attn mandrew and kinky: gingers here get a lot of play. so much so that they even have entire advertisments featuring pure ging. i'm not sure what this poster is trying to sell. maybe cameras, maybe gingers.
see?
love,
maggie
i don't know how to make this picture not so big
Monday, November 30, 2009
Sunday, November 29, 2009
last evening after a day spent thining grape vines and bud rubbing in the speedy's vineyard . . .
(to catch up: after the crazy lady's house, robin and i went back to carolyn's for a week where we spent thanksgiving and hung out with her family and hugged because we were safe again and made fun of each other because that's sometimes what you do when you really like a group of people. we forced ourselves to leave carolyn's to come to the speedy family in marlborough on the north tip of the south island. nice family. pam, the mother, rules hard. pam and david have a vineyard of sauvignon blanc grapes that they sell to winemakers.)
david took us on a truck drive throughout the 70 acres of their property. at one point during the drive at the peak of one of their hill-tains as david was driving over uncharted bush with plants growing taller than me said, "i should get in here and trim things up a bit." i couldn't help but think while you're at it, maybe make a road or something. cars here really work. new zealand may be the only place i have been where it makes sense to have an SUV. and they actually use them as utility vehicles. as i think back to week one of ownership of our 1988 toyota corona when it got stuck in the mowed grass on flat land, i can't help but wonder if we should have gotten an SUV.
at three different points of our driving expedition we came across fallen pine trees that blocked our path. never were these trees huge, 18 inches diameter at the max, but still, they were ENTIRE TREES. at each impass, robin and david would dexterously grab a branch and with what seemed to be little effort remove the trees and roll them down the hill-tain. during each of these moments i flitted around running from side to side trying to find a way to help. by the third tree, i recognized that my role was most helpfully filled when i stayed away, so i simply walked behind the two capable people dragging a tree. i even stepped in (dried, thank god) sheep poo. i don't think i have ever felt more useless.
as if life could get much more perfect, the speedy's have an outdoor bath that connects to the hot water supply. without meaning to, be it a midnight bathroom run or waking up to turn over, i have seen the milky way more times in new zealand than i have seen it combined before. there is so little light at the places we are staying that the stars are most incredible. well done, stars.
with the christmas season quickly approaching, robin and i have been gearing up for what we are referring to as "christmas in the car '09." we bought maybe the ugliest felt wreath with a whorish looking gold plastic angel on it for our rearview mirror and a 10 inch white plastic christmas tree. does santa come to cars? merry christmas, everyone!
outside for more bud rubbing (bow chicka bow wow) and singling the grape vines! and to think, i now know what that means!
love,
maggie
(to catch up: after the crazy lady's house, robin and i went back to carolyn's for a week where we spent thanksgiving and hung out with her family and hugged because we were safe again and made fun of each other because that's sometimes what you do when you really like a group of people. we forced ourselves to leave carolyn's to come to the speedy family in marlborough on the north tip of the south island. nice family. pam, the mother, rules hard. pam and david have a vineyard of sauvignon blanc grapes that they sell to winemakers.)
david took us on a truck drive throughout the 70 acres of their property. at one point during the drive at the peak of one of their hill-tains as david was driving over uncharted bush with plants growing taller than me said, "i should get in here and trim things up a bit." i couldn't help but think while you're at it, maybe make a road or something. cars here really work. new zealand may be the only place i have been where it makes sense to have an SUV. and they actually use them as utility vehicles. as i think back to week one of ownership of our 1988 toyota corona when it got stuck in the mowed grass on flat land, i can't help but wonder if we should have gotten an SUV.
at three different points of our driving expedition we came across fallen pine trees that blocked our path. never were these trees huge, 18 inches diameter at the max, but still, they were ENTIRE TREES. at each impass, robin and david would dexterously grab a branch and with what seemed to be little effort remove the trees and roll them down the hill-tain. during each of these moments i flitted around running from side to side trying to find a way to help. by the third tree, i recognized that my role was most helpfully filled when i stayed away, so i simply walked behind the two capable people dragging a tree. i even stepped in (dried, thank god) sheep poo. i don't think i have ever felt more useless.
as if life could get much more perfect, the speedy's have an outdoor bath that connects to the hot water supply. without meaning to, be it a midnight bathroom run or waking up to turn over, i have seen the milky way more times in new zealand than i have seen it combined before. there is so little light at the places we are staying that the stars are most incredible. well done, stars.
