Back in the States...

Being back has been... pretty much exactly as I predicted it would be.

It's such an odd mixture of emotions.

There are certainly things I am happy to return to--family and friends for one. And not having to "top up" my phone credit every month and having to worry about who has Telecom and who has Vodafone. Faster internet has been good (especially for skyping, and recently, Oovooing...)

But there are plenty of things I miss about New Zealand.

I miss my friends and Waiteata. I miss VUW. I even miss the ridiculous hills to an extent. I miss the scenery, of course. I miss the tramping trips. I miss the bird-chirp sound that happens when the street signs tell us its okay to walk. I miss Cuba Street. I miss JJ Murphy, Mighty Mighty, Good Luck. I miss Temperance Bar's Tuesday night jazz jam sessions. I miss the Varsity Singers. I miss the Street and my Traction group there. I miss hokey pokey and Tim Tams. I miss Cadbury's Coconut Rough chocolate. I miss group dinners. I miss the bazillion cafes that are always open and always around. I miss midnight kebabs. I miss music jam sessions in Te Puni with Andy, Nacho, Lenny, and Bryce. I miss Thursday night poker. I miss being the one with the accent! I miss Tui.

Being home is difficult. There's no sugar coating or getting around that fact. Reverse culture-shock is intense. But each day it gets a little easier. I'm starting to hang out with and talk to people. And I'm very lucky to have such a great support system.

Also:

It snowed today in CO... maybe we'll have a white Christmas!

It's been the first time all winter that I've felt like its Christmas-time. Merry Christmas everyone.

There's snow in this photo, even though you can't see....

Samoa

One week in paradise! We decided there would be minimal planning-we literally just woke up every day and they decided what to do. Talk about relaxed! So it seems only appropriate that that's how I present my blog post!

Dec 7--After 3 really awesome days in Wellington, Liz and I were reunited and joined by Graham for our final week of awesomeness in the Pacific. We arrived at the airport on Upolu (Samoa is two islands called Upolu and Savaii) in the evening and took a taxi to the Princess Tui Inn. When we arrived we were told we had been given an updated room because they had given our original room away and we didn't have to pay anything extra. Win!

Dec 8--We woke up early, had a fruit and toast breakfast, and planned our trip to Savaii. We wanted to catch the 4 pm ferry to the other island which gave us the rest of the day to do what we wanted on Upolu. So we decided that we'd go see the Robert Louis Stevenson museum/homestead. For those who cannot place who he is he is the author of books like Jekyll and Hyde and Treasure Island. He owned a really beautiful home in Samoa and is actually buried at the top of the mountain right by his home. We took the museum tour, and with time to spare, we decided we'd hike the 45 minutes to his grave. What we were NOT prepared for was how much of a hike it really was!! Liz and I were in sun dresses and all three of us were wearing flip-flops (or "jandals"). It was... interesting. Ha! It was really beautiful, but with the heat, humidity, and NO WIND... well.. let's just say it's a good thing none of us were trying to impress anyone! The view from the top was awesome and the grave itself had a lot of cool engravings and poems written by Stevenson himself. 

Then we took the ferry to Savaii, and once there we took a taxi to the Regina Beach Fales in Manase. The beach was literally 4 footsteps outside our fale (pronounced fah-lay). For those who don't know-they are little huts that are made of a floor, columns, and a roof. There are "curtains" that can cover the whole open sides... but usually its just one with nature. We got mattresses and mosquito nets and I fell asleep to the sound of crashing waves. :D We met up with our friend Mike (who we had also met in Sydney) and his friend Nathan. They were staying at Regina's as well. YAY reunion!

Dec 9--We all woke early for breakfast and then spent the morning snorkeling around! 

After lunch and showers, I witnessed the other 4 partake in Kava. It is a "mud drink" made from a root and is actually a mild narcotic. The chief of the village happened to be the owner of Regina's and so he told us about it and held a little ceremony and told us that only special guests get to partake in Kava. I opted out of this as drinking a mild narcotic kind of scared me! But according to the others, it was weak and the most they felt was an odd numbing in the throat for a few minutes. 

Dec 10--Mike and Nathan left to go to Upolu and it was just Graham, Liz, and I. It rained most of the morning so we spent the morning just reading in our fale. Then we headed out to swim with sea turtles.. which sounds cooler than it actually was. Actually.. it was kind of dodgy. It was 5 tala (their currency) and you just kind of went into this pool where there are a lot of sea turtles in captivity. Graham and I got in and then went.. "ok.. now what?" ha! It was cool, but definitely not as cool as it sounds.

 Then we took a little walk to the lava fields. An eruptions left fields of black lava that is now a pretty touristy place. There is a really cool church that was destroyed and the lava flowed through the windows and dried in the church. It looked awesome.

 And then there's the Virgin's Grave... a woman was buried there by the church. When the eruption happened, the lava flowed AROUND the grave for some reason. Its completely untouched. Very cool! It was very hot, so we took a taxi back to the resort and then took nice, cold showers. 

Dec 11--We woke up early to catch the early bus to the wharf. The public transportation is awesome in Samoa. The buses are brightly decorated and colored, the music is blasting, and the buses are always full. As we got on, people moved around so we could have a place to sit.. it was very nice! 

