Where did it go?

Week 8

I was saddened to have to say goodbye to Bee this week. Her fiancés father in Scotland has unfortunately taken a turn for the worst health wise, and so they took an impromptu trip to go and see him. Although a part of me thinks that Facebook is a ridiculous replacement of human interactions and real relationships, in this case it is a wonderful tool to stay in touch with people (Bee and I are official Facebook friends).

Anyways! I have been engrossed in research for another week, but on a different project. Noeline asked me to do a write-up in which I gave her a brief overview of several pieces of legislation before Parliament (two on the Sale and Supply of Liquor, one on Social Assistance, one on Public Health, and another on a study looking at the situation of the care of older New Zealanders). It has been nice because I feel like I am able to knock them out relatively quickly, whereas with my previous projects it has taken a good week to do research on one individual piece of legislation. I feel like I’m rambling.

I did realize something that I am learning here, though, just last night while I was working on the Analysis assignment that is a part of me acquiring academic credit for this experience. By nature, I am not really one to raise a fuss about anything. I am content to be left alone and to leave everything else alone. However, the very point of existence for Rural Women New Zealand is to do just the opposite – it is to advocate and raise a stink if something does not sit well in regards to how legislation might impact rural communities, to push for change. I know that I need to take a lesson from that, not that I will not be true to myself and not that I will totally abandon my typical approach of “let’s see how we can make this work without rocking the boat.” But I need to be able to use my voice, as well. I need to be able to stand my ground when necessary. We’ll see how this shapes out!

I think I am going to be challenged in a whole new way over the next few weeks. I’ve been bumped up to the front desk in lieu of Bee’s absence (she is the office manager). I’m helping answer the phones (reminds me of my days at NLCF) and do some administrative tasks. Having a very limited knowledge of the administrative side of RWNZ has left me a bit dazed and feeling stupid in trying to help people over the phone. Oh well – lots to learn I suppose!

As a final note, I just asked my co-worker Paddy what she thought of the American accent. I wondered whether it was obnoxious sounding. She said it was adorable – nice and soft. On the other hand, she finds Kiwi accents to be flat and harsh. Interesting!

Internship Journal 7 of 10...Time Flies!

This last week was an interesting one. I was still feeling quite defeated from the “call to action” scenario from the week before, and spent much of my time at work re-thinking my initial approach. By Thursday, I had an idea of the direction I wanted my report to go in, but still was having a difficult time achieving that goal. In the end, I just started writing to myself, asking myself what point I wanted to make. I sent my ramblings over to Noeline with a request for more specific guidance in how to achieve what she was looking for.

Her response greatly encouraged me. “You have no idea how well you are doing, I should be telling you more!” Additionally, in the comment’s section of a bi-weekly progress report thing I have to turn in, she noted that “Over the last two weeks I have really pushed Sarah along on ECE only because of the view that she can handle this very difficult issue. And I am proving to be right! I gave an additional challenge in that she needs to think about calls to action when investigating policies that may be
impacting negatively on a community and come up with solutions. Sarah is
proving to be a valuable asset to this office, and she makes a great cup of
coffee!”

I have come to realize just how much I value a positive comment (probably why I love instructor feedback on the papers I turn in for school). A quote from the movie Gladiator really captures how powerful of an impact words of praise have on me: “One kind word…would have been like the sun on my heart for a thousand years.” I hold on to praises and encouragement, for they build me up.

Anyway, I had the opportunity to be a part of the office outside of the office on a few occasions. On Tuesday evening, I was invited along to the book release for the RWNZ cookbook, A Good Spread. It was a nice evening, if somewhat overwhelming; I met many of the Council members who were in town for meetings, as well as the wife of the Governor General, although I only found out who she was afterwards. For the most part, I ended up hanging out with Angela, who was the chef for the evening and the daughter of one of the women who work in the office with me. We had some good laughs, and she was kind enough to offer me a ride home after all was said and done.

