Job Status and Last of Wellington Pictures

I feel the need to follow up on my complaints from my last post, and to reassure any of you who are worried that I really am okay. Everyone has days when things seem like too much, and although I am facing some of those, I know that everything will work out for the best.

I had my meeting with the Kindergarten Association, and am hired on as an "unqualified" reliever. I cannot be "qualified" until the Teacher's Council finishes my application, which will be up to six weeks from now. The unfortunate part about this is that the Kindergarten Association always calls its qualified relievers first, and apparently they have lots of those right now, so it is unlikely that an unqualified teacher would get called in. After receiving this information, I decided to get on the reliever list at a few other centres, and have already done so at three. I will be visiting a fourth tomorrow, and then one more next week. I would have thought that five early learning centres, plus the ten kindergartens that the Kindergarten Association coordinates, would be too many, but I have been told at each centre that they won't be needing relievers very much in the near future. So I'm just spreading out a bit. I am still just a little dubious as to how all of this is going to work out, but I'm glad to be officially on the lists, and the idea that I could be called in to teach is nice.

Okay, back to Wellington. I have some pictures from the Te Papa Museum, which is a very exciting place, full of interesting displays, interactive exhibits, and a great deal of variety. I know that pictures of a museum seem weird, but since when has that prevented me from sharing? So here goes.

This is one of the main attractions at Te Papa. It is the biggest and most complete Colossal Squid on display anywhere. It was caught near Antarctica, examined by scientists, and then transported here. I was actually a bit disappointed, as it seemed smaller than I imagined, but it apparently shrank in the preservation process, and it was still twice as long as me. To give you a bit of scale, it's eyes are the biggest of any known creature - the size of a soccer ball!

The goat-ish animal on top of the mountain is a Chamois, which came to NZ in 1907 as a gift from the Austrian Emperor. They have spread over the South Island, and are now hunted freely, to restrict their impact on native species. The birds in the lower left corner are native Takahē, which are flightless birds that almost went extinct when Europeans came to NZ, but are making a recovery.

This picture is part of the absolutely fantastic earthquake exhibit at Te Papa. The red line shows the division between two tectonic plates, and quite clearly demonstrates why there are so many earthquakes here. Doesn't look like a very safe place to be, does it?

This is the Māori god Rūaumoko, who controls earthquakes and volcanos. You can see a lightening bolt coming out of one eye, indicating that he also controls storms. It is hard to see in this picture, but he has pieces of earth in his eye and mouth, to show his control over earth and its movement.

This picture shows that some wētā (insects) from NZ weigh as much as three mice! I don't know why I find that so fascinating, but I absolutely do. I want to see one in real life now.

This is a tuatara eating a wētā. Tuatara are native to NZ, and (as is true of almost all native species here) is found no where else in the world. They are very important little lizards, because they are the only existing members of the Order Sphenodontia. Apparently, there were lots of species in that Order, back when there were dinosaurs, but all the others have died out, leaving only the tuatara. I think that's pretty neat.

This is a moa. I confess that until I went to Te Papa, I thought that moas were made up creatures that only existed in J's video games. Wrong. They are extinct now, but they lived in NZ not all that long ago. I am amazed by how much like look like huge kiwis. Amazingly, though, moas actually had no wings at all, not even the little ones that other flightless birds have. The bird that is attacking this one is the Haast's Eagle, which was its only natural predator. Unfortunately, the moas were overhunted and lost a lot of their habitat when Māori people came, and they became extinct in 1400 A.D.

This is a traditional Māori whare (building). I was not allowed to take pictures of the inside, but it was beautiful, full of carvings of people and gods, with paua shells inlaid, and amazing detail.

That's it for the museum. There is so very much information in there, and so very many things to see, that I could post pictures and stories forever, but I will restrain myself. I have just a few more pictures before letting go of Wellington and moving on to other things.

This is J's new umbrella. Do you like it? There were several very cool sculptures/fun things downtown, and J and I had fun finding them as we walked around looking for a place to eat on our last night.

