This is a story I wrote for Homework in Term 1, and I was looking at it and I thought, "This is actually a good piece of writing," So I decided to recraft it a bit and post it on here! Enjoy <3
I remember feeling the boat sway beneath my unsteady feet. I remember my heart, swelling and pounding beneath my best embroidered pinafore. We were on a boat, had been for about 5-and-three-quarters months. We had almost arrived in New Zealand, supposedly a country of new opportunities (or so the men onboard had said). They were quite fond of me, as I was young and apparently sweet, just eleven years old, the youngest on ship. We had travelled far and wide from England, a busy country. I had HATED it there, although it was sad saying dreary goodbyes to beloved friends. There were screams of joy and relief as the tiny island of New Zealand came into view. I felt a burst of cheer in my stomach, which spread all over my body until I felt as happy as the men aboard had been. They had gone positively BONKERS by then, dancing, cheering, drinking. Lots and lots of drinking. My mother hugged me hard as my father danced with his mates, clearly drunk already. I remember mum sighing and tutting, but laughing as she had been so excited of our arrival. Mum lumbered us with the luggage, my suitcase being the smallest of all. It was brown leather, with stamps and stickers pasted on carefully. These were from the day I went to uptown London to visit my Uncle Richard and Aunt Violet. They’d bought me thousands of stamps, all so I could start a collection. I decided to stick them on the suitcase because that way I couldn’t lose them, and I thought the suitcase the perfect place to glue stamps onto, because that way I could show off all of the places I’d been. I keep the suitcase to this day, shut in a wardrobe, with everything I took on my journey tucked away inside. Maori greeted us, and although they couldn’t understand us, and we couldn’t understand them, they seemed calm that we’d arrived, almost as if they’d expected our arrival. Traders already had approached us, offering cloth, woods, and things mandatory for survival such as water and food. Some offers are politely declined, others taken straight into action, the contents of their suitcases thrown tactlessly on the dusty ground as they look for things worth offering. My Mother, Father, Dad’s mate Kevin, Kevin’s son, daughter and wife and I branched away from our shipmates who took no care ensuring shelter before the darkness dawned. Kevin, Dad and Kevin’s son David go to chop wood with an axe that Kevin traded when we had arrived. Kevin’s daughter, Charlotte, and Kevin’s wife, Victoria were chatty as anything, Mother and I could not get a word in edgeways. When the males arrived back at ‘The Stump’(a tree stump just a few metres away from civilization), they had planks, corrugated metal (courtesy of David) and had nipped out to trade some cotton, a knife, some needles, cloth in every colour of the rainbow, and food and water to last a few weeks. Mum and Victoria began sewing blankets, towels, pillows (with a stuffing of soft leaves) and socks for bitter winter nights (though by then we were guaranteed a real house as it was Spring in New Zealand). After we had eaten a meal of raw Kumara (a strange maori potato) and small rations of bread, the men set up a weird little tent, shelter type thing posts around in a circle, corrugated metal set on top. We were a bit squashed like sardines, I can remember Charlotte’s elbow digging into my hip, Mum’s head on my thigh, and David’s feet on my stomach. That was our first day in New Zealand, where I live now, in Dunedin, New Zealand. It’s amazing to see how much it’s evolved, from full of trees to barren land to a thriving city, full of people, full of places to go. I wouldn’t have it any other way.
I remember feeling the boat sway beneath my unsteady feet. I remember my heart, swelling and pounding beneath my best embroidered pinafore. We were on a boat, had been for about 5-and-three-quarters months. We had almost arrived in New Zealand, supposedly a country of new opportunities (or so the men onboard had said). They were quite fond of me, as I was young and apparently sweet, just eleven years old, the youngest on ship. We had travelled far and wide from England, a busy country. I had HATED it there, although it was sad saying dreary goodbyes to beloved friends. There were screams of joy and relief as the tiny island of New Zealand came into view. I felt a burst of cheer in my stomach, which spread all over my body until I felt as happy as the men aboard had been. They had gone positively BONKERS by then, dancing, cheering, drinking. Lots and lots of drinking. My mother hugged me hard as my father danced with his mates, clearly drunk already. I remember mum sighing and tutting, but laughing as she had been so excited of our arrival. Mum lumbered us with the luggage, my suitcase being the smallest of all. It was brown leather, with stamps and stickers pasted on carefully. These were from the day I went to uptown London to visit my Uncle Richard and Aunt Violet. They’d bought me thousands of stamps, all so I could start a collection. I decided to stick them on the suitcase because that way I couldn’t lose them, and I thought the suitcase the perfect place to glue stamps onto, because that way I could show off all of the places I’d been. I keep the suitcase to this day, shut in a wardrobe, with everything I took on my journey tucked away inside. Maori greeted us, and although they couldn’t understand us, and we couldn’t understand them, they seemed calm that we’d arrived, almost as if they’d expected our arrival. Traders already had approached us, offering cloth, woods, and things mandatory for survival such as water and food. Some offers are politely declined, others taken straight into action, the contents of their suitcases thrown tactlessly on the dusty ground as they look for things worth offering. My Mother, Father, Dad’s mate Kevin, Kevin’s son, daughter and wife and I branched away from our shipmates who took no care ensuring shelter before the darkness dawned. Kevin, Dad and Kevin’s son David go to chop wood with an axe that Kevin traded when we had arrived. Kevin’s daughter, Charlotte, and Kevin’s wife, Victoria were chatty as anything, Mother and I could not get a word in edgeways. When the males arrived back at ‘The Stump’(a tree stump just a few metres away from civilization), they had planks, corrugated metal (courtesy of David) and had nipped out to trade some cotton, a knife, some needles, cloth in every colour of the rainbow, and food and water to last a few weeks. Mum and Victoria began sewing blankets, towels, pillows (with a stuffing of soft leaves) and socks for bitter winter nights (though by then we were guaranteed a real house as it was Spring in New Zealand). After we had eaten a meal of raw Kumara (a strange maori potato) and small rations of bread, the men set up a weird little tent, shelter type thing posts around in a circle, corrugated metal set on top. We were a bit squashed like sardines, I can remember Charlotte’s elbow digging into my hip, Mum’s head on my thigh, and David’s feet on my stomach. That was our first day in New Zealand, where I live now, in Dunedin, New Zealand. It’s amazing to see how much it’s evolved, from full of trees to barren land to a thriving city, full of people, full of places to go. I wouldn’t have it any other way.