Summer is ending. People are no longer so grouchy when it rains, because it's a sign that the year is moving on and autumn, and then winter, is approaching. Those summer holidays which initially seemed like a near-endless period of time in which we in-between students could just drift has just about gone. And just as I suspected, a lot has happened this summer to change my perspective.
This blog post would be a lot smoother if a) I didn't just start randomly blogging again after more than a year and b) I had actually gotten round to blogging at the start of the summer holidays instead of merely changing my layout and profile pic so there would actually be some sort of comparison. But! too late now.
Well I have to say, excluding actually arriving in Otago, by far the most singly significant event during the break was volunteering at the kids' holiday camp. Apart from it being a ridiculously good time (think Baby Shark song http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rqV1O5eeA9Y except in front of a campfire with 30 kids high on marshmallows and late bedtimes) I learnt some key things which are really important, but which I tend to put to the back of my mind. Firstly, the power of listening. And not just listening actively because you're telling yourself to, but active listening without any conscious thought, every single time someone talks to you. Our camp boss told us that we had to listen to the kids as if they were our in-laws - like really seriously alert and taking everything on board. And us volunteers extended that to each other; questions and jokes would flow seamlessly out of responses. Love it :)
Two: the power of positiv...ity.ness. What's the word? Anyway, we learnt the 7:1 ratio: 7 compliments : 1 criticism, and also to use our LASER (look around for signs of excellence and respond). This does not mean ignore faults, but rather to do a Dumbledore and find the best amongst the worst, always. lol apparently I'm way too soft so twas no problem for me to adhere to this... but look! I am exercising this mentality right now. My room is right in front of the staircase so it's pretty noisy; at home, people only move around in front of my room if they're about to enter, and so I can't help expecting someone. On the other hand, it has a balcony, it's almost as big as my room at home, and it overlooks the flower garden :3 Actually, that's a bad example. I actually really like my room. At the moment, it makes it really easy to bump into people :) think I'm gonna bring some paper stuff down to decorate next!
Three: Life has infinite pathways and you really never know where you'll end up. The other volunteers' life stories were an eclectic mix of everything and it was pretty... I don't know... it inspired a sense of peace in me. There are many paths to where you want to go and sometimes to where you didn't know you wanted to go :)
Camp aside, (ooh this is getting all deep now) I think that I slid down the scale of idealism --> realism re. me moving down here. Back when the choice was new and exciting and stressful, I thought of everything very logically. Eg, "it will be tough to move away from my friends but on the other hand, I can make new ones." Of course the old arguments still are true. But now after spending so much time out of school with friends over summer, I'm realising the true meaning of this statement. Every so often I think, ugh, wish I could just fastforward to a time when I have made good solid friendships like I have with these amazing people who care <3 Everybody here is lovely and I'm really looking forward to getting to know them more :) But old friends are gold, yes? and every time I see people with their best/close/childhood friend I miss y'all ridiculously!
So how is Otago? It is:
not so cold as the weatherman/girl makes it out to be, unless your hall holds an outdoor barbeque to welcome the parents, in which case Murphy's law applies and it will become so cold that everyone has to eat inside
different because of its demographics - a very large part of the accommodation on the streets is house flat things for students. also the litter is different. tends to be bottles of something + two-minute noodles, lol. and there are very few shops which are not somehow trying to attract the student population in some way.
a place where even taking the bus is somewhat of an oddity; everybody walks pretty much everywhere. 3 mins to lectures though :)
full of health sci students, especially my hall. Here, it's like, if you find out a first year is not doing health sci, you're like, Wowwww, so interesting!! even if they're doing commerce haha.
Gonna post more soon, I hope! (she says somewhat dubiously..) Preliminary lectures start on Friday. O-week's been cool so far :) but the big iconic clock is chiming 11 now (can hear it loud and clear from my room :)) and I'm feeling like a total nana this week, so I'm gonna sign off. Besos~
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