Music reviews

Prior to this famine, my economic boom funded a lot of uncharacteristically expansive spending. One particular area for my extravagance was music. And though the party is indeed over, I’m still merrily continuing this indulgence. Listening to music has always been enjoyable, usually with a taste for the esoteric, dark or extreme. Here, I’ll review a few of my recent purchases:

Portishead, Third

Until this purchase, I only possessed one single, burnt, live album. Paradoxically, it is one of my favourites. My penchant for dark music is deep and the lead singer, Beth Gibson, must have had extraordinary pain in her life, for what else could she be channelling when she sings? If it is all a pretence, then she is simply extraordinary. And if it be from a truly dark vein of her being, then we should all buy the records for her psychotherapy.

Though Portishead, admittedly, doesn’t have that much variety in tone (only one song is any from the respite of intense blues, purples and greys: a ukulele song in the middle!), they innovate constantly and texture each song further and further; deeper and deeper. The sound is rich and you can feel yourself easily getting lost in it.

Bristol is their hometown; and should I go to the United Kingdom, I’d have to do a pilgrimage there. Massive Attack and Tricky, whom I adore, both originate there. A lot of the music of all three has an underlying bleakness and austerity. Opening the Third CD case, the tone is minimal with an electric dark blue tinting an urban scene with powerlines draping across. The picture on the back shows Beth, seemingly overwrought with sadness, microphone in hand, while her bandmates are at their instruments at their stations completely unaffected.

Overall, it is a darkly beautiful album. For me, it is one song too long; even I have my limits and the last song was probably the song that was most similar to their previous work, and broke from direly true to drearily despairing. I might just have to get their other two albums, though.

The Eels, Hombre Lobo

The Eels are a favourite of mine, and one of the musicians that I boast almost every recording. Much of the music has an autobiographical tendency and as such comes through as some of the most genuine, touching music you’ll ever hear. I was a little disappointed for the record and happy for him: there seems to be no more demons for him to exorcise and the album seems to be just him having fun and making music. It disappoints me in that without the emotional depths of the other albums, it leaves the music to speak for itself; and the music isn’t that original. It sounds like his previous work or him imitating other singers. There are a couple of songs which have sustained themselves through repeated listens, but others urge me to skip them. And it is not that they’re anything bad, just that they don’t inspire the listen to listen any closer.

Grizzly Bear, Veckatimest

Grizzly Bear was one of the two bands that I heard on the terrifically good Australian radio station, Triple-R, that compelled me to buy. The song I heard was what I’d only call abstract folk, a folkish sound and instruments yet the vocalist set about being an instrument veering close to incoherence and sometimes singing in a fragile yet crisp clear words. The album I bought, at the brilliant Polyester Records on Brunswick no less, was Yellow House, thus named as it was recorded in a yellow house. My first listens were difficult, I recall; but then after returning home and properly listening to it unlocked a door to wonder. It had such a rich sound! The complete set of lyrics are written on the centre of the CD case, showing that the words are few, but repeated, rhythmically and with permutation. It was true listening music. The timing of their second release was perfect: I would buy anything from them.

Veckatimest, incidentally the name of the town they recorded in, on first listen disappointed me. They had discarded the folk sound of Yellow House completely in favour of more modern rock instrumentation. But the ethos remained the same: the voice is the richest instrument of all, winding its way through the sound and bursting through with sparks and, occasionally, ferocity. The lead singer is more audible but the songs are just as theatrical and non-standard. It is the perfect accompaniment to a winter’s day on the couch, in a sun beam.

Celestial Sights

Winter is a day away bringing the dark so much sooner and so much deeper; the moon has waned to a sliver; and from the eastern dawning horizon, Matariki (Pleiades, known in Chinese as 昴星团) has again reappeared. and there I was by the obelisk this morning to see it.

It was by a whim that I was there on One Tree Hill. A few nights ago I had had a sudden desire to go to the Stardome for their show and finally got there last night. Upon exiting, I picked up a pamphlet saying that the Matariki Breakfast was on the 20th. I made enquiries and only mid-question did it dawn on me that that date fell today (i.e., the following day). Coincidence alone is enough for me so I booked it, slept and burst out of bed at 5:20am to head to One Tree Hill.

The night sky this morning was beautifully clear. More surprising was the arrangement: Venus and Mars clustered together; Mercury near Aldebaran lining up Matariki; Jupiter overhead beaming brightly. In other words, beyond just being a great day to spot the eponymous constellation, it was a brilliant day to look at planets and the sky. The group of 80 plus people were quite sociable and I chatted with lots of people and even made a friend. My $30 purchase of secondhand binoculars the previous day was well worth it as I spotted Matariki early and got to enjoy it as well as share around my lenses.

Another burst of astronomical yearning is again upon me. I have been looking at telescopes in shops again. And I'm very close to buying one. I was glad to get the binoculars even though they are a little out of focus when using both eyepieces at stars. (I use one eyepiece for the stars.) The binoculars have also fed into my nature-obsession too, being of particular use at Ambury Regional Park yesterday.

Winter Solstice and Matariki signposted a huge change to my life last year, so this weekend will be a time for contemplation.

Distinction award

It is now customary for me to drink coffee rather than tea in cafes. It is not just that my palate has finally learnt to savour the bitterness of coffee, but the sheer disgust I have in paying the same amount for what is often a Twinnings tea bag in a cup (the sheer gall of it!). Aside from the tea cafes, there are, however, a few cafes that exceed expectation. One of these is Maggie Scott café on the Upper Reaches of Dominion Road (near Burgerfuel).

I sent myself there today, away from my usual writing haunt, upon espying a new tea brand, Tea Drop, which had a blend I hadn’t encountered: Lavender Grey tea. So I ordered, sat down and set up. My tea came over in a tea set but with the best arrangement I’d seen in a standard cafe: a tea cup and saucer; a 2 cup tea pot of hot water; and a tiny square saucer upon which a tagged silk tea bag sat. The latter is the distinguishing point: a tea aficionado rarely wants their tea to overbrew, and a little saucer is what is often desired for the spent bag or tea-leaf cradle.

It wasn’t perfect though: the Lavender Grey was pleasant, but not outstanding; they had a radio playing in the background; the china was unadventurous. But in terms of surpassing all other cafes on a single point, it does achieve a distinction.

Time and space

I've never had a problem with time: time is my blood; space, however, has always strained my imagination, whether it be judging gaps in traffic, whether it would be throwing small objects into bins or filling bags. After driving along the Summit road of the Port Hills in Christchurch on Sunday afternoon, boarding a plane and then resting at home that evening, I again scratch my head over the matter of space.

A Gorgeous Trip

Many desires cannot be consummated; the itch once scratched yearns to be scratched again. Travel is one of those. Set in motion by a promise to return to Wellington and designed to fulfil my hastily made vow to explore the lower Hawkes Bay, my road trip for the last weekend rapidly became the most ambitious tour of the year. The numbers say it all: 5 days on the road; 2084 kilometres travelled; 3 forest parks visited.

After an hour of teaching on Thursday morning, I filled up my car and went on my way. I hurtled to Taupo, and then through the autumnal beauty of the gorge highway to Napier. I didn’t know where I was to stay: My original plan of staying in the Kaweka Ranges at Te Puia Lodge was in doubt as the weather had been bad, but finally I received the call: yes, it was fine to stay there. I was caught unprepared: the Kaweka Ranges are accessed many ways; all I knew was that my way was to go to the end of Puketitiri Rd; and how was I to get to Puketitiri Rd? My fuel needle hovering over “half-full”, the sun heading to the North-western horizon, I scrambled around till I found my road and once upon it, I raced against the setting sun. And so on and on, Puketitiri Rd went. The map belied its full stretch. It was over half an hour till I sighted the snowy ranges and almost an hour till I saw a landmark on the map. My gas-tank pessimistically sagged well below “half-empty” toward the two bottom lines, a white one and a red one, that marked the bottom of the proverbial barrel. The road wound upon itself, through a gate and along a narrow road flanked by an unverged 50 metre drop and a rockface. At half past four, I landed myself in the car-park and I still had a 2-3 hour walk to the hut. The fuel needle rested for the night at half a millimetre above the white line. I reassured myself that the lines are not absolute, that there is still a buffer of fuel below the lowest line.

The track followed the Mohaka river gorge and was well-formed and easy to walk and run on. The last two-thirds entered into the spectacular. The river bent around huge bluffs and the mountains were nicely gathered around. Night fell too quickly and my headtorch went on; the delight of the view was reduced to the auditory pleasure of the river. The hut was unsurprisingly empty and pleasantly supplied with gas. The temperature went into a nosedive and to survive the night comfortably I put all my clothes on, put an emergency blanket over the top of my sleeping bag and put my towel around my neck, my woolly cap on and my sunhat over the top. I sipped my tea as the darkness overcame me.

I woke at 5:30, broke my fast and set off. I could wear just shorts and my tramping shirt and felt warm enough. The true beauty of the gorge was apparent with some scenes being simply breathtaking. I believe I could also hear the squeals of Blue Ducks in the river. As I followed the gorge down, I suddenly felt the chill. I became aware that all the mountains now had a green top and below a certain height were white: all the greenery below a certain level had frosted over. The mud crunched beneath my feet as I felt colder and colder. I arrived at the car. It was frozen over too. There were hot springs at either end of this trail but I was too rushed to go to either of them. My first taste of the Kawekas and it was a sweet and cool one. I want to taste it again.

