So I can't really even begin to explain or document the last few days.
It's been hilarious
And random
And intense
And well *shrug* here goes.
So have been keeping on keeping on with classes and one on ones and everythign else that has been goign on. It's been very exciting and after a whole two weeks now, things seem to really be picking up speed.
Outreach teams have been decided now, and I will be working with Adam and Laura heading up a team of 6 students. More details for that will follow in email and the October newsletter.
Friday was so great, and even though I was up at the break of dawn (actually nope, it was dark out) it was totally worth it. Part of this DTS is that staff are involved in the local outreaches, so Jessa, myself, and four of our awesome wonderful students help out at a breakfast for homeless people in our area. It was a really great opportunity to help out a really great ministry, and learning from Pastor Joe and the other guys in the ministry. Also got to talk to a really talented girl from the First nations youthgroup they ahve there, who has been having some trouble lately here. Reminds me of me when I was 14, so hopefully will be able to get to know her more and speak more with her.
I am having the night off tongiht, watching 'Legally blonde' and (believe it or not) about to do my nails! tehehe. How girly can you get huh
So for those of you who were interested in the "experiment" I got given a pack of pastry, so I decided to get a batch of mince and cheese pies going. It's so far the beginning of something, cuz the pastry wasn't ideal, and I havne't got the gravy quite right, but otehrwise, the pie was goooood. A 'not quite perfect but pretty nice' taste of home. Gave one to Ralph (who as an English guy, of course gets it) and Stefan enjoyed one too as a 'cultural experience' tehehe. It was a really fun night actually, Stuart and I set up camp at his place with pies, icecream and he had a suprise for me for the night.........Footrot flats on DVD!!!! It was soooo fun, and i loved being able to have company enjoying south pacific goodness!!!!! Soooo great, thanks Stuart!
Today was an entirely different, yet equally entertaining story. Last week I won tickets through one of the local newspapers for "The Magic Flute" Stefan and I got quite excited about it, and so planned to go on the train and bus out to Surrey (about an hour travelling)
However, after all of it, it turned out to be a really weird show, an ADAPTATION of The Magic Flute, re-written and re-told for children and from a Canadian First Nations perspective. It was good for what it was, but definately a *ahem* little outside of what we expected.
Oh well, it was a fun day hanging out with Stefan, and I really enjoyed it.
I am also on a quest to get my haircut. Hmmm
Oh and how's this for great. Got a new bankaccount with no fees for 100 transactions per month. Not a big deal normally, but HUGE for me, thanks God! ATM and no feeeees :)
Anwyays
The plan for the next week is all mixed up because of Canadian Thanksgiving on Monday. I'm excited to have my second Thanksgiving in Canada, and will be enjoying it relaxing at home with the Parizeau family, Stefan, Stuart, Henri, Pam and Craig and Jamie. I am bringing Pavlova!!!!! mmmmmm Am so excited. Turkey is the coolest thing. Turkey everything............
I think there is definatley turkey in heaven....
Ok
this post is long now
hopefully not too boring
i'm kinda sleepy
Will make sure I take some really good pictures for the October newsletter.
Love you all lots
Hillary

So the saga of the bike chain
Don't get me wrong, please I beg of you, but if my bike chain falls off one more time while i'm grinding up some lovely Vancouver steep bit I'm gonna have a wobbly. Sigh
Though the look of grease stains on my hands and the inside cuff of my jeans makes me feel positively handy. As if I actually knew something about bike chains.....
It's alright though, I think I am going to have to suck it up and take my bike into the shop tomorrow during lunch. oh well.
Things are going really well, the first week panic attack stress moments are definately lessening, and it's been good to kind of get into a groove, and find a bit of normalcy as the routine begins to sink slowly in. It's crazy busy still, but at the same time, it's nice to know that I'm working really really hard, and on days like to day being able to see just a tiny glimpse of how God is already at work both in us and in our students. Had my first one on one today and after the dramas, uncertainty,tears and prayers to work out who would be in whose groups, she told me that all the girls had all talked about who they wanted most for their one on ones, and it turns out that what they hoped for was exactly matched with what ended up happening. Yay for listening to God's voice!
Am having a really good dinner while i sit here typing this, haven't had couscous in months, so it's nice to be back in that too :) Simple pleasures right?
So has anyone heard that song "From the Inside out" by Hillsong United? Froml the United We Stand album. Soooooo good, good album. totally awesome worship song, have been singing it a lot at church, and managed to get it off Stuart, so have been rocking it at home too. So great to start and finish a long day with some good worship times.
Am also in the middle of a Kiwi experiment. It's going to be great (well at least I hope so!) so will post picutres if i am successful......(yup i know that was vague, I don't know who could be reading this....!
Anyways, time to jet, so look below for some prayer points and I'll post again soon.
Love ya
Hill


Prayer points for praying people
-Outreach decisions are coming again, between the two Southeast Asian places (let me know if you want more details) and so the teams, and the leaders (i.e. me and the other staff) are praying about where to go, and where to get the money to go. Everyone needs $400 by Friday to pay deposits for tickets, and one or two students don't have that yet. So it's going to be an interesting time!
-One on ones and journals and general discipleship wisdom for me as I get to know my three girls better.
-Continued energy and health as the momentum of the schedule picks up and the weather gets colder


LATER TODAY - UPDATE

The experiment completely worked, it was a wonderful amazing success. Pictures coming soon.

So, today, on a lovely Vancouver Sunday I would like to share with you my musical inspiration of the day. I normally don't do blogs like this, but after being touched so deeply, (and laughing til I thought I was going to cry or wet myself) I figured I needed to share this with you.
This is my tribute to Wing. I heart Wing

Wing moved to New Zealand about 10 years ago from HongKong, and after some set backs with a far too rigid and narrow minded CD industry there, she decided to launch out, and put herself into the public light with her own money, and fulfill her obligation to share her god given voice with the world to bring enlightenment and joy and happiness.
My personal favourite would have to be "Wing sings ABBA" Who can beat that Dancing Queen.......
listen to free Wing clips on www.wingmusic.co.nz
Especially for you Nic and Ryan and Wade if you are reading, please listen to Highway to Hell, from the "Wing sings AC/DC" collection. It inspired me......(to run and hide)

So, after this whole crazy crazy first week, it's all official that DTS is well and truly all on. As if we could have believed otherwise. This first week had been a rollercoaster, with fun, laughter, tears, angry-ness and general mayhem and chaos, but a lot of goodtimes.
I'm back at my house now, feeling a weird mix of exhausted and empty and way too full of emo and thoughts and such so i think after posting this i will shower, pajama, and watch some Scrubs! yup, sounds like an excellent prescription.
Just wanted to sign on and let you knwo that it's been going well, and to post one or two pics to give you guys a bit of illustration to the name sthat you will probably see me mentioning over the next 5 months or so. It's soooo grea tot finally meet these studnets we've been praying for for so long and it was more than great to live in the hosue with them for a few days.
We took them on a bit of an excursion today around Downtown, an Amazing race set up if you will, and i thin kthey all had a good time. Pair that with the great corn bread and chilli dinner that the Davenports hosted for us, and it was a great Saturday.
Am defiantely looking forward to church tomorrow too, some of the students are gonna come with so that will be good
anwyasy
bed time so here's the pics. and all you phantom readers out there, how bout some comments eh
love yo uall lots
me




Our Amazing Race team at General Motors place (Ice Hockey home in Vancouver)


Crystal and I kissing a moose/mountie?!?!


The Starbucks checkpoint where we had to find "The Australian"


The lovely 7 girl students

So I have a new cell phone number here in vancouver
but thanks to nathan's good advice i'm not gonna put it here on my blog. Apparnetly that's a bad idea
My new number should have gone out in email but if you didnt' get it, email me
or leave me a comment
love you lots
will post more about DTS later
hill

So this is a bit of a weird post. And it will be short cuz it's nearly half eleven and time I was in bed!
I'm exhausted, but thanks for the prayers, I'm sleeping really well now! Exhasuted mostly cuz we've been busy! DTS is officially underway and as was to be expected, nothing has been quite as we expected! (how's that for something)
It's been sooooo great to meet our 13 studnets and the first 2 days have been great, beginning to build relationships and see these fresh faced students so excited about what God is going to do, and us even more so!
It's hard to belive that today was the one year anniversary of me starting my DTS, and now here I am as a staff member. weird.
On a not good note, I'm very sad to say that my friend Dawn had an accident on Monday, and broke her hand really badly. She is having some R&R time at my house, being taken care of by Randy and Rita, but as she was meant to be staying in the girls house with the girl DTS students, I am now staying here.
It's kinda crazy how it all panned out and now I am here albeit for only a week or so, but I'm pretty stoked about it, getting to know the girls and such, but at the same time it's uber tiring and there is a little part of me that misses my crazy high bunk bed!
But it's all good, and I am loving this so much.
Thank you to all of you who have prayed and thought and cared and called and emailed and hav been a part of me getting to this spot for this here and this now.
So, it's bed time.
Love you
will post again soon hopefully with some pictures!!!!