Also, Noeline generously took me out for lunch over the weekend. She picked me up on Sunday after church and together she, her partner Ronan, and I all drove out to Maranui Surf and Life Saver’s Club for lunch. On the second floor of the club is a nice café that overlooks the water. It was lovely – the sun was shining, there were people out surfing, and the food was delicious! Afterwards, Noeline drove me along the coastline, pointing out different locations of significance or interest (memorials, Peter Jackson’s old home, a nude beach, walking trails). My favourite thing about New Zealand is by far the outdoors. It’s spectacular! The last stop on my adventure with Noeline was to go to her home and meet all of her cats. It was great to hold an animal again, that’s all I can say.

All in all, I suppose it has been a very diverse but interesting week at work! I feel as though I have emerged on the other side of a challenging assignment and that I’ll be able to pull through it in the end. This next week ought to be a change of pace, as well, for I’ll be getting a taste of some administrative duties, from what I understand.

Remarkable: (adjective) Attracting notice as being unusual or extraordinary

"Go to South Island," said Jane over our cheeseburgers at the Farmer's Home Tavern in dear old Hemlock, Michigan (voted best cheeseburgers in the county, don't ya know). Well, Jane, if you are indeed reading this, I followed your advice more than once. You were absolutely right!

My final trip to South Island was almost a whole month ago. I can't believe it's been that long already. On 1 July, Kendall, Amanda, Adam, Wes, and I boarded a morning plane to Dunedin. I sat next to a Maori woman who had an owl tattoo on her chin (the owl is the guardian to the Maori, or so I learned, just as women are the guardian of the

children). If you are curious to see what they look like, go ahead and use Google image and search for "moko kauae". Anyway, she had been in Wellington to learn how to teach Zumba (an aerobic, Latin-inspired dance) from a Canadian man.

The view out the window was incredible! I borrowed this picture from Kendall...although I did take it with her camera! ;)

The sun rose just as we were flying over the beginnings of the mountains of S. Island. Even if I don't particularly enjoy flying, I enjoyed seeing that view!

We arrived safely in Dunedin and grabbed a shuttle into town. As we had a bit of time on our hands before our Intercity bus left for Queenstown, we took the opportunity to explore the city a bit. The rest of the group's attention was caught by the Cadbury chocolate factory. Though I do enjoy chocolate, I opted to simply walk around the city instead. It felt like I was off on another one of my solo-European adventures, just wandering the city, seeing what there was to see, both the marvelous and the mundane.

There is a certain demeanor that every tourist has, a particular way of moving that sends out the signal "I don't really belong here like you do, but I am enjoying being here much more than you are." In any case, there was a moment of mutual acknowledgement between myself and another woman while out on this walk. As it turns out, she was an Australian who was in the country to help look after her grandchildren for a time. She explained to me her recent trek to see sculptures of giant molars, noting that their placement had been an item of controversy to the locals. We wished each other well on our travels, and I followed her directions to the "mouth of the bay".

I met back up with my travel companions at the bus station just in time to catch our double-decker bus. A bit of a side story, I volunteered to work at an orientation for the incoming international students earlier in the summer and met a student from Saudia Arabia who had previously studied in New Zealand. I asked him if I were to visit only one place where I should go, and he recommended Queenstown. During this trip, I followed his advice, for that is exactly where the bus was headed. It was a nice trip - the sun was shining the whole way as we rolled across hills and through mountains. Amanda introduced me to a game she had made up on a drive through Iowa called "my cows." The object of the game is to be the first to spot a herd of cattle, at which point you call out "MY COWS!" After a few miles, as you can imagine, you have accumulated quite the hoard of cows. However, the most important part of this game is to be the first to spot a cross, because you then win the came and kill all of the other person's cows. Entertaining.