After defrosting the car and packing up, I got in and set off again. I looked at the fuel needle: it was now on the white line. I was glad that I had joined AA just a couple of days before but was increasingly anxious about the prospect of running out of gas. I did my best to save petrol by coasting and trying to sustain speed the best I could. And at least the sun came out to thaw my fingers. Suddenly I was filled by another worry: There weren’t deer in the fields yesterday, so why were there now? Why is the mountain range on my left now? I knew in my heart that I must have taken a wrong turn but held onto a hope that I was just too focussed the day before. I decided to go to the next house I saw and knock to ask. The road-end, however, came to me first. Fortunately there was a house at the end as well and I leapt out to ask the farmer, who kindly clarified that my navigation was regrettably off: I had gone over ten minutes in the wrong direction and now the fuel needle was certainly on the red. I castigated myself thoroughly and roared off back down the road, then onto Puketitiri road again, round and round, coursing through the straights, the gate and past small communities. I was pretty resigned to running out: How long could this really go on? The needle was well below the red. This interminable road would have to end or the petrol. I coasted over a ridge and the horizon opened up to the bay view. Relief swept into me: Napier was almost here. I went through the semi-suburbia of Napier, turned into a Gull station and parked catatonically at the pump. After having a good drink of ginger beer, I got out of the car and filled up: 39.90L of petrol. I think I know the total capacity of my tank now.

Napier was a sight for sore eyes; it was warm and welcoming after my trauma. And it was only 10am! I decided to head up Te Mata peak as my main attraction here. Some of my students had told me about it and suddenly I couldn’t help but look at it: a huge blade of rock ripping from out of the ground near Havelock North. As my car went up the slope, I became the uncontrollably distracted driver of your nightmares. It was such an awesome view and every time I looked over my shoulder at the huge drop or the site back over the harbour I could barely contain my gasps or exclamations of amazement. At the top, it was easy to see tracks leading through the park. I want to go there again.

The Southern Hawkes Bay and Wairarapa were pleasant to drive through, the Ruahines and Tararuas following me down on my right. I had never been that good at remembering which mountain ranges were which but now I think I’ll never forget (even if I call the Ruahines the Rimutakas by accident). The blue and ochre of the Bay became the grey and green of the Wairarapa, which I have never visited. The main stop was to be Mt Bruce, New Zealand’s National Wildlife Centre for breeding threatened species. I saw Kiwis again and, maybe for the first time, a Kokako. It was spell-binding to watch. It was smaller than a tui and jumped rambunctiously around the leaf-litter before leaping onto the fencing ten centimetres from my face: “Mook-mook-mook?” it asked. I responded in kind, but he just repeated his question. According to Maori, this bird had the second best voice in the pantheon of NZ birds, behind the now extinct Huia, and this one expected me to sing! I continued south and the weather continued to intensify.

I drove to a hut at the bottom of the Tararua Ranges, and settled in for the stormy night. I got up at 6am and went on a walk to a lookout, while the weather took a little rest from its huffing and puffing. I really want to explore the Tararuas more. My only real concern was whether the Rimutaka Hill Road was open or not. It wasn’t, and my first trip through it was very enjoyable. It winds around the Rimutaka Range side of a gorge where it meets the Tararua Range. Just like Te Mata, the view could be lethal in its beauty.

From Wellington, I picked up a passenger and headed back over the Rimutaka Hill to go to the little known Cape Palliser. Unbeknownst to me, we were coming at the most perfect time. I had intended to do the Pinnacle walk but the storm that was centring itself on the lower North Island was powering up the seas and wind. Add onto that the fact that we arrive around high tide, you’ll soon get the picture: Behind a sign warning of falling rocks, rocks certainly were falling; sea spray hissed over the road; sea foam invaded the seal, imitating snow; miscellaneous driftwood strew the road. Yet on the other side stood cliffs and both jaggered and weathered rocks. We got to the end of the road where I climbed the stairs to the lighthouse (“Climb at your own risk”). The mid-section of the ladder felt perilous enough, but the last three steps were as risky as it could be. The wind-speed was horrifying. If you leant into it, it could more than hold you up, it could send you places. Descending was just as tricky. As we returned back down the road, I made a discovery. There were dozens of seals all along the foreshore. We somehow hadn’t seen them! And also new additions to the road had appeared since we had come down: a log had washed up and a whole tree had fallen over the road! This was nature at its rawest. I still want to go tramping here so I shall return.

The next day I left Wellington and after a quick look-see at the Otaki Gorge, went onwards through Wanganui to Mt Taranaki. As I entered the park, I saw a sign: “Kiwi zone: No dogs!” and immediately behind it, in my headlights was a ferret charging away like a greyhound. I sped up, lining him up with my left wheel but he broke to the left and dove into the undergrowth. The mountain itself was enshrouded in mist and I had to take it very carefully. Remnant snow was fringing some sections of the road too. At the top, the mist was so thick that to walk around without a head-torch could be enough to get quickly lost forever in the cold and the wet. Again, I was the only one staying at lodge but that gives one the freedom to spread out.

I woke at 6am and went on a short loop walk to see Dawson’s Falls, which was pretty small but good nonetheless. I headed down the mountain and the sun shone on me again for the first time since Friday morning. I headed onto the Forgotten World highway, a place I had always intended to visit. It was truly beautiful. It hasn’t got much development at all, but has all the material for a Great Walk and agricultural eye-candy, every corner an idyll. The jewel, Tangarakau Gorge, could only be gaped at, the only problem being that there were few places to stop to view it. And, further on, from a place called Nevin’s Hill lookout, there has to be the best view of Ruapehu I’ve ever had. As a whole the highway might be the best drive visually that I’ve been on, a Great Drive perhaps.

And then it was back via Taumaranui, Te Kuiti, Otorohanga to Ngauruawahia, and onward to Auckland. The last day was truly a case of sensory overload. I had to wonder if I had been reduced to a gibbering, gawping tourist: “Wooo, mountain; woooo, tree.” but on the way back through the agricultural Waikato, I realised what I had seen was truly special.
This reads more like a love letter to the North Island, and perhaps it is. I am suffering a particularly acute, yet peculiar form of patriotism; one that causes one to wish to possess the whole country in the mind.

The undulating track

“I’m not here,” the singer moaned weakly through the car's drone;
to his voice, we flew through the night to the Taupo lakeside;
where Youth Everlasting, with a subtle smile, spoke slightly;
laconically receiving us for the night.

I watered pine trees in the morn;
with water of steeped tea tree leaves, brewed before;
down a diversion, a turn, and another, till we reached the rocky roads;
populated by swine and equines, that’d lead us to the Waikaremoana lakeshore.

Panekiri bluffs rose tall, and with it we rose too;
we crawled our way along the path, past fungi and pot-heads;
we leapt from cliff tops, but the darkness smothered our eyes;
ascending the stairs, in the gloom, we pondered cackling dusk birds.

The next dawn a storm-head wound around an early squall, holding us;
‘Shall we go?’; ‘How could we go?’; if we’d left, well, who could know?
It blew a backpack across the decking; but it hurled us on our way;
we rounded the bends and found the shore to the calm.

The blighters bit and the hazelnuts twisted;
ligaments strained; the falls eventually came; and so did we;
She was wrong, y’know; that DOC girl, that is: Who could go so fast?
How could we be so wrong, to think we were fast, to take it so leisurely?

Our pursuer, the night, caught us by the legs again;
possums prowled at every corner, their blood eyes beaming red;
we suppered at a lean-to: if only it could have been the Party House;
arriving at the hut, cleaned, we slept to the clatter of nails and tails.

Dawn breaking, the veil over the hut lifted too: a roof of green and red!
The insects muttered overhead while we curled around the inlet;
for the first time, the sun emerged full to sweeten the shore;
but our pace was not reaching the time set.

Text bell, flat; one bar, flat; one bar, two bars, flat;
the boatsman’s call rang out in the distance;
fishermen cried out in vain in our service;
we could only rest and make new plans;

At a picnic table we assembled again;
and spoke of deception, miscommunication and more;
on the shore, I could once again talk with the outside world;
our trip out was imminent; the blighters bit; and, back, the car roared.

“I’m not here,” the singer moaned again through the drone of the car;
we were; talked of talk; but there’s no such thing as a free meal.
That fella naturally objected to the ideal; she talked it to death;
the night was finally a comfort as we came to the final reel.

The tail of the fish

The enigma of the Far North has finally been dispelled from my mind. It is now solid rock, temperate water and flowing warm sands of white, orange, yellow and grey. In my youth and in later excursions, I had never gone further north than Kerikeri; perhaps, at times, I even had doubts of the worth of a trip up that far: what would there be but metal roads, sand, marijuana and farmland? Inspired by the tales of my students, however, the Far North became the second of three destinations I vowed to visit this year. An Auckland Anniversary day plan foundered early, but fate dealt me a second chance: the internet meet-up group I had joined had proposed an Easter trip to Cape Reinga and around, and that was something I couldn’t possibly turn down.

