Surprises

Driving, Mass, Lunch, Ice Skating, Tyburn Monastery: all the ingredients of a really awesome girls retreat. Life has lately been this hectic rush to get assignments finished, studying started and working extra shifts, but over the weekend I had the privilege of going on a retreat to Auckland with God's Girls. God's Girls is the girls group that I attend at church, run by the amazing Kelly and her sidekick Christine! It was an all girls trip to Auckland, with the complimentary boy, Joseph. I got to spend my weekend with the holiest women around. We set off from church at 7:40, 10 minutes later than we had planned, and took the 2 1/2 drive to Auckland, stopping at The Copper Kettle Cafe for a rest. I had the lucky job of driving; lucky until we arrived in Auckland. Never have I encountered so much traffic, incorrect directions and nose bleeds all in one go! First of all I had to contend with the nightmare one girl had of us all dying on the inside lane of the motorway, hundreds of millions of cars (albeit a slight exaggeration), directions to the Anglican Cathedral, not the Catholic one which is where we were headed in the first place, and one passenger having a nose bleed at the stress of all the traffic. We made it to the Catholic Cathedral of St Patrick's, eventually, and found the most amazing shop, one with all the Catholic things you can dream of. If I had been in the shop long I would've bought everything. We went into the beautifully crafted church, and to the delight of us all, adoration was taking place.

The vast ceilings, impressive size, beautiful sanctuary and holy statues all spoke greatness and pure elation of the heavens. It gave you an insight into the beauty that heaven holds, what is waiting for us. Unaware of the time we sat in adoration, and through a mass that we had no idea was going to be on, we were guided to this Holy place in time for the highest form of prayer by none other than the Holy Spirit. We couldn't believe our luck at the opportunity to join God in such a beautiful place. Soon after mass we went to the food court for some lunch, to my immense surprise we past an English Lolly Shop, so naturally I had to drop in, the alluring sweet smell brought me to the good old English lollies, so I bought some. During our planning of God's Girls trip to Auckland we decided to do something really fun that we hadn't really done before, not sure how we came to the conclusion of this but we all decided on going ice skating. It's something that not many of us had ever had the opportunity to do. It's crazy that being in such a cold place you can be so warm. We spent and hour and a half on the ice skating round, trying to look really good (we were the best there ... apart from the figure skater). We all had the experience of falling over, some more than others, myself bring one. I now sit here nursing a very sore, fat, black knee. It was o much fun just being able to relax and enjoy the present without the worry of assignments, jobs etc, but the best was yet to come ...

About two months ago I went with a handful of girls to Tyburn Monastery in Ngakuru, Rotorua, where we got to live out two days of being a cloistered nun, we went behind the grille and went to all their prayers, masses, helped with their jobs, particularly the gardens. We just hung out with them, I have never met such a joyful group of women, so naturally we all got along very well. Tyburn also have a Convent in Auckland and so we ended up staying the night there. We pulled up and rang the door bell, waited ... to my absolute joy, none other than Mother Justin walks out to greet us! In total shock I ran to give er a hug! I was not expecting this. Since going to Tyburn in Ngakuru, Mother Justin, Mother Christina and Mother Joanna have been transferred up to Auckland, Kelly did a very good job of keeping this all a secret! We got to spend time with Mother Justin before she went back to her jobs, we settled into our rooms, enjoyed some really yummy pizza and nun tea! There is something special about tea at a monastery, it just tastes so much better, it can't be beaten! We got to join in with their prayers and just relax. Just being somewhere so peaceful and calm is something I recommend, time out from the craziness of life. Games were played: snap, taboo and a game new to us, Bananagrams. We sat up till 11 playing this, realising that we should go to bed as we were getting up at 4:45 to attend the first lot of morning prayers. We attended mass, and cleaned up. We had to say our goodbyes to Mother Justin through the car window, and off we were home. We sat quietly for the next 2 1/2 hours, from sleep deprivation, I still had the unfortunate task of driving, even with my black bruised knee. 

The trip was an awesome trip that was enjoyable, with injuries, blood, shopping, mass and lots of surprises. A trip that will be remembered by all!