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New Zealand notes, and goodbyes

We had some basic knowledge about New Zealand the way most Americans do — through television. Our favorite Kiwi show is Brokenwood. It’s been on 9 seasons, and airs a season earlier in the US than in its home town. Apparently, it’s not as popular in NZ as it is with us Americans. The Sunday night show were episodes we had seen on a streaming service (Acorn) back home.

Brokenwood is a police procedural, solving murders by local police officers, a detective constable, detective sergeant and of course the senior (chief inspector). It is set in a fictional small town in New Zealand, but the main police station is an actual real building in a town near Auckland. Of course we drove out to get our picture taken in front of it.

In keeping with our police station theme, we then, while staying in Dunedin in the South Island (a city I really loved), did an escape room in the old Dunedin Prison. We have done escape rooms before, but never from an actual prison.

We loved New Zealand, but sadly our Kiwi worldschool module is now over. I declare it a success. We covered lots of New Zealand immigrant history and maritime museums.

Here Sophie learns about the size of a whale’s heart.

A final sail through Auckland harbor a few hours before our flight.

And goodbye New Zealand. Back home for a few weeks and then on to Europe for Module 2!

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Working from wherever, sometimes even from Churches (New Zealand edition)

A lot of people are wondering if Jem and I plan to be on vacation for the next two years. If only. Instead, we are basically picking up second jobs as 7th and 8th grade teachers. Jem did stop teaching his regular course load and go on sabbatical. I joke that he left his college teaching job to become a middle school teacher. (Not really that much of a joke. And not one he finds that funny). He still has other academic-related commitments, but plans to do a lot of the actual teaching during the next two years.

I am maintaining my law practice. I have a lot of experience with remote working going back more than 15 years. In 2006, I thought I wanted to take a break from the law rat race and move to Hawaii. I moved to Hawaii, but never quite left my law practice and clients. In the end, I worked remotely from Hawaii. I used to say my office was wherever my laptop and cell phone were. I was remote working 15 years before it was a thing.

So, I don’t really plan to do anything differently than I have been doing for the past 4 years, other than adjust for time zones. New Zealand isn’t too bad. Some days I might have to start working as early as 5 am local time, but generally, I can have about 4 hours a day of overlap with US business hours. Not like Japan, where I have 0 overlap with U.S. business hours. For the Worldschool part, I am responsible for overseeing Math and foreign language acquisition but I will do that in the several hours a day I will get back since I am no longer driving to school, picking up from school, and taking to and from activities.

Remote working for me is really no different than for anyone else who has embraced a nomadic remote working life. We look for rentals that have work spaces or hotel rooms with a separate room for me to do calls or meetings as needed. Sometimes I really luck out and my workspace is fantastic. This one this summer had an ocean view.

So did the place we stayed in after that:

Weirdly, both locations this summer were across the street/next to churches. Something Sophie picked up on right away: “Why are our houses always next to churches?”

Our third rental of the trip had this across the street:

Weird. I don’t think New Zealand has that many churches, but we just ended up next to some of the few ones they do have. Very pretty ones to boot; at times I felt like I was back in Europe.

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Hello. This post is going to be terrible just a heads up.

Hi. This is Amalia. It’s been a while since I was here. Anyways I’m gonna talk about some pictures, I guess.



This photo was taken I think 6 years ago. This was at the skyline in New Zealand, Rotorua. If you’re wondering what Sophie is sitting in, it’s called a luge. Looking at this photo is bringing back a lot of memories. I was so happy and energetic back then :0. We still have that jellybean plush, Sophie has in the photo on her lap, at home. Sophie looks so small too, like 💀.



Our mom said we should recreate the picture so we did that. The place is a lot different but that would be expected since it was years ago. Not only has the place changed but we have also changed a lot as-well. Ok that sounded really cringe please ignore that. As you can tell in the photo I’m wearing my beautiful Dodgers cap 😌. I literally wear it everywhere. To be honest Sophie hasn’t really changed that much. Still as energetic as always.

I’m also wearing my school uniform jacket in that photo ♥️. I love that jacket <3.



This photo was a couple hours later when me and Sophie went to zip-line. I was gonna do it from the start but I didn’t want to go alone so Sophie decided to go with me because our parents were too scared lol. Even though I am terrified of heights, I still did it and it was pretty fun. As you can tell in the photo I did not take off my hat 😌. My final words before I went on the zip line was, and I quote, “If I’m gonna die I’m gonna die with me hat.” You might think I was overreacting, which I probably was, but it was seriously terrifying. It was so high up and if you fell you surely would not survive.



This is the photo of the zip-line. I realize it doesn’t look that high but trust me, that’s only ‘cause of the angle. Absolutely terrifying but at least I was with my hat 👍. Oh and Sophie.

K that’s all bye ✌️.

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Carrots Project, by Sophie

(Mr.Google) Carrots originated in modern-day Iran and Afghanistan

(Mr. Google) We believe that we began cultivating carrots around the 12th/13th century

(From History 101) Carrots were very popular also Carrots were commonly placed in tomb just chilling next to the dead Pharaohs

(Birds and Blooms) Full of beta carotene vitamin C and potassium along with tons of vitamin A

(Birds and Blooms) Fun fact even just half a cup of cooked or raw carrots contains about 204% of your recommended daily value.