I took this picture out the window of the bus on the way to Palmerston North. (By the way, I took the bus because Lionel decided to stay for the weekend and tour Wellington, and J didn't have room in his car until he dropped his colleague off in Palmerston North.) Anyway, I think that the land mass is Kapiti Island, which is apparently beautiful, and to which we will be going some day. What it made me think of this time, however, is the Māori name for NZ - Aotearoa, which means "the land of the long, white cloud." According to Māori legend, a man named Kupe was the first person to ever come to NZ. He sailed here with his wife (who, being a woman, doesn't count as the first person who ever came here). When she first saw NZ, she yelled, "He ao! He ao!" ("A cloud! A cloud!") It turned out that the cloud was floating low over the land, much like in this picture, and that's where the name originated. (There are other versions of the story, but I like this one best, and you can see how it could be true.)

Apathy

Yesterday and today (Monday and Tuesday), I have felt terribly apathetic. This is not a typical experience for me - usually have more fervour than I know what to do with (unhelpful in it's own way, at times, but at least I'm used to it). I think that coming back from Wellington to the continuation of waiting for paperwork and not having a job was quite a downer.

I know that that's silly, because my Criminal Record Check actually went through this week, and I have an appointment with the Kindergarten Association tomorrow to hopefully start relieving. The NZ Teacher's Council received my application, and they will take up to six weeks to process it, but at least my part should be done. So I am much closer than ever to starting work, but I just find myself feeling lethargic and defeatist. What if I get hired as a reliever, but they never call me because they already have plenty of relievers? Then things will just keep going as they are. Which I hadn't thought was so bad - I mean, I live in NZ, how bad can it be? But still I find myself sad, tired, and uninspired.

After moping and puzzling for a while, I figured out the problem. I need a job. It's no longer just that I would like to have a job because I like my work, or it's nice to make money, or that's what grown-ups do. Now it's that I have an emotional and psychological need to be a teacher again. The problem is, I am not doing anything meaningful or important to anybody now. I keep busy running errands, learning Māori, reading, visiting early learning centres, etc., but on a daily basis, no one would care if I didn't. I am (as you all know) very extroverted and enjoy being interconnected. I have friends here, and please don't think that I don't value them, or that I feel isolated. On the contrary, I am amazed and thrilled with the connections I've made. But I don't get up knowing that a classroom full of kids is waiting for me, that they would miss me if I wasn't there, and that my skill at my job is helping them a little bit every day. Turns out, I really like that feeling.

I am in the spectacularly privileged position of having found exactly the job I want to do for the rest of my life, and of finding overwhelming fulfillment in every day of my work. I am so thankful that this is true. The problem is, I am not doing that job right now, and, in fact, have not done it since I quit my job in Canada six whole months ago. That is the longest I have ever not worked in a preschool in four years, and now I know why. I need it. It gives me purpose, energy, fun, direction, love, and joy. Of course, I have all of those things in other ways in my life, but it's not the same. When I don't have kids to focus on, love, worry about, plan for, hug, laugh with, puzzle over, etc., my mind has trouble filling up that emotional and cognitive space, because nothing is quite like it. I am trying to be optimistic about finding many of these things in relieving, and I really did enjoy doing it in Canada, but I still see it as a stepping stone to settling down into my own classroom. And much as I want to be excited for this next step, and even though I know what an important one it is, today I just wish that I was done taking steps. I am ready to get there and stay.

I feel stupid whining about all of this, given how lucky I am to be here, and knowing that I will eventually find a job that I love, which is more than many people do. But I am not good at being unemployed, and when I left my job in Canada in May, I never would have thought that I would make it all the way to mid-November without a new one. Again, it is dumb to complain about a sequence of events that landed me in NZ, but... I am anyway, I guess. I am still thankful, but I am also tired of waiting to get back to doing what I love.

On the bright side, please wish me luck at my meeting tomorrow. I'm not sure if it's an interview exactly, but I am confident that it will move me forward towards relieving, and I am glad.

