Auckland, day 2

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Auckland isn’t anything special, but that one thing it does have is nice parks. So today I decided to a long walk to some of these beautiful parks. But before doing so, I wanted to check out some local art, so I headed to the Auckland Art Gallery. This free three floor gallery was more of an art museum than a gallery, but nonetheless I enjoyed it. Many of the paintings portrayed Maori culture and history; others were paintings of New Zealand landscape. It gave me a good idea of what I should expect to see in the coming months. As I passed these paintings, I was planning in my head all the sites I wanted to see.
Across the street from the gallery is Albert Park. Albert Park is surrounded by many of Auckland’s Universities. And as thus, students tend to congregate at the park. As I sat on a park bench facing a fountain, a photography student was photographing her friends for a class assignment.

I continued to walk for a good 45 minutes until I reached Mt. Eden. Mt. Eden is the tallest volcanic cone in Auckland with some spiritual meaning to the Maoris. Because it is considered sacred, no one is allowed to enter the crater, you can only walk (or drive) to the summit. But there are some excellent views of Auckland city from the top. Aesthetically, Mt. Eden itself is nothing more than a grassy mountain with a grassy crater.

After making it downhill, I decided to take the long way back to the hostel stopping on the way at Auckland Domain and Parnell. Auckland Domain is this huge park with rugby fields, tropical-island looking ponds, and Victorian formal gardens. It was once a volcano, however you really can’t tell just by being there and looking at it. Within the Domain is the Auckland museum; however I decided not to go in as I was pressed for time.

Leaving the Domain, I entered the neighborhood of Parnell. Parnell very much reminds me of a mix of the soho and small town, USA. It’s got cute boutiques and upscale cafes. If I were to stay in Auckland for a longer period of time, I’d want to find an apartment here.

At 7pm, I arrived at the synagogue for Simchat Torah services. The congregation is really laidback and seemed not to organized, but other than that services are services. The men danced with the torah, the women started to dance, but stopped after a few minutes. There was cake and cookies, alcohol. The usual for simchat torah. After services, the rabbi invited me and a few others to his house for dinner. Since the rabbi was still pretty new to the congregation, the conversations around the table was mainly about what should be done with the congregation going forward, and what has been done in the past. There seems to be some ongoing clashing going on between the more observant and the less observant - the usual shul politics. Everyone at the dinner was of the more observant end. We had left the rabbi’s house at about 1:30 AM and everyone made their way back home - in my case, back to the hostel.

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Comments

[Olivia]

did you get my last question?
It seemed like it, b/c you answered my ?s...btw this isn't my real name cuz i didnt want it to be on the www. are you traveling alone? if so, who is taking all the pix of you?