Windy in Wellington

We made it to New Zealand safe and sound. I'm surpised by how it feels here because I expected it to feel more like the US. Japan is very foreign in that you can't understand things, but here we understand things yet it's very different in terms of food, customs, everything is just slightly skewed. So, you think you've got something, but then it turns out to be totally different. That doesn't make sense. For example, in restaurants a lot of times no one is there to seat you but there are no signs that tell you to seat yourself, so there is a constant sense of confusion. Lots of fried food here, pub food. It's quite English here actually, although I've never been to England. They don't give you exact change here either, so if something costs $3.99 and you give them $4, they give you no change back. Weird. It's very expensive here too, even compared to Japan. Shoes are an average of $150 a lot of places. I looked at a shirt that was $550, unbelievable! Food is pricey, and shampoo can be an average of $10 a bottle but I guess that's what you get for importing that kind of thing or growing yourself. Lots of local stuff. We found the farmers' market on Sunday which was nice although there weren't many actual growers there. It was still fun though. The water here is beautiful and there is a small beach nearby. It's summer and the high is around 70 degrees here but the sun is so intense that we all wish we'd brought more shorts. Our rental car battery died Sunday, so dad couldn't go golfing but it's fixed now. You drive on the wrong side of the road here and Mom and I were convinced we would die on the way to the apartment but we made it. Our apartment is really small but it serves its purpose. We celebrated Christmas this morning with our little stockings and many little gifts were exchanged. Now we've got Christmas Story on tv to help keep us in the mood, but it doesn't feel like Christmas. I think we all miss home and our friends and the rest of the family in the US.