At the wharf we took a taxi to the waterfalls where there is fresh water and a little lake to swim around in. We climbed up about 30 feet or so and jumped off into the water! Cliff diving--item #26 on the Bucket List crossed off! It was FUN! And the water was SO nice. We met a couple guys from the States there: Dan from Hawaii and Fortino from LA. They are traveling together for a travel company, trying to come up with the best packages for tourists--basically they are paid to vacation. They were really cool and we ended up getting drinks with them at the end of the day. We ran into them again at the blowholes. They are these holes in the rocks over the ocean and the waves are so intense that when they crash, they go up into this cavities and water sprays everywhere! It was awesome. We were throwing coconuts into the holes and watching them come back up! 

Dec 12--We spent our last night at Regina's on the 11th. We spent all this day traveling back to Upolu and got a room at Valentine's Motel. We lounged around all day lazy from traveling and frankly feeling the humidity and heat too much! All 3 of us were pretty Paradise-d out! But that night we went to the Aggie Grey's Lagoon Resort.. one of those nice, 4 star kind of places. Mike and Nathan were staying there (from a packaged deal) and so was Dan and Fortino. So we all met up, had a buffet dinner, and then watched a Fiafia.. a fire dance! Very cool.

 It was also the first meal we'd had where nothing was fried.... finally some real, healthy foods! Then we sat around and talked and hung out till about 10:30. Then Liz, Graham, and I went back to Valentine's. 

Dec 13--We spent a lot of time at the flea market souvenir shopping and doing some last minute Christmas shopping. :) We ran into Mike and Nathan and then headed to the Sliding Rocks. They are SO cool! A series of mini waterfalls with tons of pools of water and it is quite literally a natural waterpark. The rocks are smoothed out by the water and helped by the moss growing on them. So its not painful to slide down them! Liz and I noticed that we were both concerned with safety and whatnot and that the locals were simply there to have a good time and didn't think about it. Interesting cultural observation. At one point, I was hesitating to slide down and so Liz said she'd go first. I scooted over to let her through, but in the process started sliding and didn't have anything to grab onto. So I slid down the wrong part and ended up sliding further than I was supposed to on rocks where there was no water! My butt hurt and I'm pretty sure I actually bruised it. Ha! The locals thought it was hilarious. As did I... it was really funny. haha! We had pizza for dinner and then packed!

Dec 14--Our flight out wasn't till 11:59 pm. This gave us the whole day to do nothing. So we spent the entire day at Aggie Grey's Lagoon once more. We swam around in their pool, read in the shade, made use of their pool bar (you sit IN the pool!) 

and the beach. At around 2, Graham took us sailing. He had been sailing pretty much his whole life and was teaching us a bunch of stuff! It was really fun!! Then we came back, had lunch, and read the rest of the day. Liz and I found a nice little beach on which to relax on till the end of the day. 

We took showers, packed, and then were off to the airport around 8:30 where we waited for our flight. 

And thus Samoa came to an end. We were all, quite frankly, ready to leave. You can only spend so much time in THAT much heat and humidity. The vacation was fantastic... but never could I live there! But for the time we were there.. well, it was fantastic. 

MASSIVE UPDATE

Wow!!!!! 
So being without internet means theres a lot of stuff I get to update all of you on! (all 2 of you who read my blog...lol)

Gah! Where to start??

Well WWOOFing is over. That part of the journey has been completed. We were with two people, Tania and Howard Edmunds who are seriously some of the coolest people I've ever met in my life.

They lived abroad in South Africa (woo!) for 5 years, and Howard was born in Kenya, moved to England, then to Australia. And has been on his property for over 40 years now. He actually lives in the house he grew up in!

Anywho they own an opera company and I was able to get a professional voice lesson while I was there (oof, my voice is OUT OF SHAPE). We did a lot of weeding in the garden, getting rid of rubbish and fallen leaves, etc. Really easy work. And we did our share of cooking and cleaning as well. They had a spa that they insisted we use often. (and it was).

They took us to a dinner theater where Liz and I got to dress up too! Yay black and red cocktail dress! 

They also took us down to Surfer's Paradise a couple times where I surfed for the first time in my life!! And I was actually able to stand up!

We also spend two nights in Byron Bay. TOTAL hippie town--but not in an obnoxious way. In a way that makes you feel cool to just be there. We met tons of really awesome people and went to some cool clubs and walked the beach at night and fried on the beach during the day! We picked a bad time... during "Schoolies." Apparently in Australia the seniors who graduated all take a week off to just party and drink and be stupid... which as you can imagine can get.. sloppy. These kids dont know their limits or how to be smart. So it gets to be a bit crazy. Luckily Liz and I were able to avoid Schoolies most of the time.

At our hostel we met a ton of different new people from all over! 

We even played some Hold 'Em... and I won. The boys at Waiteata would have been proud of me. :) WOOOOO! (i wish money had been involved...lol). 

I also got to hang out with my old flatmate Andy in Brisbane!! We spent an entire day together and it was awesome-sauce. :) Anyways, now I'm in Waiteata sitting with my friend Hoiran and enjoying my time in Wellington. :D 

Melbourne, Colac, Brisbane, Mt. Tamborine--AUSTRALIA!

Well I've been in Australia for 3 weeks now officially.
Part of me feels like time has flown by really fast. The other part feels like I've been here for months.

After Sydney Liz and I caught a train to Melbourne. It was overnight (12 hours) and we beat the system by sleeping on the train and therefor not having to pay for a hostel for the night. WIN! Liz's bag was overweight so she had to check another one.. but she didn't have a spare one so she placed like 7 kilos of stuff (about 15 pounds) into a trash bag and used it as a carry on. SO FUNNY!

