Is it REALLY March?!?

It was a great weekend –
First off, Kamaea turned 15 a few weeks ago, while we were on the South Island. I had promised her that I would make her an "American" cake to make up for us being gone. I finally got around to doing it Thursday night - it was just a chocolate cake with whipped cream and reeses pieces on top. She absolutely loved it, so it was successful. We celebrated at at it late that night after we got back from mutual, since I was going to be gone all day Friday.

Friday was our first "Auckland Activity" day with the BYU group, so we didn't go to the schools. We each got a ferry/train/bus hop on-hop off pass. So we took the train and then the bus into the city where we all met up at the Auckland Museum. We spent a few hours there, including watching a Maori cultural performance. It was pretty cool. They sang, danced, and spoke Maori. Interestingly enough, there were no other Kiwi’s in the audience. Everyone was from all over – Ukraine, Germany, UK, Australia, Holland, France, other European countries, Canada, and of course all of us Americans! Kind of cool. They performed and showed us the tools, weapons, and other items the Maori people used back in the day. They also performed the haaka - my favorite.

After the museum a few of us in the group stuck together and stopped at some shops on the way back into the downtown Auckland area. We took a couple of ferries - one to Devenport and one to Birckenhead - mostly for the boat ride. I also got to see a huge fleet of sailboats go by. Ahhh! I love them so much. It was the perfect sailing day!

Later that night we headed to Albert Park for a Chinese Lantern Festival. There were SO MANY people there. I got a glimpse of what China might really be like. Ugh. It was really cool to see all of the decorations and lights and performances though.

Saturday was a lazy day - I got stuff done in the morning, and then we went to Orewa beach in the afternoon. The water was absolutely perfect and it was nice to just relax. We went with James Ahmu, who was our toru guide when we went to the South Island. His ward was having a party and he invited all of us. So, of course we had a massive feed with sausages, salads, cake, and other goodies. So blissful. What would the world be like with no beaches? Or chocolate? It's too terrible to contemplate.
A couple of girls in our group threw themselves a "half birthday party" - so we all got together at Joy's house, ate junk food, and watched a couple of movies. Joy is such a good sport. It was fun to just kick back and hang out with everyone.
As for today - it is MARCH 1ST! I can hardly believe it. I only have 6 weeks left in "En Zed." Man, time flies!
School was kind of different today - well, more than usual at least..... The middle school levels (7-8 year olds) had a "Swim Sport" day. All of the kids competed in swimming races all day long. I got to be one of the judges, which was a lot more fun for me. It was exhausting though - all of us teachers were worn out! It's so much work to keep a couple hundred kids under control in a normal classroom - but put them in a pool surrounded by other screaming children and water splashing everywhere....whew! It was a fun day - something different at least.


These were the non-swimmers; they either didn't bring their togs or they didn't want to swim. Poor kids had to just sit there all day long. They became the little cheerleaders though.