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December 29, 2006

How to be Tough

Since yesterday I'm wasting my holiday with a stomuch bug. Besides the usual symptoms (you know what), I'm having a headache, chills and aching bones (feels like being tortured by Spanish inquisition!) How annoying it is that it hits you on your holiday, when you're supposed to do all the fun stuff (walking, drinking latte in trendy cafes, visiting art galleries, shopping for books, etc). I'm spending my 2nd day half way in bed, half way on Internet. And I haven't started my home improvement projects yet (such as baking a carrot cake, baking muffins, finishing cleaning the windows, etc). The holiday will pass and I won't even notice it... Arghhh....


Photo by Jad 23

Since I've been spending unproportionate time on the web, I came accross haka pictures. Just in case you thought life in NZ is all normal and the sense of exotics has faded away, look at this! Careful with that, tongue waggling and bulging eyes may become addictive. For a while we with Kaj did that to emphasise our points to each other (after watching the Utu movie). It really helps to drive your point and holds the potential to improve any couple's communication.

No wonder that NZ national heros All Blacks, the rugby team (don't tell me you never heard of them!), perform haka before each rugby match. Few weeks ago there was a huge row with Wales, because All Blacks were not allowed to perfom haka just before the game. All Blacks claim that by doing haka they connect with their herritage and the dance itself is full of spiritual meaning (the slitting throat movement at the end is actually not slitting throat, but drawing the breath from one side of the chest to another. Yeah, right...) The Welsh thought that the only reason why All Blacks do it, is to intimidate the opponents (you don't have to have much brain to figure that.. just look at the uneasy faces of the opposing side in the video!)


Photo by Bring Back Buck

Its pretty interesting. Living here you find out that there's a whole new level of being tough. Rugby is the most popular national sport in NZ (all boys have to play it at school!) and if you've never seen a rugby match, you'll be very impressed - 130kg of meat flying accross the field clenching a ball crashing into another 120kg of meat... Sweat, curses, broken teeth flying around... You get the idea?


Photo by Bring Back Buck

After that, 140km cycling tour as a favorite weekend past time seems pretty moderate. Also our whining about cold homes, "heroism" of paddling in 13C degrees water for hours (wearing wet suites, of course!) seems pathetic, doesn't it? By local standards we're complete sissies, I'm afraid...


Photo by Bring Back Buck

Since I started with All Blacks, another very famous team is Tall Blacks. This is a basketball team and being Lithuanian, I should know better, but I never really heard about them before coming here. Apparently they are a very very good team. We'll see at the Olympics at Beijing if they're any good. Aaand.. The Black Caps is another very famous cricket team. When it comes to women, the biggest sport is netball and the most well known team is Silver Ferns. The netball players are also known to marry rugby players. Its quite amazing that out of 4 most popular sports here, 3 are completely obscure and virtually unknown to the rest of the world, so they can be played only with the other countries from the British Dominion: Australia, South Africa, Britain itself, India for cricket... Any other? So far we've been throwing away the Sports pages before even putting the newspaper on the table and I think we'll just continue doing that!


Photo by Bring Back Buck

Posted by gkligyte at December 29, 2006 01:06 PM
Comments
Well, the backyard cricket or beach cricket seems like a sensible alternative to the REAL thing. Kaj tried it, he should know. Maybe we should buy a bat? Posted by: Giedre on January 5, 2007 12:22 PM
hey Paul, cricket is indeed a truly fascinating game. I didn't know the games can go on for five days, only to break for cucumber sandwitches! Or maybe a curry. I haven't figured that one out yet. Posted by: kaj on January 5, 2007 10:38 AM
Moippas liethualainen tyttö! Greetings from the Andes: We are back in bogota and catching up with your adventures. Take care of that nasty bug, sip some tea and lets hope you get some days of vacations after all. Hugs plenty: Andrea, Luna and Teemu Posted by: abc on January 4, 2007 10:34 AM
Hi Giedre and Kaj, hope you're better and had a great New Year. Glad to see that you're getting acquainted with the one true game. Cricket of course! See, I knew seeing me play cricket on Kaisaniemi would one day inspire you. Anyway, there's both a cricket and a rugby world cup this year, so I would cancel your newspaper between 5 March and 28 April (cricket) and especially between 7 Sept and 20 Oct (rugby). ;-) The cricket's in the West Indies and the Rugby in France. Expect bleary eyed work mates. Cheerio Posted by: paul on January 1, 2007 08:26 PM
Hi Giedre, very sorry to hear you're sick; sounds like a food poisoning :( hope you'll get better soon so you can start enjoying your holiday. It is very interesting to read about the NZ old spiritual dancing. First time I got to know about it from the movie "The Whale Rider" - have you seen it? It is good to see that this tradition still prevails in NZ. Take care of yourself, sveik! -Agne Posted by: Agne on December 30, 2006 02:34 AM
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