Farewell Dinner at The Grove

Evening of July 5th Bill and I headed out to one of the top restaurants in Auckland with the fellowship staff and wives.  Throughout the year we have enjoyed many incredible dinners in their homes and it was a treat to go out to The Grove with them.

before leaving I was standing by our one heater warming myself. It is COLD in our house with one little space heater!

Me and Ellie snuggling before Alecia came to babysit.

We had Alecia take a picture of us before leaving.

trying to show the 4 days left.

our first course was a specially prepared entrée (their starter) with white truffles from Michelle’s plot down south. it was over the top.

dark, but at the end of the night. Robert, Michelle, Bill, Hamish, Michel. What a great group this is!

Bill and Hamish.

Bill and Michelle.

Bill and Robert.

Bill and Michel – the program director. These two got along great this year. Can you tell?

goodbyes are hard to do

tonight we said goodbye to our dear Agar family. we have spent so much time with these delightful people and love them all so very much.

 

Agars fly back to Australia on Tuesday morning and tomorrow they have a farewell dinner in the city planned. Even with many competing offers they wanted to spend a laid back night at our house for Indian takeaways, wine, chocolate, tea and kids watching a movie.

After lots of screaming and running around and some quick grub the kids settled in to watch a movie. while we sipped our drinks, ate our delicious take away and talked.

Bill was setting up the timer to get a photo and I had to include this beauty. Nick was teasing Charlie and Millie about picking their noses (I think charlie was mostly the one picking his nose).

The whole clan.

close ups with Charlie distracted by funny Nick.

that is almost perfect! We have set a date for 3 years to see each other again. Let’s hope we can stick to it!

There were many tears shed (mostly me and Prue) upon saying goodbye. I honestly don’t know if I would have survived without Prue this year. She has really lived normal life with me – we vacationed with them and spend many afternoons with the kids playing in the reserve behind their house sipping tea and chatting, then feeding us dinner when Bill and Nick were working late. What a joy it has been to get to know them and thankfully we know we will see them in the future. We look forward to a family trip to Australia before our kids graduate High School and hopefully a ski trip in the US sooner. We love you Agars! 

Farewell Party for Nick…and Bill

 

Last night we went to the Farewell Party for the fellows. The joke is that the party was really just for Nick because people would ask Bill if he was going throughout the week. When we showed up the napkin just had Nick on it so Bill gave him a hard time.

better pick. These two have enjoyed working together.

Bill & Nash – the new Head & Neck Fellow for next year.

OR Staff Kathy and Michelle with surgeons David and Nick.

Head and Neck surgeons Rajan and John.

OR staff Jas, Sarah, and Chen with Emke (laryngology fellow) and her husband.

Nash, me, Angus (Dora’s husband), Kathy, Nick and Prue.

Bill with Paul (General ENT consultant) and Angelica (OR staff).

After wrapping up our time at the Lumsden (bar/restaurant) we made our way over to The Zoo – a LEGIT oriental karaoke bar. There were individual rooms for the karaoke – we had a bit of a snaffu trying to work the screens because they were in Chinese. Thankfully a few of the OR staff were able to work it out so Mark could bust out in his best singing voice.

it was quite the set up.

the little room.

Bill, me and Prue hanging out in the back hoping to not get the microphone pushed at us. Bill had to sing Payphone by Maroon 5 for the group. We also were dancing (some people were up on tables) to Gangnam Style while Bill’s coworker sang it in Korean. So classic.

The face everyone makes when the mic is being thrown at them.

Me, Prue and Ro (Mark’s wife).

my biggest laugh of the night is when Nick sang JT’s Sexy Back in Korean (or at least it sounded like it). It hit my funny bone!

Bill and I left about midnight and I heard they were out much later. It was a fun sendoff for Bill and Nick.

the French Cafe

Wednesday night we went out to The French Café with Nick and Prue as a end of fellowship celebration dinner. The French Café is one of the top restaurants in Auckland and it DID.NOT.DISAPPOINT!

