I apologize for my long period of absence. I haven't been doing a lot, but at the same time I have been busy. So I shall attempt to highlight the past few weeks without going on for too long.

Here we go...First of all, I started playing soccer on Friday nights. It is so much fun. We play against other halls, but ours, Atawhai, didn't have enough people so we joined with another hall. I forgot how much I love playing soccer. Also, I have been playing a lot of ultimate frisbee. Alyssa got me hooked, and I am actually getting pretty good at it. I have been trying to stay active and it is lots of fun just fooling around with friends.

I handed in my first two big assignments this past week, so that is pretty much what I have been doing. Classes are going good. My semester break starts on Friday. I have two weeks off!! Sweet, sweet relief! So on Saturday I will be traveling down to Wellington before flying out to Christchurch on the South Island. It will be Alyssa, Anke, and me traveling around the South Island, and hopefully we will meet up with some other people along the way. I am pretty pumped for that!

This past weekend I went camping for a night with Kayla. She was going with a friend of hers, Amos, and invited me to go along. So I found out Friday morning and left that afternoon. It was spontaneous and great! Her friend, Amos who is a Kiwi, drove us. We drove about fifteen minutes out of town and hiked to the site. It was right on a river and the night was so still and perfect. We hung around the fire and made s'mores! There ended up being me, Kayla, and five Kiwis. And the Kiwis have never had s'mores before! Imagine that! However, the s'mores were makeshift. We had to use chocolate chip cookie biscuits instead of graham crackers because they don't have graham crackers out here. Kayla and I decided that the cookies may have been better anyway. I enjoyed being around the Kiwis too. I am getting so used to their accents I don't even notice it anymore. Especially with Khali.

Being out here I have had many encounters with creatures. There is a little hedgehog that lives in the bushes outside of our flat. He is adorable. Then there is this cat Mikit, as we named it, that visits from time to time and will actually wander into our flat. We also have adopted a walking stick bug, Limb. He just chills on our house plant. We found a pray mantis the other day too. I was very happy to hear that there are no snakes here though, and no large animals either. I think you won't see anything larger than like a possum. The possums are nasty.

I am having trouble recalling everything that has been going on, so I will attempt to keep this blog more updated! I am missing everyone. I hope everyone is doing well!

Taupo

I spent the past weekend in Taupo with a group of friends. Taupo is north of Palmy and is situated on Lake Taupo and surrounded by mountains. We caught a bus in on Friday and set up camp right outside of town. Our campsite sat right on a river. It was very picturesque. There was virtually no one around. So there we were, all 9 of us, with nothing but the river, the woods, and the gorge (although the road was actually a fairly short walk away).

On Saturday I got a little bit adventurous. My flattie, Anke, and I thought it would be a good idea to bungy jump. So we did. Next thing I know I am standing 47 metres above the clearest water I have ever seen clutching poor little Anke as hard as I could to my side, with nothing but my feet attached to the bungy. There was no turning back! A quick wave at the camera and we were free falling through the air. I must say, it was quite a thrill! It was over so quick, though, it is hard to even remember it.

After the bungy Anke and I did a "swing" at the same place. We were placed in a harness and attached by the hip. As they were preparing us we were sitting in the harness like a seat and suspended in the air. They told us to wave at the cameras, so we did, and with no warning they detached us, so once again we were free falling through the air. I am pretty sure my face went from smiling at cameras to complete and utter shock! Once again, the free fall was over so quick.

So after the two adrenaline junkies got their fill, the group moved on. We hiked along the river to Huka Falls. The hike was fairly easy, but the views were spectacular. I have never seen water so blue, and so clear! There really are no words to describe it, and pictures never do it any justice. It was clearer than anything I have see, even in Hawaii. Even in the deepest spots you could see straight to the bottom. And the falls, though short in height, were so powerful looking. Definitely a sight worth seeing.

After taking a dip in the water a little further down the river, we headed back to town for some food and we watched the Iron Man race. I got to see the first place woman finish, and also found out the the third place woman was from the US. Both nights the stars were out. There were so many. I love being able to see so many stars!

Finally on Sunday, before catching our bus back to Palmy, we ventured to a cliff jumping site, but decided that the cliff wasn't high enough. So instead we did a rope swing into the lake! Following those adventures we took a dip in the hot thermal pools in the lake. I knew that they would be warm, but I was so surprised to find out that the water was as warm as a hot tub or warmer! It was painful to get into at first. It was really cool to see such a thing!

So those are the main highlights of the trip. I wouldn't mind going back to Taupo. There is so much to do. I also cannot wait to see more of the North Island!

Tui, Terradatyls, and Treaties

I have noticed that everything around here smells fantastic because of all the lush, green flora. And along with the abundance of plants comes the loudest insects I have ever heard, and a variety of very peculiar sounding birds. The Tui bird has a wide range of vocal abilities, as I have learned, some of which are beyond human hearing abilities. Tui is the Maori name and the bird is native to New Zealand (Aotearoa). It is known in English as the Parson Bird because of a small tuff of white feathers under its neck that resemble a parson's neck piece. Khali told me that if you were to tell someone in Maori that they are a Tui bird it is a big compliment because it means you have a good singing voice. Tui is also the name of a large NZ brewery. I see these little birds all over campus.

I believe the other bird I hear is a magpie. It is a nasty sounding bird. If I were to imagine what a terradactyl might sound like, that is what it would sound like. I will be sitting in my room doing work or taking a nap and all of a sudden I will hear this awful screech and see just the shadow of a bird fly by my window. I swear those things are out to get me.

Yesterday in my Food and Eating class we talked about sustainable food systems and food regimes. It was pretty interesting. We discussed the idea of "food from somewhere to food from nowhere, " as in knowing exactly where your food came from or producing it yourself to having it appear "magically" on the shelves of a supermarket. We talked also about the future of water and she put up some virtual water contents for different things. For example; In a single slice of bread there is 40 litres of water, in a single sheet of paper 10 litres goes into making it, in a pair of leather shoes there is 8,000 litres, and in a 150g hamburger there is 2,400 litres. I thought some of those were pretty surprising!

Last night I did my laundry and it started to torrential downpour out of nowhere, so that was fun! I also found out that there is apparently an Iron Man competition in Taupo this weekend while we will be there. It should be interesting!

Today I had a 9:00 tutorial for my Treaty of Waitangi Treaty in NZ Society paper. It was over in the Maori studies building. We were in this room that is used for Maori welcome ceremonies (i think, I have to clarify this next time) so we all had to take off our shoes and sat on these cushions on the floor. So that was really interesting. Just a little bit of background, the treaty of Waitangi was a treaty signed by most of the chiefs of the different Maori tribes and the British Crow. The British Crown had already recognised the Maori as a sovereign state in NZ, so therefore in order to colonise NZ a treaty had to be signed. It could not simply be occupied. IT is very controversy because it is debated that the Maori were mislead and that the translations of the treaty into Maori have a completely different meaning than it does in English, so therefore the Maori did not know to the full extent what it was they were signing. That is pretty much what I will be exploring further in this paper.

Aroha. (the concept of love in Maori)