Sunday was a fairly quiet day, we went in town and got some pictures of where we were staying and then came back to sit on the deck. It’s much hotter here then we’re used to so we moved into the living room into the shade for a bit. Luckily we had closed the sliding door because all of a sudden this bird flies straight into the window with a loud thud! We nearly jump out of our skin and then rush over to the window to see if the bird was all right. Apparently it was as it jumped up, shook its head and flew away. We decide it was safe to out back outside and we were relaxing in the lawn chairs when this bee decides to join us. I’m not such a fan of bees so I freak out when it lands on my leg, which thankfully was covered in my jeans. Unfortunately the bee seem to have gotten stuck in my jeans and no amount of freaking out and running around would get it off. Holly decides to try to kill it and starts beating my leg with her notebook and when that didn’t work, she switched to my sneaker. We finally got the bee off completely unharmed meanwhile I had welts all over my legs. We’ve officially had all the run ins with insects and animals that we could ever want.
We got a ride into school the next morning with Sue, one of the teachers at our school. We had no idea what to expect and was slightly nervous and eager to meet everyone. Turns out we shouldn’t have gotten the ride in with Sue because our principal Martin was going to pick us up and distract us for a bit so the students could get themselves ready to welcome us to the school. Instead we just hid out in the staff room until it was time for us to go out by the gate. There was a new student starting at the school the same day we were so she was also involved in the welcoming ceremony called a powhiri. The student normally lived with her mother in Christchurch but was sent up to live with her father in Manaia while they tried to get things back together down there. Thankfully the student was there because we ended up just following her and her grandmothers lead throughout the ceremony. It was one of the most amazing things we had experienced. The students sang us in, then there were speeches (all in Maori, so we didn’t know what they were saying then but it was translated later) and the students even did the Haka for us, twice!! It was incredible. The students then went off to class and Martin, the principal, took us around the village and then brought us to his house to meet his wife. We had a fascinating chat about educational systems and practices and he told us more about the school. The students will call us Whaea (pronounced like fire only take away the re and replace it with a) which means auntie. The males teacher are called Matua, which means uncle. As he had told us, the village is all related in some way which makes the school act completely like a little community where they all look after each other. There are 77 students in total and that’s years 1-13, there is no bullying in the school and we have yet to see any kind of fighting. That afternoon, we got to watch the years 9-13 Kapa Haka which is similar to a choir like class. They learn songs by a piece of paper with the words on it and the tune is past down by having someone sing it for them first. No instruments are used except a student placed guitar with no music to read from for another song they rehearsed but already knew previously. The students are extremely talented, it’s beautiful to hear them sing.
After classes end we meet the bus driver and then get a ride home with him and the students, we set up a time and a spot to meet him in the mornings. They figured the students might be on their best behavior now that we would be on the bus but that seemed to last all of 10 seconds. They didn’t really seem to notice we were there. This will now be every day for us.
We thought we’d heard all about the crazy bugs in New Zealand and were officially on the lookout for white bummed spiders but we were relaxing after a first day at school when Holly comes out of her bedroom and asks me what’s on the wall. Having my back to it, I hadn’t originally seen the giant bug stalking us. It had sneakily stationed itself between us and the broom and it was the grossest thing we had ever seen. It was black and about the size of my palm with gross beetle legs. One twitch and I was out the door screaming. I don’t know how no one noticed the screams, maybe this had happened with the British people who lived here before us but no one came to our rescue. I was ready to give the bug the house but Holly seemed to think we needed a place to sleep. I tried to get the broom but couldn’t manage to make my feet get within 5 feet of the gross thing. After Holly throws my flip flops at it, it takes off running across the wall and down the coffee table heading for my room. Thankfully Holly jumps into rescue mode grabbing my trusty insect beating sneaker and attacks the thing in the doorway of my room. She beats it with my sneaker, then leaves the sneaker on it and starts jumping on it. Thankfully the sneaker had better luck with the beetle then the bee. It now sits outside as a warning for other gross beetle bugs.
We made it through our first day but there are lots more adventures to come.
To Be Continued...
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