with the christmas season quickly approaching, robin and i have been gearing up for what we are referring to as "christmas in the car '09." we bought maybe the ugliest felt wreath with a whorish looking gold plastic angel on it for our rearview mirror and a 10 inch white plastic christmas tree. does santa come to cars? merry christmas, everyone!
outside for more bud rubbing (bow chicka bow wow) and singling the grape vines! and to think, i now know what that means!
love,
maggie
Friday, November 20, 2009
GOOD NEWS BEARS! katherine is coming for christmas! the same katherine who two months ago had no job. money should be an issue for none of you. be a star player and come to new zealand!
also, katherine's arrival will really tip the lentz v. thompson/fail representation in new zealand dramatically. pick it up, lentzes.
HURRY, KATHERINE, HURRY!
love,
maggie
also, katherine's arrival will really tip the lentz v. thompson/fail representation in new zealand dramatically. pick it up, lentzes.
HURRY, KATHERINE, HURRY!
love,
maggie
Thursday, November 12, 2009
last thursday robin and i went with our wwoof host, we'll call her ms. nutty, to a gravel shop of sorts. the gravel shop was probably my favorite thing about our week at ms. nutty's because it was a football sized parking lot filled with 30 bus sized mounds of differnet kinds of gravel. pebble gravel, sandy gravel, huge gravel, small gravel. it was all nice. i love the sound of wakling on gravel so my ears got a chance to dance to the music!
why was gravel the best part about a week at our last host's house? because she was a bit mean and a bit crazy. good riddance. on thursday afternoon, after completing a whole day of work for her on her soon to be commune, she suggested that robin and i go ahead and leave to go camping. although we wanted to leave SO BADLY we stood our ground and stayed the night because whoa, lady, we earned a place to sleep.
we did learn a few things from our time at her house, though. things like it's important to wake up at 6am and stir ground up crystal powder into the water for your plants and then throw it up into the air so that the morning rising sun will catch the crystals and help your plants grow. you know, useful things like that. if you want a good laugh, read about biodynamic and cosmological farming. it's a hoot.
what was interesting about staying at ms. nutty's house was that she clearly didn't like us or want us there and although she was as organic as one can be in her farming, she wasn't a good hostess. it was an enlightening experience and one that taught me that just because someone is good to this planet doesn't necessarily mean that he or she is good to other people.
but friday was a glorious day for many reasons! 1. it was our escape. 2. we went to abel tasman national park to camp for the night where we spent the afternoon on what turned out to be our private beach and private campsite. and then! as some message from god signaling that all was safe and well now that we had left Whackoline's house, we saw a double rainbow (prouduced magically from no rain!) from start to finish over our campsite as we drank our evening tea. what glory.
sunday we arrived back into the safe harbour of caryolyn's house! what a wonderful feeling it is to be arriving at a place you know you love and one that is fun and welcoming. we and the family sat around like old friends on sunday night eating fish and chips take out laughing and making fun of each other. it felt just like a home. that is one part about wwoofing that i so enjoy: we really become parts of these people's lives. the near saintly nature and incredible generosity of most of our hosts is lovely to witness and encourages me to welcome people as they do in my future life. today for example, we are going to run errands as carolyn is out for the day and pick up her son from his exam.
two nights ago when i woke up to use the restroom i was once again astounded by the brightness of the moon here. the tiny sliver that remained was so bright that i again couldn't look directly at it and so bright that it had washed out the millions of stars that robin and i camped under the night prior. that's the wonderful thing about the night sky. when there is no light pollution, i show up expecting to only enjoy the star show, but then am always blown away by the encore presentation of the moon. that nature, always wowing me. we see so many breath-taking vistas on even the most mundane walks or drives that i have developed a pavlovian response to every visual in NZ. nature provides something beautiful and i, as a trained appreciator, reply with the appropriate "oh my god," "look!," or "whoa." i am learning to embrace the silence i must learn to answer nature, as language always fails me in such stunning settings. for the sake of robin and for this year and to not belittle every mountain or ocean, i will learn to measure my applause through silence.
last night on our walk (read: vertical hike) to our cottage after dinner, robin and i were stopped in our path by an angry mother cow. after realizing she was angry only to protect her newborn calf, we thought we could outsmart/outrun her by hiking straight up the mountain and then backing over the hill down to our cottage. the cow won big time. once robin and i cleared through a bit of forest we met her gaze again as she had predicted our route and was still blocking the path to our cottage. at one point of extreme frustration after we had fallen to our bottoms amidst the prickly gorse i shouted out to the cow, to god, to anyone who would listen, "mama, we don't want your baby!" she didn't hear my plea and we had to back track down the mountain hanging our heads in shame to carolyn's and thomas' laughter. the good news was that carolyn, feeling our legitimate fright and frustration, drove us up to our cottage. what a successful mother, that cow. well done.