so, it's been a crazy week
I actually can't remember what/when/why i last posted. hang on a tic.
ah, ok, i remember now
So yeah, training is all finished, and so this week has been flat out working, between cleaning the houses ready for students to live in, making welcome baskets and cards, and, very very very exciting, getting my BC drivers license!!!! woooot!
so as of this week i am now a road user on any side of the street. Bring it on!!! tehehe
it's going to be good and my first YWAM driving testing practice duty will be doing bread run on sunday night. For those of you who dont know the YWAMese, Bread run is a things we do every sunday night, where we drive to a bakery in Kerrisdale, and they give us all the bread they have at the end fo the day
so awesome.
so yeah, it's about a 20 minute drive, so it'll be a good trial run. i think i'll be sweet, cuz i aced the theory test, and have been biking a lot on the right hand side of the street, so my head is fairly well wrapped around it. we'll see though :)
Had a super exciting thing today, got to meet the first of the DTS students, who came in early with her parents and so got to bike over and give her the tour of the house and everything
was sooooo exciting, it's all real!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
anwyays, i gtg and get ready for JEn's birthday party tonihgt, will post again soon.
Also, I officially sent off my first real newsletter this week, so if you didnt' get it and you want it, let me know
it has useful things like contact details and ufn things like pictures! :)
Love you lots
hill

so here's a thought on leadership
we had our DTS training today and we were talking a lot about leadership and authority and respect and we did a bible study to give us a bit of biblical context on the whole thing. So we studied the relationship between Paul and Timothy and the mentoring rrelationship etc. And then we went through a bunch of different scriptures looking at who had influenced paul and timothy, and then how they in turn influenced others who went on to influence others again and so on and so forth.
Then Adam had a great idea of getting us all to write our names on the white board and then writing who has influenced us and how we then have to realise we have no idea who we have really influenced, or who has influenced the people who have influenced us. also totally connected to the sermon at church on sunday (guest speaker john bevere) when he was talking about how when Christians fulfill what God has called them to do, beit as an accountant or an evangelist, the knock on effect can't be measured, we never see how many lives we really effect until we're in heaven.
It made me homesick to be honest to write so many kiwi names on the board, as well as a lot of canadians, aussies and americans and other internationals, but it was really good to see all those names written down and be able to thinmk and pray about how you are all involved with the work that i am doing here. all of this is partly due to you and your words and work. pretty huge huh. So thanks.
we had a great dinner tonight, the DTS staff hosted Sara Fay, and did the good old pot luck thing. yay for american bbq chicken, rice, twice baked potatoes, veges and HOT BROWNIE AND BUTTERSCOTCH RIPPLE ICECREAM!
lol
anyways
it's sleep time now. need to gather my strength for biking to work tomorrow on the first rainy morning :( sigh
much love and pineapple lumps
hillary

So I figured that the hiking trip deserved a post all of it's own. Also, that makes it easier to include the pictures.
It was a really good time away, and now for the big reveal.....we went to Vancouver Island, near Nanaimo and Qualicum to be precise, and went for a three day hike in the Strathcona national park, guided by Layne's dad, Everette and their friend Alex. It was pretty intense, but really great to be working and walking together and encouraging each other and trying our best not to break limbs or dehydrate or any of those other fun things :)




We camped the two nights at an amazing spot called Lake Kwai, and it was really fun getting used to all the North American type bush safety things that are never really a concern when camping in New Zealand. I seem to remember the scariest thing in the NZ forest being a wild pig, and the most tent threatening thing to be avoided was a nikau palm branch full of water that might crash at anytime dousing you with water. Never had I considered the possiblity of bears and cougars and the need to carry "bear spray" or keep all our food, and toothpaste and other similarly scented things in a steel box 100m or so from the tents!
This is where we got to eat dinner though.......




The goal on the second day was Mount Albert Edwards, and unfortunately Stefan, Mark and I didn't make it all the way to the summit, but instead enjoyed some recoup time halfway up from one of the amazing rock shelves while the others powered up to the top. I can think of worst places to sit for a while though.....



also great was getting to spend time with Layne, albeit briefly,and her family being so hospitable and amazing and fun and taking care of us. Looking forward to going back to the island to hang out with them for sure!

So yeah, now it's back to reality and noise here in Vancouver, and I'm excited to say that I am going out now to IKEA with Stefan and Pam, so that should be fun.

Keep praying for us and for more students for the fall school!
lots of love, hillary

So it's a lovely grey Vancouver saturday morning. Peaceful, still, and still mostly warm despite the rain.
This will be a short post cuz I still have to brush my teeth and put my laundry on before heading out to IKEA with Stefan and Pam.
My muscles feel much better now, and I am enjoying the fact that i didn't have to be out of bed until 9 today. Also bonus was that we scored a free pack of bacon, so jacqui and I had baon and eggs for breakfast, an excellent weekend breakfast treat if I do say so myself.
Had my first day of bike commute yesterday, and even though my muscles were pretty angry at me, the saved time made it all worth while. Thank you so much for the emails and prayers, it's been great, and for your viewing pleasure.......



Also, quick update and praise, we have a location to run the DTS! a church that has been connected with our base for quite a while has agreed to let us use their buildings for the school! fully equipped industrial kitchen and everything, including accomodation for the male students. Thank you God! and thanks to you for your prayers.

Am back in Vancouver
Tired, and aching a whole lot
Will post more tomorrow.
Lots of love

So it's getting late, and my laptop is running low on power, so here's to keeping things brief.
Last night was hilarious, I'm glad to say that my roommate Jacqui has successfully passed through the BroTown kiwiana initiation, watching two full episodes of BroTown with me last night. Needless to say there was some explaining to be done, but all in all, I'm very pleased with her progress tehehe. We need to get the aussies roudn too cuz I know they will appreciate it, especially when Dad sends me a copy of Sione's wedding! (thanks dad!!!!!)
I won't be posting for the next few days as we head off bright and early tomorrow morning for a wilderness adventure (aka group bonding in the mountains!)
The DTS fall staff are all going to a mystery location to climb a mountain for 2 1/2 days with a mystery guide. very exciting. So will try and take some pictures and avoid getting eaten by any bears or cougars so i can live to blog again.
I'm sitting on my couch right now, rubbing some anti-flamme into my right wrist which is a bit stiff after today's epic adventure.
Last year living here i was always a convenient maximum of about 20 minutes walk/bus/train away from just about everything. Since moving back here now, though i love my new place, it's now about an hour walk away from anything.
So, today, after much deliberation over pictures and emails from craig's list (vancouver's trademe/trading post second hand website) jacqui and i made the trek on the bus out to kitsilano beach (1st and balsam for those with google earth) and bought a pair of bikes for $110 each. pretty mint mountain bikes in fairly good nick, and so we put them through the ultimate test of value for money by biking an epic 1 1/2 hours home (via the local Canadian Tire to buy very flash and useful bike helmets).
So yeah, feeling pretty chuffed, pretty fit, and pretty pleased with our endeavours all round.
So as I sleep now, there is though a definate feeling of the calm before the storm, as we head into a super busy period of work pre DTS with a full week of training, moving day at the base, the hiking trip, and a much anticipated trip to IKEA (either you get that one or you don't!)
but yeah, will post pics of my lovely bike (any suggestions for a name for the bike?) and will be back on friday-ish
Pray for safety for us too, between bears and injuries, we jsut wanna have a good time!
Love and pineapple lumps
hill

And here is some general hilarity

Some of the guys made this and they get money if you watch the video. Brilliant


And it is as crazy as you think, that does say 'Patio surfing'

So I forgot to post pics from our epic adventure
Here goes for some

Stuart and a Tim Horton's Canadian Maple donut. Best donut, EVER


Me and either Ari or Noah!?! Hanging in Winnipeg catchin gup with Dave and Heather at the Winnipeg base


Leigh driving! (funny that on a a road trip)


