Food Review: Better Burger

Cuisine: Burgers

Price: $14.50 for burger, fries and milkshake

Location: 31 Galway Street, Britomart, Auckland
Website: http://www.britomart.org/better-burger

Better Burger is a newly opened premium burger joint in Auckland’s CBD. After a cold, wet and windy Tuesday morning I checked it out. The seating was open air which, while great in more pleasant weather, was noticeably chilly on this particular day. Thankfully they had flame heaters, which provided some warm. Better Burger’s menu is extremely simple, with beef or vegetarian burgers, fries, soda and milkshakes on offer. I ordered the double cheeseburger, with fries and strawberry milkshake, and an additional vegetable burger. The staff were extremely friendly and happy to explain their philosophy behind the eatery. All of the produce is carefully picked, and cooked with care. For instance the buns contain honey, as opposed to sugar, for a fuller flavour. 

Much like the menu, the presentation of the food was simple but clean. I couldn't wait to get stuck in! The beef patties were thick and perfectly seasoned, the vegetables crisp and the rich cheese adding to every bite. Each mouthful was juicy, delicious and morish. The doubled fried fries were fantastically crispy, while still retaining a light and fluffy centre. To top off this delightful meal was the strawberry milkshake. Thick and luscious, it was like drinking ice cream. Heaven! The vegetarian burger featured a fried Portobello mushroom, which had a fantastic savoury flavour. 

Better Burgers concise menu doesn't provide a lot of choice. However what they do serve is incredibly delicious and good value. The beef burgers are cooked to perfection and the fries are crispy pieces of heaven. I will absolutely be back for more.

8/10

Just Dance

I remember back when I was in Glasgow, hanging out at a bar and being handed a flier for salsa classes. I used to find dancing an uncomfortable and awkward experience, in clubs I would simply head bop. Here was an opportunity to test the limits of my comfort, try something new and get better at dancing. That's how I ended up at my first salsa class.

I felt very uncomfortable in my first lesson, with me being so reserved at the time. Touching girls was a bit weird, the moves were hard and I felt like I was being judged. Despite this, after the first class I realised I was hooked. Dancing was surprisingly fun! So I went back, and even took lessons twice a week. After a few months I was somewhat competent at salsa and would enjoy myself immensely. Part of the charm was undoubtedly talking to the girls, many of whom were cute. I also found that salsa would dispel a sour mood and leave me over flowing with positive energy. If you had told me that I would enjoy, and become an okay salsa dancer, I would have thought you crazy. Salsa also helped me to become less self concious, to the point I really started to enjoy dancing in clubs. Then things changed. I graduated, left Glasgow and didn't continue with salsa in Singapore. Now, more than a year later, I started salsa in New Zealand.

There are several options in the city but calling out to me was a Latin American dancing school, literally, opposite home. So I signed up for a class and went for the first time last week.

I forgot how fucking amazing dancing is.

It felt like I rediscovered something I had lost. I was actually terrible at the dancing since the class was teaching LA salsa (as opposed to Cuban which I learnt in Glasgow), but it didn't matter. Even when I was screwing up the moves I still had a great time and was so happy for hours afterwards. I'm definitely going to make salsa part of my life. I just need to find the right school now!

I'll Be There For You, When The Rain Starts To Pour

I've only been in New Zealand a short while, but I can say I've been very lucky in one regard; the amount of friends I've made. Perhaps it's because I've done my best to be proactive and friendly, I always try to be a genuine person, but in a way I've been taken by surprise in how fortunate I am. So far I've made enough friends that I could see one a day, or even groups, and still not have time enough for all of them. More importantly these are all people I sincerely like and enjoy spending time with. Sadly some of them will be leaving the country soon, but I still feel blessed for these relationships.

A Rolling Stone Gathers No Moss

Being unemployed sucks. It’s been around two months now and I'm starting to feel the unpleasantness. I arrived in New Zealand in January, travelled until April, found a place to stay and I've been looking for work since. The first couple of months were fine. Many a time I was bored, but I somewhat enjoyed the freedom and time. Unlimited video games and movies? Yes please. Now things have changed.

