New Zealand shocks the world!

How about our boys humbling Italy Sunday at the World Cup in South Africa? They're calling it the biggest shock so far at the 2010 World Cup (and it's definitely NZ's best soccer result ever). Ranked 78th in the world, the New Zealand All Whites managed to hold Italy, the defending world champs! And we're happy to take the draw (1-1) in spite of the bad ref call that allowed Italy's penalty kick goal (whereas our goal was perfect). 

This is only NZ's second World Cup ever for soccer (we're a rugby nation) and there's only 25 professional players in the whole country. (Some of our boys are bankers by day, not making the $100,000 per week soccer salary the Italians manage, for example.) Well, the All Whites sure stole the headlines from the All Blacks today! The match was actually at 2-4am NZ time, so I set the alarm just in case we had an historic moment -- and we did! (nevermind I about knocked myself out in the dark, bashing my head on a wall corner on my way to the living room -- I bounced away and did another header on the opposite wall -- that knocked me flat!) Definitely hard to get back to sleep after that match . . . and the revelling continued all morning -- on the news, at work, on the streets. Fun day to be in New Zealand!

Sorry if you're not a soccer fan, but this is big! I suppose I should report other news, like it was over 60 today, on WINTER solstice (perhaps warmer than Homer's summer solstice, we'll see when they hit June 21st -- our day is almost over). I was outside on my lunch break, making a Father's Day call to my grandpa, sitting in the sun, gazing out at the harbor, jacket-less -- that's a new one for winter solstice.

Fantastic tapa cloth exhibit opened at Te Papa this week: PaperSkin. I participated in the blessing (staff only, before public opening of all exhibits) and went in for a curator talk on Samoan siapo -- interesting since we always had them hanging in our home growing up from my dad's peace corps days in Samoa. One fijian piece is almost 23 meters long and it's the first time it has been displayed since it's creation. The musical soundscape developed for the exhibit is pretty cool too. Other than that, I went planting native cabbage trees with a conservation group last weekend -- got to do some wetland planting too. I don't know how those little guys don't just float away . . .

Well, that's about it for the last couple weeks other than the highs and lows of being away from home . . . enjoyed a great skype chat with my Homer marimba band, Tamba Hadzi, after their performance at the Kenai River Festival. I'll spare them by not posting the snapshot I took! Here's a better one from last year's Seward Music Fest:

 

Miss you girls!