The Expat Paradox

 One of my goals for this year was to improve my (almost non-existent) ability to swim. We are getting ever closer to the end of the year so a month or so ago I decided it was time to act on said goal. I recently  made my fourth visit to the aquatic center, so progress is slowly being made. As I was sharing the lane with a fellow who kindly gave me some pointers (he used to be a swim instructor), we ended up chatting while catching our breath between laps.

As I was leaving I realized he was the first stranger I had talked to in quite awhile that did not incorrectly assume I am Canadian and then want to discuss politics when I corrected the assumption. It was a refreshing change to a recent conversation that was as follows:

    Other person: How is Canada handling COVID-19?
    Me: No clue
    Other person: But you're Canadian so....
    Me: No, I'm American.
    Other person: Are you sure?
    Me: Very. 

It was an odd conversation that left me wondering why people have to try and guess, instead of simply asking "where are you from?".

Questions of origin aside though, this has been a strange year to be living in a foreign country. I am not usually prone to homesickness, but I have found birthdays and holidays to be a bit tougher this year, knowing that going home for things is not a viable option right now. Several conversations with other ex-pats have shown me that I am not alone.

As such, little moments that remind me of home feel very meaningful. A Canadian friend recently surprised me by sharing some "real" (i.e. North American version, not Southern Hemisphere version) Kraft mac'n cheese mixes with me. The taste is just different enough to be exciting. I was also quite delighted when I discovered that one of the local grocery stores now sells Tostitos corn chips. This is exciting because they taste nicer than the other options, and they are also relatively the same price because they are sold in the regular chip aisle as opposed to the international aisle. Troway gave proof of their authentic-ness when I brought home a bag and his first comment was "huh, they taste American!"

Music can also offer a glimpse of the other side of the world. We had a beautiful spring weekend so Sunday morning we ventured down to the waterfront for a market. Lo and behold, there was a hillbilly band playing, complete with mountain-man beards and washboards!

Saw this on my drive to work the other day.

Pukekura Park is in full bloom!

Showing some American friends around Taranaki :)

Despite minor challenges of living overseas, I am grateful to be in NZ and know that we have had an easier year than most.

Hang in there and Happy Thanksgiving!

Te Mata Peak

 The stretch from Queen's Birthday at the start of June to Labour Day at the end of October is always a long one, since there are no public holidays between those days. As such, we often plan a short getaway when Labour Day hits so we can enjoy the extra time off. This year we trekked over to Napier to visit Troway's oldest sister.

A benefit of going to the East Coast is the incredible amount of sunshine they get. It is always a few degrees warmer than our tumultuous West Coast. Of course, this does mean you need to plan ahead if you intend to be active outdoors. We almost got caught roasting in the sun, but luckily had gotten an early enough start on the day that we managed to avoid turning into lobsters.

My goal when we travel is to always find at least one place or thing we have not done/seen previously. For this trip, the 'something new' was climbing Te Mata Peak. I did my research, we plugged in the GPS and away we went for couple of hours of fresh air. According to my research, we could enjoy a nice stroll around the park area, get a nice view of the Hawek's Bay area, feel like we had been laid-back adventurers. Well, haha. We did get to feel like adventurers. And we got to see incredible views. But we had to work for it!

When we looked at the map, we found a trail that was a bit over 5 kilometers in total. It offered a walk through a redwood forest, some undulating farmland, and stunning views. "That sounds like fun!" we thought to ourselves, and off we went. Little did we know that by halfway through the 5 kilometers, we would be winding up our way up a very steep hill, but it was undoubtedly worth it in the end!

In Maori legend, Te Mata peak is 'The Sleeping Giant.' The story goes that Te Mata, the leader of the Waimarama tribes, fell in love with the daughter of a rival tribes' chief. He was given a series of tasks to complete to prove his love for her. The last of these was to eat his way through the hills between the plains and the coast. He died trying to complete this task, and his prostrate body forms this peak.

Read more about it here: https://www.hawkesbaynz.com/see-and-do/art-design-and-culture/the-maori-culture-guide/local-legends/the-sleeping-giant/

Yep, we climbed all the way up!

Life Update

 By this time in the year, I expected to be able to regale you with stories of travel to Melbourne in route to a wedding on the West Coast, and if we were lucky a stopover in Hawaii on the way home. Alas this was not meant to be, but we have had other things keep us busy enough. I do not think this will be the most exciting post I have written, but still thought it might be worth putting something up since I have not been good at adhering to any sort of regular blogging schedule lately.

The most exciting news is what has been happening on the husband front. Troway very successfully completed his Personal Trainer certification in August this year. Cross your fingers and toes that he will soon be gainfully employed in the fitness world, unfortunately dear 'ol COVID-19 resulted in delays in the interviews he had scheduled. 

