Happy Bonfire Day!

Tonight is the night that New Zealanders celebrate the fact that Guy Fawkes was caught and did not successfully blowup the British parliment buildings as he was planning to several centuries ago. Generally everyone here has a BBQ and fireworks on the weekend. Since this isn't considered a national holiday, we'll be celebrating tomorrow night. I sort of wish I was already in Wellington because we just saw a news clip and this Guy Fawkes celebration will be the biggest one they've ever had.

I think it's all very interesting that they name the day after the bad guy and then set off fireworks to recognize that he couldn't blow anything up. I am looking forward to the festivities tomorrow.

Right now I'm in a tiny town called Ngaruawahia. You saw it like 'narrowahere'. There are two other wwoofers at this farm, an Austrian guy named Simon and a German named Tim. They are both very nice. When I arrived this afternoon they were painting the porch. It's been quite rainy here so the farm work is a bit on hold, but I could see all the sheep and lambs from the porch. The family here is Davina, Don, and three kids, Martin, Dallas, and Chance. Martin has decided that my name is Cheese and I spent the afternoon building him a school bus out of lego. Of course, I made it with all the yellow blocks and this was hardly acceptable because there aren't any yellow school busses here. Dallas has a broken baby toe because she is completely wild. Chance is the smartest three year old I have ever seen. He can use the internet even though he isn't allowed to. He actually managed to locate the Bob the Builder game site and start playing the games in the two minutes his mother left him with me. I was amazed (and had no idea he wasn't actually allowed to use the computer. Makes sense, I suppose).

There is all sorts of hiking and canoeing and wonderful things to do here. I'll be back with more later!