Tapa

Tapas: usually made from tree bark and beaten into thin strips. These strips are then woven together to make rugs or clothing. It's actually a tradition in the islands of Tonga, Samoa, and Fiji but since so many of those islanders are now living in NZ it's a custom that has stuck. So as I mentioned in my previous blog we actually made some as part of our maths class. Although we didn't actually use bark we did use paper which still comes from trees. Anyway the basic steps are as follows:

Find a design you like or make up one yourself. The key is to create symmetric patterns and shapes. The tapa can either be one large shape with small patterns or smaller patterns all coming together into one tapa.

Divide the paper into gride squares to make drawing the design easier. Then pencil in the design. Once your design is finished go over the design in black permanent marker. Also color in the parts you want solid black.

When you've finished with the black then you dye the paper. But first you want to crumple up your paper into a ball and then carefully uncrinkle it again. Run a clothes iron set on warm over the back of your tapa to smooth it out. Now you're ready for the dye. We used just common dye found at the store (shops) it was a brownish color. You mix the dye with water and sponge the die all over the entire tapa until it looks like so:

Let your tapa dry completely.

Finally using bleach and q-tips you can dye parts of your tapa white to accent the pattern. It won't bleach the black marker only the dye. Let the tapa dry and you're done! Here's my finished product:

Math Class Adventures

Remember watching the Harry Potter movies and imagining what it would be like to have Professor Flitwick's squeaky voice and shaky hands teaching you a charm's spells or Professor McGonagall sternly reminding you that transfiguration requires concentration not lolly gagging?  Well, from the moment our math class began this week I felt as though I had been transported into such an experience. That first day of maths class she walks in with short blond hair, fashionable clothes, and quite the personality. Since when did Madame Hooch become a maths professor I thought to myself after resisting the urge of looking around for her broomstick, black robes, and quidditch whistle. After a quick introduction she pulled out her dice, measuring sticks, colored counters, and whatever else you can think of a math teacher owning and the class began.

Rich task was her middle name and problem solving was most definitely her game. Class involved trial, and error, explaining and correcting, but with speed and accuracy. Her purpose to rid us of our old school boring mathematics approach and to introduce us to smart maths teaching. Being the unique teacher that she was we learned number rap songs (with dance accompaniment), used geometric features to create tapas (google the word they are really cool!), drew giants based on a single hand print, and we beat each other at games similar to chess but with number equations that move the pieces. Every day was a whirlwind of activity from 8:15am until 3:30pm. She was not afraid to correct you and her common phrase was "investigate!"

Math class will never be the same. I always thought math = memorize a bunch of formulas and know how to work numbers. Instead our professor taught us that math noticing patterns and learning how to decode them. We developed interesting and easy ways to integrate a simple mathematical concept into other subjects without going overboard on materials and planning. Although a bit eccentric at times (add in an intense New Zealand accent full of idioms and academic vocabulary) our professor opened up the world of math in ways I had never though of before.

Words to Know

So of course one of New Zealand's trademarks is their accent. It's wonderful being in an English speaking country but just because we speak the same language doesn't mean that we always communicate. Here is just a brief list of some new words I've picked up over the past week and a half:

throw a wobbly: throw a fit
spit the dummy: spit the pacifier or in adult context means they couldn't take it any more
to give someone a brown eye: to moon someone (funny if you think of skin color in relation to the word they use and we use)
heaps: lots of
pudding: word used for dessert pudding can be cake, cookies, brownies etc. custard = American version of pudding
biscuits: cookies (I tried to explain biscuits and gravy to my host mom haha she thought it sounded disgusting until I told her they weren't cookies)
footie: rugby
togs: bathing suit
so yum: really good (they use this word all the time)
rat bag: trouble maker
poncy: posh, ritzy
cool as/sweet as: really cool/awesome. You have to listen carefully to this one because they don't fill in anything else. They just say "sweet as" that's it and it pretty much sounds like they are swearing... but they aren't. There are even companies that have summer deals "sweet as."
acts: ask
yous: plural of you. They say how are yous doing. Or these cupcakes are for the two of yous.
car park: parking lot
motorway: highway
jelly: jello (jam is jam/jelly)
jandel: sandals- flip flops
boot: trunk of a car
nexminute: next minute or next thing you know...
scallywag: no not a pirate but another very much used term for trouble maker
my shout: meaning I'm paying or it's on me

