the Neverending Fall Break

The neverending fall break.  We still have 5 more days off before classes start again!  My mind is boggled but I will not complain.    

I have spent a good portion of this break studying and getting ahead for 2nd term which will undoubtedly start up at 120mph. I guess since we are using the metric system here, it's more accurate to say ~240kmph. 

I'm nearly finished with the longest, most interesting science lab report of my life.  Basically in the lab we isolated the gene that makes jellyfish fluorescent and cloned it into e.coli bacteria so they glowed, too.  After mushing up those poor glowing bacteria like little mashed potatoes, we used a pretty new age machine that read out the bacteria's gene sequence .  That information came out as 760 letter long chain of just G, C, A, and T's.   I put that info into the BLAST, which is a sweet online algorithm tool pioneered in the 1990s by a few brilliant mathematicians who worked for the National Institute of Health.  The algorithm searches super, super, super long DNA sequences just like the one I got from the lab readout (but hundreds of thousands, even millions of letters long),  and helps to find matches.  Unsurprisingly, the gene that we cloned into the bacteria had dna sequence matches with pars of the Victoria jellyfish genome.

We made e.coli glow like this! http://cam.facilities.northwestern.edu/588-2/green-fluorescent-protein

Now that i'm nearly finished with the lab I feel very proud of my accomplishment!  The whole process did not seem simple at all,  and I had to do a lot of problem solving to understand the mechanisms involved. Honestly,  for a solid few weeks I had no idea what we were even doing.  So it feels good to now be able to put it in my own words.

Besides working on school things,  I have been chipping away at the mountain of to-dos for my physicians assistant school applications.  Research,  writing essays, applying for financial aid, and securing letters of recommendation are just a few of the balls I'm juggling.  The respite from classes is beyond welcomed! 

I'm my favorite personal chef. Today it was garlicky broccoli with tomato, tofu, and rice. 

Words to live by. 

I'm wishing friends and family days of love.  I hope that we all can see the sunshine coming through our deep being.

land unlocked

Hi

Lilies by the beach

Oh boy, oh boy.  I am finally coming to understand why all my coastally raised friends balk when I tell them of my land-locked upbringing. 

Luckily in NZ you are never far from mountain or ocean!

I had been back from the great roadtrip for about three days before the yearning to go to the ocean became overwhelming. I made sure to get a solid breakfast in my belly before throwing on my winter coat and hopping onto my bike. What is this yearning!  Be Still my heart! 

What even is this?! On campus. No wonder I yearn to escape.

I tried to bargain for a nice riverside spot that wouldn't require the daunting hour long ride,  but Nay said my steadfast heart.  It made a good compromise where it became still, along with my treadmill mind, only upon reaching the  beach.  

The constancy of the slate gray waves crashing again and again across the shores,  eroding,  cleaning,  making noise just for the sake of making noise.  I like to look out and imagine that I can telescope all the way across the pacific, to the shores of San Francisco, right into my sister's life. It's funny how a big thing like the ocean can seem so little.  especially after I've been making mountains out of mole hills  .

Mole hill? Mountain?

This is one of those mountainsi was really sad to not be seeing every day. Milford sound. 

You can say I'm tapering off of vacation.  I've spent a solid 20 hours perusing the intranets (perusing might not be the right word.  What I'm doing is slightly more obsessive) researching just about everything motorcycle.  I've loved motorized vehicles from knee high to a grasshopper.  I remember begging my mom to bring me to the go kart tracks when I was 9; then looking in the newspaper for a 50 cc dirt bike when I was 12. And more recently,  I had saved up $500 for a sweet little '79 Honda CB360 right after I graduated college, yet ended up with a hand crafted oak horse carriage from the farm auction instead. . I digress.  I have even gone so far as to stalk the bikes at the local Yamaha dealership. And I also feel best when I pretend that my (sturdy,  awesome,  loveable,  but not motorized) bicycle is actually an undercover motorcycle. 

