2011- a year not to be forgotten

Well that was a hell of a year.

On and on the dramatic changes kept rolling. Many of my friends and colleagues were living in the places that were consumed by the storms. From Tripoli to Cairo to Damascus and even to State College, my thoughts and worries were kidnapped by whatever the day's headlines were.

No one I knew came to harm, thank God, even if they are forever changed.

The Arab Spring, the collapse of proud European economies, the death of Osama Bin Laden, the Japanese earthquake and tsunami. On and on. Books will be written about 2011, the 1968 of a new generation. Before then, I will leave it to the Year in Review stories to wrap up a truly astonishing twelve months.

Not even far-off New Zealand was spared in the face of such global enormities. While the systems of state survived and there were no riots in the streets here, New Zealand had her fair share of heartache and despair this year.

The year began as we wished it: calmly and with time for some family outings. We were really getting into the swing of New Zealand. Amy was loving the life we had here. After work had prevented me from spoiling her on Valentine's Day she gave me a rain check. Eight days later I was to be working in Christchurch and we were going to make a night of it. I had reservations at the fanciest of restaurants and was going to show her around the beautiful town.

Chaos in the aftermath of the earthquake.

As most of you know by now, that evening never came. Instead, less than an hour after Amy arrived in Christchurch, the earthquake hit, destroying much of Christchurch and killing 181 people. Amy's blog told powerfully of that day and how lucky she was to survive.

But, as with many Cantabrians, the earthquake wasn't a one-off event for us that ended February 22. Amy struggled for a long time afterwards; I found it difficult to live life in the same way I had. We both avoided tall buildings and jumped at loud noises. Just as things were settling back into a normality the folks in Christchurch still haven't found, there were some quakes here in Wellington that put the edge right back into us.

Still, the earthquake didn't define our year. Life, as it does, went on. Damaged, perhaps. Bruised, definitely. But it went on. You can tell the line of demarkation from my blogs. Before the quake they were light tales pointing out the quirkiness of New Zealand and the splendors of life here. Afterwards my writing was tinged with sadness, fear and poignancy. It took a while until we gave ourselves permission to laugh loosely and genuinely.

But New Zealand imposes itself on you, as does the limited time we have here. Two years, then out. You can't afford to sit around and dream of next year. You've got to get out and do. And we certainly tried to make the most of this wonderful land.

Not without a safety net, though.



Amy told New Zealand she didn't care how good looking it was, she was breaking up with it. She needed to create a Plan B. Just in case there were more quakes. So she started looking for houses in the little town in North Carolina where we'd spent a year before moving to New Zealand and where my parents live.

Through all the frustrating twists and turns, Amy did not know that karma was on her side. After hours and hours of researching houses on the internet, Amy went back to the States to check them out personally. After almost two weeks, none of them passed muster. In frustration she told a friend of hers as they drove past a certain house that if it ever came up for sale she'd buy it.

She returned to the other side of the world exasperated and tired, vowing never to make that wretched journey again.

Two weeks later the phone rang in the middle of the night saying the house - yes, that house - was for sale. What's worse, it was for sale by the bank and we had just three days to come up with an offer. Three days for a house we'd never inspected.

The long and short of it is we bought it and Amy winged her way back to the States and, in reverse order, fell in love with the house.

I'm sure she wishes karma had been a bit more efficient, but karma is busy.



Morgan too had a year to remember. After he heard that his school was taking a rugby team to South America he decided this was the thing for him. We told him he had to make the team and raise half the money, thinking neither would happen.

He decided to run the Wellington Marathon to raise the money. Thanks to amazing friends and family - and even some complete strangers who were blog readers - he scraped in the funds. He made the rugby team and ran the race - at just 14 - and off he went to Chile, Uruguay and Argentina. He came back having had a great trip, but also a little older and wiser. His attitude about traveling, culture and respect surprised - and pleased - me immensely.

The year ended wonderfully with a flourish of family. Ewan's godfather, who had not seen his now 12-year-old charge for eight years, came for Christmas and spoiled the boy rotten. It was important - and fun - for Ewan. Mum and Dad and my brother Jamie all visited in December and that tied a nice bow at the end of a full, turbulent and instructive year.

