Food, Rain and Ukeleles

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Firstly, I apologise for the complete lack of communication/updates to this in the past week! It has been relatively busy but not such that I shouldn't have updated this. My excuse is in fact the book that i'm reading! 'The Magician's Guild' by Trudi Canavan. A lot better than I initially thought it would be. Unfortunately it is the first in a trilogy - the sequel to which I don't own and can't find in any book shops in Auckland!
Right - The past week:
Monday was an interesting day. I arrived to be told that Nicole, the receptionist at Owairaka, was ill and could I possibly fill in for her for the day? Ok I thought - I can do this! It's one thing being a receptionist in a school you went to for 13 years, know the staff, the campus and the majority of parents/children have english as their first language and if they don't are fluent in it anyway. At Owairaka however this obviously wasn't the case! I have never been so nervous answering the phone in my entire life! I managed to survie the day doing stationary orders, photocopying and trying to be helpful generally and followed the day with an ice cream from the school Dairy on the way home. The kitchen at the hostel had been taken over by Swedish people that evening and so we (Milly and I) sat in a little sitting room on our floor eating pasta and playing card games with Claire (our Australian friend), Tess and Callum (an Irish guy who's been staying here for 10 months already).
On Tuesday I had music for most of the day and the first session of Puriri team (years 3-4) Choir. I taught them some warm ups that I do with national youth choir involving pretending to be a penguin and a banana! We began teaching them Hine e Hine a Maori lullaby. We also had a session with 5 Rimu team children (years 0-2) which we have name 'special singing' for the children who need more confidence in singing/can't pitch properly yet. That evening, Amanda, Claire, Ben and I went down to the London bar to watch Daniel sing in an open mike night. He was fantastic and everyone else there seemed to think so aswell.
Wednesday saw the first session of Kauri team choir (yrs 5-6) where after teaching them warmups I began teaching them 'Colours of the Wind' from Pocahontas. They were making a pretty good sound and it was really rewarding after just one rehearsal! After school Robyn took Milly and I to the UK food shop in Onehunga (pronounce On-ee-hu-nga). We got far too overexcited about custard creams and robinsons sqaush! When we got home, Annette met us to give us our food money for the next two weeks and to celebrate the fact we all had money again all the volunteers and Annette went out to Mt Fuji (our favourite little Japanese place down the road). I made the correct decision with my food order this time and was chilli seed free!
On Thursday I was mainly in music lessons with Robyn again. At break, Dan and I took a couple of Ukelele's into the playground to have a little jam and get some of the kids playing with us. Some of the Kauri team girls came over and showed up our ukelele skills completely. They are fantastic at playing and so much better than me (although I am improving!) The afternoon was spent doing a bit of admin and then some general music appreciation for Daniel myself and Ben as there were no music lessons. We just had a quiet night in complete with chocolate and tv.
On Friday it was incredibly rainy. There were rivers of water running everywhere and it made me appreciate greatly that GHS junior school is all in one building! (The staff room at Owairaka is quite a distance without cover from the music room!) After school a huge group of us went to the cinema to see 'He's just not that into you' Whilst not the best film i've ever seen it was entertaining and funny at points whilst at other made you cringe. After the film we all went to 'Father Ted's' and Irish bar just off the main street. There was a band playing but i'm not sure whether there was much musical talent in it. We couldn't hear the singing most of the time as the disortion on the guitars was so high and when we could they forgot the words to 'Summer of 69' - Bryan Adams! It was still a good night though!
The weekend saw an early start for Milly and I as we got a 9.00 ferry to Devonport. We had been told by one of the teachers to go the food and wine festival over there which began this weekend. We arrived to find that it didn't start until eleven and there was a $45 entrance fee. Feeling like poor students we decided against going and wandered around Devonport instead! We spotted an exciting looking cafe for lunch and met Claire, Tess, Hugo (a Dutch guy we had met the day before) and Callum (our Irish friend) there. Following a massive lunch of Chicken Satay (be jealous Kat - be very jealous) we went for a walk around Devonport, along the beach and up to North point as the others hadn't been up there before. We explored the old army shelters on the side of the hill and then made our way to the bar we had discovered on our first trip there. We made our way back across the water and then got ready for the evening. We all went across to Auckland Domain to see something called the 'Starlight Symphony'. It was a free, live show of mainly classical music including old british favourites - Jerusalem, Pomp and Circumstance but also had performances from Brooke Fraser (a young singer/songwriter) a Queen tribute and musical theatre! The evening was finished with Tchaikovsky's 1812 overture with 4 mahusive canons as well as a laser light show and the best firework display i've ever seen simultaneously! It was a fantastic end to the evening.
This morning we got up early again and Tess, Daniel, Milly and I went to Titirangi market on the other side of Auckland (one of the teachers from Tess' school drove us over there) It was a fantastic little market with many beautifully handcrafted items and some very exciting looking and smelling food. After a quick trip to food town in New Lynn (Natasha dropped us back halfway home) we managed to find a bus that took us to the hostel. This evening we are heading over to Annettes in Epsom (yes there is an Epsom over here!) for a BBQ and a swim which should be fantastic!

Ok, well I feel that this novel has done justice to the fact that I haven't updated this in a week.

I hope everyone is well over in England/where ever you might be in the world and keep smiling!

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Photos

21st Feb
View from the Ferry

21st Feb 1
Cool light on the water

21st Feb 2
View of North Head

21st Feb 3
FAMILY-SIZE Cadburys

21st Feb 4
Starlight Symphony programme

Comments

[Kat]

I am jealous...VERY jealous. Me want satay.