Pictures: The Harbour, The Beehive, and the Botanical Gardens

Hello everyone. I have had a very busy day, which included three separate Skype dates, and then a high-energy and delightful barbecue (apparently that's the Kiwi way to spell it) with some friends who very kindly invited us over. I am very happy with our day, but I feel all talked out after so much discussion and sharing with so many people. Not surprisingly, that does not put my in a blogging mood. Fortunately, today's post relies heavily on pictures, so hopefully you will not be too disappointed in my lack of enthusiastic descriptions. Be assured that I was enthusiastic as I was actually seeing these things. :)

The first set of pictures are of my walk down Oriental Parade, which is a road that runs along the harbour. It has a great walking/biking trail that goes along next to it, with stairs down to the beach.

I stopped to get some ice cream, and found "Kapiti Coast New Zealand Originals" in a little shop. The Kapiti coast is just west of Wellington, and is very beautiful. I got this passionfruit ice cream popsicle, and it was ridiculously delicious.

As I was walking, I noticed a trail zig-zagging up a hill, and so I followed it. It lead up through forested areas, with houses build here and there on the side of the hill, and when I got up high, it gave me great views looking back on the harbour where I'd walked. (I walked along that strip of sandy beach you can see in the left side of the picture and around to the trail at the bottom right.) When I found it on the map, it was labeled Mount Victoria, and it looks like there are trails that extend quite a ways from the water. I did about half an hour of hiking, but there is lots more for next time.

At the top of one of the trails is this wonderful slide, which, of course, I tried out. It is actually quite fast, especially when you get to the curve. :)

This is Matiu/Sommes Island, to which I had missed the ferry that morning. I am definitely going next time we're in Wellington! You will hear more about it when I post about Māori legends sometime soon.

This is the beach where I found the paua shell and the sea glass.

The next few pictures are from Wednesday night, when J, Lionel, and took the cable car up to the Botanical Gardens. It was rather cold and definitely raining, so we didn't linger as long as we might have otherwise, but it was still beautiful.

I know it's cliché, but I love drops of water on roses.

I have never seen roses this colour. Seems like they would be a hit at K-State.

On the way back from the gardens, we went by the capital buildings. I had already seen them when it was not rainy, but J and Lionel got to see them, so that was good.

This is Parliament House, where they have the Debating Chamber and the Speaker's Office.

This one is called "The Beehive," and it is the Executive wing of the parliament buildings. It is much bigger than it looks in this picture - I could not get far enough away from it to get the whole thing into a picture without a big tree in the way or something.

There is plenty more of Wellington coming - I may have to space it out in between updates on other things, because it is going to take me a while to cover it all.

Pictures: Drive to Wellington, the Zoo, and Downtown

After a pleasant week in Wellington, J and I are glad to be home. And now that I have my camera cord, I can show you pictures of what the week was like.

On the way to Wellington, Lionel and I stopped in Foxton for some chai and something sweet - I picked apple shortcake. A local bird was thrilled with my choice. Right before my incredulous eyes, it hopped up and took a huge bite out of my apple shortcake - right off my plate! I was thrilled, although the future patrons may not appreciate me encouraging this behaviour. But it was very exciting!

This was my first view of the harbour, as we drove down out of the large hills.

This is J and I at dinner the first night - we ate with Lionel and another colleague, and had a nice time.

My first full day in Wellington (Monday) was beautiful and sunny, although the wind was ferocious and cold. I took the bus to the zoo, and enjoyed walking around. The Wellington Zoo is not particularly big, but it is well put together, with lots of shows and feedings to watch.

I know ducks aren't that exciting as zoo animals go, but how adorable is this little family?

This is one of the stars of the Wellington Zoo, Sean the Sun Bear. He was rescued from the wild when he ended up too near a town, and is now a huge local attraction. In addition, Wellington Zoo is a world leader in Sun Bear breeding, and Sean brought much-needed genetic variation to their program.

This is a Nyala - a kind of antelope. This particular Nyala came from South Africa. I think that they are very beautiful. The males, of whom I was not able to get a picture, have beautiful spiral horns.