I wish everyone a very happy 2012. May all your dreams come true and may the world begin to take a shape we can all understand and love. And thank you, as always, for reading "Life in the Land of the Long White Cloud."

In Samoa, today has been cancelled

Pity the poor Samoan child born on December 30.

No birthday this year. No anniversary. No December 30. In Samoa there was no today, in a manner of speaking.

Samoa, trying to reposition itself back into the same general time zone as its two largest trading partners - Australia and New Zealand - is jumping westward over the international dateline.

So they will go from Thursday, December 29, straight to Saturday, December 31. Well, at least no one has to work on Friday. Lovely, if empty, gesture.

The time difference - an hour ahead, but a day behind New Zealand - has proven to be a bit of a problem in recent years. You should try making travel arrangements; it defies logic and most computer systems. The new prime minister of Samoa, who also made the country switch to driving on the left-hand side of the road two years ago, decided it was time to correct a decision made 119 years ago. Pun intended.

Back then American traders thought it was important for Samoa, formerly known as Western Samoa, to be moving in the same orbit, to the same beat, as American Samoa and the west coast of America herself.

Instead of being the last country to greet the day, Samoa will now be one of the first. That's not much of a consolation to the kids who missed out on a birthday today. They'd be sure to prefer a couple of decent presents to a pretty sunrise.

Bulls' Hits keep coming

As soon as I saw the sign proudly announcing the town of “Bulls,” I thought of the Bulls Hit Ranch and Farm outside Hastings, Florida. It's the maker of some fine chips - crisps you'd call them in New Zealand. It was the first giggle of what had been a long day on the road. There were a few more laughs in store. Turns out the town of Bulls, in the breadbasket of the country, has a wonderful sense of humor.

It is unforget-a-bull, as they like to say.



Many of the businesses and institutions have added signs that will make you chuckle. The I-site for tourists is “Inform-a-Bull;” The local grocery store is “Restock-a-Bull;” an antique store is “Collect-a-Bull;” Even the McDonald’s – not usually known for its corporate humor – gets in on the joke, referring to itself as McValue-a-Bull with a drive thru-a-Bull service.



The Medical Center, above, says it’s “Cure-a-Bull” and the church is “believe-a-Bull.”

You get the picture, this is a town with a good sense of itself and everyone gets in on the joke. It has a good feel to it.

While there are quite a few hyperbolic places in New Zealand – “The Adventure Capital of the World” comes to mind - there are more places with a healthy sense of depracation.

I’ve already written about the Independent Republic of Whangamomona. They're a wonderfully free-spirited and rebellious bunch who - over a zoning matter - have set up their own country right in the center of the North Island of New Zealand.



And now I've just learned about Blackball. No wait, wait, that’s not the funny part.

Blackball began its life as a hardscrabble mining town on the South Island. When the mines closed and the railroad left nobody held out much hope for the town. It went through a few iterations, though, including rebellious trade union center, hippie magnet, and is hanging on by a thread.

The funny part concerns the town's hotel. It began life as the Dominion Hotel in 1910. Then it was decided that it should be renamed after one of the town's founders, a man by the name of Hilton. Seems a small multinational hotel chain objected strongly - lots of lawyers involved. The good folks of Blackball, being good sorts, complied of course.

It is now known as "The formerly Blackball Hilton Hotel." It is a place that must be visited on my next trip to the South Island - even if it is completely out of the way. I've seen pictures. It's the sort of place where a roaring fire is in need of good company and some craft beers in need of introductions.

The gnaw of pain across the world

Uncle and nephews with Apple envy.

While the tyranny of distance that so tortured early newcomers to New Zealand has certainly been eased by modernity, it still stings. For the first time in my life I went more than a year without seeing my parents and siblings.

Of course e-mail, Skype, and on-line phone services allow you to stay easily in touch. Still, aching farewells at airports – not knowing when you will meet again – have become a hard-borne melancholy. Today we dropped off my brother Jamie and our dear friend Jason at the airport; three weeks ago it was my parents.

As we pulled out into the traffic at the airport it was hard not to rage against our separate paths that have left us so many thousands of miles apart and so many months between reunions.

