Rugby World Cup 2011 in New Zealand; First Stop Wellington!

The flight to Auckland was reasonable and I managed to make my connection albeit (my favourite word) sitting in Auckland domestic departures that was about as exciting as an aids testing clinic and as no frills as ryanair when they decided engines were too expensive and reverted back to pedal power. I sat next to an ex-player on the flight of the golden generation and for the life of me can't remember who it was(* After Wales won the grand slam in 2012 the same player was on the Scrum V special celebrating the win, and it turned out to be Phil Bennett). I bought a phone and visited the Welsh Dragon, a welsh bar that had been converted from a public toilet. I hit my hostel bar but as it was a cockfest and blowing a cold gale outside I called it an early one and tried to get some much needed sleep. The only thing between me and sleep was the police sirens, wind rattled windows and the Korean kid in the corner watching soft core porn with no headphones in. To my utter dismay more Koreans filtered into the room and although I was clearly trying to sleep, they talked loudly on the phone, used a hairdryer, although there are extensions for that in the bathroom, and kept making those jokes to which they have a long high pitched laugh, it was ok if they were staying tomorrow, on opening ceremony night, i was going to repay the favour (unfortunately they bailed the next day).

I woke after a thirteen hour sleep to the first day of the rugby world cup and the reason for my overall trip. I went to the Te Papa museum, too early so went to collect my Wales Vs South Africa tickets at the stadium, wrong place. By this stage I was getting frustrated and when I retried the Te Pap I was too pissed off to stay and eventually found my tickets at an art exhibit of all places. I then bought a camera to replace mine that broke on day two of Fiji and went people watching. I tried to formulate a plot before I end up in jail or shot, success is my only MF’ing option, failures not.......to get out of Wellington on Monday but bit the bullet after trying to be clever and booked a twelve hour bus to matamata. I had a few pitchers with some Saffers in the basement bar where I heard the phrase ‘sneak a sunrise past a rooster’. I then went down to Wellington harbour to the fan zone and watched the opening ceremony. I also saw a woman with a Wales hat doing some filming so went over and turns out she was on S4C and tried to interview me, I gave a terrible interview in broken drunk welsh and then hit on her, but she was having none of it. I met Adan, a team mate from home and watched the first half of the rugby in the cold before heading with the boys to the warmth of a bar for the second half.

We met some Kiwi girls and after dancing with them for a while the boys bailed and I ended up going bar hopping for a few hours and I ended up going home with Hazel, a student from Hawkes Bay.

My main aim of the morning was to keep the walk of shame as interact less as possible but I was about as subtle as a member of the G8 riot police. I immediately bumped into a housemate, said my good mornings and ducked out for the comfort of my own bed. I spent the afternoon in various drinking establishments watching the underdogs come so close. Romania with a bit more game knowledge would have beaten Scotland, Namibia put on a spirited display against Fiji, Japan held France for so long and the England game was a boring waste of time. I however took Hazel out to watch the game and have some food and then we went for a drink and subsequently back to hers.

Sunday 11^th September 2011; Match day!  A years’ worth of planning, trekking mountains, crossing oceans and pissing off locals has brought me to this the 2011 rugby world cup for Wales versus South Africa in Wellington, the big one. I spent the morning packing for my 8am, twelve hour bus the next day as I was sure I would be in no state to do this after the rugby or in the morning. I then spent the rest of the morning getting pumped on the build up, great rugby speeches on youtube and left at lunch actually believing we could win.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V6xLYt265ZM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRgeIhaFi44

It was a mild and drizzly day in Wellington and I popped into the Welsh Dragon for a cheeky pint.

I feel that being Welsh is a state of mind as well as an identity;
We dare to dream where others subdue themselves with doubt.
We dare to believe when all hope seems lost
And we dare to come together to back our fifteen men in red take on any force large or small, with the pride and passion of our nation.
We dare!

I went with Dara and Colin, two Irish lads I had acquired, to Molly Malones for food and met Paramedic Steve to watch Ireland put on a poor display and win against a very spirited USA team. We made the walk to the stadium and parted farewell with Steve as neither of us intended to go out for more than a pint after and it would be pretty difficult to find each other as Steve was phoneless. The game, as I’m sure you know, turned out to be a classic combining good running rugby through Jamie Roberts and Toby Faletau, through great line out play by (can’t believe I’m saying this) Luke Charteris to a solid defence (in most part) with key big hitters being Sam Warburton and Dan Lydiate. Wales will regret missing some chances including Priestlands attempted drop goal 15 yards out in front of the posts and some other handling errors with the try line in sight. And if Wayne ‘dickhead’ Barnes had gone to the TMO over Hooks second penalty it might have given Wales a cushion when they were 16-10 up but it wasn’t to be, and in that case I wouldn’t be writing this I would have drunk myself into the obituaries in celebration.

 I sat a block over from Nick, the Saffer I had met in Fiji and we went on a good bantered pub crawl with Caz, whom I also met in Fiji, Caz’s brother and some of their friends.

In Molly Malones, we discovered how drunk Nick was, as he ordered five plates of chips and as there was nowhere to sit filled up the bar with the most welcome snack.

We moved on to Mish Mash and after a couple of beers were joined by Jamie Roberts, Bradley Davies, Mike Philips, Powelly and Priestland. On dropping my brother’s name to Bradley (who roomed with him in the Wales U-19’s in Italy) I initiated convo and got into their group. I also ended up in several group photos with the boys as Jamie insisted I be in the photo as Nick’s brother.

Jamie sent my dad his best (as always) and we had a chat about the controversy of the penalty ‘miss’. Jamie told me that the match ref Wayne Barnes was there and I caught him up to chat about the incident. I asked Mr Barnes, who insisted I call him Wayne (twat), what he thought and he blamed the kiwi linesman and sent me over for a chat.

Managed to get a picture with dickhead Barnes before baiting him to breaking point

After a quick chat with the lino and TMO over a pint we agreed three things:-
1 Wayne Barnes swears alot
2 I swear more
3 Wayne Barnes is a dickhead and got it wrong

I pulled all my saffer mates over and insisted on introducing them and that they should be friends as he had gifted them the game. I then got some welsh fans also to try and taunt him but as Dickhead Barnes was surprisingly charming they surcame to him and bought him shots. To which I decided I needed to go into overdrive until I managed to get the scourge of world rugby, senior dickhead to ask the bar staff to have me ejected. Great success and time to call it a night.

I woke to the same to the same world, we didn’t change anything, the sun still rose, the wind still blew and the birds still sang. What we did is show world rugby that we will fight for every inch. It was a wet walk to the bus stop and I slept most of the way to Hamilton, and with the exception of a Maori argument in the bus stop it was massively uneventful. I got to Matamata and had a chat over dinner with superb hosts, Neil and Linda Brown, old family friends. I also found out on twitter that Jamie endorsed my Wayne Barnes antics before crashing for the night.