I realize New Zealand's a bit more than a centre (woah - I just spelled that the Kiwi/British way) of adventure tourism. Some of you are probably interested in my daily life here... my classes, my schedule, and my weekends when I'm not out touring the country.
Because, you know, that stuff actually is very interesting.
But guess what? You will... NEVER know about it!
Or, eh, maybe not never. But you won't hear about it today because I still have a lot of other stuff that I need to catch up on. It's been insane lately, what with the onslaught of papers and exams that I have suddenly come in. Midterms are just about over, but I still have a lot of stuff to do.
As a result, with a lot of work... comes a lot of procrastination.
So I give you this week's edition: Merging like a Zipper.
The excitement of the beginning has passed by this point... we've formed the fellowship, we've bypassed the initial orcs, and now... we have weeks of mindless walking in front of us. There are still battles approaching, we still have an enemy to fight, and, as always, there's that the burden that one of our group carries around his neck. But until the next adrenaline rush, all we have is a bucket full of boredom and a field full of sheep.
BAAHHH!But we also have archaeological field trips. As an anthropology student, it's my duty to my fellowship to explore all the branches of my department, even if archeology's focus on artifacts pales in comparison to my more sensible interest in people.
Right... so, eh...
Archeology field trip. About a month ago - two weeks or so after my trip to Rotorua, my lecturer from my NZ Archaeology paper brought us out on a trip to this giant hill. "Paper," by the way, is the Kiwi term for "class." So, lately, I've been writing papers for my papers.
Anyway-
Because, by that point, I had made a friend in that class, she offered to give me a ride. Otherwise, I would have to crowd into a bus with the rest of the class and suffer through a bumpy, probably vomit-inducing ride. We left early... and arrived long before anyone else was there, so she decided to give me a tour of the neighborhood.
Her tour consisted of every major and minor landmark in the area... and its thorough history. I saw a bank where a gun was fired once upon a time (a rare occurrence due to the strict gun laws in this country), and several stores with strange names. There was a clothing store called "The Carpenter's Daughter." No idea where that came from.
Of course, I also commented on random things that stood out to me on the streets. There are a lot of rotaries here, and there are a lot of strange signs. One of these signs is a picture with a zipper and a car. That's right. You've guessed it: Merge like a zipper.
Our first stop was a dead end - the edge of the road where we could see a little lake area with a little island. That island was fascinating. It was small and.. well, take a look for yourself:
Don't worry. You'll see more pictures of this amazing island later.
We proceeded, then, to go to a little area by the harbor... with benches and geese and stuff. I guess it's a park-like area. There's a sign there that says...
No alcohol.
No smoking.
No parking on the grass.
No fishing.
No littering.
Do not collect shellfish.
Yep. That shellfish thing was random. Only... not quite. Shellfish was a major source of food for the Maori.
Only one picture of that harbor area, mainly because my fingers were freezing in the wind. August is winter here, remember?
We passed by some houses. My friend and tour guide pointed out a Maori sovereignty flag outside one house... and a New Zealand flag outside of another. I made a comment about a game of Capture the Flag.
After that, we finally hopped back into the car and drove to our field trip destination: Mangere Pa.
Our first view of Mangere Pa.
I'll begin with some background. A pa is, in essence, a Maori fortified site. Once the original Polynesian settlers have arrived in Aotearoa (aka New Zealand) and settled into groups, conflicts began... possibly as a result of a competition for resources, which resulted from a rise in the population.
The pa formed as a defensive refuge and a lookout point. They were made on natural hills, though the land was modified with terraces and artificially flattened land. Defensive structures, for the most part. Mangere Pa had a strange crater in its center:
Around this crater, there were several holes in the ground. These holes are kumara pits - sweet potato storage areas. They were covered once upon a time (wood tends to deteriorate over time). And... yeah. They stored lots of sweet potato.
You can just make out the dips in the land.
These pits covered most of the pa, and I took a lot of pictures of them. As the only American in the group of Kiwi students, I felt obliged to play up the American tourist stereotype.
