Sea World

On the second day of our trip, we went to Sea World.We met up with my mum's friend and my mum's sister's friend. First, we went to a sea lion show. The sea lions show was a story with a couple of sea lions. The story was about a greedy lady, who sells fish. But she is taking all the fish so a detective, a policeman and a sea lion tries to stop her. It was quite funny and the sea lion was really good.

Next, we went to the dolphin the show. This show wasn't a story, it was one where they talked about saving the dolphins. While the rescuers were talking, the dolphins were doing jumps and flips. Near the end of the show, the two trainers were standing on two dolphins each. Then the dolphins went underwater, but the trainers didn't, then they jumped up are they all went flying. It was hard to take photos because my camera was a bit slow but here is the best one.

After the dolphins did they final flips, we went to see some Polar Bears. There was this cute Polar Bear just sitting there eating a piece of meat. After a while he decided to go for a swim. He kept on doing the same thing over and over again. He would sit at the surface then dive under and pop up at the other end. To get to the start, he would fall on it's back and swim back. When he popped up, he would get his big, white paws and wipe his eyes. It was cute because he wasn't trained to do that. He was almost human.

My cousin, Josh, wanted to look at the sharks. We walked along a path and ended up underwater. We were in this room that had a big glass window. We could see all the different sharks and fish. It was amazing that the fish were swimming with the sharks and survived. There were about ten medium sized sharks and one big shark. Just as we were leaving, the big shark came up to the window and kept banging it's head on the window. It did that until a man, who was underwater, pushed his nose away.

When we were walking back to the rides, we passed a water tank, that a lot of people were putting their hands into. I thought that the people were patting dolphins but they we patting sting-rays. The tank was split into two parts. The smaller part had the little sting-rays and it had a sign that said, "Don't touch the head of the tail, only the sides". In the deeper end, the were huge sting-rays that were harder to touch because they kept on turning different directions. I stuck my hand in because I wanted to come home and tell everyone that I touched I sting-ray. When a sting-ray came by I reached out but a soon a I touched it, I pull it straight out. I did that because it was so slimy that it shocked me.

There were only two rides there, there was the Sea Viper and the Jet Rescue. I didn't go on the Sea Viper because it was closed when I got there. I went on the Jet Rescue instead. The Jet Rescue was I ride when you on jet skies and you go really fast. When it started I shut my eyes but after the first turn I open them.When we turn, it looked like we were vertical. As soon as you start it takes a picture of you, it was closing time so it didn't take any photos.
I wish we could go back again.

Our Hotel

Yesterday, I came back from Australia. We stayed in a hotel, in Surfers Paradise. The hotel is called The Equinox Sun Resort, it's right across the road from the beach and has a swimming pool. The Equinox is not a tall hotel because it is only thirteen floors high, most hotels on the Gold Coast are thirty floors high. We were on the twelfth floor so we had a great view of the beach, the pool and the tennis courts. 



  My cousins came to Australia too but we stayed for eight nights and they only stayed for four nights.We went to the pool twice a day because the temperature was up to 30ºC. On the second to last day, it was raining a lot. So dad suggested that we all get into our togs and go down to the spa. When we got down there the rain stopped and so we just played in the pool.

 






At night the pool lights turn on because the pool closes at 9:30 and it is dark then. The lights are blue and they make shadows on the pool walls, when you swim at night. At night, when you look out at the city, there are a lot of bright lights. I like looking out at the city when the sun is setting. All the street lights  and building lights makes Surfers Paradise look busy. Standing on the balcony at night made me feel like I was in a movie. But I did miss New Zealand.

Water Beds

A couple of days ago, I was wondering what a water bed is. Is it a bed that goes underwater? Is it a type of bed that a fish sleeps in? I found out that a water bed is a mattress filled with water.
My mum showed me a funny video about water beds. In Germany there is a tv show that pulls pranks on people. One of their pranks was in a bed shop and they did...

Click here to find out.

Outlook for Someday Reflections

Finally it is done, in the post up to Auckland.  In room 13, Ms T showed us a poster about a movie competition called The Outlook for Someday. The Outlook for Someday competition is a movie competition for young New Zealanders (under 24), to make a short movie about sustainability. So I went into a group with Renee, Be, Arielle and Lily. We did ours on Water Pollution. We did a news report, Be was the news reporter. She crossed over to Renee, Renee was a fish and she interviewed Arielle and Lily and they were fish too. When Renee finished, Be said that there was another report by herself and Lily(Lily was a reporter). Be said that was the end of the report. Here is our movie.