Melbourne was a cute little town--definitely not as busy or hectic as Sydney and it was more.. calm? I enjoyed myself. We were picked up by Liz's friend Jess who lives in a little town outside Melbourne called Colac. They met at a horseback riding summer camp in Maine and have been friends ever since. And Jess said it was cool to stay with her for about a week. She and her boyfriend Daniel live together and have this cute little home with an overly loving cat (Bella) and two adorable little puppies (Chloe and Jock). 

We went out to the local pub where literally everyone knew everyone! We had dinner at her parents' home, went to her Pony Club (yes its actually called that) and I learned more about horses than I thought I'd ever learn! We also got to try Daniel's Didgeridoo... I actually laughed so hard I was crying at one point. Its hard!!

We flew out to Brisbane on the 18th and were picked up by our WWOOF hosts (we work on a farm for a few hours in exchange for free meals and accommodation. Its worldwide! Look into it!) Tania and Howard. They live in another tiny little mountain town up in North Tamborine. They have the most incredible home. They built it themselves and they have a separate room entirely for music! The best part, though, is their backyard. Its a little patio, and then it literally ends and the mountains, cliffs, and forest starts. As in, if I stepped off the patio, I would tumble down a cliff. Its the most incredible view to wake up to every morning. And I sit outside with a cup of coffee (a cuppa!) every morning and write whats on my heart. Its wonderful.

Howard used to be on the Olympic Eqquestrian team so he and Liz have been chatting a bit. And Tania is an opera singer and voice teacher... so she and I have quite a bit in common! It's insane that we would be such a good match with them! They've both led the most incredible lives and I've learned so much from them. I look forward to the next few weeks.

We;ve been gardening mostly. Nothing too hard, and no--not slavework (AJ!)

A few days ago we went to Surfer's Paradise Beach and took a surf lesson. That's off my bucket list now AND I stood up on a wave! Several times!
I am quite proud of myself and I honestly think having a snowboarding background helps!

I love it here. I'm having an awesome time.

I am sorry my blogs have been pretty picture-less. They don't have wireless internet here and it's hard to find time to go find an internet cafe or whatnot. I've uploaded a few albums since being in Australia and they can be found on my Picasa site.

Love u all!!

A real update--Aussiesss

There's no doubt about the fact that the Australian cities seem a little more.. Westernized? I mean New Zealand definitely has Western influences (yay for Europeans invading indigenous people for the millionth time!) but the Maori culture is definitely much more... integrated. I don't really know how else to explain it. There were times in Sydney when I felt like I was in a friendlier New York. Liz and I were in Sydney for 4 days and it was really awesome! 

We were staying in this super dodgy hostel.. and every time i walked in the door I started laughing to myself about how sketchy it was. It's part of the experience right? And it was only 3 nights.. still it was hilarious. We met some cool Irish girls and three German guys (SO MANY GERMANS IN THE PACIFIC!) And I learned that I haven't been saying some phrases right. I usually say, "Ich spreche Deutsch fuer drei Jahre im Gymnasium"... and apparently, even though its understandable, I should be saying, "Ich spreche Deutsch for Zeit drei Jahre auf dem Gymnasium." O well. 

Anyways we met up with our friend Mike, also from Wellington. And we walked around the town, saw the Sydney Opera House (YAY!) and took a ferry to Manly Wharf. 

SOOO many jokes... like when some sign said "Manly Pharmacy"... it never got old. We met up with Liz's long lost cousin Andy (they hadn't seen each other in 4 years!) and the four of us watched this super awesome surfing competition on the beach. 

And then we played on the beach, before heading home. 

The next day we took a train ride up to the Blue Mountains. Anyone going to Australia should definitely do this. Its 2 hours out of Sydney and the mountains are incredible. 

The tramp definitely reminded me of New Zealand (*tear*) and we had a really awesome time just walking around and seeing everything. 

Our last day in Sydney was spent at the Botanical gardens, the Sydney Harbor Bridge, and Darling Harbor. It's been a pretty awesome trip so far. 

This morning we got into Melbourne. There's this awesome view of the city and everything from this super expensive spot. But our travel guide book told us that we could get the same view for free if we went to the bathroom on the 35th floor of this 5-star hotel. Guess what we did??? HAHA, it was SO funny. 

Anyways, off to dinner. We may be heading towards a Vampire Dinner Theater tonight. OOOOHhh. 

In honor of my German friends: Tschus! (i hope i spelled that right)

PS. I finally got my purple tree picture!! (see last blog)

Purple Trees

There are these trees that are covered with blooming purple flowers all over Sydney... and often they are in the midst of a sea of green. (the title makes more sense now doesn't it?)

Every time I see these trees I feel like there is a really cool picture to be taken of them... I just can't figure it out! It's actually quite frustrating. I know it's there. I can feel it.. I can almost smell it. There's a cool picture in there somewhere.. I just have to find out how to take it and from where.

I wish I could find just one purple tree amongst the many other green ones... maybe in the center of a circle of green trees. What would that symbolize? Perhaps the pressure to conform and the defiance to be different. ooh, i'm getting all Indie now.
But even then I don't know how I'd take this picture!!

Stupid purple trees.

I think that'll be my saying now, when things don't go the way I would like for them to.

Stupid purple trees.

Sydney

I am in Sydney now with my friend Liz.

Pictures to come!

...Final countdown?

