confession: i ate at dennys...and kind of liked it.

so here's something you should know about me: i hate dennys, shoneys, baker's square, perkins, and all other restaurants which offer quantity to compensate for a lack of quality. generally i would turn down an invitation to any of these places, but this week, being just a bit homesick and facing the alternative of a lunchless thursday, i hopped in the church van with the rest of the staff to see what wonders a new zealand dennys might hold.

as much as i wish it to be true, an international dennys is no different from a dennys in, say, alabama, save for the mysterious prawn twisters (see picture) on the appetizers menu and the indian(ish) mi goreng snuggled in between the cajun chicken and the chicken fajitas. and yet i loved it, not for the watery seafood "chowder" or the thick hot chocolate that was too sweet even for me, but for the christmas-colored vinyl booths and $2.99 breakfast menus that make a truck stop restaurant in kansas city seem a magical thing.

to continue our american day, in the evening we went bowling with jules and mesi (landlord and his gf, who's ethiopian but has lived in australia for 15 years) as a last hurrah before mesi moves back to melbourne. her brother dawit, her sister woiny, woiny's husband ross and their two-month old son jacob joined us as well. rarely has the word "bowling" conveyed an indoor activity in new zealand, so we took the opportunity to exert our physical and cultural dominance by winning a game apiece while casually sipping on our vanilla cokes. our burgers would have completed the picture had they not included beet slices where there ought to have been pickles.

still having a wonderful time in new zealand, but unemployment without adventure is making me long for the familiarity of an american food court...

-rachel