Fast Food

I am not McDonalds' biggest fan, but I do always find it interesting to visit places that like in other countries. I find it interesting to note who has broken through the international barriers. I have now been to McDonald's in the US, NZ, Japan, and Austria. Same sign, some of the same menu, slightly different twist at each one.

In Japan the McChickens come with wasabi and on the dollar menu you can get something called shaka-shaka chicken. In Austria you can find nice pastries on the menu (and the fanciest fast food joint I've ever seen, which was in a ballroom). In New Zealand you find a coffee shop with barista made coffee. And the current menu special is a "build your own burger" option. I have hard that in Hong Kong you can now get married at McDonald's, and the KFC sells edible fried chicken flavored nail-polish (taking "Finger lickin' good" too far?).

Other fast food options in New Plymouth are KFC, Pizza Hut, Burger King, Starbucks, and Subway. Subway's special this month is a lamb sub. Pure NZ raised lamb they say. Pizza Hut here sells a shrimp and mayonnaise pizza. Burger King is possibly the only place in town that does free refills on drinks.
Big news in the world of fast food is that you can now find Wendy's in major cities like Wellington and Auckland. So when New Plymouthians venture out, they report back if they have sampled the new fare. Supposedly we are going to get an "In and Out Burger" in Auckland but I think right now it is in speculation only.

While the options mentioned above might be a "taste of home" in some fashion, my favorite here is actually a kiwi option. Burger Fuel offers beef and chicken burgers, with creative new options every couple of months. In true kiwi fashion they have an option with beets on it, but it also has mango so I think that is just weird. I have not tried that one, but I am a fan of the chicken and bacon/avocado burger  :) The fact that they can do vegetarian, gluten free, and halal rank them higher than the average fast food place in my opinion.

Have a  great weekend, hope I didn't make you too hungry :)

Happy Weekend

I think there reaches a point anytime you have moved to a new place where some of the charm starts to wear off. I have definitely reached that here, where there are certain things that I just do not understand, or occasionally find irritating about New Zealand.
But one thing I never tire of is the beautiful scenery. Everywhere I have been in this country has stunning things to see, with a wide variety of landscapes. But I am completely biased in thinking New Plymouth might be one of the prettiest places to settle down.

The mountain picture here was taken from my music room last week.
The others are from sunset Thursday night as I was driving into town.

A couple of weeks ago we went away for the weekend to visit some friends in Tauranga. We stopped in Cambridge for lunch and this was outside the cafe. And yes, I did have to stop and play it. 

Pineapple lumps are a kiwi favorite. Below is the link for a recent commercial for this unique sweet treat. Definitely worth the 30-second watch :)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpj2oVJhYjM

Have a great weekend!

Harpsichord

My musical adventures this week have included practicing on a harpsichord. I have the honor of performing with the Taranaki Symphony Orchestra in November. I will be one third of a trio playing J.S. Bach's Brandenburg Concerto in D Major, accompanied by the orchestra. For the sake of authenticity, my portion will be played on a harpsichord.

Playing on a harpsichord has an entirely different feel from a piano. Each piano has its own feel, but harpsichords are in a class all of their own. The biggest difficulty at the moment is adjusting to the different sized key. Because the harpsichord keys are shorter and narrower, I find that I am over-shooting quite a bit. Volume control is also a challenge, as this is generally managed by the number of notes you are playing as opposed to how you play them. Then of course there is the fact that harpsichord strings are plucked instead of struck by a hammer.

So what is a harpsichord?
Harpsichords are member of the string family, most in use from the 16-18th century in European music. It was replaced by the piano in the 19th century. The strings are set in vibration by being plucked, with a soundboard underneath. Harpsichords can have one or two keyboards, depending on the range. The shape is similar to that of a grand piano but is narrower.

The harpsichord I will play for the November concert is owned by a local musician. It came in a self-assembly kit and he built the instrument on his own. He maintains and tunes it when needed and said he is happy that it will be used for a major upcoming concert. The last time I played a harpsichord was in college, to accompany a Baroque opera production. Quite a step-up to now be preparing for a performance such as a concerto :)

Grocery Shopping

I have always enjoyed exploring grocery stores in foreign countries. Actually, even in different US States, you never know what you will find. Japanese grocery stores tend to have a rather strong fish smell. The bonus to this is you know it is because that mornings’ catch is in the meat aisle waiting, just in case you want to make your own sushi for dinner. Austrian grocery stores were often rather cramped, and it took me awhile to find my way around, due to my lack of German language skills. My first venture to a grocery store resulted in an almost failed attempt to buy laundry soap. My new roommate and I, who had just moved into our lovely apartment, and were both lamenting not doing more language study before coming, spent quite some time wandering around lost. One of the ladies working there took pity on us and asked if we needed help. Unfortunately, she did not speak English. So the three of us are there trying to use sign language to communicate. Probably looked absurd, but in the end we communicated that we thought we smelled and wanted to change that!

New Zealand supermarkets thankfully have readable labels J But there are also some interesting things that would not be found in America. I learned the other day you can buy a two liter jug of lime flavored milk. It was mint colored, so did not really look appealing to me. But I have been told it is delicious.

The international section of the store is also amusing to me. The “American” shelf has marshmallow fluff, Reese’s peanut butter cups, and on a good day, Sweet Baby Ray’s BBQ sauce. I have not yet broken down and paid the astronomical price, hopefully I will be able to put off cravings until I make trips home!

