So Much Love

                                                So much of everything this past week.

Chinese started, and what everyone has heard is true, it is by far the hardest thing I've ever tried to learn.

After our first class, we all studied together and practiced writing characters and pronouncing the strange tones. And I swear for two days, all I did was Chinese. And I still managed to fail the first quiz. Well, we all did, so I don't feel too bad. I'll be working on that for sure this upcoming week.

We had a BBQ with some of the staff and residents here at Laidlaw during the summer, and the food was amazing! But first, our cook Garth and our main contact Jenny, taught us all how to play the New Zealand/Australia fav sport Netball. They have a special court and everything here. It was so fun! Our group is pretty athletic so we all got into it. It's like a mix between ultimate frisbee and basketball with weird positions and restrictions. I'm sure there will be many more afternoons full of that.

It's really just been a lot of school this week, which I guess is okay, since this is for school, and it's been good for our whole team to get to know each other while we just live day to day. It forces real conversations instead of "hey! wow! look at that! take a picture! oh my gosh! New Zealand is amazing, let's move here!" If you catch my drift. 

I am really enjoying getting to know everyone. As far as I can tell, everyone is getting along, and even more than that, I think some pretty solid friendships are being formed. The 8 girls are amazing, we're already best friends because girls are that cool. The guy and girl line is finally being crossed and we are all starting to mix and hang out. Don't worry Dad, we all signed a contract swearing to only be friends with each other, so all the normal weird tensions that would exist are completely out the window. No pressure. We have some pretty incredible/funny/passionate/intelligent/kind/encouraging people in this group. Recipe for a successful semester.

Anyway, tonight we all drove to another side of the Island to watch the sunset on a black sand beach, it was pretty incredible. Here are some pix.