First week at Rotorua in rewind

I arrived in Rotorua a week ago...yesterday here is whats happened so far.  The day I arrived I headed out from Auckland at 8 in the morning with my good friend I made Joe.  We would have made it to Rotorua on Friday but the bus system can be a bit wonky at times so in order to save almost 50 dollars we bused from Paihia to Auckland and stayed at the base Auckland for the night.  That was a most interesting night we walked around Auckland and found a Chinese restaurant to eat.  Well lets say I didn't know I was still in Auckland we were the definite minority in the restaurant, I didn't even know what I had ordered but they came out looking like chicken nuggets so I was really excited...only to find out they still had bones in them.  Has anyone tried to eat fried chicken bits with bones in them with chopsticks?   I think I would hold the world record for flying chicken bits!  the whole staff was taking turns watching me try to eat these things, finally I just ate them  like extremely tiny chicken wing.  In the end I gave up the amount of food wasn't worth the work around the bones and headed to get a milk shake from Wendy's down the road.
Anyways back to Saturday.  I arrive at Rotorua at noon and said good bye to my friend Joe and was picked up by my host families son Harley.  Harley dropped me off at the house and said good luck mate we'll be back and the parents will be back.  So there I was alone in a house that I didn't even know...crazy for them to trust me so explicitly that they just drop me off.  Harley had just returned from Australia working on an open pit gold mine.  He and his wife didn't have a place to live as she (Shonna) went into labor 5 weeks early, lucky that Harley flew in from Australia early!  Everybody came home at the same time and I met Allan and Marry who own the house, their son and his wife (Harley and Shonna) and the newest member of the family Georgia. 
Sunday September 5 happens to be New Zealand's fathers day so every one was off out and about while I was left to my own devices.  I happened to get ahold of my cooperating teacher so I got a crash course of the layout of the school and what I needed to wear and where to go.   Monday...I was instructed to be at school at a quarter to eight for a teachers meeting.  Well the meeting didn't start tell half past eight so I felt kinda strange sitting in the lounge by myself for near an hour.  Beside that thought the week went off with out a hitch and I am becoming very comfortable with the school the students and the teachers.  To go into everything that happened would take forever so I will highlight the important things. 
Tuesday: I went for a run in the Redwoods with my cooperating teaching, a slow pace but the forest is beautiful and it was a relaxing 10k. 
Thursday:  I went for a run with my cooperating teachers son who is in impeccable shape.  I hadn't ran very much in the last few weeks and it was all I could do to not loose my pre-run banana.
Friday: I made it through all my classes and went and played badminton with my cooperating teacher for 2.5 hours (plus all the club members).  One of the club members is an old wily Canadian who would trash me at the game with out breaking a sweat!  After getting beat horribly by every one in the club we headed to a local pub called the Pig and Whistle, named and established in an old cop shop.  Mmmmm good New Zealand fish and chips with several pints of beer, a great way to end the week.
The week wasn't as exciting as I had hoped, mainly because it has been raining nearly non-stop so most activities outdoors were limited by the massive amounts of water pouring from the sky.  Saturday I grabbed the bus and explored the city trying to get my bearings of the area but that got cut very short by the rain.  Sunday, well today...tomorrow for all of you.   Today I went to church in the morning, read a bit then explored the hot springs.  There are an amazing amount of geothermal activity in this area and my host family took me out to check them out and to one of the hot springs you can go swim in (however Yellowstone makes this place seem small) the rest of the day was spent soaking in a hot spring and eating good food!  That is pretty much the week in a nutshell, I am going to get some more photos out soon.  Take Care, Cheers!