Kia Ora, Aotearoa!

Greetings, blessings, and sunshine to you from down under.

About a week ago, a rather bedraggled assembly of students with varying energy levels and jetlag arrived in the Land of the Long White Cloud (Aotearoa in te reo Maori). Since then we have ventured into the sea and up the mountains, into the kitchen and out onto the lawn, on bicycle and in nine-passenger vans, and generally around in each other's company. The intentional community that CCSP has taken the time to form here looks to be an environment in which I will very well thrive, process, and grow this semester.

Just having finished up lunch here, I hear the sounds of dishes and silverware pinging as one group takes on the lunch clean-up chore this week. They are also cranking music that we are all sharing throughout the house. From where I sit, I can see a species of tree fern called a Rough Tree Fern, and can nearly see the amazing Puhutakawa Tree and maybe a Cabbage Tree as well. What I can't quite see from this vista are the vegetable gardens kept here. We have eaten so many vegetables from our own excellently kept gardens on campus. Speaking of which, campus is actually an old convent--called The Old Convent, funnily enough--and I live in one of the rooms in the old schoolhouse connected by a breezeway. We have compost and recycling processes and containers, and our goal is only to produce one typical black plastic bag of rubbish as a community of 30 each week. A worthy goal.

We bike whenever we want to go somewhere on our own time. We hike lots. We learn a considerable amount from the Maori culture and language. We eat together, laugh together, make our community norms together, and strive towards shalom together. We had academic orientation together today, and start classes on Monday, I think. After, of course, a weekend trip some students have planned backpacking through Abel Tasman national park. Look for more, periodic, blog updates in the future.

Kia ora, and I send much aroha back home.