Ha, I know half the people who just read the title of this blog are playing the song "Final Countdown" in their head.. and if you weren't and know the song, you are now!! (all I can ever think of is Job from Arrested Development). 

So here we are. November 1...(remember I'm in the future for most of you). Where has the time gone? I swear I feel like I arrived in Wellington, knowing no one and being excited about it yesterday. But that was July 7. A full 4 months ago. I have 3 days till my last final and 6 till I leave for Australia. 

I've been filling my last weeks with some exciting stuff! 

Last week I went with 5 friends to hike the Tongariro Passing... for those of you who don't know, it's where they filmed Mt. Doom. We took two cars and drove 6 or so hours (including rests, bathroom breaks, and filling up the tank) to the track. We arrived at 1 am to our first Department of Conservation (DOC) hut. We hiked about 30 minutes to the hut in the dark with head torches and stuff. The group consisted of Sampo and Miia from Finland, Jens from Denmark, Joanna and Lennart from Germany, and me.. I was positively non-European. haha. 

Anyways we woke up early the next day for breakfast and made lunch and started hiking around 9:30. Now this was an intense hike.. about a full 7 hour day. When we got to the mountain (Mount Doom), Miia and I decided we didn't want to go all the way up to the summit. There were clouds and I was already tired. So we went up halfway and turned back around while the other 4 continued to the top. Miia and I had time to just talk and bond and hang out while we headed towards the second hut, called Katetahi. One of the best things about NZ is the scenery. Yes, it's beautiful. But its really unique too. You can walk for two hours in a straight line and hit 18 different kinds of terrain! We were trecking through slushy ice and snow, and then forrest, and then rocks and sand, and then ice again, and so on. Where we were walking is a very volcanic area so we were walking through soft soil and minerals. There were even some geothermal pools of bright green and blue, not 1000 yards from another lake that was completely frozen over. I love New Zealand. 

Anyways Miia and I got to the hut first. It was rolling hills upon hills and lakes and mountains and cliffs.. and this tiny hut sitting by itself on a hill, facing all of this. It was incredible. The view was breathtaking. We were fortunate enough to have the entire hut to ourselves!! Most of the time, there are several groups of people trecking through and spending the night at the DOC huts. But we got really lucky. 

When we all got there, we took out our sleeping bags and pulled mattresses from indoors to sit on the porch, drink tea and coffee, and laugh and talk and enjoy the scenery. All of us were so ecstatic about the amazing day we had all had. To quote Lennart: "If there is an amazing sunset tonight... I don't know... my head's just going to explode!" 

That's how we felt. And there was an amazing sunset. Luckily, Lennart's head stayed in tact. But just barely... like the rest of us.. ha. 

We made dinner and were just having a really good time enjoying food and one another's company. An hour after the sun started setting, there were still streaks of orange and red and pink in the sky. I grabbed my sleeping bag and ran outside to catch the last of it. Lennart joined me. And then Joanna and Jens. Eventually the two of them left and we were joined by Miia. The three of us stargazed for a while before heading to bed. It was an incredible weekend. 

And yesterday I went to a beach!! It was really cold and windy, but surprisingly the water wasn't all too bad. And of course I jumped in.. I couldn't resist the water! My time here is coming to an end a little too quickly... but I'm glad for all these experiences and the great friends I've made here. :D 

SONG OF MANDELA!!!!

Sorry, this post has nothing to do with New Zealand. 

But this is us singing and dancing with Bokamoso from South Africa!!!! 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eEOW6q7tCvU

4:00 am Interviews...

I decided to apply to be a member of the 2010 Colonial Cabinet at GW this upcoming summer. 

Being abroad, though, has had its difficulties. The Headquarters have been very kind and helpful and set up a phone interview with me for 11:00 am Friday Eastern Time. This is 4:00 am Saturday NZ time... and I stayed up! When I hadn't heard from them by 4:10, I called them, assuming there had been difficulty getting through to me on my NZ phone. 

I was right. But then there seemed to be "technical difficulties" rising left and right on the other end of the world, and our wonderful interview was postponed to this week, also at 4 am... 

I must really want this job! 

So this Saturday I got to stay up till 4 am... AGAIN. But this time, as soon as it turned 4:05 and I hadn't heard from them, I called. They asked me like 5 or 6 questions. The entire interview was only like 20 minutes... I stayed up till 4 am for a 20 minute chat. 

I better get this job..

All Nighter

Anyone who knows me at GW knows that I pull all nighters... enough to where it has GOT to be unhealthy. I just pulled my first one here in NZ (and hopefully last!). 

My desk is cluttered with notes, notecards, a large glass of water, an entire french press of coffee, and various other things like pens and highlighters. In about 2 hours here I will be taking my last exam for my Psychology of Crime and Law course. And I think I'm pretty much as ready as I can be. 

Being on at ridiculous hours of the night enabled me to talk to Kevin online for a while which was awesome because I haven't talked to him in forever. And I did take study breaks to clear my mind in between chapters by watching episodes of Friends or listening to music or writing really, really, really ridiculous emails to everyone on my contacts list. (Kaia got the brunt of that, really). 

In about 3 hours, I hope to be in bed, fast asleep after having passed my exam! haha. 

But we'll see. I almost never nap when I pull all nighters. (again, aren't i just the epitome of health?)... ah college life. You gotta love it. 

If I'm delirious today, you all know why! 

Last week of school

ALREADY! 