Oh! Here's a giant kumara pit. Since we were all standing over it looking down, we created some nice shadows... so it's pretty.
Yes, there are a lot of kumara pits. But they weren't all used at the same time, so it's actually fairly difficult to estimate the population of the people who once lived at the site. Sweet potato tends to rot easily, and a pit becomes disgusting and bacteria-filled after it's stored kumara for a while.
We also got to play with a long steel stick thingy:
I'm not sure what it's called, but it's used to feel for midden. Midden would be a pile of prehistoric rubbish. Shells from shellfish, chips from broken tools, animal (and human) bones would be thrown into a big pile. For the most part, these pits were filled with the inedible parts of prehistoric Maori diet. And yeah - when I said that human bones were sometimes found in these sites, it means that some Maori did practice cannibalism. Not all... but some. And they have their reasons for it. It wasn't too commonplace. Let me know if you're interested, and I can write more about it from what I know via ethnography. But back to the kumara pits: sometimes, the Maori would take these piles and use them to fill up old storage pits.
Archaeologists love trash, and they love to analyze it, so midden is actually pretty interesting to study. They would take that stick and push it through the dirt into the ground. If it hits something hard and makes a crunch sound, then, chances are, you've hit midden.
Some midden, of course, rises up to the surface. When you look at it... for the most part, it's a bunch of broken shells in the dirt. See the little white things?
And here's a person actually using that long steel stick thing to search for midden.
Here's some artificially flattened land. At one point, there were probably some houses or small buildings on this bit of land.
We climbed up to the top... and got a great view of the waters around Auckland and Mangere Pa.
Yep. It's a great lookout point. Someone up here would be able to spot invading canoes long before they arrive.
Here's a terrace - a man-made depression in the hill. A bit like a moat, I guess... only without the water. The defender has the advantage of higher ground. Moreover, wooden palisades used to jut out of the ground, further blocking the invader from attacking.
Here are some random cows on the pa. Yeah... by the way, these cows mean that I went home with my nice sneakers covered in poo.
Oh! Look! It's that little island again! Only, this time, I'm looking down at it from the top of the pa! Yeah... I really liked that little random island.
And, finally, more of the view from the top. New Zealand's a beautiful country....
(I was a bit embarrassed at how touristy I was. So I tried to take a picture from the top... out from my pocket... without looking at the screen. The following picture shows how wonderful my aim is.)
Right... so, eh...
Archeology field trip. About a month ago - two weeks or so after my trip to Rotorua, my lecturer from my NZ Archaeology paper brought us out on a trip to this giant hill. "Paper," by the way, is the Kiwi term for "class." So, lately, I've been writing papers for my papers.
Anyway-
Because, by that point, I had made a friend in that class, she offered to give me a ride. Otherwise, I would have to crowd into a bus with the rest of the class and suffer through a bumpy, probably vomit-inducing ride. We left early... and arrived long before anyone else was there, so she decided to give me a tour of the neighborhood.
Her tour consisted of every major and minor landmark in the area... and its thorough history. I saw a bank where a gun was fired once upon a time (a rare occurrence due to the strict gun laws in this country), and several stores with strange names. There was a clothing store called "The Carpenter's Daughter." No idea where that came from.
Of course, I also commented on random things that stood out to me on the streets. There are a lot of rotaries here, and there are a lot of strange signs. One of these signs is a picture with a zipper and a car. That's right. You've guessed it: Merge like a zipper.
Our first stop was a dead end - the edge of the road where we could see a little lake area with a little island. That island was fascinating. It was small and.. well, take a look for yourself:
Don't worry. You'll see more pictures of this amazing island later.
We proceeded, then, to go to a little area by the harbor... with benches and geese and stuff. I guess it's a park-like area. There's a sign there that says...
No alcohol.
No smoking.
No parking on the grass.
No fishing.
No littering.
Do not collect shellfish.
