Well it has certainly been a wild few days, with the wind and rain rattling windows and blowing fences over. Fortunately I suffered no damage like last time, when I lost slates and guttering. I feel for the people in Queensland Australia who have suffered terrible flooding and now a Cyclone to contend with that his destroyed many towns along the coast. Now we hear of fires over in Western Australia , fortunately its north of Perth well away from the city where Cathi and the family live. Due to all this extreme weather on the east coast my grandson, has not been able to find work so decided to cut short his trip and is now in Perth staying with family, he will be home in March. Its great that they have this opportunity to meet up again, they emigrated in 1996. Sunday 6th February was Waitangi Day in New Zealand it’s a day I remember well. In 2005 during my stay with Ann and Derek we were initiated as an honouree Maori during a ceremony in the ` Marae` their Communal Meeting House on the outskirts of Nelson. The Lodge is build of logs and had a very distinctive decorated entrance . The large hall was colourful with carved totem poles, masks and paintings around the walls. The ceremony was held in their language by twelve elders in ceremonial dress, who recited their history and then spoke in English, after listening to their stories we each rubbed noses with all the elders and then they took us in procession to enjoyed a feast, a great memory.
History this month was all about the rise of Quakerism by James Naylor and George Fox two very unusual men who set about delivering their interpretation of Christianity in the 17th Century. I found it very interesting as I didn’t know anything about the founding of the Quaker Religion.
As I am sure you all know that Valentines Day is my birthday . I had a great week , out to a couple of lunches, lots of presents and heaps of love I am exhausted. Wonderful phone calls from everyone I had hoped to hear from. We had a Valentine Poetry Evening on Sunday it was a hoot, more funny - mad poems than usual. I once won the competition in Wigan, it was a good night I was totally surprised.
Andrew is finally moving into his own house, next Friday he gets the keys. I know I will miss him but I’m look forward to getting my space back. The house was almost taken over and filled with his possessions 12 months ago, the amount of stuff he had was incredible. We both will have an exciting time finding all the things that have been squirreled away and probably forgot that we had. I am very excited for him he has been very patient waiting for this moment .
http://hubpages.com/hub/Waitangi_Day
