School Days by Luke and Sedona

This week, we convinced Luke and Sedona to share a few thoughts about their respective schools, so here they are without further ado:

Luke and Sedona in their school uniforms on Luke's first day of school 

Luke

I am year 6 which is 5^th grade.  I go to Saint Heliers Primary School.  I walk 5 min. to school. I take maths, news, reading and spelling quizzes.   In sports at school right now I play cricket. I am learning a few words in Maori (the native people’s language in NZ) and Mandarin.  I like to play handball with my friends each day at recess.  I am participating in Battle of the Books, and I have to read ten books by the second term.  We don’t have to wear shoes in the classroom or for sports.  I am looking forward to my rugby season starting next Saturday.                            

I was very happy to Skype with my friends back home in Mrs. Moles’ class today, because I really miss them.                                        

Luke's school

Luke winning an award at the first Merit Assembly of the year

Sedona

I am a Year 10 (equivalent to 9^th Grade) at Glendowie College, which is what they call a high school. School is a lot different here. First of all, everyone walks to school. It takes me about 20 minutes to get to school. And they don’t use percentage or letter grades. Instead they give you either Not Achieved, Achieved, Achieved with Merit, or Achieved with Excellence. They also have a period set aside for Morning Teatime. They don’t have a cafeteria; everyone just sits outside and eats. The classes I am taking are Math, English, Social Studies, Science, Enterprise Studies, Drama, and Music. My favorite is drama.

Something I am really looking forward to is my trip to Wellington with my form class.

Sedona at the entrance to Glendowie College

Sedona's school band playing at the Sandcastle Festival at St. Heliers Beach

Family Favorites

We were so fortunate that Mom, Dad, Bert (my brother), and Jamie (my sister-in-law) were able to visit us for two weeks in March.  We covered a lot of ground, had great weather (minus Cyclone Lusi) and enjoyed sightseeing as well as a family ping pong tournament.  On our last evening I asked them each what was their favorite part of the trip and while it was hard to choose, here are some highlights:

During the first full weekend we ventured down to Rotorua on the way to Wellington.  Surprisingly, they did not cite the sulphuric smells of Wai-O-Tapu as a favorite, but we did all enjoy seeing the Lady Knox geyser and beautiful brightly colored geothermic pools.

Wellington is a lovely city nestled into a harbor and is the capital of NZ.  We visited Te Papa, the country’s newest and most impressive museum.  Standing 6 stories high and including a rooftop viewing deck as well as an outdoor bush territory, it is truly a national treasure.  Bert, a sportsman and an explorer, was quite taken with one of the original cannons from Captain Cook’s ship there.  He really enjoys nature and history, so this museum was perfect for him.  He also enjoyed quite a few meat pies during his time here!

My dad’s favorite surprised me, but maybe it shouldn’t have.  He was fascinated by the drive to and from Wellington and the change in scenery on the North Island.  That drive takes you from the city to the suburbs, through the “heart” of New Zealand (Lake Taupo), and past many farms with sheep and cattle.  Then you find yourself on the “desert road” or as much of a desert as you’ll see in NZ.  You also drive by a beautiful snow-capped mountain (Mt. Ruapehu) which was especially picturesque on the way home.  I guess the memories of farms from Mississippi have stuck with him all of these years.

A rather perfect day was our trip to Waiheke Island, which is close to Auckland and known for its natural beauty and wonderful wineries.  To get there, you take a ferry.  This was one of Mom’s favorite activities.  The ferry is quite civilized, serving gourmet coffee, snacks and even beer and wine.  It is a smooth ride and we enjoyed the top deck on the way over, so that we could really see the scenery.  Although a bit windy, the sun was shining and we could see from the harbor why they call Auckland “the city of sails.”

Our first stop was Man O’ War (on the far end of the island down a gravel road) and Mom really liked the beautiful view and relaxed wine tasting.  This day was also Jamie’s favorite.  We enjoyed lunch at Te Whau, olive oil tasting at Rangihoua, and two more wineries, Goldie and Mudbrick.  Goldie was actually gifted to the University of Auckland, although it remains a commercial venture.  The young woman who poured our wine described how 15 students actually live on the premises and get to help with the wine each semester.  I think Jamie has now applied!  There’s a beautiful walk past the Merlot grapes up to a huge tree with fabulous views (including looking back to our lunch spot).  We were blessed to enjoy the beauty of the island and the talent of the winemakers.

While I was sad to see them go, I am so happy for the memories we made!

