kimmels invade New Zealand!!

Well, the reunion has taken place, and what a great reunion it was!  I picked up the Kimmel crew just a few days ago…they were delayed by the ash cloud but fortunately were able to be re-routed and only delayed by about 6 hours from the original time they were supposed to arrive in Dunedin.  We all drove back from the airport in our temporary Kimmel-mobile, a giant 10-seater silver van, and fam was immediately baffled at driving on the left side of the road.  The next morning we met up and all walked to the farmers’ market, my last time there : (  After the market I had to head back to the library and cram for my final that I had that afternoon.  But then I was done, woooooo hoooooo!  We just hung out for the rest of the evening until the jet-lagged crew went to bed and i went to Grace House for a farewell gathering with a bunch of friends, which was so much fun.  We ate lots of unhealthy food, took tons of pictures, and had multiple dance parties.  As much as I am SO excited to go home again I am really sad for this time abroad to be coming to a close.  I have been just so incredibly blessed with really amazing relationships here, people whom I will never forget and who have had some profound impacts on me and my faith journey.  I will be forever thankful for this time.

On Sunday we went to morning church, where my family got to meet many of my friends from this semester.  The sermon was preached on 2 Samuel 21 and it was very well done.  This is one of those passages that i have had trouble understanding why things happened the way that they did, why this situation was recorded in such detail, and the relevance of how it relates to us today.  I was pleased that the talk addressed all of these questions and explained how this ties right into the Gospel message.  After church we treated dad to Caper’s for fathers’ day and the family couldn’t get enough of it.  Then we went to Tunnel Beach, another place that they loved.  The weather hasn’t been too nice so far while they’ve been in NZ (surprise!) but we’ve been operating by the motto that my friends and I have lived by all semester: if you let the weather determine your travel plans you’ll never go anywhere or do anything.  So Tunnel Beach was great.  We came back and hung out at my flat for a while and did some laundry and then went for a pizza dinner at Filadelphios, a place I hadn’t tried yet.  And after that it was packing time…the process wasn’t as difficult as I’d expected, though I am fortunate to have my family and their willingness to bring an extra bag for some of the extra stuff I’ve accumulated.  This obviously came as no surprise, as they are well aware of my chronic over-packing-itis.  Though, that they are surprised by is the temperature and climate here.  They are utterly amazed at how sporadic the weather is here and how cold it is inside our flat and wonder at how we could stand living like that.  Well, it’s not like we had a whole lot of choice, but I have to say, I’m pretty proud of myself that I have not used a heater of any sort until about a week ago when I finally cracked because I couldn’t sleep due to the cold.  But I’ve acclimated well, if I do say so myself.  I don’t think mum has been warm the entire time she’s been in the country, with the exception of when she’s in the shower.

family at the train station/farmers' market

boys at tunnel beach

jaffa dumping!!

Monday was moveout day.  I said my goodbyes to my flatmates (though I will be meeting up with Asma in a few days in Queenstown) and left 43 Howe St.  It’s definitely been a bittersweet goodbye, that’s for sure.  But I keep coming back to knowing that I’m not meant to stay here; God is calling me to take what I’ve learned and experienced here and bring it back home with me, to my life there.  I have been so incredibly blessed over these last few months and I have grown so much and now it’s time to move onto the next chapter.  I took care of all of my last-minute errands, including paying 2 more parking tickets - gah, they are such sticklers here!  We got mom and dad venti coffees at Starbucks (they looked like such Americans carrying around those huge coffees!) and did some shopping and then headed to walk Baldwin Street, the steepest street in the world.  Let me tell you, this was one steep street!  Interesting fact that I learned on the Cadbury Factory tour last week (which was sooooooo great by the way!  I love chocolate!!!): Each year in July Cadbury sponsors a huge event to raise money for charity. They manufacture 50,000 Jaffas (a Cadbury specialty, they are round, orange-coated chocolates, about the size of gobstoppers) and number them 1-50,000.  Anyone can buy numbers as sort of like a lottery thing, betting on particular Jaffas.  Then they haul all of them to the top of Baldwin Street and, I kid you not, dump all 50,000 down the street and the first few numbers to arrive at the bottom win cash prizes and all of the rest of the proceeds go to charity.  Pretty cool, eh?  Well, since I’m not going to be around for the annual Jaffa dumping, I decided it would be appropriate to buy myself a bag of Jaffas and dump them, and that’s exactly what I did, with the help of dad : )  After we finished our fun on Baldwin St. we headed to get some ice cream (of course) and then out for a drive on the peninsula.  And after that we embarked on our journey out of Dunedin.   We traveled a short distance north to stay in a place called Moeraki.  This is familiar, if you recall the sick picture of me upside down inside a round boulder on a beach (the Moeraki Boulders).  We came for the evening specifically to eat at a world-renowned seafood place called Fleur’s.  Well.  We got to Moeraki and couldn’t find it so we stopped at a local tavern to ask and they guy informed us that it was right nearby, but apparently during the winter season it’s only opened Wednesday-Sunday, and it was Monday.  Bummer.  But we decided to just stay and eat at the tavern, which was pretty good.

We saw the Moeraki Boulders the next morning and had a ton of fun taking pictures and climbing the rocks.  Mum and dad were set on getting coffees at the beachfront café that I had bragged about but it was closed for annual maintenance.  I don’t know what it is about this week but we have been striking out: Cadbury Factory was closed starting the day the family got into Dunedin, Fleur’s was closed on the day we tried to eat there, and now the Moeraki visitor’s center.  But all was well when we stopped back at the Starbuck’s for them to get their ventis, and no parking ticket this time.  After that we continued south, on our way to Alexandra for me to be reunited with Leonard!!  And they still had him!!  I rewarded the car mechanics with some American candy (thanks to Nick, who donated the Cowtails), and they were totally ok with that.  AND I did ask if there was any chance that the license plate was maybe still on the back of Lucille…as I desperately wanted to get it when we junked her but couldn’t manage to get it off.  And they did go and take it off for me, win win!  It was a good stop in Alexandra : )  Then we continued over to Te Anau and arrived at our pre-booked accommodation, which is super nice and Te Anau is just as nice of a town as I’d remembered it.  And tomorrow we head out for a Milford cruise!  This is the one day that I am hoping for rain, as I haven’t seen the fiord turn into the hundreds of waterfalls, as occurs when it’s wet.

It’s so good to be back together with the family : )