Freedom from Speech cartoon

Hey folks, I've created another cartoon I call "freedom from speech". It criticizes Western hypersensitivity.

Quick Update New Zealand

Yep, I know. Ok, let me try my best to summarize the last couple of months and I'll give a padded out version later.

1) Sebastian has left New Zealand. I mean, he came back from Australia to New Zealand and now he's gone again back to the Fatherland. Before he left; me, him and another German traveled to Taupo to do the Tongariro crossing and go skiing. It was amazing! We almost died on the crossing... but that's a story for another blog post.

2) I have a new roommate. Lilli. She's cool. She's a super feminist, vegetarian and very lazy political activist.

3) I still haven't been accepted to do a PhD!! Ahhh! It's taking so much longer than expected. I've submitted the application though. Hopefully I get accepted soon.

4) Oh yeah, I recently realized how crime ridden New Zealand is. A friend of mine got robbed at gun point, another friend has become a witness to another crime and my bike was stolen. WTF New Zealand.

5) I'm planning a road trip around the South Island with a bunch of people. It should be great!

6) In between PhD stuff and Virtually Passed stuff, I've started to create some really shitty cartoon satire to keep me occupied. Here's my first I created today. I got a long way to go, but meh, it's a start.

7) Oh, and I've yet to meet a New Zealander that pronounces "fish and chips" as "fush n chups"

New Zealand day ???

Sorry future me for not updating my blog. A lot of shit has hit the fan - but on the bright side, it's splattered on the wall in front of me and is starting to form a faint outline of the mona lisa. Let me explain.

I quit my job. Yep, it happened. The reasons behind my departure are actually quite simple, but I figure a lot of people reading a summary of my reasoning will probably perceive me as a stoned hippie with absurd idealistic values versing a big bad evil corporation. So what the heck, I'll save you the time:

Me: WTF duuude? You're like totally squashing my freedom maaan. I'll leaving broh.

Society: I can't let you do that, Matt. You will work 40 hours a week, Monday to Friday, and society will love you for it.

Me: C'mon maaan. I wanna do what my heart tells me I should do. I'm not, like, benefiting from being here. Ya know?

Society: College. Job. Family. There is no other way... submit, Matt. You have no choice.

Me: *smokes a doobie* That's all opinion man! I don't fit in here, dude. The skills I have, you don't want, and the skills you want, I don't have. I'm done, broh.

Society: What about your future? What about money? You need it to survive.

Me: Yes and no, broh. Yes... and no.

Ok, I hope that made just a little bit of sense. The reason I'm not in a 100% pure state of panic right now is because things are still looking up for me. PhD entrances occur every month at UoA, I've found a job as a Math tutor and I'm optimistic that I'll be able to get some more work as an Acoustic Lab technician at the University soon!

Now that I've done the book keeping, let me go into some detail about what I've done recently.

I just came back from a 7 day camping trip to Rotorua. There were 5 of us; two Germans, 1 Italian, an American, and whatever I am. We did an amazing hike around lake Waikaremoana. It's mean't to be a 4 day hike, but we did it in two. It was extremely rewarding. The views were phenomenal and the company was great. I loved it. In the other days we did small hikes, saw waterfalls, and toured caves n' shit. Sebastian (my ex roommate) is currently in Australia so we used his car to drive everywhere. The car was in bad shape to begin with - now it's just a metal sheet balancing on 4 wheels. The engine is super inefficient, the window wipers both broke, there were missing seat-belts and the side mirror fell off. If the car was a transformer it would transform into a wheel chair. This trip was a good opportunity for me to tour some more of the New Zealand country side. I'm still blown away at the mountains here - they're all so green and oddly shaped; it's as if gravity works differently here than any other country. I'll post photos on Facebook soon.

New Zealand 4 day weekend

Finally I can talk about New Zealand in all its glory. Easter holiday has given me the opportunity to travel outside off Auckland and see the beautiful countryside. I decided to make a last minute booking to see Taupo and do the Tongariro crossing! Who says atheists can't appreciate religious traditions? Regretfully none of my roommates could come though.

Oh yeah, I have roommates now. It happened shortly before I decided to take up bike riding. OK, so I haven’t been updating my blog in awhile. Let me start from where I left off.