As you can tell,  my rationalization powers are chugging away at full force.  Let's just say it's between this and being a cat lady. 

Other than being slave to my inner mermaid and being myopically obsessed with two wheels and a motor,  I have made a very delicious roasted beet and warmed chickpea salad with feta and herbs (yum),    given more henna tattoos,  learned to drive on the kiwi side of the road (no metaphor), composed my own ukelele song,  and learned that season 2 of orange is the new black gives me nightmares,  so I have to stop it now.

Irish rorschach love henna

I also practiced my photoshop skillz. In the future I don't have to ever go anywhere or do anything;  i will just manipulate a photo to give the impression!

I have been so blessed to receive emails from a few friends back home.  All the little stories and photos are great medicine for the homesickness.  I'm so grateful!    Please send me little notes if anything strikes your fancy ; they're so special to me! 

Xoxo

Back from Spring (Fall) Break!

Apologies for keeping this blog in the dark for a few weeks now!  Blogging is kind of like keeping a garden and planting mint: if you don't keep up with it, the more time that passes, the more and more behind you get!

I like to keep these short on words and heavy on pictures, so although much has transpired in the last 2 weeks, I'll sum it up as this:

3 weeks' break from school! Yay! 7 of us gals have had a week-long trip plann in the works since early March. As stressful as it was to decide so far ahead of time what exactly our route would be, book hotels and car rentals, it was definitely worth the effort. The trip went pretty much without any major bumps-- no nights of hobohood, nor day transportationless.

I was surprised how easily 7 of us fit in a regular old Toyota van. That thing was a trooper! It was definitely working hard as it chugged up and over Arthur's Pass, and I was worried about the brakes going out on us as we careened down towards Queenstown, but it was a little rebel and it hung in there like a pro!

Our route was this:  Christchurch--->Hokatika --> Fox Glacier (prounounced glay-shee-uhr, btw)---> Franz Josef Glaysheeuhr ---> Lake Wanaka ---> Queenstown ---> Milford Sound ---> back home to Christchurch under the starry skies.

If google maps told us our route would be a 3 hour drive, we could expect it to take us 5.  That's a good thing!-- a group of like-minded A.D.D folk wanna stop for just about every snail on the side of the road.

It was so great to get out of the scholarly brain fog.  Between the cozy, winding mountain roads and my newest acquisiton, TinkerBill (an angelic ukelele), anxiety dreams about missing school assignments/ failing / etc disappeared after only 2 nights!  Talk about some potent medicine.

The Mark Twain quote is pertinent:  “I have found out that there ain’t no surer way to find out whether you like people or hate them than to travel with them.” – Mark Twain, Tom Sawyer Abroad

Luckily I found that I liked my travel companions.  Yet 8 days was plenty!  Also, there is a quote floating around somewhere about how the unfortunate part about traveling is that you still bring you along! It stands in contrast to that fantasy of total escapism.  Lots of days, especially the cloudy / cold ones, felt like I was wallowing around in my shadow wondering what the heck, why were all of my imperfections tagging along for the ride!

So, I'm proud to say that I learned a lot in those 8 short days. I hope to find a moment to recount a few of my favorite experiences in another post:
-somehow still commiting to skydiving over Queenstown after watching one of the skydive "masters" trying to figure out a malfunctioning electric sliding glass door
-sitting at Lake Wanaka feeling like living in a dream
-Sheffield's meat pie song
-giving travel companion Rachel a haircut using eyebrow scissors (and it turned out BEAUTIFULLY!)
-making friends with a duck who loved the sounds of my ukelele
-a bright orange moss lining the river rocks in Milford Sound was so illuminous that it looked like the whole riverside was spraypainted construction orange
-Wille Nelson On the Road Again lyrics: "On the road again… going places I have never been.. seeing things that I may never see again… I just can't wait to get on the road again."
-school anxiety dreams replaced by dreaming in mountains

I miss home, the creature comforts and the familiarity. But the wise words of my friend Nathalie echo in my head: "home will always be there waiting for you."  And those of my momma who ponders about feeling at home inside ones self, regardless of the pillow you're resting your head on.

xoxoxox

kaikoura

                     Unsurprisingly my blogging gusto is falling under the universal law of entropy.    It is not that I have had fewer thoughts and experiences I want to share,  just a simple matter of school squeezing quite tightly my time budget.

