The "Wiata" (Talk)

Wrote a postcard to work. Learned how to play Casino. Walked down to a place for Tansy & Louisa to go horseback riding. Found lots of nice shells. Flowers everywhere. Frank says the morning glory is a weed now. I saw a lot of nasturtiums. The horse people didn't show. Turned out they had a bad emergency.

We all road over to the ocean beach. It was very windy & the sand rushed up into our faces as we made our way down the dunes & sea grass to the beach. The smell of honeysuckle was strong. The sand was black. Tansy & Louisa dug holes in the sand to see if they could find some hot springs. They found some later when the tide was
low. If we had found warm water, the tradition is to sit in the warm hole. I had fun building a sandcastle. I wish someone had joined me in my endeavor. The girls went swimming in the ocean. I put my feet in & it was too cold.

We then dropped the girls off to walk home & we went on a supposed to be hour tramp that took me 1 1/2 hours. It was a beautiful trail with lush green grass & lots of fern trees. Also foxglove flowers & all sorts of beautiful bushes & trees. Frank could name them all. We were searching for a grove of Kauri Pines. They live thousands of years & were harvested almost to extinction. Only 240 are left. The oldest is 2,110 years old. I was sweating, huffing & puffing, & crawling part of the way. It was a steep trail.

On the way back, we stopped for ice cream & Ian bought us each a flounder for dinner that the store wrapped in newspaper. One odd thing I noticed at dinner was that we didn't have napkins or paper towels. Maybe it's an environmental thing.

I washed dishes & the girls dried. It was an awful job with the fish.

When it got dark around 9:30ish, we all walked to the park just down the way. Angela had brought firecrackers & sparklers. We lit sparklers & Frank set up the rockets. The rockets were actually real fireworks with the colorful explosions in the air.

When we got back, Ian set up coffee & a fruitcake & formed the chairs & couch into a circle. The girls went to their room so it was just us adults. Ian was forming a Wiata or as the Maori would say, Kerero (talk). The host stands up & says whatever is on his mind, for as long as he wants, then sings a song. Everyone else is to do the same. Because the stuff was said in confidence of just those there, I won't print it except a little of what I said. I talked about my low self esteem & forgetfulness. I told about my observation on how everyone seemed to be very huggy & touchy people so I went around & took each person's hand & gave my impression of them. I don't understand why, but I started crying when Frank had spoken about trees & when I told him & that I love trees too I really broke down & cried. I must've been tired. I sang "America the Beautiful" with a squeaky voice since I had been crying. I forgot a whole line so I just hummed it. Oh well.