OK, so, at the time when I was still living with my Grandparents and when my taste for pre cooked sausages and weet bix & watermelon wasn’t a full blown addiction, I managed to live a pretty stable & repetitive lifestyle. Eat. Sleep. Work. Repeat. That all changed when Granddad and I went to one of his friends place to watch him brew beer. Holy crap, I’ve been doing it all wrong. He did everything from scratch; heating the raw grains with 67 degree C water, growing his own yeast, moving 50L silo’s with motor driven chains… it was amazing! I decided right then and there that I needed a house where I could duplicate this magic. A home with a large enough backyard to transform into a brewing factory. A house with roommates relaxed enough to ignore the occasional explosion. I found that house. It’s in Waterview with 2 other Kiwi Uni students; Elliot and Nicole, and 1 German; Sebastian. The place is in a pretty good location too because it’s far enough that rent is cheap ($160/week) but close enough to bike to work. Ah! Bike riding! There is a direct bike path which begins from my house and leads directly to the AECOM office. The only downside about the house is that there is no internet!! I guess taking 2 weeks to install a basic utility is an inefficiency I’ll have to get used to in New Zealand. In my desperation to browse Facebook and watch YouTube videos of puppies I drained all the data on my phone on the first day. On that same day, my roommates and I decided to go to a pub to enjoy a good beer together. It occurred to me as I was asking the bartender what the WiFi password was that I have a serious internet problem. I mean, replace “internet” in that story with literally any other substance and people relaxing voices and white clothes would be picking me up and dropping me off at the nearest rehab. I’m not concerned about my addition to the internet though - the router should be working within a week. I’m also thinking of getting the Samsung Galaxy S7 soon too so my phobia of being out of touch with the rest of societies technological standards will be temporarily subsided. Oh yeah, I might start up a video blog with this new phone - so yeah, brace yourselves for that.

OK, now I can start talking about Taupo. This Easter break gave me 4 beautiful days to explore as much of NZ as I can. I booked a last minute lodge in Taupo (it was last minute because doing stuff without internet is hard) and set off to Hitchhike down Taupo. Once I realized that waiting by the onramp to the motorway wasn’t working, I caved and purchased a $29 bus down to Taupo. As soon as I arrived I made friends with a young Scottish couple and 2 elderly South Africans in their 50’s. The South Africans were so transparently racist it was disturbing. I knew better than to argue with highly opinionated old men, so I let them rant about how blacks were really just another breed of Chimpanzee until they fell asleep. Once the racists were all tuckered out, I had a chance to explore the town. It’s beautiful, the lake is wonderful and the town is very spread out and disconnected giving it a tranquil country vibe. Funnely enough, I realized while walking around that I had been here once before when I was working for Schlumberger. I’ve probably already written a brief post about this 3 years ago!

The next day I payed $65 to get a shuttle bus there and back from the Tongariro Alpine crossing. I woke up at 5:00am, hiked both optional peaks (I can’t remember their formal names, but one of them was Mt. Doom!) and met a bunch of people.

Once again, I got an extreme case of total bliss talking to several groups consisting of Americans, Canadians, Dutch, French (well, technically New Caledonian) and Polish. It saddens me a little that they were all backpackers so I can’t develop any long term friendships with them.

Traveling back to Auckland was a lot of fun. I woke up super early and tried hitchhiking again. I figured my luck would be much better going from Taupo to Auckland than the reverse, and I was right. After 1 hour I got a lift by two friendly parents who insisted on telling me every possible fact about about New Zealand and their 4 children. Fun fact #1: Kiwi Fruit grows on vines and was first called ‘chinese gooseberry’. They dropped me off at Tauranaga where I easily caught another ride by a very intelligent (and somewhat obnoxious) Australian software developer all the way back to Auckland.

I'll talk about work and roommates in another post! Right now I'm super tired :D

New Zealand week 4

Alright so it's been a month. Time to get summarizing!

By now I feel I've gotten a pretty good understanding of Auckland. The city is small, somewhat lively and the people are extremely friendly. Regretfully I haven't had the time to explore the city as much as I'd like to. I can only do long activities during the weekends, and I use them to try and travel to the outskirts of Auckland to go hiking! In all honesty, I'm actually a little scared at how little time it took me to develop a routine which stops me from experiencing as much out of the city as I can. I go to bed at the same time, I walk to the same places most of the time and I even drink the same Milo & milk snack drink for lunch every day. It's not all routine though. I've started using my lunch breaks to walk around and I've scouted out a few awesome pubs, coffee shops and Auckland University - I'll have to check them out in more detail later! I've also started developing a pretty good relationship with my fellow graduates which is really great. I join them for lunch occasionally and for after work drinks on Friday. Once again, I'm still blown away at how friendly New Zealanders are.

Oh yeah, I went to Sydney for a few days too. It was a bit awkward to see my Aussie friends again so recently after having a farewell party, but it was still fun. The induction, for the most part, didn't teach anybody much, but at the very least it was a great chance to network and catch up with my brother before I headed back to NZ again.

Ok, what about work? I'm proud to say I'm getting better at it. The projects aren't an intimidating swirl of complicated PDF's and CAD drawings anymore and I'm almost good enough to use some of the computer programs completely by myself. I think my work colleague, Nick (the other acoustics Engineer who is half machine, half machine), is to thank for thet though. He is very patient with me and explains concepts to me very well. I've also recently tried to take some initiative by trying to use Google Docs and Sheets in my everyday work to make collaboration on projects easier. It's helped, but it's not a silver bullet solution; there's still no way to get around the inefficiency of printing off a document, signing it, scanning it, then throwing the document away. On the downside my physical health is taking a slight downfall. My fat ass now deflates on my office chair in an attempt to adapt to an 8+ hour sitting day, my foot is still sore/stiff all the time and my back is starting to creak like an old door. I'm getting old! Ahhh!