When we arrived in to Queenstown, we were picked up by another of the American interns who was placed at an internship at a hotel there. He was generous enough to let us stay in his room while we were in Queenstown -- thanks again! Although all of us were absolutely exhausted, we agreed to spend a night out and about in Queenstown. The highlight of it all was most definitely the delicious Fergburger!! I got a "cockadoodle oink" sandwich (chicken and bacon) and it was fabulous (especially since I hadn't really eaten since brekkie and it was well past ten pm when we stopped for a Ferg). The rest of the gang signed up for a Pub Crawl -- I accompanied them, but stayed sober. Didn't stop me from dancing!

Just to pause and reflect on feelings about alcohol...I don't like that people feel that they have to be drunk to have fun. I have plenty of fun sober, believe me! There's the whole concept of joy that I feel people miss out on, which is unfortunate. And I would rather people not feel that they have to have a few drinks in to be an interesting person. Just loosen up! Be yourself without depending on a drink! That isn't to say that I don't drink on occasion, but it's in moderation and more for the enjoyment of a drink, much like one would enjoy a chocolate bar. Anyways...

Friday morning rolled around, and what a perfect day to be in Queenstown! For a cloudy little country, the skies were clear and perfectly blue! Amanda, Kendall, and Joe headed out to bungy jump, whereas Adam, Wes, and I stayed in town until it was time for our Lord of the Rings tour (yup...you read correctly).

Linda, one of the women I work with, recommended taking the gondola if the weather was fine, and so that's exactly what we did! What a view!

Behind me is Lake Wakatipu, which has a tide. According to Maori legend, the tide is the result of the beating heart of a giant that was killed there. The actual legend is much more interesting -- full of heroism and love -- but at the moment I can't recall it properly.

The following mountain range was dubbed "The Remarkables" when it was discovered that they run perfectly north and south. Plus...they're just...remarkable to look at, eh?

As New Zealand is the adventure capital of the world, we decided to do something adventurous. The result was a "luge" ride, which was fun!

We took the gondola back down the hill, went in to see if we could see a Kiwi bird (didn't end up doing that...wasn't worth fifty bucks...). But saw some Kiwi-tracks! ;)

As we continued on, I noticed a graveyard, and said to the guys "This might sound creepy...but I kind of like graveyards." So we walked around in there for a few minutes...

My interest in New Zealand began when I learned as a fanatical young teenager that Lord of the Rings was filmed there. As such, a trip to this country would not be complete without a tour. Adam picked it, Wes and I went! It was pretty nice!

Of Herbs, Stewed Rabbit, and Oliphants >>

The first half hour or so of the tour was on the awkward side of things. The guide was odd, and truthfully didn't know too much about Lord of the Rings at all (bummer). That being said, it was kind of hilarious when he popped the trunk and pulled out a sword, saying "Here's a sword if you want to take pictures," then standing off to the side with his hands in his pockets.

Odd guide or not, the views were incredible and we got to see some wonderful scenery!

Road trip, anyone?

Where Arwen won a round against the Black Riders.

A good day! :)

On Saturday, we got up nice and early to take a bus to Milford Sound.

Our driver was nice, gave us a lot of good information about New Zealand plants and Maori legends. One of my favorite announcements was when we crossed the 45th parallel. He said that only ten percent of the world's population has been south of that parallel (which is halfway between the equator and the south pole). Cool.

For the most part, I'll just let the pictures speak for themselves.

Around here is where Sir Edmund Hillary trained to climb Mt. Everest.

And voila! A non-tropical parrot! They're tricksey little buggers, too. I hear they like to steal things...

The Sound! Well...technically...fjord...but dubbed sound...

Adam and the loverly Kendall! :)

I don't know how to express the fact that I had a great time that weekend in any other way than to say that I had a great time. Those words sound so empty. It's what you tell everybody when you come home when they ask "Wow -- did you have fun?" And you just smile and say "Oh yeah, I had a great time!" But I really mean it! It was a great time.