Julie even let us borrow a book with little phrases to help us practice/learn how to blend in. Give me a few more months I'll be a pro :)

Basketball

Remember one of the goals I made for this trip? Try new things and don't look back? Well I took that challenge on Tuesday. Tuesday night is basketball with the YSA like I mentioned before. Ok so it wasn't exactly a "new" thing since I've played basketball before but playing at the church with the ysa (especially with some of the big kiwi boys) was something I'd never done. There were lots (heaps) more people there this time around but I still managed to play a few games. Some of the games even got a little more competitive than they probably should have been with a few elbows getting thrown here or there. Truth be told I was not a star player by any means but it was so much fun! There were more girls this time around (even one that I recognized from a class I had at byu- she's leaving for a mission in february small world!) so it was 2 girls 3 guys per team and same rules 5 baskets. You could also only win three games in a row since there were so many people who wanted to play.

I had a blast! I even prided myself in making the winning shot for our team's first game. We went undefeated until our 3 games were up. It's getting to the point where people know not only who we are but our names too (though I'm still working on all of theirs). We didn't get home until after 11 but it was a really fun day plus we didn't have any homework.

Our mathS class is going pretty well. The teacher wanted us to see how hard it is for kids to work with numbers and learn new concepts/vocabulary so we worked in base 8 instead of base 10 (meaning numbers only existed as such 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 20 etc and our conversions were different). It definitely got us thinking. Funny how once we learn a concept we forget how hard even the simplest things were at one time. Don't believe me? The next time you see a baby pay attention to how much effort it takes for them to pick something up with their fingers. What is now a routine and simple task used to take lots of effort and concentration. So often teachers are the same way with their students. They see the task as something easy and routine because it is for them and yet the students are learning these concepts for the first time. It's given me a lot (heaps) to think about as I prepare to intern this August.

"MathS" and FHE

So apparently in America we have to be unique at everything. We write the date our own way (1/15/2013 instead of 15/1/2013), we use feet, yards, inches, gallons, pints, etc. Not to mention working in degrees Fahrenheit instead of Celsius. We like walking and driving on the right side (which actually is how it should be according to most of the world) and we have developed our own interpretation of the word for mathematics or maths as they call it here. We read an entire book called Elephant in the Classroom (which I totally recommend for anyone struggling in teaching mathematics) and they quoted americans as using a unique version of the word "maths."

 Haha well we started our mathS class today. Helen our teacher is quite the character and already I can tell this week is going to fly by. She isn't a member of the church but has quite a passion for helping teachers becoming better at teaching math in the classroom. At one point she was trying to teach us a concept and finally she said "I've got it! You'll never forget this!" and then proceeded to use an analogy comparing beer/wine mixing to help us understand haha.

For FHE we were invited to a family's house that only live a few houses down from us. Their daughter Shannon is our age and is another connection for us to the YSA. We had the best time! They had even recorded the Alabama vs Notre Dame game for me so I could watch the highlights :). We ate dinner and Sara and I taught the lesson. They still have a few younger kids at home so we made it pretty short but we focused on the plan of salvation. Boy did that bring flashbacks from the mission- especially being in someone else's house, eating dinner, and not being as familiar with the culture (plus the brown skin). We also played church bingo and 7-up (not the thumbs up game but a different one). The dad was the bingo caller and cheated by looking at other people's cards to make sure everyone got a bingo. Everyone got upset and Sara and I just laughed because it made us think about our families. We stayed at their house for quite some time playing games and then watching home videos of different Samoan dances that their family performed for the oldest son's wedding last year (he married a BYU girl from the year before as we were reminded MULTIPLE times....). We also got to see pictures of the youngest son (10) playing rugby. We had candy and more Samoan coconut rolls for dessert- so delicious 

BBQ

Sunday. We went to our ward for the first time. All of the other girls and our director are in the other ward except for two other girls that are with us. The majority of the ward are islanders so naturally we fit right in with our light hair and skin :). I had the coolest experience of meeting the family of a missionary that I served with in St. George. The missionary isn't coming home until March but I'll get to see her before I take off. Our YSA class was pretty full with a variety of ages, which is nice. Funny... they still stress eternal marriage just as much and have teachers who bring it up at every possible moment with everyone either groaning or snickering. haha I guess somethings are the same world wide.