Our first day, after escaping the greater Auckland area, had two major sights: a crag at Tokatoka and the Waipoua forest. The crag, the first walking of the trip, surpassed all my expectations: a steep climb and a stunning view over the Kaipara harbour and the Wairoa river. Night fell after our visit of the Waipoua forest and we car-ferried across the Hokianga harbour and eventually found our first camping site: Raetea forest park. For a free camp-site it was quite pleasant with a river flowing by and a well-maintained loo.

The next day, I rose early but not the earliest: our organiser is the first person to comprehensively beat me out of bed on a camping trip (and he did so on every single day). He’d already gone on several short walks by the time I emerged to cook my porridge! Day two was to be a big day: driving to the northernmost stretch of mainland New Zealand, the Aupouri Peninsula, tramping to Pandora’s Beach (near Spirits Bay), driving to Cape Reinga for sunset and then camping down in Tapotupotu Bay.

On the Abel Tasman track I had swum for what I thought was to be the last time of this warm patch at Awaroa. I was wrong: I swam four times this trip! I swam at Pandora’s beach with joy. Two others joined me. Large fish were swimming through each huge wave that crashed. You could body surf from the strength of the Pacific tide. I loved it! The sandy beach itself was utterly spectacular in its own right. Tramping in and out wasn’t anything special though, except for the effort that it required. Three of us enjoyed a run-tramp side-trip out to a summit, but otherwise it was just hard grind on a wide, unsheltered gradient.

Cape Reinga was different to how I expected, and it had apparently been very recently developed with a nice carpark, modern but befouled toilets, and a track leading to the lighthouse with plaques describing the significance. They have started to seal the road there too. This probably counts as a necessary development in view of the sheer number of people who go there and with a mind to prevent erosion and enable accessibility, even though it felt a China Tourism Board job, especially with recorded music playing as you went through the arches after the carpark. But have I yet said it was stunning? The view was special. The waters churned beneath us; North Cape and Spirit’s Bay stretched to the East, and the Three Kings Islands stood beneath the setting sun. Our group bonded at this Point.

Tapotupotu campsite is apparently the northernmost in the country and is famed for its biting insects, and this may be where Tramping Luck again shined on me. Although the weather was outstanding for the whole time we were there, there had been a cold snap mid-last week which may have killed all the nasties off. I was bitten once (I think) in the whole weekend and never had the need to use repellent. And the campsite, despite the numbers there, was very pleasant.

The next day got off to a slow start due to communication issues (I'll mention these later) but once we were off, it was grand. We launched into our biggest tramp, the Te Werahi Gate circuit. This covered a lot of the unique landscapes that Northland is famous for. We went through sandy, rocky areas, around capes and through the dramatic borderlines of desert-like areas and then thick bush and swamp. I swam at Twilight Beach, but the surf was a bit too timid for my liking. It was pleasantly exhausting with my joints filling with a pleasurable weariness.

In the late afternoon, we continued down the west coast to Te Paki stream, a gateway to Ninety-Mile beach. I’ve never been on the famous beach before and three of us indulged our tired bodies in the masochistic act of running up sand mountains. The sand cascaded down the sides like water with every stride. The top of the dune had a fine ridge: one side shaded and cool, the other side warm. The sand was the finest milled sort possible and you could bath in it with pleasure. We all charged down the sunny face of the dune. Someone even forward-rolled most of the way! After using the stream as a carwash, we headed further down to Rarawa beach, and oh, in the dusk cool, and with your knees getting swished by the warm Pacific water, it was bliss. Did it have the whitest sand ever? And how could New Zealand have such crystal clear ocean water?

Our final night was spent camping on the Karikari peninsula, just to the south-east of Aupouri peninsula, at a campsite called Maitai Beach. We arrived in the dark and after erecting our tents and feeding our stomachs went off to bed. The spells of these places are cast with the rising sun. I rose at 6:30am and had an Up&Go before donning my togs and heading for the shore. This was a plan I had had for the last few days: to have a morning swim. The breeze may have been cool but the water was the same temperature as it was during the day, a pleasant, tepid warm as I stepped my way deeper and deeper, passing the usual temperature-sensitive threshold points on my body with ease. I wore my goggles but could only spot evasive crabs sidestepping my potential onslaught. A fisherman patiently stood on the rocks nearby with a rod in hand. The morning sun was on me as I eventually emerged, and silhouettes along the beach approached: two of my companions were also out in the early morn. I pulled on a shirt and walked barefoot with them up the ridge that divided the bays and onto a knoll that looks out upon the whole harbour. It was the fourth day and I was now locked in a bodily ease that could last a lifetime. We descended and continued into the next bay.

One of my adventurous companions mentioned his desire to talk with the locals so I accompanied him up the hill to the baches. As we approached a gate, a Maori man waved at us, we waved back, and in turn he put his big dog in the house and shut the door. As we walked up the drive, he introduced himself as Henry and he happily chatted with us with his neighbour’s girl lurking at the side sipping tea and eavesdropping on the adults’ conversation. He said that he was always keen to build the personal connection with people, as without people, the world would be meaningless. He talked about his wariness of the Maori language resurgence - he didn’t put his children into kura kaupapa schools as he had a deep suspicion of the tradition that comes with it. (He spoke later of his grandfather as a hard man who may have contributed to the death of his wife, and thus denying his father the female nurturing of a mother figure. This may have been the tradition he feared.) He spoke of his fear of the gentrification of the peninsula and the stifling that multi-ownership (i.e., tribal collective ownership) can create. The land that his shack was on had been in his family’s hands for a very long time, mainly for dairy since who knows when. We left him to see whether our friends were ready to move on but I was left with the recurring thought that without a knowledge of the people, the land is just form.

After going to yet Another Breath-taking Beach (ABB), we headed for Coca-Cola Spring, which one of our car mates talked endlessly about. It is the name often used to refer to a popular freshwater lake on the Karikari peninsula. It’s name may say something of the namers because for me it was the colour of black tea; and it tasted like it too; or as one tester more specifically described it: Assam black tea. Three of us dove in completely. Fresh water is much colder than the ocean water and the initial wading was shiver-inducing. Three of us (each time I refer to three of us, interestingly it was a different three each time, me being the only common variable) lolled around in the water with a ball game called Commitment. The rest just sat and watched.
Diving under the surface was a surreal experience: you couldn’t see far at all. With your head under and eyes open you course through the brown darkness without any idea what is ahead.

From Karikari Peninsula we shot around Doubtless Bay. Fading small communities were bracketed by residential developments. In Taipa, a brick fireplace stands bereft of its house, alone and without comfort amidst a dairy paddock. The cows low and graze around it in the meadow of the present. It all acts as a reminder of the forces of change.

The main organiser was one of the more earnest people I’ve met, and it was saddening to disappoint him at times with our carefree attitudes. Like me, he was a time man; but I didn’t carry the burden of the planning and was mainly oblivious to what was left to do and what amount of time remained. Each one of us would take our time or do what fancied us despite his apparent urgency. The final slap in the face for him was on the trip home, when, at Mangonui, our vehicle predominantly wanted to “break from the convoy” and follow our own schedule to get back to Auckland. He still had two other sights he wanted the group to visit before we parted ways and his disappointment was palpable. There was irony, though, that our vehicle was lured to the first sight (Whangaroa had a crag that stood high and haughty, a temptress, softly drawing the attention of the menfolk in the car to knock the bugger off) and then bumping into them at the second sight, which appeared on our right and we thought it improper to pass by.

A side story for the trip was that of the Couple. They were fairly regular participants in the hiking meet-ups but always sustained an aloofness and desire for privacy that was at times incompatible with a group activity. They started on a bad foot: after arriving at the rendezvous point in Auckland almost an hour late, they nonchalantly stepped out of the car without any embarrassment, apology or explanation. During the weekend, they didn’t communicate or mix beyond the efforts of other group members to chat with them and operated on their own clock despite a tight schedule and rarely let others know what they were going to do when we arrived at each place. This wouldn’t have been too bad if one hadn’t been the driver of one of the two cars we took, carrying three others including the main organiser. The Couple frustrated him in particular to the point of saying: “I don’t care anymore.” He did still care, of course, a lot and bore the responsibility for their failures on himself as an organiser. There was a weird moment of redemption, though, where at Twilight beach they disappeared altogether without us knowing when they’d be back. Everyone was ready to leave, and some of the slower walkers had already left. But they were nowhere to be seen. They had been last spotted near a distant cave, so one of our members walked in that general direction to whistle and yell and, if necessary, go over by the cave to see. They may have fallen in. Eventually, in response, out from the rocks popped the obviously naked white body of the man. We gesticulated that we were moving onward, and we naturally thought they’d got up to some mischief in a pool or in the cave. Once they caught up with us came an interesting story: He’d spotted mussels in the cave, stripped off, dived in and started collecting them off the side of the cave. A stingray (which incidentally had been seen by another member earlier from the shore) had come into the cave freaking him to the point of leaping out of the water. He then broke open the shells and fed it by hand from the safety of the rocks. That evening he gave everyone else a nicely cooked mussel each. (Mine was donated to a lucky soul.)

