Melbourne

So Nina and I have now settled into a relatively normal routine; catch the tram, go to school, go to sports, do some homework.
When we first arrived to Melbourne from a wonderful time in the rugged Kangaroo Island where we were able to hold orphan kangaroos and get up close and personal with the feisty koalas, we stayed in a hip neighborhood of cafes and shopping. We went to the Aussie Open a few times, where my dad and I were able to see Djokovic (now the champion) play Berdych, which was shockingly intense from our seats directly behind the Djoker's entourage (can you say aggressive in Serbian?).
A week later we settled into a great apartment that has a view of the bay and the botanic gardens. We adventured out to "the bush" to get our school T-Bars, which was not our favorite excursion of this adventure to say the least. We also got our school uniforms, which make us look like the newest members of the Barney cult. Our school is completely purple, which reminded us of North Shore Country Day School in a "we bleed purple" kind of way.
After our first week of school Nina and I felt pretty good about the culture shock the international student coordinator promised us we would experience. Our peers could not be friendlier and our teachers have been helpful and interesting. We look forward to learning CPR, discussing and watching old films in our English class, and getting to know the Robin Williams-esque literature teacher. How could it be bad with excellent cappuccinos on every corner and surf schools just around the corner?

FOOD!

New Zealand is an agricultural country, so all of the food was wonderful. We were also delighted to find the Aussie food just as mouth watering. We began to wonder what caused this strange phenomenon of great food. It turned out all that our taste buds needed was a little rotation of the Earth. It is summer here, so everything is in season. The fruits are all juicy and ripe, and the veggies are always perfect (maybe not our favorite but still perfect). We went strawberry picking near Adelaide, and Audrey and I had a hard time not finishing the whole basket before we got to lunch.

The other reason food here is so good is because they have one secret ingredient that we never get in the US: Passion fruit. It's actually a small, round, purple-y black fruit with yellow insides and black seeds; not what we were not expecting. As most people who have never seen passion fruit we were very surprised that they were not large fleshy pink fruits. Regardless, they are delicious and used on just about everything. It tastes like a sweet kiwi with mango and strawberry mixed in. It is absolutely spectacular, and once we get home we plan to become passion fruit importers.

This little taste of our daily lives will hopefully give you all a feel for the spectacular alternative organic culture we are enjoying here in Melbourne for the two weeks before school starts.

Bungee Jumping Capital of the World

We are spending New Years and the few days after in Queenstown, which is in the South Island. We flew into an itty-bitty airport and were ready for another cute little village. The deceivingly small town is apparently one of the extreme sports capitals. As we drove through town, scoping it out for ice cream places and shops, we found groups of schoolies (kids who just graduated high school) setting up their tents in the parks and preparing to party. Of course Audrey and I were like, "okay, bye. We can go and see the town on our own." We took the tamer approach and spent a quiet New Years watching the fire works across the lake (19 hours before our Chicagoan counterparts).

This is the view from our apartment:

To our surprise the schoolies and locals were out and about today . We made our way over to a beautiful mountain, and took a gondola up. We planned on having a picnic on the top of a mountain to follow through with the Schield tradition of doing nothing but eating on our vacations. When we finished our lunch we saw a little sign that said, " Paragliding!" As always, Audrey and I begged our parents to please just let us have one little ride, and to our surprise they allowed us to go on the ride of our lives. We hiked the steep hill

to a point where we, strapped to our guides, ran off the cliff and were soon flying over the mountains, lake, and town. I was prepared to be out of my mind in fear, but it was actually just exhilarating. We had a little photo shoot in the air and enjoyed twisting and swirling while performing tricks in the air, catching the next thermal (what they call the winds). We stayed up for about 20 minutes and gracefully floated back to the ground. It was amazing, and we definitely got our extreme sporting out of the bungee jumping capital.

It's So Pretty Here

Eyjafjallajokull volcano has nothing on the Maori names around here.

It's sunny and beautiful in Auckland

and on the road. It's obvious why they filmed Lord of the Rings here. Every were we turn is another picture worthy view. We drove from Auckland to the Coromandel peninsula, and Audrey and I were staring out the window the whole time. We went to a hot spring beach, went snorkeling in the South Pacific, and climbed down to a secluded waterfall and all we could say the entire time was, "Gosh, this is so pretty." We have decided that it would be the perfect setting for the television show Lost because it has a mix of tropical forests and sloping hills that look like they're straight out of the French countryside.

LA to Auckland

After an amazing few days in LA visiting with friends and adventuring with cousins, we took off for New Zealand. The flight was long and I think Nina and I spent most of the time either staring blankly into space or rearranging ourselves. By the time we were off the plane, we had skipped Wednesday completely, although I do not understand the date line logic completely. Then we headed straight for the coffee, but we were completely lost. Apparently there is completely different coffee lingo down under, and I am beginning to feel totally out of my element. Apparently a “long black” is a large cup of black coffee, a flat white is strong black coffee made with espresso beans and topped with steamed milk, and a short black is a small cup of espresso coffee. I think I'll stick to the flat white to be safe for now. Once in downtown Auckland we went off exploring and found that the people were as charming as their accents and the landscape was as hilly as it was breath taking.

Packing

Today was day one of packing. I realized that waiting until a week before we depart for New Zealand was probably not the smartest idea when my floor was littered with everything from clothes to batteries to tie dye duct tape. After trying to stuff everything I own into a carry on sized bag, I began to see how three sweatpants and four bat mitzvah sweatshirts were probably a little excessive for the mid summer weather we are anticipating. Hopefully the kiwis won't mind the same pair of shorts and perhaps a tie dye duct tape dress.