So, hello. In this post I am going to be talking about the beautiful, delicious, delicacy known as carrots. Yes, carrots. Now, no wonder your parents always tell you to eat them because besides from strengthening your eyes, they give you cat like superpowers. They are also filled with beta carotene, Vitamin C, potassium, along with a but ton of Vitamin A. Also, fun fact, even just half a cup of cooked or raw carrots contains about 204% of your daily recommended value. I don’t know who’s eating a half cup of raw carrots but alright. Oh yeah, the best way to eat carrots is just put it in a pan with a bit of butter then add honey and sugar until the carrots are softened, trust me it may cause diabetes but trust me it’s worth it. (DISCLAIMER: I’m just joking STAY HEALTHY PLEASE)

Now, we believe that we began farming carrots around the 12th/13th century. Originating in modern day Afghanistan. Now isn’t that interesting? Also last fact but I bet you didn’t know that carrots were very popular back then, no like seriously, like carrots were commonly placed in tomb just chilling next to the dead Pharaohs. Carrots in coffins… hmmm…

Containing information from:

“Birds and Blooms” “History 101” and of course “Mr. Google”

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“WorldSchooling, what is that?”

So, we have now begun our (long-awaited) two-year World Schooling years.

Before the twins were born, we decided that at some point in their childhood we wanted them to live abroad for a year or two. But we could not really settle on which country, and very quickly we realized we wanted it to include multiple countries and multiple years. The kids were not even 2 when we decided we were going to travel with them around the world for two years and home school them. Later, we learned there is a technical term for this — it’s called WorldSchooling. We settled on 7th and 8th grade for WorldSchooling, in part because job changes and sabbaticals aligned with those years and in part because who honestly felt 7th and 8th grade were the best years to be in a classroom with 20+ other 7th and 8th graders? No one I know. The kids will never understand what middle school hell we saved them from.

So, we officially began this summer! House and pet sitters were arranged and first plane tickets were purchased (using United miles! Before they devalued!! We are hewing to a tight budget on this venture.) As we get underway, we will be posting some more information about our WorldSchool philosophies and curriculum goals during the 2+ years we plan to be on the road. The general idea is to have 2-3 month modules in a particular country/continent. For example, we are starting with a New Zealand Module (Module 1), and then moving to Europe for Module 2. South America is set for Module 3. We will have several weeks at home in between to catch up on things like dental appointments and work obligations.

We have spent the past several years scouting out various countries and locations — aka vacations aka mini-world-school trial runs. The first year will be mostly a year of repeats, New Zealand, London, France, Chile. But also some new places for us too, Tahiti (stopover on the way to New Zealand), Italy as part of the Europe module, Argentina in addition to Chile.

Sixth grade graduation, let the WorldSchooling begin! (Don’t they look excited 🙃)

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I Quit My Job and Moved To…Version 2.0

Approximately 12 years ago, I hit a career wall and decided to quit my job and move to Hawaii. I chose the Big Island because it was remote, rural and the opposite of living in the big city like Los Angeles. I was going to chuck in the practice of law and open a coffee shop. Maybe. Or run a coffee cart. Or, I was just going to snorkel and swim with whales and dolphins and stare at the ocean.

I did most of that. The moving to Hawaii, swimming with whales and dolphins and staring at the ocean part at least — never did get to the coffee shop and coffee cart. Within a couple of months of moving to Hawaii, I realized that the practice of law was not something I was ready to chuck in, I was mostly burned out and needed a break, and that primarily it was just where I had been practicing that was the problem. I sat for the Hawaii bar and became a Hawaii licensed attorney as well as a California one. A couple of clients kept hiring me for projects from Hawaii. It was great. I spent two years working from wherever, part-time, including a memorable trip to Central America with my high school friend Paige who was writing for Lonely Planet at the time. My law practice was wherever my cell phone and laptop were. I was newly single and traveling around the world.

About two years into this semi-retirement, an opportunity of a career opened up and I was offered an in-house position at USC that I could not turn down. My close friend and mentor who was working at USC said she could really use my skills and needed me and that sealed the deal. But I knew my wings were getting clipped. The job was full-time, which was not ideal, in so far as I wasn’t quite ready to leave semi-retirement, and I knew that I would eventually chafe and need another break from the full-time, work-in-one-country job. I never thought it would last 10 years, but it did! An amazing 10-year run, but last year I started hitting that wall. I was burning out again. I could feel it. This February, I was ill for a few weeks and knew that for my mental and physical health, it was time to reprise the semi-retirement. But this time, instead of quitting my job and moving to Hawaii…I quit my job and moved to Japan! Just for the summer. Of course, as you already know, we stopped in Hawaii first for the birthday celebration of our friends Len and Sue, Hawaii 5-0. For version 2.0 of quitting my job and moving further west (“go west, burned out lawyer”) I had the great fortune of having an adventurous husband and kids along for the family — Axelrod — adventures. These adventures you are reading about now.

First stop out of the U.S, our happiest place on earth, Tokyo DisneySea!

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Official First Post: Welcome Readers

So, now that I have figured out how this blog thing works, I can officially do our first post. Which is technically our third post. Oh well, things never work out quite how you plan.

As I will explain in some subsequent post in more detail, I have given notice at my 9-5 fixed job and am making a job change. Among other things, I am becoming a homeschool second/third grade teacher for the summer.  We pulled the girls out of school and are finishing up second grade and starting parts of third grade on the road abroad. “World School” is the technical term.

We hope to be doing lots of traveling as a family and doing short bursts of “road schooling” or “world-schooling” and then sending the girls back into their classroom.  Luckily, we are in a private school and thus do not need to go through the Robocalls and/or requests for independent study process — and we will not be reported to Child Welfare as “truants.” We will just teach on the road, and let the girls engage in some self-directed learning.  We will be using this blog to catalog where we go, and how the world schooling project is going. The girls will do blog posts for homework as well and will love to get feedback.

So, officially, welcome to our blog about travel, world-schooling and …. Axelrod adventures!

We left California last week.  Our first stop is Oahu, Hawaii because it is….party time!