Kiwi Kids Rocked It

Monday

Our thoughts are with Toby, one of Ro's classmates, who's very sick and was transferred from Tauranga to Starship Hospital (the children's hospital in Auckland) while Mark was at work on Saturday. This morning, Ms Carr had the class write Get Well cards for him. On a lighter note, today was Ro's first school Christmas production, for which they've been rehearsing for weeks.

Today's matinee show of the production was well-attended by parents as well as the entire school. Cerine came with us as we watched Ro's class do their part as reindeers. Other classrooms performed as elves, snowflakes, North Winds, etc... The songs were lively and everyone had a good time, although we could tell Ro was visibly unhappy when his antlers came apart halfway through the show.

"Kiwi kids are rockin' it, rockin' it! Kiwi kids are tops!"

Belting their hearts out

After the play, Ro's class went back to their room to change back into their street clothes. In a testament to the laid-back atmosphere around here, the boys and girls all changed together in the classroom, stripping down to their skivvies. Not sure that would go over in the States. Even before the play, we had spotted the school cat crossing the street, and Sherry remarked that she's seen the cat everywhere - wandering in and out of classrooms, on the sofa in the office, and so on. Surely in America, some parent of a cat-allergic kid would have complained by now, but the Kiwis just take it in stride.

We took Cerine to Main St Cafe for brunch. It's a sentimental favorite, and is actually owned by a guy from Georgia (USA). Mark had his usual Eggs Benedict with bacon, Cerine the same but with spinach, and Sherry a huge breakfast scramble of which Mark probably ate half. All delicious, as usual. After filling our bellies, we went down to Pilot Bay to "bless" the girls' greenstone Maori symbols. Mark had given Sherry a single twist for her birthday, not realizing the custom of blessing it in the ocean at the time, and Cerine had bought a Koru (spiral) in her travels here. The weather was a little cool and drizzly today, and they didn't want to walk all the way to the ocean, so Mark dipped the symbols in Pilot Bay from the fishing pier.

One last look at The Mount for Cerine

We took Cerine to Tauranga airport for her flight to San Francisco (via Auckland). Sherry wondered if Cerine needed an import license for all the TimTams she was bringing back! We hung out with her for a little while in the terminal until it was time to pick Ro up from school, then said our goodbyes. Although we loved having her and Mark's parents here, it's been a long month of burning the candle at both ends, which was magnified by the poor sleep we'd been getting since flying to Melbourne. Sherry's such a light sleeper, and Ro such a noisy one, that all of us sleeping in the same room was a recipe for exhaustion.

On the way home from school, Ro lost one of his jandals climbing into the car. Of course, we didn't realize this until we got home. Mark was of the opinion that he could go to school barefoot for the rest of the summer, since he and the other boys kick their shoes off as soon as they get there anyway, but Sherry was determined to keep looking for it and drove back to the school, finding it in the road. Meanwhile, Mark took Ro downstairs to the pool for a couple of hours until dinnertime. They enjoyed playing with Ro's boogie board, racing back and forth across the pool in the steady rain. Sherry appreciated the "alone time," as she was anxious to get the apartment back in order.

After a hearty spaghetti dinner, we put an exhausted Ronan to bed early. We caught the end of the first test cricket match between NZ and traditional powerhouse Pakistan from Dunedin, which NZ won in dramatic fashion. Then came the rebroadcast of the All Blacks vs France; Mark had missed the live show on Sunday morning, and was eager to catch it. It was the last test match of the season, and proved to be a fast-paced, exciting match, with lots of running and only a modicum of the strategic kicking that has bogged down much of rugby union this year. The AB's won handily 39-12 in Marseille, a place France has only ever lost one previous test match. NZ even kept alive their remarkable streak of not allowing a single try in the Northern Hemisphere for the second straight season.