I enjoyed this trip: I didn’t do any of the work planning it; I didn’t do any of the driving; I could just savour the experiences. There were places still yearning to be visited. I wouldn’t mind spending some time in Matauri Bay, Whangaroa Harbour or find out what is left on the west coast north of the Hokianga. It did open a world of new places that I would like to revisit, or places I’d like to share with others. The South Island sometimes feels like beauty without heart; the Far North felt like it had that heart and the form to match.

Pedestrian Virtue

Although I am quite scrupulous in many facets of my life, I've always been quite liberal in my jay-walking. My mind has long since memorised the phasing of most of the central city traffic lights (in fact, even when arriving new places, I learn the phasings of intersections faster than I know the roads I walk through). I know when to cross and I don't need a little green-man to tell me. When I do cross, I'll look into the only direction(s) where vehicles could come from, hence, I'm self-assured in my safety.

A few years ago, my faith in the rectitude of this approach was shaken mildly by a single conversation with an older gentleman. He remarked how he had seen someone with a trainee guide-dog waiting at a central city intersection, and how hard it must be for the dog to learn when to cross when people randomly cross. This is true, but what I thought about was how hard it must be for parents to teach their children of the same appropriate behaviour. Do we as individuals share any social duty to provide a good standard of behaviour to model for the young?

An appeal for social duty is not unusual these days. But it is especially difficult to maintain in the pluralistic world we live in. The mores of the people in our city are many. We are comparatively individualistic; we don't tend to use social pressure for these matters (although we do for language in some respects, often referred to as "political correctness"). And with the multitude of ways people do things, the power of one person going against the "right way" is much stronger than a single one sticking to orthodoxy. (Interestingly, I'd say the opposite is also true: if everyone is not doing the "right thing", one person standing for "orthodoxy" is quite effective). Another example of this, a mother told her precocious son they couldn't sit in the seats for the elderly despite his pleading. After they sat down, another passenger took those seats. Naturally, the lack of a uniform social standard means that it comes down to adhering simply to parental authority.

There could be another appeal we could use: an appeal to protect the less streetwise. A few days ago, I was about to walk across Whitaker Place off Symonds Street. The red man was displayed but I was hungry and wanted to watch the news. Cars were streaming out from Wakefield Road, turning onto Symonds Street. I crossed knowing I'd just have to observe cars coming from Wakefield so I passed other people standing at the corner and went across. Moments after I got the other side I heard a beep. A group of girls who I had passed on the corner had followed me across when a car had come straight from Wakefield and headed quickly for Whitaker before braking mid-street to prevent hitting the girls. This is not the first time this has happened. Cruel arguments for Social Darwinism and relevant comments on personal responsibility aside, people do tend to follow others instinctively in our actions and inactions, and thus unorthodox behaviour can cause others to err; and in some circumstances, they may err to terrible consequences.

One thing chimes in my mind as I read those words: How conservative I've become, wanting to restrain individualistic behaviour for the "common good"!

Awaroa Inlet at dusk

The tide has evacuated the mudflats again, leaving it pocked and strewn with bivalve tombstones. They crunch underfoot as I follow the empty bed of a stream, where once it supplied the bay, before the bay ebbed away back to the ocean past the sand-dunes.

The sky darkens, smudging the definition between the mountains and hills, transforming them into a unified black frame for the navy blue sky. Without any planets in the early evening, Sirius is the first to make itself seen; the Pointers and Betelgeuse follow: The night scene is forming again. The moon is far from rising and this Summer night sky would be a rich one.

After midnight, the tide would be back here, and if I were to remain, where would the water be up to? How far across the half-tide bay did the afternoon trampers get before they had to turn back? Was I there now? Had I gone already further than they had dared, all without challenging the water?

As I approached the remnant estuary, the mud sucks in my jandals, soiling the corners of my socks. The viscous mud pops, releasing my soles as I backstep to higher ground. My path intersects with past-laid footprints; they are deeper than mine, laid at a time moister than now.

A small strain of chatter is all that can be heard from the din of the hut; the glimmer of the candles and torches are weaker than the light of the Pleiades. Around the celestial south, does the sky spin in the wise of a clock, or against it? The mind wants the wideness of the sky; the mind wants the chatter to end.

Awaroa Inlet at sunrise

It is really something to fiddle with wet and sandy shoelaces with your dry, well-slept hands; at one moment repelling; at one moment sensual. The sun is up already, we know, behind the ridge, struggling to rise in a sky only marked by a few filaments of cloud.

Packs on, we stride onto the flats, to warm ourselves before the crisp air shivers us. There is no sparing the cockle shells, their transformation into sand and soil hastened by our transit. The evening’s footprints have been swept clean by an unseen tide, new prints laid by the early birds.

All that’s left of the expansive bay is a delta of small estuaries for us to cross. The water enters the top of the shoes and down to the toes; the water crosses the threshold of the knee and the knee-jerk shudder that brings. But that is as deep as it goes, and we linger in the flow.

Out of the stream and onto the mudflat, we see the crabs are out, and the oystercatchers are joined by a solitary grey heron in breaking their fast.

Twenty three minutes after low-tide

I may have found my rhythm in cold-calling, but that doesn't mean that it is any better. I'm onto my fourth marketing interview this Friday: my third was a real rocker. The Hong Kong-born New Zealand-raised training responsible, upon hearing about my linguism and wanting to know whether I would be able to build rapport with the (potential) Chinese students, lured me into speaking Cantonese. Lightning questions were bolted across the table. One sentence: fended neatly; another one: replied with aplomb; the third: boujee? what is a boujee, "Newspaper," ah, "baozhi," I translate into Mandarin, well, yes, I can read newspapers in Chinese. The meeting was the best yet, though. Despite the trial, she has been the one that I've built most rapport with in the meeting, and whose company's situation was most likely to yield potential students.

With my roll shrinking even further, the urgency has increased. But there is good reason to believe the bottom has been struck; the bleeding has been arrested. E-mails last night reassured me somewhat: two Czechs will be returning from their travels, journeys which I thought might have ceased their tuition; another student, who promised that he'd talk his manager into extending his tuition, extended it with interest; and another will come back from a trip. And I've finally settled on what my volunteer work will comprise, after a hiatus of half a year.

And at Abel Tasman National Park, tides oppose your your progress with their ingress. Low tide is when you can cross. I've done fairly well with my additional leisure. My lack of travel last year in the boom has been more than compensated by my frolicking about the place including Abel Tasman. 23 minutes after low tide on 16 March, I crossed a morning chilled Awaroa inlet on the Abel Tasman Coastal Track, one of the most perfect places, where I had one of my most perfect moods the previous evening.

That was when I went out for a walk on the mudflats in my jandals to see the extent of low tide. The exertions of the day had levelled my mind so the starlight could shine in.

Of swings

March has strode into my life and has already dictated the terms for the rest of the year. With the loss of Wellington, the graduation of five students, foreign trips of three and the imminent maternity of another, my roll has started to dwindle back to levels not seen in a very, very long time. I was aware from the New Year break that such a predicament could arise. And foreknowledge did soften the increasingly sharp realisation of what was coming.

Fortunately, I have appealing contingency plans, but still first I'll apply myself to plan A with all my strength. This enterprise of mine means a rather lot to me and I shan't let it slip into a coma. After some hesitation, I've returned to that horrid task of cold-calling. Already there has been some promising signs. One of the most promising signs is the kindness of receptionists to yield contacts so easily and the friendliness of those whom I've had to deal with.

Cold-calling, three years ago, resulted in my biggest working success. One single cold-called potential client became my greatest income stream, gave me a transnational status for a year and provided the joy of full-time occupation with my work. The students were pretty marvellous too. And so, again, in the depths of this recession I again will seek to uncover a seam of gold. Or perhaps just a spring or two to keep me warm over the winter. The search for that client took two patches of sustained cold-calling, the first ending with a lot of leads that were followed to their ends without success. It is a rather brutal process and it'll take a long time before I can, with some eagerness, raise the phone to do such calls. I'm expecting a long haul once more.

In my early years of business, I made use of my surplus time with Chinese study, reading and also philosophical investigation. This time round it'll be firmly centred on developing my writing skills. My chinese study will be rehabilitated, reading maintained and swimming sustained, but I will keep writing as a core. I want to see what I can do. I want to fulfil my potential here.

If my teaching endeavour fails altogether, I will likely head to Europe and England for travel before flying to China to educate, earn and adapt in a Chinese environment, before once again returning to my much loved home, New Zealand. Quite an enviable plan B, eh!

The Eve of Change

This evening I prepare for the end of one phase, but not yet the start of another. My mind knows, but, perhaps, hasn't really realised yet the imminence of it all. Of the next step, I barely have a few paper scratchings and a recurring lyric. I aim for another dalliance down a rabbit-hole of fate. That would be my middle name, after all. I pray it is creatively fecund; never a bolt hole, nor a black hole.

Daniel, he went East~

Hikurangi was a mountain I had only become familiar with in the last few years. It has not only the distinction of being the highest non-volcanic mountain in the North Island, but, nestled at the end of the Raukumara ranges in the East, it is also known as the first place to receive the sun at dawn. Prominently marked on most maps, it has tempted me for quite some time.

