(to my fellow americans, today is boxing day. it's a british thing.)

one of waiheke's many vineyards

waiting to board the ferry to leave waiheke

we left waiheke in the morning and put our stuff back in the apartment. then we ate a crap lunch at a korean-run japanese restaurant. i almost boiled off my mouth due to the extremely hot soup and tea. i really don't know what it is about korean food preparation, but they serve you things boiling hot. each time i almost seriously scald myself. it never fails.

then we went to our first cricket match. new zealand vs. sri lanka! can't you taste the excitement. why did i go? because all americans think the same thing about cricket: "what the hell kind of game is this?" i have no idea what it is and how to play. i only have a vague idea that there is a similarity to baseball. there were over 20,000 fans in attendance.

the first thing that surprised me about the match: on the sidelines, outside of the stadium, there was a grass field where many fans were playing cricket themselves. i guess when games last 8 hours, you gotta entertain yourself as well. watching them, i had no idea how the hell you play. it's the same thing i've always seen on tv and movies. i guy with a flat bat, almost like a boat oar. it really doesn't give an indication of how the field is setup and how one scores. then in the stands, i noticed that a lot of people had supplies like they were camping out. i had no idea you could bring your own provisions. next time.

cricket fans have a go

cricket games can last forever. normally they are carried out over 5 days. we decided to attend the shorter 1 day match. those can last for 8 hours. it started at 12pm. we arrived at 3:15pm. the game ended at 6:10pm after scoring a required 142 runs!!! when we arrived there was only about 20 something runs. trying to figure out the rules and scoring aspects was pretty fun, actually. you really have to watch a sport in order to understand it. now that i have an overview, i will look up what the rules are because now i can picture the field and what the players do. i was joking that americans created baseball out of cricket; that they changed around the rules so that games wouldn't last so damn long!

the entire time we were there, the blackcaps were up to bat. i never saw sri lanka bat. the blackcaps had 3 outs. it took forever to get an out. i don't know how many outs are required for them to change sides so i was really hoping for more outs. i was able to figure out some scoring aspects. 1 run, 4 run, and 6 run hits. there were several 4 run hits but mostly runs (think "points") were obtained through small hits, 1 run at a time, or by "stealing bases", to use a baseball expression. the extremely few 6 run hits were spectacular because you have to hit the ball just right for it to go that far. 1 even went into the stands!

i even bought a t-shirt. go blackcaps!

after dinner, we decided to find a laundromat. we rode the bus to one in the city that we came across on the net. oops, it's just a dry cleaner. there are none in the city i guess. then i got a call from my high school friend. we went to have coffee with her and her boyfriend. there are in sydney at the moment due to his job, but are on vacation, exploring a bit of new zealand. they've already been to a few places we can't wait to visit. it was most bizarre to be meeting up again in a coffee house, but this time displaced in new zealand. the last time we met was sometime in the middle of november at a coffee house by my mother's house. next time we do this in africa!