Painting at the Settlement

Since last Friday we’ve been at an intentional Quaker community in Wanganui, a few hours from Wellington on the west coast of the North Island. The Quaker Settlement started about 30 years ago. Each family has their own house and are responsible for their household finances and possessions. In the middle of the houses are shared conference center facilities that can be rented to outside groups. Everyone in the Settlement pitches in to maintain the common facilities.

About every 10 years the houses and common buildings at the settlement need to be painted. This year they organized a work week offering food, fun, and accommodation in exchange for painting and other help. Matt has been masking windows and doors and I’ve been painting. There were heaps of people here over the weekend but there aren’t quite so many now. Mostly it’s just us and the settlers painting with a few other people.

The upcoming Earlham program to New Zealand is planning to spend a few weeks here at the beginning of the program. The facilities here are perfect for a group like that- small rooms with shared sleeping accommodation, big kitchen, dining facilities, teaching space, and gardens.

If you’d like to read more about the settlement, here is a link to their webpage:
http://www.quaker.org.nz/groups/the-quaker-settlement
and there are pictures here:
http://www.quaker.org.nz/groups/photographs-of-the-settlement

We're not sure where we're going or what we're doing next. Hopefully we'll figure that out today!

Carrie