Even tasty,  homemade meals are becoming more rare as the semester gains momentum.

Molecular genetics continues to threaten to explode my brain.  On top of the difficult subject matter is the learning what expectations are for learning methods and outcomes.  Only one of my four classes provided a syllabus,  so each week it is important for me to set aside some time to comb through the class Web pages to see what to expect.  This is one of the more notable adjustments I have had to make in this experience of studying abroad.  The other is that classes do not provide study guides to outline what is expected knowledge on tests. This makes studying the appropriate
Material somewhat of a shot in the dark.

Fusing a nature find with a drawing and some Samsung galaxy photo editing to relieve the brain squish of threatening squareness. All work and no play =  no thank you.

You can imagine how wide open my arms were to a bit of escape when the weekend hit!   The plan was to rent a car with 3 of my 4 roommates and cruise north for about 3 hours until we reached the coastal town of kaikora.

My roommates pose in front of our budget clown car

The road wound through sheep filled foothills.  I would feel like I was in Colorado for aboot 2 seconds,  with the dry,  grassy hills dotted with pines,  and then I would notice a massive and mystical eucalyptus tree, and that whole feeling would go out the window.

Somewhat familiar scenery

Stopping for a pee break it was a lucky coincidence that we found ourselves in the parking lot of the local community's weekly farmers market.  The market is on year round and has lots of crafts,  baked goods,  meats and cheeses in addition to the expected veggies.  I treated myself to a caramel latte and a bacon+cream cheese bagel for breakfast.  Yolo!

Patron saint of the hot cross bun

Yumyumyum yumyumyum

Someone was selling second hand children's toys.  This resourcefulness was most reminiscent of Taos. 

Kaikora was a further 2 hours of beautiful mountainous driving.  Although we were traveling northbound along the coast,  much of the time the sea was hidden behind rolling hills.  The trees are just beginning to fade out of green and show a tinge of yellow.    

It's beginning to look a little like autumn

We made it or of the winding foothills and emerged onto the rocky western coast of new zealand south island

                 
          Kaikora is a great touristy destination with lots of options for activities.  Go swim with dolphins,  or kayak amongst the seals!  We decided instead to just walk or onto the extensive stone slab of a peninsula and sun ourselves next to the crashing waves,  as if we were the seals.

Luckily we woke up from our sun baked oblivion just in time to get off of the some slab as the tide was roosting and threatening to separate us from the land mass.  I am not exaggerating when I say it was a very close call!    By the time we got near the parking lot we had to cross a rising rover ride up to our knees,  and quickly rising.  It was very Into The Wild of us.

Enengulfed! Yay!

Drive home was equally beautiful and even more comfortable due to finally getting used to sitting in what is usually the driver's seat with no pedals or steering wheel.

Honing in on the rare Armenian mermaid

I hope the sound clip attaches to this image to give a better feel for the road trip!

Good jams and serene scenery.  I see some similarities of NZ <---> NM vibes the more rural I travel.

Cheers!

Ka wahi te tī

Ka whati te tī,
Ka wana te tī,
Ka rito te tī.

When a cabbage tree is broken it shoots up and grows a new head of leaves.      
______________________

To the left of the Be More sign (which is also actually quite zen... be. More.) Is a cabbage tree.

This is a little quote in a Te Reo introduction book.  I am not positive that it is meant to be superiorly zen, but it has been my mini mantra these past few days.  Especially on the week days when I feel repeatedly knocked down by to-dos. And today is Monday again. How is the world did that happen?