It’s a sad revelation that Jamie and I were excited that we’d see each other again in July. That’s “only” six months. For Morgan and Ewan it’s hard not to have regular contact with their blood relatives. These rushed visits are all about crazy running around, when family life is supposed to be the opposite. I’m grateful that they made the great effort to get all the way out here and that we had a semblance of normal time together for a while.

But it’s hard dropping of dear friends and family at the airport, embracing and taking one last look – trying to remember the details that might cloud over before the next meeting. “Grief is the price we pay for love,” Prince William said earlier this year. So is the nagging of sadness, the cost of living apart.

Things that make you go hmmmm

I suppose I should just be glad these tracks lead to the foot of a cliff and not the top. You can see more images of things that have given me pause here.

Merry Christmas, y'all

We wish you all a wonderful day from extraordinarily sunny Wellington. May the season and 2012 bring you everything you wish for.

A very Maori Xmas, and a happy few beers

On paper we had a pretty miserable Christmas Eve. We were severely skunked several times. But when you've got family together and a blue-sky day in Wellington, paper don't mean squat.

We did fail on the planning front, ending up with a bit of a redneck version of the day we had planned, as you can see by the Larry the Cable Guy photo above.



My brother Jamie, newly arrived from New York City, had very kindly offered to treat us for lunch. We decided to take him to our favorite place, The Bach Cafe. Trouble was we'd left it too late. We were informed upon arrival that the only thing they were serving was chips and wedges. So basically Jamie bought us french fries for lunch - our generous uncle. He was disconsolate; you can see the joy in his face as he picked at the grand Christmas fare.



Still, a hike to the Seal Colony at Red Rocks Reserve promised to make up for our oversight - not that we had any food to walk off. Jamie, Jason - newly arrived from London - Morgan and I headed off. It's a 10 kilometer stride along the most wonderful bays that, on a day such as this, can't be beaten.

For the first time since coming to New Zealand, there wasn't a single seal to be found. Not one. The beach, my father said, was sealed off. (You always want to attribute awful puns like that.) The David Attenborough buff in Jamie was sorely disappointed. I told him that if he'd actually bought me lunch, I'd have taken him to the place where the seals really hung out.



As I've mentioned, the seals here are bachelor fur seals, the slobs who were unable to find a mate on the South Island. Jason, ever the romantic, thought perhaps they'd finally found a bunch of loose women and were having a party somewhere. Yes, that was it.



The Christmas cheer was already taking root. Lots of Kiwis were hanging out at their bach (holiday home), imbibing the Christmas spirit. At least these guys, above, will not have to risk any roadblocks on the way home. What a simply idyllic day they must have had: rowed to a friend's bach, had a few drinks, and rowed back.

On our way home we remembered that we hadn't yet acquired any Christmas crackers. This is not a good thing to realize at 6 p.m. on Christmas Eve. Downtown Wellington was deserted. Only a few stores were still open. All the Christmas crackers were sold out.

Skunked again.

But it really didn't matter. Life was good and we were all together and the boys' excitement was mounting. All Jamie wants for Christmas now is seals.

You CAN NOT kill the pudding

Precious - Jason with the beloved Christmas pudding.

"One good thing about being so far away from the Scottish side of the family is that I don't have to serve Christmas Pudding. I'm not exactly sure what it is made out of, we've never actually eaten it, but it resembles fruit cake. After dinner we drench it in brandy and light it on fire then ooh and aah over it and pretend to be excited about eating it. So, even though we will have Adrian's brother and partner over for the Holidays, I am putting my foot down and not serving cake."

Thus spoke Amy in her latest blog post. It is as close as she has come to enforcing an arbitrary law regarding the British traditions she married into.

A funny thing happened, though. And I mean really funny. Ewan's godfather Jason arrived to spend Christmas with us. He proudly unpacked the presents he'd so generously brought for us. His face lightened with pride as he produced a - wait for it - CHRISTMAS PUDDING. Our dear friend, Melanie Jappy, not wanting us to be stuck at the end of the world without such civilized accoutrements had very kindly made it for us.

I honestly thought Amy was going to die of laughter. The pudding is back. Yeah, baby.

War Memorials of New Zealand II

Though tucked away at the far reaches of the world, New Zealand has not escaped history.

