Volunteer work in New Zealand: Miranda, Coromandel Peninsula
31st of May, until 3rd of July, 2025.
Mark and his son Charlie pick me up from the airport. Such a nice thing to have someone picking you up from the airport. It never happened to me before. Well, not that I flight a lot anyway…
At home, I meet Kanani, who is originally from Hawaii but has been living in New Zealand for about 40 years; their daughter Kameia and her boyfriend Jack. Mark is from the UK but has also been living here for a very long time. Both of them know a lot about New Zealand, so I’m happy to stay with them and learn more about this country.
I like Kanani immediately. Actually, I had already liked her even from her photograph on Workaway. For me it’s like I already know her from other life. We have homemade pizza for dinner which is a great start!
I supposedly came here to help with some gardening, like weeding and pruning, but also they had asked me previously if I could do some caulking, or if I had ever used a caulking gun. Well, I have a hell lot of experience with it, so I told them that I could definitely do that. So on my first few days I did some gardening, but as I started doing the caulking on a raining day, they liked the result so much that they put me in charge of only doing that. Yeah, I was doing caulking for the entire time I was here. It’s absolutely alright for me because, as they both said, that’s something they could not do, while gardening they can, and as my main goal while doing volunteer work is to help my hosts with what they need, I’m happy to do caulking for a whole month, why not?
The place where they live is awesome. There’s so much land! They have veggie garden, trees, fruit trees, trees, six sheep, trees, six chickens, trees, and then some more trees. Laugh. It’s gorgeous here and I love it! The house is stunning, with an amazing and large kitchen, and also large living room, huge bathroom and the bedrooms. I’m staying in a marvelous bedroom with a lovely king size bed, door and view to the lovely garden. The house is all made out of wood, with cemented floor, and there’s art all over the place. Most of them are by Kanani but also some by her family and friends.
Kanani is an artist and even though now she’s focusing in her paintings, she has done different types of arts before, like ceramics and felt, for example. She has a big felt piece in the hall which I love. Her latest theme is birds, and in all her paintings she adds words, Maori and English words. Her paintings are beautiful. She will have the opening of an exhibition soon, in Thames, the first biggest town outside here.
Mark was a teacher for most of his life, even though he started studying Theology in University. He still does some online teaching now, after his retirement. He’s also writing a book with a very interesting topic, regarding the Gospels of the Bible. But it’s not a religious book, by the opposite, is a way of looking at this topic from a non-believer perspective. Even though the book is fiction, it’s all based on facts and history. Mark himself does not believe in god or anything related to spirituality, and that would be the topic of a few of our conversations. Well, at least at first. After sometime, I felt as, in the opposite of my good friend Miles, for example, Mark wasn’t really taken in consideration what I was telling him about my beliefs. Instead, it seems he was only waiting for me to finish my sentences in order to reply his opinion afterwards. That demotivated me to keep on with our chats, which I thought to be very interesting at the beginning. And that’s because I’m the type of person who doesn’t like to feel intimidated while having a conversation, any kind of conversation. I don’t like to feel as I have to prove myself with every sentence I say. It’s exhausting and unpleasant. I might be wrong about Mark’s true intention, but at least that is how I felt about it.
But we’ve spend some good times together and I learned a lot with him, regarding many different topics. He told me all about Dungens & Dragons, which I had no idea what kind of game was it, but being a pro and playing it for over 30 years now, he was the best person to talk to about it. We also had a very fun afternoon shooting some stuff with a BB rifle. It was so cool! I’ve never done anything like that before. I’ve never shot anything ever before. And I love it! But we only shot recycle things and later on some homemade targets.
With Kanani the conversations flow easily and without restrictions. I do wish we’ve had more long conversations, but as we were both busy with our works (me with the caulking and she with her art), we would only have sometime to talk while preparing dinner, and soon after it, as I also wanted to do some of my personal things, and she hers. But every time that we get to talk it’s always so nice. And I also learned a lot with her about feelings and life. I feel like I’m with my mum, even though I’ve never had the chance of chatting like that with my mum. Actually, that’s a thing that I have mostly notice after my travels in New Zealand. Many times I have encountered ladies in my travels with whom I’ve had a great mum and daughter kind of feeling. Which I now think it’s perhaps a way of the universe compensate me for not having had that before with my mum (I’m sure we will once I’m back to Brazil), but also for these ladies to have either a contact with a daughter who they never had, or someone who reminds them of their daughters who are now adults and have left home. Well, with Kanani it’s not really the case, as Kameia is only 18 years old, but perhaps an older daughter she didn’t have. And I say this only because I have family feelings towards her and not simply friendship feelings.
We mostly take turns cooking. For breakfast and lunch is always everyone for themselves, which I love it. I have porridge most of the mornings, but I also have toasts from time to time. And I have my first avocado toast here. Yay! It’s actually delicious! But I don’t take a photo for Instagram. They have really good coffee, but I only have coffee two times a week, during my days off. On the remaining days I have English Breakfast Tea or Lady Grey. Yummy! Kanani makes the most delicious jams / marmalades (my favourites are the lemon and blueberry and plum ones), and Mark bakes some nice breads from time to time. But they also buy the most delicious sliced breads for toasts, the ones with loads of seeds which I love. They have loads of apples and plums trees, so during the season, Kanani makes lots of stuff in conserve. One of my all times favourite is a sweet chilly with ginger sauce, which I can eat with basically everything. They also make liquors with their fruits, and I try some of the whiskey and vodka, and they are both great.
Kanani cooks some amazing dishes. She also bakes my first pumpkin pie. Dear Loki, I love it so much! She would bake it twice, the second time just before I leave. Yummy! She also bakes the best ginger bread in History! And I keep copying her recipes and make notes about it. Hopefully one day I can reproduce them. We make our own pizza sometimes too, which is awesome. Kanani also makes salsa quite often, and it’s delicious! We have with almost everything but I love having it with tortillas and some beans or chickpeas. Kameia also makes some nice dishes, including some delicious chocolate chunk cookies.
I make our Brazilian prato feito (made meal) once and it’s nice. In that same night I also bake our carrot cake with brigadeiro for icing. It’s yummy! Ah! And I also bake empanadas once.
We go to Kanani’s opening, and it’s so nice. Although I feel a bit overwhelmed by the amount of people around. We are all inside the tiny gallery, and so many people talking to me, it’s a bit hectic, but I survive. I have two glasses of Chardonnay to help me with that. The exhibition is lovely and there are so many wonderful pieces of art at it. And also lovely people. Among them all I meet Kate, a friend of Kanani who plays the harp, and in fact she’s playing this night. She’s adorable and invites me to come and learn how to make cheese with her. I say yes, of course! It would turn out to be a wonderful experience!
Time passes really fast, and even now as I write this I cannot believe that I was with them for one month. It seems way shorter than that. My initial plan was to stay for whole two months, and I’m sure it would be awesome, but now I must start my travels in order to be able to see more of New Zealand both islands.
On my last night they take me to a local pub. How cool! I have fish and chips (it’s a local thing in New Zealand) and an amazing IPA beer. Everything is absolutely amazing! We play cards as well, as Charlie is staying with us again and also came along. It’s pretty much fun and a great last night.
Kanani drives me to a hitchhiking point just outside Thames next morning. It’s sad to say goodbye to her as I wish we could spend more time together. But everything happens for a reason and I just have to believe that there was one for the fact that I couldn’t stay longer here. I’m happy anyway. Really happy! I feel incredibly blessed for have spent my time here in Miranda with Kanani and Mark.
10 Years Around the World 