The cosy back seat team, Ange, me and Stefan

So, the saga of the toothbrush
Now most of you know I'm not really a squeemish person, but occaisionally I do get a bit funny when people mess with my personal things. Like my toothbrush, or peopleputting their shoes on my bed!
The first problem was with packing a big hurry and leaving NZ in a rush, and also wanting to be clean while i travelled the epic 21 hours or whatever to vancouver, I had my toothbrush in my carryon. But because of all the crazy carry on bag checking, my toothbrush got all touched and handled (i'm talking bristles too here) by the dude checking my bag at the airport. Gross. So needless to say I bought a new toothbrush in Vancouver when I arrived.
So that was fine and I used the toothbrush all throughout conference and everything. Good.
But then!
I got home and I was having a gumby-running-late-brushing-hair-crazy-morning moment where i totally fumbled and dropped my NICE NEW WONDERFUL toothbrush and it bounced off the rim of the toilet and onto the plunger. Gross. And again I say, GROSS.
Sigh
But now, it all works out for good, I have a new beautiful orange and white toothbrush from the dollar store next to the base. Good

so i am faced with a bit of a conundrum
have just come back from conference, and i'm pretty sure my flat mate is back from utah, but she isn't home, it's pushing on 1am, and i am thinking i should go to bed soon. however the problem is that jacqui and i share a room, and while she was away i was using her bed, because mine is the top bunk, 6 feet off the ground, with no ladder! the ladder got moved with the painting and has now vanished into a vortex, leaving me sitting on the floor wondering if i should borrow her bed again and risk the weird moment of being woken up at some crazy hour when she comes home or maybe jsut sleepin gon the couch to sort it out tomorrow.
tehehe, the things we wonder about eh
i am excited to do laundry.
i know this sounds sad to most, but any traveller knows what i mean. after one backpack for 10 days and wearing my pajama top on the last leg of our roadtrip today because of a lack of clean clothes, laundry is quickly rising to the top of the pirority list for tomorrow.
The road trip was awesome though, I wouldn't have traded that for any flight no matter how spacious. There were all the predictable problems of 4 day drives with 5 people and geared squeezed into a station wagon, but at the same time, the "getting to know" time was so great, and i really enjoyed it! Thanks Ange and Leigh, Stu and Stefan!
Conference was so great, Pinawa was a beautiful spot to have it and over the week I got a good chance to get to know a lot of the other workers from many of the other bases around canada, including some really great and encouraging kiwis, fijians, samoans and aussies. Had a good dose of south pacific pride, and recovered from the isolationist identity crisis i was having (mostly as a result of jetlag)
anwyays
it's bed time, i'm sure i'll have lot to type later
will post some pics from the road trip, and maybe a video or two if i can work out how lol
love ya
hill

So I am back on the beaten track.
In downtown Winnipeg to be precise.
Things here are great, the conference went really well. It was so good to meet people from so many other bases and get a bit of context from finding out about the work that is going on with other YWAM bases. Also, on a VERY good note was hanging out with the other kiwis and aussies that i got to meet there. was sooooo good to not feel so out numbered, and really swim in a bit of south pacific pride! alsocool was meeting a few of the fijian and samoan workers who really know how to party it up and laugh, A LOT
so yeah all in all it was a good time with a lot of encouraging teaching, socialising and relazing. We went rafting down a big river too and caught a turtle for the kids to play with and also managed to almost get a tan. between lots of cycling and kayaking and rafting i cirtainly did my excercise to attempt to compensate for the ridiculous amount of amazing good food they fed us!!!
it was good fun
anwyays
so we are now resting it up in YWAM Winnipeg for th night, relaxing and chilling out, and hopefully catching up tonight with a couple of the girls from my DTS.
then we are driving slowly back tomorrow to saskatoon, then the next day to calgary and then the day after that to vancouver. i'll have tuesday off to relax and get my room together, good too as jacqui will be back from salt lake city then too and we can organise our room together.
ok Heather and Dave jsut arrived!!!! have to go
love ya
will psot again later

so, conference is going really well, and I am enjoying getting to know a bunch of other YWAMers from all over Canada, as well as a couple of Kiwis, Samoans, Koreans, and just about everyone else from everywhere else. I didn't htink I'd be in much internet contact, but it's currently 1am, and after a pretty intense "woah, i have to write this idea down before i sleep" moment i am now so awake that i figured i would post again since the last one was a sad length of time ago.
It's been great to be back, had great "run and hug" moments with stefan and stuart and dan and some of the other familiar vancouver faces, and am looking forward to a few more when the winnipeg trio make the drive up here to hang out with us. Also,had a really great 5 hour hang out with my mate Dan who (worst timing of all!)flew out from England to spend a week in Vanocuver arriving saturday night, about 8 hours before i was due to leave for conference. so we hung out for 5 of those 8 hours, for once jet lag working in my favour, keeping me cheery and awake till well after 4am when i needed to pack and get ready to leave for the airport at 5!!!!!
My room in Vnacouver is pretty sweet, sharing with another girl from the base, Jacqui, and also sharing the flat with another baser, Pam. So yeah, back in a girls flat, and looking forward to good times ahead.
It's been super weird at conference, though good too, but have had a few moments (like, maybe 15!!!) where i'll be listening to something, freak out and think "woah i shouldn't be listening to that, i'm not staff, i'm only a student" then freak out again when yes I realise I am infact a staff member and will be for the next two years! YIPES
But all things considered, it's been great, i am unjetlaggged (almost) and keeping on keeping on.
love you all loads, email me and tell me good kiwi stories! i'm almost all out of brotown episodes, so need some real life kiwi news soon!!!
will post again next week, most likely with some legendary road trip stories after the mammoth drive home over the better part of three provinces! should anyone choose to check, we are driving from pinawa/winnipeg, manitoba, all the way back to Vancouver, british columbia. yeah baby!

So the day has come! (Sorry this is only for Aucklanders, unless anyone else is really really really keen!)
My buddy Caroline has come back from Canada, and I am going back to Canada,
aaaaannnnddddd, it is Caroline's 22nd birthday.
So...............................in honour of these wonderful
occaisions, we are having farewell/welcomeback/happy birthday drinks,
so we can all hang out, catch up, hug, party, chill out and see each
other, for the first time in ages, or for the last time for a while.
When: Tuesday 15 August 2006, 5pm and onwards (Caroline and I will
hang about, and you can all come and go as you please......)
Where: de Post Belgian pub, Mt Eden Village, opposite Circus circus
Come along for a little while, or the whole night, and bring LOTS of friends :D
Love you all muchly, and you better show up!

For everyone else not in Auckland, who can't make it to drinks, will post again super soon, but in the meantime i'm going to go watch the amazing race!

oh oh oh and good news, I GOT MY VISA LETTER TODAY! CANADA HERE I COME!

So it turns out that I am indeed a material girl in a material world.
Trying to organize this whole “moving to the other side of the world” debacle is turning into a huge headache, an expensive headache and mostly making me want to break things, throw things at travel agents or cry. Or maybe all three at once.
It’s so far taken me 2 website visits, 6 phone calls and 2 visits to work out what my baggage allowance is. Sad but true, it’s only 30 kgs! So my whole little New Zealand life is going to be summed up in one and a half bags (not two bags of equal weight, apparently one must be large and the other small) and the maximum weight allowed is 30 kgs. And call me a material girl if you like, but moving my whole me to Canada in 30 kgs of luggage? Yipes.
I suppose this will make me really strict with myself on the limits of crap I am allowed to bring, as well as very appreciative of every ounce that I do bring, that makes the cut. Sigh
I know I shouldn’t let stuff bug me, but I guess if I am not even able to begin coping with the big stuff, I might as well let the little things drive me crazy in the interim.
Church have planned a going away lunch for me after church next weekend, and this weekend I am roadtripping to Hamilton to pick up my friend Amy and her bf Luuk, so we can hang out for a bit before I go.
I can’t believe how busy this last 3 weeks is getting, and the emotional crusty roller coaster it is becoming. I watch my life happen at a barge pole distance today, shake my head, and weigh up the options of moving to Antarctica. Penguins are good company right Krista?

so yeah, it has been a while since I posted, and unfortunately I don't have the convenient excuse of having been abducted by aliens. However, I have been frantically busy and trying hard to get everything sorted out as I head into my second to last week or work, and third to last week in my beautiful New Zealand.
What the HECK! I know! three weeks today I'll be sleeping off the jetlag somewhere between Vancouver and Winnipeg and wondering why on earth I packed my bags the way I did.
It's very strange being in this "preparing" mode again, and also kinda difficult, but it is good, having a lot to look forward too and a lot of amazing and loving support from so many people for what I am going to be doing.
Support raising is going so well, God is amazing, and I now only have $400 left a month to be pledged for me to reach my target. Right now, the big prayer point would be my visa, which is still in processing in Sydney. So yeah, keep that in mind if you can, that would be sooooo appreciated.
so i'm frantically trying to keep raising support, seeing people, spending time with mum and dad, walking my dog, trying not to put on ALL the weight I lost in Canada again and get rid of all the stuff that I can't believe I stored for a year.
Oh ok, here's a cool thing. I got an amazing free hair cut on wednesday. Totally good, and when mymum drov eme to the appointment they gave her a free cut too. all in aid of polishing the new hairdresser and promoting the new salon. mmmmm, freeee
also ummmmmmm, what else also. not sure
so yeah, on that note, i hope that rachel, you are appeased and can take the tin foil off your head, and now I am going to go make some soup.
love ya
hill

So I’ll tell you something funny about my life here in NZ. My dog (chockie, short for Chocolate cuz she is like a Dalmatian but brown and white not black and white) is really really badly behaved. Last night we has roasted chicken for dinner, and when we went to bed, my dad had left the roasting pan on the stove to clean in the morning. The dog jumped up and pulled it down and licked all the oil, spilt some on the floor, licked that too, but worst of all hit the gas burner on with her paw, and since there is no ignition thing, the gas just started leaking out into the kitchen, so when we woke up the whole kitchen and living room was full of gas and smelt awful and my dad is walking about saying stuff like “nobody turn on any lights or strike any matches or we’ll all die”
So that was funny. And yet not.
What a drama eh
So, after a near death experience or two, what else has happened today
Not much
But I did promise more blogging, so there it is.
How is Canada today?
How is Norway today?
How is wherever you are today?

