8 August, 2008 in Uncategorized by Aonghas

Ugh, It’s A Kilt!

Today the Year 13 students got the opportunity to dress up in cultural costumes to celebrate cultural diversity and also to round off International Languages Week. My outfit consisted of the Anderson tartan kilt with a matching Anderson tartan tie. I wore those long white socks that go nearly up to your knees; they were such a pain to keep up. When I got to school I found out that Dr. Colvine was also wearing a kilt and he recognised the Anderson tartan when he saw me. I was quite surprised how many Year 13 students decided to dress up actually. Some people even went to the effort of going to costume stores to hire their outfits!

A group of Year 13 students dressed up for International Languages Week

6 August, 2008 in School by Aonghas

A Look Through Musical Archives

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRAEME BRENS AND PHILLIP MOBBERLEY!
I was supposed to have a late start this morning since it was Wednesday, but Mrs Faaea-Semeatu wanted me to come in to school early so I could have a look in Studio 3 for orchestral music that looked appealing. She told me yesterday that she would be in Room 81 before school because she had Professional Development, so I could grab the studio key from her then. When I arrived at school it was nearly 8:30am. I approached Room 81 and I saw the back of Mrs Faaea-Semeatu, but she was also with Ms Heath, Mr Shaw and another teacher. I felt anxious knocking on the door because I knew that I wasn’t even supposed to be there. But I knocked on the door anyway. Not suprisingly, the first reply I get is “go away, we have professional development!” from Ms Heath. I backed away from the door dumbfounded about what I was going to do next… Luckily for me, Mrs Faaea-Semeatu came to my rescue and gave me the key. Scary territory, I don’t want to have to go there again next time!

So off I went to the music department. I let myself into studio 3 and started to rummage around all the old-looking folders and music piles. At first I couldn’t find much, but then I realised all the band and orchestral music was lined up along the shelf at the back of the room. I started flicking through them all from one side to the other, and in the end the most interesting/playable pieces I could find included Candle in the Wind by Elton John, Theme from Carmen, Thunderbirds Theme and The Theme from A-Team. The newest music was probably The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers medley, but we played that piece in the orchestra back when Dr. James was at Rutherford (2004). I talked to Mrs Faaea-Semeatu later on in the day and I think we are going to go with Thunderbirds. Now the only thing left to do is find people to play in the orchestra!

5 August, 2008 in Uncategorized by Aonghas

Chinese Celebration

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MARTYN AND BECKY LI!
Day two of International Languages Week and we celebrate the Chinese culture. I should mention that yesterday’s day of celebration was actually Spanish (hence the pinyata competition). Today we managed to get the music playing outside the music room sliding door during interval. Yesterday I forgot to bring a CD of cultural music but luckily Caleb had some cool Japanese music on his laptop so we managed to get a CD burnt in time for interval. The main attraction of the day of course was at lunch time with the Chinese food being sold in front of B Block. Now I knew that Chinese food was always popular during International Languages Week, but I didn’t think it would be THIS popular. By the time I arrived at the food stall, all the spring rolls were already sold out. Now that’s what I call fast food! The fried rice was on its way out too by the looks of it.

After lunch I went to the junior assembly with Luke and some of the other Prefects before going down to the sports pavilion to help with the clean up of pots and pans and woks and utensils. When I arrived at the pavilion, it looked like everything was under control in the way of washing, so I helped wipe down some tables. After that I felt a little redundant because I didn’t know what to do. Ji Eun was practising for Bring It On so I asked if she could teach me a few moves from their performance. It wasn’t easy, let me tell ya! The 8 moves that I learned in 15 minutes was merely 10 seconds in their performance which was several minutes in total. If I struggled remembering the order of those moves, I think I would have no chance remembering everything in their routine.

Ms Hsiao asked us to go around school and take down all the advertisements of Chinese food from windows and classroom doors so the remainder of the period was spent doing that. Tomorrow… Japanese Day!

4 August, 2008 in School by Aonghas

International Languages Week Begins

HAPPY BIRTHDAY AUNTY NOELINE, GEORGE SONG AND MICHELLE DE VOS!
This morning was a tad scary. I thought it would be the first time I had to go to the office to get a late slip. Although I had Chinese class first, I wasn’t just running half a minute late – it was pushing 5 minutes late! As soon as the car rolled up to the back gate, I darted up the driveway like a… cat? I made it to the stairs in C Block and I tried to walk in discretely so the teacher wouldn’t see me. As luck would have it, I walked into my Chinese class and Ms Hsiao (Chinese teacher) wasn’t even in the classroom. Nadia was standing at the back of the class with the pinyata she had bought in the weekend for lunchtime today. Ms Hsiao walked in just then and saw me at the back of the class. It was at this moment I was going to find out if she was in a happy mood or an angry mood. She looked at me, I stared back… the tension grew. Wow, I think this could turn into a short film! No, it wasn’t that dramatic actually. She basically just asked me to go with Carey and put up the posters of photos from the China trip in the holidays.

Carey and I went to get the key for the noticeboard so we could put the posters in behind the glass, but we realised the task was going to be more difficult than we initially thought. When we slid the glass door across and tried to position the posters, the height of the notice board was slightly less than two posters on top of each other, so we decided the only way to fit all the posters on the board was to position them horizontally. However, there were quite a few notices from ages ago that were still stuck there on the notice board. Things like UNITEC revision classes, ball gown hire, scholarship applications… and we didn’t know which ones we could take off or which ones we could cover. Mr Moore walked past and told us that we could pretty much take off anything we wanted, so in the end we just gun-stapled the posters over all the old notices. That way they would still be there after International Languages Week. Good thinking!

At lunch time we had the pinyata hitting game set up outside B Block and it drew quite a big crowd. The first pinyata we had was circular and quite small compared to the other one. The rules were one hit per person and they were spun around blindfolded before they got to hit. It didn’t take long for the first pinyata to break. In fact, the person who swung the last hit at the pinyata managed to bring the whole pinyata to the ground. Everyone (mainly junior boys) jumped at the chance for a small confectionery but the pile up looked like they were fighting over something worth a lot more than a lolly!

After that little brawl I was a little worried for the second pinyata that was twice the size. This one was in the shape of a horse and it took a lot more swings before it showed any signs of damage. After so many attempts the donkey/horse was still swinging and twisting on the string. That all changed when Mr Beguely stepped up to the mark. He took one whack at it and it was enough to break a hole in the pinyata. You can guess what happened next – that’s right, everyone dived in and started a massive orgy of scrambling for lollies. So all in all, quite a successful lunchtime in my opinion!