Incidentally, the East Coast was one of my three places I’ve vowed to visit this year along with Northland and Southland. I was last in the East Coast when I was 4 where I have vague memories of visiting Fantasyland. My desire to tour the East Coast had meshed perfectly with my yen for climbing mountains, and in this case, Hikurangi, and then Waitangi weekend fit so well into these plans. I tried to make a plan to get there with a friend but it fell through two days before the long weekend, and then I failed to scramble well enough to get another person. So, again on a long weekend, I was to go on a trip alone.

I didn’t plan at all – I just packed generally and left. I stopped first at Gordonton and availed myself of their Devonshire tea, headed to Taupo, whose i-Site failed to give me the information I required, and then finally onto Napier, whose i-Site did. It was a pretty little town and I intend to visit it again, perhaps to it and the neighbouring southern townships. I booked my evening accommodation for the evening, a campsite at Mahia Peninsula, and asked for permission to climb Hikurangi from the Ngati Porou Tourism Board (as it is not state-owned land), which was granted.

Driving around the coast to the peninsula was a relief. The stifling heat of the day had eased, and the sun was lower bringing a reddish evening tone to the landscape. Was Mahia Peninsula special? I cannot say; it just felt perfect. Perhaps, through other eyes and at another time, it’ll seem like another dingy little beachside community.

“The dolphin might still be in the bay. Just look out for the people watching,” the lady at the desk mentioned as she sent me to my site. After pitching my tent, I headed to the beach for a swim in the surf and then over to order some takeaways. While waiting “20 minutes” for my food, I went further along the shore where some kids were still in the water 30 metres out to sea. One was cruising through the waves vertically at quite a rate before stopping, and that was when I spotted the fin. Yes, Mahia does, indeed, have a friendly dolphin that lolls around for hours with the kids.

The next day I woke early, upped sticks and went north, arriving in Gisborne at 8:30am. I got further information about my evening destination, Hikurangi. From there I shot up to the coast beach-hopping through Tolaga Bay and Anauru Beach and then fueled up at Tokomaru Bay. All that lay ahead of me now was the mountain.

The plan for the mountain was simple: walk up to the hut in the afternoon, eat and sleep in the hut, wake early in the morning and ascend the peak for the sunrise, and then descend for my homeward journey. As I pulled into the car park area, I saw that DOC had provided an information sign. The difficulty was rated as: medium to high. This intrigued me a little. The Tongariro Crossing and Pirongia were both rated as medium, and this was going to be my first opportunity to climb something with a “high” rating. I shrugged, threw on my 10kg backpack and then started up the hill at 2:30pm.

It became apparent very early that this was not going to be an enjoyable day of tramping, but a physical challenge. The first section to the hut was over 10 kilometres long through unforested farmland devoid of any shelter; it was sweltering that day with temperatures verging on 30 degrees; and I was carrying a heavy pack up an almost unending gradient (it was only when I descended that I noticed that there were not only flat sections but some small declines). My sweat pores were going gangbusters, requiring me to regularly rehydrate and rest, but after three hours of grind, I came over a ridge to the cute hut.

Not being a DOC hut, it had some interesting aspects: it had cutlery, candles, a pot-belly stove and dishwashing liquid available. The long-drop was an old one, not from the standard issue that you see on most walks. Overall, it felt quite homely.

After dinner I tried my best to sleep early to prepare for my 4am wake-up. I didn’t get to sleep quickly at all, baking in my sleeping bag, but by the time my alarm went off I felt rather refreshed. Once I had wolfed down breakfast, I grabbed by day-pack, slid on my head-torch and headed out. Above me was the usual winter early evening sky with Scorpio looming large with Sagittarius following. The moon, being close to Full, had already gone over the mountain and had probably already set. In the distance to the east I saw the lights of Ruatoria – obviously someone else was awake. Immediately I set about ascending and the early slope was steep. I entered light bush for the first time and then into alpine vegetation. It was an eerie scene. It was here that I had my first encounter with speargrass (which in my ignorance of its actual name, I referred to as “Hell’s Cabbage”). The leaves were very sharp and would perforate my shins for the whole journey; sometimes little ones would be concealed amongst grasses so as to ambush my hands and arms; and then there’d be patches of them rendering a section almost impassable. Some would have the most hellish flowers emerging from them, big spikes awaiting tender flesh.

The markers had reflective lines for those ascending at the wee hours and at first they were simple to follow. Once in the alpine vegetation though, some were placed further apart than you’d expect. Twice early on I went astray and had to wander sideways till I caught sight of a metallic blue and pink reflection, often having to navigate through speargrass. The track took me around to the western face of the peak, the opposite side from the hut, and only then did it trail upwards toward the summit. And it was then that I lost the trail for the last time. I believed the last marker I had seen must have been the final marker and that it was now up to the climber to find his way. And so I climbed. And trudge up a scree slope. And I climbed over a sheer face to a dead-end. And I went back down and around over the delicate plants. During this time, the sky lightened sufficiently for me to turn off my headlamp. Every time I looked up, all I could see was a craggy mass with at least another 100m of ascending remaining. I looked down over the smaller hills. They were gloomy still - I still had time before sunrise. I surge up again, crossed back over the scree slope and then up. And it was still another 50 metres to go. Exhausted, I looked out over the ranges behind me to see, yes, the mountains were crowned in red: I was too late for the sunrise. Disappointed, I had a good rest at this point, drank and then launched myself again up the hill and within five minutes hauled myself onto the summit of the peak. I howled a cry of relief, only then to look fifty metres over to see another peak, the peak, the peak with the trig on top, which is to say the highest point, Hikurangi peak. Between it and me there was a dip and ascent still remaining. I looked over at the sun and leant back against the peak I was on to regather myself. It was 6:40am. I ate, drank, stretched and rested before again clambering down the rocks and up to the trig. Along the way I noticed a few other paths up to the ridge I was on and then it struck me that I hadn’t taken the intended route up. At the proper trig I had a proper rest, saluted the sun and then prepared for my descent.

With the numerous possible routes down, I was not sure whether there was a best one. Descending entails more risk that ascending. I chose one near the trig peak and started to painstakingly descend, at first on all-fives (the buttocks becoming a valuable limb) and then later on my feet when it felt safe. It was nice to see some human footprints on this section; there were none on my ascending route. There were several parts where scree surfing was possible to a degree. At one point I “screed” my way close to two abrupt drops, the only ways down. I looked at the one on the right but didn’t like that prospect, so I went for the one on the left which had the advantage of natural foot and handholds in the rock-face to descend with. The drop was almost three metres, so I turned my body around and went down backwards. Halfway, with over a metre left to go, I put my left foot onto a big foothold, aiming to drop my right foot down onto another and then jump to the ground. But: crack – crumble. The big foothold beneath my left disintegrated with my weight on it. I quickly pushed my body into a crevice in the wall and re-evaluated my plan. My handholds were not great and what remained of the big foothold didn’t inspire me with confidence. I couldn’t see a way down, but then there was nothing back up, even if I could get back up. I spent a good two minutes having a rest while prised into the groove. Thoughts came to mind like the blood donation form I had ticked and crossed two days before, which asks whether you indulge in hazardous activities such as “mountain climbing” (I had crossed it). Fortunately, last year in August I had gone down to Taupo where I did proper rock-climbing with Andrew for the first time. Although I did only the basic ones, there were some interesting “learning points” which suddenly shot to mind. A lot of the perception of impossibility was coming from my lack of faith in handholds. But with each extra hold you have the collective strength doubles the safety and reliability. I put my weight through both hands to turn my whole body around (facing away from the rock-face) and pushed my body into the rock-face again. I reached down to lower handholds and then managed to get my left foot to the last foothold and dropped down. Success! This all was done in ten seconds. Naturally, I howled in triumph like a lion.

Luck was with me in that I was again descending on the western side: I was still in the shade of the mountain and still had plenty of water. The remaining path on the rocky section, although hazardous, was quickly processed (there was one other potentially body-maiming moment, but for brevity it will be omitted). I was now just a scree slope short of the alpine shrubbery, but where were the track markers? I groaned loudly. Why couldn’t I just go down the right frickin’ slope?

After a brief rest, I deduced that the track must be to the right so I traversed several scree slopes and speargrass patches before finally spotting the silhouette of one, and in fact noticed that there were markers going further into the mountain than I had seen (i.e., that was the way I should have taken up). But now, finally, I was back with a simple way down. At thus I descended. The only funny note was that despite all the peril in the climbing and descending of the peak, the only time I shed blood was on a rather flat part in the alpine shrubbery when I somehow lost my balance and grasped for speargrass. Blood came oozing out of my palm immediately, but once I had put pressure on it and it had stopped bleeding, there were no visible wounds.

Again, in respect of the points raised on my blog of Pirongia in the freedom of going alone, I don’t believe I would have done the mountain if I’d gone accompanied. There was too much risk, difficulty and pain that I could accept for myself but wouldn't want to put anyone else through. But in some sections it would have made it easier and safer. The first day had been a physical test; the last day was both a great physical and mental test.

