Grace and I have a hard time coordinating whether or not we're going to make stupid faces in pictures.  Fortunately, out of 3 takes over the course of New Year's Eve, we managed to get one good shot.  Haha.

Happy New Year everyone!

New Year's Eve

I realize that for my kiwi readers, 2009 is already underway.  I was reminded of this at 6:57am when my cell phone rang and rang and rang until I finally woke up, realizing that the ring wasn't in fact part of my dream.... I missed the call.  It was Jude, presumably wishing me a Happy New Year from the other side of the world, as it was 3 minutes until 2009 by the clock on my phone.

In Minnesota, where I currently am (and have been since the 26th) visiting Grace, 2009 will begin in 8 hours, 1 minute and counting. :o)

Photo updates to come!

Week 10 moments

Time for an HVHS teaching update! Things have been going extremely well at school, and although this week is utter insanity (last week of term, my sole charge week, writing Year 9 reports, Year 11 and Year 13 performances and assessment reports, Year 9 guitar assessments, etc.), it has actually been a very positive experience. I had my Global Student Teaching supervisor Jill observe my final Year 13 Jazz History lesson today, and it went really well. It was a successful lesson, although I didn't feel it was my best (mainly because of a couple pacing issues due to the fact that my Year 13s haven't had a Jazz History lesson in 3 weeks, so all of their answers and discussions took longer as they had to recall all of the information). Nonetheless, Jill's comments on my teaching were extremely positive. A few quotes for the interested:

"I can tell already that you are a very proficient teacher..... and I don't say that often."

*jokingly* "It was almost a waste of time for me to come here and observe you doing exactly what I knew you could do!"

"You will have absolutely no problem finding a job.... and if you do, I want to know why!"

So, needless to say, I was very happy with how the day went in that regard. I also had my Year 9D guitar assessments today, and at the end of the spell when I was supervising the students putting their guitars back in the storage room, one boy stayed behind after putting his guitar away, looking like he had something to say. He sheepishly said to me, "It's been good, Miss, being in your guitar class. And I'm sorry about a couple things right at the beginning...." (we'd had a little "chat" in the first 2 lessons about some disruptive behaviour, i.e. horsing around with his friend in the classroom while I was distributing guitars to the rest of the class) ".... but it's really been good. Thank you." So that was a completely unexpected and really nice moment today. Then when I went back into the classroom I had a couple more boys waiting around to say thank you, to wish me a good term break, and to ask me if I was going to travel New Zealand on my 2 weeks off, so all in all it was definitely a nice way to end the day. I also got another very complimentary interim report from Stephen, so to make a long story short, today was fabulous! Definitely a lot of feel-good moments today (including at lunch time when Salma, one of my students from the last line of Year 9 guitar, stopped to have a visit with me outside the hall and asked me worriedly if I would be back in Term 4. When I said that I would be back for 4 weeks, she grinned and said, relieved, "Oh ok, good!"). I love HVHS!

Despite the fact that I still have copious amounts of work to do tonight (Year 11 performance assessment reports, Year 9 general music assessment marking, Year 9 general music reports.... oy vey....), I feel very content. I have another Orchestra performance tomorrow at assembly in Spell 1 so I'll have to get everything for tomorrow prepared for tonight, as performing in Spell 1 means that I lose my non-contact (prep) period. Life around here, as I said before, is utter insanity. But, it's all good. :o) And besides, you know me.... I've never been one to sit around idly anyway..... bring on the next challenge!

(I maybe shouldn't say that and tempt fate, as Gary, Katriona, Stephen and I are planning on having all of the Year 9s gather together in one room tomorrow and watch the DVD "High School Musical" in the last spell of the day. I can sense the impending chaos!)

So with that, I leave you with another video. This one isn't super recent, as I've only just figured out how to compress videos for the blog. I actually took this video of Grace a few weeks ago when we were hanging out on Courtenay Place in Wellington, likely during one of our traditional Tuesday get-togethers. So here you are - meet Grace in 3D! (Oh, and for the record, the shout-out to Auntie Diane is really to Auntie Diane and Uncle Ron.... didn't mean to leave anyone out! Haha. And if somehow you missed the in-joke about double chins, you must go back a few posts to find the infamous double chin pictures.... they're really too attractive to pass up)!

