New Zealand 2007

New Zealand 2007

I found myself the most wonderful deal.

One night when I was surfing travel websites I hopped on to expedia.ca and discovered an unbelievable deal. Round trip ticket to New Zealand via Chicago and Los Angeles….. $1500. I couldn’t believe my luck considering most flights were in the range of $2500 each. Without a second thought, I purchased a ticket. The days that followed brought about a refreshing slap in the face. I didn’t really have $1500 to spare with my ever so fixed income. I resorted to selling off some personal possessions including my elaborate DVD collection numbering over 300 titles.

Death of a collection

I worked at a video store for more than three years and I was able to amass a respectable collection of DVD titles. It pained me to give them up but after careful consideration, I picked out fifty titles I was unable to relinquish. Following my personal selection, I invited a selected few to pick over my collection to obtain the remaining elite swag. The day had come and I posted a listing on ebay asking $500 for 300 titles. After the week was out, I had found a buyer willing to dish out $650. I was now safe and able to produce the funds required to settle my outstanding rent.

The Good News

The real reason I was so quick to make a flight to NZ was to meet a special someone I had been speaking to for several months. I was not greeted with the warmest of greetings when I notified this Kiwi on my good luck and intentions. It short, I was blown off. I was surfing an all-time high and ever so suddenly, I was riding an all-time low. I was told there was no reason for me travel to NZ and that I should reconsider my options. The deed was done and I was well past the point of no return. Fate sometimes has a way for tossing you a curve ball.

Uncertain Future

The great thing was, this Kiwi was nice enough to give me an entire one week notice (before my flight plus add a little sarcasm here) that perhaps it wasn’t the best thing for me to go since she had met someone and blah blah blah. I had sacrificed so much to make this happen and now I was being left out in the cold. I took two days off work to weight my options and clear my head. I even considered canceling the flight and taking the full $1500 hit on the coinpurse. I called the airlines to see if I could unload my ticket but since I had no cancellation insurance, I was screwed. The second day of my reorganization I came to the simple rationalization that I have the ticket, I should just go and damn to consequences. So, I decided to go. There I was, a Canadian boy, alone and off to a distant land for an adventure of a lifetime.

Screw the consequences, I was going anyways.