I washed off in Hick’s Bay and then started the long drive home. This was the part I hadn’t thought about: driving over 500 kilometres after waking up at 4am, climbing for 7.5 hours and exhausting myself psychologically. I can honestly say that it was done responsibly and with numerous stops. Naturally, this is the other disadvantage of going it alone - no-one to help in the driving. And thus concluded my longest of long weekends.

The psychology of dead and missing trampers

With the long weekends fast approaching two Thursdays back, I quickly tried to throw together some activities to do. Mt Pirongia again called to me in my dreams; and thus, I called some friends to check their chances of coming, one of whom was fairly positive about coming (although he later hurt his foot the day before the walk). The plan I had in mind was to cruise up on a short track (Tahuanui), stay overnight at the top and go down on a long track (Bell's track) the next day. This was the second of the two possible loops that could be done on Pirongia, the first being achieved in a single, long day with James prior to New Year.

I was mostly packed the day before but was late to bed that day. At 6:30am the day of departure, I received a text from my friend: his bruised foot had not recovered well enough and he couldn't come.

To go or not to go: I wasn't seized by the enthusiasm while I was lying in bed, slightly sleep deprived. Conversation on the track would become introspection.

But, solo tramping: Now that was something I hadn't indulged in much lately; and an overnight tramp - that'd be pretty cool. When accompanied, often I had to compromise in terms of speed or devote a part of my mind to what they other person was thinking or needing. A group or companion also makes it more difficult to socialise with other people on the track.

After swaying from one option back to another, I suddenly fell into a determined state of mind and launched myself into full-blown preparative activities and then out the door. By 11am, I was there and started to march the track. I had been on the Tahuanui track several years before: we had tramped to a campground close to the trailhead, and then the next day gone up to the top ridge and back without getting to the hut. As I started this time, I noticed that things were different. I passed a off-shoot track to some caves: that wasn't there before! I checked the map and realised my hunch was right: I must have missed a sign and had inadvertently gone on the track I wanted to descend on!

This one, Bell's track, was much longer than Tahuanui, with the DOC leaflet suggesting it would take 8-10 hours. I was most concerned about time. I didn't want to be getting there at 7pm. But there was a campground midway between that was suggested to be "half-way". I thought I'd walk until 3pm, and if I hadn't seen the campground, I'd head back.

I thought again about the joy of solo tramping. My own speed, the freedom to strategise how I'd do things and also not feeling the same sense of responsibility. I thought how liberating things are on your own: you can take some risks and push yourself in ways you wouldn't be able to accompanied. I amused myself in this statement possibly being the same psychology of dead and missing trampers. I fidgetted a lot with my pack. It had been ages since I had tramped with a whole pack.

The track had been mostly flat, apart from a rapid ascent away from the river. The week of dryness had meant that muddy parts were minimal. I strode into a series of clearings, the last of which was the camping ground. There was a dodgy-looking young man with a gun, who had a campfire blazing with a friend and his dog (dogs and fires were banned; but I had already seen two other groups with dogs in tow). The time was only 1:30pm! That meant I had got to the half-way point in only two and a half hours. I ate most of my lunch and hydrated myself completely. The temperature was rising: the forecast had suggested the temperature would hit 28 degrees in nearby Hamilton.

After fifteen minutes I rose once more and surged onwards with renewed vigour. There were so many fallen trees on the track, which often meant the track disappeared for portions and you'd have to forensically search for a scent of the track (especially if the fallen tree had a track marker on it). You can easily realise the two-fold difficulty of tracks when you've lost sight of the way forward: there are many "apparent" tracks that aren't tracks at all; and when you cross between apparent tracks in search of the correct one, progress can be extraordinarily difficult. Maybe that is where the 8-10 hours came from: a conservative hour added for people losing the track. I marched on through passing a large group of middle-aged women who were headed for the half-way campground. They looked exhausted when I said there was about an hour still for them to go. This intrigued me, but I failed to ask them exactly how long they had been walking.

Two hours since the campground, I became a little concerned; not about time, though , but about water. I didn't think about water when embarking on the longer track, and I still didn't know how far from the hut I was. The next landmark was the ominously named peak, "The Cone," and this was near the end, just a short walk (no more than an hour) from the hut. I was gradually getting higher and higher on the track but nonethless hadn't seen anything that would be regarded as a significant mountain peak. Ahead I saw a reasonable hill that I thought would be a good lookout to judge where I was. I emptied my ginger beer and put my remaining water into the ginger beer bottle and headed up the hill. It went on and on, and I was tiring and thirsting. From the top I saw a convincing peak. I had decided to eat my orange before the peak for the water and sugar, and also I had a nibble on a muesli bar. I ground my way up the slope, eating a bitter koru along the way, and mounted the summit. From the summit, I spotted another higher peak in the distance, The Cone. I had mistaken the peaks.

I slumped on a log at the sight of it. I rested again and thought back to my previous experiences of water-deprivation. One of my first major solo tramps, my conquest of Great Barrier island, featured a similar situation where I ran out of water half-way up Mt Hobson, the highest peak. That situation was worse: time was a very real problem and the risk of night falling while I was still out was a real threat; I only had a day-pack; and going over the mountain was the only way out. Nonetheless, I made it out.

This walk was different as I was pretty well prepared and could even bivouac if things got dire. I had all my food with me. And I still had plenty of time before sunset (and even if I did have a shortage of time, I had a headlamp). One general lesson from those past experiences was simply that regardless of how thirsty I am, it is mostly a self-fulfilling desire: the preoccupation intensifies it beyond the actual requirement. I knew I'd get there in the end; it was just going to be a little unpleasant.

So I approached The Cone. I ascended 5 metres, rested for 20 seconds, ascended 5 metres and rested again for 20 seconds. My heart was beating ferociously after each period of ascent. It was steep, even without the compounding factors. Piece by piece, I rose to the top. Reaching the top, I felt elated. I sprawled myself over the flat helicopter pad. The unobstructed breeze washed over my body cooling it. The afternoon heat had passed and I was in the mountain air. The peak itself was the second highest peak in the Pirongia park, only 20 metres shorter than Pirongia peak. The time was 5:30pm, meaning that I had been walking for over 6 hours. I lay prone on top for sometime. I finished off the last gulp of water in my bottle, rose again and then marched lightly onwards.

The track onward had surprisingly been weedwhacked. The quality of the track prior had been challenging. My shins had been cut up, velcro weed (every hirsute man's enemy, and a reason in itself why I might buy gators) had aggravated me to my wit's end. And in a novel way, the bogginess was astonishingly bad. Usually I'm a mud-charger: I try to go through the middle of muddy parts of the track because (a) you'll get muddy anyway; (b) it's faster; and (c) to walk around it would accelerate track erosion. On the higher reaches of the track there are genuine natural bogs, not just muddified sections (from rainfall). Placing your foot in a bog, you'll go shin-deep into a thick mud; since the bog can look like solid ground, to remove your foot from the bog, you might put your other foot on an apparently solid area only to find that you'll shortly have both feet vaccuum-stuck in a bog. Thus, I was transformed into a sissy, dodging and leaping to avoid the muck; nonetheless, it was unavoidable: becoming mired was a reasonably common and frustrating phenomenon.

I walked onward through the cleared path, trying my best to avoid the soft ground as much as possible. After another half hour, I came across a boardwalk. This was a good sign. When James and I had walked the other loop, boardwalks had appeared as we came close to the hut. And thus no more than 10 minutes later, I heard human voices and the roof of the hut came into view.

That was the main story to be told about the weekend. But there were some nice things. I started the book I've been planning to read for the last three months, The Gulag Archipelego; My three hutmates and I got along well and even went outside to look at the stars. I saw three astronomical sights I'd never seen before: the Coal Sack (below the Southern Cross), and the Large and Small Magellanic clouds. The latter two I had heard of and read about but when I searched on new moon nights for them and had never been able to see them through the urban (I was pleased as punch).

Sleep was pretty good in the hut, and my descent down the mountain the next day was early and lightning-fast. I had time to eat in Raglan and swim at Port Waikato. It was a rather marvellous trip.

The value of trademarks

After pioneering the concept and terminology of Suburban Tramping, I was shocked to see some joker (a musician) inviting people to his gig and myspace page (http://www.myspace.com/urbantramper) with the name Urban Tramper. Of course, this is slightly different from my term, but the juxtaposition of ideas is identical.

What's next? "The Mountain Crawlers"?

Final reflections of the year

It has been an interesting last two weeks of the year. I've completed the Queen Charlotte track, had a smooth family Christmas, went tramping in the Waitaks and swimming at Piha with my sisters, conquered Mt Pirongia (the walk almost conquered me!), cafe-hopped with my eldest sister and then went to a bar and cafe with friends last night (going to a bar is a rarity for me). Today will bear a nice lunch with mum and a party to see in 2009. It has definitely been my most relaxing, pleasant end to the year that I can remember with any clarity.

I haven't really had a chance to really look back on 2008 with any deep consideration. It has been definitely been epochal; traumatic as well as stimulating. It redefined my future path to the extent that I'll probably let the first half of 2009 run along before setting substantial goals. 2009 is a great unknown for most aspects of my life. I cannot predict where I'll be, what I'll be doing, who I'll be with nor what I want come December 2009.

