the photography of brian boyko: Southern Highway 2: Southern Highwayer!

I woke up this morning after a good, full night’s sleep, and started packing my stuff into my new car, Wendy.

Wendy, my new (to me) 1998 Toyota Corolla II Windy G.
New Zealand 2010

I’m not normally the type of person who names cars, but the car is a Toyota Corolla Windy G; and when you pronounce “Wendy” with a Kiwi accent, it sounds like the American “Windy.”

The accent takes a little getting used to. I did a double take earlier this morning when a New Zealander said I would love the Bay of Plenty because there were plenty of “beaches.”

But I digress. Wendy is a smaller car than my Yaris back home; and the Yaris is just about the smallest car sold in America that seats four passengers. I’m actually kind of stoked about that. Smaller car means less fuel, meaning less petrol costs, meaning I don’t have to feel too guilty about trips to nearby Rotorua, Te Puke, and elsewhere.

As I was loading up the car, there was a group of lovely Australian ladies waiting for a taxi; a flight back to Sydney was delayed and the airline put the passengers up in the hotel for the night.

“Howdy, ladies,” I said in my best Texan accent.

“G’day!” they replied in smiling unison.

Aw, yeah. That’s right. I’ve got a flirty, exotic accent now. I’ll save that for later.

Or not. I have an interesting relationship with flirting. I’m actually pretty good at innocent flirting; the type of flirting that you know doesn’t actually mean anything; the joking around flirting towards the out-of-your-leaguers of the world.

It’s serious flirting that I completely suck at.

So, I loaded up Wendy, left pretty early in the morning – picked up supplies for the trip at a local FoodTown (a supermarket) in the form of berries, a nut/raisin trail mix, and a bottle of water (which I intend to refill).
I left pretty early in the morning – around 8:30 am – to try to beat a predicted thunderstorm scheduled for the afternoon. I managed to only get lost a tiny little bit (compared to the previous evening). And, to my credit, only headed in the wrong direction a tiny little bit.

The route took me through Southern Highway 2; which is statistically one of the most dangerous roads in New Zealand – especially for right-hand side drivers.

Per my agreement with Mom, I am only to tell her about the dangerous stuff, like bungee jumping, skydriving, and SH2 after they have been completed successfully – it will be anticlimactic to most readers that I did not die. In fact, I did not even have a close call. Other than the fact that it’s a one lane highway in both directions, through mountainous roads, wasn’t much to it, really.

Of course, I drive defensively and slowly; first off, I did the speed limit, and when I felt uncomfortable doing the speed limit, I did less than that. So, if you’re wondering who the jackass going 70kph on some parts of SH2 was, it was me. Hey – don’t get mad, I did let you pass at every available passing opportunity.

So, I arrived safely into Tauranga, checked in, and started getting stuff done. First was a trip to the post office; David and Haley will be glad to know that the car is now officially mine, and a trip to the bank (same place). Headed to an Internet booth where they took $2 coins for 30 minutes of Internet time to check my mail and make a phone home to tell Mom I was not crushed by a combine on SH2, and call up a potential flatmate in Brookfield. It’s about 15 minutes away from my workplace, and the rent’s decent at $150/wk, and includes SkyTV and broadband (though we’ll talk about how much I use broadband later.)

On the way back, I passed the Tauranga Cultural Centre, which was showing a photography exhibit; but what caught my eye was the advertisement for Theatresports at Te Puna Quarry Park.

Improv Comedy! It exists here – I was afraid I might have to start up Tauranga’s improv scene myself; but where there is Theatresports, there’s improv, where there’s improv, there’s potential friends. A good omen indeed.

It’s 5:00 right now, and I need to shave (to make a good impression with my potential future flatties), so I’ll just leave you with some photos I’ve taken so far on the trip.