haere rā : farewell

i'm sitting in the Auckland Airport, watching the clock slowly tick towards 11:30pm and my flight to Singapore.

after spending a week in Raglan surfing and relaxing, i spent the last two nights before my flight in Mt. Maunganui  with my parents friend's Robin & Tony Hasslet. Tony and my dad worked together on some projects for Weyerhauser before they retired. the Hasletts were kind enough to let me stay with them and even fed me while we recapped what i'd been fortunate enough to see in NZ in my two months.

i left the Mount this morning though, headed for Auckland, sold my surfboard to a construction worker who's learning how to surf and spent the rest of the afternoon getting last minute things i needed and trying to find an internet cafe to video chat with my family before i left NZ. i struck out on the internet cafe but we'll catch each other while i'm in Singapore.

the extent of my awareness of what i've experienced mentally, emotionally, life-altering-amazingly has been zero. i've tried to think about it a bit but my mind has keeps going blank. i hope it's not permanent.

the extent of my ability to comprehend what's next (Singapore and Nepal) is best described as chaos. the closest i've come to putting it into words was a 2 minute session on the drive to Auckland this morning of, "nepal....expletive.....NEPAL....EXPLETIVE!"

well, my flight is checking in so i'm going to go now. i'll post once from Singapore before i head for Nepal.

to all the folks that read this, send me emails, write me on facebook or just curse my name in general - thank you. i know i've told some you directly and others have probably heard from the grapevine but the trip has not been what i've expected and the mind has mean tricks when it's with it's inner thoughts for too long. but the end result has been nothing but positive and leaves me with the same sense of incapability to comprehend all the great things have come from it. i just want to say thanks for the support. the idea that was hatched to "get away" from everything and to "cut ties" has turned into an adventure and experience in coming home.

i hope this finds you well.

my haere ra moment with big brother thunder. he's been good. the best i could have asked for. the moment that sums up our time together came today. driving around Auckland, running errands, i got stuck on the inside of a roundabout, did 2.5 laps around it and missed the street i needed while listening to Bill Wither's "Just the Two of Us". it was beautiful. i should have kept going around until the song ended.

one for the road at the airport

haere ra, New Zealand. i'll see you again someday.