Dinner with the Kiwi housemates

Its the big build up to Christmas now and its just totally different over here. Apart from the fact that its scorching hot (some shops still have fake snow in their windows though) the streets in town aren't really decorated like they would be at home except for 1 shop which has a giant Santa outside it - complete with freaky winking eye and beckoning finger. He's known locally as Pervy Ol' Santa!

There just isn't the same atmosphere at all with most people just looking forward to 2 weeks off in the sunshine instead of the big day itself. So to ensure that we aren't missing out on our festivities we have the house decorated to the max with bits of tinsel and baubles everywhere.

We had a really nice dinner with the other guys in the house and it really started to feel Christmassy then. Had a big roast chicken and just sat around chatting with the crappy Christmas CD on in the background. We'd been saying to Ben and Candice that we really missed the idea of sitting in front of the fire on Christmas night (none of the houses in Auckland have heating because its so hot), so just before dinner Ben produced a little cardboard fireplace for us. He'd made it and painted it and glued in twigs and sticks for us to make us feel at home for Christmas - so nice. You can see the fireplace in the picture!

Also this week we both got confirmation that we're starting new jobs on the 9th of January and we're both delighted because they're ones that we really wanted.