We worked with the families that were going to be moving into these houses. Whatever family moves into the house they have to work 500 hours on either their own house or others being built with Habitat. So it was a really great feeling to be working with these families because they were so excited to have all of the help from volunteers to get their house built faster so they could move in. I cant even begin to imagine how excited and anxious they feel right now as their house is being built. This one lady, Sammie is moving into one of the 5 bedroom houses we worked on with her four children. Her oldest daughter is 15 so as soon as she turns 16 she can come help build with her mom to knock off some of the hours for their family. Most of the families that are moving into these houses are living with other big families in a small house and have been living like this for such a long time. It really gives the whole family so much opportunity to get to live in these houses because the children get to have better educations because they are in a comfortable living environment and they are not moving around and many other reasons. In order to live in the houses they also have to have a job. So they stay busy. After moving in they do sessions that will teach them how to be a homeowner and how to budget and take care of the house.
After a few hours around 10ish a church group of 5 came to help build. My new friend Sam and me were assigned to do the bathrooms so we pretty much built two bathrooms in two different apartments on our own, (minus some minor details.. I mean major details). We just worked and worked really hard all day long on these bathrooms.
So after we worked really hard on Saturday I got picked up at 4:30 and I was almost the last one to be there so that was good. Everybody else left about an hour earlier than I did but that just means I am an extra hard worker, haha!! So Larraine (my host family) and Margreet (the mother or one of the workers at habitat on Saturday) knew each other because they both do things for Habitat and Margreet and the other people that I worked with on Saturday invited me to go to their church. I had Larraine call Margreet to arrange plans for this ride because I thought it was a good idea to go to church with my new friends that I made and I won’t go on Easter Sunday which will be really weird because I think I have always gone to church on Easter Sunday.
So Larraine picked me up and made me dinner and we ate and then I worked on a little bit of homework, Skyped with Ian then went to bed and got up early to go to church on Sunday. Margreet picked me up and then after church I hung out with Sam and went to Botney which is just a cool little mall with lots of stores and activities going on around. There was a band that played and there was those bungy trampoline jumps and things like that. I got a long sleeve shirt because it was so cold there and I got another water bottle to replace the one I left on the airplane.
After Botany Sam and I went on this little walk around this cute little park to waste time until his dad came and picked us up.
Then we drove through town for awhile longer and looked at other hot spots and then went home and ate dinner at a Thai restaurant and that was really nice. Everything was just so perfect and great and I learned so much by doing this extra week in Auckland. And had so much fun and got a lot done all in that amount of time.
The next morning (Monday) Larraine and I woke up early and worked at the Habitat for Humanity second hand store. It was a lot of fun and I feel like I did a lot and helped make the store a little nicer. We worked really hard on the clothes section because there was so many clothes that needed to be put out and organized so we organized that whole section and made a male and female section and made certain sections for small, medium and large clothing because before it was just all clumped together and not organized at all before. This will really help people and point them in the right direction when they are looking for something. I also did a few other miscellaneous jobs that I found here and there but it was actually a really enjoyable job. I really liked doing that and I feel that it is so nice to volunteer because you can work hard and make a difference but it can be on your own schedule and not have to be so by the book in a real job and listen to a boss every second. Plus I just kind of like the company and walking around and going back and doing what I think needed to be done to make it a more appropriate place.
Between Larraine and I we definitely did some damage on the clothes section and it looks so much better than it did before we worked on it. There is still so much more work that needs to be done in that store and I feel like if I had a whole month to just work there I could make it so much better but I just have to deal with the fact that it was just for one day and be happy with the job I did.
After Larraine and I left the store we came home and relaxed a bit and then Sam’s mom invited me over to her house because she was cooking dinner for Joanna, Nick and Sam (Joanna and Nick also worked at Habitat on Monday and built houses with me and they were from the church program also) so she invited me to come along also so Larraine drove me to Sam’s mom’s house and we had a nice dinner and hung out and watched desperate house wives and then Jackie (Sam’s mom) drove me home.
I got home and went to bed and then woke up early morning on Tuesday and met Sam at Habitat and we finished the bathrooms. We actually didn’t finish them but we got so much done on them so now they can be ready for the next step. As soon as we finished that job around 2pm we got dropped off in the City of Auckland to walk around and explore. We were going to go to an underwater place with penguins and sharks but it was closed by the time we walked over that way. Instead we walked around and saw some cool views of the city and played around in the parks and got ice cream and waited for Sam’s dad to come pick us up at 6.
Goodnight!!
When he picked us up he then drove me back to Larraine and John’s house and I worked on homework and got a lot of research done for my paper that I am going to write. Then I went to bed because my plane was leaving in the morning from Auckland to Christchurch.
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