My Occupational Identity

Tony G- Occ Sci 2015 (Hamilton)

My Family

“BELONG”

Family is forever!

I am a husband and Father to four awesome kids. I have been a husband and father for almost 8 years and I love it. I enjoy the things I am able to learn from this experience and the precious time I have with my family to make memories. We love doing things/ spending together.

Personal picture

My Faith

“BELONG”

I belong to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints! My values and beliefs are important to me and make up a big part of my identity, in that I try to live a good life. This is a picture of the NZ Temple which I live close to.

http://www.teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/27315/mormon-temple

Gardening (one of my patches in my neighbours backyard..lol)

“DO”

I enjoy gardening! This is something I have learnt about growing up, and since leaving home it is something I have carried on and have started teaching my children. It’s a great time we have together planting and then harvesting. This year we never bought tomatoes from the shop because we had a excellent crop growing constantly and it was satisfying and rewarding. We also grew lettuces, broccoli, spinach, silverbeet, capsicum, celery, kamokamo, pumpkin ,bok choy and herbs.

Personal picture

DIY

“DO”

I enjoy getting outside and doing DIY around the home! Using tools, building, fixing things, making things. Sometimes my kids will come out and watch me work as pictured. I was dividing our shared garage in this picture.

Personal picture

Music (DJ’n in centre place)

“BE”

Music is my R&R! I enjoy listening to music. I find it therapeutic.

I enjoy DJ-ing and have been interested in this for over 20 years. I enjoy being able to entertain people with music. I enjoy most genres of music and depends on how I am feeling at a particular time. This was recently at ‘platypus’ shoe store opening in centre place!

(Personal picture, 2015)

Cooking (traditional UMU)

“BELONG”

I love to cook! My wife likes it when I cook as well because she gets to have a break from the kitchen. I started cooking from a young age and I enjoy it to this day, trying out new recipes and experimenting. I love doing hangi’s and umu’s. Umu is a traditional pacific island cooking method using heated stones to cook above the ground as opposed to a hangi which is cooked in the ground. I enjoy the process in both these methods in that there is a big social element to it with the amount time you can spend. 2hrs prep and 2hrs to cook, and 20 minutes to eat, similar to a hangi. Pictured there is 2 pigs ready for cooking, taro, and palusami.

(Personal picture, 2014)

Fishing! (Outdoors)

“DO”

I love going fishing! Being out on the water and being able to catch fish, and the process involved! This is something I havent done for a few years now but I love it when I do get to go out. This is out on the west coast of NZ (kawhia), and we caught about 100 snapper, 150 kahawai and 60 gurnard between 13 guys, was a good day! I end up giving most of my catch away, I’ll keep maybe 3 for my family, and then give the rest out. I enjoy the fishing more than the catch.

Personal picture

My Hood (“Rewa”,Manurewa, South Auckland)

“BELONGING”

I grew up in Manurewa in South Auckland. I did all my schooling there. I love my childhood years there and the ties, memories I have to my childhood. A lot has changed there since my childhood but I know my ‘roots’, and where I am from. A few of my childhood friends are still there and we stay in touch via Facebook and a lot of us have moved on, but we always refer to ‘rewa’ and the memories from our childhood.

Sports (Basketball & NRL)

“DO”

I enjoy playing basketball on a social level. I used to play basketball when I was young and in school and played rep for counties manukau. I enjoy watching/ following sports nowadays, in particular the NBA and NRL. My son plays rugby league so my Saturday mornings are spent supporting him which I love. That’s a picture of a basketball great, Michael Jordan.

http://tiger.towson.edu/~aahmed12/Jordan.html

Occupational Therapy

“BECOME”

Hopefully in a year and a half, I will be an OT graduate. This is something that I have enjoyed learning about and cannot wait to finish. It has its challenges but mostly a good experience. This involves the occupation of being a student.

https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=996040700421147&set=gm.1505153469734211&type=1&theater