imagine trying to play this with Kiwis, who don’t know who Hellen Keller or Crazy Horse or Cary Grant is, and who you have to explain the word “frazzled” to among other words. It added a whole new dimension to the game. I was playing and visibly watching the gaps between our cultures make themselves known—what words they knew and didn’t, what pop culture they understood or didn’t, what US events, public figures, and places they knew about and didn’t. It was quite an interesting learning experience, something I’m sure that the game hadn’t been intended for, but provided anyway. Watching their amazed expressions as we explained who Helen Keller was almost made me feel as proud as when I told them the perks of Minnesota. It was as if Helen Keller was my second cousin, and I was the one who had taught her how to say water.

After the game they gave us a ride home again, for the last time...because...we bought a car! A 1988 Toyota is now resting down the block from our flat, just waiting for its first of many adventures to ensue. New Zealand is very difficult to travel without a car, as its public transportation is neither cheap nor easily accessible. So, with careful consideration and after viewing about 100 cars on trademe (their equivalent of craigslist) we found a working one within our budget. At the end of August, we will be putting it (and ourselves—driving on the left hand side of the road isn’t as easy as it looks) to the ultimate test as we take it for a 10 day mid-semester break adventure driving from South to absolute tip of the North Island. We have been planning it out and will be resting our heads in a different city and hopefully on Arely's friends couches (told you she makes friends with everyone--she has them in almost every city we stop in and we've only been in New Zealand a month) almost every night until reaching Auckland, staying there a few days, and then driving back again. To put it in perspective, each island is about a 9-10 hour drive lengthwise, which is doable with a jug of coffee and a good mixed tape (we have a tape player in our car!!) in a few days, but we are breaking it up into lots of short drives to enjoy the absolute most we can. How amazing is it that we can travel an entire country stopping at all of the major cities in 10 days? I just hope our car will make it through it all, especially the portion of steep winding driving up through the southern alps. Hopefully we won’t be choking each other in the backseat by the end of the trip, dumping off bodies in the uninhabited mountains...

Realizing how expensive gas (or petrol as they call it) is here... oofta

My start as a car model

Finally, I feel inclined to say that this may be my last post for awhile. Kiwi Living is hopping continents! In just three days, I am flying to Thailand for a little over a week to visit my boyfriend, John, who is on scholarship teaching English there. The internet there is not state of the art, as he is staying in a small village in Northern Thailand, so I will most likely not be able to write (as I will also hopefully be out enjoying 90+ degree weather) but will make it a point to post as soon as I get back. Please say a little prayer for me that all will go well, and I won’t love the warm weather and John time so much that I "miss" my plane back.

Cheers!