one week

One week from this moment, I'll be somewhere over the Pacific en route to Los Angeles. I'm really excited to see everyone stateside, but I'm so sad to be leaving NZ, and am comforting myself with the knowledge I'll be back in the general area in a few months.

I'll miss Wellington - being able to walk everywhere, the amazing view of the harbour from my window, the arts/entertainment vibe, the forested hills surrounding the city, seeing black-coated masses of businesspeople and bureaucrats streaming down Lambton Quay in the morning/at lunch hour/in the evening and dodging my way through, the cozy cafes, pubs with fireplaces, the 146 different restaurants, and the way the wind whipping past my room at night sounds like waves crashing on a shore.

I'll miss the land - snow-capped Southern mountains, countless Northern islands, the brilliant blue water everywhere, how the angle of the light makes everything 'pop' during the day and creates technicolour sunrises and sunsets, cliffs and beaches and alpine desert and rainforest and extinct volcanoes and ripply hills and green-green pasture.

I'll miss the people - the three families who adopted me over the year and in whose houses I'll always feel at home, the travellers I've met from all corners of the globe, the Kiwis who've bent over backwards to give me the best possible impression of their part of the country, and the friendly and helpful strangers I've relied on every day.

I'll miss rugby madness, Indian takeaways on every corner and my hunt for the perfect butter chicken, flattened vowels, waiting for the inevitable 'so what do you think of New Zealand?' enquiry from every Kiwi I meet, feijoas/persimmons/kiwi/avocado/tamarillos at the Sunday markets, kumara, Whittaker's chocolate, little lambs in fields, an outdoors store (or three) on every corner, superfine merino, Maori-English translations, Black Adder tea, the silver fern emblem, and the nationwide enthusiasm for EFTPOS.

I'll miss Aotearoa New Zealand.