From left to right: Marco, Christa, myself, and Dan. As this was an international student function, Hayley is not pictured. I swear we are not always this goofy-looking.

Now that I’ve given you a taste of who I am, I’ve got to introduce you to the supporting cast here in Aotearoa (“Land of the Long White Cloud,” the term for New Zealand in the language of the indigenous people, the Māori). I live in a university-owned flat with four other characters on the shortest street constructed by humans. First there’s Hayley, the only Kiwi (New Zealander), a graduate student in Microbiology. She’s pretty chill, in the true style of New Zealand, but she has a wicked cynical streak, which is hilarious when watching movies of all kinds. Ironically enough, she has also taken on the role of Resident Mother Hen, making sure that we’re all right She’s from Southland, and for those of you unfamiliar with New Zealand, that means she’s a southern country girl, with a “southern accent” to match. I’m getting better at separating her accent from the rest of the country’s. Random fact: Girl’s a terrible procrastinator. She picked us at the very last possible minute, from a group of ten (ten American males of course, apparently the least desirable demographic), when thousands of international students come to Otago every year.

Then there’s Marco, an American from Manhattan who attends Amherst stateside. A stereotypical American in many regards, Marco is charismatic and boisterous, loves having a good time, and is most definitely your guy if you want to party, or play cards. He’s a man of action, and often makes the decisions, saving the rest of us from that endless vortex of “I don’t really care; what do you wanna do?” Random fact: Marco will spend hours on end organizing his iTunes, classes forgotten, making sure every field is filled in. He’s currently working on assigning a rating to every one of his 2800+ songs.

Next comes Christa, from Leipzig, Germany. She’s here to improve her English, though it ain’t half bad at this stage. She’s the social one, and is absent from the flat many a night, hanging out with these people, or that party. Christa gets the bulk of the phone calls and mail, which have earned her the title, “Most Loved Flatmate.” Like me, she’s having difficulty adjusting to the temperature, though that hasn’t stopped her from going on some wild journey nearly every weekend. Random fact: Hayley actually never picked Christa as a flatmate. She just kinda turned up one day, to the surprise of all. She’s signed a contract, so she’s legit now. We think.

Finally, there’s Dan, a student from Pittsburgh who attends Williams College. Poor guy went speed dating his first week here, and he still hasn’t heard the end of it, as Hayley takes great delight in introducing him as “Dan the Speed Dater” at every single opportunity. That’s called Schadenfreude, boys and girls, and is the word of the day. But Dan is the glue of our flat; he’s the hilarious, nerdy guy who’s not ashamed to get up and dance when the music moves him. Or at least, attempt to dance. Most of our laughs come courtesy of witty verbal exchanges between him and Hayley. Random fact: Dan is obsessed with really terrible, low-budget films. He was actually disappointed when he accidentally rented Leprechaun 2, because it was supposed to be better than his intended pick, the first Leprechaun movie. To make up for this, we’ve just rented Slaughter High.

Oh yes, and there’s Hal, our basil plant that is slowly dying despite our concerted efforts to keep him alive long enough to eat him.

And where do I fit in? I’m the guy who prefers not to have lasagne residue on the pan he’s about to bake brownies in. The flatmates call it OCD, I call it hygienic. I’ve somehow built a reputation for having some grooves on the dance floor, which I will neither confirm nor deny. But mainly, I’m the nice guy, somewhat “token” because I’m a minority, and overall the normal one. You know, the guy that the TV show is always based around.

Or at least, I like to think so.