The Aquarium

Our first big jump into New Zealand tourism was a trip to the local aquarium, Kelly Tarlton's. Mary-Ellen and I had visited it before, much earlier in the year and were excited to share the experience with the family. So, jet-lagged and full of excitement, we packed into the cars and headed to the Mission Bay area. The weather was far from ideal for sightseeing, but none-the-less we did manage to come across a traditional Maori sailing vessel, known as a Waka, hauled up on the beach. The beautiful vessel was adorned with paintings and carvings that echoed to a time when these vessels were used for long ocean journeys.

Once into the small aquarium, there was much to enjoy, and it is always fun seeing it through someone else's eyes. The resident penguins had the whole family captivated for quite a while as they swam past windows, waddled around their enclosure and fed small chicks hiding in the corners.

A personal favourite of mine, the rays, were large as life wandering around their enormous tank with their 1.5 metre wingspan.

One of the major highlights was of course the large tube and conveyor belt walkway. While standing on the moving floor, we were transported through two large aquaria, that ran around us creating a tube. Ancient looking sharks and majestic eagle rays swam around us as we journeyed through. Dad of course had a blast taking pictures of the numerous creatures that swam by.

One of Mom's favourites was the sea horse exhibit, which although hard to compare to the breeding facility she went to in Florida, was still an amazing viewing of some rather unusual and interesting variations on the sea horse body form.

Tired and ready for a nap, we concluded our first real adventure in New Zealand, returning home for some well deserved supper and to look through the pictures we took. It was clear at this point that the family would be in for a long presentation when Dad got home, showing off this and the many more adventures we would have on their visit!

A Family Reunites!

2:30 am - woken up with the same excitement one experiences on Christmas Eve as a 6 year old, the tossing and turning started

6:30 am - finally rolled out of bed to get ready to head to the airport

7:30 am - watching youtube videos in an attempt to distract ourselves as it was STILL too early to go to the airport

8:00 am - running to the car to head to the airport

8:02 am - in the car, seat belts buckled and car started

8:04 am - the plane from LA landed at the Auckland Airport

8:40 am - arrive at airport and park

9:15 am -  4 sleepy people walk through the gates to start what will be an awesome amount of New Zealand sight seeing.

9:30 am - in the cars  and now on the way to the house to drop off luggage, change and start the day!

10:30 am - one of the best kiwi breakfasts at Bolaven  - a little tucked away yummy restaurant that serves brioche french toast, free range eggs, happy bacon and sausages and perfect toast

11:30 am - off for a tour of Mount Eden which included a stop at the butchers, the produce market, the fish mongers. the chemist and a few little shops along the way to pick up some fresh food for the next few days

Overall  a super successful first morning with lots of sight seeing around Fiddlehead Flat. The weather was nice and overcast allowing the winterized Canadians a chance to acclimatize to the warmer weather without too much rain.

We spent the afternoon hanging out, chatting, catching up and eating lots of yummy fruit. It was glorious.

School's out for Summer!

Where-oh-where did the last 9 weeks go!?!?! This term FLEW by with sound barrier breaking speed. Things were chaotic, hilarious, full of warm heart fuzzies and I wouldn't change it in any way.

This term held final exams for the Year 9 students and one last NZQA standard for the Year 10 students. Outside of testing, we had a blast. The whole term focused on Algebra, which lets you get into some really fun real word applications - such as speed dating. I used this a few times in my classes with great success, it was so easy to do and it got so many kids talking to classmates that they would not normally have talked to as they were solving problems.

We also played "Algebra Survivor"  - a game from a website called coolmath.com. We had some great online and in class games played where teams could earn survivor points that were then tabulated for the grandest prize of classroom history - CHOCOLATE!

All of the learning aside, I absolutely LOVED the last day of school - and not just because it was the last day of school. The kids I taught all year did some AMAZING things. There was a Christmas concert in the first part of the morning - man, can these kids SING! Their voices are clear, powerful and full of passion and love. All of the instruments were played by the kids and the choir was fantastic. It was a chill inducing morning with all of the talent in the room and all the LOVE the audience gave to their peers. There were kids rushing the stage after each performance to shower their classmates and friends love with hugs and kisses, high fives and general congratulations. It was a beautiful show of love, support and the recognition of the courage it took some of these kids to get up and share their talents.

After the concert, we had prize giving which was another ceremony that looks somewhat like it does at home, but again the love and recognition by the students for their friends was overwhelming. After each section of awards, when photos were being taken, friends and families would again rush the stage with big messages of congratulations, hugs, kisses and candy leis. I have not seen this before, and didn't take any photos of the leis (I should have!), but I did find something similar online.

The awards ceremony ended with one of the coolest things I have ever seen a school do for a student. There is a boy, Soape, (who I was lucky enough to teach this year - not only talented with music, but also academically and a very likable kid) who posted one of his music assignments to youtube (see it here). It was seen by Agnes Tupou (who the song was written about - by her husband) and the music department was able to arrange to have STKS (the guy who wrote the song) come in and perform with Soape to close out the awards ceremony. You can see the video of this performance here. How the music department kept this a secret from the students and almost all the staff was amazing.

I'm off for a few weeks now - until January 22nd -  and we have a BIG vacation planned with Mark's family (parents and brothers) arriving in the next few days. I'm already looking forward to the next Polyfest (music/dance/cultural competitions), but not wishing my summer away.

On their way

Well, it has been quite some time since we last blogged, and much has happened. A school year has ended, field experiments have been set up, and summer students have been trained. We have been busy bringing all of responsibilities to a close in order to be free to enjoy the upcoming adventures with the Wilcox family. At this moment they are twiddling their thumbs waiting to board the long plane from LA to Auckland. Mary-Ellen and I are doing some last minute cleaning and preparing to do some Christmas baking for our weary travelers who will be arriving bright and early tomorrow morning. We will be on the road for much of the visit but I will try to keep it updated as best as possible.