We love getting gifts from home! Since we’ve been here we’ve received a few packages from family members (Thank You Mum and Lisa) and two packages from friends.
At Christmas time, the Gaigers sent us a package which included some spectacularly kiwi t-shirts (mine was from Dannevirke! – see it here)
Yesterday I checked our mailbox for the first time in a couple of weeks (explanation in a moment) and found a delightful little package from the Birds. And it included some kiwi chocolate and some chocolate fish!
But the best part was the enclosed letter. It is great to hear about what is happening in the lives of people we no longer see every day (or week, or month).
So this post is to say a special thank you to Mum and Lisa and the Birds and the Gaiger’s for their thoughtfulness and to let you know that you are not out of our thoughts or prayers.
If you send something (even a letter) and it takes us ages to reply, it could be that we are just tardy about checking our mailbox. Why? As you know in NZ the mailbox is right outside your home. In condo’s in the US, this is not necessarily the case. Our mailbox lives in an apartment building of its own as you can see. A second reason is we don’t get much in it. We get two bills each month (power and gas), the odd thing from church (once a month or so on average) and lots and lots of junk mail. So there is often not a great incentive to check it and as long as we get our bills paid nobody bothers us about it.
A note on chocolate fish. Last night we were telling one of our American friends that we received some chocolate fish in the mail and they screwed up their face and said “Ewwww”. When we think of Chocolate fish, we automatically think of marshmallow and chocolate. They think of chocolate and cold, wet silvery fish.
[Amya - there is a place here to sleep if you ever come and visit.]
