Here's to tears and turning corners

Hello. It's been a while - feels like an age - since I did a blog post. It's been a heavy few months indeed. I've had my head down, grafting away in survival mode I suppose, both of us have. It's been a difficult transition moving to New Zealand, much more so than I ever could have anticipated. It's deep-level stuff, psychological and emotional, unseen and thus unexpected; certainly caught me off guard. So much of what we expected has been dashed or severely reevaluated, and yet ultimately, what a positive experience.

I remember just before we left the states I wrote a post about negative spaces and the like, but it seems as if I had it wrong somehow. Silence, like shadow, is the true negative space, the no-thing that defines the some-thing, and my absence from this blog has been its expression. I used to be the kind of person who would never proclaim a positive experience or a fortunate turn of events for fear of jinxing it, but thankfully I'm not like that anymore. During the past week or so it has felt like Wellington, the land here, has begun to open up for us, slowly, but definitely surely. It's an awesome feeling, like taking a huge deep breath after climbing a particularly nasty mountain. I don't want to make a big deal out of this, I just wanted proclaim the turning of a corner, there on the deep, unseen level . And also to say hey and hi and wow and thank you.

'On the surface there, where eyes shine like midnight pines and smile saw-tooth grins.'

P.S. There's a song if you click the title.

Maori-Hongi. The traditional way of greeting.

 

I got the above two images off the internet...aren't they awesome? What is even more awesome is that Hongi is still the way to greet each other in the Maori culture here in New Zealand. I find it intimate, real, and beautiful. 

I started relief teaching on Friday (Yay!!) and was fortunate enough to be part of the crew preparing the kids from ages 8-11, of all different cultures, for their initiation ceremony happening next week. They are basically going to be adopted into the Maori family and it is a kind of "right of passage." The children are ridiculously excited. They have to learn the words, songs and steps of the ceremony. Wow. Two traditional Maori elders came to the school in the afternoon to perfect the ritual and make sure the kids know exactly what to next week. It is a sacred ceremony and it is fascinating to see how seriously the children take it and how solemnly they learn. 

If you would like to have an idea of the beginning of the ceremony, have a look at Whale rider, a stunning New Zealand movie that shows a part of the initiation of the village boys. The following URL is an excerpt from the movie. The welcoming ceremony part is about  quarter of the way in: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=rSYWz4Z3idc (I really recommend seeing the whole film though. It is magical)

The children are going to sleep over in a Hoturoa Marae. A traditional Maori meeting place where the ceremony will be performed. They will learn different traditional Maori arts such as weaving, basket-making and fishing.

Hoturoa Marae

It was an interesting experience as I can not speak Maori, but the kids helped me so much in the pronunciation of things! Funny to see little European kiddies rattling off in Maori. I was grateful for such a special day. :)

The strangest thing has started to happen this last week...my heart has slowly started to open in slithers and I can feel the warm flowing of love and appreciation for this place streaming out on odd occasions when I least expect it. Which is very surprising, as I had no idea that my chest was so tightly clamped shut. But in these moments, the lightness of spirit and happiness I feel would overwhelm me, as their sudden appearance make their scarcity these last few months just so much more pronounced.

It is something I never paid much attention to...How, when you are in your familiar and comfortable environment, your heart is open and receptive, ready to respond to whatever stimulus it receives with enthusiasm and confidence or reluctance and nonchalance; whatever the mood of the day may be. Even daunting tasks do not look so daunting when you are surrounded by the familiar and by loved ones who help you solidify and justify your decisions and actions.
But when in an unknown place with challenges unlike any I've experienced before, my body's natural reaction seems to be to shut my heart as tightly as it can in its cage of ribs, tucking those embracing and flowing sails that reach into the world firmly away.
No wonder I've been so sad!
But I think now enough time has passed to start trusting this new environment and myself in it and I am just exhausted from unconsciously keeping the world out and myself safe. So whoop whoop! you brave heart, lets do this thing together... :)

I am starting relief teaching this week which I'm sure would prove to be a very interesting experience! Wish me luck!

The photos below are from some of the walks Russell and I did around town last week.

Russell and I went walking on farmland about 15 minutes drive from where we stay. The area is called Belmont and it is where the city suddenly becomes rural. We walked among cows and climbed the tallest hill until we could see the ocean. It was absolutely icy up there. We saw that the mountains on the South island were snow capped, so that explained the numbed noses and fingertips!

The hills in this area used to be used for military bunkers. Some of them are still standing as you'll see in the pictures. If I was a farmer I would transform them into shelters for the animals...they have lovely thick walls!

Is that a boat?! No...just a rock. Had me fooled there for a second!

 

    "To See a World..."  
(Fragments from "Auguries of Innocence" by William Blake, one of my favourite poets) 

To see a World in a Grain of Sand
And a Heaven in a Wild Flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand 
And Eternity in an hour.