Yep. That shellfish thing was random. Only... not quite. Shellfish was a major source of food for the Maori.
Only one picture of that harbor area, mainly because my fingers were freezing in the wind. August is winter here, remember?
We passed by some houses. My friend and tour guide pointed out a Maori sovereignty flag outside one house... and a New Zealand flag outside of another. I made a comment about a game of Capture the Flag.
After that, we finally hopped back into the car and drove to our field trip destination: Mangere Pa.
Our first view of Mangere Pa.I'll begin with some background. A pa is, in essence, a Maori fortified site. Once the original Polynesian settlers have arrived in Aotearoa (aka New Zealand) and settled into groups, conflicts began... possibly as a result of a competition for resources, which resulted from a rise in the population.
The pa formed as a defensive refuge and a lookout point. They were made on natural hills, though the land was modified with terraces and artificially flattened land. Defensive structures, for the most part. Mangere Pa had a strange crater in its center:
Around this crater, there were several holes in the ground. These holes are kumara pits - sweet potato storage areas. They were covered once upon a time (wood tends to deteriorate over time). And... yeah. They stored lots of sweet potato.
You can just make out the dips in the land.These pits covered most of the pa, and I took a lot of pictures of them. As the only American in the group of Kiwi students, I felt obliged to play up the American tourist stereotype.
Oh! Here's a giant kumara pit. Since we were all standing over it looking down, we created some nice shadows... so it's pretty.
Yes, there are a lot of kumara pits. But they weren't all used at the same time, so it's actually fairly difficult to estimate the population of the people who once lived at the site. Sweet potato tends to rot easily, and a pit becomes disgusting and bacteria-filled after it's stored kumara for a while.
We also got to play with a long steel stick thingy:
I'm not sure what it's called, but it's used to feel for midden. Midden would be a pile of prehistoric rubbish. Shells from shellfish, chips from broken tools, animal (and human) bones would be thrown into a big pile. For the most part, these pits were filled with the inedible parts of prehistoric Maori diet. And yeah - when I said that human bones were sometimes found in these sites, it means that some Maori did practice cannibalism. Not all... but some. And they have their reasons for it. It wasn't too commonplace. Let me know if you're interested, and I can write more about it from what I know via ethnography. But back to the kumara pits: sometimes, the Maori would take these piles and use them to fill up old storage pits.
Archaeologists love trash, and they love to analyze it, so midden is actually pretty interesting to study. They would take that stick and push it through the dirt into the ground. If it hits something hard and makes a crunch sound, then, chances are, you've hit midden.
Some midden, of course, rises up to the surface. When you look at it... for the most part, it's a bunch of broken shells in the dirt. See the little white things?
And here's a person actually using that long steel stick thing to search for midden.
Here's some artificially flattened land. At one point, there were probably some houses or small buildings on this bit of land.
We climbed up to the top... and got a great view of the waters around Auckland and Mangere Pa.
Yep. It's a great lookout point. Someone up here would be able to spot invading canoes long before they arrive.
Here's a terrace - a man-made depression in the hill. A bit like a moat, I guess... only without the water. The defender has the advantage of higher ground. Moreover, wooden palisades used to jut out of the ground, further blocking the invader from attacking.
Here are some random cows on the pa. Yeah... by the way, these cows mean that I went home with my nice sneakers covered in poo.
Oh! Look! It's that little island again! Only, this time, I'm looking down at it from the top of the pa! Yeah... I really liked that little random island.
And, finally, more of the view from the top. New Zealand's a beautiful country....
(I was a bit embarrassed at how touristy I was. So I tried to take a picture from the top... out from my pocket... without looking at the screen. The following picture shows how wonderful my aim is.)
Mangere pa is only twenty minutes or so away from the center of Auckland. The city's not that great, architecturally, but the area's beautiful. I also thoroughly enjoyed this field trip. For those who don't know what they're looking for, the pa's just a giant hill with livestock and poop on it. For those who do, there's a good bit of history in the land.