After church we started getting everything set up for our BBQ. Julie invited all of the BYU girls with their host families and a few other people (including the missionaries) for a pot luck dinner. Beau's dad is native Tongan and came to grill the meat (hamburgers, hot dogs, chicken etc) and boy was it good!! We set up a canopy with chairs and tables outside. It was a bit hot but started cooling down later in the day. It's funny that upper 70s are "so hot" to the Kiwi's but I guess they also don't have air conditioning and if there isn't a nice breeze blowing it can get a bit stuffy. Anyway the BBQ was a hit! We even sang a song in Maori that we'd been learning and others sang other songs after us. The missionaries that came are both from the states and were in shock, not knowing how to handle themselves around so many Americans.

We had to fight to help with the dishes (we keep trying to convince Julie that we're not guests but part of the family and have to do our share of the work). So we made a deal that we would do the dishes until we are tired and then turn the rest over to Beau's dad. So that's what we did- until they realized that we weren't getting "tired" and they finally kicked us out of the kitchen.

That night we went to another missionary setting apart. This time we missed the actual meeting though because of the BBQ and we just went for the social aspect. Of course there was tons and tons of food. We tried a few things included Samoan hot chocolate (not my favorite since it's pretty much just heated water with coco powder and something else in it) and Samoan sticky buns (bread with a coconut sauce over the top. It's not very sweet but still really good). Afterwards we watched the first movie in the Work and the Glory series with our roommate Camilla. About half way through the movie it hit me how ironic it was to be in NZ watching a movie about America.... It also got me thinking as to how blessed I am because I've had the opportunity to visit many of the church history sites. Many people only ever see movies or pictures of these places and I've been there. That was pretty humbling to think about.

A day at the Zoo and Dancing

Saturday I think it all caught up with me because when Sara got up at 7 to go play basketball with the YSA I hardly remember telling her that I was going to stay in bed. It felt so good to sleep! I had breakfast and had already started on my laundry by the time she got back. Everything here is a lot smaller than in the states. Trash cans are about 1/3 the size of what we have and you have use a specific type of black bag that you purchase for the trash company to be able to pick it up. The washer is also a lot smaller and no one has dryers. Everything is hung up instead. 

So our big event for the day was heading into the city to see the Auckland zoo! Julie helped us figure out the bus system (which is pretty expensive 5.60 one way but cheaper if you get an all day pass that allows you ride any bus you'd like to anywhere in the city). We were so proud of ourselves when we got off where we needed to be with the right bus. The plan was for us to meet up with the other girls around 11 but our bus got to the zoo closer to 11:30 so we worried that we had missed the girls. We ended up meeting up with two others from our group and we found out later that the other girls had changed their minds about going. Our little group of 4 was so much fun! 

The zoo had quite the range of animals and it was really clean and well organized. The weather cooperated and it didn't get too hot until a bit later in the afternoon. We got to see a little elephant show where they showed us the elephant's teeth (it was an asian elephant) and feet and even made it lay down and then get back up. We saw tigers playing with balls and flamingos sitting on their eggs. We also met cousin "it" the orangutan (look at the picture) and of course we went through the Aussie Walkabout exhibit and encountered kangaroos and emus. But the best part was seeing a real live kiwi bird! They are native to NZ and are only found on their islands. They are extremely rare in the wild and there are lots of conservation efforts to keep their species alive. They are brown, flightless birds, about the size of a turkey with super long beaks to dig for bugs under leaves and dirt. While waiting for the bus on our way home we walked through a park near by called Western Springs that had chickens and pukiko birds (see picture) everywhere. 

Then to top off the day, a missionary from the stake got home from his mission on Monday so they had a big celebration for him and we were invited. He had served in Tonga and so they had decorated the cultural hall with different maps of the islands that he had served on (he served on the same island as John Groberg for about 6 months). Of course there was lots of food and then a few amazing cultural dances and songs welcoming him home. The costumes were lovely and all of the entertainment was put on by the returning elder's family. Afterwards there was a dance for anyone who wanted to dance.  I didn't recognize many of the songs but it was so much fun! I'm starting to get the names down of all the ysa. We didn't get home until late and were pretty tired but it was such a fun ending to an awesome day!