Something that I learnt from this project that I did not know before was…
* Information: When we were researching, Be found a website that tells you all about Pollution. We clicked on Water Pollution and there was a list of how long it takes for things to degrade. I didn't know that glass takes so long to degrade, that no one knows how long it takes.
* Process: When I was editing our movie, I needed to green screen so Ms T showed me how to green screen. So I learnt how to green screen. I showed a lot of people how to green screen after that.

The part of this project that was most challenging for me was…
The most challenging part of making the movie was finding the right colours for our fish because we had to green screen them. At the start we painted them yellow but then we found out that yellow is too close to green and so we had see threw fish.

The part of this project I found most rewarding was…
The most rewarding part was when Ms T put all the forms and the DVD of our movie in an envelop because then I knew it was all done, all the hard work had paid off.

The thing I need to improve on the most is…
I need to improve on thinking about what might happen when I do something, like when I painted the fish yellow and I didn't think about the green screen.

The thing I found that I am really good at is…
I think I'm good at editing movies because I helped two other groups edit their movies.

If I had to do another Outlook for Someday movie, the things I would do differently are:
Next time I will take time to make the fish better because they didn't fit their heads that well. You
could see the gaps between their heads and the fish heads.
I would also fix the sounds because they go loud and soft a bit.
I would make the editing a bit smoother. When the scenes change it is a bit jumpy.

Getting Ready for Aussie

In the holidays, my Family and I are going to Australia for a holiday. At the end of the last day of term, we are going to start getting ready. We will organise what suitcases we are going to take. The warmest it is here is the coldest it there so I will have to buy some clothes. I have been saving up some money but one New Zealand dollar is eighty cents Australian, hopefully things are cheaper in Australia. My cousins are coming too. They live in Auckland and I don't get to see them that much. I will take lots of pictures over there so I can put them on my blog.

Ki O Rahi

Room 13 have been learning a new game. It's called Ki O Rahi. Ki O Rahi is a game that was played since World War 1. Ki O Rahi was created as a peaceful way of sorting out arguments. When Ki O Rahi had been banned, rugby was introduce. During World War 2, Ki O Rahi was played again. The Maori showed other countries how to play, like Italy and France. In 2005 it was introduced to over 31000 schools in America.The first international matches were held between New Zealand and France in 2010.

Tom from Wellington City Council, taught us how to play Ki O Rahi. For Ki O Rahi, you play on a circle field, so someone mowed a big circle with little circles inside, on our field. This is what the field looks like:

The Kioma start with the ball. Someone from the Kioma team, stands in the Te Marama and throws the ball to another Kioma player, in the Pawero. The people in the Pawero throw it out to a player in the Te Ao zone. The Kioma team are trying to hit as many Pou as the can. One touch of the Pou equals one point but they can't get the points until they score a try. To score a try they need to run through the Te Roto zone and put the ball in the Te Kahaarait line. Once a try is scored, the ball starts back in the Te Marama zone and the Kioma try and get another try.
The Taniwha team, try and get the ball off the Kioma. Once they have the ball, they run up to the Te Kahaarait line and throw the ball at the Tupu. The two Kioma people in the Pawero try and stop the ball from hitting the Tupu. Once the Taniwha hit the Tupu, they try and get the ball again, and try and hit the Tupu again and again. The Te Ara zone is a zone that no one can walk on, the only time someone can walk on it, is when someone in the Te Ao zone wants to swap with someone in the Pawero.
 In this video that I made, the Green team are the Taniwha and the yellow team are the Kioma. It is a video of some of Room 13 playing and it has some voice overs of me explaining what it the aim of the game is. You should listen because it has good background music. If you Click Here it will take you to a website that has the Ki O Rahi legend and a Glossary. Here is the video about playing Ki O Rahi:

Do you like One Direction

For Statistics, in Room 13, I had to do a Tally Chart. The Question was:

Do You Like One Direction?

Yes: 11 People like One Direction.
No: 16 People don't like One Direction.

I thought more people would like One Direction because One Direction are really famous. I don't like One Direction but it is ok because everyone has their own opinion. Do you like One Direction? Please write your answer in the comment box.