We came.... we zorbed and swooped.... we conquered!

I'm back from a fantastically adventurous and exhausting weekend in Rotorua with Jude, Julia, and Grace. We met up with Grace's friend Jay at the Zorb and spent the rest of the day with him zorbing, swooping, luging, etc. We spent lots of money but saw lots of awesome sights and had lots of extremely entertaining and memorable bonding experiences. I'll do a post of some other pics from Taupo and area later, but for now here are the adventure photo highlights from our picture CDs ($50 NZ worth! Hahaha):

The Zorb ball at the bottom of the hill

Jude and Julia after their ride in the Zorb

Jay, Grace, and I give a thumbs up to Zorbing!

I'm screaming as I pull the rip cord at the Swoop. All 3 of us proceed to scream for the entire free-fall.

Headfirst.... what a view!

The bluriness of the background, Jay's screaming face, and Grace clutching Jay's arm say it all.

Once the initial "pee-your-pants" moment subsided, we were able to enjoy the ride and pretend we were flying.

All in all a great weekend! As Jay put it, it was a "sweet as Saturday" (and yes, that's sweet AS. One 's.' The kiwis say it all the time... basically it means really sweet. This also works for sayings such as "That joke was funny as" or "That test was easy as"). Yep, our trip to Rotorua was sweet as!

More updates to come later. Don't be surprised if the blogging is a bit lacking this week, as I am doing my first week of sole charge (i.e. teaching all of Stephen's classes) this week. Things are CRAZY around here. That being said, I need to get to bed. I've got lots to do tomorrow and I need all the sleep I can get, especially since I've still got this ridiculous cold! Must rest. Until next time, cheers! (Oh, and wish me luck for tomorrow.... WYC is singing my arrangement of God Defend New Zealand and O Canada, and I'm conducting!!!!)

Cowboy hats, beautiful beaches, and dead sharks... who could ask for anything more?

Here are just a couple photographic highlights of my weekend. It has been a great weekend - hoedown party at Liz's place on Friday, Castlepoint with Grace, Fi, Sam, Richard, and Kirsten on Saturday, movie night with Grace and Aidyn last night, and then a productive Sunday (today). So far I've cleaned my room, done laundry, finished and e-mailed my Week 8 reflection to my Global Student Teaching supervisor, re-booked my flights to Australia and Vancouver for November, and now I'm updating the blog. Will do some lesson planning today as well. But for now, here are the pictures (oh, and if you somehow missed my massive post from yesterday, do check that one out too! Tons of pictures!)!:

Julia, Jude and I sporting our fabulously sparkly and matching cowboy hats at Liz's hoedown party. The matching freckles are courtesy of Julia and her eyeliner pencil.

The view of the lighthouse in the distance at Castlepoint

Me and Grace at Castlepoint

This rock was HEAVY!

Nice view of the water on a beach at Castlepoint

Yeah, that's a dead shark. Don't worry, I washed my hands. Haha. EWW.

Another section of the beach at Castlepoint

Lauren and Grace: Soul mates, or sole mates? You decide.

More pictures, and an update!

Another picture post! I promise to post more meaningful pictures (i.e. my house, HVHS, Kelson, etc.) at some point, but for now I'm just so darn amused by these Photobooth pictures! I swear, I need to buy a Mac just for this program alone. Hahaha.

This one is pretty much one of my favourites.

I look like Quagmire from Family Guy! And I love Grace laughing at me from the corner of the picture. Haha.

I apparently was NOT impressed with myself.

Grace's forehead and chin are usually this big in real life. I'd say this is a pretty accurate representation.

Brett gets extra funny points for a super curvy mustache (and a Humpty Dumpty vertical smile, right Karyn?!)!

Comic book!

Grace and I are in a horror movie!

Pop art!

This is the sketch feature. I am looking at Grace adoringly, but she's more interested in making dumb faces at herself in her computer camera.

