Winiata’s Blog

On Monday May 12^th, I packed my bags and headed out my front door, on the way to school for our 2008 Totora Springs camp. Most of the students in the symphonic band and choir were attending this camp which was held at Totora Springs.  After I arrived at school, I watched as everyone else filed into the ALC. Quickly, I put down my bags and followed. We settled down on the floor and waited for instructions. Once our music teacher had finished speaking, we grabbed our bags and boarded the bus. The trip there was noisy and loud because lots of people were singing in the back of the bus. I spent much of the travelling time texting my friends.  When we arrived, we unloaded our bags and prepared our cabins by unpacking and laying out sleeping bags, etc.  Then we had our first practise. We set out all the chairs and got out our instruments. We stocked our folders with the music we needed for the camp. The tunes we were given were really great, and I had fun as we learnt how to play them all.  As the day went on, we practised for many hours, and before I realised it, the day was all over. After dinner I lay down and thought of what a fun day I had had, and I couldn’t wait until tomorrow.  The next morning, after breakfast, we commenced our practising. That day we practised for about 6 hours, and at the end I was really tired. But the time had come for the big concert, for which we had prepared many hours. We were going to have an evening show with an audience of hundreds.  We lined up in another room, and tuned our instruments ready for the night. I was starting to get a little nervous. The teacher told us to head for the big room where we were going to perform. But on the way there, the fire alarm went off. Everyone had to evacuate the building, which made a lot of visitors angry. Once the alarm had been switched off, the word was given to go back inside. We sat down quietly in our seats and waited for everyone else to settle down. The teacher lifted her arm. It was time for us to play. I lifted my instrument slowly, and as I did, the beat was given, and we played. I looked at the music as I played my Tenor Saxophone. I watched closely as the audience stared back at us. We played about five songs before the bracket was finally finished. I rested my saxophone on my lap with relief, and watched all the others perform.  The concert carried on for about 1 hour. By the end I was tired and wanted to get out. At the very end, we all stood up and took a bow. We all filed out of the big room with happiness and relief that it was all over. All that practising had certainly paid off. I am proud and happy that I performed that night at Totara Springs camp, and I look forward to the next time I’ll be able to play in the T.A. Intermediate senior band.