So, yeah I did decide to get with a new template. I tried a few, and I ended up on this one. I don't really like this one as much either, but none of them seem particularly great.
I'm going to test this one and see how it goes, gimme some feedback?
Okay, so amazingness of amazingness. I broke the $1000 mark today!!!! YEAH BABY! THANK YOU GOD!
It's crazy ridiculous and schweeeeeeeeeeeeeet that this much support has happened, I'm not even sure how it all happened, and now I am reeling with writing thank you letters and otehr random follow up.
wow
am looking for a laptop still, so keep me posted if anyone hears of any nice laptops going for cheap. if all else fails, i'm goign to wait til the last minute and buy a Dell dealio, but i'd like to save as much as i can now.
Short post today, I'll think of other things to post tomorrow
Lots of love
hill

So it’s kinda cool being able to read up on my blog stats and see who is reading from where. Ok so I can’t really tell who, but I can see what countries people are reading in. Who do I know in Norway? I don’t know. Norway reader, I welcome a comment to say hi 
Well actually I welcome comments from everyone who reads my blog. Say hi, make a joke, tell me a story. Comment eh?
So what is actually going on here in lil’ old New Zealand?
Not much really. I’m at work right now, it’s a little on the slow side to be honest. There is an air of Friday afternoonitis, even though it’s only Friday morning. I’ve been as productive as I can so far, but now there is really nothing left to do.
Speaking of lil’ old New Zealand though, I read a great book called “The land of two halves” Gavin actually recommended it to me and it’s a good read for all you canucks and other non Kiwis, to get a bit of a handle on how amusing and lovely my country really is. And it’s written by an ex-jouranlist/columnist so it’s really very good. How’s this for excellent: “…the ladies in the street in their tartan skirts, wearing shoes so sensible they’d go to church on their own….” brilliant
So I got the opportunity to share at Lou’s church yesterday. It was really awesome, there was a kind of missions focus, and two missionaries who know my friend’s Kristina and John in Sudan were speaking about the work they are doing in Madagascar. Very cool, and great to meet more missionaries and hear stories and pray together. Got some cool words when we were all praying together at the end, and was generally a really encouraging night. Have loved going along to ‘Base’ and I really like how outward focused they are as a group and yet also how close they are as friends and church family. Been very good to be around with how isolating this whole “re-entry” thing has been.
I have been listening to a very cool CD Lou lent me yesterday, Jose Gonzalez. Now apparently he is very popular and amazing and his songs are already being used as advertising soundtracks, but I had never heard him before. The verdict? Sweeeeeeeeet.
It’s funny, I’m going to the travel agent tomorrow to pay a big huge chunk of my airline ticket, which will probably break the bank for the next two weeks until the next pay day, but will be a very encouraging step on the way to get me back to Vancouver. It’s strange, take off day is only 5 weeks away today. Too fast. I feel like I’ve kinda skimmed in, not really landing or sinking or even getting into life here properly and now I’m taking off again.
Very cool though on the GOING BACK front, is that I have somewhere to stay all sorted out. I’ll be sharing a flat with Jacqui and Pam, both staffers at the base, and it’s going to be sweeeeeeet. YAY! God is Good!
Support raising is going alright, though I’d appreciate continued prayers as I keep making follow up calls and emails. Still another $600 monthly support to go.
Very cool thing is that I have got a bike to bring back now. Free, and even though it’s been left in the rain a few times and not used for a while, it’s in great condition and with some oil, cleaning and time with Dad and I it should be in good working order to bring back to Van! YAY!
Next on the list is that I need to find a good, yet affordable laptop to take with me. Dell has been having some sales, but still a bit too much. Anyone getting rid of a good laptop anytime soon?
So yeah, anyways, back to work, Jose, a bit of Johnny Cash, and then hopefully some chillaxing and a surprise birthday party planning session.
Oh and for those of you who knew about the ball that was going to be happening on 22nd or 29th of July (depending on who you heard from) it’s unfortunately been cancelled due to umm, ‘artistic differences’. Thanks for the support of everyone who said they would be involved, but yeah, it won’t be going ahead.
Ok, lots of love and hugs
Hill
PS: HAPPY BIRTHDAY EILEEN
PPS: HAPPY BIRTHDAY GAVIN
PPPS: HAPPY BIRTHDAY JOY

so i learned the deaf equivalent of the 'slow clap' tonight.
You know that moment when someone is umming and ahhing about whether or not they will perform on stage and the audience gets that laughing slow clap going and then speed up and bust out in applause? yeah the deaf version. soooo coool. it starts with putting your arms up in the air and then down and then up again in the same rhythm you would with the slow clap. and then you stomp your feet on the floor, slow at first then faster and faster and faster like you do on bleachers at a sports game, because they can feel the vibrations through the floor.
soooooooo fun
it was basically an amazing awesome night. I went with Margaret (my amte nic's mum) to watch the Storyfest 2006. IT's an annual signlanguage competition, where people come together to see who can tell the best sign language story. It was sooo funny, and sooooooooooooooo amazingly good to get back into sign language and deaf culture again. In the intermission, I also managed to catch up with my old NZSL teacher Sonia, and we had an awesome talk catching up on everything that has been going on. She doesn't know this yet, but hopefully i will be able to have a few coffees with her to pick up some of the basics of American Sign before I come back to Vancouver.
Soooo exciting. This is the biggest natural high, soooo much better than TV! and coming from me who just spent 4 hours NOT TALKING, that's pretty sweet, and yet a dramatic turn of events.
Had a bit of a crazy God thing last night. Went along to my mate Lou's church and some stuff was goin on, and have come away feeling kinda overwhelmed, but with a lot to think about.
On an amazing note, my support has just broken the $900 mark!!!!! God is good!
And if any of you reading would like a support pack, and a groovy magnet you just let me know. KEep up the praying!
I'm getting my eyes checked tomorrow. another irony about working at the foundation of the blind and being obsessed with sign language. but yeah, we'll see how it goes. new glasses woudl not be a great thing to have to buy now, but better that than not seeing right.
So yeah, it's been an amazingly wonderful night.
And now i'm gonig to bed
love you lots
email me you crazy cats
hill

So Happy Canada day my dears. For yesterday here, but I know that it's still Canada day in there!
I can't even believe it that this time last year I was sick, in a pub and then watching the Lions game at the Soho in Vancouver!
What the heck.
So it's been an amazingly lovely day in Auckland today. I like that midwinter Auckland is sky blue clear skies and a light breeze and no clouds! I decided I don't have nearly enough pictures of this beautiful city and I'm gong to be back in Vancouver even before I know it, so I better remedy the situation.
Alastair and I drove all round with a chair, and a NZ teddy bear that for all those BroTown fans out there we have named Sione! He (of course) will be coming back to Vancouver with me, and therefore so will a nice little bit of nesian goodness.
Speaking of that, does anyone have a copy of Nesianmistik's first albumt hat I could borrow?
I wanted to let you know too that the fundraising ball is going ahead.
Saturday 29th of July, 8pm, at the Homestead in henderson (wow how many people reading this still know what that means?!) everyone is welcome, $25 a head, it's going to be a great night, email me for tickets as soon as possible!
Ok tha'ts all for now
I miss you all very much you Canadians and I am looking forward to hanging out with all you Kiwis in the next 6 weeks. And 6 weeks will have to be it because I booked my tickets today! flying into Vancouver at 6pm on Friday August 18th! Jill's birthday! can't even handle how exciting this all is. crazy go nuts.
And everyone from everywhere else? We definately have to party soon.
Poker night and pineapple lumps and pilsener pacific? we are way overdue for a renunion, you know who you are! :D
ok night night all
have a good week at work
love, hill

