Cricket Update

For those of you who have been biting your nails wanting to find out what is going to happen in the Cricket World Cup, New Zealand will play Australia in the final. India and Australia played last night for the final spot, and the news says it was a huge victory for Australia. They apparently played very well and India was not quite on their game. New Zealand and Australia are major rivals, especially when it comes to sports. Australia says New Zealand is their little brother; New Zealand says they have no need for a big brother :)

The final game is scheduled to start at 4:30pm Sunday afternoon (NZ time, it starts earlier in the day in Aussie time), and is predicted to end sometime between 11pm and 1am. So the Wellington Chamber of Commerce has reportedly issued a statement recommending bosses be lenient on Monday morning in regards to productivity and keep in mind the potential national sports achievement.

Photos and adventure stories to come soon, I will be sorting photos this weekend :)

Local News

I have lots to blog about but when I tell you all the fun stories, I want to have accompanying photos, which I have not yet sorted through to organize and find the best ones. So, I thought for now I would settle for a bit of an update on local news. Hopefully in the next couple weeks I can share goodies about the recent adventures I have had, including my sister visiting!

Firstly, if you had heard anything about “Cyclone Pam” that came through this part of the world, I can assure that all is well in New Zealand. The cyclone did hit some islands in the area, but nothing too close to New Zealand. The eye of the storm was within about 400 kilometers of the North East end of New Zealand, but the worst we experienced was some rain and high winds. On my side of the island, it was just a bit overcast. The worst damage was done to the island of Vanuatu, which is an island nation in the South Pacific, towards the upper corner of Australia (if you look at the globe, New Zealand is off to a bottom corner of New Zealand nearish to Tanzania). It has been an independent nation since only 1980, prior to that it was a colony of France. According to the news, about 80% of the island was seriously affected by the storm. New Zealand and Australia's Red Cross and National Guard have been providing aid in hopes of restoring some comfort and normalcy to the nation.

The Cricket World Cup has been going on the last week or two. While I am not a cricket fan and do not watch it, possibly in part because I do not yet understand it enough to really know what is going on (I do plan to eventually figure it out, but it has not yet made it to the top of the to-do list), I have been keeping tabs on how the NZ team (the Black Caps) is faring. Yesterday afternoon, NZ beat South Africa in a very close semi-final game. Per the morning radio talk, this is a good achievement, as in more than one prior World Cup, they have lost in the semi-finals. On Sunday the Black Caps will play in the Finals in Melbourne, Australia.

The neighboring town of Eltham, which reportedly is currently in the Guinness Book of World Records for the world’s biggest scone, is preparing for a unique annual event. Next weekend, on Easter Saturday, young and old alike will compete in the Eltham Cheese Race. I have not been to any such event, but from what I have been told, the contestants race down an incredibly steep hill trying to beat a roll of cheese... Yeah I really am not sure about this one, but if I hear anything else I will let you know J

Here is an article about a previous cheese day:

http://www.stuff.co.nz/taranaki-daily-news/news/8506023/Eltham-set-to-get-cheese-rolling

I just got peaches for an excellent price so I’m off to do some baking J Keep an eye out for pictures and travel stories coming soon!

A New Home

Last post I vaguely hinted that I might share stories or photos from Americarna. Unfortunately I didn’t make it this year so if you are really wanting to see pictures of good American cars, you’ll have to settle for googling it, or find my post on last year’s festival J I do have a good reason (or is it an excuse?) for my lack of attendance. I recently moved, so I decided the weekend was better spent finishing unpacking, cleaning, etc.

Those of you that have heard me describe my lovely sunny little apartment by the beach (and who are still suffering through winter) are probably wondering why I chose to leave that behind. I think that I will miss being so close to the water, but having a car gives me the mobility to meander down there anytime I choose. So I decided I was ready for a change.

In part some of my decision was due to rather noisy neighbors. They seemed to be the carefree sort who are happy to stay awake all hours of the day and night and share their laughter and not always delightful music with the neighbourhood. Lucky for them, I was always happy to share my piano music with them so I suppose it equalled out in the end J

On the note of piano, my biggest reason for moving was really that I wanted more space. I especially wanted to have a place that would allow me to have a piano room. Now that I have that, my students love it. They focus much better, and enjoy that there is a room dedicated to nothing but music.

Since I was choosing to move as opposed to actually having to move, I was able to take the time to be a bit picky about what I settled on. I knew that I wanted a house with two bedrooms, but beyond that I suppose I was trusting in the fact that the right situation would come along. I am glad I did because just as I was about to settle for a place that was nice but not fantastic, a much better one came along.

My new home is a lovely 3 bedroom house (although really the third bedroom is more of an office, which has now become a piano studio, yay!). In addition to the joy of having a studio AND a guest bedroom, I have a fireplace in the living room (so excited for that when cold winter evenings hit), a gorgeous sunroom off the kitchen, and a nice big yard. The yard is complete with a picnic table, clothesline, lemon tree, aloe vera plants, and garden beds which are empty enough to allow for lots of creativity. Perhaps the best part of it all is that the rental cost is the same as several much smaller places I looked at. It is not a huge house, just spacious and exactly what I was after.

I hope that you are having a good week. We have a 3 day weekend coming up for Taranaki Anniversary, and then my sister gets here!