In the weekend, my family and I packed the car, ready to depart on our journey up north just past Whangarei. We were attending the wedding of my cousin and her fiancé. Once in the car I knew it would be an uncomfortable ride, and I wasn’t wrong! I was stuffed up in the back with all these groceries around me. They were annoying me, especially the bread because I had to take extra care with it or else it would have been squashed.   After driving all the way through Auckland, we arrived in Whangarei after dark, and just couldn’t wait to get out and stretch! But the trip wasn’t over then. We still had another 40 minutes to bear until we arrived at our true destination. As we were travelling we went through a long and winding road. As we turned one of the corners, I looked out the window and I just caught a glimpse of a poster with a dark mask on it, like Phantom of the Opera. That sure gave me the creeps, especially when I couldn’t see anything else. Finally the trip was over, and we unloaded the car, dumping our gear anywhere we could. We were staying at my nana’s place for a couple of nights. Straight away I lay on the couch and drank my Milo. About ten minutes later, more people arrived but I didn’t have a clue who they were, whereas mum seemed to know them all, so I didn’t have to worry. That night my nana was in pain and mum had to take her to the hospital at ten o’clock at night, but she didn’t get back till five in the morning! This made the baby really upset. He had been crying for about half an hour when we finally gave up and let the baby out of the room where we were trying to put him to sleep. We stayed up with the baby for a long time, until finally he fell asleep. Next morning I woke up with major bags under my eyes. That morning we got dressed into our good clothes and went out for breakfast to find the bride in her white dress, with her hair all straightened out and all her make-up and stuff, ready for her big day. And next to her were the bridal party. I couldn’t believe that we spent the whole night with the bridal party and I didn’t even know.That was a surprise! After a while, we packed up our beds, and got into the car. Mum was really tired, and she was having second thoughts about driving. But we got there anyway. The wedding was being held in a field in my auntie’s paddock. As we arrived we saw a big marquee pitched in the middle with all these cars parked in rows in the front. Once we had parked the car, we noticed that it was raining down, so we got the umbrella out and went around, greeting all of our extended whanau. We got to the entrance and stood, with a crowd of people, under a shelter. There were some boys emptying puddles off of our shelter, so my brother and I decided to join in. We gathered all this water in a big puddle on the roof of the marquee and moved it to the edge. Once everyone had stepped back, we pushed the water over the edge and we watched it splash all over the ground. We found it so amusing that we repeated it several times, each time making it bigger and bigger. Suddenly, the crowd were silenced, then I heard them talking about a pink Cadillac. I was wondering what it was about, then I peeked around the corner and saw the answer. A pink Cadillac had just driven through the mud on the driveway and stopped beside a walkway (which I had only just noticed). A moment later, the bridal party got out of the car. The bride was wearing her white dress with a long train out the back, which was held up by the maid of honour – her sister. She was leading with the bridesmaid by her side. The path they were walking was decorated with plants and flowers. There were three people standing at the end of the path, waiting for them. Then they proceeded to the big totara tree that was between the path and the entrance to the marquee. There was a man standing under the totara tree. He was the bishop of a church. He was going to marry them. As the bride arrived at the tree, she was joined by her fiancé. They smiled, and the bishop started to talk. Everyone came in closer to try and listen to what he was saying. He was pronouncing the vows. Everyone was happy as they watched them get married. When it was finished they were all cheering. People started proceeding to the big marquee. As I walked in, I could see all these tables lined up nicely, with all these chairs placed around them. There was a long row of seats with people standing around them. The Master of Ceremonies announced that it was time to take photos. One by one, group by group, people started to come up and either take a photo or have their photo taken. About half an hour later, everyone had settled down, and the MC stated that it was time for the speakers. People from the bridal party stood up to express their feelings for the new couple. Other people talked about the bride and groom when they were kids, how they had met, and how happy they looked. Mum had a speech and talked about our great grandfather who has been dead for 16 years. He was the Patriarch of our family. After that we just stood beside her when she sang her song. Finally it was my favourite part – time to eat! There was a long table in the middle of the marquee and it was covered in food. Seafood was crayfish, kinas, pauas, raw fish, smoked snapper-heads, mussels, and really big oysters, as big as fried eggs. In the hangi there were huge trays of mutton, chicken, pork, kumara, pumpkin, stuffing and spuds. For dessert we had ice-cream, steam pudding, fruit salad, and chocolate logs. The wedding cake was a german chocolate cake. When all the eating was over they had a huge party and the DJ played music which was loud as. Everyone had beers but by this time it had been raining so hard that the ground was really churned up with mud and people had to go home to get changed and put gumboots on. After we went home they said that the paddock flooded and all the cars got stuck trying to leave! We stayed there for two more days. Then at 3 am on Monday morning my brother Etere got a bug from the other kids in the house. He was vomiting and felt sick. So then mum decided it was time to leave and go back home, if everyone was going to end up vomiting. On the trip home we only got as far as Whangarei and I puked all over my uncle’s lawn! I was just as sick as Etere. We drove to Auckland and just as we were leaving there, my little brother Jordan vomited all inside the car. Now he had the bug. The smell was unbearable, and we all felt like throwing up again. Mum was the only one who didn’t get sick. We arrived home safe and sound later that night. Overall I thoroughly enjoyed the trip even though it rained most of the time and everything was either soaking wet, or covered in mud or vomit! The good part was being at the wedding and seeing all the whanau again.

 “Ready to climb?” I said nervously. My bee layer simply replied “Climb away”. These words rushed through my head as the long pole swayed in the wind. One by one, I climbed each rung. As I reached the top I hesitantly put my shaking leg onto the first platform. I asked the bee layer what to do next. She told me that the best way to get across to the next platform was to jump, but I wasn’t so sure. Slowly and carefully, I lifted my leg and leapt forward onto the next platform. I had taken my first leap, but was it enough? The next was easier than the one before. I was starting to get the hang of it, but then I saw there was a big problem. The last gap was really big, and worse still, it was going up hill. Suddenly, the rope that seemed to keep me safe from possible danger, got tighter. I was yanked backwards, which kept me from my goal. As I searched around for support, I happened to look down. What a big mistake that was. Seeing all those concerned faces looking anxiously back at me. My legs were now wobbling like mad. Then something made me look across. I watched all the other people struggling to meet their challenges. Then I thought to myself, ‘If they can do it, why can’t I?’ I moved back a couple of steps, took a big breath, and sprang out. I felt a firm surface beneath my foot. YES! I had finally made it. I reached my arm out to tag the pole. Success sure felt good. An excited feeling charged through me. It was done! I made my way back to the middle platform, jumping for joy as I went. I felt relieved as I flapped my arms like a bird on the way down. Boy that day was cool. The experience was fantastic and I hope I’ll be able to repeat this again one day soon. 