Even more exciting in Troway's opinion is the outcome of his rugby season. They managed to have a short season in between bouts of lockdown. His team had an undefeated season and got to bring home the trophy as Taranaki champions! His team is largely made up of fellas that have been playing together since they were in junior high and high school, and the last time they had a shot at the championship was about 7 years ago (the first rugby game I ever watched haha). 

                                      

Outside of education and rugby, life has been pretty quiet. I have six piano students, who present various degrees of challenge. They range in age from 7-37 years old, and are all at different levels of enthusiasm and skill. Troway and I joke that we collect other foreigners and this seems to be the case with my students as well; only one of the six is a Kiwi :) Hopefully at the end of the year I will be able to organize a small house recital for them to showcase their work this year. 

Since things have been a bit less hectic this year, we have tried to be more adventurous in our cooking. Partly this means being organized enough to menu plan and therefore have the ingredients for interesting things. But we have worked to incorporate new things into the mix. Recent favorites are meatball stuffed pitas, shrimp tacos and the Japanese night we managed to pull off.

                                            

Much of my free time of late has been taken up with various forms of craftiness. My big achievement was finishing a wedding album. One for the honeymoon is next on the list, although I am tempted to be lazy and do an online photobook... But I also recently acquired my own sewing machine (had been borrowing the mother-in-laws) and have gotten familiar with it by making some baby quilts (lots of babies being born around us).

                           

Hope you are staying healthy and well. We tried this tasty delight from the Asian market the other night, it was surprisingly delicious!

                                                 

Spring is finally arriving :)

                   

Weekend Adventuring

This year has undoubtedly seen some change to how things "normally" work. One (minor) impact on my life was the submission process for my Masters thesis.
Normal process is to submit an electronic copy for digital storage, with a second hard-copy submitted in-person to be published in the University library. Once my examination was complete, including final revisions and sign-off from my advisor, I was able to submit the electronic version in May. This meant that I was technically officially finished with the degree program. However, since campus was closed until further notice due to COVID-19 at the time, I was not able to submit the hard copy.

Campus re-opened at the end of June so I was advised I could submit my hard copy in July. So this past weekend I drove up to the city so I could make a fun weekend away out of it.

I drove up Friday morning since I had to be on campus during business hours to submit the thesis. The submission event itself was really a non-event. I walked into the correct office, handed it over and walked out. But hey, officially officially done now! Plus I have a cool book on my shelf with my name on it, so worth it, right? :)

The rest of Friday was spent catching up with a couple of PhD students I became friends with, and exploring the Japan Mart to stock up on groceries. I also managed to fit in a lovely walk along the Long Bay beach reserve Saturday morning before getting back in the car to head as far South as Hamilton.

A Chinese restaurant I passed :)

Saturday's highlight was exploring part of Hamilton's botanical gardens with a friend who happily acted as my tour guide. I had heard good things about the gardens but was unaware of how much they have to offer. Due to the size, and the amount of time allocated for garden exploration, we only went through the themed gardens, but that was enough to keep us busy for quite awhile! A section of the gardens is dedicated to several theme gardens, which change over time to keep things fresh. We saw a Chinese garden, Japanese contemplation garden, English cottage garden and English Tudor garden, Italian Renaissance (my personal favorite). There were also some fascinating "Fantasy Gardens:" the Katherine Mansfield garden, Concept garden and Surrealist garden were the ones we had time to explore.

Admittedly, visiting a botanical garden in the winter means that you miss most of the beautiful flowers, but at the same time it afforded the opportunity to appreciate other aspects of the garden. AND, it reminded me how lucky I am to live on an island, that I can go walk around a botanical garden in the winter and it won't just be covered in snow!

Entrance to Chinese Scholars garden

English Cottage Garden entry

Japanese garden

Let the contemplation begin

Italian Renaissance

English Tudor garden (unsure why I took it at a weird angle...)

Kate Mansfield garden (not a real house unfortunately)

Entry to the Concept garden, based around the Magic Flute

Papageno, the birdcatcher in the Magic Flute

Tea anyone?

Surrealist garden...the arms on the "trees" moved, kind of creepily

In other news, I got to watch the tugboats bring a ship in to Port the other night :) Stay safe and well.

Winter in Taradise

Over the weekend we were blessed with some lovely sunny days so a friend and I decided to take advantage of the opportunity for some fresh air.