Parks and Rec

I think Leslie Knope’s dream job, should she ever decide to leave Pawnee Indiana, would be to run the Parks and Rec division of the Auckland Regional Council.  Auckland has an amazing amount of public green space, with over 4000 local and sports parks as well as 35 regional parks.  You are never more than a few minutes from one of the local parks, which have tons of entertainment options: 712 playgrounds, 73 skate parks, 11 full cricket fields, and 2732 dog exercise areas!  Our children have worked hard to explore as many playgrounds as possible since we’ve been here and have decided that Elstree is one of their favorites, due in part to the giant spinning tire.  They also like Albert Park, which, like many parks in Auckland, has plenty of massive trees that are great for climbing.

Elstree Park

Albert Park

The local parks in Auckland also are home to most of the 48 volcanic cones that dot the Auckland landscape.  Auckland sits on top of a large volcanic field, with some craters that erupted over 40,000 years ago and others as recently as 600 years ago.  Many of these volcanoes provide some of the best views of the city and some still contain working farms.  In fact, some of the parks have interactive farms experiences for visitors, including cattle milking and sheep shearing.

Mt Eden

Michael Joseph Savage Memorial Park

Cornwallis Park

The 35 regional parks are even more impressive than the local parks.  They cover everything from the rough, pounding surf of the Tasman Sea, to picturesque waterfalls, to miles and miles of beautiful beaches.  

Piha Beach

Karekare Falls

Orewa Beach

We recently discovered that in 1999, the Auckland Regional Council set up 16 large gold picture frames in various spots within these parks to help promote the tourist industry.  Some have apparently been removed over the past 15 years, but most still remain and we have found two already that certainly make for some great photo opportunities. 

Luke and Sedona at Shakespear (sic.) Regional Park

Bert and Jamie visiting the Aratiki Visitors Center in the Waitakere Ranges Regional Park

The parks also offer tons of recreational opportunities, including horseback riding, disc golf, paragliding, swimming, surfing, fishing and even yoga.  So everyone – even Ron Swanson – can find something to make them happy.  In Ron's own words: 

“Fishing relaxes me. It’s like yoga, except I still get to kill something.”

So what exactly is Ashlyn doing?

Some of you may have wondered, if Kevin is at work and the kids are at school, what is Ashlyn doing?”  In this blog I will tell you!

It’s hard to believe that we have been here for almost 2 months and the kids have been in school for one month.  After everyone got settled, the first thing I did was go back and visit places that we had already been – at my own pace.  Luke can make his way through a museum in Olympic record-breaking time.  Kevin wants to take photos of EVERYTHING.  And Sedona, well, she just wants to get to the café for a cuppa.

So, I returned to the Auckland Museum and enjoyed “Selling Dreams – One Hundred Years of Fashion Photography.”  I went to the Auckland Art Gallery for a wonderful guided tour.  And I rambled through the Sculpture in the Gardens exhibit at the Auckland Botanic Gardens.

View of the Skytower from the Auckland Museum

Melvin Sokolsky for Harper's Bazaar, March 1963

I’ve also had the pleasure of doing some professional work.  I’m conducting a small market research study for Academic Impressions (AI) on the potential for their work in New Zealand.  I’ve also been doing some writing and have a piece on what I’ve learned from campaign volunteers coming up next week in their on-line newsletter.  I’ve met some great colleagues at the University of Auckland and the University of Waikato.  I’ve even been asked to speak five times in various cities by Educate Plus, a nonprofit group that focuses on development work in education.  That will be exciting to travel and see other schools across the country.

Jamie Pickernell, "O Crabby, I Do Believe We're Rather Lost"

I’ve also discovered a lovely group called the American Women’s Club.  A very elderly but high energy woman named Ruth invited me to their book group and as a result, I read “The Luminaries,” the 2013 Man Booker Prize winner by NZ author Eleanor Catton.  It’s over 800 pages, so that alone took up 2 weeks of my time!  I’ve also gone to this group’s regular meeting and joined a local walking/coffee club on Fridays.

Not as exciting, but I do try to keep up with the house.  Wednesday is my cleaning day!  More interesting are the finances of this.  For example, I can get 10 avocadoes for $3, and I can rent movies for $1 on Tuesdays and Thursdays.  But it takes over $100 to fill up our gas tank and when I took a dress to the dry cleaners, it was going to be $39!  That will now get cleaned another way.

I’m enjoying some time to explore Auckland on my own, make some wonderful international contacts, and some days, just go to the beach!

St. Helier's Beach with a view of Rangitoto