After the field trip, I got a ride back to campus... where I had lunch with my friend before we parted ways. I had class, and she had to go home.
Here's an interesting aside. You may not get it if you've never been to Auckland... and it's probably a lot harder to tell this joke through text, but I want to give it a try. I thought the joke was funny.
Background notes:
-Mangere Pa is one of many pa in New Zealand. The biggest and most well-known/tourist-y pa is in Auckland... known as One Tree Hill (this is its English name).
-There are many places in New Zealand that have retained their original Maori names. Mangere Pa is one example. Rangitoto and Rotorua are two other examples.
-Maori pronunciation is different. "Wh" is pronounced with an f sound. "Whangarei," for example, would be pronounced fong - uh - ray. "A's" are like the "o's" in "bog."
-"O's" are pronounced ah. Onehunga is pronounced Ohn - uh - hung - uh.
Okay. With that in mind... here's the joke:
An American tourist in Auckland returned to his hotel one night. The person at the front desk asked him what he had done that day. The tourist replied, "I went to One - Hunga." (Pronounced as the number "one" followed by "hunga.")
The person at the front desk laughed and responded, "No... you were at Ohn - uh -hung - uh. You see, there are two languages in New Zealand: English and Maori."
The tourist nodded. He understood. The next day, he comes back from a trip. Once again, the person at the front desk asked him what he had done that day. The tourist grinned and responded, "I went to Ohn - uh Tree Hill."
--
End of Joke.
Get it? He actually went to One Tree Hill... but... he pronounced it in Maori and...
Er.
You need to hear it to get it. And... yeah, it's a funny joke... because... I thought it was. And.. it was corny. I like corny jokes.
Anyway, hope you guys enjoyed this entry. I'll try and update again soon. In the meantime, good night.
---
The picture of sheep, I stole off of Google. I do have a LOT of pictures of sheep... but I didn't take any of them on this particular trip, and I was too lazy to dig them up.
The other pictures, I actually took myself for once.
After the field trip, I got a ride back to campus... where I had lunch with my friend before we parted ways. I had class, and she had to go home.
Here's an interesting aside. You may not get it if you've never been to Auckland... and it's probably a lot harder to tell this joke through text, but I want to give it a try. I thought the joke was funny.
Background notes:
-Mangere Pa is one of many pa in New Zealand. The biggest and most well-known/tourist-y pa is in Auckland... known as One Tree Hill (this is its English name).
-There are many places in New Zealand that have retained their original Maori names. Mangere Pa is one example. Rangitoto and Rotorua are two other examples.
-Maori pronunciation is different. "Wh" is pronounced with an f sound. "Whangarei," for example, would be pronounced fong - uh - ray. "A's" are like the "o's" in "bog."
-"O's" are pronounced ah. Onehunga is pronounced Ohn - uh - hung - uh.
Okay. With that in mind... here's the joke:
An American tourist in Auckland returned to his hotel one night. The person at the front desk asked him what he had done that day. The tourist replied, "I went to One - Hunga." (Pronounced as the number "one" followed by "hunga.")
The person at the front desk laughed and responded, "No... you were at Ohn - uh -hung - uh. You see, there are two languages in New Zealand: English and Maori."
The tourist nodded. He understood. The next day, he comes back from a trip. Once again, the person at the front desk asked him what he had done that day. The tourist grinned and responded, "I went to Ohn - uh Tree Hill."
--
End of Joke.
Get it? He actually went to One Tree Hill... but... he pronounced it in Maori and...
Er.
You need to hear it to get it. And... yeah, it's a funny joke... because... I thought it was. And.. it was corny. I like corny jokes.
Anyway, hope you guys enjoyed this entry. I'll try and update again soon. In the meantime, good night.
---
The picture of sheep, I stole off of Google. I do have a LOT of pictures of sheep... but I didn't take any of them on this particular trip, and I was too lazy to dig them up.
The other pictures, I actually took myself for once.
