Days 112-118

This week has been one of few distractions or events. Sunday I had a small get together officially for my birthday- it included a meal at the only Mexican restaurant in Hamilton (which was down a dark alley- it looked like every free meal would come with a complimentary mugging). The meal was great- and though it took much longer to make and was more expensive than it would be at home, I didn’t mind. I was surrounded by friends whom I loved and cared about, and likewise cared about me. While I was basking in this social happiness, I closed my eyes, and everything felt fundamentally right. I felt as if everything had aligned, and I was simultaneously reliving my past and embarking on an exciting new adventure. In a word, I could close my eyes and feel like I was home. Home. What a concept. Is it where we live, or where we are happiest? Can home really be constrained to a physical location, or is it something more? Is it a mental state inside ourselves? Is our true home our soul? Is home a house, a family, a familiar scent or breeze of wind, or is home a table halfway around the world, full of friends sharing jokes and letting laughter seep out into the cold night air? I can’t tell you. Perhaps home is something we each need to define for ourselves, but on Sunday, I could tell you exactly what home was for me. I could close those eyes and be home. I could be whenever I wanted, any time I desired- I could be last Christmas, or a hot day in July, or the first day of school. I could be at thanksgiving dinner or mother’s day. Maybe what I shared was just that feeling of intense… correctness, the knowledge that this is one of those fragrant life moments that I can look back on for years to come and never forget. Perhaps that is what links all of those memories I have when I close my eyes. Perhaps that is home.

I’ll get off my philosophical pedestal now.

The few days to follow were filled with little of importance. I have no exams until the 24th, which means studying before the 14th would be useless- I need to keep a constant flow of information going through my head in order to be effective, and I think that 10 days for 2 exams is already more than enough time. The week has been filled with sleep ins, trip planning, and relaxation. One could say I am mentally preparing for my soon to be stressful endeavor.
One thing I did do was visit the Hamilton gardens with a really good friend of mine, Anna. The Hamilton gardens are a collection of gardens in styles from around the world. There is a Japanese garden, an English garden, a Chinese garden, an American garden (which looked like someone vomited new age pop art over a block of downtown inner city Newark that had been abandoned for 40 years), an Italian/Greco garden, and an Indian garden. There were also a few other gardens (including a Maori garden, which was literally a pile of dirt. It made the American garden look like someone committed new age pop art over a block of lush, downtown San Francisco. Anna and I walked around, and I marked each garden on overall coolness, tranquility, beauty, originality, thematic elements, etc. The winner was the Indian garden (which was a large courtyard with 4 quadrants of flowers, with the Greco and Chinese gardens tying for 2nd place (the Chinese garden had an awesome hobbit hole type thing). Anna and I then walked to the river and had a good deep conversation until I could no longer feel my hands. Few things make me as happy at the end of a day than a really deep, meaningful and rewarding conversation with a friend.
I also took an evening and walk around the campus with a friend of mine to do some urban exploration- going to areas you normally wouldn’t think of. We walked up outer staircases on one of the blocks just to see the view- something I normally would not do, but I realized how beautiful the view is at night. Half the campus can be seen just from that one spot. The entire idea is to get a new perspective on things, a new viewpoint. We walked around for a few hours, until early morning, and it was great. This is a friend I normally don’t get much time to talk to, and it sure beat the pants off of sitting down and watching a movie, being antisocial.
The week has also been filled with a game I know I have described before, called ‘Who am I?’. The rules are simple. Each person chooses a famous person, Ex. Albert Einstein. I write his name on a sheet of paper, and give it to the person on my left. They stick the paper to their forehead- now everyone can see who they are except them. You can only ask yes or know questions to figure out who you are, and the questions go to the next person when one of your questions is answered as ‘no’. Example:
Am I am man? Yes.
Am I European born? Yes.
Am I Dead? Yes.
Was I known for music? No.
(goes on to next person). First person to figure out their person wins!

This game is incredibly simple but addictive- it is exceptionally fun and can get very challenging. People get very heated when they can’t think of who they are, and we often find ourselves saying ‘just one more game’. One night we played for 5 hours.

So, as you can see, my life here the past week has been fairly low key. If the weather was better or I was better equipped, I would travel, but circumstances just weren’t great for it. I will be traveling starting the 25th, all the way until the 31st of July, when I fly out.

I can’t help but think that after everything I have been through here, I am going to go home, sit down on my bed, and look at all of this as I would a dream. An entire semester, half a year, around the world, and I have come right back where I began. I already know it will be a powerful and surreal experience- but I also know I’ll come back some day, here to these islands. A seed has been planted- I can’t stay away.

P.S. A small update on swine flu. Level 6 pandemic level has been reached. The Waikato region of NZ has been affected, but minorly. I know that New Hanover county, where UNCW (my home university) is situated, has also had cases. Apparently if the infection makes it’s way into the halls here at Uni of Waikato, the containment procedures are fairly extreme- the uni shuts down, domestic students are sent home, internationals stay and are cooked frozen meals until it blows over. This is not an official statement, but I heard it from a source I consider reliable. I imagine it will only be a matter of time before the university gets hit- whether I am here or not, who knows. Apparently estimates in the newspaper today expect 50% of the nation’s population to get the virus in the next 2 years. It is pretty incredible how quickly information travels and situations can develop. 30,000 cases, 74 countries. That’s pretty impressive.