thomas' hunting dogs just let out all the chickens. i can hear robin trying to catch them. i have to go help. it's pathetic.
just went to help. we couldn't get the last two. i just chased them around trying to catch them in a towel or undulay, undulay (sp?) them into their house. we are two universtiy educated women. what is this life?
cows and chickens and hunting dogs, oh my!
love,
maggie
why was gravel the best part about a week at our last host's house? because she was a bit mean and a bit crazy. good riddance. on thursday afternoon, after completing a whole day of work for her on her soon to be commune, she suggested that robin and i go ahead and leave to go camping. although we wanted to leave SO BADLY we stood our ground and stayed the night because whoa, lady, we earned a place to sleep.
we did learn a few things from our time at her house, though. things like it's important to wake up at 6am and stir ground up crystal powder into the water for your plants and then throw it up into the air so that the morning rising sun will catch the crystals and help your plants grow. you know, useful things like that. if you want a good laugh, read about biodynamic and cosmological farming. it's a hoot.
what was interesting about staying at ms. nutty's house was that she clearly didn't like us or want us there and although she was as organic as one can be in her farming, she wasn't a good hostess. it was an enlightening experience and one that taught me that just because someone is good to this planet doesn't necessarily mean that he or she is good to other people.
but friday was a glorious day for many reasons! 1. it was our escape. 2. we went to abel tasman national park to camp for the night where we spent the afternoon on what turned out to be our private beach and private campsite. and then! as some message from god signaling that all was safe and well now that we had left Whackoline's house, we saw a double rainbow (prouduced magically from no rain!) from start to finish over our campsite as we drank our evening tea. what glory.
sunday we arrived back into the safe harbour of caryolyn's house! what a wonderful feeling it is to be arriving at a place you know you love and one that is fun and welcoming. we and the family sat around like old friends on sunday night eating fish and chips take out laughing and making fun of each other. it felt just like a home. that is one part about wwoofing that i so enjoy: we really become parts of these people's lives. the near saintly nature and incredible generosity of most of our hosts is lovely to witness and encourages me to welcome people as they do in my future life. today for example, we are going to run errands as carolyn is out for the day and pick up her son from his exam.
two nights ago when i woke up to use the restroom i was once again astounded by the brightness of the moon here. the tiny sliver that remained was so bright that i again couldn't look directly at it and so bright that it had washed out the millions of stars that robin and i camped under the night prior. that's the wonderful thing about the night sky. when there is no light pollution, i show up expecting to only enjoy the star show, but then am always blown away by the encore presentation of the moon. that nature, always wowing me. we see so many breath-taking vistas on even the most mundane walks or drives that i have developed a pavlovian response to every visual in NZ. nature provides something beautiful and i, as a trained appreciator, reply with the appropriate "oh my god," "look!," or "whoa." i am learning to embrace the silence i must learn to answer nature, as language always fails me in such stunning settings. for the sake of robin and for this year and to not belittle every mountain or ocean, i will learn to measure my applause through silence.
last night on our walk (read: vertical hike) to our cottage after dinner, robin and i were stopped in our path by an angry mother cow. after realizing she was angry only to protect her newborn calf, we thought we could outsmart/outrun her by hiking straight up the mountain and then backing over the hill down to our cottage. the cow won big time. once robin and i cleared through a bit of forest we met her gaze again as she had predicted our route and was still blocking the path to our cottage. at one point of extreme frustration after we had fallen to our bottoms amidst the prickly gorse i shouted out to the cow, to god, to anyone who would listen, "mama, we don't want your baby!" she didn't hear my plea and we had to back track down the mountain hanging our heads in shame to carolyn's and thomas' laughter. the good news was that carolyn, feeling our legitimate fright and frustration, drove us up to our cottage. what a successful mother, that cow. well done.
thomas' hunting dogs just let out all the chickens. i can hear robin trying to catch them. i have to go help. it's pathetic.
just went to help. we couldn't get the last two. i just chased them around trying to catch them in a towel or undulay, undulay (sp?) them into their house. we are two universtiy educated women. what is this life?
cows and chickens and hunting dogs, oh my!
