Last night I had a fabulous home cooked kiwi dinner with Ness, the organizer of this segment of my trip and her family. Before dinner, we stopped to pick her daughter up from Netball practice which is considered the most common women's sport in NZ. It's a lot like basketball with a little team handball mixed in. Something we'll definitely have to try this year in my class!
For dinner, We had amazing roasted lamb with mint jelly, vegetables, and pavlova for dessert (they refer to dessert as pudding). You honestly haven't lived until you've had pavlova (or chocolate covered hokey pokey- see last picture, or hokey pokey ice cream). It's kind of like a merguine cake with whipped cream, fresh kiwis, and chocolate on top. Absolutely delcious!!
I chatted for hours with Ness and her family about the upcoming stops on my trip, New Zealand and American differences and plenty of other topics. I was fascinated to learn all about the common practice of New Zealanders going on an OE, or overseas experenice to travel and live in other countries. It is fairly common for young people to finish college, work for a few years to pay off debt and collect some money, and then leave NZ for a few years travelling the world. Many kiwis travel for a 2-3 years all over before they settle back home to start a family. Sounds like a fabulous idea!
Mellons bay is a very affluent area so it made sense when almost everyone I met had travelled around the world but furthermore I learned that New Zealanders really value other cultures and make a constant effort to travel becuase they live in such a small confined country. Ness and her husband explained that most kiwis really do live for the moment and spend their money when they want on what they want and worry less about saving then we do. Overall, it was such a wonderful night with a great family and I'm excited for our future plans to come back to visit and take a trip to Figi!
During the morning today I observed a PE teacher at Pigeon Mountain Primary which is in the same area as the schools I've attended this whole week. This school was similar to Mellons Bay besides having a PE "Specialist" who serves as a reliver to the homeroom teacher every other week. We played some soccer in the morning and then moved on to gymnastics later in the day.
Somehow it has taken me until today to realize that kiwis are not keen on wearing shoes (they are keen or saying "keen" though : ). During the past few days I noticed some kids walking around barefoot but assumed there was a reason behind it. Today, the kids came running out on the wet field barefoot to play soccer and I knew something was up. Turns out, many New Zealanders really don't wear shoes too often, in fact, they arent required in most public places (restaurants etc.). The rest of the day I started noticing how everyone was barefoot!
I also enjoyed learning about the school's ESOL (english as a second language) program. Currently, the school is hosting 30 Korean students through their ESOL program. Each term, the schools hosts a set of about 30-40 korean students for about six weeks- many of whom live with host families in the neighborhood. It seems like such an amazing experience for both sets of students!
After school, I had a great sushi lunch, stopped in a candy store (they call all candy lollis) to grab a few necessary items and headed down to Hamliton which is the third most populated city in NZ (keep in mind there are about 4 million total in the whole country so imagine the opposite of the DC/Baltimore Metropolitan area in terms of traffic and crowds and that's what its like everywhere here.
During the evening here in Hamliton I visited a information center to get a little feedback on my upcoming adventures. The woman who assisted me was super friendly and helpful! Upon leaving, I asked for the best way to get towards the botanical gardens which were not far from where we were. The woman seemed a little uneasy and started to explain how the sun would be setting soon and it might not be the best idea to travel there at this time. She quickly cut herself off and said something like, "oh well you're from America so you can probably handle yourself in a dangerous situation like that." Obviously I took her original advice! I'm not sure the people over here have the best perception of America.
Tonight I had an outstanding meal from a restaurant in downtown Hamilton. I've been waiting for the right time for fish and chips and this was definitely it!
Tomorrow I head down to the Waitomo caves for a five hour adventure including abseiling, rafting and climbing through glow worm caves. I'm psyched for this experience! !
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