employment...slowly but surely

good news - we're now partially employed! bryan starts his new, ultra-glamorous part-time job at subway on thursday, allowing us to breathe a sigh of relief since all we've been getting lately are rejection letters. our flatmate jin had been trying to talk us into heading to china instead, where we could stay with her family and teach english to the neighbors' kids. the offer was tempting but didn't offer any help for the financial strain, so we're glad to find employment that doesn't involve any more dramatic relocations.

i'd been second-guessing our decision to stay in christchurch lately, partially because of the difficulty in finding jobs but also wondering if we were settling for an experience that parallels the one we would have had at home. certainly this year abroad has not been the kind of cultural experience that we would have gained from a year in india or mongolia or algeria, but when i think back to our original conversation about this trip last october, i remember that we weren't really aiming for a third-world country experience anyway. just being out of the country - anywhere out of the country - has given us the chance to re-evaluate our identities as americans (and as minnesotans). these identities were only reinforced by the vikings-saints game yesterday, which we watched at the holy grail sports bar in the company of a dozen or so other americans and the odd american football-appreciating kiwi. i'm not much of a football fan under normal circumstances, but being so far from home and seeing my local team on the big screen brought out the sports enthusiast in me. our pastor's two high school sons follow the sport a bit and have promised to have us over for the superbowl next month, though i'm wondering if the offer still stands if the game is aired live, which would make it lunchtime on a monday.

this season of unemployment hasn't been nearly as boring as we expected, as we've had no trouble filling our daytime hours with movies (it is, after all, oscar season), trips to the library (it was more difficult to get a library card than a visa), and cleaning out those storage closets at church. we've instituted a tuesday morning movie date complete with donuts and chocolate milk that we pick up from the bakery on the way, though i'm guessing we'll have to find another time for this new tradition once we get into a work routine. this weekend we even went rock climbing at the ymca with our landlord and his girlfriend, our bad technique resulting in some aching forearms and shoulders in the morning. our landlord does judo and somehow roped bryan into a martial arts/wrestling match on the thick mats in the bouldering room against his will; hopefully bryan earned his respect enough to result in the promised fixing of the phone line and dishwasher.

anyway, better go - someone's cooking lamb steak downstairs and i'm starting to feel queasy. i don't think this kiwi pilgrimage will result in an addition to the accepted meats groups after all.

-rachel

p.s. - i just realized i can post videos on here, so here's a little panorama from the routeburn track for your viewing pleasure. you may want to mute your computer, as all you'll hear are wind sounds. it also may be the world's most boring video...sorry :)