some photos and a rambling almost-apology

Meep!

Once again, time flies and I have very few excuses. I just want to mention that there are times when, due to other things in my life, it is quite difficult to sit down and write a blog post and not because of lack of good things to tell you all. There are times when, no matter how awesome the story is that I have lined up to share with you, the words that instead spill from the storyteller place have nothing to do with an awesome week in Rarotonga or an epic road trip on the South Island. Rather, they are musings that I am not really ready to share with anyone who has internet access. Which is quite an effective discouragement from writing at all.

But never fear, dear readers! I have finally managed to wade through most of my (hundreds of) photos from mid-semester break! Perhaps one of these days I'll feel able to sit down and honestly tell you about my epic journeys without feeling overwhelmed by other things. But for your viewing pleasure while you wait for me to un-bury my head from the sand, I've started posting pictures. Here is a public link to the first facebook album, for those of you who aren't on facebook it should still be accessible (I did check) but if it is not for whatever reason, just let me know and I'll find some way to make sure you can see the pictures!

Meanwhile, I'm left wondering where exactly the time has gone. All of a sudden there are only two more weeks of classes and six weeks until my flight home. What? Funny to think that it is finally getting cold here while friends at home are packing away the textbooks and breaking out their summer wear!

catching up and moving on

Hi Folks!

I could talk about how time flies when you aren't paying attention, or how much less inspiration I have to write when I have no big news. The truth is, I have no excuse for not posting since the earthquake. So much has happened in the weeks since, although somehow none of it seemed all that important at the time. Suddenly, almost six weeks later, I am essentially halfway done with my semester here. What a scary thought.

I could tell you about the heart-wrenching move from Christchurch to Auckland: the frantic scene at the airport check-in counter ten minutes before boarding (the employees of Air New Zealand are saints), the new apartments where nothing quite works properly and the stove consistently sets off the fire alarm, the flatmate who holds shouted phone conversations at 1am every night, the twenty minute bus ride from our North Shore dwelling to the campus at the heart of the Auckland CBD, the difficulties readjusting lives after being so suddenly transplanted. I could describe feeling like a refugee when, despite the declarations of sympathy and promises of help for earthquake survivors, no one actually knew who we were or what to do in order to help - the delays and miscommunications in helping register for classes, the sense of being lost (within the city, among the crowd) as well as displaced, the lack of any orientation in a new, much larger city. All of the little things added up to desolate feelings which gradually numbed as life went on, but although they dominated my life for a while they don't make for such a great story on their own.

Amidst the process of settling, navigating a new campus, city, living space and schedule, and figuring out how I fit into this new place, real life continued at a relentless pace. And now here I am, heading off tomorrow for mid-semester break adventures. I'll be in Rarotonga for a week-long IES field trip, after which I've got another week of rambling the spectacular South Island with Jill and Joe from my program. This is my last contact with the internet world for the next few weeks, and with any luck I'll come back with plenty of stories to tell you!

One last note: I lost my camera just before arriving in Christchurch. Accidentally left it on a bus. It has finally been returned to me through the kindness of strangers, the incompetency of InterCity Coach Lines and the miracle-working of Eunice McKessar (IES Christchurch coordinator), but sadly I have no pictures at all of my time in Christchurch, nor of my first month in Auckland. Eunice has posted her photos from orientation here so that you won't completely miss out. It is difficult to believe that not only did I not get to take photos of our city-orientation scavenger hunt, thanks to the earthquake I will now never get to record the scenes I had filed away in my memory for future visitation. Most of these scenes are now home to the ghosts and wreckage that only time and hard work can heal. But in the meantime, I hope you enjoy Eunice's pictures!

That's all for now!

IES Christchurch Spring 2011: The Beginning (pre-quake)

Uprooted

The past days in Springfield have offered a much-needed opportunity to recover, rest and reflect. Each person deals with trauma in a different way; some need to talk about every aspect and feel guilty/scared/lucky, some need distractions from any mention of the subject. I spent my time feeling grateful to be healthy and whole and remembering that life goes on and the best thing I can do is to make sure that it goes on with purpose and appreciation.

While we ate home-cooked food and slept on firm ground, recovery efforts continued in Christchurch. We kept updated through the televised news as the official death toll rose above one hundred with expectations of it rising even higher.