One thing I appreciate about shopping here is the butcher shops. Before moving here it was not anything I gave thought to, but I have my favorite places, depending on who has the better sale, and it has proven to be well worth it for the quality of meat. I miss the bakeries found in Europe, but the produce shops here almost make up for it. Everything is very fresh if you know where to go, and it is much easier to find locally grown things (possibly because New Zealand is a small enough country almost anywhere can feel ‘local’).

For non-produce or butcher shop items, there are generally three options. New World is the “posh” supermarket. You can collect air points there, and have a wider selection of specialty items and dietary things. Countdown is the mid-range store, with the aforementioned American food selection, as well as some Japanese items. Pak’n Save is my preferred option, simply because it has the cheapest prices on most things. It resembles a warehouse so apparently it’s the not-classy store, but my budget doesn’t mind J

Well now I have made myself hungry, should have known better than to write this just before lunch!

Hope a great day!

Newsy Update

In the news department for my life, there are not a lot of interesting things going on, but I thought I should share some things anyway.

We are in the midst of winter now, so most days are damp and chilly and rain can be generally expected. We did have an unusually nice weekend last week though, which was fortunate as we had friends visiting from KC, so we headed out to the mountain for some hiking. The nice thing about Taranaki is if you get your fill of the mountain you can head to the coast and hang out at the beach instead, which we did.

At the base of Dawson Falls

Ice cold mountain stream

The sun kindly came out for a few min so we could get cool pictures :)

Cape Egmont lighthouse

In other news, I have begun trio rehearsals for the Brandenburg Concerto in November. Working on it in my own time has been tough enough, but it is certainly at a new level now that the other solo parts have been added. But at the same time it makes more sense to have it all together (something my fellow musicians will understand I’m sure). In our most recent rehearsal we were working on a section which is rather bare bones for the flute and violin, but has incredibly fast notes for the harpsichord (yours truly). It is one of the sections which has led me to believe that Bach may have had more than 10 fingers. But anyway, I heard what I have waited to hear all my 18 years of piano playing…. “You are playing far too slow.” What a change from the weekly reminder in my youth that not every song was a race J

While we are on the topic of rehearsals, I accompany a high school choir. In a rehearsal a couple of weeks ago, the director said one of the coolest things ever about my playing. We were sight-reading through a new piece, four-part harmony. At one point when we were stopped to review a section the director told the choir they were not allowed to complain about their part because I had to do the Rubik’s cube with my fingers to play all of theirs at once. She got a lot of cool points for that!

Hope you are all enjoying summertime, stay cool and I will write again soon!

Changing Seasons

I arrived in New Zealand exactly 3 years ago today. Strange feeling in a way, looking back. When I first came I really did believe it would be for a year. I was ready to move on from the job I had until then, and thought this was be a fun adventure, a chance to see a new part of the world, make new friends, do some new stuff, and occasionally get paid since I had a work visa. But I have been told all my life that I am not the only one making plans for my life, and I'd say my venture to the Southern Hemisphere is an excellent example of the truth in that.

Little could I know that my 3-day a week temporary job at an electric company where I felt completely out of my league would turn into a full-time permanent job offer where I was part of a tight-knit family-like team, and have gained enough knowledge to be able to join in team debates and help run a major project impacting a large portion of the company. One of my co-workers enjoys training me on all things electrical and says he is crediting it all to my electrical engineering degree :) Other teams joke that it is a good thing I joined the team so someone could keep the guys in line. They are certain that if I talk fast enough and put on my twang, nobody has a chance of arguing with me.

I also would not have guessed that I would become such an involved member of the music community here. In my time here I have been fortunate to have many unexpected opportunities. I met a world-traveled singer and got to be her accompanist. I was the lead keyboardist for a professional theater production of Phantom of the Opera which ran for 4 weeks and nearly beat the major cities at their own game in terms of attendance and popularity. I have given concerts and have fantastic students. I have learned much and appreciate how much I still have to learn. My current project is one of Bach's Brandenburg's concertos, to be performed with the Taranaki Symphony Orchestra in November. While I have often dreamed of the opportunity to perform with an orchestra as a soloist, I did not expect to be able to so soon in my musical career. It is an exciting honor, and the 70-measure harpsichord cadenza will keep me busy practicing right until concert day!

Probably most importantly, I have made lifelong friends and have several adopted families here. I think no matter how much you love your job or how many exciting adventures you have, having loved ones near is the most important. No family can ever replace your family, but having someone who is happy to give you a hug on the tough days, and being invited for things like birthday and holiday celebrations mean more than those making the invitation might know.

I'm not actually sure why I called this post "Changing Seasons." I think I intended to write about the weather, or something, but this is what came out so I will share it.

My first night in New Zealand was spent in downtown Auckland at a hostel, next to a bar that was having a onesie party. It took me 5 min to figure out how to work the electrical plug and got grumpy at the young fella working the front desk for not giving me an extra blanket, but I made it through.
Tonight I've got a cobbler and meatloaf in the oven, with a wonderful piano studio and plenty of space (and blankets haha).

Hope all of you are well. Love and blessings.
D

Happiness

There have not been a lot of terribly exciting things happening lately, but I thought I might share some little day to day things that make me happy.

This morning we went shopping in the "mall," Centre City Shopping Center. A group of retirees were doing highland dancing in an open area.

Winter weather reports, which often sound like a weathermans way of saying "No clue what will happen."
A weekend report might be: Rain on Friday, showers on Saturday, and drizzle on Sunday. I think I'd save myself effort and just say it'll rain all weekend!
Another favorite of mine is "rain with clouds and sunshine."

This restaurant advertisement I saw on a truck:

This house with odd windows I saw in Wellington a couple of weeks ago:

That I can see this from my piano room on clear days:

Hope all is well.
I'll try to have an interesting post soon :)