The unpleasantries of the day have always found her. And New Zealanders in every village of the country are reminded of that daily. The War Memorials of New Zealand are really one of the most poignant and powerful landmarks in a land where such things could easily be ignored.

I have written about these cairns to the fallen before. But I'm startled every time I travel to a new place to see, there in the heart of the community, the list of the dead marbled eternally. The memorials range from the grandiose cenotaph to mere plaques on stones, some of the smaller ones the sadder for it.

There are layers upon layers of poignancy in such places. The above memorial is in Millers Flat, in Otago. The town has a population of 200. In World War I alone the little village on the Clutha River gave 15 of her sons to a distant cause.

A little reading - believe me, the histories of places such as Millers Flat do not add up to many pages - took me back again to the story of "Somebody's Darling," so nicely told by Billy Connolly in an earlier post.

Just five miles downstream from this memorial in a place lonelier than this, a body was discovered in 1864. Nobody knew then who the man was. William Rigney, a local, decided that no man should go like that. "He was somebody's darling," he said. So he dug a grave, made a marker, and invited everyone to the funeral. "Somebody's Darling lies here," says the marker. More remarkably, Rigney changed his will so that he would be buried beside the unknown man - almost 50 years later. They lie side by side still.

Since sending 6,500 mounted troops to help the Brits in the Second Boer War (1899-1902) in South Africa, the Kiwis have sent troops to many of the world's hotspots. (Four New Zealanders have lost their lives in Afghanistan in the last two years.) Among those who did not return from South Africa was the gloriously named Septimus McDougall of Martinborough, obviously the seventh arrival in a large family.

Martinborough (population 1,300), on the North Island, has a square containing numerous memorials to the wars New Zealand has fought in. Fifty of its young men died in the First World War alone, a conflict in which New Zealand, proportionally sustained horrendous casualties. They sent more than 10 percent of their 1 million population to fight - men and women - and almost 60 percent of them were killed (17,000) or injured.

These remorseful spots, ignored no doubt by most people most days, become the center of attention each ANZAC Day, when the Kiwis and the Aussies remember their dead. The services begin before dawn each year, and usually empty and quiet villages and hamlets teem with people paying respect to those who lost their lives. While it began as a tribute to those who served at Gallipoli, ANZAC Day has now been broadened to honor all those who gave their life in battle.


While the names on many of the monuments here could be straight from the Rugby fields of Scotland, the Maori too have given outsized service. The Maori Battalion in the Second World War, which followed the Maori Pioneer Battalion in the First, won more individual bravery decorations than any other New Zealand battalion. Of the 3,600 men who served in the Maori Battalion, 649 were killed and another 1,712 were wounded.

Even in poor or isolated villages, the War Memorials are impeccably maintained. It's a respectful - if lugubrious - way of bearing testament. I stop at every one and take a picture and read the names, my small tip of the hat to those who came before.

Another battering for New Zealand

The Nelson Mail.

New Zealand has been clobbered again. This time by torrential rains that caused landslides and rivers of mud roaring down valleys. Sometimes as much as 15 feet of mud has buried fields and homes, Pompeii-like. People were swept out of their houses. Roads have been closed, communities cut off, and hundreds of homes either destroyed or labeled unsafe to enter.

The only blessing is that somehow, somehow nobody was killed.

This is just the latest chapter in what's already been a brutal year for New Zealand. And yet the body shots keep coming, and even the immutable and indefatigable Kiwi spirit is getting a little ragged around the edges.

Nelson, the center of this latest storm, is a lovely spot. Ironically, it is generally said to have some of the best weather in New Zealand. This week as much as 800 mm of rain are said to have fallen in areas. I have no idea how much that is, but someone helpfully described it as a shitload to me today.



That this latest chapter of misery came just before Christmas adds weight to the burden. One farmer, faced with 15 feet of mud over his property, was quoted as saying the scope didn't bear thinking about. He had to focus on the clean-up, not the destruction.

"It is hearbreaking, but you sort of learn not to get caught up in it all," Kevin Davis said. "You don't really have time to get caught up in the emotion of it. If you let it get you down, you just turn it into a bigger job than it is."

This stoic quote came from a man who was pictured in The Dominion Post standing on the new mud that had buried his farm. He was standing above his pick-up truck. It was up to its windows in the stuff that seemed to have congealed.