Yesterday, we were informed that the university would not be reopening any sooner than the tentative date of 14^th March. Reluctant to completely cancel the specific experience we had signed up for, IES gave us a choice: stay at the University of Canterbury with the knowledge that it may take even longer than two weeks to reopen and the likelihood of future aftershocks, or transfer to Auckland before the weekend was over. Some made lists of pros and cons, pondered the unknowns or simply complained that it was too difficult a choice to make while some started planning travel to occupy the next two weeks. Some knew immediately that they wished to remain in Christchurch while others seriously considered Auckland. For me, the choice was clear. My gut instinct told me to stay in Christchurch, the place I had chosen and settled in, the experience for which I had prepared for over a year. Even though the city I had planned to live in is now leveled to the ground in places, having withstood this devastating event as one of its inhabitants I now wanted to be a part of the rebuilding journey. I didn’t want to feel like I was running away.

Today, matters were taken out of our hands. We received the message that all IES students were being pulled from Canterbury. We were all to be transferred to Auckland, with the hope that the move would be completed by the end of Monday, 28^th February.

I was upset, I am still in shock, but I cannot say that I am surprised, given the uncertain nature of education at Canterbury for the time being. My initial impressions of Auckland as a WWOOFer were not positive ones and I had chosen Christchurch and the South Island because I wanted a smaller-town feeling and a more authentic Kiwi experience rather than the international large-city experience of Auckland. On the other hand, my dear friends and former WWOOFing hosts Hilary and Jane live there and our temporary IES-provided supervisor Charlotte has been answering questions and telling us about perks of living in Auckland. I wanted to be on the South Island for proximity to the scenery and wilderness for which it is famous. However, one thing to remember is that within New Zealand nothing is all that far away from anything else and there is plenty to see and do all over the North Island as well.

At this point, it makes more sense to transfer. I can wish that it were to Wellington or Dunedin rather than to Auckland, but that sort of thinking is useless at this stage. It is upsetting because it is in this way that the earthquake is having a direct impact on my life and matters are now out of my control in a way that they weren’t before when my living space remained safe and intact and none of my friends or family were killed. I can hardly complain about moving when there are still so many people left without basic comforts. So, to Auckland I go for the time being. I do not yet know what my classes are, what my living situation will be like, or what sorts of opportunities will be available to me there. All I know is that it is time to prepare for my new home, knowing that I will be able to make more long-term decisions once I am settled there.

Tomorrow morning we return to our apartments one last time. I have the weekend to fill out the necessary paperwork, pack up my life (again) and say goodbye to the remains of this city I have come to love. More than ever, I appreciate the messages of love and support from all of you during this, the strangest week of my life so far

All my love,

Chloe

A bit shaken

Hey guys,

1 pm:

This comes as a break from the tales of my travels during January and early February, but something just happened that I want to tell you about in real time. I was in an earthquake. Now, some of you know that I spent the first few years of my life in southern California, where earthquakes are a fact of life. Others of you who’ve already talked to me know that I’ve also experienced a couple of earthquakes (no larger than a 4 on the Richter scale) during orientation here. These smaller earthquakes are aftershocks of the 7.1 on September 4th that damaged many of the historical buildings in downtown Christchurch, but injured only a few. The earthquakes I experienced before today were reminiscent of a very large bus driving by.

I don’t yet know what the magnitude of this one was that I’ve just experienced and I can’t even begin to describe it properly. At 12:51 pm, as soon as I dove under my desk the building began to violently shake. I don’t know how to describe what it feels like to have the building moving back and forth underneath you. A couple minutes later, I finally felt brave enough to venture out from under my desk. Internet was gone, power was out, both toilets were leaking, the fridge and cupboards were tossed open and a bottle of oil was shattered on the floor. The only ones home, my flat mate Gabby and I just stood there, guessing at the magnitude and remarking on what a large and scary aftershock it was. We had no idea what a big deal it was, or what would soon follow.

…hold on, someone’s knocking at the door … I’ll bet it’s the RA again.

a couple hours later:

So, a few large aftershocks and several smaller ones later, all students living in these apartments have been herded outside, led in succession to various destinations around the complexes with very scant information, and are now clustered on open grassy spaces and near doorways to ground-level apartments. One flat mate went into hysterics, fleeing to the arms of the nearest strong, attractive man. I got a quick call through to my mom to make sure she knew I was alive, but the phone networks are a mess. Text messages are arriving in multiples of 6, or not at all. People are being advised to keep network use to a minimum and only use texting in hopes of keeping the lines clear for people trapped in buildings to call for help.

