Dearest kids, a word about travel,
We've just crossed from the North Island of New Zealand to its South Island by ferry. It was a 3-hour crossing and now we're on our way via rail to the town of Christchurch where in the very recent past earthquakes ravaged the unsuspecting town.
Thinking of New Zealand as an English country is truly misguided. It's rather part of a Polynesian triangle with Hawaii to the north, Easter island to the east, and New Zealand to the south. With that triangle as the indigenous peoples' travel map, you can quickly recognize New Zealand's geographic location as one of the Polynesia islands. That the British Crown's explorers claimed her only confuses New Zealand's authentic existence in the down under.
Since two of the tectonic plates crash together along New Zealand's South Island shoreline and the ring of fire forms its backbone, it's hard to imagine why early Polynesian voyagers would have wanted to be here. It's even harder to understand why European explorers would have found safety here. But all one has it do is to look around at the majestic beauty of this almost untouched land to know what lured all the voyagers here. The volcanic clues of hot springs and geysers may have been identified as connected to the pagan gods rather than recognized as indicators of the dangers of the moving earth's crust. Further mystifying new arrivals might have been the infrequency of volcanic eruptions and earthquakes making New Zealand's islands seem idyllic in so many other ways.
Separated from Pangea millions of years ago, New Zealand finds itself uniquely housing plants and animals that live nowhere else. The strangeness of a land with only 2 bats as its entire mammal population seems magically appropriate in this Lord of the Rings movie setting. But the pristine nature of New Zealand has been contaminated by many travelers wittingly and unwittingly dropping other species, plants and animals, to find homes in what would never have been their locations.
Kiwis are what the current residents of New Zealand call themselves while we think of the yummy green fruit by that name. And like Americans, those Kiwis represent a real mix of immigrants who easily shed their native lands to assume the Kiwi lifestyle and display a genuine warmness and friendliness to visitors. Outdoors people, Kiwis appreciate their country's physical diversity and untouched spans of rolling hills, winding rivers, sharp mountains, deep valleys, and rocky shores which the blue Pacific protects and almost promises not to pitch those tsunamis other Polynesian countries fear.
Travel is a wonderful way to learn about other places on the planet, its geography and its people. In fact, we as a school, encourage you to travel with your children whenever you can as part of their global education. Don't worry about what they'd be missing at school rather think about what they'd be missing about life if you didn't include them as often as you are able. In fact, I was just playing with my thoughts and I imagined that when the school were to give your child homework for school missed, you might in turn give the school itself homework for what everyone else would be missing by not accompanying you and your child on those educational travels you're taking! Tee hee!
Director/Elementary 1 Teacher