March 5, 2011
I have decided that I need to learn to use some new adjectives to describe New Zealand. I feel like I write wonderful, amazing, beautiful, pretty, breathtaking, a thousand times over when I am describing the experiences I have here. But there is no other way to describe it! I wish I could just bring my entire family here so that they could experience what I am. I am so lucky!
So, once again, a wonderful week. On Tuesday I was observed by Dr. Jacobs for the first time, and my lesson went so well. The kids were great, they loved my lesson, and everything turned out just as I had hoped it would. Of course there are always a few surprises, and one thing Dr. J reminded me of was that I do not know everything, and when something unexpected happens, or when I get a reaction from students that I was not expecting, embrace it! Create a teaching opportunity from that. Anyway, so I was very happy on Tuesday!
Right after I taught my lesson and conference with Dr. J, all of Pomaria met outside the Inquiry Center. At 12:51 pm, for two minutes, we all stood in silence, remembering the earthquake that had happened exactly one week earlier. Principal Choromanski gave a wonderful introduction speech, and for two minutes, we all stood and remembered those whose lives have been lost. Last time I checked, the death toll was at 159. It is so sad that this has happened. And the past few days have been raining, so now Christchurch is dealing with roads that are impassable because of flooding. I cannot believe how devastating this earthquake has been.
After school, I talked with Mrs. S for a while. She has given me so much advice, and has shown me so much. But afterwards I met up with Katie in her classroom, and we waited for her teacher Whaea Janet to get back from her meeting. We then headed to her house, out in the beautiful country up in the Waitakere Ranges! The view from her house is beautiful. But her daughter, Licelle, took us down to Bethel’s beach and we swam for a while, then headed back and ate an amazing dinner, banana split, and relaxed and hung out with her family. It was a wonderful, relaxing night! In the morning we woke up to sheep and a beautiful sunrise! It was pretty cool. After breakfast we rode with Janet back to school. Here are a few pictures:
Licelle made us take a funny picture...cute, I know :)
Leaving Bethel's as the sun began to set!
The view from our bedroom window that morning!
Thursday was Red and Black day. As a school, everyone dressed in Red and Black, the colors of Canterbury Primary school in Christchurch. The kids were asked to donate gold coins ($1 or $2 here) that Pomaria will donate to the Canterbury Principal's Association in Christchurch to help fix the primary schools that were damaged because of the earthquake. We took a picture as a class, so I grabbed my camera and had one of the Year 6 girls snap some pictures for me! Mrs. S is on the left, and in the middle of the top row is Nana Tui, who assists Milly for a few hours in the mornings. Milly is an autistic girl in my class who receives a lot of assistance during the day.
Right after school on Thursday, we were picked up by James outside Pomaria, and then headed over to Ranui Primary and picked up Whitney, Nicole, Emily and Neeley. We all met at the Jacobs' house, then headed to Hot Water Beach for the weekend! It was so much fun, as always. I love being with everyone. Sometimes personalities can get a little overwhelming, but that is like with any large group. But we just have so much fun together!
The gorgeous sunset on the way to Hot Water Beach
We got to our beach houses, which were a two minute walk to the beach, around 9pm, and split up 8 girls to each house. The main house, the one I stayed in, was really nice! We played a few games that night, watched some TV, and headed to bed. The next morning we woke up pretty early, and headed down to the beach around 9:15. James was there, and pointed out to us the hot spots in the sand. It was the coolest sensation-- as you dig your feet into the sand, boiling hot water comes up through! And sometimes it was so hot it would burn your feet! But because the tide was still pretty high, we weren't able to dig. But low tide was at 1:52, so two hours before and after was when you were supposed to be able to dig big holes in the sand and have your own hot water pools! Well, because of the winds, the tide didn't go out as far as we had hoped. We spent hours digging (well maybe not HOURS, but a really long time! haha), only to have the waves come in and break down our wall! But it worked out, and we made a pretty awesome hot water pool! It was so fun to sit in it, and have this warm water and hot sand underneath you, as you're sitting right next to the cool ocean.
After digging our hot pool, some of the girls headed back to eat lunch, and Diana and I went back to eat a little later. It was so nice to be able to come back to the house to eat, and go back out to the beach later! I just love the beach. There is nothing better. But when we got back, Diana and I talked with Natalie Snow (a girl who helped organize our weekend and drove some of the girls) and then went boogie boarding! The waves were perfect for it!! We had so much fun! I get a little scared swimming in the ocean here, only because many of the beaches have warnings about the riptide and undertow. It's scary to hear stories about people who drown because of getting sucked under the rip. But we just have to be smart about where we swim. Anyway, boogie boarding was a blast. It's times like that, when I am riding waves into the shore of Hot Water Beach in NEW ZEALAND that I kind of have a reality check and realize where I am! I am so lucky.
A few of us outside our house!
It was crazy how many people starting coming to the beach as the tide went out! We had to stake out our territory and just stand there and be aggressive so that no one took our hot spots! haha.
Friday night we made spaghetti and salad, and after eating, cleaning up, and playing some fun games on the porch with everyone, Natalie took us to see some glow worms! It was scary walking there, but Heidi, Neeley and I stuck together. Hot Water Beach is in the middle of no where, so besides the head lamp that Natalie was wearing, there was NO light. You couldn't see your hand right in front of your face. But it was so neat walking along this trail into the woods where these glow worms lit up the trees! When we go to Rotorua, we get to do a Rafting trip through a cave that is filled with glow worms. I'm so excited for that!
Saturday morning, we woke up early enough to go out a see the sun rise over the ocean. It was beautiful.
This is Stingray bay! After cleaning up the houses and packing up, we drove to Cathedral Cove, only to discover that it is currently closed to visitors because of falling rocks. I was pretty bummed. But it was drizzling rain, and kind of chilly, so I was ok with not having to walk for an hour in the rain and sticky mud to get there! But we did get to walk to Gemstone Bay and Stingray bay along the coast. They were both really pretty. But after walking back to the car and trying to clean off our muddy shoes, we headed back to Auckland. We stopped in Thames for lunch, stopped at James' house to look at some green stone and bone carvings that his friend sells, and were dropped off back at home! I was pretty exhausted, but was able to get some homework done, eat a delicious dinner with Alice, and shower and head to bed.
It was a wonderful weekend! It's hard to believe that we have less than 5 weeks here...it is definitely bittersweet.
0 comments:
Post a Comment