The First Major Hiccup

I have so much news I am not really sure where to start! First off, the question on many peoples minds is "Are you still going to New Zealand?" ...The answer to that is YES!! We are still going, we have just become a little delayed.

There were a few issues with the visa papers/clearance to go to NZ, so it is going to take us a little longer to get there. Mark has contacted the University, and they are sensitive to the situation and the delays. They have given us until May 2013 to arrive in Auckland with full scholarship benefits.

Yesterday, Mark got the official acceptance letter in the mail from U of A (University of Auckland), although he had the email copy of the letter weeks ago. He is now officially a registered student, with a student number and everything. We are both really excited, and I am super proud!

So what does this all mean for Mark and myself? It means we are going to spend the next few months working so that we can put a little more money into our "New Zealand Fund", and we plan on spending the extra time on this side of the ocean with family and friends.

It also means we get to be around for some pretty awesome LIFE EVENTS!! Mark and I will be around for the birth of our first niece/nephew, the wedding of two very dear friends and we will be able to celebrate the birth of one of our close friends 2nd baby. We will also get ONE more Christmas at home - WITH SNOW! We are thinking of this little delay as an awesome opportunity to be present for some of the events that we would have missed had we left earlier this week.

Due to the delay, we have been busy! We refunded our plane tickets and we will rebook once we know better the date that we will be able to go - we are thinking after Christmas by the time all of the issues have been resolved. We are still living with all a lot of our stuff packed away in boxes, ready to ship and we do not plan on any major purchases as we know we would have to sell it off in a few more months.

Mary-Ellen and Mark

Driving (on the left) in New Zealand

Our latest round of New Zealand Prequel has us doing lots to get ready for the big move!

I finally got around to cooking lamb chops and boy were they good! For all my meat eating friends, I reccomend you try this delicious meat at least once. I did ours in the oven with rosemary and garlic and it was fall off the bone tasty.

Mark has gotten all of his letters from UNB and had them sent off to Auckland. Auckland has gotten back to him with some of the papers he needs for his student visa, and we are waiting on a few more things to come in the mail. The visas pretty much finished. We are just a few signatures and papers away from sending them.

My teaching license has been finished and sent. At this point, it is a waiting game. I have to wait for them to get it, approve my request and send me the teaching license.

We have also started to consider driving in New Zealand. We are starting to look at approximate costs of their used cars, what details we need for insurance purposes and how to register a car in New Zealand. The registration seems to be really important - not only form a legal stand point. If you fail to notify New Zealand that you bought a car you can be held liable for any outstanding tickets that have been issued to that car (parking, speeding etc). If you notify them, then you are not responsible for past drivers outstanding tickets.

Mark and I have also started to look into international drivers licenses. We will apply for those later this summer as they are only valid for 1 year. This will give us some time before we need to apply for New Zealand drivers licenses. We are both still unsure of how we will feel driving on the "other" side of the road in the "other" side of the vehicle.


Mark and Mary-Ellen

Brilliant News! (Kiwi Translation: Good News)

We received our second piece of mail today from New Zealand. It was from the New Zealand Qualifications Assessment - basically the people who get to determine if I have enough teaching education and experience to be a teacher in New Zealand.

They have approved me to teach "senior years" in New Zealand - this would be equivalent to our grade 7 to 12. In their school system they have "elementary" and "senior" schools. With this first step complete - I will now finish up my teaching license application to mail out later this week.

  The document that allows me to apply for a NZ teaching license. Now that I have seen it, I have to send it back to NZ with my teaching license application and a few other papers.

I needed a few documents that had already traveled to New Zealand back from my primary assessment, for the teaching license.  By the end of it, these few teaching documents may travel more kilometres than Mark and I together.

Step 1: Apply to NZQA and have my qualifications assessed (COMPLETED)

Step 2: Apply for a NZ teaching license based on outcome of Step 1 (Application Started)

Step 3: Apply for a work visa (Application Started)

  Step 4: Apply for jobs (Looking, but still too early to apply)

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Mark and myself filling out forms on a Monday night. Here you see the medical forms, visa forms and licensing forms

An interesting fact from the forms - all forms must be filled out in black pen with cap locks or they are considered void.

On Mark's end - his thesis from his Masters has been sent off to Fredericton for binding and we are awaiting some letters from UNB to send off to University of Auckland with regards to his scholarship.

We have started to plan our summer - who we will visit when. We have started to look at how much of the summer we will need to work and how  much of it we can dedicate to spending time with family and friends. We are hoping to visit Cape Breton in July for a week and we have plans to head to Ocean Park for a week in August before we fly out. As we figure out dates, we will send them around to family and friends in the area.

Mary-Ellen and Mark

Ouch ! Another Paper Cut

 
So much has happened since our last blog post it will be a mental gymnastics event to remember it all.....here goes the tumbling and twirling.