So today is Helen Keller day. It was her birthday today and is now a day in New Zealand (and maybe everywhere else too?)
used to promote deaf/blind awareness. i know this because I am working at the Royal New Zealand
Foundation fo the Blind and today they had a birthday cake and balloons for that exact reason.
And you know what else I found out today? There are apporximately 1500 deafblind New Zealanders at the moment.
What the heck. And an estimated 3600 deafblind Canadians.
What the Heck.
Touch is the primary source of communication for people who are deafblind, and they
have programmes set up to teach deafblind children the same way Helen Keller was taught,
using a manual touch alphabet and language and braille. There are also tools like telletalkers where someone can type in words and then
a temporary braille strip is produced for the deafblind person to read. again i say, what the heck.
how inspiring that people live, learn, work and study all through touch.
wow. how am i not more grateful for my hearing and sight!?
So now, I am practising the deaf/blind alphabet. very similar to New Zealand sign language alphabet, in terms of the shapes and
movements that are made,
but different becuase where for the deaf it's visual using 2 hands, both the "speaker's", it uses two hands, one of the "speaker"
making shapes on the palm and fingers of the "listener"
amazing
So yeah, I am really learning a lot at this job, it's kinda fun being the perceived "font of all knowledge"
that people ask for "Information and Advice" when they ring or visit the foundation. tehehe
I just kinda do my thing and it seems to be going alright.
Had lunch with two girls that I used to teach drama to when I was in high school, one of whom is now dating
my little brother Alec (not so little, he's living in Japan right now studying Japanese!) Very cool.
Good kebabs too. though pretty messy.
So am listening to a lot of country/pop kinda music at the moment. Cheesy I know, but it's like my
Vancouver soundtrack. Keeps it all fresh while I sit here and type at work.
Have a bunch of pictures on my wall here too, so Auckland gets to see a bit
of Vancouver and many of you.
My goal is to have pics of just about everyone i know with me when I am back in Vancouver. I like having pictures with
me as most of you know, and so far the collection is pretty good. I took all my stuff out of
storage and those boards of pictures that i had up at my 21st/goodbye party
are still in good nic and are definately coming with back to Vancovuer in the bottom of my suitcase!
Hmmmm, what to do now.
It's a slow day.
It was really cold this morning, so I was wearing two sets of arm warmers, one on top of the other
Nerdy yes, but also warm! and who can hate black and grey stripey arm warmers.mmmmmmmmmmmmmm
It was so cold last night there was actually a frost and my windscreen needed hot water to be poured on it to thaw
it out
I'm serious Canadians, STOP LAUGHING
tehehe
Funny bad moment of the day was when i was talking about seraching our database for details and
excluding deceased members from the search. My boss turned around and asked me if "i knew how to
bring up the deceased if necessary" . ouch.
I have curly hair at the moment. Makes a nice change. I might get this done permanently. can I do that
without it looking like some kind of crazy eighties disaster area? it's not really curly it's just loose wavey and not poker straight like
my hair normally is.
so who in vancouver is reading my blog? i really want to know the website and the name of the programme
that leigh and ange downloaded to help them learn languages. apparently it was a free one that they
downloaded off the internet. can anyone help me out with that? Ryan? Jaqcs? Need to start working on my Cantonese
whiel I am still around my mum so she can help me practise.
so yeah anwyays
that's all for today folks
Happy Birthday Helen Keller

So my darlings, New Zealand is even as we speak preparing for "the coldest night of winter yet..." I'm not even kidding, and, Canadians please contain your laughter and superior smirking, it's expected to drop to a frigid low of two degrees. centigrade. there will be frost. and up to a foot of snow in some places.
sigh
so how is the true north? i dunno, i'm here in the true south!
But life in the true south is good. i had my first official day of real work, having real responsibility of the "advice and information line". it was good, though i needed my lunch break for sure. was a good one too, as i met up with darragh and orla, gavin's brother and sister who are here for a visit. it's been fun hanging out with them, will post pics from our driving tour of auckland by night here as soon as orla emails them to me!
otherwise it's slow going here, things are just keeping on keeping on.
enjoying it, and excited for the future, and watching dvds lol.
good recommendation this week, goes to de post belgian pub on mt eden road. mmmmm, good feeds belgian beer and chill out place when it's raining and storming.
am tired. it's late. it's bed time.
will post again soon
have a lot more to say, well kind of, but it'll all keep
i miss you
i love you
and i'll write soon
hill

So here goes.....
LETS GO ALL BLACKS LETS GO! 27-17 YEAH BABY!!!!
So in the midst of a driving rain and some nice black sky and clouds, we got to be drenched for the sake of a SWEET game of rugby, ALLBLACKS vs. IRELAND. And lucky me, I got shouted my ticket by Gavin's big brother Darragh, and ended up doing my absolute best to out shout him, their sister Orla, and their English friend Vicki. But, it was totally worth the sore throats and the drenching, because we took it out in the second half for a good 10 point win. Lots of Irish were there, and it was great to have some good kiwi experience and cheering and have an allround good night. I tell you, when the Rugby World Cup is on, I will be glued to a screen in a pub somewhere in Vancouver, the haka still brings shivers down my spine!!!
Life here is going alright, it's good settling into my new job, I am now the "Information and Advice officer" at the RNZFB, and it's been going really well, Monday is my first day of having total free reign of the desk, so yeah 0800 callers be prepared!
Support raising is going well, the Pizza magnet has so far been a hit, all of them are gone, the other ones are moving much slower! but more pizza ones will be printed by monday so it's all good.
Mum and Adeline are watching Troy, terrible movie, but seriously (and i know it's tacky and superficial) but between Bradd Pitt, Eric Bana, and Sean Bean, it is a seriously good looking cast :)
Anyways, it's strange to think that if all goes well I will be back in Vancouver in less than 9 weeks. It seems pretty crazy actually, but at the same time I am excited. Am stocking up on Kiwiana to take back too, maybe not too much, but definately an All Blacks flag to add to the Kiwi one I have in storage there in Jacqui's living room.
Okay,
bed and warm dry snuggly pajamas are calling.
Love you lots and lots
hill

Yeah, like I said, which one do you think this is in my mum's opinion?

So I should clarify.
When I said I thought Queen's birthday happened while I was in Vancouver, I meant Queen Elizabeth IIs actual birthday. Like, for real, happy birthday to her!
Just to clarify :)
So had my first day of work today. Was alright, and it was exciting really feeling how this is the first step back to Vancouver and missions and YWAM and all that good stuff (aye layne?) It's pretty chilled out work and pretty straight forward and it looks like i have a lot of fun cool people to work with.
Have finished my magnets, have 2 designs, to give people options (my mum refers to them as the one for my friends and the one for normal people! lol)
But have attached a sneak preview of one of them (guess which one it is!) just for a laugh.
I'm so sad for the Oilers. I kept tabs while I was at work but missed the third period *sigh*
it can only get better though!
Anyways, dinner time shortly, so will sign off.
Love you lots and lots
hillbo

So, am watching the West Wing, season three, on DVD with my mum.
Was supposed to be designing my "pray for me" fridge magnets, but my lovely camera ran out of batteries as i was loading pics so i guess it will have to wait til tomorrow.
Things are going alright, it's been pretty tough being home to be honest, good to be with friends and family, but with more than enough stressful moments with the same.
Am speaking at church on sunday to give the big update, story sharing, support raising, picture showing thing, so here's hoping it goes well, all prayer much appreciated.
Tomorrow is a public holiday and I was a little weirded out to realise that I not only didn't remember that when i came home, but then when informed that it was a long weekend I couldn't remember why. Queen's birthday apparently, but i'm sure that happened while i was in Vancouver. But then again if she's queen she's allowed to have more than one birthday i guess. plus as queen that would mean more than one pretty cool parties whenever you want.
Ok so i'm a bit tired.
I miss Vancouver, I love Auckland, but Vancouver.......
I start full time work on Tuesday, at the Royal NZ Foudation of the Blind working on a short term contract, and have applied for another job doing two nights and a weekend shift, so we'll see how that goes. mostly going for that one to pay for the gas/bus to get to the main one! but we'll see.
Support raising is going ok too, thank you so much for the support and prayers that are happening on my behalf.
I miss so many of you so much, you know who you are.
Oh and before I go......
GO OILERS
tehehe
even if i am the only one in NZ cheering for them!