My new residence in central Auckland has been an experience in itself. I'll think long and hard if it is where I'd like to live longer than the 6 months I've promised. It has been the perfect place for me at the time I came.

Yesterday I made a disappointing discovery: my left rear brake light was smashed (with the pieces on the ground) and a black mark had appeared on the bumper. Someone in my apartment complex or a visitor had pulled out or in unskillfully and damaged my car. There was no note or anything like that. It is possible that someone in a four-wheel drive (that would fit with the damage) with the music on might not notice such a contact. It is very true though that this place is an enclave of predominantly bad drivers. I have, on more than one occasion, had to take evasive action as people reverse out of their car-parks without checking for on-coming traffic. Such is life.

The only thing that I can say with pleasure is that I'm very happily Daniel and, come what may, I'll be pretty pleased with whatever happens. I wish you all a pleasant change of calendars and hope that the time till you have to head back to the grindstone passes with exquisite slowness so that you can enjoy every moment.

Fate


Fate for me is not the predestination, but the poetry of life; it is the coincidences and harmonies that mesh the flow of time. It is indiscriminate in its benevolence and cruelty (and infinitely so!): the unlikeliest salt appearing on your recent wound; the gift when you need it most; the synchronicity of our lives; those that enter your life; those that leave; the people who act in concert with you; and those who move against you, beyond words and agreement.


One can believe in personal agency with this kind of fate; in fact, I'm more than happy to exacerbate the effect by chasing it to its conclusion. You have a choice of whether to do so or to just let the moment of coincidence slip by as just a coincidence. I've had my fair share of opportunities and while some of the fate has stabbed; some have opened into fresh fields.

On my right hand, my latest pursuit of the scent of fate ended in a composed, yet wry smile. It opened a window beyond what I knew; it let me see more of myself; but it came up empty. On my left hand, I've been followed by a seemingly inescapable fate, one that nags at me, torments me, tempts me and shadows my steps.

"Coincidence is not a kosher word..."
( a Jewish saying recorded in The Penitent, by Isaac Bashevis Singer)

Biopics - "How raw do you want it; stripping to the bone."

On Sunday night I saw Rubbings of a Live Man, a creative biopic about actor Warwick Broadhead. Who is Warwick Broadhead? Well, before I saw the biopic I knew nothing. I am a fan of biopics though. Real life does tend to be stranger than fiction, and real stories are more powerful as a result of it

There are the typical ones: a straight, chronological reenactment such as: Walk the Line, Malcolm X, Ali and Ray. Malcolm X was particularly impressive to me. I saw Walk the Line on Sunday, and thought it a nice yarn but nothing special, other than Johnny Cash was a rather tortured individual. Drugs and alcohol can do all sorts to a man, and that is a story that needs to be told. I'd look forward to a Brian Wilson biopic one day.

But another kind of biopic, which I'll call a creative biopic, delivers an experience as well as the story of a life. My first encounter with one of these was American Splendor, the life story of Harvey Pekar. I knew nothing about him before I saw the film, but the movie not only engrossed but also caught the imagination. The movie jumped about; it intercut to the real Harvey Pekar talking in his real idiosyncratic way during his reconstructed life. Most importantly, the film did cut to the bone, leaving no stone in his life unturned.

Rubbings of a Live Man went a step further in that the film's subject participated in artistic reenactments of his own life (!), sometimes as himself, sometimes as another character, whether it be his own mother, a momentary lover or God himself (or, shall I say, God with an attention disorder). There were no holds barred. It cut to the bone: The human nature revealed; it brought him to tears at one point and said the words quoted in the title to the director. The reenactments were occasionally whimsical, sometimes brilliantly surreal (the first being so truly perfect, it shocks). The preparation for each scene recorded as well, showing perhaps the truest of true person: Him in his natural habitat. Incidentally, none of his seventy-plus performances have been recorded, this film being the only audiovisual impression of his accumulated craft. It is a performance like no other.

Exhaustorama

October was cruisy. October was cool. New work was on the horizon and everything was at peace.

It was peaceful until this week, when upon me fell a ton of bricks: I truly had to work harder than I have ever had during my working life; I had to endure more tiredness than I've usually have. It also sets a few new personal records too.

The next few weeks will quiet down till the new year and then hopefully it will open up afresh.

Elections

I've spent quite some time over the last three days consoling friends and students over the election result. It was emphatic.

There is a good deal of consolation to be had for any person with left-wing sympathies with this result. This is a National party of the reddest blue since Muldoon (which was conservative rather than right-wing). Provided it sustains its centrist orientation, there isn't much difference between it and the previous administration policy-wise. Labour loyalists may be dismayed by the electorates that have been painted blue, but it is loyalty to a name or a brand.

There has been a fair bit of suspicion and invective directed towards our new Prime Minister. The suspicion would seem to be unjustified or perhaps just politically generated. John Key may be a millionaire, but not a doctrinaire. Helen Clark was an ideologue with effective political pragmatism; Key would seem to be a pragmatist without ideology. The predominant line against the result has been: 'The right wingers are what got us into this mess (i.e. the credit crisis); why did we go against the world trend and go right?'. Frankly, I'd prefer an out-and-out pragmatist in a crisis so in a way, I'm a little relieved.

Personally, this was one of the harder elections in which to choose my party vote. It has been the only election in which I could contemplate voting National. Aside from their law and order policy, I didn't find much to be offended by. Also, I would have voted for them to enhance the chance of a majority government (I voted for Labour in 2002 for that reason). With the Greens fairly assured of survival but with a high likelihood of only being in opposition, I didn't have much reason to vote for them. Instead I chose to vote Labour in memory of Noel.

For Labour, I'm glad that they have been moved into a peaceful revitalisation process. So often in our politics the losing leader has to be rolled to generate that change. With Clark and Cullen moving into the background, other leaders should can establish themselve with three years to prepare for 2011.

The conclusion of the United States' election was similarly emphatic; American voters showed 'they could' elect someone 'black' as their leader. More significantly, and this point cannot be ignored, the Democrats have continued their sweep of both houses gaining majorities. This will allow the Obama administration to be freer to pursue its goals.

So onward we go. We'll await their progress.

History and theory

Two years ago, I received a tome, Ideas, for my birthday. Exceeding 1000 pages, it was heftier than most books I'd read; and it was read and appreciated in its comprehensiveness. Last year I bought Cultural Amnesia (by Clive James), upon hearing an interview with the author on the radio. (This seems to work with me; I bought my first John Gray after hearing him talk to Kim Hill.) Its main body consists of almost 900 pages and will be the bone for me to mentally chew upon until Christmas.


The book itself was a lifetime in the making, the eventual condensation of the notes in the margin that he has written during his time. The book on the surface is a collection of short biographies of persons from the last century; most of them were familiar to me prior to reading the book.


History really is a collection of biographies. When you read about any historical event though, it is often only described on a political level, or a macroscopic level, where individuals, apart from those at the heart of the affair, are not described. If I see the term Anschluss, I only know of it in those terms (i.e. Hitler wanted to create a large German-speaking Reich etc.). Several of the biographies so far have detailed German Jews in Europe prior to and after World War Two. Anschluss was a huge event changing the lives of the Jews who were part of the intellectual cafe culture of Vienna; Sigmund Freud was one of them; he escaped in time to die of cancer in London. It paints a picture of what Vienna was and the situation of the people before and after and how it changed things forever. Similarly, a Russian poet Anna Akhmatova lived in both Tsarist Russia and then into the Soviet times. What the Bolshevik revolution did to her life and career truly show the difference between the totalitarianism of a monarchy, and that of an ideology.

My general feeling so far: History is great painted with the lives of those that experience it.

Financial Malaise

The on-going financial crisis has been a pretty reliable topic in the speaking section of each lesson I run - new ructions, plans, hikes, crashes and spasms splashing the news day after day. Interest though noticeably evaporated last week. It appears the whole situation has just gone on too long. The novelty has not only worn off but is starting to bring many down.

Having a varied group of nationalities, I follow the relative damage to the countries concerned: Hungary has been tarred by association. CNN decided to put it in the same sentence as Iceland (reckless, perhaps) and said that the IMF had offered it a loan (which it declined). The market and the currency nevertheless plummeted in response from which it hasn't recovered. The Czechs and Slovaks are the happiest: their banks are safe; their economies are still unaffected; their only sadness is that with the Euro (and their currencies which move with the Euro) are appreciating, eroding their New Zealand savings. The Croatians are also fairly unaffected except for those speculating on the sharemarket as it keeps its downward trajectory ('I just keep buying the stock so I can lower my average.'/'It just keeps falling!' from two different students).

I've heard from a couple of self-employed people who are struggling a little. I haven't had any noticeable effect (it'd be a surprise if I was affected as quickly as them though). I have recently been given a project which will be a monthly money earner. I hope this will insulate any post-Christmas easing. And the boom of this year has left me with reasonable savings. Interest rates falling along with house prices appeals to the acquisitive part of me. I'm not yet into house buying mode or even in a situation where it is an ideal plan but the fact that the trend has begun that will eventually suit me is good. Lower petrol prices suit summer roadtripping too. Maybe post-crisis living won't be too bad for me after all.