love,
maggie
Thursday, November 5, 2009
after just having dinner, i have come back to the computer to finish an email and now to explain what i mean about carolyn's kids being cool. tonight's dinner was a simple pasta and tomato sauce because carolyn and her husband are at her daughter's graduation. she forgot to invite the 16 year old, thomas, so he was left here with me and robin. one particularly good dinner conversation included the idea of robin making mugs and then thomas coming up with what to write on them. his idea was to write this on the mug: "hey, look behind you. i'm standing here all creepy. don't think this is stupid just because i am a cup. this is real shit (his words, not mine). yeah." see how that's funny? oh god, i hope this translates in writing.
also, i know i just suggested that you all get on a plane and come visit, but instead could you wire me the money you would spend on a ticket? a few days ago, i made a bet with robin that didn't turn out in my favor, and now i owe her $5000. whoops.
love,
maggie
also, i know i just suggested that you all get on a plane and come visit, but instead could you wire me the money you would spend on a ticket? a few days ago, i made a bet with robin that didn't turn out in my favor, and now i owe her $5000. whoops.
love,
maggie
whoa, whoa, whoa, everything.
i just killed a sandfly on the computer screen. they are the only bad thing i have discovered about the south island thus far. stike one, new zealand.
due to the scattered nature of my brain, the incongruencies of my thoughts, and the rapid rate at which i am experiencing newzea life, i am going to number the rest of this post.
1. the bit about the sandflies probably should be copied and pasted into the numbered section.
2. i hope you didn't read #1.
3. we are so happy to be at carolyn's and spending time with her lovely family. i had forgotten that high school aged teenagers can be exceptionally cool. carolyn's kids are reminding me of this. we have a board and rope swing that hangs from the tree beside our cottage at the top of a mountain. that part rules in itself. but the real beauty of it is that when we swing out, we can see the crazy clear river 300 feet below us.
4. i just realized that i have been on three different swings the eight weeks i have been here. i am averaging more than a swing ride every three weeks. (incredible math, huh?) i think this means that my life right now is a dream.
5. on our nine hour drive from outside of auckland to wellington to catch our ferry to the south island, robin and i did lots and lots of singing. at one point as we were driving around the stunning lake taupo with the sun reflecting in our glasses singing obediah parker's cover of "hey ya" at the top of our lungs (not nearly as well as cc does, but hey - we try), i looked over at robin and could not believe our incredible fortune. that moment was EXACTLY what i had imagined our life would be and then, poof! it is.
6. a few hours later in the drive to wellington our tape deck converter was having a bout of PMS and stopped working. we started singing to each other instead. the only song that got sung twice? UNC(go heels, go)'s alma mater. goodgodfest, college was heaps of fun.
it's time for dinner. more later. i am happy. i wish you were all here. you can be. just get on a plane!
love,
maggie
i just killed a sandfly on the computer screen. they are the only bad thing i have discovered about the south island thus far. stike one, new zealand.
due to the scattered nature of my brain, the incongruencies of my thoughts, and the rapid rate at which i am experiencing newzea life, i am going to number the rest of this post.
1. the bit about the sandflies probably should be copied and pasted into the numbered section.
2. i hope you didn't read #1.
3. we are so happy to be at carolyn's and spending time with her lovely family. i had forgotten that high school aged teenagers can be exceptionally cool. carolyn's kids are reminding me of this. we have a board and rope swing that hangs from the tree beside our cottage at the top of a mountain. that part rules in itself. but the real beauty of it is that when we swing out, we can see the crazy clear river 300 feet below us.
4. i just realized that i have been on three different swings the eight weeks i have been here. i am averaging more than a swing ride every three weeks. (incredible math, huh?) i think this means that my life right now is a dream.
5. on our nine hour drive from outside of auckland to wellington to catch our ferry to the south island, robin and i did lots and lots of singing. at one point as we were driving around the stunning lake taupo with the sun reflecting in our glasses singing obediah parker's cover of "hey ya" at the top of our lungs (not nearly as well as cc does, but hey - we try), i looked over at robin and could not believe our incredible fortune. that moment was EXACTLY what i had imagined our life would be and then, poof! it is.
6. a few hours later in the drive to wellington our tape deck converter was having a bout of PMS and stopped working. we started singing to each other instead. the only song that got sung twice? UNC(go heels, go)'s alma mater. goodgodfest, college was heaps of fun.
it's time for dinner. more later. i am happy. i wish you were all here. you can be. just get on a plane!
love,
maggie
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)