I love the way this zoo has approached insects, spiders, snakes, and reptiles. The whole exhibit is like a comic book, with the descriptions of the creatures phrased as super powers. I think that it is an ingenious way to get children (and adults) to appreciate these creatures, rather than dismiss them all as "creepy" and just be scared of them.

When I sat down at a picnic table to eat my sandwich, this little duck decided to join me. He hopped up on the bench opposite me and calmly watched me eat my entire lunch. It was nice to have some company.

The following pictures are from Tuesday, when I did a bit of exploring right in the middle of downtown. It was another beautiful day, and I had planned to take the ferry out to Matiu/Sommes Island in the middle of the harbour. I had also planned to be early for said ferry, but due to slight miscalculations, I only got there 5 minutes before it was scheduled to leave. Unfortunately, my worst miscalculation was not having known that about 500 other vehicles of various kinds also leave from that warf, and I found the right ferry just in time to watch it drift away. Yuck.

Fortunately, I had a lovely time downtown. This is only the beginning of my pictures from that day, but the rest are of a different part of town, and will be saved for my next post.

This is a stunning ball made out of silver ferns, and is one of my favourite Kiwi things I've seen so far. The cables holding it up are surprisingly noticeable in the picture - in real life, with movement all around (above and below), you don't notice them, and it really looks like it's floating.

Right by the waterfront is a beautiful bridge made out of weathered wood that is very reminiscent of a shipwrecked boat. I don't know if that's what they're going for, but that's what it made me think of.

This beautiful lady caught my eye because I couldn't tell if it was letters or just holes that decorated her.

Upon closer inspection, not only are there words, there is quite interesting poetry. I had fun reading her skirt. I am especially fond of the bit at the top of this picture, because it's about tea.

I was drawn to the lovely colours of this sculpture, and I have always loved seashells - little did I know that in just a few hours, I would find my very own paua shell on the beach!

More Wellington

I have been having a great time in Wellington, and J’s training is going well. I have been to the Waterfront, to Mt Victoria, to Te Papa Museum, to the Parliament buildings, and up Oriental Parade (a beautiful street by the harbour). These things are all best saved for when I get home and can accompany them with pictures, but I will do what I can today.

I went down to the beach off Oriental Parade, and had a nice, relaxing walk. In addition, I found some lovely mementos, which I can take pictures of on my computer. First, I found two beautiful pieces of sea glass. I find it sad and irresponsible that so much broken glass ends up in the ocean, but amazingly poetic and comforting that it turns into something so beautiful. It’s like nature’s effort to soften and transform the harsher side of human nature.

Here are the two pieces that I chose to keep.

Next, I was astonished and thrilled to find a large, whole, stunning paua (abalone) shell, right there on the beach! They are coveted here, and therefore hard to find anywhere, but especially somewhere like Wellington.

This is the inside of the shell. The colours don’t show through well on the picture, and it should be polished, but it’s really pretty.

This is the outside of the shell. Apparently, you can sand/polish away the deposits on the outside, and then it will look just like the inside! I haven’t decided if I want to find a way to do that or not. We’ll have to see.

In other news, J and one of his colleagues and I went out to dinner at a Phô Vietnamese restaurant. In addition to being a nice place, it brought back great memories of all the Phô that we ate in Ottawa last year. We’d never had it until we moved there, and then J fell in love, and we ate at pretty much every Phô place in the city, which is quite an accomplishment. Anyway, it was a lovely time.

It was cold and rainy today, but it was still a good day. Also, I realized today that I missed our little house in Whanganui, which made me happy. It’s nice to have my own home to miss. J

Wellington and Forgetfulness

When I packed for Wellington, I made sure to fully charge my camera, bring the charger just in case, and even to put in a big memory card. But did I remember to bring my cord so that I could put the pictures on my computer for my blog? No. So, no pictures until we get home on Friday night. Sorry about that. They're good pictures, though. You will enjoy them when they come. :)

I rode down to Wellington with Lionel in his camper-van (which is what they call RVs here). We had a nice ride through some beautiful countryside, ending up by the beautiful harbour. It was nice to talk with Lionel, and it was very nice of him to let me ride with him. When we got here, we met up with J and another MPI employee, and we all walked around downtown a bit, then found a nice restaurant for dinner. It was a delicious dinner, with pleasant company.

