What can happen in a month

First of all, I apologize for not keeping you up to date for a long time. But while working, the working hours get longer and you're pretty exhausted, there's usually not much time left to write. I'm glad if I manage to go to bed early so that I'm not tired the next morning. When you get more and more into your daily routine, not much happens anymore.

However, within a month, which unfortunately has already passed since my last article, a few interesting things come together. Whether it's at work, Christmas and New Year's Eve which were in between, or even on our days off. I just want to give you an insight into all this.

The work became more and more exciting day by day. We were allowed to take on more and more tasks independently and therefore spent more and more time in the office with our customers. It reached its first highlight when we were allowed to be our own bosses for the first time. None of the bosses were there on that day, and Jan took a day off. It was very exciting to have the responsibility for a whole branch for the first time. There was a bit of nervousness, but Nik and I were really looking forward to this day and it was a great success. It went smoothly without any major problems. In the following weeks, such days naturally became the norm, but they were still fun.

Shortly after I wrote my last report, we finally got new permanent employees who relieved Jan, Nik, and me a lot. A Scottish boy and two Czech girls joined us. At the beginning, everything went well and we tried to get all three of them into work as quickly as possible. The Scottish guy turned out to be a super nice colleague and a good new friend over time. But with the girls, everyone had more and more problems. They refused to carry out orders and complained about everything. This destroyed the good working atmosphere and annoyed all of us. After several attempts to clarify things with our bosses, we received the news today that the two of them will most likely quit soon. But thank goodness the office continued to run smoothly during this time, and we gained more experience in many problem situations.

But what we must not forget during our working time are the visits of our bosses, which became fewer and fewer over time, but we got to know all three bosses. Two of them even came to a small Christmas party shortly before Christmas. We had a lot of fun that evening in the pubs of Queenstown.

But a lot has also happened in our free time (on our days off). Apart from our nightly camping site changes around Queenstown, as you are only allowed to stay at most camping sites for 2 to 4 nights, we usually use our days off for tours around Queenstown. So one day we drove down the lake towards Glenorchey and Rees and Dart River and had a nice day there.

The next three days were already filled with Christmas. We spent our Christmas vacation in Dunedin with the Leahys and Sewells from the 24th, 25th, and 26th of December. We spent Christmas morning itself (in New Zealand, the morning of the 25th is the main day) with the Leahys. After a cozy breakfast and a walk on the beach with the family, we unwrapped gifts. In the evening, a big party was on the agenda with many international friends. It was a lot of fun to get to know so many different new people.

All of this was also captured in a Christmas article by a friend of our family who works for the newspaper a few days before Christmas. It was a fun and funny experience. Here is the link: http://m.wn.de/Muensterland/3099845-Luca-Theile-verbringt-Weihnachten-in-Neuseeland-Sommer-Sonne-Jingle-Bells.

After Christmas, it was time for a marathon of work. No workday was less than 10 hours, and we also had to work on New Year's Eve. But the evening before, we still spent a relaxed time at a campsite. We joined a group of about 30-40 French people and got to know a New Zealand family. We sat together with the daughter for a long time and had a good conversation. So despite the unfortunate circumstances, we had a nice New Year's Eve.

After we had three days off in a row for the second time, we headed to Wanaka, to Lake Wanaka. There we met a friend from Germany and her girlfriend, and later also with three other girls, two of whom were on a student exchange to New Zealand three years ago. The Leahys also spent a few days of summer vacation in Wanaka. So we enjoyed a few great days of summer vacation at Lake Wanaka with many nice people.

After our days off in Wanaka, our car started making strange noises again, so we had to take it to the workshop for a day. Fortunately, it was quickly and cheaply repaired and ready for our next trip to Dunedin, which was already scheduled for the following weekend. We wanted to meet the Sewells for a cricket match in Dunedin. After Nik's former host father had overslept and forgotten to get tickets, we managed to get some at short notice before the game. The Blackcaps (NZ) played against Pakistan in a test match. The Blackcaps won clearly. Cricket matches often last a whole day.

So our two days off in Dunedin were quickly over again. After another week of work, we have already reached our current day off, which we spend in a relaxed atmosphere at a campsite and use for writing the blog.

I hope I have told you all the important things from the past few weeks and haven't become too long-winded. We will now work until the end of January and maybe even longer. So I can't tell you anything about the next report yet. Stay tuned!

Until then,

Your Luca