We started low-key with an extended version of the lake circuit at Lake Mangamahoe, which meant we stayed plenty warm due to walking but got to enjoy lovely views of our snow-covered maunga (mountain). I say "extended version" because we somehow managed to double-back on a section of the trail and walk in a big circle a couple of times. We certainly did not mind the extra walking, but were extra hungry when we followed the kiwi tradition of replenishing at a coffee shop post-adventuring.

The following day we decided to head towards the mountain, with the intention of enjoying hiking the Dawson Falls track. We expected it to be colder at the mountain, but were pleasantly surprised to find that it has snowed enough that by the time we were at the right location we were in the snow. We enjoyed the Kapuni Loop Track that goes past the falls, as well as the Wilkies Pools loop track that offers lovely mountain views and some excellent stream crossings. I have done both of these tracks numerous times, but never before in the snow! It is also the first time I have played in the snow in July, first time for everything I guess, ha!

There were some brave souls out sledding, and a few snowman attempts. My hiking buddy was safe from snowballs, as it was very crystal-ey powdery snow, a bit different from what we usually see in Missouri. I realized it has been 7 years since I have been in real snow (I have done a few hikes in the winter where there was a bit of dusting here and there but I do not think that really counts) so it felt like quite a treat.

All this adventuring successfully confused my young nieces, who could not quite grasp how auntie had been able to go play in the snow when they had just got back from swimming in the lake. :)

Life in COVID-19 Lockdown

As Troway and I were passing time in planes and airports as we traveled the world at New Year's, one of the things we discussed was our goals for this year. Some were small, some a bit more intimidating, but none of them included the events of the last couple months. We feel quite fortunate that we were able to enjoy such a long trip but still returned home to New Zealand before things got too crazy.

New Zealand did not feel much impact from the virus until March. But like all places, once it was here it began to spread so something had to change in order to curtail it.
The something is what the government Level 4 lockdown, which put the country in a socially isolated state for five weeks to allow cases to be treated and prevent increased infection rates. It was effective, but was a challenge for all in one way or another. Life is not back to "normal" yet, and I suspect will be a bit odd for some time, but I am thankful that the government chose to act early to prevent widespread infection. I am also grateful that Troway and I were at a point life-wise where we were able to get through this strange time without too much stress.

In hindsight, this year so far has shown me that you should be a little bit careful what you ask for. After the last couple years of planning a wedding, doing grad school study and still working mostly full-time, one of my goals for this year was to slow things down a bit, and re-learn how to enjoy relaxing and pursuing hobbies. I did not intend this goal to be achieved by society shutting down, but it does mean I have had lots of time for said hobbies and relaxation.

One thing I am grateful for throughout all of this is my ability to continue working. My job is considered essential and it is not a job that can be done from home, so my daily routine in terms of work was minimally disrupted (if a bit hectic and exhausting at times due to navigating new ways  of working due to isolation requirements, etc.). But when my work day was over, my only "to-do" was heading home to hang out with Troway and the cat and pursue whatever home activity tickled my fancy.
Troway has not been so lucky in regards to his daily routine. He had resigned from full-time work at the start of March to go back to school. But that all got shut down at the end of March, just as he was looking for something part-time to fill the gaps when he did not have study. Naturally nobody has been hiring lately so he has been at home, trying to study remotely where he can. Rugby was cancelled, the dojo is closed, and the fitness classes he runs are still not able to resume due to restrictions on group numbers.

What then have we done with all of this spare time? In the interests of our clothes still fitting, we set up a fitness routine. We have taken turns choosing what to do in order to keep it interesting. Troway is in charge of weights sessions (Denise's least favorite, but apparently it is good for me). Denise is in charge of motivating Troway to go for a run in case he does get a short rugby season this year (it is finally looking good on that front, they have practice this evening, albeit with limited numbers to adhere to group restrictions). Some days we chose to go for a walk and explore a new part of town. This has allowed us to observe what everyone else is up to. There is LOTS of DIY happening around town!

We have also spent a lot of time catching up on yardwork. I enjoy having a lovely garden and a good-sized yard, but that of course does mean lots of things to do to keep it that way. It is probably looking better than it ever has over the last couple of years :) I have also taken up quilting again; there are now about three projects on the go... and I am working on a proper wedding scrapbook, which is lots of fun!

The biggest change we have seen has actually been in the shift of "normal household duties." I actually commented to one of the other ladies at work that I finally understand what it is like to have a wife at home! I have hardly done housework the last six weeks, and Troway does 90% of the cooking now. It has prompted some interesting reflection and discussion on traditional roles. I am thoroughly appreciative of the fact that Troway has been home and able to take over grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, entertaining and training the cat, etc. etc. etc. 

We went for a walk in Tupare gardens over the weekend, thought it would be good to share our fall colors while those in the Northern Hemisphere are enjoying spring :)