Strangely I've been fantasizing about becoming a full time entrepreneur and focusing full time on two projects; Virtually Passed and a new company which opens up small flexible work offices around the city. I can't help it, I think about it all the time. I really want to pursue Virtually Passed on my weekends. Aunt Christine and Uncle Ron would make good mentors!

6 Days in Auckland

Ok, so I've had a few days to adjust to my environment and I'm ready to share what I think about Auckland without getting too focused on specific things that annoy me.

Lets start with my job. Firstly, it's a lot of work. I feel like a toddler asked to learn quantum mechanics; there's so many programs I need to master, forms I need to fill out, and acronyms I need to remember. There's also a lot of HR stuff and legal and financial shit I need to sort out due to my adjustment to NZ which is making things a tad overwhelming. On the bright side, I think I'm on top of the theory so that's good. Oh yeah, I'm also in the smallest division in the company: acoustics. It's just me, a slightly experienced genius, Nick, and my manager, Clair. Nick is in his late 20's and is so on top of his game. He arrives before I do (8:30am) and leaves after I do (5:45pm) and is constantly powering out work. He is genuinely a human Machine. Even on 'casual Friday' - or as I prefer to call it; 'formal Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday' he still wears a full suit. He's a well lubricated cog in the machine and it's making me anxious that I might not fit that well. Clair is a Scottish woman in her late 30's who is also super smart. She seems to have infinite patience with me which is nice, but I'm also anxious that I may never have the powerful Scottish accent she has. My first project I've been assigned to is about controlling noise from Tesla batteries (yep! How cool is that!?) that are being placed in a sub station. If I fuck up the project, I hope nobody hears about it (pun intended). Umm what else? Oh yeah, I feel myself gradually get increasingly more unfit. Sitting down for so many hours a day is really taking a toll on my body. I feel a lot more out of energy and I'm starting to gain weight already :(. It's made worse watching young fit people run along the harbor as I catch my bus into work in the morning. I had an after work drinks on Friday which was awesome! By far the best thing I like about NZ so far is the people - everyone is super friendly. I'm honestly extreemly relieved that the NZ hospitality lived up to it's expectations. I can't wait to move out and live with some great people!

Ok, so what do I think about Auckland as a whole? Well there is still a whole lot left to experience, but what I've gathered so far is that it's tiny. The buildings are very spaced out and small and there are hardly any people anywhere. I'm sure the city isn't as quiet as it appears to be though, I'm pretty sure everyone is hiding in some super popular area of town I just haven't discovered yet. I haven't seen much going on yet, but on the website MeetUp there seems to be quite a few things happening. I'll give it a proper go next week and see what I think. I went on a coastal walk today which was nice, but I think I'll have to try something a little more interesting and challenging next weekend.

Lastly, living with my grandparents has been awesome. I thought the lack of independence would be getting to me by now, but it's not at all. Being made lunch and dinner every day and having my laundry done regularly is a luxury I've really missed. I smell clean and I'm not hungry! Yippie! In return I help them out with 'technology issues' like opening Facebook on an iPad and turning on NetFlix. It's a pretty sweet deal.

New Zealand day 1

Ok, let's do this.

I got a job with AECOM in Auckland and flew into NZ last night. I'm currently crashing with my grandparents, which by the way are incredibly hospitable. Free food, free rent, free lifts everywhere and a free public transport card. Thanks Nana and Granddad, you're awesome. I'll repay you shortly once I sort out my bank shit!

Ok ok ok. First day at work after being an unemployed bum for 3 months. How was it? In a word: ''meh". In a few words: "I think I like pretty much everything about the job; the people are nice, the work seems interesting and the facilities are great. The only downsides are; work attire and working hours". 

So before I start a powerful rant that I'll probably regret somewhere down the line, let me clarify a few things you probably already know about me. 1) I HATE formal clothes 2) I HATE the 9-5. 

So first things first, in the induction we were told that the working hours will be quite flexible. This got me incredibly excited until the inductor clarified to the inductees that that 'flexible' mean't we could arrive 10 minutes late as long as we left 10 minutes late too. That's not flexible! Arrgh!

Why in 2016 is work determined by time and not by merit? All this does is encourage the illusion of productivity and ironically makes things inefficient! We've enlightened ourselves so far to believe (correctly) that it doesn't matter what colour, nationality, gender, or sexual preference you have; all that matters is your ability to do the work. This is good, society! Good job! Why can't we go one step further and say it doesn't matter how long you work at something or what you wear while you do it, all that should matter is your ability to do the work! I promise you in 50 years from now people are going to look back at this generation and laugh at how remarkably intelligent CEO's and business managers managed to convince themselves that they can measure the performance of an employee by measuring the % of cotton the employee wears while timing how long that person stairs at a screen. Eargh.

Rant over. 

In other news, I'm still quite optimistic about my job. 

Oh yeah, New Zealanders are extremely friendly :) That's a talk for another rant.