Alright Folks,

I got into Auckland 9 days early to surprise Sharlene and to help with the move into the new house. I got in the day before the move and between Sharlene’s parents and I we ensured Sharlene knew nothing about my arrival. That night Sharlene’s dad and I went down to their holiday home to pick up a truckload of Sharlene’s stuff and to keep the subterfuge going. The next day we got to the house before Sharlene and waited to surprise her. We did not get a huge amount of time to get reacquainted as there was loads of work to do.

The first few weeks were taken up with organising the house and buying those little extras that make a house a home, like 3 couches! It was all very exciting and we both enjoyed making the house more homely each day.

For my belated birthday we did a “welcome Emmett to Auckland day”. We started off by doing the AJ Hackett Harbour Bridge Climb. The views were cool. When we were up there we were offered the chance to do a bungy jump off the bridge but as much as I would have liked to do it there was no way I could have done it.

After the bridge climb we met with Sharlene’s parents for lunch and than went to Kelly Talrton’s Underwater World. It is an aquarium with a difference. You go on a ride though a penguin reserve that is made to look and feel like Antarctica. There is also a walkway that is covered with curved glass that sharks and all the other fish swim above. It is very cool. From here we went home to prepare for my first night out in Auckland. We went for dinner in the Sky Tower (the tallest building in the Southern Hemisphere) in their revolving restaurant. All in all it was an amazing day and many great memories were made.

Other than that we did some other Auckland touristy things like One Tree Hill that no longer has a tree, and Rangitoto Island which is an extinct volcano.  I also got the chance to meet many of Sharlene’s friends and colleagues. One of her friends’, Michelle, boyfriend is into scuba diving so that was great to meet someone that shared my enthusiasm for the sport.

Unfortunately, my new career idea of becoming a scuba diving instructor took a fatal blow when we found out what the annual salary would most likely be. In fact there are very few instructors in New Zealand that do it on a full time basis, most just work evening or weekends as well as their full time job. Although the diving is good in NZ it is not what you would call a diving destination and therefore most people do it on the weekends. I suppose I had been hoping that it would be like the places that I went diving where there was always an abundance of people that wanted to dive everyday.

This meant that I had to go back to the drawing board as regards a job. This had been one of the reasons I went travelling as I just did not like the type of work that I did before. I did not want to have to go back to alcohol sales but my experience was limited to alcohol sales and hotel work. Unfortunately, both are industries that I no longer want to work in and thus the job finding task became very fraught with disappointment as I realised that if I ever wanted to earn a decent wage and work similar hours to Sharlene I would have to go back to sales.

Many jobs that I went for wanted someone that had residency or a permanent visa neither of which I possessed. To be totally honest I was also somewhat relaxed in my search for work. I came to convince myself for many reasons that I was not in a hurry to find work and that the right job would come along if I kept looking online. Plus I had enough saving to keep me going for some time.

However, as days became weeks a job still did not seems forthcoming and combined with other issues tension began to build in the house. I felt stuck in a vicious cycle of job searching and disappointment and with uncertainty over Sharlene’s position the tension soon turned into arguments. At this point it began to turn sour and the constant arguments over nothing took their toll on us and in the end the relationship was the final thing to give under the pressure.

From there it was very difficult to do anything but feel despondent. All I could do was to accept the challenge that life had given and move on. During this time I was told something that made me stand up and have a run at life again. A guy I shared a room with in the hostel told me that “life is an experiment and you have just been thrown back into the mix”. It doesn’t sound like much but I have found that I drew strength from it every time I was feeling down. I also received great comfort from my friends and I am so grateful to them for that. Even though you are all thousands of miles away if felt great to know that I had your support.

So folks there it is. It was fun while it lasted but it was just not working. Here’s to the next chapter…

Until next time, Em