The lack of day to day goals, challenges, team work and the feeling that you are contributing nothing of value to society is straining. Over the last few days I've felt afflicted by a feeling of malaise. To combat these feelings I'm pushing myself to keep occupied and challenged in the following ways:

• Get out of the house every morning/afternoon, if only for a walk
• Get out of the house during the evening
• Socialise with existing friends
• Embrace any opportunity to get out of the house and meet new people
• Write blog posts more frequently to give me a sense of achievement and progression
• Take up a sport or activity

For instance today my schedule looked like this:

• Do laundry
• Apply for jobs
• Plan activities during the week
• Arrange with friends to hang out
• Go for a walk and get a snack and shopping supplies
• Hang out with friends during the evening for an arts exhibition
• Go to a bar to meet other friends

I still have far too much down time, but it’s keeping me sane just now. I’m afraid that if I stop, I will die.

Food Review: Giapo

Cuisine: Ice cream

Price: $9.50 for a single scoop cone

Location: 279 Queen's Street, Auckland CBD, Auckland
Website: http://giapo.com/

Giapo specialises in one thing and one thing only; ice cream (well, sorbets as well). Located conveniently on Queens Street, it's a must try if you are in the city centre. Giapo's compact premises have minimal seating so be prepared to take your ice cream for a walk. This is perhaps the only mar on an otherwise fantastic experience.

Giapo's June menu 

There are over a dozen choices of flavour, some of which change every few weeks. Each is lovingly crafted by the staff, who decorate the ice cream with creative toppings like blow torch melted marshmallow. Prices are extremely reasonable with double scoop cones under $10. You can also try deluxe cones, with one covered in white chocolate, which are worth trying for the novelty.
I've been to Giapo a couple of times now and eaten several flavours such as avocado, tiramisu and chocolate evolution.

State Of Flux

Today was a weird day. I woke up at 4 am, for some indeterminable reason my sleeping cycle has gone to shit. I'll go to sleep at the usual time, between 10 pm to 12 am, and wake up at 4 am. This has never happened before, but okay, I can deal with it by napping. So I stayed awake until around 10 am, took about 45 minutes to nap, then went out to meet friends for lunch.

I met them and hanging out I felt a degree of awkwardness, or to put it more precisely; I felt disconnected from them. I don't know if it was in my head or it was due to the fact that the three of them know each other well, yet I've only met them recently. Either way the feeling of disconnect persisted and I wasn't as outgoing as I usually am. I did notice feeling especially full after eating lunch, and then sick after a combination of hot rock melon milk tea with lychee jelly and cookies. After spending a good six hours hanging out with them, I rushed home hoping to join some dancing classes. I've finally decided to take up partner dancing classes such as salsa, bachata and ballroom which are offered by a school opposite my flat. Yet I found that the school is closed the rest of the week, argh! So suffering defeat, I hung out at home for a bit before heading to meet friends at a bar.

There, yet again, I ran into trouble. That disconnect was there, worse than before, and my interactions were very mechanical and forced. People didn't react well to my presence and conversation would die. I started to feel shit. My energy and passion weren't there. Then over an hour after arriving, around the time I wanted to leave and go home, my energy returned. Suddenly I was lively, talkative and enjoying myself. I noticed people responding and enjoying my company a lot more. But I have to ask myself; why?

Why was my social interactions stunted for most of the day? Why did I feel disconnected and mechanical? Why did it suddenly change so late in the day? Was it because I was tired from my fucked up sleeping? Was it because I felt queasy from what I ate? I don't know. Its worrying that my social skills can fluctuate so much.

I hope this doesn't happen again.

No Touching!

One thing I learned while at uni was to introduce more physical touching with friends. Prior to that I would only physically interact with my family, play fighting, hugging, high fiving etc. I struggled to translate that physical closeness to outside my family. At uni I started to change and incorporate more physical contact with people. A simple, but important part of that was greetings. Shake hands with guy friends, hug female friends. Pats and high fives also work. It's something I've always tried to incorporate since then, to physical greet those I care about.

Recently however, I've found myself greeting people insincerely. I've met several girls through Couch Surfing who expect you to hug them, even if they have displayed no interest in talking to you. I've met guys who did the same. At first I played along with it, to fit in with the social veneer; 'Wow, look at me, I'm so friendly and open just like the rest of you!'. But no more.

When I hug a girl, or shake your hand I mean it as a sincere gesture. It means I like you and your company, that I consider you a friend. However if you are somebody that clearly has no interest in being my friend, or talking to me, why the fuck would I sully and degrade my own standards? Bugger you and your attempts to appear friendly. So from now on, if I don't like you, then no physical greeting, you'll get a "Hey" and that's it.