Out for hot chocolate at Gloria Jean's - Lambton Quay, Wellington

Grace and I meet up in Wellington every Tuesday (and usually on Friday and/or Saturday), and it's become tradition to take Photobooth pictures every time we see each other. Our albums will be huge by the time we go home!

In random exciting news from today, Fiona and Sam are thinking of buying a new car soon and keeping their old one so I can drive it myself! YAY! (Don't worry mom, they're going to teach me to drive standard with my left hand, sitting on the right side of the car, driving on the left side of the road, going through roundabouts "backwards," etc..... I'm getting used to it just from being a passenger for the past month and a bit!)!!! Having my own car would give me SO much more independence, which would be absolutely so fantastic and convenient for all of us - Fi and Sam wouldn't have to worry about bailing me out of situations in which I miss the last bus, they wouldn't have to drive me to/from school, we wouldn't have to be texting each other all the time to see if I should take the bus or if I need a ride, etc. And not to mention the convenience of driving myself into the city for Wellington Youth Choir rehearsals and stuff. Ahh, it would be so awesome!

And of course things are still going really well at HVHS. As I've said before, internship has its ups and its downs, but Stephen is absolutely fantastic, and I'm learning tons. I'm getting the hang of lesson planning, classroom management, questioning strategies, etc. Today Stephen and I planned our Year 11 assessment, so we'll be testing them next week on John Psathas' "Waiting for the Aeroplane" (the piano piece that I've been teaching them through score analysis), and Beethoven's "Moonlight Sonata." I also taught my first "Listening through jazz history" lesson to my Year 13s today, and that was a lot of fun. I have a very eager group of students, and we're able to have very involved and intelligent discussions about the music that we're studying. I led them through listening and analysis of music from the New Orleans, Chicago, and Swing eras today, and tomorrow we'll do Be-Bop, Cool Jazz, and Fusion. We're also creating a "Jazz Through the Ages" timeline on the back wall of our music classroom - I made a poster for Bossa Nova, since it's my favourite style and we're not going to be able to study it in this unit (unfortunately!). I've been talking to them about it casually though, and a few of them are really keen to hear the Stan Getz/Joao Gilberto/Astrud Gilberto recording of "The Girl From Ipanema" (which I've raved about, so now they're interested), and they keep asking me if we get to study it, or if I can sing it to them in Portuguese. I'll see if I can get my hands on a recording for them... I'm sure I could find time to play it for them at some point, and it would be a shame not to expose them to it, especially when they're so keen to learn about it without me actually "forcing" them to study it. :o) Stephen commented on my personal interest in and enthusiasm for the topic of jazz history today, and he said that the students are really responding to it. I'm having a blast teaching this unit, and I'm so lucky that Stephen has let me take over!!!

That being said, I have to plan the next listening lesson for tomorrow, so I'd better get on that. I'm also teaching a Year 9 class on pitch tomorrow in spell 5 (last period of the day), so that will be INTERESTING. I know the class well, despite having not taught them myself yet.... they can be quite rambunctious, so pair that with the last class of the day, and Friday. It should be a challenge. But, that's what I'm here for! Bring it on! :o)

(Oh, and thanks for the hot dog card, Karyn! HOT DOG CLUB FOREVER!!!!!)!

PS - As of tomorrow, Friday August 17th, we're officially halfway through Term 3! Amazing! I'm over 1/3 done my internship already.... time flies! I think it's almost time to start thinking about where I'm going to travel on my 2-week break!

Picture update of a Wellington weekend and Canadian cookies!

Another picture post update for my faithful readers (i.e. Mom and dad, Auntie Diane and Uncle Ron, Karyn, and a couple friends)!!!! This was my weekend in Wellington - full of fun, rain, wind, and silly pictures!

Did you know that Chuck Norris is an alto I? (i.e. Someone playing a joke on Hope Norris)

Grace and I don't ALWAYS take stupid pictures.... sometimes they're quite thoughtful, and even in sepia!

Ok, I lied. We take pictures of ourselves with double chins for fun.

Ones like this provide us with hours of entertainment, and sore abs from laughing too hard at our own physical misfortune. But seriously, are you impressed? Look at the quality of that double chin! Simply amazing.