On the 8th of April, rooms 3 & 7 arrived at school with all their bags packed and ready to depart. We were going to Ohope for this year’s camp. Ohope is a nice little town right next to the beach. Once the bell rang to start school, we all assembled outside the classroom, but we had to wait for another hour because one of the drivers had not yet arrived. Just before we left, the teacher put us into the groups that we were travelling in. I had the best car because our driver gave us chocolate bars to eat. 

On our way to Ohope we took a detour and stopped at Lake Okataina, and boy was it windy! We went onto the lakeshore and immediately noticed two waka that were beached, half on the shore and half in the water. We played touch on the sand and I got hurt. I was running fast and I fell forward and grazed my knee badly. 

After eating lunch we took a walk along a track into the bush. I was misbehaving and tossing sticks onto the track. Eventually the track led to an even windier clearing by the lake. The force of the wind was so strong that when I tossed a stick straight up into the air it landed 5 metres behind me. After a while we returned back to where the cars were parked. 

On the way back we drove through some very winding roads, and our car came very close to scraping against the steep cliffs on the left hand side. After that, the rest of the trip was ordinary, until we arrived in Whakatane and got lost for a while.

When we finally arrived at Ohope we discovered we were the first car to get there. We couldn’t unpack because the cabins were still locked so we played cricket while we waited for everyone else to get there. My friend accidentally hit the ball across the road and we weren’t allowed to cross over to get it so that ball was history until later on in the day when we recovered it from a bush. Once the others got there, we all grabbed our bags and put everything in the cabins. 

Later that afternoon we went to the beach to play a game of touch. My knee was still hurting and I tripped over again and got sand in it so that didn’t help. So I abandoned the touch game and decided that throwing handfuls of wet sand at the girls would be more entertaining. That night we had meatballs and spaghetti for dinner. I stuffed myself full.  Then I went to bed and slept like a log. That’s the first day done.  

Walking through a house which has been destroyed by fire is really weird. The public tours went from 10 o’clock until 2o’clock. At 3 o’clock, all the fire-fighters in town gathered for the next event. They were going to burn down the remainder of the building. All the fire trucks were parked along the road (which, by the way, was closed), and they tested the hoses. There were cones and barrier tape marking where the public boundaries.

There was a big crowd of people sitting across the road from the house. We all had our cameras out ready to see the action.  Shortly after, a fire-fighter went inside to the owner’s bedroom. About a minute later, we could see flames leaping up, through the bedroom window. Two minutes later, the window exploded. Soon part of the roof was on fire. I looked in the hollow gap where the window had once been, and the room was completely full of flames. That was when my camera and I went crazy.  

Ten minutes later I heard from the crowd a gasp of shock as the bedroom roof collapsed. The bedroom door had incinerated, letting the fire spread into the rest of the house. Suddenly, big clouds of strange yellow smoke appeared above the house. It was the insulation in the roof which made the yellow smoke (Bradford gold batts). What really amazed me was how hot it was. The corrugated iron up the roof was melting so fast that I could feel the heat from across the road, and it felt hotter than the sun.  There was a big tree at the front of the house. At the beginning it was all green and growing ok. While the house was burning, all the leaves were turning brown and shrivelling.  The firemen were hosing the neighbour’s houses, and also the lawn and the tree. Luckily the tree was saved from catching fire, but I don’t know if it is still alive. 

My favourite part was probably the chimney collapsing. While the house was crumbling room by room, the chimney was still standing. Eventually, it finally began to give way. But this was different because it was falling just a little at a time. The excitement of the crowd was growing every time it fell because we all wanted to see what would happen when it finally flopped.Another highlight was the smoke which was billowing out into the sky. Sometimes it was white, black, yellow and grey. When the roof had fully collapsed, there was a big burst of black and yellow smoke. When I got home afterwards, I could still see the smoke from my house.  I can’t wait to go back and see what it looks like now.

