The thing about kitchens without ovens. Creative cooking, I like to call it. We like to refer to our microwave as a "moven". It supposedly has an oven setting, but whether this is a true "oven" setting is questionable. It only heats to 100 degrees, which, if you've ever cooked anything in your life you know 100 degrees won't get you very far. So what do we do? We improvise. This past weekend we had two lovely family dinners. Lasagna was cooked in the "moven", I discovered there is such a thing as brocciflower (a broccoli/cauliflower hybrid, apparently it's brocciflower season), we indulged ourselves in a roast, which could be smelled from down the sidewalk, gravy was made from a bag, and cheese sauce was served out of a tupperware container. Now, these weren't dinners to write home about (although I did) but for broke college students without a real functional oven, it was the best thing I've had since I've been here that's been cooked in a village kitchen. I don't know if it's that they don't trust us with ovens, because they are very serious about their fire safety. In the first week we were told maybe 10 times that if you set the fire alarm off you have 30 seconds to press the "oops i set off the fire alarm" switch and then you have 2 minutes to clear the apartment of smoke before they call the fire brigade and charge you $1000. And no one wants that. Especially now that the exchange rate is no longer in my favor. But that's a whole other story.

In other news, it appears that I will be New Zealand bound the last week in November! If all goes according to plan (and mommy and daddy say yes) I will be flying into Christchurch (the south island), spending a few days there, and then flying to the north island to Auckland and spending a few days there. Other than that not much has been happening around here. It's been raining essentially since we got back from the Whitsundays. I thought I left Ithaca, but apparently it's weather came with me. Finals are coming up, so everyone has finals fever. Although it is must less severe here than back home. I really could care less about them considering I only have one final. If you can even really call it that. Also, the release of Harry Potter in australia is before its release in the states. And I will be seeing it at midnight.