Luckily the rain is slated to stay away for a couple of days, but the repairs will take months, if not years to complete. The same old story, just in a different part of New Zealand.

The Lady of the Lake

Because I am still enchanted with my visit to Queenstown, I want to write about the TSS Earnslaw.

It's a transparent excuse to cast my mind's eye back to the Southland and to show off a couple more photographs of its resplendent beauty.

Not that the Earnslaw - known as the Lady of Lake - isn't a worthy subject. She is indeed a thing of beauty. Built in the same year as the Titanic, she's the oldest steamship in the Southern Hemisphere.

She's a busy steamer, too, plying her trade for up to 14 hours a day.



Lake Wakatipu was never without her during our time there. She was part of the view, chugging up and down the lake in the shadow of the 8,000 foot mountain whose name she bears. She carries herself with the Edwardian dignity of her age. I must confess, though, that my Dad and I wondered how, in this land of environmental consciousness, there was no protests against her belching smoke. I'm glad she's allowed to ply her elegant trade, though, because she is a grand old thing.

She's had illustrious cargo. Queen Elizabeth II and other royals have viewed the splendid surroundings from her deck.


Lake Wakatipu.

The twin-screwed steamer was even featured in Indiana Jones and the Crystal Skull - though she was tramped up (or down) as a mere Amazon riverboat.

Unbelievably, she was built in Dunedin by the famous John McGregor and Co. shipbuilders. After completion she was disassembled and brought up to Lake Waktipu by train, where she was put back together again in the manner of a jigsaw puzzle.



Wonderful celebrations are planned for next year, her centennial. This provides yet another perfect excuse for a visit to Queenstown. She's lucky to have survived. Two other steamers are a thing of the past and that same fate nearly befell The Lady in 1968. Luckily she was spared, for the wonderful views of the lake would not be the same without her. Born to be a working lady, transporting cattle, sheep and the people of the area, she now does daily tours for visitors - a much more dignified existence.

A reminder of a Northern Xmas

Christmas in the Southern Hemisphere is odd to us northerners. It shouldn't be this bright and sunny with so much daylight around. Going to the beach shouldn't even come into the equation.

So, in search of dark and cozy places with that comfortable Christmassy feel, we headed off to Krkcaldie & Stains, Wellington's famous department store.



It worked. The place is wonderfully dolled up for Christmas, complete with elaborate storefront window decorations, a piano player, a doorman and, of course, Santa. The old store, a Wellington landmark since 1863, even smelled like Christmas.



Our day in Wellington was an interesting dilemma for Amy. Since the last four earthquakes here, her old fears of being in downtown Wellington have been reborn. She avoided the place, with its high-rise and landmark buildings, like the plague for months.

Those very valid fears - Wellington sits on a huge fault - were abating somewhat. No longer. Still, I'd bought her a rather spendy birthday present from Kirkcaldie & Stains - which she wanted to return. So what would win out? Her self-preservation or her loathing of wasting money? A Devil's Alternative. In the end it was no contest and the gift was returned. There were no shakes, but we didn't exactly linger. The boys, much to their delight, weren't encouraged to sit on Santa's lap.

Kirkcaldie & Stains, it was revealed this week, is up for sale, but no one yet knows who's wanting to buy it. It would be a shame if it was bought out by a chain and genericized. But that seems to be the way of the world these days.

In the meantime, we had a nice little hour or so of nostalgia around town when the windowless department store kept the summer sun outside at bay and allowed us to paint pictures of Christmases gone by in our heads. And then we went for an ice cream at the beach. The best of both worlds.

Invasion of the face snatchers

It is technically supposed to be summer now. Though as I write this the wind his hammering our house. Doors are bumping, the blinds are flapping and occasionally the whole place shakes. It is cold, almost cold enough to remind us of winter at home. Cold enough to be good.



Still, last week it was getting warmish, so much so as to make me think about a swim in the harbor. But these nasty jellyfish began washing up, quashing the thought quickly. While they look quite pretty, they seem to be packing quite a bit of tentacle action. A triathlete training off Oriental Parade, where the nicest city beach is, was recently stung in the face. Even though he was a Kiwi, he confessed to it being quite painful.

