Are you listening or are your ears painted on for decoration?

first: I'm sorry for all the forthcoming typos. I have to hurry because I am behind schedule in my day (for 2 very good reasons) and will thus mash the keyboard in a hasty effort to blog. Think of it as a fun game of mad libs...

What has been going on:

1) I'm not longer sick (though I think my allergies are kicking in but that's tolerable).

2) I have moved from the moldy 6-person-3-bedroom house and into a two bedroom unit of a dulpex in a place I loveling refer to as the Compound.

3) I went to a fascinating cultural experience on tuesday and wednesday that was not only quite exclusive, but very inspirational.

ok so I have nothing more to say about #1. So #2, the compound is named as such because it is owned by the company that owns the hot pools that I work at. That company is called Ngai Tahu Tourism. They also own the Glacier Guides which is a company that takes thousands of tourists on to the Franz Josef glacier each year. For anyone who may not know, it's the glacier that makes Franz Josef a big toursit stop on the map. I have yet to visit the glacier. Anyways, the compound is mostly for the glacier guides to live in seeing as there are so many (on a side note, the glacier guides, or GG's, are renowned for their habit of sleeping with as many customers as possible and passing along a wide variety of STI's. More about that later perhaps). My place is one of the best units you can get on the compound because it's right near the front so it gets a bit more sunlight than the others that are nestled into the rainforest. The compound itself is just on the edge of thise edge or a town. In fact, the paved road ends block away fromthe drive to the compound and there are no street lights after that point so I've taken to carrying a flashlight (which doubles as a blunt weapon when walking home in the middle of the night). The place itself actually smells like pee. I'm working of fixing that. But I have space in the fridge for my food - I can even use the freezer! I have a room ALLLLL to myself, AND I have hot water. Why am I braging about things that should be standard? ... I'll let you answer that for yourself.... At the moment I don't have a roommate so I'm living alone. I needed to get out of the other place. I love the girls that I lived and worked with, but I need my space and alone time and there was none of that there. I didn't even have a proper shelf in the cupboard or the fridge! My neighbors at the new place are girls so that's good. Soon I will have a roommate and hopefully it will be a fellow massage therapist or at least a girl... or at least not an asshole (they smell).

#3!!!!!! This is the really exciting part for me. Ngai Tahu Tourism is owned by the Ngai Tahu iwi, or maori tribe. For that reason, I asked when I was hired if I would have the oportunity to take part in cultural events or something. I was extremely lucky in getting invited to a marae (pronounced "mar-eye") which is a maori meeting house. They are considered private property and you aren't aloud to go in one without an invitation. There are also protocol that you need to follow while you are there. I'm not sure how best to describe it, I want to say it's like a church but it isn't. But it is sacred and the main part of the building I was in was full of the most amazing carvings I have EVER seen. They were magnificent. I wanted to trace all the lines with my fingers. There where no cameras aloud obviously but I will try to find some pictures in books in the furture. The two days that we were there we talked about maori history and the history of Makaawhio ("mah-kah-fee-yo") which is like a sub-tribe of Ngai Tahu I guess. We also learned about the Te Reo Maori language and how to pronounce things properly. Many places in NZ still have their maori names so that was an important one. The language itself is experiencing a revival over the last two generations since it has been put back into schools, but when NZ was fist colonized it only took them one generation to learn english then 3 generation to lose te reo maori. It's still not a language thats used for everyday communication so it's forced to evolve to include modern things like computers and texting. We also talked about some of the maori stories of creation - my favorite! I love that kind of stuff!

(ah crap! I have to go! I'm such a slow typer! I will continue this blog tomorrow... sorry!)