This is my third weekly diary (which is the latest you could get). Yesterday, after we had picked up our Makuhari student, we went to view a house which was in the newspaper. A man called Grant lost his house in a fire 6 months ago, but the house didn’t burn all the way down. It had happened at 2 o’clock in the morning (the day it was damaged of course!). Grant was the only person in the house at the time, and if his dog hadn’t woken him up, he wouldn’t have survived.  There were some firemen waiting outside the house, and they took us in for a tour. They told us that the fire started when a laptop was left on the carpet. It was over-heating and it ignited. It travelled along the carpet and burned the couch, which just happened to contain the equivalent of 30 litres of fuel. On the wall was what remained of a flat screen plasma TV. IT was just a piece of rusted metal hanging on the wall. The fire-fighters showed us how dangerous it is to leave electronics plugged into the wall at night. The kitchen was a mess and the fridge freezer had melted and shrunk. There was a tap going in the sink but the tap handle had burned so bad it was melted and couldn’t be turned off. I went into a room where the door had been shut, and the room had suffered hardly any damage. As I walked around inside, I looked up at the roof. It was completely hollow and I could see all the wires that used to power the lights. I could see what was inside the walls, and in some places, you could just make out the wallpaper which was surrounded by flame marks. There were signs on the walls which stated the things that happened there, for example: one said ‘this room reached up to 400 degrees Celsius’, and another said ‘the smoke level was down to here’, which was about 30cm above the floor.  It must have been really sad for the owner to stand helplessly outside and watch all his belongings explode into flames.

This is my second weekly diary (which is a little late). 

Yes!! I’m finally a House Captain for my school. It’s going to be a great year indeed.  

Yesterday, I went into town with my friends after school. We went to McDonalds (a well known fast food restaurant in New Zealand), the Warehouse (another well known
New Zealand shop), and other shops. We had a great time (and at the end, I was the only one with money!)  

Anyway, today we’ve done heaps of outside work even though it rained! Working in the rain!  And, I had to do a whole garden by myself while my brother just sat around and did nothing. It almost broke my back! 

Well . . . . . . . . . .  goodbye!

Last Friday there was a championship swimming event at our school. Only the confident swimmers attended. We did loads of different heats. I swam the easy ones first - 25m freestyle, 25m backstroke, and 25m breaststroke. Then came the harder ones – 25m butterfly, 50m freestyle, 50m backstroke, 50m breaststroke and the big one, 100m freestyle. I did the best in freestyle where I either got 1^st, 2^nd, or 3^rd.It was a good day and I felt good that I did it.

I aim to improve in tech arts (music, art, food, sewing, wood work and especially science). I aim to be a good role model as a House captain.  Also, I want toI aim to improve on my instrument ( tenor saxophone) by doing practice 4 x a week. I aim to try my best in sports. Also, I want to be better in Cross Country by getting fit.I aim to extend on my kapahaka experience by attending every Noho (live in) and joining in every event and competition they attend. I aim to work well with others (Term 1 work group) and by myself. I aim to get my work finished early so I won’t have to worry about anything for the rest of the week. I aim to improve in my ICT skills (multi-media experience, typing, and computers) by practising at home on my computer. I aim to write a interesting post on my blog every week and write a constructive comment on someone’s blog.I aim to improve with my reading, which means going to the town library every fortnight and reading a book each week. 

This is my first weekly diary as on of my goals this year. In my school, I’m now a year 8 which means it’s my last year in the school. All of last years year 8s are gone, and we’ve got new kids. The problem is trying to remember their names.  Anyway, my mum said I have to do the most I can while I still can. I’ve already started in getting jobs in and around the school. I’ve got to work as hard as I can, so I can get ahead. At home, I’m setting my own personal goals. About a week ago, I wanted to do a double-flip on the trampoline, and I accomplished it pretty fast. Also, I aimed to do an aerial, and I finished that last night. What I’m looking at now is a back-flip. So I’m pretty proud of what I’ve already done on that tramp.  As you can see, I’m starting my ‘everyday writing’, and I hope I can keep it going for the rest of the year.