In mere mortal English that translates to, "Oh my God, that thing just about ripped my %$#&ing face off."

Luckily the weather has postponed me having to make any sort of macho decision about this. If we've got to have Christmas away from family down here at the southern part of our globe I'd at least like to have the benefit of a bit of warm weather. I'm just saying.

Update: The Dominion Post is reporting on the invasion. While initially there was talk that some of the jellyfish looked like Portuguese Man o' Wars, they're now settling on them being bluebottle jellyfish, which can still render a nasty sting.

Lobsters for her birthday

Amy is versatile. It's one of her great strengths. She's as at home in the ballroom as in the barroom and speaks to governor and garbage man with equal ease.

She can go five star or no star and be happy either way. It was her birthday this week. The plans, as they do, started grandly. Slowly, though, the grind of the week took over and the grand began to shrink to the more functional. The gourmet dinner at the White House restaurant - which can be an all-night affair - had lost favor to the all-you-can-eat ribs at the Gas Works. White House to the Gas Works. You see what I'm saying.

The prospect of getting down and dirty with some ribs was a good one. There are no airs and graces when you've been married 17 years.

By the time I came home, though, those plans were also a thing of the past.

"Let's just play pokies," Amy said when I got home.

I can see some of you squirming and saying, "Ewwww, too much information."

Just hold your horses. Pokies are Poker Machines.

"Let's just waste all the money we would have wasted on a fancy dinner on the pokies," she said.

And that's what my lovely wife wanted to do for her birthday. It was something we hadn't done - since her birthday last year. So we headed off to the pub, ensconced ourselves in a seedy back room, sitting romantically side by side staring at the spinning wheels. To win on her machine, Amy needed a lobster to pop up. The only fancy thing about the whole evening was Amy occasionally shouting, "Oooh, I got a lobster."

For the coup de grace we stopped off at McDonald's on the way home.

Amy said it was the perfect birthday. And you gotta love that.

The 500th post

This, amazingly, is my 500th post. That's about one a day since we arrived in New Zealand. I'd never blogged before. I must say that it's been tremendous fun documenting our family's time in this wonderful, idiosyncratic country of New Zealand. I've learned a lot, not just through my research, but from my readers who have contributed a lot of wisdom and encouragement. I've also found a great community of bloggers, none of whom I've met, all of whom are fabulous.

Shortly after we arrived in New Zealand, Amy encouraged me to start a blog. She's regreted the monster she created, but supported me and my new bad habits with good grace ever since. She took the picture below and wrote a powerful post about her time after the Christchurch earthquake. She'll always be my favorite blogger.

To mark the 500 milestone, I'm recapping some of my favorite blogs, in no particular order.



1. The Christchurch Earthquake:
When the earthquake hit, it roared with a violent brutality. The force and the noise were stunning. Mele either fell out of the couch or was looking for cover. I tried to help her up but we fell to the ground. Then we just held onto each other, just because we didn't want to be blown away. More.



2. Morgan's Marathon:
Wellington threw everything it had at Morgan - but couldn't stop him. Two weeks of sickness tried its best, but didn't stop him. At 14, Morgan is a Marathon Man. He said that after the first mile he didn't think he'd be able to finish. Everything hurt. He was coughing. And then the foul wind roared in, bringing horizontal rain. It was the cruelest thing to do. When I saw him at the half-way point, I was worried for him. There was such a long way to go. But then he said, "I'll see you at the finish line." By God, he's going to do it, I thought. More.



3. The Young Man and the Sea:
I don't know how he died or why. I know only that his memorial overlooks a bay and is well-tended by his friends and family. I've seen their tribute videos to him on-line. He seemed like a life-lover, full of energy and smiles. Now his school tie flaps in the wind on a cliff above Cook Strait. He died two years ago, aged just 18.

He's kept me a strange sort of company these last couple of weeks. More.



4. The tale of the post-coital cormorant:
Our female guide disappeared off into the bushes. We were with a bunch of Kiwis, so we didn't ask. After a few minutes she arrived back.

"Shags just weren't meant for trees," she said cryptically, nodding her head back towards the forest that climbs down to the beach. She carried on to the water to tend to the kayaks, leaving me a tad startled, and thinking, "Wow, what an athletic young lady" or words to that effect. More.