NZQA - Two weeks ago, I received an email from NZQA (remember, these are the people who need to say that I have enough teaching hours/credits and licences to be equivalent to a New Zealand teacher). Their email was not the one everyone wants to receive after 6 weeks of waiting...they were short some paper work. Not the end of the world, especially since I had the required paper work at home. It was all stuff to do with my practicum hours, and my evaluations.



I got the email last Friday, and at the paper work all scanned/emailed off by Saturday afternoon. Crisis Adverted. Today, I went to check the status of my application, and it was "closed". All of the paper work has been sent back to me, along with my results. I emailed NZ to find out if there was a way to find out the outcome other than waiting for the paperwork but unfortunately as it is a legal document.....I must await its arrival.



Visa Applications - With a few phone calls to the New Zealand Embassy (here in Canada), we figured out that our best option is a family visa. It allows me to go to New Zealand with Mark as his spouse, and to work but I don't have to work to stay in the country. That being said, I want to work and to continue to teach but if it takes a while to find a job/get settled I will not be asked to leave the country.



Looking into the applications, we need to ensure that our passports are up to date 6 months after we plan on being in New Zealand. This meant that although our passports were valid for another two years, they had to be updated.



Passports - Our passports had to be redone as we had printed off/started visa applications. This means that last week on his day off Mark drove up to Fredericton with our current passports and submitted them to be redone along with all the necessary paper work. Now we are awaiting their arrival to finish all the visa work.  I am a little sad as I much prefered my old passport photo to the new one. The old one was taken mid summer with a nice tan. The new one is winter pasty and to add to the humiliation I was taking the bus that day and it was raining. My curly hair was all over the place.



Continued Sorting - All of our materialistic things have now been given away or donated. Tonight we finished sorting our books into those we want to keep/store and those we are going to donate to the local library. As of tonight, all that remains to sort is paper work and documents.  The next step will be to properly pack all the rubermaids we have with stuff we want to ship to New Zealand.



Plane Tickets - Tonight the plane tickets were booked ... it looks like we fly out from Saint John in August to Montreal. From Montreal to Toronto and then from Toronto to Tokyo and finally Tokyo to Auckland. With the time changes, the added day and delays at airports we have yet to calculate when we will actually arrive in Auckland.

We have also done some other things like decided to take a few weeks off work before we go to spend some time with all our friends and family. We are hoping to take 3-4 weeks depending on our funds. We will be attending the annual "Wilcox Ocean Park", schedule a visit to Cape Breton for a week and spend a few days with our friends near and far.

I especially want to coach at Synchro Camp this summer before I go as the nearest synchronized swimming club is over an hour away from where we are planning on living. Perhaps I will take a judging course before I head off to try and keep myself in the sport while I am away.

Mary-Ellen and Mark

You've got Mail

Yesterday, our first piece of mail came to us all the way from New Zealand! It was paper work from the University of Auckland regarding Mark's scholarship - of which I am VERY proud! It's a little blurry as I was so excited taking the photo -but you can clearly see it is from the University of Auckland!!!

This inspired us to FINALLY go out, buy some lamb, learn how to cook it, and most importantly - TASTE IT! Lamb in New Zealand is like chicken in Canada - it's what everyone eats a few times a week, the "go-to" meat, the chicken of the pasture if you will.

Mark and I decided to try ground lamb on recommendation as it was closer in texture to ground beef - a meat that Mark and I already consume. I decided to make lamb burgers with our ground lamb as again, it would be very similar  to foods we already eat so presentation would not bias our taste.

I mixed up the lamb just like ground beef - similar spices (garlic, onion, pepper), bread crumbs, egg  - and made it into patties which I then fried. They don't look too much different from your plain old Canadian burgers (see photo below). Their taste is another thing, even with the garlic and onion you knew you were not eating pork, beef or chicken but not in a bad way. We both decided we liked the lamb, and are excited to taste New Zealand lamb this fall.

Our next challenge will be roasting rack of lamb or shoulder of lamb.

Our lamb burgers before they met our buns and condiments 

Paperwork Central

The last two weeks have been spent getting all of my paperwork together for my New Zealand Qualifications Assessment. This is "Step 1" in obtaining a teaching license. It is the step where they verify that I have enough schooling, credit hours, experience and such to qualify for their New Zealand Teaching License. They have 40 days from receiving all of the paper work to let me know if I qualify to apply for a teaching license. Once the results are in, I can start to apply for the teaching license. I am currently trying my hardest not to look at the tracking number from Canada Post every day, especially with the Easter holidays, as there are some days it does not move very far.

We have also started the big purge. We currently have plans to take with us 4 suitcases (the maximum two people flying that far can take), and send 4 Rubbermaid bins down ahead of us. It will be very strategic as we need to take everything we will need/want with us in a very small amount of space.

There are somethings that are easier to leave behind than others. We are unable to take any appliances as their voltage is different. Even with converters we would fry anything except cameras/laptops, which are built to withstand international voltages. I am going to miss my slow cooker - a lot. For those of you who know how busy I really am, it has been a blessing. I am also going to miss other comforts like my Tassimo machine....especially since they JUST brought the really good lattes to Canada.  I know that Mark is going to miss all the plants/gardening and aquariums as we find our plants and animals new homes.

