During school this week I got to attend a refugee group meeting. This is where kids that have been part of a refugee camp and some point in their lives get the chance to get together to talk about where they are from, the different places they have lived in their lives, and their different cultures. Today three of the girls who are from Iraq that got to dress up in their cultural formal outfits as they talked a little bit about where they are from.
They looked so beautiful and it was a great experience to learn a little bit more about them. Two boys from my year 4 and 5 class were a part of this group as well. Sherzad is from Afghanistan and Tao is from Korea. Many of these kids have seen horrible things through the struggles and wars that their families have been through. The support that they are provided through this group is well needed blessing. It was so fun to be with all these children while the learned about each others cultures, asked questions, and participated in different activites.
There was another girl who presented during this group today whose name is Linda. She has some severe disabilities physically and mentally so I was very proud of her as she got up to present a little bit about where she’s from. She was born in Congo and spent a good deal of the beginning of her life in Africa. She dressed up in some of the formal attire from Congo and talked about the drums that the people use there. I have grown to really love Linda. She is part of my year 7 and 8 class right now. It has been a very big change to work with her because she is severely disabled. I have spent time with her as she works on typing out sentences because holding a pencil is very difficult. I have also spent time with her during swimming. This was one of the biggest challenges of all because she is bigger than me. I had to keep a careful eye on her to always know where she was at all times. Often she would want to run into the middle of the other students swimming lessons and disrupt what they were working on. I had to try to hold her back and keep her in a certain area. But over all we’ve had fun together and we are learning how to work together. It is very hard to understand her as she tries to speak so we are working out how to communicate and work together. But it has been a big learning and growing experience for me to get to spend so much time with her.
My mentor teacher, Jo, really is living my dream life ha. She gets to teach elementary school and also teach a workout class at a gym. I know that doesn’t’ sound super glamorous but to me it sounds ideal! She just laughed when I told her she was living my dream but it really does sound good. She invited me and the other girls to come to her class and we were super excited about it! We got a ride with her and headed to her class. It was more than an aerobics class. It involved a lot of weights and lunges and abs! It was SO fun! I can’t wait to get back home and start taking classes at the gym. I must admit the four of us were pretty weak compared to some of the other people in the class and especially Jo. But we made it through. Unfortunately and fortunately we were all sore the next day. I love being sore because then I know that I got a really good work out in. But the soreness is not going away as fast as I would have hoped. My arms are still killing and it’s been a few days ha. Jo was so sweet to take the four of us! Hopefully we can go once more this week!
This weekend was our last weekend in Auckland! So crazy! Next weekend we will be in Rotorua, the fallowing weekend we will be up North, the weekend after that we will be Australia, and the last weekend I will be back in Utah with my family!
Anyways we wanted to really enjoy our last weekend in this wonderful city that has been our home for the past two and a half months. Friday morning the four some went on a long walk across town to the wonderful store of Pak-n-Save.
This is one of the major grocery stores in New Zealand. It is similar to Costco except items do not come in quite as big of bulk sizes and at Pak-n-Save you have to pay for the bags you put your groceries into. At Pak-n-Save we started to stalk up on candy/lollies that are unique to New Zealand to bring back for our families to try!
Friday night we had a late nighter with most of the girls. The focal point of this get together was to try Emily’s famous cheese cake, that was FANTASIC!!! But it was so nice to be able to sit around together and talk about life and school. I really miss getting to see all the girls during the week. Once it started getting late we called our taxi friend that we had made the other night, George! He came and picked us up from the party and remembered right where we lived!! He is so great! He said that we are becoming his regulars so he will start giving us even better discounts J I really want to make him cookies or something because it is really nice to have a nice taxi driver who you trust! Yes I’ve only been in the car with him twice of a total time less than an hour but I’m pretty sure I can trust him.
Saturday all 16 and Dr. Jacobs, Linda, and Dr. J’s sister all got to go up to the top of the sky tower for a big brunch! When you first get to the sky tower you take an elevator that is part glass up the center of the tower. As we went up you could watch the floor from where we left as we rose higher and higher. We got to our first stop, the observatory. This was room where we could walk around and look through the glass widows covering the walls on every side.
You can view the whole city from here. It was amazing being up that high. There were also parts where you could look through the floor where there was glass and see the city below and feel like you are almost floating.
Next we went up the elevator a little bit further to the restaurant. I loved being a the restaurant for two reasons. One, it is fancy!! Being the oldest of five in my family with conservative parents and special night out for a fancy dinner consists of Sizzler, Apple Bees, or Costa Vida. So I felt very privledged to get the opportunity to eat somewhere quite a few steps up from my usual dinner outings. Secondly the room is revolving. Where all the guest tables are, the floor moves very slowly around the sky tower. This allows the guests to get a beautiful view of the whole city while they enjoy their meal.
This is Linda, Dr. Jacob's wife, and me with our fancy desserts! We were very excited about this part of our meal!
Our brunch consisted of about four courses. They brought out some pre appetizer pastries for us when we first got there. After we were able to chose an appetizer, main course, and dessert. Heidi and I decided to share our meals so that we could try more at this wonderful place. We split Calamari and Seasonal fruit for our appetizers. For our main dish we got the same thing, a Salmon Eggs Benedict which was very good! I was nervous at first because it didn’t look like something I would normally like. Sometimes fancy food doesn’t actually task very good to me ha. But may the dish was very well done or maybe my taste buds are maturing. Finally dessert! I ordered a Peanut and Cherry parfait. It had a peanut butter cake like bread with a scoop of cherry ice cream and a decorative piece of peanut brittle sticking out of the ice cream. I love that how all the food was presented so beautifully! It took us about 2 ½ hours to finish our meals up there.
After bunch/lunch we set out with the few of the girls for a walk out on the town. I bought my last present for my family, it was for Bryce!! Then Christine and I walked through one of the nicest designer shops that they have down town. It had Gucci, Tiffany’s, Coach, Ralf Lauren and probably some other ones I can’t remember. The store was four levels high full of designer bags, shoes, make up, clothes, and jewelry. I enjoyed walking through it even though I was afraid to touch anything!
On the way home Christine and I had a couple hours of public bus issues but eventually we made it home just in time for dinner with Phyllis, her brother, and her sister-in-law.
Sunday we taught our last week of primary to our wonderful little class, and said our goodbyes to the members that had been so wonderful to us. I will never forget sweet Sister Pillings. She is an elderly lady in our ward who drove us home each week. She always caught us after relief society offering us a lift. She was so thoughtful and always made sure to make us feel cared for. I didn’t get to spend as much time with her as I would have liked but I will never forget all the rides that she gave us!
I have some exciting news to add to my last post for the day! Back in Provo one of my roommates Carly got engaged this Friday!!!! I am so sad that I couldn’t be there to hear about everything and to be giggly and happy with all the girls at home! But I want her to know how much I love her and how excited I am for her!!! I can’t believe she is old enough to get married to someone, but David is such a great guy and I know they are going to be so happy! But I miss Carly lots and I can’t wait to be home with my roommates Caitlin and Jarelle as well J
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