I’ll continue updating this entry as the day goes on, but for now I’m going to wander about the apartment complex in the drizzling rain.

Around 5 pm:

I’ve been spending the past couple hours sitting in a neighbor’s car listening to the radio. Not a pastime that is healthy for the nerves, but one of the only things I can bring myself to do at the moment.

If you’ve read/seen a news report on it recently, you’ll already know that the quake was magnitude 6.3 on the Richter scale, at a (shallow) depth of 5 kilometers below the earth’s surface, and only 10k southwest of the city center. As of now, there have been at least 8 severe aftershocks between magnitude 4.3 and 5.7, and countless aftershocks every few minutes. The radio keeps repeating the same news over and over, but we’ve heard that the cathedral spire and roof have collapsed along with numerous other buildings in the city center, and Lyttelton at the epicenter of the quake has been devastated. It sounds like hundreds are trapped/wounded/possibly dead.

There are a few factors that made this quake so much more devastating than the September quake. It was shallower, much closer to the city center and happened during a time when the city was packed with people. The September earthquake happened on a Saturday morning, when most people were still in bed. The worst injuries involved heart attacks among the elderly and lacerations from broken glass. So far, we still can’t say how many are dead or how many still trapped will be rescued alive. We are the world’s front-line news and yet we can’t see what is happening. If it weren’t for the continuous aftershocks, I wouldn’t be able to tell that anything bad had happened. The area around the apartments is virtually unharmed, apart from broken oil bottles and things fallen from shelves.

Late in the evening:

I can’t stop thinking. My apartment got power (but no internet) back about six hours after the initial quake, and my flat mate Elizabeth and I cleaned up the oil, started boiling water for drinking, and ate dinner. I had to turn off the TV, I just can’t keep watching the same footage of buildings falling, wounded people and flooded streets. I feel helpless and my nerves are shot.

6:30 am:

I’ve finally decided that sleep is futile. My third floor apartment is prone to magnifying every little aftershock, and after leaping awake for at least the 7^th time I’ve just given up on getting any sleep.

That evening: Springfield

I spent the morning walking around with first my flat mate Elizabeth, and then a couple of other IES kids. Most stores are closed, the streets are all but deserted, but there was a little bakery giving away fresh bread next to the supermarket. We heard a rumor that the uni was willing to fly all international students to Wellington or Auckland, free lodging and food until campus was ready to open again. Then we heard from Eunice, our program coordinator that IES was arranging for all of us to return to Smylies, the hostel in Springfield where we stayed during our orientation a couple weeks ago. Most of the IES kids had already hopped on a bus to Nelson, so there are only nine of us staying here.

It is difficult to accept that I can have this dry roof, warm food and uncontaminated water when there are so many people still in Christchurch without any of this, when there are people mourning lost loved ones and rescue crews still working through fire, rain, rubble and exhaustion to recover bodies. Now that I’m away from the disaster zone, I just want to go back and help, but I do not know how I can. I cannot even start to think about how lucky I am. Lucky that I had planned a Skype date with my mom that morning. Lucky that I didn’t just hop the bus into the city or to the tramping tracks when I was done with class at 9 am, something I was so close to doing. There were two buses crushed just by the city Bus Exchange – somewhere I had been nearly every day this past week. There was an international student from Samoa who died on one of those buses. I just can’t stop thinking about the many ways I was almost among the injured or dead, but for lucky chance.

I do not know what the next weeks will bring. I do not know when the uni will reopen, or whether I will be transferred to another school. I do not know how long it will take for Christchurch to recover – this city that I have only known and loved for such a brief amount of time. I appreciate the messages of love and support that I’ve gotten over email and facebook.

Continue to hold Christchurch in your thoughts during this tragedy. I love you all. 

Chloe

With cyclones passing by

After we left Dean’s house, Jane and Hilary welcomed us to their +40 acre sanctuary: a farm that backs onto the National Reserve of the Waitakere Ranges. Courtney and Brent from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan joined us as WWOOFers on the farm that evening.

The Waitakere Ranges: subtropical, humid, and beautiful for hiking. 

 Merlyn the horse and his donkey friends. 

 

They are perfectly set up to host WWOOFers and yet this was only the second time they had ever done so! We were housed in the tipi (later relocating to escape from the deluge of tropical storms), but they also had two small house-trucks (kind of like gypsy wagons crossed with RV’s) and a satellite cottage that had recently been vacated by one of their daughters. 

 house truck! 

