New picture from the Tongan visit to the archives

This was a picture taken of the Tongan visit to the digi lab.  It is now posted in the tea room.  It was taken by an employee of the archives.

Family Home Evening

 For Family Home Evening we made goody packages for the missionaries serving from our ward.  I think the adults outnumbered the young adults because it is summer and so a lot of the young adults are gone.  The people on the back row starting from the left is:  David Osler, Elder Overton, Mikey, Sister Overton, Chelsea, Katherine Osler, Sam (Samantha), Kree, Nic.  Front row: Mario, Ben, Sister McVey.  The Osler's are the family that invited us for Thanksgiving Dinner.

November 28, 2011

Rugby Stadium

While we were at the Home and Garden Show, Don asked a security person if we could see the rugby field.  They let us in and this is what the inside looks like.

Home and Garden Show

 We decided to go to the Home and Garden Show held at the Westpac Stadium (which is where rugby is played).

 This is a baby sheep.  They were selling insulation made from sheep wool.

 These are watering cans that are made in the shape of different animals.

 This patio table holds a lot of people and has a lazy susan in the middle for serving.  You would need a pretty big patio for this table.

This is an enclosed trampoline.  Just what everyone needs for their backyard.

Thanksgiving in New Zealand

Thanksgiving Day is alive and well in New Zealand.  Even though everyone around us are not celebrating the Americans are not forgetting.

In our ward there are four young couples who work for WETA (the Peter Jackson production company) and they invited the McVey's and us to join them Thanksgiving night for Thanksgiving Dinner.  We had all the usual food items.  They even had turkey which is very expensive here (a 12 lb. turkey costs $80.00).  They also had mashed potatoes, stuffing, and pumpkin pies.  They don't have regular pumpkins here so the pies are hard to make.  What they call pumpkins look like squash.  The dinner was at the Osler's home in Seatoun.  It was very nice and made us feel like we were home for the holidays.

The festivities continued on Saturday.  We had Thanksgiving again at the Mission Presidents home in Tawa.  Two senior couples had just arrived so we got to meet them.  The Chesley's are from Hermosa Beach, California and they arrived on Wednesday (the day before Thanksgiving) and they are serving in Upper Hutt. Also another couple from American Fork the Farnes were there.  They left early because they had a 6 hour drive to Napier.  A long drive for someone who is just beginning to drive on the other side of the road.  We also had the Brazzeals, Patchetts, McVeys, Kezarians, Overtons and President Kezarians sister, her husband and daughter.  The food and company was very enjoyable.

It was amazing to see the Mission Home.  It had a lot of modern conveniences such as a full size washer and dryer, a full size refrigerator, a dishwasher and garbage disposal.  Their home was also much larger than our flat with a beautiful view of the hills around it.  The upstairs has a large room with rows to beds for when the new missionaries arrive.  In December there will be about 14 new missionaries arriving.  It is a very beautiful house.

Sidenote:  Ann Ross from St. George has a grandson who is one of the missionaries arriving in December.  His name is Alex Ross.  We would like to meet him but he will be on the very bottom tip of the South Island and because the mission includes part of the North Island and all of the South Island we don't see the missionaries on the other island unless they are transferred to the North Island.  Hopefully we will meet him before we leave.

Tongans Visit to the Archives

Mike Higgins is working with the Tongan Government to set up a digi-lab in their country's archives.  So today the New Zealand Archives hosted 4 dignitaries from Tonga and they toured our lab.

At 10:00 we were invited to a tea.  The first speaker spoke in Maori (language of Maori people in New Zealand).  Then we all sang a song to them in Maori (except the 4 Americans who didn't know the song) and then a line was formed and they greeted us.  Instead of a handshake the greeting of Tongan people is to touch foreheads and noses.  It seemed a little different to us.

They also have a tradition that the men always sit on the front row and the women sit behind them.  Their theory for this is that if the man is in front he can protect the woman.

They then came and saw the digi-lab and we explained how we processed the documents and then how they were filmed.

There were 4 dignitaries from tonga and 3 of them were LDS.  We have heard there are a lot of members in Tonga.

Tour of the Archives

We have now been at the archives for about 3 months and we have never had a tour.  So Fiona (the girl who supplies us with all our boxes to film) decided to take us on a tour.  She took us to places where normally tours never go.

 She also pulled out interesting documents for us to see..  We saw the marriage license for Sir Edmund Hillary who climbed Mt. Everest.  He was brave enough to climb Mt. Everest but too afraid to propose to his girlfriend so he had his mother do it.

 In New Zealand there is a new book coming out about a murder that happened on the South Island many years ago.  It was news back then because New Zealand is very safe and has very few murders.  The story is about a rich girl who moves to New Zealand and becomes close friend with a poor girl from the other side of the tracks.  The rich girls mother doesn't want her to be friends with the poor girl so they decide to move.  The girls then plot the murder of her mother.  They end up killing the mother and are found guilty, but because of their age they only served 5 years in prison.  Fiona showed us the court records of the trial.

The poor girl later became a writer and wrote murder mysteries under another name.  When Fiona said the writer's name Sister McVey said that she knew someone by that same name and had read some of her novels.  Sister McVey went home and goggled the name and it was the same person.  The interesting thing is that this writer later joined the Mormon church and her books are now sold at Deseret Books.

This is the longest word in New Zealand.  Try pronouncing this.