A Robin Redbreast in a Cage
Puts all Heaven in a Rage.
A dove house fill’d with doves and pigeons
Shudders Hell thro’ all its regions.
A Dog starv’d at his Master’s Gate
Predicts the ruin of the State.
A Horse misus’d upon the Road
Calls to Heaven for Human blood.
Each outcry of the hunted Hare
A fiber from the Brain does tear.

He who shall train the Horse to War
Shall never pass the Polar Bar.
The Beggar’s Dog and Widow’s Cat,
Feed them and thou wilt grow fat.
The Gnat that sings his Summer song 
Poison gets from Slander’s tongue.
The poison of the Snake and Newt
Is the sweat of Envy’s Foot.

A truth that’s told with bad intent
Beats all the Lies you can invent.
It is right it should be so;
Man was made for Joy and Woe;
And when this we rightly know
Thro’ the World we safely go.

 

   

A homage to my homeland

Sorting through our travel photos yesterday, I came across some never-before-published pictures from our Orange-river trip in Namibia. We did the trip with my mum and brother. It was a truly magical family experience. 

Although I think that some of these pictures are simply magnificent, they do not come close to capturing the true splendor and vastness of the land in Namibia. This was July 2011. Enjoy!

 

"If there is something inside us that we don't know about, such as hidden resources, unsuspected guts and cunning, or nobility of spirit in the face of sorrow and pain, it will come out if we are confronted by the unknown while we are alone, without friends, without familiar boundaries, without support." Florinda Donner, The witch's dream


It has been a while since I posted an entry. I must be honest, these last few weeks have not been easy. My friend Cristina and my goddaughter Angelina had to return to Cape Town as she lost her job at WETA due to money and work shortages.
I heard somewhere that moving countries has equivalent psychological trauma to getting a divorce, and in these last two weeks I can really vouch for the relevance of such a seemingly bizarre statement.

After my loved ones left, I most definitely felt a void; loneliness and a longing for the sweet smell of Namibian rain, my mother's soothing words and encouragement, the bustle of Cape Town streets, my position at Ecole Francaise du Cap in which I felt successful, proud and happy and most importantly, loved ones at the end of a phone line or street, happily ready for a tea and a chat.

Perhaps I am crossing a line here, but it is true enough in my personal experience and thus I feel it deserves a space in this blog... I miss Africans.
I miss Constantia, our beautiful help back home in Namibia whose quiet and loving demeanor never fails to help me put things into perspective. She has always been a constant throughout my childhood, patiently and lovingly soothing our home atmosphere and attracting me like a magnet to her presence. She is still working for my mum and I have known her for as long as I can remember.

As a young school girl, I was always in the minority when it came to colour. When I think back to it now, my schools were palettes as colourful as can be, ranging from charcoal, clay, loam, dust and lastly, chalk. My African friends felt connected to the land and had a groundedness and realness that I realise now is difficult to find in people. I was very naive when it came to colour and was quite shocked and thrown off when I went to South Africa to study and realised that different colour groups were divided and formed cliques that were hard to penetrate unless you were the right shade of caramel, chocolate or cream.
Here in New Zealand the predominant colours are green and white (in that order.) The land most certainly dominates. There are also (almost) only white people.
Russell told me that shockingly enough, New Zealand was very hesitant to let anyone other than white people enter its borders until the 1970's, when it introduced its non-racist immigration policy where right of residence became based on questions of skills and qualifications, not ethnicity or national origin. This explains a lot in the sense of the pale population.

I know that this must sound strange, but the Africans of all shades that I grew up with felt like fire, earth, endurance, hardship and courage and with a twinkle in their eyes they went about life in their way. British people (and I realised recently that the majority of kiwis are ex-British immigrants) feel very different. Perhaps it is just my background that makes me susceptible to the slightly uncomfortable feeling in my belly when I interact with a society that is insular, distant, coldly efficient and in my opinion, even unintentionally arrogant for their rich heritage, privilege and history.

I do not mean for the above to convey a message of negativity and regret; to the contrary, I feel for the first time, more sober when contemplating my roots and feel a true appreciation for my childhood. We chose New Zealand for so many reasons and I still feel in my heart that it was the right decision. This time of trial and transition I am meeting with fierce persistence and effort and am attempting to achieve the eternal patience of my beloved Constantia. Besides, I know for a fact that one can never tar an entire nation with the same brush (ha ha, no pun intended!) There are countless human gems out there; this I know for a fact. I just need to be patient for things to fall into place.
It is such an interesting exercise when you become the warmth, encouragement and strength that you so crave from the outside, for yourself. It reminds of the quote I typed at the top of this post.


Anyways...I am not quite sure where all that ramble came from. Let me now tell you of the beautiful adventure Russell and I had last week. We went to the South Island by ferry. Our brave little Dorothy drove us down the West coast on impossibly windy passes through dense forests, to the little town of Nelson, where we backpacked for three nights.

I shan't say too much of the beauty we experienced and how healing it was to both of us to venture into nature and get perspective on things again, but will rather let the pictures tell the story:

 

 Tiny, round finned Hector dolphins. Very rare and endangered, this is the only place in the world where they can be found:

 My dearest Riley, how would you like to live THERE?! :)