Although Jane and Hilary are both kept busy by their work as counselors, they have just begun, with the help of their friend Peter, a multi-step process to transform their land into an organic lime orchard. Right now the fields are planted with buckwheat to break up the clay and make the ground more workable. The buckwheat also fixes nitrogen in the soil that will feed the baby lime trees. Peter is also establishing about a dozen new beehives, which will start producing honey for the market in about ten months. The day Juliette and I arrived at the farm he had just gotten some of his new queens in the mail. We got to watch (from a safe distance) as he settled the new queens in queen-less hives. 

A woodworker by trade, Peter also makes these beautiful bee boxes himself.

We spent a couple of days waging war on a nasty invasive honeysuckle-type plant with an enthusiastic root system that could easily reach many meters, putting down roots from every junction along the creeping vine. It is quite difficult to eradicate because it is tricky to figure out which direction to pull in order to get all of the root pieces. 

The fruits of our labors: cleared garden patches, and giant piles of plant matter to haul elsewhere!

These vines were closely intertwined with sharp grasses. A consequence of forgetting to wear long sleeves and pants, my limbs were covered in a web scratches that felt like razor burn. This was also when I met the dreaded sand fly, quite similar to the black flies I know at home. A few hours’ negligence of shoes and socks left me with over 100 itchy bites on each foot. 

As another cyclone roared through, we spent a couple of days hiding from torrential rain. We cleaned out the satellite cottage that would become the home base for future WWOOFers: moving junk and sweeping out cobwebs and cat hair. Next, we did a series of odd jobs that included moving dead plant matter (in the pouring rain), washing outside windows (in the rain) and transplanting a few-hundred gooseberry seedlings (under an overhang, but still in the gusty rain). Jane promised to send me pictures of the gooseberries when they make their colorful paper lanterns! 

 That evening, all set up in the finally clean cottage, we (the WWOOFers) invited Jane and Hilary to 'our place' for a final family dinner. [Left to right: Courtney, Juliette, Brent, me, Jane] 

Jane and Hilary are among the sweetest, kindest people I know. They welcomed us instantly, sharing not only their home but also stories of life and travel, advice, and some of the best meals I’ve ever eaten. I was sad to say goodbye and am hoping that my final exam schedule works out in a way that will allow me to visit them again at the end of my time in this country. 

[visit Jane and Hilary's WWOOF profile for more pictures of their fantastic place]

Next stop: CouchSurfing in Rotorua!

Port Waikato and the Life of a Kiwi bloke

At about 425 km (265 miles) long, the Waikato River is the longest river in New Zealand. Driving along its banks to the Tasman Sea, the land switches from rich, reddish volcanic soil to black sand. At the mouth of the river, Port Waikato is a tiny village with no more than 200 inhabitants during peak surfing season. It is a good place to recover from jet lag and get accustomed to the Kiwi pace of life, but there is not much else to do. Juliette and I went on many beach walks while we stayed here.

We aren’t sure why this whale was stranded: we think it was injured and/or lost. Couldn’t be saved. According to Dean, there were five stranded whales on the same beach a week previously and they had only managed to save one. 

We learned quickly to wear sunscreen every time we go outside – burn time here can be as little as ten minutes without it, especially for a paleface like me! We still managed to get somewhat pink despite the hiding of the sun by the tropical storms that were sweeping past New Zealand for several days.  

Dean lives almost right on the beach. Because there is no soil at all, his entire garden has been planted in pots and bathtubs – a perfect solution! During our stay here, we helped Dean in his attempts to solve the problem of water loss in the garden pots, adding nutrients, water catchers and straw insulation to potentially help with moisture retention. We also helped him move and sort the accumulated junk of many years’ worth of automotive racing, building and surfing: the hobbies of a typical Kiwi bloke. If you ever need a rusty weight machine dismantled, moved through a small doorway and [mostly] reassembled, do not ask me – once was enough!  

Other highlights of this stay:

-Wild cats: three kittens and their mom like to live under the parked car and try to sneak into the house for food. 

 The gray one was particularly boisterous and adventurous. We named him Rosco.

-We also learned not to argue with the Spanish. The other WWOOFer here, a fellow from Spain called Alex insisted on making paella for us, despite the fact that we had just made and eaten our own dinner and despite the fact that he was not actually going to eat any of it himself. We decided it was easier to just smile and nod and have two dinners in one night.