Furniture has been sold/in the process of being sold or it has been marked to give back to the original owners. All of our clothing has been sorted into sell/donate and keep piles, but even that may need a second sorting. Our decorative items are slowly being given away to family and friends, while others are being donated. It is really humbling to look at what you REALLY need to live, what you want to live comfortably, and what you want to live extravagantly.

So far, our list of stuff to take consists of very practical things/irreplaceable things:
*clothing/outerwear
*towels
*basic pots/pans/dishes/cooking utensils
*one set of bedsheets/pillows
*a few nostalgic items such as our painting of the place we met/our framed wedding invitation/photos of friends/family and if we can squeeze them in a few places I would like to take a few decorative items to make our new house, OUR house.
*our most favourite board game: Settlers of Catan
*Mark's dive gear
*camera/laptop

(Are we missing anything?)

It has been a battle between cost of shipping/cost of replacement when we arrive in NZ. Some things are worth shipping as their cost quickly outweighs that of the shipping, while others are better to be replaced in NZ.

I am sure that between now and our departure our list will grow and grow and then in July as we are packing, it will shrink quite small as we really pick out those things that we are able to take.

Mary-Ellen and Mark

The (Grand)Parent Report

On Wednesday, once both Mark and myself were home (March 7th) we started calling our family and friends to let them know the good news.

A word of warning - two twenty-somethings should never call their family at a strange time in the day and start with "We have good news"....no matter how much squealing and how loud you follow that up with "Mark won a scholarship to study at the University of Auckland, in New Zealand" they will still ask "When are you due?".  At this point you *sigh* and repeat "Mark won a scholarship to study at the University of Auckland, in New Zealand" and then add on "We're moving to New Zealand"

Our parents and friends have been really supportive of the whole idea thus far - we shall see how crazy they think we are once we get closer to the big move. I think there are some out there who truly believe this is the time for us to try everything once - we currently do not have kids or have large commitments to the Saint John area. People are generally excited for us, and we are just as excited. I think there are others who feel that we will never come back once we live so close to the equator.

We are hoping that we will see a few of you "down under" as we know we will be there for 3 years. What a better time to travel to such a splendid place than when you have friends/family who you can stay with?

Currently, Mark and I have plans to return to Canada ... (who knows...perhaps even dear old Saint John), but we are willing to keep our options open. Mark wants to teach at the university level so we shall see what adventures that will lead us to in the coming years.

Mary-Ellen

We're going where...?

Here it all is...the background, the history and the excitement behind "The BIG Move to NEW ZEALAND".....

Mark is finishing up his masters degree (his MSc.) and started to look for opportunities to study for his PhD. One that caught his eye was a Dr. Jeff's at the University of Auckland. He has similar interests and areas of study in the same fields Mark wants to study in for this degree. Mark contacted him and he let Mark know about a scholarship that he could apply for.... fast forward a year.

Mark applied for the scholarship and WON IT!!!! We found out on Monday, March 5th, pretty late in the evening (thank you 14 HOUR time change!). I was actually out of town, so Mark called me to tell me the good news. I picked up the phone to hear "You're going to New Zealand"....there were no "Hello's", or "I love you's", or I miss you's" ... Just "You're going to New Zealand". It took me a minute to have it all sink in. We weren't able to celebrate until Tuesday when I got back and we did that with rootbeer floats!

Us ---going to ---New Zealand!?!?!!? (Pretty much my main thought at the moment)

Since we found out, our life has become one big office of paper work. I feel like I work for the government (oh wait, I do!). It is form after form, letter of reference after letter of reference and certified copies of everything --- including the high school graduation certificate.

We are hoping to send out the first round of paperwork this week as it can take over 35 days (from the time they get the paper work) to go through it and come to a decision. The first round is myself applying to have my teaching credits transferred so that I am able to apply for a teaching license (ergo, teach in New Zealand).

We have also started to do more in depth research (the stuff other than, "hey, that looks neat...if we ever go to New Zealand we should visit that"). A few funny tidbits - when you lease a "flat" the landlord is only responsible for supplying you with a stove. Think about it...that's right .... no fridge! We also are responsible for paying "green fees" which are lawn care fees. Rent is paid by the week and the main meat consumed is lamb. The weather looks mild (a very big positive for one who hates feeling cold!), but wet.

Mark will be working primarily out of a marine station (in Leigh, New Zealand), we hope to rent somewhere close to there. We are planning on selling our car here and purchasing something over there. We have been told by our New Zealand penpals that we will want a car. Leigh is pretty much close to nothing and is a small touristy town. My dear New Brunswickers, think of Saint Andrew's. The small town only has one elementary school and the middle school students study at the universities satellite campus. They do not actually have their own building. High school students are bussed near by.


Mary-Ellen