aotearoa

Pipiri

Posted 24th December 2020 by robeanne

1st June: Look down! Lampposts with feet. I love the quirkiness and creativity of people. It lifts our spirits. Cuba Street, Wellington.

2nd June: An adventure on the train was cut short when we got to Taita Station – “this train is terminating at Taita due to a signal fault”
We were very promptly picked up by a ‘train-replacing bus’. We have been very impressed with the public transport these last few days – not least because it has been free!

3rd June: Our journey on public transport took us to Days Bay yesterday, a walk up the hill, along the ridgeline and down to Eastbourne before getting the ferry back across to Wellington. Today we flew home. One of the things I love about flying is being able to see places, orient myself and recognise places I have visited from above. The wee island is Ward Island and it was connected to Eastbourne during the war by an anti-submarine boom.
www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/69986525/wartime-defen…

4th June: I’m working on my te reo mahi. The Matariki constellation is known as Pleiades in the western world, and by other names by other cultures around the world. In Aotearoa, the rising of Matariki marks the start of the Māori new year. thespinoff.co.nz/atea/05-06-2019/matariki-what-to-know-ab….

5th June: It’s never too early in the month for a photo of the cat! I haven’t moved far from the computer today as it’s been a busy work day.

6th June: Our Oxfam team caught up today for a bit of a reunion – a walk along the Karangahake Rail Trail and then lunch at the winery. Autumn is turning to winter but there is still colour in the trees.
I hīkoi tātou tēnei ata i Karangahake. I kõrero, katakata ngā hoa ki a tātou.
Ngā tae o Pipiri, ngā waiata o te ngākau harikoa.

7th June: I haven’t seen my big boy for such a long time. He needs a haircut!

8th June 2020: Back at te reo class again. I love learning using the rākau. Challenging but fun and we learn so much. This tells the story of the maramataka Māori – well the winter of it anyway. Find out more here – read.bookcreator.com/uEJkCGS2bHaLPf8CtnYtxBm2qi52/p5vN2Zn…

9th June: No comment …. Arthur Dent maybe?

10th June: Adding to the kōrero. Raumati or Summer when the nights get shorter and the days get longer…

11th June: Dawn at Lake Rotoroa. I came down to run this morning not really feeling t but needing to do my 5km Time Trial. I decided that if it was going to happen it would so as not to put myself under any pressure. I ended up taking about 15 seconds off my previous PB. 27m12s. It wasn’t pretty!

12th June: Playing with leaves at the river. We are trying to keep our after work walks going but they are becoming less frequent… partly the weather and partly being back at aa physical place for work rather than working from home which dictates working hours.

13th June: Not a great photo but you can tell that these are wax eyes (pihipihi) feasting on the seeds of this daisy. There were heaps of them!

14th June: Two days of stunning weather in Whanganui-ā-Tara. Yesterday we ran at Red Rocks and did a side trip to see the seals. Today up to Belmont Trig – it was icy as we set off and the frost was still there at midday but what amazing views! kiwitravelwritertalksfoodtravelandtips.com/2009/09/19/red…

15th June: Tonight at te reo class we had to give instructions to make a cup of tea… I was at Chris’ in Silverstream ‘Zooming’ in so decided to create step by step instructions visually.

16th June: A murky day in Silverstream today. Had to persuade myself out of bed to get this run in before work. As usual, I was glad I did. Despite the murk it was lovely to be out.

17th June: Sail or fly – DT curriculum integration. Working with teachers exploring how to create an integrated programme of learning. So much learning all round. #lovemyjob #teachersarecool #origami #algorithms #computationalthinking

18th June: He ahakoa te ua me te hau i oma tāua tēnei ahiahi i te ngahere ki te matairangi o Rangituhi. Wild and windy at the lookout but good to blow the cobwebs away. Thanks Sarah. #trailrunning #hauora #rangituhi

19th June: It’s been a wet and windy week in Whanganui-a-Tara. I drive past here every day to and fro when I’m working in Porirua and see it in all weather. #commute #pauahatanui #whitby

20th June: 10km Time Trial on the programme today. My running buddy Jo paced me to a PB!

21st June: The shortest day – midwinter in Aotearoa and the start of the Maramataka Māori. Time for a swim! It was a beautiful day in Whaingāroa after the rain in the middle of the day cleared.