This is the community space where I like to back in the wifi. 

Not much time on week days to get into fiction,  but I finished this wonderful novel by Tea Obreht this weekend. 

On Saturday I finally went out of my comfort zone and into a yoga class at the recreation center on campus.  It is pretty sweet how the Rec center is free for students and offers a boat load of group classes every day of the week.
The setup in the class was casual and comforting,  with all the mats facing in a big circle,  radiating outward.  I love my thin,  bendy manduka brand travel mat,  because I was able to put it on top of a very padded but slippery mat and ended up with a ton of grip.

The class had a range from newbies to acrobats.  I enjoyed how music played softly in the background,  but I really missed the skill with which one of my favorite teachers in taos actually cues the whole flow to really go with the jams.     (Friday night slow jams class with Ashleigh at shree  yoga taos, I miss you!)

Huge tree, i love you.n

Turquoise is a good homesickness remedy. 

After sufficiently chilling myself out,  I spontaneously joined the student army of rugby fans.  I had a pale ale amongst the rowdiest youngsters ( and thankfully
some equally overwhelmed international students by my side) before the club-led bus whisked us away to the match.

Stu dent section wins the photobomb award. 

  The regional team,  the Crusaders, had a good record against the South Africa national team,  the Lions.  The game was pretty well attended,  with fans filing up a majority of the stands in the newly-built (not huge) stadium. The red and black flags available for free certainly enhanced the visual impression.

Always finding a way to hey my horse fix.  

                           
Rugby is a fun game to watch for 3 reasons:
1) these guys are straight up brutes. It's a full-contact sport and the extent of their protective gear is: a mouth guard.  No helmets,  shoulder pads,  nada!
2) the game keeps moving.  Passes have to be made going backward,  kind of like having off-sides all the time for you hockey fans.     And when there
is a tackle,  the guy with the ball on the bottom of the pile has only a few seconds before he has to make the ball available again for play, or else it goes to the opposing team.  So the clock keeps running and the game is in action for the majority of the 80 minute game.
3) the ball passes are quick underhanded spins that originate near the hip. Very different from an American football overhand pass.  The plays are adlibbed so the game takes on a great energetic quality.

Did I mention the views aren't half bad? 

       It was a great weekend,  and on this drizzly Monday (btw hurricane Pam is not hiring us here) I would love to hear from you!  If you have a minute,  send me an email and tell me about what's going on! !!

Xoxo

Beach: moody. Crashing waves. 

Henna inspiration. 

Beach fashion week. 

Sweet trees. 

unwind

"There are many paths through the Ring of Life. They are a constant movement toward self-fulfillment through growth of your mind, expansion of your experiences, widening of your senses and growing your spirit. It’s ceaseless and constant throughout one’s life.”

- Frosty Wooldridge, Golden, Colorado

   

Rewind

     I love this quote. it reminds me that life is a process, not an object.
 I've been putting forth a great and focused effort in my genetics class, and some moments it feels as if it is to no avail.  Occasionally the fearful thought that all this book learning is far removed from, or maybe distant from,  the real life I want to be living. but it is because I am living in these thoughts that I am not truly engaged in the moment to moment act of living.... not because of the class or the work.
I have been literally worrying myself sick!

Restriction enzyme map of a bacterial plasmid DNA. Yeah, this was stressing me out!

  Thankfully I am beginning to feel better: (thank you yarrow, tulsi, bubbly water, ibuprofen, cough drops, hot showers, sleep, and Sriracha sauce....)

Yarrow tea.. medicine translucent in the sun.

Enjoying a freshly picked pear and wearing the wonderful turquoise bamboo velour mermaid pants my awesome sister gave me is probably the best medicine.