Brett, me, and Grace at Brett's hostel on Saturday evening (this picture was taken directly after the 40-minute detour from the train station to Taste of India, mentioned in the last post)

This one was taken about an hour ago, as I was making red chocolate chip cookies for my Year 11 music class. Martha Stewart, eat your heart out!!! (Thanks for the Lululemon headbands, Karyn! I love them!!!! My head feels complete again! Haha)

Here are some of my Canadian cookies! I'm having my Year 11s do a score analysis group assignment on Wednesday (where they take little strips of paper with descriptions of important aspects of John Psathas' piano solo "Waiting for the Aeroplane" and put them in order according to the score), and the teams to get it in the correct order win Canadian cookies. Extra cookies for the team who does it the fastest! Yay!

Crazy Karaoke Competition in Wonderful Windy Wellington (now THAT'S alliteration)!

Last night Grace and I experienced the first true rainy, windy Wellington evening. The wind was so unbelievably strong that it almost knocked us over a few times... incredible! And it was raining so hard that, combined with the force of the wind, it was raining horizontal. Simply amazing! The bottom of my pant legs were actually noticeably heavier than they were before the rain hit, and my feet were actually slipping around inside my shoes (I suppose that's what you get for wearing dress shoes with no socks in the pouring rain!).

So Grace and I went into town in the early evening to catch the Vector Wellington Orchestra and Orpheus Choir performing Beethoven's 9th and a piano concerto by John Psathas (the NZ composer whose work I'm studying with my Year 11s right now - and there was even a pre-concert talk with John Psathas!). So we went into town, all gung ho, ready to meet Brett at the Wellington Town Hall, and when we got to the box office we saw that the show was sold out. NOOOO!!! So we texted Brett and made plans to meet up for Indian food instead. Grace and I then walked back toward the train station where we had seen a sign for a karaoke competition in the entryway of a bar, and we went in and got the details. Registration would be from 8-9pm and it was only 6:30, so we headed back toward Taste of India to ease our growling stomachs before our big karaoke debut. Grace, the master of directions in Wellington, led me astray for a whopping 40-minute walk "toward" Taste of India (which really wasn't close at all, thanks Grace! haha) in the pouring rain and wind. We laughed all the way there, complaining intermittently about how hungry we were.... By the time we got there my stomach was just about eating itself... I've never tasted better curry in my life! We met up with Brett and then went back to his hostel to eat and visit before heading back off to the karaoke competition.

Grace and I took the bus from Courtenay Place to the train station, then we walked to the bar and registered for karaoke. There are 4 heats or something, one every Saturday night, and then the finals are on September 1st. The grand prize is $1,000, and there's also a $500 prize for 2nd place and a bunch of other random prizes to be won, so Grace and I thought "Why not give it a shot?" We both competed, had a blast, and at the end of the night I moved on (with a few other people) to the finals... not to mention the fact that I snagged a fantastic brown t-shirt that says BROWN on the front, and Wellington Brewing Co. on the back.... the ultimate in fashion! I sang "Don't Know Why" by Norah Jones and "My Guy" by Mary Wells (a flashback to my first karaoke experience with Karyn and Diane at Johnny's in Winnipeg!). Grace sang "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" and "Danny Boy." And then, of course, we had to pull out our famous duet - "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me" by Culture Club. So fun! We also met a bunch of silly funny guys at the bar, so we hung out with them, singing duets, dancing, and taking pictures. We ended the night dancing at The Establishment on Courtenay Place with our new friends before heading back to Grace's place on the train for the night.

*** Note to all readers: I can vividly picture my mother cringing, right at this moment, at the thought of Grace and I making friends with random strange men at the bar in Wellington, and going out dancing with them.... but don't worry, they were very nice and we had a lot of fun... no problems! ***

Oh, and by the way, if you haven't noticed yet, I've just discovered the joy of using different text colours in my blog entries. Fun, fun!

Anyway, there's the update from my fun weekend in Wellington. Grace and I met up with Paul on Friday and it was nice although a bit awkward, as I think Grace's and my excitement at seeing each other again combined with the very quiet Paul's jet lag was a bit overwhelming for him, but he has since messaged both of us to say that he had a good time and would like to get together again at some point. So we'll give that another shot and see how it goes!

