Green concerns cross the oceans

Joanne Huang, from Mauritius and studying neuroscience in the United States, is on a field trip and is based in Wanganui at the Quaker Settlement. Photo/Bevan Conley

Mauritius is a long way from Wanganui and Joanne Huang is a long way from home.

Born in Mauritius, Miss Huang is a third-year liberal arts student majoring in neuroscience at Earlham College, Indiana in the US.

She is in the university group of 15 who are in Wanganui for several months to study and work at internships to further their environmental studies.

Miss Huang smiles knowing the group arrived in Wanganui in time for our late summer.

"It's pretty nice. We fled the winter polar vortex and some students were delayed and frustrated because they could not make their flights."

At the end of this week the group will travel to the South Island for three weeks to look at geology, biodiversity and cultures.

The 21-year-old is working with Sustainable Whanganui member Hadi Gurton at the Whanganui Environment Base (WhEB) because of its environmental consciousness, she said.

WhEB is based at the Resource Recovery Centre (RRC) in Maria Place.

While with the base Miss Huang will survey the number of people who come to the recovering centre and assess who is recycling, and what, on a daily basis.

A standout for her is the environmental movement and their protests in New Zealand that Miss Huang says cause change.

There were a lot of things about New Zealand that were similar to Mauritius, notably the green of the land.

Miss Huang said she wanted to study abroad because her sister is studying nursing in Perth and chose Earlham because it was a small school.

When she graduates she may look to work in Perth to be close to her sister and Perth is closer to Mauritius across the Indian Ocean.

Miss Huang speaks four languages; English, French, Hakka, and Creole.

Her father is originally from China and Hakka is his native dialect in which she converses with him.

Block one of the students' field trip curriculum was a trip on the Whanganui River during their stay at the Quaker Settlement on Virginia Rd.

In their second block the students are with homestays and on internships, then they're off to the South Island, and then back to Wanganui.