home is where my accent is?

okay.... so I'm back in Kaitaia and Mim's playing 'Last of the Summer Wine' on the cello... Mum & Dad are in Scotland looking at my pictures of the Holme & Colne Valleys that I'm slowly uploading from Aotearoa NZ and they reckon they feel disorientated?! At least at kindy today I wasn't the only one jetlagged, one of the staff returned from Europe about 3 weeks ago and two of the kids had their first day back today after a trip to see their grandparents in England. It was somewhat surreal overhearing a conversation in the outdoor play area about John Lewis' in Tooting Beck! (not between the boys I hasten to add, it was their mum and Clare!)

It is good to be home again it must be said - and not least because all the travelling has stopped. Much as it was wonderful to see everyone I'd had enough of traipsing around after about 2 weeks never mind 5! I felt like I was getting information overload, a bit like travelling as a tourist in many ways only instead of learning about places it was catching up on everyone's news and desperately trying to remember who'd moved/got married/had kids/split up before I totally put my foot in it... thanks so much to those who put me up/put up with me, especially when jetlag got the better of me.

For various reasons advanced planning didn't really happen which meant I missed seeing a fair few people I'd've liked to but it also led to a few serendipitous encounters I'd never have thought to add to my itinery had I been a bit more thorough in advance. It did stike me more than once that a decidedly kiwi attitude to travelling did seem to be prevailing - maybe I'm becoming more naturalised to this place than I thought. Bonnie did say she thought I sounded like Elizabeth when I arrived back at Kindy this morning... given the chameleon nature of my accent and the fact that I did a whistlestop tour of all previous major UK influences (Yorkshire, Somerset, Lancashire, Newcastle & Edinburgh - in terms of people if not actual locations this trip) I'm quite impressed with myself for obviously slipping back into my current 'norm' so quickly!

So, it's back to sunhats, sunblock, Ninety Mile Beach, homemade lemonade (fruit from the garden), Whittakers chocolate... and in case anyone is getting too jealous - mozzies and sandfly bites too!