So I'm back in New Zealand.
Thanks for everything everyone, both in Canada and here.
I will reply to emails asap, but for now, just wanted to blog and let you know I am safe and sound and home.
Flew from Van to LA and arrived at 9, to wander around downtown LA for the majority of the day, exploring taking pictures and generally being touristy.
Got on the plane to Auckland at 9pm, and slept for the majority, and 12 hours later (43 minutes from sweet NZ) we got diverted to Fiji, because all the airports in NZ were closed from fog.
7 hours later though, to blue skies and a barmy 16 degrees, I set foot in Auckland International Airport again.
Lou and Sara and Alex braved the airport at 5, but then left for church when they found out about the plane, but Lou came back and was there with my parents and with my dear Alastair who didn't know about the plane had waited it out for the whole 7 hours in the airport! What a trooper.
So yeah, not much else to say yet, I'm dizzy (literally) and keeping awake til 10 even if it kills me and am super super excited that the oilers won the western conference even though I wasn't there to cheer.
I love you and miss you Canada and Canadians, and I am glad to be home and seeing you all soon Kiwis.
Will blog more later
and email too
lots of love
h

so bearing my last ration of Tim Hortons (sesame seed bagel, toasted and a candian maple donut) all stored safely in my carryon for my 11 hour lay over in Los Angeles airport, I am sitting at the internet terminal in Vancouver international using my last canadian loonie to blog for the last time for a little while in beautiful Vancouver. The sun has just come out (through some rather appropriate grey clouds and drizzle) and my coffee from the 24 hour place that Rachel knows en route to the airport is just kicking in.
Have been up for 24 hours so far, and am due to fly in 51 minutes to LA aboard the lovely Air Canada. Thankfully my two gigantor bags didn't get weighed and got checked straight through so I can pray and then wait to pick them up in Auckland without a worry. She'll be right, right?
It's bitter sweet to leave, to be so excited I can't sit still that I am coming home and then so sad I'm teary eyed (though i guess i could blame the caffiene) that I am leaving this home. Have had too many teary hugs and goodbyes in the last 4 weeks staggering it all out as I floated from house to house and person to person, and yet am excited that in the next few days there are certain to be some teary reunions.
It was so strange packing stuff up, dividing things into the "need, take back to NZ" and "it'll keep, store in Vancouver". Having 2 dressers, one filled with stuff and a box of clothes in storage on the other side of the world is just the first nervewracking step to a two year commitment I am both excited and jittery to make. But here's to obeying and waiting and praying and hoping.
I miss Vancouver and Canada already, but can't wait to see home sweet home.
Ok, my loonie is officially done.
See you on the flip side

So the whirlwind is drawing to a close.
It's been amazing, but it's getting time to go home. I think I'm actually ready for it this time.
Chicago was amazing fun, and I arrived in Toronto on Sunday night. The plane was fine, the airport was slow, but it was great to see Caroline at the airport and hang out at her place over late night pizza and wings and catch up with the Oilers winning the second game of the series in the background!!! :)
It's a beautiful day in Toronto and I am chilling out taking it slow exploring around and going to meet up with Will for lunch/coffee shortly while Caroline is at work. Yesterday was a public holiday (Queen Victoria's birthday?) and we joined a day tour out to Niagara falls. Between the water, the ice wine tour, the lights and the road trip, it was a really really great day.
It was strange flying over Toronto and Lake Ontario and seeing the beauty of it all as the sun went down. Then within 24 hours to see the majesty of Niagara falls and just be struck with how awesome God is.
I had the Chris Tomlin song 'Indescribable' in my head the whole time and couple of times just couldn't hold it in, thanking God for this amazing world and that I got to stand there and just soak in it. (no pun intended given it's a waterfall!)
but yeah, pretty amazing stuff.
Will be back in Vancouver on Wednesday night and then on the plan pretty much all day Friday and Saturday to arrive in Auckland at 5am on Sunday 28th. Crazy go nuts to be sure, but it's going to be awesome.
Pineapple lumps and rugby here I come
I miss Canada already!



'Indescribable' - Chris Tomlin

From the highest of heights to the depths of the sea
Creation's revealing Your majesty
From the colors of fall to the fragrance of spring
Every creature unique in the song that it sings
All exclaiming

Indescribable, uncontainable,
You placed the stars in the sky and You know them by name.
You are amazing God
All powerful, untameable,
Awestruck we fall to our knees as we humbly proclaim
You are amazing God

Who has told every lightning bolt where it should go
Or seen heavenly storehouses laden with snow
Who imagined the sun and gives source to its light
Yet conceals it to bring us the coolness of night
None can fathom

Indescribable, uncontainable,
You placed the stars in the sky and You know them by name
You are amazing God
All powerful, untameable,
Awestruck we fall to our knees as we humbly proclaim
You are amazing God
You are amazing God

Indescribable, uncontainable,
You placed the stars in the sky and You know them by name.
You are amazing God

All powerful, untameable,
Awestruck we fall to our knees as we humbly proclaim
You are amazing God

Indescribable, uncontainable,
You placed the stars in the sky and You know them by name.
You are amazing God

Inconquerable, unchangeable
You see the depths of my heart and You love me the same
You are amazing God
You are amazing God

Anyone wanna buy me an Apple G4 laptop? :)

So I typed up a legendary, entertaining, insightful, witty blog entry yesterday and then Adam's computer deleted it. grrrr.
So here goes again
Things are really good here, it's been a bit of a non-stop whirlwind but it's been pretty awesome.
We left Winnipeg on Sunday night and made the drive east to Kenora to visit Matt's house for some late night movie watching, boating on the lake goodness before Jessa, Adam, Josh and I roadtripped it down to Minnesota on Monday night.
I'm amused to say that I entered the United States of America wearing socks, flipflops and my pajama pants! (who does a 8 hour road trip wearing jeans!)
But yeah, it was super fun, and good arriving in Minnesota.
Minneapolkis was beautiul and we had fun driving around and exploring the zoo, Laura's work (mmm icecream) and the Uptown area. Laura's place is so beatiful and relaxing, and it was so fun to meet her family and hang out with her and Krista and Joel again. Also compelte with a Adam/Laura/Hill morocco reunion making couscous for everyone's lunch on wednesday.
Josh Adam and I headed south and east on wednesday night for Chicago area, and yesterday was the all out American experience day. Adam and I hit Chicago for the Cubs vs. Washington game, complete with hotdogs, soft salty pretzels (bleh), and a souvenir Chicago cubs blanket. We even managed to get photographed twice by the fanfotos guys, so you can check us out on www.cubs.com/fanfoto and select the "Thursday 18 May" game and then we are the first pic on Gallery 11 and then about halfway down the page on Gallery 33.
It was fun, though a bit on the windy side, and sadly the Cubs lost. But we still cheered and shouted and sang "Take me out to the ballgame" during the 7th inning stretch.
We completed the day by walking up and down Michigan ave, eating Chicago style stuffed pizza (heart attack but sooooooooo good, best pizza ever) and stopping by the cheesecake factory, the Hershey store, Ghiradellis and then to the coolest Apple Mac store EVER, where we took the following pics :)
Basically I think Chicago is about regaining the 50 pounds I thought I had successfully lost inthe last 18 months! tehehe jk, but I don't htink I'm cut out for life as an American. I'll see you soon Commercial drive dollar grocery SALAD!
Can't even believe I'll be back in NZ in 11 days. Not even computing yet. Excited but crazy all at the same time.
Am loving it here and will be flying out on Sunday night to Toronto to see Caroline, Will and Jenny and then back to Van and back home. Not sure where the next post will be from, but will be sure to include highlight pics of all the different stops along this crazy adventure month.
Hopefully a bunch from Chicago Chinatown too, the 2nd biggest in North America I think.
Ok, that's all from me today
Going back to enjoy some sun and EXCERCISE in the yard.
Love and sausage patties
hill

So this has been a crazy crazy whirlwind trip, but it's only just beginning.
I am writing from Laura's kitchen in Minnesota, and this is one of the most beutiful houses i have ever been in. It's right on one of Minnesota's 10,000 something lakes and there are birds and trees and beauty everywhere. It's amazing and I'm so sad to leave here tonight. We had a nice day yesterday with beautiful weather, exporing the minnesota zoo, the uptown area where laura works and hanging out with Jessa for the last time. Very sad, goodbyes suck. Doing them staggered like this is a much better idea, until I am onthe plane by myself and then...doh! But then I'll be excited about coming home, so it will only be 13 hours of stress before it's all good again.
Am very excited about Chicago, Adam and I are going to party it up, and our first thing is a Chicago Cubs basebal game. sooooo cool.
But one thing I noticed, being here in the USA, I miss Canada! IT feels different here and they sell guns and ammo off the self in Wallmart.
But yeah, life is keeping on keeping on.
Will write again soon
Love, hill

So apparently you have to change some setting on your laptop so that other people can actually post comments. tehehe
oh well.
so it's been a crazy weekend. It still is, but we are sadly drawing to the close of it.
We arrived in Winnipeg at 9.15 on Friday morning and it was totally crazy, I think we were the three most excited people to ever land in winnipeg. We got totally laughed at but it was worth it! we did the whole yellin and screaming and shouting and run and hug and had so much fun hooning around. It's been sooooo good to see everyone and hang out and hug and just catchup on life. The whirlwind "tournado" has begun.
It's pretty amazing too, 13 out of 24 students made it here for the weekend, and Dave and HEathr managed to make it down fo our picnic and bbq yesterday. So good to see everyone.
Today we leave for Ontario, We are going to spend the night and tomorrow at Matt's house in Kenora, and then Jessa, Josh, Adam and I road trip it down to Minnesota, and then the tour goes on. It's crazy exciting to think this is all happening and then I am going home! Back to good old kiwiland. I already have 2 standing orders for shipments of pineapple lumps, and I am so excited to see you all.
Will post pics when my feet hit the ground again
Love and pickles
Hillary

