Dearest friends and family,

Hello once again from across the ocean. Thank you so much to everyone who has reached out to me (or even if you’re just reading this), and I apologize that it takes me a few days to reply, I promise it’s not personal (or is it HAHAH). This week’s blog post contains a full week of life, and the last week before I begin school. A ‘Dunner Stunner’ is a nickname for a beautiful day in Dunedin. Instead of going day-by-day for this week, I’m going to categorize my activities and list them in that way. One of the big things I did this week was make my bucket list for my time here! Realistically I won’t do everything on this list (because of school and lack of car, but I’m going to try my best - and get creative - to do as much as I can). I’ll include screenshots of the bucket list at the bottom of this post. For now, here is the map form of most of the items/locations, for the most curious amongst you all: https://www.google.com/maps/d/u/0/edit?mid=1WEU3PYco62d4cfOjdsQwZ-BlUHRj-YQ&usp=sharing. Yay, maps! Soon, I will also plan my trip for the mid-semester break!

This week, I was finally able to get out into the hills and do some hiking. I’m trying to do all the hikes that I can, but I’m limited to places I can get to by bus or foot, for now, because I don’t know people with a car that I’m on ‘trip planning’ terms with yet. The beginning of most hikes is a walk through a lovely lush jungle-like forest. First up, Signal Hill – what’s amazing is that I walked to the trail head from my flat (that’s how accessible things are). This little hike included some views of the Otago Peninsula. After, I walked down the road on the backside over to Baldwin street (the aforementioned steepest street in the world).


Otago Peninsula

Otago Peninsula


Baldwin Street
Another hike I did was called Pineapple Track and Flagstaff Summit. I'm really impressed with the bus service here -- I took the bus out of the city for about 15 mins to this hike. How cool is it that I can bus to a hike?? After this hike, I went to the local farmer's market which is pretty popular here and ate a delicious savoury Chinese crepe (Jian Bing Guo Zi) and a halloumi bao bun and it was so super amazing yummy delicious (or maybe I was just really hungry from my 10km hike... we'll never know).




Another hike/walk/adventure was going to Allan's beach to see sea lions and fur seals on the Otago Peninsula. Emily (my friend from McGill who is also here at Otago), her flatmate, and I took the bus out to the Otago Peninsula for ~ 1 hour, and then we walked along the road for 1.5 hours. Along the walk were these birds called oystercatchers, which had long dainty legs, and black swans! Once we got to the beach we only had around 20 minutes before we started walking back again :P But first, we admired the sea lion and fur seals! It's a little crazy how sea lions and seals are becoming not-so-crazy, and more normal. This adventure was quite the schlepp but I'm considering it training for bigger hikes which are on the horizon (I hope (... I'm trying to be patient)).



black swans at Hooper's inlet (on the way to Allan's beach)


The university here is more organized and kinder compared to McGill, it's amazing!? Including interactions with staff members whenever you have a question, and just the way they have everything centrally organized. On Monday this week I had my international orientation which was surprisingly informative. Other uni events I attended included a welcome barbecue for the UniFlats and an International Food Festival (went with my flatmates!). It's funny, the classic Kiwi barbecue involves a sausage on a slice of white bread (!not a bun!) with 'tomato sauce' (ketchup), barbecue sauce, and, if you're lucky, fried onions. I think I've had more than 3 or 4 of these in the past week because I love free food.

I signed up for the local climbing gym called Resistance. I'm looking forward to this because two of my flatmates (Rory and Emily -- oh yeah, Emily (nicknamed Savage) came this week too and she's great like the rest of my flatmates!) also climb, and I'm in a climbing group chat which is something I don't have in Montreal. I've only been twice so far, but I'm planning on going tomorrow again. I like the way they set and I'm happy to have some climbing buddies. I also managed to get signed up for the Tramping club which runs outdoor hikes, swims, climbs, social hours, etc! (update: on Tuesday, I put my name in the hat for a hike to Paradise (yes, it's called Paradise) but didn't get picked :/ womp womp).

I feel like I'm starting to get to know my flatmates a bit better, and I am learning their personalities more and I am able to be myself a bit more. We have a pretty social flat; we're watching Wallace & Gromit, we made homemade ice cream together this week, had a pizza dinner, played Mario Kart, and more. I've now had two different people tell me that I lucked out with my flatmates and that they're really great and I believe them (two of my flatmates are from the UK and are on exchange for a year, so some people already know them!).

Technically, the first few days of school have already started as I write this, and I might make a special blog post later this week or next week as a day-in-the-life type of post to really give y'all a glimpse into the day-to-day because I feel like I can't actually convey what it's like being here just by writing about my week in retrospect.