The view from our table while eating lunch at the Pegasus Bay Winery
My first week of work at the University of Canterbury went very well. The first day Dr. Richard Blaikie, my boss, gave me a tour of the university and I met many of the people who I will be working with over the next few years. I also met with HR to do some of the standard new hire stuff. I will have a second, much longer, HR introduction meeting in couple weeks, which I am not looking forward to. I spent the rest of the week designing the lithography setup I am going to build for my experiments. Hopefully next week I will order all of the parts that I need. On Friday Jocelyn came to work with me. I showed her around the campus, and she had a meeting with a lady in the development offices of the university. After work Jocelyn and I went over to the Staff Club with my boss for a couple of drinks. The Staff Club was a very happening place and I was very surprised how many of the professors were there having drinks after work. We were there as Richard's guests but as a postdoc I can join, which I plan to do.
Another major happening this week was that we got our car and I got to try driving on the wrong (left) side of the road. It is very weird for many reasons. The first is the obvious that you are on the other side of the road and it feels very awkward making sharp left turns and wide right turns. The other weird things, I had never thought about, like the levers for the blinker and windshield wipers are reversed. So every time I got to make a turn I turn on the windshield wipers. Also when changing from reverse to drive it feels weird using my left hand. Even parking is harder since being on the other side of the car throws off your perspective of where the car is in the spot. I am sure after driving around for a while I will get used to it. Probably just in time to go back to the US and I will get confused all over again. So far I have driven to the grocery store and also to a winery that was about an hour away. Driving to the winery was very easy since it was mainly highway driving. The only slow part of the drive was when we had to stop to let a herd of sheep get buy us!
So our day trip this weekend was a trip to Pegasus Bay winery to celebrate Jocelyn's 30th birthday. When we arrived they give us a mini private tour of the rooms where the barrels of wine are kept and the bottling facilities. After the tour we then tasted many of their wines including, a sauvignon blanc, a sauvignon/semillon, three rieslings, a chardonnay, two pinot noirs, and a merlot. We ended up buying bottles of the riesling, sauvignon/semillon, and pinot noir. After the tasting we ate at the restaurant. It was a nice enough day that we were able to eat outside and take advantage of the scenic views. It is crazy to think that in the winter it is still warm enough to eat lunch outside. Jocelyn and I split a ricotta and toast dish and a seafood saffron risotto appetizer with mussels the size of golf balls which were both very good. For the entree Jocelyn had the lamb and I had the grouper which was made in parchment paper with herbs and mushrooms and served in a broth. Somehow it took Jocelyn almost two weeks to eat lamb in New Zealand. I ended my meal with profiteroles with chestnut and honeycomb and Jocelyn had pana cotta with warm chocolate sauce and a pear cooked in their famous pinot noir. We were both very happy with our meals and left very full. Although the food was very good I think the highlight of the trip for Jocelyn was getting stopped by the sheep in the middle of the road and having them surround our car. Maybe next year for her birthday I will take her to a petting zoo.