22nd June: Matariki star cluster. Matariki, Puhutakawa, Hiwaiterangi, Tupuu0101rangi, Tupuu0101nuku, Waiti, Waita, Waipunerangi, Ururangi.

23rd June: FOMO – spotted these two dogs hanging out of the back of a ute on my way down Grey Street (I wasn’t driving!)

24th June: Building our korero…. te korero o the Maramataka Māori

25th June: a bright splash of colour in an otherwise dreich day.

26th June: Protea in Hamilton Gardens.

27th June:

squadfest #2 – the plan was to run a marathon. my legs thought otherwise! a gym session with the physio to treat my tendinitis left me with DOMS (delayed onset muscle soreness) so I ended up pulling the pin after 33km. This is Jo dancing through the mud! It was a bit of a damp day. Black Track Rotorua.

28th June: Aonghas has discovered chess. He beat, then coached Leah to a win against me but Nigel for the better of him.

29th June: Begonias with their winter colour

30th June:

Rainbow at the trig
Tēnei ahiahi i tae au i te kõtihi o te puke i kite au tēnei āniwaniwa i te rangi.

March 2019

Posted 6th April 2019 by robeanne

On the first day of the month, we made a last minute dash to see Eddie Izzard’s show, Wunderbar. Despite a horrendous jourtney up ther, we had a great night.

Still summer – breakfast on a sunny Saturday morning in the garden.

A chance for a long overdue catch up with a friend. Our conversation on that morning was a topic that warned of tragic events that happened later in the month.

Summer evenings in Kirikiriroa. Making the most of late summer. The changing face of the view from the trig – earthworks for the new road layout at Cobham Drive.

Only in Aotearoa….

Ararimu – working with a new school so I like to have some photos of the landscape to get an idea of the place where their feet are. Ararimu means ‘pathway through the Rimu trees’ – it seems that there was no Māori settlement here but it was on the road between Tamaki Makaurau and the Waikato. The documented history here seems to start with European settlers.

The Mighty Waikato river – evening trailruns. Enjoy them while they last!

Tap takeover at @Crafthamilton. A smorgasbord of Garage Project beers with accompanying food tasters. Ended up being a bigger night out than we had planned! The dangers of wearing an ‘iconic’ Garage Project Tee-shirt when the brewers were in the bar!

Early morning on the Waikato river – the Kirikiriroa marathon is run by some friends of ours and so I spent the day volunteering as a marshall.

The nights are starting to draw in and card games and whiskey seem to be in order! This evening Victor Hugo seemed to get turned over more often than usual. Quite serendipitous for my hand this time!

Autumn skies

View from a teenager’s bedroom door…….

It’s not often my 19 year old will come out for a walk with me – especially at midnight! But I needed some fresh air after a long day at the computer and Nigekl was in Oz. So, we took a football and played footie on the way – maybe it;s not often that a 56 year old Mum will play footie with her 19 year oild son?!

Values….

“The darkest day…”

We were travelling down to Taranaki to the WOMAD festival when we heard about the events in Christchurch on the news. We were in shock as we listened to the radio. All around us was the beauty of the New Zealand landscape. How could such a thing be happening in Aotearoa?

Campervan life – got to have a tea cosy!

Aging hippies!

Aonghas received a parcel in the post….. a trophy! Something to do with his online gaming – signs of a misspent youth!

I had the pleasure of attending a meeting about the Tainui Education Plan (Kawenata) at which Ann Milne spoke. Inspiring and challenging.

Technology projects at schools in NZ…. design thinking, authentic contexts, problem-solving. Some way to go methinks!

Full moon at Ohope beach. This time on Saturday we’ll bve walking along here on our penultimate leg of the Oxfam 100km!

One week on … #headscarfforharmony. There has been a lot of kōrero about the rights and wrongs and appropriateness of this gesture and Jacinda Arderns’s choicve to wear one in the last two weeks, but at the time, it seemed like the right thing to do to support our Muslim community. I still think it was the right thing to do.

Those stop banks! Much easier in the daylight and they had been mown! But there was some long grass and uneven ground for us to wade our way through – this was about 30km into our 100km walk for Oxfam.

We made it! It was a long last leg; we were hurting but we kept going and made it home in well under 20 hours. For a while, we thought we might make it under 19 hours but it wasn’t to be!