"That's how I put myself to sleep - thinking of your shortcomings."

Saturday morning we were hopping a flight for ChCh, which is Christchurch for those of you not in the know. Liza had said many times that we needed to arrive for the flight ten minutes before it leaves, and we’ll be fine. I figured that was some kind of exaggeration, as are most things she says. On the way there, as the clock turned to 10:50 for our 11:15 flight , you might say I got a little tense. Liza just cackled. I was almost hoping we’d miss it just to prove her wrong, but we did not.

On our quick 40 min flight we were served a snack and lolly (candy). Also, at no point did anyone ask for id. It’s the way flying used to be because again, no one is ever in danger in NZed.

Upon arrival in ChCh, we picked up our rental car. This would be a totally unremarkable event, except that something died in our rental car. It smelled like a diaper that had been lit on fire and then coated in rotten eggs. It wasn’t so terrible at first, which is why we drove off the lot with it. When we got in it this morning, the stench was literally spilling out of the car. We took it back to swap it out (which took more than an hour of waiting), and learned that NZedders also don’t “DO” customer service. Even though they’d given us a shit machine, they were not interested in giving us a free upgrade, or guaranteeing us a GD cd player. Liza did negotiate her way into a half-day refund for our trouble so a whopping $12.50 was put back on my card (about $8 in the U.S.).

But I’m getting ahead of myself…after dropping our bags at our place, we headed out for the ChCh Lonely Planet Walking Tour/Pub Crawl (the pub crawl is our design, not theirs). You’ll recall that our Auckland tour was foiled when we stopped for beers and French fries. This time we were much better prepared: we got an earlier start so we could stop at even more bars for beers and French fries. We saw tons of statues of people important to ChCh, and took turns posing in their likeness and disrespecting their heritage. Once we were all done we had a glass of bubbles to celebrate at a place called “Stunning Buns.” That’s all I need to say about that.

For the evening, we met up with friends of friends back in the States, Basil and Amelia. Amelia is also here studying for a few weeks, so she and Liza talked bright-eyed and excitedly about their research, while Basil and I talked about college football. The meal was unremarkable…the place looked like a Hard Rock Café on the inside…but Amelia picked up the check using her per diem, which left us extra cash for what proved to be an amazing Saturday night on the town.

We grabbed a quick drink with our guests at a place nearby called the Vespa Room, that was filled inside with old Vespa scooters. I sneakily poured some out for my boy Scootz. Amelia and Basil took leave of us, and Liza and I decided to go some place a bit more quiet. “Oh, what about this place…it says they have karaoke.” BEST. DECISION. EVER. I don’t think either of us ever got the name of the bar, but it did indeed have karaoke, as well as the holy grail for any girls like us, in need of some attention and free drinks: a bachelor party. The bachelor himself was dressed in a red jump suit and wig like Michael Jackson from Bad. He had a list of things he was supposed to do, and we gladly helped him with getting a spanking (using a paddle; we’re not that kinky) and buying him a BJ shot. We sang Whitney, Liza did the lean back, I did the Single Ladies dance. It was like we were back in DC. The bachelor party moved on to the next bar and insisted we meet back up with them, which we (twist our arm) did. After a couple more songs, we ventured out to find them, and en route came upon an empty shopping cart. Liza said “hop in” and I am not one to argue. She pushed me for about two blocks before dumping me over. A couple NZedders rushed over to catch me, and we definitely heard “Americans…” muttered. AND PROUD!

Christchurch is a college town (as evidenced by the fact that the have a Pita Pit, the mark of any college town) so the streets were chock full of “kids” stumbling from one giant club to the next. It was exactly like being on 6^th Street, except more expensive. Anyways, the night was a rousing success and resulted in a first for the trip: hangovers.