So yeah, I'm officially old.
It's weird, but 22 doesn't feel too much different to 21.
Actually who am I kidding. It's super weird.
It's been fun though, have so far spent the day chillaxing with Amy and Kate (Jill's 5 and 11 year old sisters) who each gave me a beautiful hand made birthday card and then proceeeded to decorate the house with balloons and streamers for me with Neal (14 yo bro) help :)
Very cool.
It's been so awesome staying here, their family is so cool and hospitable. Have really enjoyed it, but at the same time am soooooo excited to be going on to winnipeg tomorrow for the birthdya party to end all birthdya parties. and then on to all the other cool places i get to go. not to mention my beautiful new zealand, in practically no time at all.
Sigh
It's all good
Am going to cruise again, will take a bunch more pics and post some fun ones like Krista attacking logs, Andrew and I Tim Tam slamming, and Jill and I doing facials.
Love you loads
Happy Birthday to me :)
Hillary

so apparetnly it turns out that i am a bit behind in blogging funny stories of the weirdness that has insued since arriving in the fair prvoince of alberta. so by popular demand:

While i was still staying at krista's, andrew came up to hang out with us.
friday night: ended up painting our faces (andrew and i) blue and white. not sure why. maybe cuz their oilers colours! Go Oilers! but then i had an allergice reaction to the paint and had to take it off. andrew however left it on all night when we went bowling in witaskiwin with jill. crazy go nuts.
satuday: the chair escapade.
so we take 3 deck chairs in the trunk of krista's car and drive around the lacombe county for oh 4 hours or so taking pictures and videos of us, sitting, standing, attacking logs, hunting seagulls, all from the comfort of our deckchairs.
yeah, i know, it's hard to believe isn't it. but don't worry, the dvd will soon be back in stock.......
and last night?
well last night involved a lot of driving, the use of at least one adjustable wrench, a bit of coffee and a couple of smokey bars.
it's been a cowboy country alberta extravaganza.
pictures will follow soon
love you lots
hillary

So a new province altogether, Alberta has been pretty trippy
I've been loving it, though right now am fairly exhausted.
It's been a bit of a whirlwind, arriving in calgary to meet up with Krista and her sister in law as we got off the plane and it was pretty awesome to drive around and get a good view of the place. We went to a kind of Calgary legend, a drive in burger place called "Peter's drivein" it's pretty much a long standing calgary institution that could freeze the arteries of something whose arteries could not be frozen. Ok so that didnt' make much sense but what i guess i mean is that although the burger was not bad, I was already feeling queezy from the horrendously bumpy landing, and now felt worse. lol
on that note though, bumpy landing aside, 10 points to westjet for being a super cool and pretty awesome airline.
so anyways
Yeah, so Alberta is pretty awesome. And pretty flat. And also pretty, well for lack of a better word, pretty. Krasta and I mostly chilled out and soon realiesd that we were ER twins sepertaed cruely and harshly from birth. In the short 4 days that i was there we managed to catch up on half a season of ER while milking cows and moving stock and even watching a calf being born (though 'pulled' apparently is the term of choice. eeeeeew)
it was pretty cool being able to do a bunch of farm stuff and hang out with Krista and her family so yeah, thanks Prins family that was cool.
Also, my favourite cow - Laura this is for you - is cow 89. And my favourite calf is 'Stubby face' Calf number 29something. :)
so now i am at jill's house whihc is near edmonton/le duc/witaskiwin/and camrose. which is albertan speak for we are about half an hour from anywhere :) my whole perspective of distance and driving has changed now


ok so i wrote most of that ummm, about 5 days ago.
things are really great, Jill's family are all amazing and awesome and I've had such a good time here just hanging out and relaxing and learning about homeschooling and planting gardens and playing a lot of tictactoe and speed and slaps with her little sisters as well as some serious olympic worthy trampolining with the aid of the sprinkler :) weather here has been cool and crazy with snow and 21 degree sunny days all in the same week. and they call auckland changeable!
so yeah, it's been awesome and i will post again soon when i can think of other things to add.

oh and my book plug for today (well for htis year it's so good)
Philip Yancey's book "Soul Survivor" I finially finished this book and it really is super awesome, highlight chapters for me were about Henri Nouwen and Frederick Buechner

Love you lots like Jelly Tots
Hillary

So i've realised that basically all my posts start with the word "so...."
thigns are gonig well here, though things really have reached the crazy crazy point.
i have finally packed up all my stuff ans shipped it off to jacqui and nancy's place to store whil ei am away travelling around canada
i am soooooo excited i can't even really believe it.
every other day i think i kind of wake up and think "hang on where am i again? is this relaly real?"
i know that sounds silly but it is kinda freaky packing up again after so long to really be really truly packing up to go back to the otehr side of the world, even if only for a super short time.
but even that is crazy strange.
sigh
well anyways
this has to kind of be a short post as i am out of minutes in the net cafe, but yeah, things are keeping on keeping on and the next post will undoubtably be from ALBERTA somewher! YEAH BABY YEAH!!! (ok that was for all you old school balmoralites)
love you lots
hill

So I brought a plate of lamingtons to work today and everyone was pretty stoked about that.
It’s hard to believe this I really my last day of work in Vancouver.
It’s going well so far and everyone is happy because we started out the day with a plate of Lamingtons that I brought after last night’s baking frenzy.
Made a whole lot of lamingtons
A whole lot.

-Tape is rewinding-

It’s strange to think that it’s all going to be done soon. But at the same time, the countdown is as follows:
-5 days to Alberta and Krista
-8 days to Jill
-20 days to my birthday!!!!!!!!
-21 days to Winnipeg!!!!!!!!!!!
-45 days to AUCKLAND

Ok tape is done rewinding

-Next tape is rewinding-

Ok so got distracted in that break talking.

-Next tape is again rewinding-
Lunch is in 15 minutes. The ladies I work with are taking me out to Chinese food. Mmmmmmmm
Tonight am hanging out with Jacqui and Ryan and not sure what we are doing yet, just general hanging out I figure.
Had a really good laugh today at the “Numa numa dance” (thanks Jason!) and also a couple of the non-crude, hilarious pranks on ebaumsworld. Will post the links another time I guess. Sooooo funny.

Tape is ready
Two words
Lunch break
Two more words
Baskin Robbins…………

Back to work!

-tape rewinding-
Feeling pretty full. Chinese food and Baskin Robbins. But only once is alright, right?
Put it this way though, am walking the LONG way home.

Falling asleep actually
Yawn
Ok, so this is funny:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5349997277616358646 yeah baby. Napoleon.
www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/206373 numa numa man, the legend himself.
www.flashplayer.com/music/napoleonnumadance.html Napoleon meets Numa numa, baby yeah!

-ok this is serious now-
this is my last hour of work in Canada
woah

And now it’s done.
Post again soon, probably from an net café or Alberta.
Lots of love
hill

So it’s morning
On my second to last day of work
I am going to blog as I go I think, typing between typing while I rewind tapes and such
Tape is rewinding
ok, so I am leaving Vancouver really really soon
I can’t quite process that right now
It’s been a super crazy go nuts last few weeks and I have been loving it, but at the same time a little part of me is waiting for the dust to settle.
I spent Easter weekend on Vancouver Island staying with Layne and her family. That was pretty awesome. The island is beautiful, and her family were super welcoming and cool. Will post a pick of me with them at some point. Also, her dad took us 4x4ing in their Jeep up whatever mountain it is that is near their house in Qualicum and even though I thought we were going to wipe out a couple of times it was really good. It was pretty bad weather with lots of snow and cloud, but it was gorgeous, like driving in Narnia, and I (finally!) got to do a decent snow angel in Canada! Very cool, we even took a video of the momentous event, before having numerous snowball fights and building a snowman. We called him George.
This last week of work has been cool too, everyone being super nice and hopefully will be able to keep in contact with a couple of them. They have been shouting me Starbucks on a regular basis too, so this week I have already (after only 2 ½ days of work) consumed two Grande triple shot non-fat caramel macchiatos. So much for letting go of my caffeine dependency.
Am looking at buying a laptop for when I move back to Van. Any suggestions? Or anyone looking at getting rid of their good laptop? Have been browsing the Dick Smith website, but not really sure yet.
Ok, next tape is ready to go.
-later-
Ok. Had laksa ayam for lunch. That was an excellent idea. And tomorrow am being bought lunch by the other people in my department as a thankyou/going away pressie after my six weeks or so here. Very nice of them indeed. Chinese food I think
-later-
Have found this excellent yoghurt. Whipped key lime flavour yoghurt. Just like eating mousse. Good.
-later still-
Wow that’s a whole lot of food talk there.

Actually, a bit more on food. Am making lamingtons and Anzac biscuits this week. A salute to kiwis and aussies everywhere. I don’t even like lamingtons really. But I figured they would be fun to make. Will take pictures….