5. Robert Louis Stevenson in Samoa:
A consumptive Stevenson, in search of a warmer clime for his bleeding lungs, arrived in Apia in 1889. To him it was "really a noble place."

He bought 400 of the most exquicite acres I have ever seen in Vailima and set about building a "home fit for angels." He succeeded magnificently. My heart ached when I first saw Hemingway's finca in Cuba; it broke with the pain of the beauty of Villa Vailima. More.



6. The Wellington Sevens:

OH ......... MY ........ GOD.

In all my time, I have never seen anything so wild, so bawdy, so wonderful, so funny, so upbeat - and I am not talking about my wife.

The Wellington Sevens are something indeed to behold. More.



7. Trapped on Mt. Taranaki:
Soon we were up among new-fallen snow and put the car in four-wheel drive. The wind was preposterous up here. This far up and away from civilization, it screamed like a banshee welcoming us into her mad and rule-less world. Out of the car it grabbed us, punched us, pushed us. We got back in and decided it was time to head back, hoping for a better day.

We were fleeing with honor. Except we weren't. More.



8. First Landings in New Zealand:
To be frank, there was no startling revelation that we had landed in another country, far less one at the end of the world. After being sniffed by a killer customs beagle - which discovered Ewan's Granola bar - the first thing we saw was a McDonald's. We felt nice and comfortable. Flying from Auckland to Wellington, though, the awesome newness hit. The landscape is dramatic. Massive mountains. Deep volcanoes. Gorgeous coves and secluded bays. And a gentle emptiness. More.



9. Fox Glacier - a hell of a ride:
“All right, we’ll head over to Franz,” said the pilot, meaning Franz Josef Glacier, but saying it so that it sounded like France. Oh shit, the drinking pilot hadn’t been exiled at all. He was merely flying Franz Josef Glacier, as we were now. I gave the pilot a meaningful once-over, suddenly concerned. But he showed no signs of a trembling hand or a hung-over disposition. A wee tremble this close to the rocks could be fatal. In fact, he was the most confident, if taciturn, young man and inspired confidence. More.



10. The tale of a lost hat regained:
The old memory banks are often generous, if not always reliable, and so we are burdened to live perpetually in the shadow of the Halcyon Days. In reality, of course, the gnawing worries of the past have merely been replaced by newer agonies.

And, because the old worries have now resolved themselves, we figure they were never that bad in the first place.

The truth, we know, is different. We live and love and suffer in the present. And worry, always, about the future. More.

If I say cricket, will you read this?

These pictures are from a N.Z.-Pakistan test match which, interestingly - considering the content of this post - the Kiwis lost.


Despite the Kiwis getting a quick out, by the lunch break of the fourth day of the cricket match between Australia and New Zealand the Wallabies needed only 90-odd runs in their second inning, with nine wickets in hand, to beat the Black Caps and take an insurmountable two-test victory in their cross-Tasman rivalry.

Yes, that was English. I was just trying to make the point that, to the uninitiated, cricket is an illogical game. And that's without talking about googlies, Yorkers, silly mid-wicket, or getting caught leg before wicket.

I will not, in other words, bore you with the details. The bottom line is that the New Zealand cricket team had an astonishing win over their Aussie rivals today. Their improbable victory was the first time they'd won a test match in Australia for almost thirty years.

New Zealand will always be a rugby country. But for a land with just 4.3 million people they compete at a world class level in an unbelievable number of sports. They like competition here and the kids learn a love of victory - be it in sports, academics, debating, music or chess - at a young age.

When we were first shown around our sons' school, the teacher told us up front that "we encourage competition here." When I gave him a so-what look, he said some "foreign" parents had issues with that. He added quickly, though, that there were enough extra-curricular - as well as curricular - activities so that pretty much every kid can be the best at something.

At our sons' recent prize giving ceremonies, there were indeed many more awards for academics and cultural activities than sports.



I know this is a deep swamp to dive into so late in the evening, but I think competition, heavily married with sportsmanship, is a good thing. That's a post for another day. The point I'm simply trying to make is that Kiwis are extraordinarily tough competitors. They had no business winning today, as they have no business winning on many given days in many contests. But they hang in there.

