Pole plaane pole probleemi

After semi successful startup weekend in Tauranga was time to get my car sold. Trusted loyal ride named Maggie who liked to drink too much and we had to take time off for 3 months to figure out where our relationship was heading. Because high season is about to start when lot of backpackers are arriving to NZ. To bump up value little bit more I had to do warrant of fitness for the car as well. To pass the test I had to change brake pads which was not welcomed unexpected expense. Luckily after asking around in couple of garages I ended up in a place where I got a lot cheaper and better service. 

One side note. Google has apparently noticed that I move around a lot or something and always asks me to take pictures of places or do reviews. It started couple of months ago and since then I have been Googles little helper. In a way Google has already slaved mankind by making mankind work for Google and making it better.

Luckily my German friend was kind enough and allowed me to stay couple more days at his place to get my car fixed and wof done.

During startupweekend I met one Kiwi dude who had traveled around quite a bit and he was cool enough and offered that when I am in Auckland I can crash his couch for couple of nights. When low on potato it was perfect option for me to save some potato.

When I arrived to his place he was out but he had left key for me. Place was pretty cool, garage that had living rooms above it. But the garage itself was in the end of dark alley and I was thinking by myself that how random is this that I ended up here. 

I ended up staying there til end of the week and occasionally showing my car to some potential buyers.

At one point I had to go see a doctor because I was feeling still sick after startup weekend without getting better. I picked some random medical center nearby, called there and got appointment 1.5 h. later. I was actually impressed by this. In Estonia waiting times to see a doctor are so ridiculous that you either die or get better before you can see a doctor.   

As a general rule here, people tend to be nicer than I am used to back in home and doctor was no exception. Tho she was "useful" as the doctors I am used to. After quick check I got prescribed some pills I had to start to pop. Because I had travel insurance which covered doctors visit I didn't have to spend a dime on it.

Duration of my stay happened to overlap with the hosts with my hosts birthday. He was quite modest dude and he didn't celebrate his birthday, without facebook I wouldn't even know that it was his birthday. And his only plan was to at his friend place for couple of beers, so I tagged along. 

While having beers and talking about life in general I was struck by weird similarities with myself. My host and his friend were both quite ambitious fellows who wanted from life more than you just can see. They have had always bunch of different business ideas what to do and trying find a way to be more successful in life. But in most cases things have just stayed as ideas. Because while brainstorming ideas they drank beer and whiskey. I can't count times when back at home at my friends place we have had beer and whiskey and talked about business ideas. But what has always started as promising business idea brainstorming sessions has always ended up with more whiskey and less business. In a way I had ended up in a weird doppelganger situation/place just like back in home. And as predicted, business ideas, mening and goals of life ended up with more whiskey and with a hangover in the morning. 

Best part? I had a appointment with one startup who already was in similar business that  I have been working on past months. Earned some extra challenge points with this one.

But drunken business/life theories evening was kind of interesting opportunity to observe part of my own life as a neutral observer and to realize that people ae not that different around the world. There is different categories of people who share same mindset, same hopes and worries. Thou it kind of seems common knowledge it was interesting to experience in first hand.

And other thing I realized was that to think out of the box you have to be out of the box. Box istelf is only things that keeps you in the box. Easier to say than to do of course. Because box comes in different sizes and with different shackles. Which could be in the form of commitments, resources, mindset, experiences and even luck which cannot be broken just like that. And sometimes only way to be outside box is to reset the box, which for me has been the act of dropping everything, packing my underwear and heading to the other side of the globe. Like the saying goes, if you want to have different outcome don't do same thing all over again.

Last evening at my hosts house kind of confirmed this assumption. We had quite long chat and was really cool to hear how he had started his travels in Australia, ended up in Mongolia and rode motorbike trough Chile. Was supsiring to hear that once he had conservative and narrow minded mindset, which didn't seem to be obviously the case anymore.

After I had to leave I was again without any plan or knowledge where I'll be in couple of hours. I had to show my car to couple of people and that was it. One people who wanted t see the car were quite far from city center and I really was considering bailing out f driving there, but because car sales wasn't going fast as I wanted I decided to bite the bullet and go there. So called buyers were young german girls who were staying with airbnb host. Some weird luck, couldn't sell my car to them but at least airbnb host had some free room and I got super cheap deal for next couple of days. My bed was in garage but at least it was  big and comfortable and meals were included as well. Host was old but really funky and energetic old lady. She has been hosting quite a long time and there were some indians who had stayed there almost an a year.
Don't know what was the occasion but for some reason in the evening there was bunch beer and whiskey. Apparently I ended up in pretty awesome airbnb house.

After being little bit more than a week in Auckland and thinking about it, it seems how ridiculously everything has fallen in its place quite randomly. How many extremely different places I have ended up just by cruising without any destination in mind. And to top on that I managed to get goof price for my car.

Last day in Auckland was quite busy. But managed to have amazing lunch with my Taiwanese friends before going to airport at least.

And in Christchurch was friend waiting already to pick me up.