Weekend at Omaha Marae

This past weekend, the Loyola group was shuttled to a Marae about an hour and a half outside of Auckland on the lovely shores of the Northland's western coast. A group of young guide from Potikiri Adventures escorted us and led us through the welcome ceremonies performed by the owners of the marae. A marae, by the way, is a Maori meeting ground. The land is very sacred to the Maoris and shoes are not to be worn inside the marae building, nor are food or drink to be taken inside. The welcome ceremony began with our group standing at the outskirts of the marae, the women in front and men in the back. As a Maori woman chanted a welcome from the doors of the building, we walked forward slowly and entered the meeting house to the right side, the visitor's side. After paying our respects to the elders of the marae, we sat for a formal greeting given by a man named Uncle Perry. Then, as Maori tradition dictates, the greeting was followed by a song sung by the woman and Uncle Perry. Then it was our turn. Brent gave a short speech thanking the owners for sharing their place with us and we sang a song in Maori, following the lead of one of our guides.
The formalities having ended, we ventured outside as the sun crept lower in the sky to take pictures of the idyllic setting and kick a soccer ball around a bit. Dinner followed, and then a drive to the local pub, where we got to know our guides better. I spoke with one guide in particular and found that she is an avid climber and she offered to take me climbing around Auckland! I haven't got her info, but we'll see that group in a few weekends hopefully again when we go to Taupo and Rotorua. I would absolutely love to learn how to climb while I'm down here!
The next morning, I woke before everyone else to a bright orange and pink sky. I grabbed my camera and ran outside with two others who'd been admiring the same view. Being awake at that time of day when the rest of the world is still asleep and everything is calm is such a powerful experience. I wish I'd actually just put the camera down for a moment to take it in more.
I feel as though I've been doing that a lot this year, grabbing for my camera and completely forgetting where exactly I am and why I want to take a photo in the first place. I find myself enjoying places more via my photos than the actual, tangible setting. Note to self...
So our first activity of the day was the local Farmer's Market in town, where vendors sold local oddities but nothing too extraordinary. I did get sucked in to buying a purse for a fairly cheap price. Other than that, nothing too exciting so we moved on to the beach where we splashed about a bit, frolicked, then left. Nothing too exciting that day until the afternoon.
The post lunch part of the itinerary began with Maori stick fighting. We began with a warm up of ten suicides of back and forths in decreasing order from 10. Does that make sense? The first suicide included ten runs to the opposite side of the lawn and backpedaling back, and the next repetition included nine back and forths...Repetitions of either ten sit ups or ten push ups (yea right, me? Upper body strength?) were alternated between the suicides. The exercise was actually really welcome except for the sun and the fact that I had just eaten quite a large lunch.
On to the fun stuff: We got our stick's and I can't remember what the Maori term for them was or what the actual art of fighting was but I was puuuuumped. Our teacher was some 5th level -out of seven, and there are only 12 people at the 7th level in the country- champion who was intense. His intensity was probably compounded by the fact that his first language was Maori and he struggled a bit with English so he'd just kind of show you moves and expect you to get them by example. No worries for me. Then it came time to fight each other and Karlee and I were paired against each other. If you don't know Karlee, she is my 6'1 roommate for next year and the two of us tall blondies were made to enter the ring of onlookers and fight. The blocks, and attacks for that matter, that we'd just learned went out the window and we found ourselves saying "Okay, I'm going to hit you hear now! Find a way to block it!" The fight must have looked pretty lame because we were more concerned about not hurting each other, than getting the moves right. That went on for about two minutes....exciting stuff, lemme tell ya.
After stick fighting, I was able to take out my aggression whilst kayaking. We played a few games, paddled around a small reef, then turned back toward shore, but not before a rousing game of Cowboys and Indians. Red paddles vs. White and Yellow. Seeing as I was hot from the 10 suicides and had not successfully taken out my pent up aggression on my future roommate for fear of upsetting rooming relations for next year, I found myself diving from my kayak, onto the vessels of others, sliding across their laps, and landing in the water, taking my opponent and their kayak with me. I think I need to get back into contact sports. I really don't have a good enough outlet for this aggressive streak. I was reminded of the drawbacks of these sports though, when a huge black and blue contusion (sp?) appeared on my left thigh the next morning. When I got back to my hall, my floor mates were asking "Oh my gosh! What happened!?" "Maori stick fighting," I said.
That night: Dinner, reading, volleyball, bar and planning of the South Island trip with one of our guides from a South Island town.
On our third and final day, we were able to get our itinerary changed and two guides took us snorkeling at a local marine reserve. We saw some huge snapper and two other kinds of smaller fish, the names of which escape me. It was a neat thing to do, although I do not think I'm made for snorkeling. I don't know if it's my lung capacity or what, but I just never do well with snorkels. I'd also had flu like symptoms for over a week at this point, so, ya know, maybe that had something to do with it. Either way, I was absolutely exhausted by that point and luckily the next activity was perfect. We were driven to perhaps the most beautiful beach I've ever been to. I promptly spread out my towel, laid down, and slept.
Later: Closing ceremonies and 'thank yous,' a visit to a Kauri tree, and back to Auckland.
In other news, I went to the health center today to try to clear up this illness issue. We have student health insurance here apparently, on top of a socialist health system and you know what that means......FREE MEDS! I am a firm believer in socialized medicare. Mmm mmm good. Although I've found that medication here in NZ is a lot less powerful that French medicine and I think I'd still prefer to get sick in France, should I choose one country in particular in which to come down with something, or develop something in the case of my abscess. That's enough.
What else? I went to watch my friend here get a tattoo of the New Zealand silver fern on his foot on Friday. Yikes! Looked painful, but it came out really cool. The place seemed a bit dodgy and they didn't bandage his foot afterward or clean it much. Then again, he didn't take these precautions himself, so I guess we'll see how it heals! Got my wheels spinning, though.
So I suppose I'm beginning to use this as a procrastination tool. I better get to work, however, because I'm leaving for a two weeks in the South Island in about 48 hrs. I don't really know what's going on in my life, things are happening so fast.