Goodbye New Zealand!

Column July 2019

Queen's Birthday ushered in my last month in New Zealand. This holiday honours the birthday of Britain's Queen Elizabeth. We used the long weekend as an opportunity to go to Golden Bay and enjoy the beautiful weather.

At school, we had to finish some work, as the winter holidays were just around the corner. Now I had to mentally prepare for the journey home. This began with a "Farewell Evening", where all exchange students were said goodbye and everyone gave a short closing speech. In addition, an important phase of the season was coming up with my rugby team. Things were also running at full speed at home. Since my host family wants to sell their house, we spent weeks sprucing up the property. My host father in particular invested a lot of time in it. He wanted to do as much work as possible himself to save a little money. The result was quite impressive.

Returning my uniform, thanking my teachers and saying goodbye to all my friends: sooner than I could have imagined, it was time to vacate my room. On my last evening in Nelson, I cooked for my host family. It was a bit hard to say goodbye, as I felt like I had become a part of this incredible whanau after a whole year.

I spent another five days in up in Auckland, New Zealand's largest city in the north of the North Island. There I met some friends I knew from my boat trip back in April. It was nice to spend my last days in Aotearoa with them. As a finale, we baked a pavlova together. This is a meringue cake garnished with fruit, which is celebrated as a national dish in New Zealand. Australians claim that this delicious dessert originates from their country, but that is complete rubbish as we all know for sure!

After twelve months on New Zealand soil, I started my journey home. First I flew 17 hours from Auckland to Dubai and then another six and a half hours to Zurich. When I landed in Switzerland, I was warmly welcomed by family and friends at the airport.

Being catapulted from New Zealand winter into the heat of summer confused me a little at first. In the meantime, however, I have got used to these circumstances and overcome the jet lag. Other things still seem strange to me. Suddenly cars are driving on the right side of the road again and no one talks to me in English as I pass by. My year abroad has changed and enriched me in many ways. I experienced a lot and made new friends. During my time "down under" I missed my family and friends. This feeling has remained, however, because I now miss friends and family from my second home, New Zealand.