How Rotten Food Lead to Self-Reliance

About the Author: Amanda is a 20-something college grad with a journalism degree under her belt, which she plans to use to rid the world of bad grammar and “there, their, they’re” confusion. After studying abroad in New Zealand, Amanda has decided she’d love to move there one day so she can wear jandals, eat hokey pokey ice cream, and continue pretending she understands the rules of rugby. When not working or blogging, Amanda can usually be found dreaming of her next travel adventure, wherever that may be. Follow her travels on her blog, A Dangerous Business or on Twitter @DangerousBiz.

The year was 2008. I was lugging my two ridiculously large suitcases through the Pittsburgh airport as my family waved me off, preparing to embark upon my first real solo travel experience. I was headed to Wellington, New Zealand, to study abroad for a semester at Massey University.

And I was going into it not knowing a soul.

This, of course, was a pretty scary prospect. I knew I would love living in New Zealand, eventually. But I would be lying if I said I didn’t have any niggling fears about traveling halfway around the world to plant myself in a city where I knew no one. What if I didn’t make any friends? What if I hated my roommates? What if Wellington wound up being a terrible place to live?

As it turns out, I didn’t have very long at all to wait to face up to some of these fears and take ownership of my time in New Zealand.

***

After more than 24 hours spent in airports and aboard aircraft, I finally touched down in Wellington. The short flight from Auckland to the capital had been picturesque, to say the least. The clouds were thin, and every white-capped ocean wave, every hilly island jutting out from the mainland, even every woolly white sheep was visible from the air. I was in such good spirits as Oriental Bay came into view that not even the turbulence caused by Wellington’s characteristically blustery winds bothered me.

I was in Wellington at last, and I was ready for the adventure of a lifetime.

As I was picked up from the airport by a representative from Massey, I was feeling good. The jet lag had yet to hit me, the sun was shining, and I was confident that this was the beginning to something new and exciting. And it was, of course.

It just so happened that the adventure was going to kick off with an unpleasant surprise.

When we pulled up to The Cube apartment complex at last, I was pleased. My new home was located within walking distance of everything I needed: shopping, food, the campus, and even the harbor. The supervisor was friendly and helped me up to my flat, pointing out things like the bakery cafe and laundry room on the way.

There had apparently been some confusion about my room, however, and so I ended up not in 6J2 as originally planned. I was placed one flat over, in 6I. And as soon as Andrew the supervisor unlocked the door, I knew that, whatever I had been expecting of great roommates and fun apartment living, this was not it.

It wasn’t the apartment itself that I didn’t like (because I did -it had a great view), and it wasn’t necessarily my first flatmate I was introduced to (though, he was probably the beginning of it). It wasn’t even really the fact that the rugs and couches were unswept, the bathrooms were grimy and I found out I was living with three guys.

No, the thing that really hit me (and I mean nearly literally hit me, like a hammer hitting an anvil or a bus hitting a pedestrian) was the smell. Think rotting food (or perhaps spoiled milk?) mixed with the overpowering scent of marijuana. My stomach did an unpleasant flop.

Andrew left me standing rather forlornly in my small bedroom, the wheels turning furiously in my head. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. Maybe with a bit of cleaning this could be livable. Maybe it was only terrible right now because it was the school holidays.

But then my flatmate Sam, who explained that he didn’t actually officially live there at all, told me that the place used to be much worse, when five guys had been living there instead of three.

“Nothing ever got done,” he said. Which worried me that this was the state of something getting done.

Sam then gave me a tour of all the damage done in the apartment, the hole through the bathroom wall, the scuff marks on the ceiling, the splintered bedroom door. And then there was the offensive plastic bag filled with what appeared to be the rotting contents of the refrigerator, oozing onto the kitchen table. Matt, who lived in the room opposite mine, apparently liked to host raves and never take out the trash. Great.

By the time I found myself back in the safety of my tiny (yet un-smelly) room, I was desperately trying not to cry. Call me a naive American (or perhaps even just naive) but I had never really considered the possibility of being assigned male flatmates. It’s just not something that generally happens at schools in Ohio.

I suppose it wouldn’t have been as bad if the thought of weekly raves and wriggling parasites didn’t terrify me. But, they kind of did.

I came to the swift realization that New Zealand might not, in fact, live up to my expectations at all.

After wallowing for about an hour while locked in my room, I eventually decided to venture out into Wellington, if only to distract myself from my less-than-ideal living situation. I walked down Taranaki Street to the harbor, where I sat for a little while watching the wind ruffle sails and the tops of waves.

The sun was still shining, and families were out walking their dogs and playing soccer in the sandy patch at Oriental Bay. It was hard to stay in a bad mood for very long.

As it turned out, I was already in love with Wellington. And I decided then and there that something as stupid as a gag-inducing apartment was not going to define my stay in this beautiful city. Yes, I was on my own. But that didn’t mean that I had to settle for a situation that was already making me unhappy.

The next morning, I went up to campus and sought out Jayne, who was in charge of making sure all the international students at Massey were happy and adjusting well.

“So, hypothetically, let’s say I hate my living arrangement,” I told her. “How can we fix that?”

It turned out to be an incredibly easy fix, and I was moved into a new (and much cleaner) flat that very afternoon.

Looking back on it now, I think this first day in New Zealand was the very first sign of change in me. I returned to Ohio a very different person from the timid girl who had left the Pittsburgh airport with those two huge suitcases five months earlier. Outwardly, I looked the same. But, inwardly, I was much different.

Being on my own in New Zealand taught me that, yes, traveling solo can be frustrating and scary. But it can also teach you self-reliance. I came back to Ohio as a much more independent, confident person, knowing that, at the very least, I could count on myself in any sort of situation. Not a bad lesson to have learned in the first day.

And, in the end, it was all because of a bag of rotten food.