While the cricketers will not be getting any parades in their honor, they'll certainly have put a spring in the step of New Zealanders. A win against the Aussies at anything - even tiddlywinks - is something worthy of a smile.

A hellish bus ride to heaven

I am not a snob, though this rant may put you in mind of one. I am misanthropic. I admit it. I’m one of the few students of English literature who found Lockwood in “Wuthering Heights” to be an appealing figure. Like him, I do not find the human race to be interesting. Quite the contrary, I find us to be a rather upsetting species. I like my space and time to myself.

So to be put on a bus with 70 other tourists and be shepherded around by a Gauleiter is, perhaps, the worst thing you can do to me.

It matters only a little if you throw in some of the most majestic scenery on the planet. The scenery, as you can see from the pictures, had the good grace to mirror my mood that day: tempestuous, stormy and wildly uncontrollable.

Even the benefit of not having to drive or pay for the petrol does not make a tourist excursion on a coach a plus for me. I am – and will always be – miserable, agitated and wholly unpleasant when forced into close confines with strangers. So sue me.

The behavior of tourists makes my position wholly defensible. They are obnoxiously loud, self-involved and unpleasantly gregarious. The only thing I gain are the germs that they so generously share with me. I’m delighted they are all having a great time. I truly am. I just do not wish to be a part of it.



Our recent outing to Milford Sound – may I not take the name of that splendid place in vain – began badly. There were other people on the bus for starters. We were then informed that we would have to delay in Franklin because two of our fellow passengers had slept in. They were taking a taxi to meet the bus there. We were encouraged to give them a hearty round of applause when they boarded.

A round of applause? I’m sorry but a) we shouldn’t have waited for them and b) they should have been subjected to catcalls and a gauntlet of vicious butt slaps upon boarding. It got worse. Upon arrival, said heroes not only took the gloriously empty seat beside me but asked if I’d mind moving to another seat – beside a large and sprawling sleeper – so that they could sit together. In normal circumstances, of course, I would have offered. I wasn’t given that chance, and these weren’t normal circumstances.

The anger I felt did not overcome my inherent sense of politeness. Of course I moved. I wish I’d been my wife. She’d have told them where to stuff their request. I sat, outraged and uncomfortable, with said large man’s head now resting on my shoulder. I listened to the newcomers – who were from a certain country that shall not be named – happily and loudly chatter away about the wonders of their trip. And how crazy they were for having slept in.



The lack of control, of course, is what makes me really hate such journeys. The best part of a road trip is to be able to stop when you want, especially when there is such majestic scenery to be inhaled. Nor do I like stopping only for pee houses, tea houses and ice cream shops. There is more to my life.

You must not mistake my misanthropic behavior for superiority. I’m perfectly aware of my own failings and am delighted to keep them company, without the need to share them publicly.

Still, my father, from whom I have inherited this trait, was in the seat behind me and was behaving in a manner more benign than expected. Peaceful almost. I took my cue and sought my inner Zen. The surroundings of the New Zealand Southland helped a great deal with that. I was annoyed, though, that the evil daggers my eyes were shooting at the awful interlopers were so completely ignored. The man who'd asked me to move, a gnome with an ego complex – he was clearly the most fantastic human being he’d ever met – was oblivious to my strong feelings towards him.

During the course of the day, he was everywhere I was, asking me to take his picture with his wife, stealing my seat on the boat when I left to take a picture, chit-chatting with me in the line at the café. He clearly thought he was enriching my day with his company.


My mood, and the weather, brightened as we neared home.

There were many such people on my day on the bus, my death march to Milford Sound. I don’t know how to more effectively exude the vibe that I want to be left alone without smashing bottles of beer, which would be a waste.

Again, I took my cue from my parents. They had resorted to the very effective method of gently making fun of the absurdity of some of our fellow travelers. Nicknames are good for that. They are good for a giggle and a lancing of the boil of forced company with my fellow man. It’s better – and far more socially acceptable than bottle smashing.

In the end the Zen of the moment and the majestic scenery of New Zealand, as well as the wonderful company of my parents, made for a great trip. But, by God, do I hate the cattle drives of modern tourism. Not a single vile word escaped my lips, but I am certainly working on my evil looks. Clearly they need sharpening. Or perhaps I should just wear a hoodie next time.