I am in my last week of classes. Currently sitting in my last Policing class (THE most boring class I've ever taken). 

This week has been pretty darn good. Last night my friends Cassie, Robert, Daniel, Lenny and I went to the Temperance Bar for live jazz music. It was incredible and SO fantastic! We were there for a solid 3 hours just listening to people jam out and all of us being super jealous of their superior musical skills. 

I still marvel at how well some girls can skat. And I'm incredibly jealous. In my head I do it well, but when I actually try my syllable vocabulary is limited to "doo" "da" "do"... LAME. I wish I could sing jazz. My friend Rachel was there and she sang she is FANTASTIC. I want to be her. I mean seriously, as pretty as classical music is... anyone in their right mind would choose jazz over classical. (Unless you're a voice professor or choir director of course). 

Anyways Friday I have an exam worth 50% of my grade. No pressure. 

And then I'm done. We go into a few weeks of finals... and I have two. But my classes are done come Friday at 11:00 am. Weird. 

Time flies when you're having a good time, right? 

The next couple days/weeks will be filled with reminiscing I'm sure. 

Hold 'Em

Thursday night is poker night here in Waiteata. (the Housing Complex I've been living in.)

Some time around 8 or 9, people gather at Flat 7 to play a game of Hold 'Em. 

The last two weeks I've been getting in late and not feeling like buying in. So I'll walk in and deal the games. (Random fact about me: Used to want to be a poker dealer in Vegas. Caesar's Palace to be specific.) This week I decided to play. 

Each week the group of players has been growing. The first week had probably 7 or 8 people. Last week was about 10. And this week there were 13. We had to start with two tables and then join them together when there were only 7 people left. At my table was Mattie (from Finland), Hoiran (from Korea!), Giorgi (no idea where he's from...), David (from NY), and Lenny. 

David definitely was the best player at our table. But he was an honorable player and was more than happy to help out those who were new to the game. David, Hoiran, and I moved onto the bigger table after knocking out the other 3 people at our table. 

At the big table there were 7 of us from the original 13. I made it to 4th place before I was knocked out on an all-in. Given I had crappy cards.. I think a  4 and 7 of diamonds. (FLUSH?!) But the guy I was playing against had two Aces... GAH! That was the third or fourth time that night I got totally screwed over (the other times ALL by David). 

BUT, I had a lot of fun and am quite proud of myself for making it to the last 4 out of 13 people. :) 

Dear New Zealand

I have several requests of you. 

First, please change your weather. No one likes mundane, routine things. So please change it up. It has been rainy, cloudy, and all around depressing for over a week. I am bored. And depressed. 

Second, please kidnap me. Hide me away for a few months in some far-off, distant forrest so that I don't have to go home. If you love me, (which I know you do), you won't let me go home. 

These are my requests. Thank you for considering them. 

Sincerely, 

Me

All I Ask of You!

OK. Coolest thing just happened to me.

It's getting to be crunch time again with exams just around the corner and three finals standing in the way of my summer vacation (by NZ standards, of course). 

SO, naturally, I am getting to that Procrastination Point again. (P Squared!)

Today I was reading article after article for my boring Policing course. Around 4:30 I decided I really wanted to play the piano and take out some aggression and frustration in the form of music. (I have had a rough couple of days. I'm fine, please don't ask me about it....No really. Don't.) The frustrating thing about me going to play the piano is that I am utterly useless without sheet music. Where is my sheet music? Why, it's in Washington DC somewhere in a giant cardboard box. So I can only remember like half of all the songs I know how to play and that gets to be even more frustrating when all you want to do is play one song through. 

At around 6:30, I was getting ready to leave. I opened the door of the practice room and saw five music books sitting on the ground!! I looked around and peeked into the other rooms but no one was around. So I grabbed the books, telling myself I'd play a few songs and then return them to where I found them. I flip through these books, and of course it's all Musical Theater. God truly knows where my soul is. haha. I played a few tunes, sight reading mostly, and playing chords to songs i knew how to sing. 

This is when I came across "All I Ask of You" from Phantom of the Opera, sung by characters Raoul and Christine. 

For those of you who don't know, Phantom of the Opera is one of my favorite musicals. And this song is one of my favorite songs to play on the piano because its so interactive. I hadn't played it in a while so the first time through was a little rough, but soon enough muscle memory kicked in! I was playing and really enjoying myself, even starting to hum along a little, when the door opened. Embarrassed, I stopped playing and asked the kid that walked in if these books belonged to him. 

He was really excited and said they were his but that he was excited when he heard familiar strains of music. He told me I was very good, which was quite the compliment! (the piano is not my strongest instrument, despite 16 years of playing). I was just about to get out of his way, when he goes, "Actually, do you want to sing through the song together? I love this song." And I agreed! So here I am with a complete stranger, singing one of my favorite piano pieces... and I had a page turner too! haha... it's just so random and so cool. And that's why Kiwis rock. I doubt that would ever happen to me in America. People are too sheepish. So yeah.. freaking awesome. 

World Press Photos

Every year there's an exhibit called the World Press Photos. 

They are photographs capturing what has happened around the world in the past year. I went to that this year: twice. 

The first time I went with Cassie. The second time with my friends Lenny and Lorenzo (from Italy). It was interesting to go twice. The first time was almost like being overwhelmed with information. You get the picture, and then the description of what is happening or what the picture is depicting. The second time, though, you already know the basic descriptions and can somehow appreciate the pictures all the more because of it. I found that interesting.

