Birthday celebrations!

It’s been such a beautiful weekend, I don’t even mind walking up and down all the hills of Auckland because the weather is perfect. It’s sunny and warm- hardly feels like it’s turning colder (except on the occasional day or evening). Last night we watched The Shining (that scary movie from the 80’s with Jack Nicholson) because my friend Jo turned 23 on Friday the 13th of May. We also ordered Hell’s Pizza, which is probably the best specialty pizza place that delivers I’ve ever had. The movie wasn’t too scary, but we played some corny birthday party games as well. We played one game where there were two teams, each with a set of balloons with one word on a slip of paper inside each balloon. Each team had to pop all their balloons without using their hands or feet and then put the words together to come up with a Jo-themed phrase. I bent down to get a balloon and my pajama pants literally ripped right up the back! That’s never happened to me before and it was both embarrassing and hilarious at the same time.

Earlier yesterday I took Jo out for a birthday gelato (Italian ice cream), and we ended up sharing a super-cone, where for $16 you get a HUGE cone covered in chocolate and nuts, filled with five flavors and then they put another cone on top. We got pistachio, cheesecake, custard, maple walnut, and a peanut butter and chocolate flavor. It was REALLY good but even the two of us couldn’t finish it. Jo is the girl in the picture below.

Even something as simple as deodorant in this country is different- they use either roll on deodorant or aerosol spray on containers. For being such an environmentally conscious country I’m surprised the use aerosol cans.

Today was Bruno’s birthday, so we went to Countdown (the grocery store) and picked him up a cake and an assortment of food he likes, like bacon and quince paste (kind of like jelly). He LOVED it. He’s turning 18, which is a pretty big deal in this country.

Other than that, all is well! I've also included an ad for "Water for Elephants" that was on the back of a bus and a bench covered in turf grass, as part of a Rugby ad. The rugby world cup this year takes place in right in Auckland in August. Kind of a big deal!