Joe and I played pool for a few hours when we got back to Queenstown (the hotel he stays at had a table), and Amanda hung out w/ us as well. In the morning, we bussed back to Dunedin, playing hearts with a man and his son on the way. I had to chill in the airport because I was on a different flight from everybody else. Not much else to report.

It's odd to write this so late...but I'm glad that I am. The details are already starting to haze over.

Next travel update will be about a weekend trip to Rotorua!

Pushing for More

Internship week 6

Most of my week at work was spent looking up information on the budget and Early Childhood Education, and then writing up a summary of what was going on politically. Something about this week was difficult, though. I was feeling pretty negative about myself (appearance, personality, abilities, the whole bit), missing home, feeling lonely, and so on. Not necessarily a highlight of the trip so far, that’s for sure. Anyway, all of those negative emotions resulted in me really not wanting to focus and do work. Pushed through it – what else can you do? – and got it done. However, when I turned it in to Noeline on Thursday, she called me into her office. “What’s the point?” she asked. “We’re about advocacy – what are we advocating? Where is the call to action? What are we supposed to be doing about this?” Things have gone well enough at work so far, but that really let some air out of an already deflated balloon.

I have realized how little I have had to push myself. Academia, the realm in which I have spent a majority of my life in, is a comfortable world for me. It’s easy for me to produce A’s, and in some ways I am ashamed of that. There are many other people who work so much harder than I do for lower grades. Working in the Writing Centre at my university has really shown me that, especially with the people who are coming back to school after living in the real world for a decade or two. One woman in particular, a grandmother from Flint (a not-so-nice Michigan city), would spend several days writing and revising a paper that I could probably knock out in an afternoon. I don’t feel that I deserve my abilities, but I do know that I have to use them responsibly.

Anyway, my point in that whole bit is that I am disappointed in my reaction to a piece of valid criticism. I never realized how much of a quitting attitude I can have. However, that doesn’t mean that I have quit. I am just going to have to do some more stretching, more searching, MORE. For the first time in my life, I have to struggle to produce something that is more.

Did You Ever See a Whale With a Polka Dotted Tail?

Second post...same day...wow. Feast or famine, eh?

When I first started to research different adventures to partake of while I was in New Zealand, one of the earliest things to go down on the "To Do" list was whale watching. Also early on the list was to take the train (an ode to Europe, I suppose). I combined them into one trek from June 24 - June 26.

Again, I had travel companions, which was cool! When I mentioned the details of my trip, Wes and Camille decided to come with me. Maybe I'm a different person than I was two years ago when I traveled all around Europe by myself, but having other people along make trips so much more fun!

The first leg of the trip was to catch a flight out of Wellington to Christchurch (located on the South Island) on Thursday night. Camille and Wes were on a different plane than I was, but in a nice change of schedule their plane which was originally supposed to take off about an hour before mine was only left fifteen minutes before mine. Worked nicely! I'm not much of one for flying, but that particular flight was made brighter by Wes lending me his MP3 player ("you're going to be all alone") so I could listen to Jim Gaffigan (comedian). Chuckling helps!

We got in to Christchurch somewhat late, but checked into our hostel and headed out to explore anyways. The night scene at Christchurch is interesting -- more lively than that at either Picton or Nelson (though nothing could compare to all the ruckus of Courtenay Place right outside of our apartment in Wellington -- it never stops there). I was hungry, and KFC was open. Generally speaking, I feel like a sell out when I buy fast food (especially American-based fast food when abroad), but it was delicious.

I didn't sleep much that night. One of the joys of hostels is the mixture of people in one's room. At about two in the morning, one of the women in my room had some sort of a personal crisis. It was an early morning, as well, for we had to be at the train station at about six thirty.

Camille and Wes were in a different booth on the train, and I ended up next to two Kiwi men. At first, I was hesitant and anti-social, opting to listen to music on my headphones rather than interact. When the sun started to come up and illuminate the landscape around me, I couldn't help but turn off my music and comment on how much I enjoyed it. "I can see that, I think," said the man sitting across from me (what the heck, I'll just call him "Red"). I can imagine the little grin I must have had on my face as I absorbed my surroundings. I was told by an Italian man in Rome that I "grin like the cat that catches the mouse," and that kind of satisfaction must have been evident on my face.

