Unlike America, Kiwi's only follow one game of sport-Rugby. The professional team from New Zealand, The All Blacks, who are 2012 world cup champions played at the newly built Rugby stadium in Dunedin on Saturday night. The entire town goes into an uproar and the streets shut down to form "tent city". The Octagon is the center of Dunedin where bars/restaurants lie one by one to form an octagon. In the middle, tents are put up with TV's so the entire town can watch the rugby, eat food, and drink some beers. On the day of, in preparation for the big game, a local team called the "Nude Blacks" get together to play a game of rugby.....yes, in the nude. I watched that game for a few minutes before Gareth took me on another tour of a town close by, called Aramoana. Aramoana has a sad history. Aramoana was the site of a brutal town massacre where men, women, and children died in 1990. "Into the Blue" is a movie that was filmed on site re-enacting the massacre, in which I watched the night before.
A little bit of history : "The Aramoana massacre was a mass murder that occurred on 13 November 1990 in the small seaside township of Aramoana, New Zealand.[3] Resident David Gray, a 33-year-old unemployed man, began indiscriminately shooting people in the township with a scoped semi-automatic rifle, after a verbal dispute with his next-door neighbor. He shot neighbours and a family visiting the township,[4] killing thirteen people, including local police Sergeant Stewart Guthrie, first responder to the reports of a shooting. After a careful house-by-house search the next day, police officers led by the Special Tactics Group located Gray and shot him dead as he came out of a house firing from the hip[1][2] (media reporting at the time called the group by the pre-1990 name, the Anti Terrorist Squad). It is the deadliest criminal shooting in New Zealand history.[5]"
Gareth took me to the town so I could see the memorial. The drive from the center to Aramoana was a windy, narrow, 45 min drive. The town is so small that there are no local police, fire departments, or ambulance in the area. All emergency vehicles are dispatched from the center of Dunedin. there is only one way in and one way out of this town. Because of this, when the reports of the massacre went out to authorities, it took the police and ambulance 45 mins to arrive. I was also told that the police around here dont carry guns so they had no idea how to handle the situation. This is why so many people were killed. Today, police still dont carry guns. They only carry Tasers. But since this massacre occured, The government has made it nearly impossible for anyone to buy a gun.
After Aramoana, we went into town, to tent city, to watch the All Blacks play at one of the bars. I dont know much about Rugby so I was kind of bored watching it. So I drank...and drank...and....
Last night, Tuesday, Gareth took me to the stadium to watch the semi-pro rugby team play. Once again I was bored. I expected an experience like that of Fenway...Lots of excitement, entertainment, and energy. Nope!! Rugby fans are intense. They go to the game to actually watch the game. Unlike me, I go to Fenway to drink my face off. So not only did I freeze my ass off in this semi-enclosed stadium but I was sober as well. Not a good time. I am hoping that the more I watch Rugby, the more I will understand the game and the more I will enjoy it. When I first started watching American Football I didn't like it, mainly because I didn't understand the game. Now, I love it! I will report back on the rugby topic in a few months :)