There were so many pictures covering a huge range of what's happening. There were happy pictures like Obama's speeches, snapshots of the Olympic Games, stage performances, etc. There were cool nature ones of animals, a jaguar hunting an antelope, lightening discharges in an ash cloud created by a volcano... 

But as always, with the media, you get some pretty shocking ones too. There were lesser known problems covered like a family living in poverty. But then there are, of course, pictures that cover things like the invasion of Georgia, preteen transsexual sex workers, the disaster in Myanmar, and so on and so forth. 

Two things alarm me here:

First, that I hadn't heard at all about the terrorist shootings at the train station in Mumbai. How did I miss that?? I read CNN as often as I can, and somehow this escaped my attention. The number of people that died were in the 50s. I was really upset that I hadn't heard about this. 

Secondly, I was greatly disturbed by how quickly I had forgotten about the things I HAD heard about. Things like the disasters in Myanmar... that happened a few months ago. I remember sitting in my room with my friends looking up all the stories we could find so that we could a.) stay informed, and b.) be able to pray for these people. We get so caught up in our own lives and our own problems that we completely forget about everything else, no matter how big. 

It just proves everything is relative. Right now, there is a lot of damage from natural disasters in Indonesia, the Philippines, and Samoa. I'm afraid that within the next 4 or 5 or 6 months, I will have already forgotten about this. I pray that I won't. But in all reality, I probably will. It makes me wonder what that says about us as humans. Do we forget because we don't care? I don't think so... perhaps it's a defense mechanism. I don't know, now I'm rambling. Running away with my thoughts--perhaps this should be in my other blog, "Welcome to my Mind-Please excuse the mess." O well. Too late. And I'm too lazy to copy and paste this to my other one. 

The people in Samoa right now will not ever forget what's happened. Children who survive will have these memories into old age. Relatively, this is one of the greatest things that has happened in their lifetime. But to someone like me, who is an outsider and hasn't personally suffered the catastrophe, it is a passing event that I hear about on the news. 

Ah... I'm still rambling. I'll stop now. Just putting my thoughts down on... internet? 

Most Unproductive Weekend Ever. :)

Last week I spent hours upon hours doing research and writing two papers worth 45% and 40% of my grade respectively. They were kind of a big deal and so I focused all my energy on this. I told myself that this weekend I'd catch up on the work I kept missing out on. 

That didn't happen.

Friday night was my flatmate's 21st birthday. So all my flatmates and I went out to dinner to this nice restaurant on a tug boat on the harbor. Pearlyn actually got a free meal since it was her birthday! We had some pretty awesome seafood and afterwards we got Bubble Tea--Maddie had her first one and loved it! YAY! We got back home around 10 pm. When we opened the door, all her friends who had been hanging out in our flat for a few hours jumped out and yelled surprise! Success! It was so funny because some of them had been at our flat for a few hours and had ordered dinner and made brownies and stuff!  They made her some pretty awesome presents and it was so cute! We had a dance party with balloons, bubbles, and pin the tail on the donkey. It was like a little kid's party... except some people had beer. Ha.

 

That night my neighbors Daniel (from Chile), Lenny (from Germany), and Daniel's friend (from Argentina), Cassie, and I went out Latin DANCING! We actually ran into other friends there that night but it was SO much fun! I love REAL dancing and I have actually taken Salsa, Samba, Cha-Cha lessons. Daniel was really good and led well enough to where I was able to follow pretty decently. Which is hard, because I tend to lead. lol. Lenny was also pretty fun to dance with. I taught him some new moves (he'd taken a little salsa before too) and we danced a lot that night! It was a really, really, really fun night! 

Saturday morning I finished filming my scenes for the film competition through my church. It is the most ridiculous video ever... it's a musical about a post-apocolyptic world. Spandex of bright colors was involved. And I wore a ghost outfit. And had a dance battle. Yup. Then Cassie and I went to the World Press Photo Museum here, out on the Waterfront. It took us like 30 minutes just to find the place, but it was really incredible. I love photography and it was really awesome to be able to see those things. 

That night I went to Kara's house, a friend of mine through Student Life (NZ chapter of Campus Crusaders). There were 7 or 8 of us playing tons of games like Psychology, and the one where you put the name of a famous person on your forehead and you have to guess who you are. I was Jane Austen and the Fresh Prince of Bel Air, hahaha! Then Cassie came over and we had hot coco and watched Gladiator. ha, best combination ever. 

Finally, yesterday I was going to get work done!! And that didn't happen much either because last minute I was invited to go to a soccer game for free! So I went with my friend Cindy and we met up with my roommate Andy, Lenny, and our friend Fabien (from France). Later I read the one article I had to for today (so i guess I got a LITTLE work done), and then watched No Country for Old Men with Sebastian and Lenny. Really good weekend, and super unproductive. 

On a side note: I think New Zealand's weather may be in need of rehab, as it seems it's on crack. 

Their "winter" was not very winter-y at all. I'd say on average the temperature was between 45-60 degrees every day. (7-16 degrees Celsius). Now it's "spring" and freaking COLD. It's rainy, windy, and cloudy all the time. :( 

I woke up last night around 5 am. Not sure why, and realized there was a hurricane going on outside my window. The sound was cool though with the wind and rain so i started falling back asleep to that sound. I was abruptly woken up by the sound of water falling onto carpet... uh-oh. I ignored it, and 5 minutes later I heard it again. I got out of bed, turned on the lights and did a scan of my floor. No wet spots that I can see... where did it come from?! So i went back to bed and I heard that noise a few more times which was frustrating because it always happened right as I was about to fall asleep again. Eventually I got to a point where I was able to sleep through it. This morning I realized that water had been seeping onto my window sill and falling onto the floor. 