Grace and I have also started a tradition of taking Photobooth pictures every time we see each other, so by the time I get back to Canada I will have the most extensive collection of outrageous self-portraits that anyone has ever seen! Grace and I were joking around about how we should put one of those on our resume or something. I'm pretty sure it would be a big hit!

Fun with Photobooth!

As promised, here are some of the pictures that Grace and I took at the coffee shop on Tuesday. She's got more funny ones too, that I haven't saved on my computer yet - in one of them I look like Quagmire from Family Guy (I will DEFINITELY post that one once she gets it onto Facebook so I can steal it!). Anyway, I think these pictures almost defy explanation, so I will just leave it to you to add your own captions in your mind! Haha.

(And in case you were curious, my Year 9 guitar class went extremely well! No behaviour problems whatsoever! It was amazing. I'm not sure if it was because I went to extra lengths to make sure that everything was orderly in the classroom, i.e. they were lined up outside the door and told the expectations before they ever entered the room, etc., but I was pleasantly surprised! It was awesome. And it's fun to think that I'm a guitar teacher! Cool beans.)

Tomorrow Grace and I are getting together at Te Papa museum in Wellington, where we will be meeting a guy named Paul from Wisconsin. He just got to New Zealand yesterday morning, and will be starting his internship on Monday. Jill, our supervisor, e-mailed us his phone number and suggested that we get together with him for coffee or something so that he's not alone all weekend in a new city, in a new country, anticipating his internship with nobody to talk to. I called him tonight, and he seems a little overwhelmed but quite nice, and easy to talk to. It will be nice to have another person in our age range to hang out with while we're here. And another visit to Te Papa never hurt anyone! :o)

Amazing Grace!

So I have finally met my dear Internet friend Grace! Haha. We've been talking online for about 5 months, since we found each other on the Global Student Teaching website. We were (are) the only 2 music education interns in New Zealand from North America in the Summer 2007 placements from GST, so naturally we contacted each other before we left. She's been here since May, and we've been excitedly anticipating our meeting in person for months now. On Friday night we finally got together in Wellington to hit up a karaoke bar and strut our stuff on the dance floor! I tell ya, Grace has got moves like no other. Sometimes they embarrass her friends, but when she's got friends like me the embarrassment factor is really irrelevant. In fact, I just join right in and get my groove on with her, a la "the running man," "the shopping cart," "starting the lawnmower," etc. (For those of you who may not know what I'm talking about, I'll just have to show you sometime.... really, these moves defy explanation).

The above picture was taken just a few hours ago at a coffee shop in Wellington that is about a 25 minute walk from the train station. Grace and I have gone here twice now, and will be making a habit of getting together on Tuesdays before I head off to Wellington Youth Choir rehearsal. Today we took a ton of ridiculous pictures on her I-Book using Photobooth. If you haven't seen this program, you need to... you don't know what you're missing. Basically you can skew the images that your computer camera is seeing in various ways (bulge, light tunnel, pop art, sepia, stretch, mirror, etc.), resulting in the most ridiculously hideous pictures you've ever seen of yourself. Some are pretty neat though, like the pop art ones - they look almost like Andy Warhol pictures. Grace is going to post hers on Facebook, and once she does I will steal them and post a few on here.

WYC rehearsal tonight was interesting... our director and accompanist were both missing, so we did some sectional work. We had altos and sopranos together, and the group nominated me to lead the sectional because I apparently seemed the most confident with the pronunciations and the notes, rhythms, etc. So I led sectional, and then when the rest of the group came back, they nominated me again to conduct the choir. So in my 2nd ever rehearsal, I conducted the Wellington Youth Choir singing the Credo of Schubert's Mass in C! It was pretty darn cool. When we finished, one of the guys called out from the back row, "Good conducting!" and the whole choir gave me a round of applause. It was a pretty neat experience! :o)

Mom, you'll be happy to know that I gave everyone in WYC Canadian pencils today (which got another round of applause, haha), and I've also given them out to my Year 13 and Year 11 music classes. They're very popular around here - too bad I didn't have room for more! Anyway they're going to good use... my Year 11s are using them for score analysis. Our last score analysis class will be coming up shortly, and I have an activity planned for them where I've cut out descriptions of various sections of the music (based on the themes and development of those themes, etc.), and they have to put them in order as they appear in the score. The team who gets it all correct first will win homemade chocolate chip cookies with Canadian flag toothpicks in them (thanks Karyn!). Fun stuff!

