CHRISTCHURCH

Christchurch is one of our last stops in New Zealand. We arrive in pouring rain, run into a tourist information center (i-site) and shelter in a Robert Harris. They have the best coffee and it's on sale today!
We spend 2 nights with Sally and Chendran. Sally warns us over the phone: 'we just moved to a new house in the center of the city and we are still very busy giving it the last finish', but that does not show once we enter the state-of-the-art house.
Their house is amazingly well decorated and loaded with flatscreen tv's and home cinema systems. Sally and Chendran are invited the first evening to have dinner at a friends place. They just moved in and are having a party for friends. We join them and meet 15 or so nice people, a lot of them having or Indian or Maleisian roots. One couple actually used to live for a couple of years in Spain: Ampuriabrava. Is that in Spain?
Next day is beautiful weather in Christchurch. We go out and visit most of the touristic hot spots in the city, as well as a tiny little corner where some artwork of Sallys' is shown to the public. In the evening we have a nice family dinner outside in the garden. Chendran has made a delicious curry, Sally is serving the wine, and we get to meet 3 of their 4 children. After dinner we play '500', a very intense cardgame. My partner is Sally. She wants to play for money. I was so lucky I could convince her not to: we lost all games.