I don’t have pictures from our 8-9 course degustation menu, but it was fantastic. Throughout dinner we forgot all of our to do lists and enjoyed the food and friendship. We have many many memories with the lovely Agar family and it was the perfect way to wrap up our time here. One of the waitresses was from Door County, WI! such a small world!

90…err 82 days left

We have 90 days 82 days left in NZ. This feels both REALLY close and REALLY far away. A lot will happen before we land in ‘merica on July 9th. Here are some things that are currently whirling around in my brain as of late.

1.  I am worried that driving on the other side of the road will be weird to me – since driving on the left side is feeling normal at this point.

2. I would say that I am FINALLY feeling settled in – only to turn around and be unsettled again.  I have finally adjusted to what our life looks like here only to have it flipped on its head again.  I do think this year has given me better expectations for what next year will be like and that will be a blessing. 

3. I still am looking forward to being in my own bed and not sleeping on a mattress on the floor.

4. I barely notice the accent anymore. When I do hear an American talk (or canadian), I realize it is easier on my brain.  I will often meet Americans and not realize we sound the same. They usually ask me “where are you from?” and then it clicks. The main words that still stick out to me are Yes, which sounds like “yeeeeeeees” and No, which sounds like “naughey”.

5. We will miss the people. Kiwis are such kind people. Everyone we have met has been thoughtful and always willing to help out. Overall people are more reserved and very perceptive of non-verbal communication, but we have found that because of this they communicate intentionally. I will probably realize how different it really is after we arrive back to the US.

6. St Heliers – I am in love with this little village. The park, beach, cafes. I doubt we will ever live in a little place like this and I am trying to cherish it while we are here.

7. café culture – there are cafes and dairys everywhere. I am amazed by how many there are here and how getting a “proper coffee” is so important to people. It will be interesting to go back and order a drip coffee or latte versus a flat white, cappuccino, long black, espresso (I know you can technically order some of these in the US but they aren’t the same). NO one drinks drip coffee here – except us – ha!

8. I won’t miss the spiders, ants and SLUGS that have invaded our home. The living here is very indoor/outdoor and the no screens allow many flys, mozzies (what they call mosquitos), ants, spiders, cockroaches, wetas, you name it inside. we had another cyclone storm on friday and there was lots of rain. so much rain, a leak started in the ceiling of our dining room (when I love renting) and as I started cleaning it up at 5am I saw this huge slug on the floor! I made bill get up and throw it outside. I honestly can’t figure out how it sneaks in, but a friend said they come through under the doors. things aren’t sealed as tightly here because of the mild weather, but I am looking forward to not having these sorts of animals in our house regularly.

ANT INVASION!!

we are a house for ants. apparently this is “normal” for auckland (according to our property manager), but we honestly have an ant highway in the corner of our dining room.

I even put another ant trap next to it and it was packed full. there was literally a highway of ants to and fro.

the kids ask me if our new house will have ants – NO!!

we’re on a boat…

Saturday, Bill and I were invited to go out on one of his bosses’ boats. We scrambled and found a sitter (who was great by the way) and set out sans kids into the beautiful blue sea.

We didn’t want to be obnoxious so we didn’t bust out the camera for a bit. I took it out when Bill decided to brave it and paddle board in front of everyone. He did awesome.

We anchored the boat off the north side of the island of Motatapu - about 45 min from auckland. Me, Phil and Tim (two friends of Hamish – Bill’s boss).

Helen and Jill – wives of Phil and Jim.

Julie who HATES getting her picture taken. Julie is awesome and is Hamish’s wife. I see her almost every morning at 5:30am because we are both workout people.

Hamish – an extremely gifted ear surgeon runs a TIGHT ship. He takes a lot of heat for it, but his boat was pristine and VERY nice.

view from the bow.  it has 3 bedrooms below.

a sun deck – if this was pappy’s boat I would have been reading a book and laying out up here.

chillin’.

I decided since we were out on a boat I had to get in the water. it was a warm day, but breezy so you didn’t have to get in the water. the water was quite chilly (it is the sea after all), but I was a girl and only went in up to my shoulders. then hung out on the board for a bit.

ahhhh – I will miss this view.

Bill & Hamish.

us at the end! what a fun saturday! So glad we were able to get out on a boat before we left!