I swear its colder now in "spring" than it was in their "winter." 

O New Zealand--you and all your little quirks.

ALL BLACKS!!!!!!!!!!

So my two greatest goals in coming to New Zealand have been successfully fulfilled as of yesterday night!! The All Blacks, New Zealand's Rugby team and a source of national pride, played the Australian Wallabies (BOO) in Wellington. Being in the capital has its perks!

Friends from Canterbury and Dunedin came up to enjoy the game. Wellington EXPLODED. 

There were floods of people, all wearing black.. kinda looked like a really big funeral. But the All Blacks are INCREDIBLE. And we KILLED those stinky Wallabies.. Anhilated them. 

We won 33 to 6. And they had 6 points because they got 2 penalties--they didn't even score! Our boys creamed them and it was glorious. 

I have never screamed so much in my life. And we were pretty close: it was weird being SO close to these super famous players. 

The game is made that much better by the Australian-New Zealand rivalry that's always there! We got the opportunity to sit in front of this huge Wallabies fan section... so when it was clear we had won, at 26 and 6, we turned around and told them all to go home. Little did we know that in the last 5 minutes we would score AGAIN. Epic!! 

The Haka live... is... wow. It's incredible. Try imagining like 20 HUGE rugby players, as serious about the game as you can get, yelling in Maori at you, with all these war moves...Youtube it. All Blacks Haka. It's serious. 

Here's my favorite player...team captain Richie McCaw:: imagine this dude running at you and try to tell me you wouldn't pee your pants a little bit...

Richie McCaw--#7

But when he isn't eating Wallabies for dinner and is not bleeding and being intimidating, I've got to say, God did a GOOOOOD job when He made Richie. :D 

Sweet as weekend!

Yes, it was a very good weekend for me. And it was extended as I skipped my only class today. But shh, don't tell anyone! :p

Saturday night my friend Karl was having a birthday party. He's one of the three leaders of my life group through church. Him, and two other guys were all celebrating their birthdays together to throw a themed party. Specifically, a robot and/or pirate themed party. Having only had a few minutes to pull my costume together, I went as a pirate. (but sort of looked like a gypsy).

It was incredible how all out some people went!! There were three girls who wore the same thing: robots and their outfits were made out of those silver car window shields designed to keep the sun out. Cute. 

My friend William looked like Rambo: I was completely ready to give him total crap for not sticking with the theme, until he told me he was a Somalian Pirate. Very clever. 

Two guys were wearing DVDs around their necks.... movie pirates. 

It was really fun!! Dance party, robot battles, robots vs. pirates... pretty epic. 

And Sunday was this beautiful, beautiful, beautiful day. The sun was shining, there was a cool breeze, I was wearing a skirt and flip flops (or jandals as they call them here). I went to church in the morning, was so inspired by the message that I ran up to my room, grabbed my quiet time journal and some homework, ran back down to the Waterfront and spent a good 6 hours in the sun, reading my Bible and then doing some work--all the while listening to worship music. I got SO much done, and I spent a glorious day in God's beauty!! And then I went to evening service, where the message was incredible. I got home around 9, talked to my roommate for an hour, and then went to hang out with my buddy Lenny. I got there around 10:30... and we talked till 2 am. It's probably the longest conversation I've had with anyone here and it was good! 

Finally today, I skipped class so I could go with my group to visit Parliament! Our tour guide was very quirky and had a great sense of humor. But we got to see just about everything that we were allowed to and that was really neat. We even got the privilege of seeing John Key's car (the Prime Minister).... that would NEVER happen in DC. Obama has to have 3 other decoy cars and two Air Force Ones. Security here is definitely lax in comparison! 

It's been a pretty good weekend. :D

EPICCCCCC!!! (Spring break, NZ Style!!)

I have returned from the most epic two weeks OF MY LIFE. I think I'm going to just try and outline every day that's interesting. It could be a pretty long blog. 

So, I was traveling mainly with this girl Kana from Chicago, and Jeff from Boston. 

We were able to meet up with other friends along the way, but mostly, it was the three of us, touring the South Island of New Zealand. :)

We flew to Christchurch on the 24th. I was supposed to stay with a friend from Orientation, but he ended up being out of town that day for his own spring break. Kana had made arrangements already to stay at this guy Patrick's apartment. Patrick was gone too, but had left his room key hidden for her to find. So I joined her, in free housing. :) Christchurch is a bit boring, in all

 honesty. Although I  bet its much more interesting when you get to see and hang out with people you know. It was a very BRITISH town... which sounds weird, but its true. We went to the botanical gardens and a museum and to Cathedral Square. Very pretty and quaint. We woke up to the most amazing sunrise. 

The next morning we caught a bus out to Dunedin, on the south part of the South Island. This was probably one of my favorite places to go. Dunedin is a very student-oriented place. 20,000 of the 10,000 people there are students. So yes, everything is oriented to our age group. I have a friend from GW named Alex, who is studying abroad for a YEAR in Dunedin! So a few weeks before leaving I called and asked if I could stay with him and he was kind enough to let me. He

 had a car, which I wasn't expecting. He drove up to the train station to pick me up, let me drop my stuff off, and then we headed to Sandfly Beach. This beach was SO cool. It was a very small, blocked off by two huge walls of rock: it gave the beach a very private feel. 

