August Winter Wonderland

It's never enough. No trip leaves me saying "that was good, let's move on," no experience makes me feel as if I can simply leave it behind, no evening leaves me depressed. I've had days that haven't been the best; I've woken up unprepared for the day; I've been upset over something. But it never lingers, the air around me simply rejects it. Nothing a listen to Edward Sharpe won't solve.
I found myself frowning the other day. There seems to be some sort of cultural barrier between my French flatmate, Catfish, and myself. It is in the form of physical interaction. He tends to hit me; it is meant to be playful, but he has a pretty strong swing. Perhaps my tolerance for pain is simply small. In any case, I have asked him on several occasions not to hit me, at least not so hard, because it simply doesn't feel playful. A couple of days ago, he was explaining to me his rugby injuries. He then showed me the helmet he now has to wear and plopped it on my head. He then proceeded to clock me on the head with his fist. He does play rugby, could that explain it? So I retaliate with a few of my own girly slaps to the arm. He gets angry and throws me out of his room. I may have made it worse because when he came to apologize, I didn't want to hear it. Now, on top of everything he's sent me a facebook message saying if I am to stop acting like a coward and speak to him, he will be in his room in the evening.
Hmmm, curious. French women must be tough.
Speaking of rugby, I went to my first rugby match! I think the pre-match was actually more fun than the match itself. During the day, people were all out in the sunlight, painting each others' faces, getting excited for the game. At the game, though, the only exciting part was the haka the All Blacks did. It was fantastic, not the typical one they do; this version I believe is called the peruperu. The haka is a war dance which is meant as a challenge to the opponents. The player must do it in unison or else it is considered a bad omen. They slap their legs and chests, make their eyes bulge, and often stick out their tongues in the end after a throat slashing motion. I wouldn't want to play them. Not surprisingly, they creamed the Wallabies (the Australian team). Surprisingly, though, the crowd was completely tame. No singing, screaming, or shouting profanities. It was more like watching a television program. Seeing the haka, though, was worth it.
Sunday was quite eventful also. It was my first time hitchhiking. I know, sounds dangerous, but it is so common here that it is considered a typical form of transportation. It was raining, though. Nobody wants a wet hitchhiker. So my friend Tom and I stood at the closest part of route 73 to the city and waited for a bit, probably about half an hour. An Argentinian man finally picked us up. He was at the game too and was as unimpressed as I was. He left us half way there. The next ride we got was an American, traveling in a camper van for three weeks. He thought it was only one hitchhiker because I was standing out while Tom was fixing his pack, but when he pulled up, Tom popped up, but he couldn't say no. It was pretty slick, we did it by accident of course, but it worked. He ended up being pretty keen on our company and waited around the visitors center as we figured out what trek we could do in Arthur's Pass. He then proceeded to drive us 15k back to drop us off at Bealey's Spur, a full 30k out of his way! It was pretty epic.
The hike itself was nice. We met a group coming down and inquired about a missing person that we heard about at the center. Incidentally he was actually part of this group; he had wandered off and somehow got lost in the middle of the night and walked all the way down the mountain bushwhacking and got to the road. Mild hypothermia but overall fine. Amazing...
We had no such problems. We stayed in a hut (Tip Top) at a clearing. There was a fire place, but it was snowing outside. Dry wood? I don't think so. We decided to look anyway: after all, we may as well put the ax and saw hanging in the hut to good use. After some hard work at the remnants of a dead tree, we tried our hand at a fire fueled by moist (though not completely wet) wood. Didn't work.
The fire managed to heat the hut just that little bit, but it was still quite cold. Nobody could be squeamish in these sorts of situations: we combined our sleeping bags and cuddled. Body heat is amazing! I can't bring across how warm it was in those bags.
The morning showed us a completely different mountain. The fog had cleared into a beautiful day. Clear skies gave us a 360 painting of majestic peaks. We walked through a winter wonderland back down to the road. Hitching back we got even luckier. A dairy worker picked us up straight from the mouth of the trail. He was heading straight to Christchurch. He non-stop talked the entire 2 hours about different tracks we could do and back country adventures, even stopped to show us Canterbury's biggest gum tree (eucalyptus)! He dropped us off half a block away from my flat. Fantastic!