Arts Evening

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This piece is Rhapsodie Mignonne for four hands by Carl Koelling.

Mid-Semester Holiday

It's been a while since posting because we just had out mid-semester break. New Zealand was easily one of the most beautiful places I've ever had the pleasure of being. I took a bus pass that took us to various cities around South Island. It was nice because it was a hop-on-hop-off type thing so they drop you off at the city and you stay as long as you want and then continue the route. I went to nine different towns, stayed in not so bad hostels and met many people from all over the world.

If I had to describe New Zealand I would have to mention the sheep. There are approximately 4.4 million people in New Zealand and 40 million sheep. Everywhere you look there are snow capped mountains flanked by deep blue seas and rolling green hills dotted with grazing sheep. It truly is magestic. Much of New Zealand is influenced by its indigenous people the Maori, which makes up the largest minority. Linguistically, it was difficult for me to pick up any significant differences between a New Zealand accent and an Australian one but the kiwi's say "sweet as" following many phrases.

We had the opportunity to do a couple of activities including peninsula hikes to seal colonies, glacier hikes (which ended up being cancelled mid way because of an avalanche that happened above us), bungy jumping, wildlife tours (I saw an elephant seal, crazy sea lions and many many penguins), brewery tours, cruises through fiords (Milford Sound is supposedly the eighth wonder of the world), and a variety of random activities.

During our adventure I ended up having many close encounters. On a peninsula hike in Kaikoura, we visited a seal colony and I got a little too close to one of the male seals and was attacked. Luckily, I can outhop a seal. I already mentioned the avalanche during our glacier hike. We had literally hiked all the way until the base of the glacier across the glacial valley in conditions of high wind, pounding rain and hail just to have an avalanche crash down. On a hike in Abel Tasmen National park, I dramatically slipped off of a rock and cut my chin. At a hostel in Nelson, I was nearly crushed by a large German falling off of a ladder from his bunk. It was a good trip.