He convinced me to jump off of a little cliff onto the soft sand piles underneath and that was

 fun. We ran and played in these HUGE sand dunes, rolling down them, running up them, etc, etc. 

There were also a bunch of sea lions just lying around. They actually blended in VERY well with the rocks. To the point where I wouldn't see it was an animal till either I was very close, or it moved. We saw a movie that night and then went to sleep. Climbing sand is hard work.

The next day, Alex took me to this really cool garden. It started off at this beautiful little pond with ducks and wound around to this pretty, hidden place. 

The paths into the woods were incredible. EVERYTHING was covered in moss. I felt as though I'd stepped into Nature's version of the Emerald City. 

There were also see-saws, monkey bars, and swings. Needless to say I had a great amount of fun on those. He had class from 2-4, so I met up with Jeff (O, Jeff and Kana had made other accommodation arrangements beforehand) and hit the Otago museum which was pretty cool. And when Alex got back, we hung out, cooked dinner, played Gin Rumi, watched a VERY weird movie, and then went to bed. :) The next day we left for Queenstown!!!! 

Queenstown is... AMAZING. It reminds me of the little mountain towns back home. The first day we got there the air was super dry, and super cold. It was that perfect, crisp, cold, mountain air. I felt at home!

The first night we just walked around this little town and hung out and relaxed. The second day we did a Canyon Swing... I never knew I could scream like that. You are harnessed to this awesome mechanism that allows you to swing over the Shotover River. But before you can start swinging, there's a 60 meter (or 197 foot) freefall drop. Now, I wasn't completely aware of how much of a free fall there was. But o boy there was. I had to just will myself to jump off that cliff. Everything in your mind and body is telling you to NOT jump, but it's amazing. And yes, Jeenie screamed like there was no tomorrow. It was absolutely incredible. 

Later that day, Jeff and I met up with our friends Ben and Charles while Kana went Bungy Jumping (which i WILL NOT do). The four of us did the Shotover Jet Boat, which is really like this big amusement park water ride, only you're doing it for real. We were getting super close to the rocks and then veering out of the way just in time, doing 360s in the water, getting really, really wet. haha. That night, Ben, Charles, and I went to this thing called the Ice Bar, or the Minus 5 Bar. It is quite literally a bar made entirely of ice. You pay $27 for 30 minutes inside this igloo for a drink, and lots of fun pictures. It was so cold you had to wear an additional coat, gloves, and hat if you needed. The cups were made of ice (which you're allowed to eat), there were ice sculptures, it was really fun! 

The second day is what I like to call EPIC DAY. Or perhaps Near-Death Experience Day. 

I started the morning by skydiving out of an airplane at 9000 feet! WOOO! That rush was incredible, and despite common perceptions, it's not scary at all! You just feel like you're floating. It is one of two things i HAD to do in NZ. Check. SO much fun. A few hours later we took a really cool helicopter ride to the beginning of our White Water Rafting site. We were doing class 3 and 4 rapids, and on the first set of rapids (class 4), our raft tipped over. All 6 of us toppled into the cold water... and I really had fun! I was rescued by another boat, but I legitimately thought it was awesome. I'm glad it happened! I thought it would have been ironic if I had survived sky diving but not white water rafting. But I didn't, and it was fun fun fun! 

When we got back, I took Kana night boarding. She had never boarded before so we stuck on the bunny hill and I taught her how to board! :) 

Day 3 in Queenstown was supposed to be a day trip to Milford Sound (supposedly one of the most beautiful places in the world), but the weather conditions were too bad. So we turned around, slept more, and then Kana and I went snowboarding again. Then we had Fergburger... which was amazing as well. Mmmm, yummy food! We left Queenstown the next morning and headed to Franz Josef. 

Franz Josef is a tiny little town. Population: 5. No, just kidding. But you get the idea. It was like 3 streets long. haha. We got in, settled down and went to bed early. Queenstown definitely wore us all out a LOT. The next morning, though, we went hiking on the Franz Josef Glacier!! Walking on a giant piece of ice, walking through the crevices, etc etc. It was fun! We were supposed to do a whole day, but it got cut down to a half day (we got refunded), because the weather stunk. Hail hurts when it hits your body at like a million miles per hour!! The wind was so strong it almost knocked over our experienced guide, who was this big Maori guy! SO yeah, needless to say, we couldn't face those. But it was fun nonetheless. I also drank water from the water pockets in the glacier: freshest water out there! 

Finally we headed to Nelson. (this is the top of the South Island, so made a huge loop). We stayed in Nelson one night, where we happened to meet up with several friends, some of whom I had not seen since Orientation! It was cool, actually. There were 3 boys I hung out with the most who went to a different school. They were there so it was cool seeing them!! The next morning, Kana and I headed to Abel Tasman, another remarkably beautiful NZ place.

The program had organized a 22-person trip to Abel Tasman. Kana and I had been unable to make the list, so we did our own Abel Tasman trip. We got to stay at the same lodge and hike most of the same hike. We just happened to return early. I spent almost all my time with my 3 orientation friends. It was really cool seeing them again. :D 

So that's it,  flew into Wellington this morning, and now I am sitting at my desk, finishing this blog. YAY SPRING BREAKKKK!