Unfortunately, when we got back to the hotel, I got hit by a nasty case of food poisoning. I'm betting that it was from some of the snacky-food at the art gallery we went to, since the food was sitting outside. Anyway, I had a miserable night, but J ran to the store and got me medicine, and today I feel 100% better, so that's all good. I went to the Wellington Zoo today, and had a very nice time. I'll wait and tell you about it with pictures when I get back.

In the meantime, I thought I'd tell you a bit about Wellington. It is the capital of NZ, and it is the third largest city in the country with a population of 200,000. It is much smaller than Auckland and technically smaller than Christchurch, but if you count the suburbs and surrounding urban area, it is actually bigger than Christchurch. It is down on the southern tip of the North Island, and is where you can take a ferry down to the South Island, if you are so inclined. The Parliament Buildings and other government offices are here, but there are also a lot of art galleries, nice cafés, and museums, and it apparently has a great night life. My friends in Whanganui have told me that Auckland is great, but if they were going to live in a big city, they would definitely choose Wellington, because it has more personality and culture. It has been ranked in the Top 10 Cities to Visit by The Lonely Planet, which is pretty cool.

The downtown area, which is where our hotel and J's training is, is extremely compact - everything I want to see/do downtown is within a 10 minute walk from the hotel, which is so nice. Unfortunately, there are amazing-looking restaurants and cafés every two steps, which means I have to walk past 100 of them to get anywhere, and am focusing on developing some self-control. We'll see how I do.

I am glad to be feeling better, glad to be in Wellington, and glad that J will be done for the day soon, and then hopefully we can get a nice dinner. Also, I'm sorry about the lack of pictures, but they will come, I promise.

This and That

After all this fuss about my application to the NZQA, they finished it on Wednesday, mailed it out on Thursday, and it was scheduled to be delivered by courier Friday morning! I was thrilled with this, because we are leaving for a week on Sunday (more about that later), and if it came while I was gone, it would just have to wait. Unfortunately, they said it would be delivered in the morning, so I waited at home all day, until I had to leave for an appointment at 3:00, and they came 15 minutes after I left! So all I got was a note saying that I would have to pick the envelope up downtown after 4:30. That meant that when I picked it up at 4:30, I had half an hour to make copies of the results, get the copies certified, repackage it with the other documents the NZ Teacher's Council needed, and then get it to the post office. Wonder of wonders, I DID IT!! Yay! I was very stressed out after the whole day of waiting and then the frantic rush at the end, but it is over now. I am hoping the the NZ Teacher's Council will be more reasonable than the NZQA was, and in any case, it is the last step towards registration, so that feels lovely. I am now working on taking deep breaths and letting go of the stress.

One thing that really helps me to do that, and that has become one of my favourite activities lately, is sitting outside in the sun to read. It is still quite chilly here in the mornings, but the sun is so strong! I can wear long sleeves and long pants, and put on my wonderful sun hat, so I don't have to worry about sunburn, and the sun beats down and warms me up, while the cool breeze keeps me from getting too hot. Combine that with a good book and a cup of chai, and it is deliciously close to perfection.

Another great stress reliever is going on walks, and Kirsten showed me a great place to do it today. We got a bit lost, which resulted in over a two hour walk through beautiful forests, with pleasant conversation the whole way, which was wonderful. Here are some pictures of where we were:

In other news, J has training in Wellington all next week, and his work doesn't mind if I share his hotel room, so we're off to Wellington! I am so excited to explore the city and see what adventures I can find. I'll post more information about Wellington itself next time. For now, J and I are going to an art show opening for a friend of Kirsten's who just graduated from art school. I think it will be a good time.