Maia and Nina, Muriwai Beach
Maia and Nina are the reasons I get out of bed in the morning and why I haven’t quit my job. We take our breaks together and gossip in the sunshine in the park during lunch. I think of Maia as my magic pixie friend, with her short peppy hair and fun loving attitude. Nina is an absolute firecracker, drop dead gorgeous with a mischievous and adventurous spirit. On one of the first truly nice days of the early summer, we invite our other coworker Ejay, and Bruno, whom I met on Tinder, to go to Muriwai Beach with us. Ejay and Bruno get along like a house on fire and it’s good that they do because Maia, Nina and I set off on our own adventure. We tear off on a run down the beach and then notice something strange. There is a man with a garden rake drawing giant circles in the sand and a woman wearing a white dress is standing in one of them, holding a bouquet of flowers. I think maybe it’s some sort of wedding ceremony and, encouraged by my friends, decide to ask. The woman tells us that she’s a sand artist and the man with the rake is helping her. She says that she has a spare rake, if we also want to help.
Hell yeah we do!
The giant circles are the beginnings of a mandela and she shows us how she wants them filled in. We take turns with the rake while the other two dance around blowing bubbles and play with a singing crystal bowl. Finished with the rake, we all three sit around the bowl to experiment with making it hum louder and softer. The hippie artist instructs us to close our eyes to feel the vibrations.
“Put your intentions into the universe while you do this,” she says.
We set lofty intentions: world peace, love for all, confidence in all aspects. We feel like we’re casting a spell, hunched over this humming crystal bowl.
The hippie artist lady is a forager and she gives us flowers from her bouquet to eat. The man with the rake has drawn giant words: LIFE and DEATH. We do yoga under the LIFE and giggle about how very alive we feel on this magical black sand beach with art being made around us—by us. We run back to where Ejay and Bruno are sitting on the beach, watching us and shaking their heads. We are jazzed by how much fun we’re having and we want to dance but Ejay and Bruno are not on our wavelength and stay seated. We spy a group near us on the rocks with a boy doing back flips. This looks more like our vibe so we again leave Ejay and Bruno to ask this group if they want to dance with us.
“Umm,” one of the girls replies uncertainly. “Maybe socially distanced? We’re all one bubble and it’s probably best if we stay separate.”
That is fine by us and we dance unselfconsciously, letting the breeze run through our hair and the sun warm our exposed skin. We cheer on Backflip Boy as he performs for us and then rejoin our boys to take a hike up the hill to see our art from a higher vantage point.
This is one of my favorite days from my time in Auckland, a taster of the opportunity-grabbing I will engage in on my roadtrip. I don’t know if I would have had the confidence to engage with the sand artist without my fearless friends there to egg me on. I don’t know if I would have had as magical of a time with anyone else, if anyone else could light the spark of adventure and spontaneity in me quite the same as these two do.
Maia, brave and adventurous soul that she is, has since moved to France where she will spend a year nannying two young girls. This is perfect for her, a girl who always longed for a sister as she grew up among boys. And it’s perfect for these little French girls, too, to spend a year hanging out with a girl who spreads good vibes like they are contagious.
Whip smart Nina is studying to be a nurse and she will take her final examinations soon. Having had her fill of the administrative side of things, she works hard as a nursing assistant at various rest homes around the city. I’m so excited for her to launch out on her career and to explore independence.
Life is made special by the friendships which enrich it and I hope these women know how much they've added to mine.
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