One of our days off in Wellinton
Wow! It has been too long since I’ve written. I work so much that making time for much else has been impossible. In fact now we are approaching the end of our journey and travels outside of the US. We still have a couple months left, but it seems like it isn’t too far away and my thoughts are already on what we will do when we get home.
Once filming began our schedules intensified greatly. For the past seven weeks we’ve been working from 5 to 5:30 am until some time in the late afternoon. We alternate six and five day work weeks meaning we work every other Saturday. It is a full day of work with no downtime other than the few minutes we take to eat breakfast and the half an hour we all plop down for lunch. With movie catering there is no way to know when exactly everyone is going to eat or if they may all come at once. This makes figuring out timing and quantities some sort of mystical magic that I cannot wrap my head around. Some days we go through impossible amounts of food while others we have a bunch left over.
We feed the people of The Hobbit breakfast and lunch which means a lot of setting up, topping up, and cleaning / moving things around which encompasses most of what I do. I help with some of the chopping and prep as well, but not nearly to the degree of most of my co-workers. We all work really hard and are, rightfully, exhausted. That being said it’s amazing to see the actors dressed in costume and see the bits and pieces of artwork and preparations around and about. You really feel like you are a part of the whole thing. I know I won’t be able to believe it myself when I see all these people on the big screen.
Doing the dishes! It takes a lot to feed 400 people
I’ve met some amazing people at work many of whom I’ve been a fan of for years. This includes Sir Ian Mckellen, Martin Freeman, Hugo Weaving, Andy Serkis and the list goes on. What amazes me is how incredibly nice they all are. Each person has been impressively warm and friendly to everyone they encounter. They eat the catered food with everyone else and are thankful at the end of every meal. I never would imagine celebrities to be like this, but maybe I’m just working on an especially great film. It certainly makes me feel lucky to have landed this opportunity.
Outside of work we haven’t managed to do very much. After I wrote my last blog my friend, Nikki, visited us for a week. It was a fantastic way to celebrate Wellington before diving into filming. Since then we’ve mostly just tried to get enough sleep and relax on the weekend. Two weeks ago we celebrated Zach’s 30th birthday. We had a party at Tommy’s house with an impressive spread of food made by Zach, Tommy, and some friends. It included slow roasted pork, steam buns, kimchi and accoutrements. I would’ve love some leftovers, but unfortunately the table broke and Tommy now has a kimchi scented kitchen. For those of you who don’t know kimchi is fermented cabbage. Luckily the disaster happened after everyone had eaten. It was a fun night overall and a nice break in the middle of filming – we had a four day weekend for Easter that week.
Zach's birthday feast
In two weeks we will be moving in with Tommy where we will live until we fly home July 10th. Tommy’s brother is temporarily moving overseas to do his med school externship so Tommy needed a housemate and we liked the idea of spending less on rent and bills, plus we get to see more of our friend before we leave! Filming is scheduled to end on June 4th; however, things in the film business can change at any time. Still, I’m assuming the job will end in four weeks, which means we will be looking for more work to get us through our last five weeks in Wellington. We aren’t stressing too much about it yet. If Billie needs our help with any other catering jobs we will be happy to work for her, but otherwise are hoping to fill in work with temp jobs and / or working for friends if they need help. I’m hoping to work less than I am now so we can get out and enjoy the city a little more. It continues to be an amazing place full of interesting nooks and crannies.
More than anything I admit we’re excited to get home. This is the longest I’ve been away from the states and we’re both missing the many conveniences that we are spoiled by back home. We miss friends and family more than I can even describe! For that reason we’re planning to spend a bit of time with several family members after we get back to San Francisco. It will be time for us to think long and hard about how we want our future to look and where we see ourselves living. I still would like to not live in a city, but that may not be an option for a while. We will see. It’s all very big, but exciting. I will be sure to write again before returning hopefully with some more real stories about work and life in Wellington. I hope everyone is well and has a great mother’s day.
Lots more pictures on Facebook - click the links on the right.