I hate to rest is what it comes down to. But my body imposed a (reasonable) limitation on my process, and I was forced to spend time doing absolutely nothing. Oh it felt so terrible! I felt bored and then anxious about how if I ended up liking this whole slacking off thing, I might never end up motivating myself again.  it was really a good time to look at my deepest motivations, and assess my priorities.  I don't know why I fall into the illusion that external things define me (ie.. jobs, grades, clothes, my yoga practice, what I eat)  but for now I can see through that bullcrap, to the light that says I'M OK JUST AS I AM! sheesh!

My homie,  the dalai lama, always bringing a smile to my face:). 

 I am so grateful to feel this freedom of being. And I am grateful for that microscopic flu/cold/whatever virus that lead me, by the breath, cough, sneeze and snot, to the light.

Slowing down to enjoy the moment.  Walking to class through one of christchurches many beautiful, arborous (new word?) Parks.

 Sometimes life brings you a big pause when you're not going to do so yourself.

Play dough, given to me as a way to learn about DNA recombination,  illustrating for me the concept of change and unconditional love instead.

jumping into routine

#FOMO. Fighting FOMO.

Fukushima fish n chips

It's not hump day, but....

An imported delicacy. Sticker shock lives on....

Living in the uni dorms is a trip.  A new community space opened up last evening.  Due to the drinking age being only 18 here, alcohol is frequently a component of university-sponsored events.  I met a fun international group of three in an impromptu game of pool. Due to our collective  lack of skills it was the longest lasting rounds I have a) been a part of and b) ever even heard of.  Obviously a harsh sense of competitiveness can't last 1 hour,  so we really had a blast laughing at ourselves.

I am taking 4 courses- 2 of them relate directly to learning about the Maori (intro to Māori culture and Māori health issues and opportunities), 101statistics,  and molecular genetics.  The latter being outrageously time consuming and nerdy cool. I am literally learning  genetic engineering.

Running plasmid DNA through a gel electrophoresis machine to see how long the fragments are.

Tools of the trade. 

With the integration of technology into the educational landscape I sometimes feel overwhelmed by the busy work that has to be done in front of a screen.  Good old pencil and paper is still probable my favorite.  Although I must admit that gif animation videos can be super helpful too!

Helpful gif illustration of what happens to brains on too much school.

 

The thing I miss most is animals in my life. There is a whacky cat who is for all intensive purposes a dog,  and I have been blessed to hang with that kooky feline at the most perfect moments when I am really missing my furry friends.

Homie named Kitty

Have you ever heard of kapa haka dancing?  Christchurch hosted the festival for this awesome Māori dance from Thursday to saturday, and on Sunday, (today) the competition culminates in a fierce day of the best of the best, dancing to their highest
Ability to win the title for 2015. I took photos and videos but learned that it is not cool, so I will just refer any interested parties to the te matatini competition website.

The skill with which the women coordinate a rhythmic dance  with poi balls was mesmerising. Most of the women and men have very different  roles in the dance. The women had an indomitable spirit of strength and beauty, and the men were truly awe inspiring in the facility with which they moved between warrior violence and welcoming friendly smiles.

Did I mention the food?! Pacifika knows how to eat!

 The sounds the groups dance to for their 45 minute sets are all of their own making. Stomping, shouting, sailing harmonies, and often times one or two acoustic guitars. Some of the softer songs were like the Hawaiian "somewhere over the rainbow" but more robust and symphonic.  Other songs were less melodic but clearly didactic, with a stoey teller moving and speaking while the dancers make motions to animate the stories. It was simply awe inspiring and I am humbled by the communal aspect of this amazingly coordinated journey of dance and song.

Cheers to living and loving,  my friends! Wishing a wealth of health and happiness to you.  I hope today you find a chance to make an art form out of a challeng

 

Stay a while! The Avon river meandering through campus. #notAllWhoWanderAreLost

                   
Ngā mihi mô tô manaakitanga mai.
 -thanks for your kindness-