sushi day

i love travelling to new places, but i also love spending enough time in one place that i begin to develop patterns, favorite places, a routine. one such developing tradition is tuesday sushi lunch, when the sushi of the day at the nearby japanese chain restaurant is avocado and salmon, a great bargain at just $4.90 for 8. today, a particularly chilly almost-winter day in christchurch, they were giving away miso soup free with any order, so i took the opportunity to try something new and accepted the small cup, if only to keep my hands warm for the short walk to the church after work. while there was nothing outrageously awful about it, there also wasn't much to recommend it, and the slight fishy taste (i've since learned that it's made with sardines) grew uncomfortably distinct as I continued to sip, so the majority of the soup found itself inside an obliging wastebasket. today the sunny banks of the avon looked especially welcoming, so i sat down in this little spot to eat and be content. beautiful.

-rachel

my first kiwi birthday

Today I experienced my first autumn birthday. I love fall, as it means scarves and fireplaces and coffee and colorful foliage, and am more than happy to celebrate my 25th birthday in such a setting. Bryan and I celebrated last week, when we both had a day off and could spend our rainy afternoon watching movies and ordering in Thai food. He's working tonight, so I spent a wonderful, quiet evening soaking my feet in a peppermint scrub that I won at church a few weeks back and reading about poor pathetic Fanny Price in Jane Austen's Mansfield Park.

But the best part of the evening was when our friend Phil unexpectedly stopped by with a surprise gift - a block of chocolate with Smarties (not the sour fruity kind, the tasty chocolate kind) and a contribution to our Disney sing-a-long nights with The Rescuers, both of which he knew to be among my favorites.

What a wonderful birthday. Thanks to my thoughtful family for sending cards - it's so much more exciting to receive mail when it comes from overseas!

-Rachel

weird thing about new zealand #1

it's difficult to predict how the availability and cost of a specific item will differ in new zealand, dependent as it is on a complex jumble of supply, demand, legal issues, transport costs, and various other economic factors. along the way, we've found out that milk is cheap while cheese is expensive, that mexican food items are often difficult to find while asian and indian foods fill a full supermarket aisle, that fast food here doesn't usually mean cheap food, and, most recently, that contact solution can only be found in pharmacies, not alongside the other rows of toiletries and medications in supermarkets and big box stores. it doesn't require a prescription or anything, but somehow it's been deemed unfit to be sold next to toothpaste and shampoo and toilet paper and ibuprofen and hair clips and cough drops and hand sanitizer and nail polish remover. no idea why.

homesick.

since we returned from australia, i've been desperately homesick. not homesick in the sense of missing a particular place or person or thing (though those moments certainly aren't absent), but of longing to establish a home. in whatever country and city i find myself in, i want to invite friends over to sit on the couch that we picked out ourselves, to drink coffee from my favorite yellow mug, to borrow movies and books with no need to return them any time in the near future.

it's now been nine months since we arrived in new zealand, and we're becoming more and more aware of our need to make a decision about where we'll be two months from now, two years from now. and yet, feeling detached from the places that have been our homes in the past, the city and even the country that we'll end up in are now completely up for grabs. we have until august 20th to renew our visa (at a hefty price) or board a flight headed out of the country. where next?

-rachel

friends

it's been wonderful this week to look around us and discover a group of people who are quickly becoming great friends. i'd like to share some of them with you so that you can join this circle of wonderful people as well :) sorry about the lack of pictures lately...i've neglected my responsibility to bring my camera along with me.

sunday - last week, we joined chris and sarah for dinner at their house in rangiora, about 40 minutes north of christchurch. they're a married couple around our age that we met at church (as we have all of our close friends here), who met when chris was preaching on a fountain in the middle of town a few years ago and sarah and her friend sat down nearby to listen and (let's be honest) to make fun of him. she was eventually won over both by his message and by him, and was baptized in the church about a month ago. they live out in the country with their five horses, with which they want to start a program to teach special needs kids how to ride and care for the animals. they're a very cool couple.

tuesday - the church has a young adults group that meets on tuesdays evenings, to which has been added a late night disney singalong at the encouragement of our friend phil, who is also the church receptionist. he moved up from invercargill (in the far south; they roll their Rs very distinctively) in january to make a career change after a few years of working in the film industry. he was once served lunch by anthony hopkins on the set of "the world's fastest indian", which totally beats our best movie claim to fame of having the crew trailers from the coen brothers' "a serious man" on campus at north central.

friday/saturday - we spent all weekend at church setting up for the maximise conference, a music conference that city church hosted jointly with vision college next door. we had a great time serving with so many great people, like alice (the moped rider whom i've mentioned before) and her boyfriend ed (who just bought a motorcycle to keep up with her), and rebecca, who's just finished her course at the nearby college of tourism and travel, and josh, an avid tramper who has recently returned from a 12-day hike through the mountains from arthur's pass to lewis pass. the topic of ultimate frisbee was raised for the first time today, which excited bryan to no end. there may be some boy "dates" in the near future, as bryan's also been eager to get the guys together for a zombie movie marathon.

unfortunately, this weekend we didn't get to hang out with hannah, who left today for a five week trip to uganda to serve at an orphanage with a missions organization and very generously left us the use of her car while she's gone. we are, of course, planning at least one road trip in the next month while we have a free set of wheels. lake tekapo? mt cook? kaikoura? hanmer springs? all of the above?

-rachel

family game night!

here's the advertisement for our next family ministries event, a game night with massive board games that we've got to figure out how to construct in the next week. the top secret but very awesome game lineup includes:

-hungry, hungry hippos (the balls will be balloons falling from the ceiling)

-battleship (with human battleships that will get "fired upon" with water balloons)

-jenga

-snakes and ladders (also known as chutes and ladders)

-twister

-candy land

we'll have themed snacks as well, which we still have yet to plan. at the moment we're thinking about gummi snakes (for snakes and ladders) and decorated brownies that will look like dominoes. any suggestions?

so far, we've had the movie night, which was a huge hit, and a mother's day event that involved us watching the kids while the parents get a night to themselves. we're having a blast volunteering with the family ministry, and can't wait until we're in a place where we can get paid for this!

-rachel

google earth is not helping.

google earth must be conspiring to make me homesick for minneapolis and for NCU, with pictures of pretty summer days on campus, like this one.

-rachel