Alex also insisted one afternoon that we borrow his camper van and go for a drive, simply because he thought we looked bored. We learned to drive on the wrong side of the road, found the single convenience store in town to get ice cream and headed off into the wild farmland.

...we went in search of Nikau cave, not realizing that it would have been a 90-minute drive.  

Our last night there, the cyclones stepped aside to allow us a beautiful sunset on Sunset Beach. 

Once our three days in Port Waikato were up, we boarded a bus and set out on the road to Swanson. 

Just a quick note, Dear Readers.

I have arrived at school, so internet connections are somewhat more reliable. I have several posts from the past few weeks that will show up as I have time. I just wanted to let you all know that I am now safely settled and have plenty of stories and pictures to share when time permits!

Arrival

After planning for the better part of a month, the journey starts. After a short flight from Seattle to San Francisco, I meet up with my travel buddy. Having not really known each other before this trip, Juliette and I went out on a limb in planning to travel with each other, but it has worked out well so far. It is nice for an introvert like me to have a more outgoing travel partner. We balance well; she pulls me out of my shell and I rein her in. It is fun to have someone to share this experience with. It also doesn’t hurt that we have similar goals for this leg of our journey. 

The twelve-hour flight from San Francisco to Auckland is long and brutal, but I experience surprisingly little jet lag. Perhaps it is because the overnight portion of the flight isn’t too forced or rushed, sleeping time on the plane is sort of night time for both the West Coast of the US and NZ. Right now, due to the way Daylight Savings Time works out here, New Zealand is only three hours and a day apart from Pacific Standard Time. 

Monday morning in Auckland airport, Juliette and I hop onto an airport shuttle, heading for the downtown train station as the sun rises. I am still a bit too frazzled to remember that I have a camera at this point. We experience the legendary Kiwi* kindness for the first time as the train station guards cheerfully ask this pair of lost-looking Americans where we are going, interpret our stumbling mispronunciations of our destination and direct us to the correct train to Pukekohe.

(Three-dozen attempts later we’ve finally gotten the pronunciation right. Or so we think.) 

Once on the train, we finally have time to relax. We content ourselves with looking out the window for the next hour.




In addition to the genuine friendliness from everyone we encounter, it is easy to notice that Kiwi life moves at its own, easy pace. Schedules are not the most important rule to follow and everything is as casual as you want to make it. Our first host, Dean, does his grocery shopping (and pretty much everything else) in bare feet.


More stories to come later!

*Kiwi = New Zealander

Hello there!

Name: Chloe
Destination: Christchurch, New Zealand

What better way to record a journey through word and image? I am about to spend the next few weeks WWOOFing my way south from Auckland to Christchurch. For those who have never heard of it, WWOOF (World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms, or Willing Workers On Organic Farms) is a network of travelers and would-be organic farmers / do-it-yourself-ers. Similar to Couch-Surfing, WWOOFers find hosts in the areas they want to visit, repaying the hosts for their hospitality by working for a few hours each day on whatever project needs doing. It seemed like the best way to spend a few weeks traveling and getting to know the land and the people.

The saying, “Take only pictures, leave only footprints,” was originally intended to promote low impact to pieces of preserved land – don’t remove anything from its habitat, and don’t leave behind anything but the impressions of your feet in the ground. And do be careful about where you leave those footprints, you don’t want to damage anything. Here, I’ll be working with a different intent of the phrase. When I am feeling more philosophical, “leaving footprints” signifies that where I go, I leave behind an impact. A small piece of me that stays behind in the form of something created, whether those creations are stories made, kittens fed, buildings fixed or gardens tended. “We need to stop talking about low-impact lifestyles. Let us strive to make an impact, and let’s make that impact a positive one!”

Additionally, even when I am not feeling quite so philosophical and wordy, “leaving only footprints” is a reference to my goal of visual documentation. For years, I have enjoyed creating stories through a collection of images. In telling stories through the lens of a camera, I force myself to practice seeing the world with eyes wide open, appreciating what is there to see and discovering what it is that makes something beautiful worth looking at. Once I reach the city and settle into uni life, it is also a challenge to create opportunities to see things in everyday life.

I intend for this blog to serve as an outlet for the discoveries that come throughout my journey. It is also the most convenient way to ensure that all of you can hear and see the stories while I am out of reach. If you have questions about anything relating to my travels, I want to answer them! Leave a comment below, or shoot me an email, I’m always happy to hear from you.

Welcome to Aotearoa, Land of the Long White Cloud.