Am also making dumplings tonight. Not wontons, they don’t’ have any good wonton skins on sale here. So dumplings it is. Mmmmmmmmmmmm

Ok next tape is ready.
Ok tape is not actually ready, I hit fast forward instead of rewind. Doh.

BTW! Does anyone have any good and yummy recipes that do not include ANY of the following:
-Dairy products
-Eggs
-Nuts
-Soy

Email me them alright?
Or put them in the comment thing
Or something

Ok (finally) it is home time.

love you all muchly and long time
hill

So yeah
Life can be complex
Life is complex
Oh well
At work so can't post in any detail, just thought I'd post these, cuz they made me smile.
I know I thought(think?) about this stuff
Will try and post again in my afternoon tea break
love you lots
hill

Countdown:
6 days til Alberta
21 days til Winnipeg
39 days til AUCKLAND!

So the days are ticking slowly down until I leave Vancouver. I feel like I'm starting to get serpeartion anxiety, scared to leave, scared of when I will come back, and then at the samet ime my other personality is happy that I am going home and soooooo excited. Lots to think about as life seems to be progressing and the "one step at a time" obedience feels like the steps are getting bigger or maybe they jsut seem like that cuz I feel so little.
Picked up my ticket home yesterday and that made it all very real, flying from Vancouve r at 5am to go to LA for the day (yeah baby a whole tourist day!) and then arriving in auckland 5am on the 28th.
weirdness of weird crazy nuts.
Speaking of nuts, have been snacking (healthily) on soynuts and sunflower seeds. Feel a bit like a bird or a squirrel, but it's all good.
Ok typing calls, at least I have James Blunt, Dave Dobbyn, OMC and Crowded house to give me a good soundtrack in the background.
Love and cous cous
Hillary



Santos and I in Essaouira


Us playing music and singing worship on the beach


Couscous night in Essaouira with Kadijah, who taught me to make it


Lori, Adam and I in our Jelabas in our living room in Essaouira


The icecream shop workers that we made friends with. The girl in the middle and I laughed for about 20 minutes, eneither able to udnerstand the othe and all totally confused and then laughing all the more because of it :)

so this week we are having couscous night.
While we were in Morocco, I learned from Kadijah, the maid where we wre staying, how to make genuine Moroccan couscous. So much fun.
So tomorrow night we are havnig a couscous night were we will all hang out, sit on the floor and eat couscous out of a big communal plate. hmmm
so anyways
the hockey yesterday was so fun, i was grinning like an idiot for most of it and so excited (Frank took me to the Canucks vs. Mighty Ducks for my birthday)
Sadly we lost 4-2 but it was still fun being inthe loud crazy beer drenched hockey atmosphere.
Am starting to clean up my stuff and sort out what is coming home with me, what is staying ehre in storage and what is getting given away as I leave vancouver in just under three weeks!?!?!? crazy go nuts
and, most exciting of all, my birthday is in one month today!!!! wooo hoooo, winnipeg mass birthday party here I come!!!!

here's 5 more pics for y'all, morocco ones this time
love you lots
hill


Laura, Dong Woo and I trying on our jelabas and Berber headgear for life in the Moroccan dessert (ok ok a shop in Marrakech)

Laura and I having lunch (carefully so as not to ruin our henna) in Marrakech. Tagine and couscous.....mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm


Hannan and I at the orphange, she really liked my toque/beanie :)



Dong Woo drinking Mint Tea, in style


Laura and I getting our henna done. I'm smiling, but IT BURNS!

So I am still working typing for 7 hours a day, which is a little on the dull side, but good work with good hours and $$ so no complaints from me.
I am on my lunch break so I am going to make this quick, but will be posting some pictures now that I finally have got the disks of Morocco and Scotland pictures sorted out!. Today we'll start with Arbroath.

Also, for those of you intersted, my travel itinerary is starting to look a little more concrete, with me leaving Vancouver on Friday 28th April to Edmonton and beyond around Canada and to Chicago and Minnesota and then will arrive back in Auckland NZ on Sunday 28th May around 7 in the morning! :P

I am also going to my first NHL hockey game today!!!!! so excited. Big huge massive thank yous to my mate Frank who is shouting me to go, Vancouver Canucks vs. Anaheim Mighty Ducks (yes Disney owns their team and yes they're named for the movie!!!)
So that is goign to be awesome and lots and lots of pics will be taken.

Ok, am getting seriously hungry, so here goes for some pics
Love you lots like jelly tots (aye Gavin!)
hill


Laura, Gavin and I when he came to visit in Arbroath


Gavin and I in Arbroath


Jenny and I in St. Andrews (we didnt' see Prince WIlliam!)


Gavin and I again


James, Laura and I in Glasgow (didn't know how to make it NOT upside down :P)

Will post more in afternoon tea break

wow, how long has it been since i posted?
well according to the little inof thing here about a month. ok, yeah, a whole month
how time flies huh
it's strange to think that 3 days ago marked my 10 monthiversary away from NZ, and started to official countdown to when I will be returning to NZ's balmy shores. It's been so amazing, and I feel like now, on this side of the maze/tunnel/roller coaster, I'm not even sure what to write any more without producing a novel.
It certainly is strange being back in "normal" (what is normal?) life, but at the same time, so good to be in a quiet house with a quiet housemate (the best flatmate ever in the whole world actually, my new adopted big brother) and a steady job (albeit a boring one)
see that is one of my excuses for not blogging on here for so long. I type for 7 hours a day at a psychiatric office and the thought of typing after hours makes my fingers tingle (but not in a good way :S)
but anywasy enough excuses
here is the sum up
spent january in morocco
spent february in scotland
spent march:
-working as a dictatypist
-getting used to life in Vancouver again
-preparing to come back to NZ again
-praying about the next few years in particular the who/what and where questions (how and why are pretty much well covered, particularly after the last 6 months!)
-living in a cool house with Stefan, one of the other Vancouver staff members, who is an Italian, German, Swiss guy. (i have a new phone number, will group email that one!!!)
-HAnging out with all the other staffers and friends in Van
-Planning my travels to see my buds from the DTS in different parts of North America.

So yeah.
Posts for the next month will be getting slightly more regular and sligtly more pensive I'm sure. Will also keep up the pics, cuz I know they are probably more intersting.

And how about some of you actually write some comments aye? Make me feel like someone reads my ramblings.......

much love
hill

VANCOUVER!
It's so good to be back!
I only have about 5 minutes before I have to gun it out of here and get back for the start of de-brief time, but just thought i'd drop a couple more pics on here before I get to all the story sharing and reminiscing. i'm going to save that for when all my lovelies here are home and i am in vancouver all on my lonesome.



Finally arrived in Marrakech! Too much travelling, too much stuff!


First group lunch solo without leaders in Casablanca


Houla, Mirijam and Soufien and I at the orphanage in Morocco


The girls at the Grand Mosque in Casa


Last dinner in Marrakech before going on to the orphanage

So I think it's almost been 6 weeks since my last post.
I figure nw is as good a time as any to give you a general update on how things are going, and also slot in a few pictures for your viewing pleasure :)
Things here are good, we are spending our last 2 weeks in Scotland in Arbroath/Dundee doing ministry stuff around different schools, churches, a prison, a skate park, and a few open air/prayer station type things.
The two weeks we had in Glasgow/Paisley went really well, the highglight for me being working with some of the youthworkers in the area and connecting with a group called Firestarters. Basically one weekend a month is spent living in churches and working in different outreach teams developing different ministry skills and reaching out to the east end of Glasgow. The age range is 10-20ish, so it was great being able to join up with different teams and get stuck in being involved, getting to know the kids, and being an encouragement and help to the leaders. I was solo in the 'Prayer team' and it was great having such a cool group all to myself! :)
Their website is http://www.firestartersuk.org/ for anyone interested in seeing more about them.We are here in Arbroath until next friday and then leave for a 2 day roadtrip around the scottish highlands while we debrief the trip. We are then back in glasgow for the night of sunday 27th and then back to vancouver 6am on monday 28th. Would really appreciate your prayers for continued energy and protection for this last BUSY two weeks, and then the journey home. Will keep you posted.
I haven't got much more time to write, but there are so many stories and pictures and everything that I will do my best to blog a bit more regularly if i think of any concise and interesting ways to say things :)
In the meantime, here are some pictures, with captions of course that will hopefully give you a bit more of an idea. My pictures won't work here because the computer in this library doesn't like my camea, so once i have burnt them to a disk there will be a whole bunch more. these are a few that i borrowed from Jen, one of the other girls in our team.



This is the view from our rooftop in Essaouira


DongWoo and Jen posing outside one of the street stalls Essaouira. DongWoo in full Jelaba of course!


The girls fueling our Moroccan coffee addiction in Marrakech. For 35c a shot, why not!


mmmmm, Coke is the same all around the world.
Though.. 'life is good, with or without cocacola' (according to santos!)


Mike and Jessi, two of our wise leaders