I should get to bed now - tomorrow will be busy. I'm teaching my first class of Year 9 guitar, and apparently this group is VERY difficult. We'll see what tomorrow brings - it will be interesting, regardless. Hopefully I can handle it.

Hope everyone at home is doing well. Leave me comments, people! I want to know if you're reading this! Haha. Love you!

3 weeks down, 11 to go!

My 3rd week of teaching at HVHS has been a growth experience for me. I had a mini-meltdown on Thursday when I was feeling particularly overwhelmed with lesson planning, adjusting to a new culture, climate, new geographical surroundings, being away from my friends and family, etc. and I let it all out through my eyeballs. My co-op teacher was fantastically supportive and understanding, and my little cry lasted only about 5 minutes. I took a breath of fresh air outside, then went in to teach my next lesson on Louis Armstrong and "West End Blues" (what a great tune!). It went really well, and I think I just needed to have that little moment of overwhelmth (which isn't a word but I will choose to use it anyway). So, all is still well with the Kiwinadian in Lower Hutt!

I finally met Grace on Friday night! We had SO much fun in Wellington - we met at the train station, and walked to a restaurant called Calzone for lattes and garlic bread (mmm!), and her friend Brett met us there. We then walked to a karaoke bar called Club K, and Grace and I busted out an amazing duet of "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me" by Culture Club, complete with fabulous dance moves during every instrumental break. The audience was getting a kick out of us too, which made it even more fun. Then we went to a dance club called The Establishment, which we quickly learned was more geared towards 30-somethings, so we didn't stay long. We ended the night at Subway restaurant, where Sam met us for a visit and then drove me back to the Hutt. All in all it was a fabulous night! Grace and I are planning on meeting up in Wellington every Tuesday now, as I will be there anyway for WYC rehearsal. Yay! :o)

Thanks to mom and dad for the card - I got it in the mail a few days ago. Karyn, I still haven't received your package, but I'm super excited! I didn't realize how much I would miss my headbands until I forgot to pack even one of them. Haha. I also have received a card from Bronwyn, so I am feeling loved here in NZ. :o) It's so nice to get mail! I promise if anyone writes to me, I will write back! Promise, promise!

So now I will post some more pics of our weekend in Ohakune and Mt. Ruapehu - you can click on any of them to view full-size. Sam and Cassie have also posted some pics, and they are linked on the right-hand side of my blog if you'd like to check it out.

(This one was too funny NOT to post. I bought these purple pants when I first got here because I was always cold, but they're quite long on me. So we were outside looking at Mt. Ruapehu from our hotel in Ohakune, and the grass was wet. I needed to lift my pant legs up, but instead of using 2 hands, I just pulled them both up with 1 hand. Sam snapped a picture. I realize that it looks like I'm grabbing my crotch. I am also making a stupid face and eating a piece of toast, just to top it all off. Oh well, you can't win 'em all.)

(This was in Waiouru, on the way to Ohakune - I am quite proud of the fact that Sam and I managed to pack his tiny 2-seater Miata convertable so efficiently! I am also looking quite tired, as I had just woken up from an hour-long nap about 5 minutes before this pic was taken.)

(Sam and me on the chairlift up Mt. Ruapehu)

(Waitonga Falls walk)

(Mt. Ruapehu)

(Mt. Ruapehu from Ohakune)

(Believe it or not, I'm actually HAPPY about winter in July!)

(On the way back down the chairlift)

(Beautiful sunrise in Ohakune)

(Ohakune sunset - this one reminds me of one of Bobby's paintings or something! Beautiful.)

(The stream at the base of Waitonga Falls)

(Tahurangi from Turoa)

(This one's for Karyn - here's the completed engagement proposal in the snow!..... SHE SAID YES!)