43. Mia
Chapter forty-three
Mia
Twenty-three hours and thirty-eight minutes. That’s how long I’ve been traveling for.
The only benefit to flying to literally the other side of the world, other than being as far away from Will as I can practically get? It’s given me a lot of alone time to think. I’ve thought the 'Will problem' to death. I opened my heart, told him what I wanted, and he rejected me. It’s heartbreakingly simple.
At least things are feeling better between me and Chloe. She’s already messaged me a few times, checking in on how my trip is going, how I’m feeling about Will, and making plans for when I get home. It’s taken all my strength not to ask how Will is; whether she’s spoken to him.
As the car winds its way up the steep mountain, I wonder whether I can keep doing this job for longer than the six months I had agreed. I miss home. I miss my friends. I miss things being predictable. Despite that, the work itself is fascinating. Spending more time getting to know not only the managers, but the staff at the resorts I visited helped drive home the reason I had wanted to help in the first place. My birth parents, my grandparents, my brother Craig; they built something special, and I can be part of it. I’m not going to sit by and do nothing while the legacy slowly dissolves.
And maybe, in time, it will start feeling more like my legacy too.
“Hi Mia, so nice to meet you.” Georgia, the resort manager, reaches out to shake my hand. I love her Kiwi accent. Everything here is laid back. The uniform appears to be a bright red polo shirt and any sort of pants the staff want to wear. Even the way the staff talk is relaxed. “You must be shattered, it’s a killer flight, eh?” Georgia has dark hair tied up in a ponytail and looks to be the youngest of all the resort managers I have met. She has a friendly smile, and I immediately feel at ease with her.
“Yeah, it’s a bit tough! I’ll be alright after a good sleep.” I do my best to try to match her tone. I’m sure she thinks I sound fine, but to me, my voice sounds tinny and far away.
Georgia throws her head back and gives a deep belly laugh. “Well, I hope that’s true, Mia, but my experience has not been the same! The jetlag will get you, that’s for sure. My top tip—sure you’ve heard it before—stick to the new time right away. Good thing for you, it’s eight here, not that you'd know from the light outside, so almost a reasonable bedtime.”
Georgia arranges for my bags to be taken up to my room. She hands me my room key and practically shoves me in the direction of the restaurant. “You just need to fill that puku of yours—sorry, that’s your tummy—then head up and get a good night sleep. A strong coffee and kai in the morning, and you’ll be right as rain.” She gives me a conspiratorial wink. There’s something about a grown woman talking about my ‘tummy’ that tickles me.
“Right as rain, you reckon?” I can’t help but get in the spirit. There’s something about the air here that makes me feel at peace.
She laughs, big and hearty and completely lacking in self-consciousness. “Honestly? No, but it will help. Now, go get yourself something to eat, and let’s catch up again in the morning.”
Despite having spent the last thirty-six hours alone, I’m grateful that Georgia shows me to the dining room and promptly leaves me.
Unfortunately, despite my beautiful surroundings, my devastation hasn’t vanished since I arrived in New Zealand. The drive up the mountain to the resort didn’t solve my problems either. I’m still heartbroken, but now I’m heartbroken in a different place.
The next morning, Georgia meets me for breakfast. “Let’s get some kai into you, then we’ll head outside. Some sun will do you good, you’ve been cooped up in a plane for days, getting outside always helps.”
I don’t understand half of what Georgia is saying. She speaks fast, and the words I do understand are peppered with words I don’t, but I’m far too hungry to ask for a language lesson right now.
Unlike the resorts I’ve visited so far in the northern hemisphere, it’s summer in New Zealand, so there’s not a speck of snow on the mountain. Instead of donning heavy snow gear, before letting me head outside, Georgia insists I apply a thick layer of sunscreen to all my exposed skin, and hands me a pair of sunglasses and an unflattering cap.
“The sun will trick you here. We’re up high, and it’s early, so it’s probably a bit nippy outside, but the sun will burn, even if you don’t feel it.”
The majority of the workers at the resort are Kiwi but a surprisingly large chunk of the staff are here on work visas. They’re friendly and chatty when I introduce myself.
“One of the great things about Whare o Whetū—this resort—is that because all the snow melts over summer, we have a full range of activities during the warm season. Lots of tramping, mountain biking, four-wheel driving, horse treks, you name it.” Georgia is walking briskly, heading toward the bottom of a chairlift. “It’s great, it means we can retain almost all of our staff over summer, and we get great utilization of the maunga.”
“Sorry. The what?” I can tell I’ll have a lot of learning to do at Whare o Whetū.
Finally, she slows down, giving me the chance to catch up. Georgia is clearly a woman who involves herself fully in all the activities the mountain has to offer. She’s speedy and isn’t breathing even the slightest bit heavier than normal.
“Maunga? That means ‘mountain’ in te reo Māori, what the tangata whenua—that’s Aotearoa’s indigenous people, I guess you’d call us—speak. You’ll hear te reo all over the place in New Zealand; it’s having a fantastic revival, and we do everything we can to respect it here at Whare o Whetū.” I love seeing the little differences between each resort; the uniform changes, the food, even the formality.
The air is clear and crisp. Georgia was right, the sun is warm, but in the shade, it’s several degrees cooler and much less comfortable than in the full sun. I can definitely tell I’m at high altitude.
As she shows me around and introduces me to the resort and some of the staff, we decide to change tact with the plan a little bit, holding smaller sessions rather than one big meeting like we have at the other resorts. She tells me the staff here are much more likely to speak up in small groups. I notice that while the idea of changing a plan on the fly would usually send me into a spiral, here, it feels okay. Good, even.
The first day is extremely successful—definitely my personal best performance. I get lots of insights and learn a heap about the staff. They have fantastic ideas of how the resort can be improved, and there are plenty of things I can take away for the other resorts.
The second I step off the stage, the fact that Will isn’t here to celebrate with me crashes into me like a tidal wave. And worse, I can’t even call him to tell him how well things have gone. Not since I literally ran away from him. He would be so proud to see that his help has made such a difference. But instead, I’m here alone.
I decline dinner with Georgia, and instead opt for room service alone in my suite. I force myself to separate my devastation about Will from my feelings about how running the resorts is going. If I’m honest with myself, even through the heartbreak, I’m excited about working to find solutions to the challenges I’ve heard about. When I think about going back to my ‘real’ job in a few months, I don’t get the same excitement. It’s comfortable, sure, but not exciting. I sink back on the couch, pull my feet up and try to imagine my life if I committed to running the resorts.
Lots of travel. I don’t necessarily love that part, but this is the era of video chat—I've even successfully taught my parents—so even if I can’t get all the way to each resort every month, we can work together to build a better place to work and visit. Doing this job, I can make a difference in people’s lives, in a similar way to being a lawyer. But this way, almost every day, I can get outside. I can learn something new, and learn about different cultures. Maybe I can finally learn to snowboard.
This is it, I realize. My heart made the decision for me when I wasn’t looking. I sleep, knowing this is absolutely the right decision for me.