Saturday, March 24, 2007

St. Patricks Day

Obviously, its a week since Paddy's day, but here is how it went down on this side of the world.

1:00 pm - Parade
1:30 pm - Drink

The parade actually included 2 midgets dressed like leprechauns. Not exactly pollitically correct.

Because Auckland has so many different cultures, every parade (no matter what the occasion) is just a mish mash of culture. Imagine a load of chinese dancers going down the street dressed in green, followed by the Hindu dancers and followed by the local GAA club.

One of the bars here put on Murphy's for the day, so I had a few of them (no green food colouring in mine thanks). Things got interesting after midnight. In the build up to the Ireland V Italy rugby game, 3 guys from Togher arrived in the bar. Now I was wearing my Cork City jersey for added affect, so they came straight over to me shouting and roaring.

Wednesday, March 07, 2007

Paraparaumu

Last weekend I rented a car a drove to Palmerston North for the latest Hurricanes rugby match (they lost this time). Arrived in the hostel to find that they put me in a room with 2 guys from Limerick & 2 from Wicklow. We had a good night out in one of the 4 local Irish bars which is already gearing up for Paddy's day (even if it was full of Scotish & English ex-pats). On the way back, I stopped off at Paraparaumu for a night. The sunset across the Tasman Sea was stunning. For any Munster fans reading, this is the birthplace of one Christian Cullen.

Thursday, March 01, 2007

Hurricanes 23-22 Blues

The Hurricanes beat the blues by a single point at the Westpac Stadium in Wellington. The Blues were really pushing for a position for a drop goal in injury time, but after about 7 or 8 phases, the referee gave a penalty to the Hurricanes for holding on to the ball. Ironically, the Hurricanes were the ones pushing for a try in injury time a week later, but they scored to beat the Brumbies 11-10.