Welcome to Wellington, Where I Let My Geek Out!

Location: Wellington, North Island, New Zealand

Welcome to Wellington, New Zealand’s capital city!  Located at the south-western tip of the North Island, it has the unique distinction of being known as the world’s windiest city!  And with wind, comes rain!  Luckily, it rained when I arrived and when I left and stayed dry, thought overcast, on the only day I had to visit the city!

The centre of town follows the waterfront.  Wellington is the chief seaport of the country and its ferry carries passengers across the Cook Straight towards the South Island.

Wellington is often described as “quintessentially quirky” .  There are many unique shops, wacky cafes and funky pieces of art / architecture.  A good example, is this pedestrian over bridge.  First of all, it’s huge!  And the design, well, it’s interesting!  I think it’s supposed to look like 2 whales, tale to tale, but honestly, I’m not sure.  Best of all, it’s wheelchair accessible!  Yup, there’s an elevator to take people up to the bridge to cross over a busy street.  How cool is that?

As it was supposed to rain that day, I had made plans for weather-friendly activities (ie. indoor activities).  First stop: Weta Workshops!  What exactly is Weta, you may ask?  Weta is a movie workshop where they create everything from props to prosthetics for movies.  They basically created everything for The Lord of The Rings / Hobbit movies (weapons, masks, armour, etc) as well as props for King Kong, Thor, Narnia, etc.   The tour walks you through various steps in creating armour & weapons (movie secret: they’re mostly plastic!) as well as prosthetics and other innovative techniques.  It was quite fascinating taking a look at everything that goes into bringing movies to life!  Their was a sign underneath this figure that read:Please do not climb on Lurtz!  Weta takes no responsibility if he bites you.

                                                                                                    Some other well-known Weta wonders.

While in Wellington, I decided to visit an attraction that I had yet to visit in any other country of the world.  I visited Parliament!  Yes, I’m a nerd.  I know that (and people in my dorm were quick to tell me the same) and I embrace it.  As some of you might know, I was a Parliamentary guide for two summers back in my university days.  And I loved it!  One of my favourite student jobs.  So I was quite curious to see how other countries approached public tours of their parliamentary buildings.  New Zealand’s government is quite similar to Canada’s with two notable exceptions: 1) they switched some years ago to the MMP (mixed member proportional) voting system and 2) they’ve abolished their upper house.

Without going into to many specific details, I thoroughly enjoyed learning about NZ’s government and its parliamentary buildings.  Although,  I have to admit, I think the Canadian Parliament Guide Program does it better!  I felt like asking my guide, “What’s your theme?  Where are your links?” and such questions!  As well, not to brag or                 anything (it’s un-Canadian after all) but our Parliament is much nicer! 🙂

Me, standing in front of the New Zealand Parliament.  Above, left: the ‘Beehive” a part of the Parliament building

And if that wasn’t enough of a “nerd’s day out” for me, I topped it off by a visit to Te Papa, the New Zealand museum.  Inside are wonderful exhibits on everything from Maori culture to seismic events to native flora and fauna.  Some notable standouts for me were the Treaty of Waitangi & the colossal squid!  The treaty is the founding document of New Zealand, however it remains as controversial as when it was signed.  The point of contention is the wording difference between the English and Maori versions.  In English, it speaks that the local tribes were ceding sovereignty of the land however in the Maori version it states ‘governance’ not sovereignty.  The other interesting artifact is the preserved body of the colossal squid, the only one on display in the world.  It measures 5.4m and weighs 300kg!  I liked it because it looked just like the alien body in Independence Day and it’s fun to think that perhaps “they” are covering up the presence of aliens on earth by masquerading the remains as a colossal squid.  Ok, ok, I kid, but still, it was pretty interesting to view.  And good timing as well: it is being removed from display in April, only to return next year!

And I finished the day indulging in a quintessential New Zealand specialty: the flat white.  The Kiwis sure do take their coffee seriously!  And as they like to say: The Aussies might have created the flat white but the Kiwis perfected it.

Flat white definition from Wikipedia, because it’s just so darn poetic:  espresso-based coffee drink. It is prepared by pouring microfoam (steamed milk with small, fine bubbles with a glossy or velvety consistency) into a single or double shot of espresso. It is somewhat similar to the caffè latte although smaller in volume and less microfoam, therefore having a higher proportion of coffee to milk, and milk that is more velvety in consistency – allowing the espresso to dominate the flavour, while being supported by the milk.