I never learned the names of those men, nor did they learn mine. But that didn't stop one of them from buying all three of us a cup of coffee, or discussion about who we were, where we were from. Red might as well have been an uncle or older cousin. I liked him immensely - sharp witted, kind, but teasing. The man directly next to me, by the window, was also nice, if a bit odd. Three strangers on a train, sharing coffee, gummy worms, and granola bars. I don't know why, but it is one of the moments from this summer that I will always remember.

After what seemed like no time at all, the train rolled into Kaikoura (Maori for "Eat Prawns"), which was to be the base for our whale watching excursion. Camille, Wes, and I walked off the train and were privy to one of the most magnificent views I have ever encountered. As usual, the picture does not do the moment justice. The mountains and sea, two titans, lived confidently side by side. The shoreline was composed of millions of rocks, well rounded from the incessant force of the sea. The sound as those waves came ashore was powerful, like a lion's roar. There has been many an occasion where if I stopped to listen I found myself in the middle of a natural symphony, and that was one of them.

Kaikoura itself is not a large town, but man is it a long one. It figures that the train station and our hostel would be on opposite ends of it. We walked for roughly an hour to find the hostel to get checked in a drop off our gear, and then back to the train station again (which doubled as the check-in for the Whale Watch trip). It was a good walk, though. Good walk with new friends. :)

I was quite nervous about the boat part of the whale watching trip (an essential part, unless one is a very good swimmer). There was a "seasickness warning" posted up on the screen at the check-in station for the trip, and I expected myself to be prone to motion sickness. Another large part of it, I think, is that I just am so unfamiliar with the ocean. It is so vast and intimidating to me. After a quick safety lesson, though, we were off to try and track down some whales (sometimes they can't find any, which would have really popped my balloon!!).

Proudly I can say that I did not get sick, though I can understand why there was a warning. It was very rough out there (as we would go over some of the bigger waves, my stomach would drop more than once), but it was pretty fun for me. Fun enough for me to giggle about it. Quickly enough, a whale was spotted! The captain, I think, saw that spout/fountain thing that happens when they breathe. I wasn't sure how it would work out to catch it, because when they announced that they had seen a whale, they said it was about a mile off. However, I didn't realize that whales will stay at the surface for a good ten minutes before diving again in order to re oxygenate. They got the boat up quite close to the whales (two sperm whales) we saw that day, which was awesome. Once again, I was amazed by the presence of an aquatic animal and just thinking about how it could live underwater. Plus, they were both huge!

As we ended the trip (about three hours long) they steered the boat out to a fur seal colony, which was neat! Doesn't it look eerie in the mist like that?

So, I saw whales! That night, we ate pizza (must be a travelling thing), and watched Whale Rider (a Kiwi movie). I think there was another movie in there as well, but I was kind of falling asleep by then.

We got the train back to Picton in the morning (walked all the way through Kaikoura in sideways rain...bummer), and that was uneventful other than meeting Siri from Norway (I think she sat next to or across from Wes, who was in a different part of the train from Camille and myself). She was on the ferry that we ended up switching to because we didn't want to be stuck in Picton all day (I had booked this trip before the trip we all had taken the weekend before, and so we had already seen Picton).

While on the ferry, Wes and I decided to use the Sharpies he always has on him to make somebody's unfortunate sea sickness circumstances a bit more entertaining...Custom designed barf bags!

All of us (including Siri) enjoyed some chicken fajitas that night at our place, and if I remember correctly Toy Story 2 was on TV (just a heads up, you don't have to worry about me nurturing my inner child any time soon...it's well fed and rambunctious). A nice ending to a great weekend!

More to catch up on, but I'm getting there slowly but surely!

Gracie