Thinking of more than just myself, the scale of the crisis is starting to unnerve me. Commodity prices are crucial to New Zealand and they are simply plummeting with global demand. It'll be quite some time before they can get back to that high. And still the extent of the carnage globally is still not known. Along with 9/11 and the Boxing Day Tsunami, this is another global phenomenon that we get to experience in our adult lives. It is special.

Daniel on the classroom floor

I'm floating. No, really I am. It has been exactly a month since my anxiety faded into nothingness. All I've been left with is a general levity, not an ounce of stress in my whole entire body. I've had favourable conditions, it's true. Work is not work. It has sustained itself and, without any doing of my own, is building up and producing more opportunities. (My reality check will come this Thursday when one opportunity will actually make me put my nose to the grindstone!) I've had pleasant preoccupations, considerate friends at my side and no hick-ups.

My dermatitis has finally left its stronghold on my right hand. My back-pain (AKA Xin-pain) has completely gone. The apparent and underlying stress is draining from me slowly. I enjoy my back stretches. One I do on my back to adjust my hips: pop-pop-pop, and ohhhhhh, how nice it is to just lie on my back on the classroom floor. I could stay there for hours.

This has been a faith-builder in the power of life, the temporacy of turmoil and the joy of being. It is now that I take a breather before I dive back in.

The Market Society (part 1?)

It is always nice when one's reading material coincides with one's conversations. As mentioned previously here, I've found a philosopher who particularly resonates with me: John Gray. His material is rather pessimistically written, making it tough-reading but incisive enough to keep you drawn in.

I started his book False Dawn: The Delusions of Global Capitalism, two weeks ago but I put it aside as I munched my way through two other books. I'm back into it now and loving it. Personally, I've always held rather economically liberal views in tandem with my libertarianism. The book is a nice challenge to these views; in fact, it is perfect reading just before a general election to have a book that goes against my base assumptions and creates a critical lens with which to interpret policy announcements.

I'm only 30 pages into 240, but have already felt compelled to write. To summarise his thesis so far, since the 1980s both the UK and NZ have been subject to rather extreme neo-liberal policies, privatising state assets, individual contracts, open markets and policies that are not directed at full employment but rather at economic efficiency. These policies create a society that serves the market (a market society) rather than a market that serves society's interests. The obvious signs of that are the transformations of small town New Zealand, student debt levels and social dislocation.

It stretches this to assert that these have resulted in social phenomena, such as high crime and imprisonment rates, higher divorce and solo-parentage rates and the weakening of the family (these have risen greatly since the institution of such policies). Moving with the market, people move to where work is and put a lot more emphasis on their career than family or relationships. I'd add that a market society works well with individualism and very well with materialism.

Putting aside the obvious fact that New Zealanders have always been going on OEs (I can argue that in the past there were other reasons for doing so), there has been a huge movement in people overseas for professional reasons, delaying laying roots in a community and perhaps building a stable family. On a small sample, Generation-Yers seem to be the full realisation of that mindset. From discussions recently, I know lots of people who have got the travel bug and 'need' to work elsewhere, or feel they'll have to move on soon. There is nothing wrong with travel and working abroad per se, but I'd say that there is perhaps an excessive desire in many people for both, well beyond its utility and benefit in the long-term.

My conversation hinged on just this point; that the desire to be travelling and working abroad is often harmful for not only the relationship or family but also for the welfare of nearly all involved; that the constant individualistic consideration over that of your relationship or over your family could be detrimental when everything is added up. The lack of an ability to compromise on individual goals, to delay gratification for the better of the whole is a pretty critical impediment long-term happiness.

These are just working thoughts though. Hopefully more ideas will come through while reading.

True feelings

Opinion polls should technically predict election results quite accurately, but for reasons probably deep in human psychology they sometimes don't really get it right. Some bright spark in Iowa decided to create an options market to predict election results and other phenomena. This structure forces the people voicing an opinion to put their money where their mouths are and guess the result. And it is this system that is the most accurate in prediction these days. The market rules again! Naturally there are some obvious drawbacks (i.e. only those with money, access, risk-taking proclivities take part) but results are results. In New Zealand we have our own options market (https://www.ipredict.co.nz/) for the election and other issues. The tests differ in one just asks which one the respondent supports and the other, which result would you invest in.

Why should asking people what they actually feel not lead to the 'right' result though? Well, there can be wishful thinking; the person might want someone to win but not be inclined to go out and vote; the person could be tepid and go with a party that they have always gone with. Investment requires a bit more circumspection, objective considerations and reality checks (mind over heart). It eliminates those who aren't really that motivated.

This applies in real life too of course. One can profess one way, but whether they invest energy, consideration and action into things should be the prime test. The more accurate test. Actions do speak louder than words.

Eh'thics

Now powered by a broadband connection, I've set about starting to live a cyber-life worthy of someone with my inclinations. After some hesitation, I got iTunes again and downloaded a few of those annoying songs that artists leave off all but their main albums then slip onto their greatest hits (which as you've got all their albums, you don't want to buy).

Monday morning always contains the challenge for me of thinking of random speaking topics that I can use in my lessons for the week. Inspired by recent purchases from iTunes and the beleaguered Real Groovy, I raised the topic of following and purchasing music. Some still tuned into the radio; others didn't follow music at all any more; but the greatest number did still follow music and downloaded music for their consumption. Did you pay for it? I inquired. To my surprise not a single person paid for their music downloads ever in their past (I didn't expect that there would be a high number, but I did expect at least a few to have).

Naturally, climbing onto the moral high ground with a tin opener and a can of worms, I delved deeper. You're well-paid auditors; if you aren't paying for music, who would? Why wouldn't you pay for music if you have appreciation for those who produce it?

The responses and defences were quite interesting. The most defiant stated that the number of illegal downloads showed the market itself was faulty. (It would be interesting to see the calculation of whether the market would survive if it allowed free downloads of all artists - he thought so; I did not.) Another raised the point that downloaded music might encourage people to buy the CDs hence it should be legalised (Did he buy CDs subsequent to downloading? Never). One said that many artists allowed music downloads proving it should be OK for all artists to survive doing so (I'd agree that musicians should be able to choose whether to allow such downloads but for the user to trample on this choice or to use those that do as justification is a bit unwise). A fairly common theme was also saying that the musicians tended to waste their money anyway and didn't deserve any more money (interestingly, these views came from proud capitalists from former communist countries).

I tried not to be too judgemental - but it is rather cool to have a controversial topic to discuss. So who does pay for stuff these days? On a Daniel survey of those around, I'm the lone person to pay. How can this business model work?

The Outside World

When I first went down to Wellington, I was surprised by the number of nameable public figures I was spotting in airports, on planes and in the city. For the last two months, I haven't noticed any until today when I spotted the now very familiar face of Mike Williams. Maybe my period of introspection has broken and I can now just rest my mind on the outside world again.

Ah, NOW I get it!

Observing self

I hold a philosophical view that experiencing is the true matter of life (as the main thing to consider). This is probably not too controversial and it has had its benefits. There is no such thing as boredom and there is nothing that can be deemed negative, no matter how bad the experience is. Recent experiences have proved it (as in really tested it) and proven it to me at the same time. Going through, transiting from one phase to another is special. It can be unbearable; It can be interminable; It can be instant and immediate; It can be detached; And it can be pleasant or horrid at the time of its passing as well as in its recollection.

Up until this year, I had a good grasp of my nature - I could anticipate my feelings accurately. Recently though all that past self-knowledge has not only become invalidated in its accuracy, but generally has now been trashed. Little applies to the present. I have had to grasp things anew, in what for a while seemed like another person's mind. So I've taken to observing myself rigorously. Does observation affect the experience of life? That is impossible to know. But the sheer act of observing, of learning from it, enriches it far more than experiencing alone. Simply experiencing is fine, but accepting it as a result, a process and cause naturalises it.

Anxiety seems to be a rather constant companion of late - it has never been so before (although some elements have been there in different forms in the past). It'll be interesting to watch how it changes with time, when it intensifies, when it recedes, whether it disappears and whether it can be treated.

Flutter, iced water and the odd case of the VW

During a tough week two weeks ago, I was struggling to understand the way my emotions flowed far beyond my control. I would pitch into despair without warning. I would be beyond consoling and only distraction could save me. I explained it to friends who didn't seem to have had a similar period.

This last week I've similarly been stricken again by the surge and flow of emotions, but this time positive - I haven't been this electrified in a long time. It has been simply extraordinary.

EXHIBIT A: Unsent clumsy prose

"If it makes you feel awkward that you have made me so happy, just think that you have been a catalyst rather than a source. To use an analogy of Socrates, you’ve been the midwife who has incidentally helped me give birth to a surprising amount of joy. Maybe before there was still the burden weighing down my balloon, but the weights have been released so I could ascend with ease: 自由自在"

While there is no news to tell (I've been refreshed by cold water), I'm in a very interesting place. I feel like I've ascended to a height from where I can see over what came before with some insight. But then again, I can hardly bank on another emotional rollercoaster not happening in the near future.

This winter has brought me: cruel heartbreak, depressive depths, the giddiness of being lovesick and the joys, agonies and flaws of true honesty. Could it possibly be that I'm getting more from this season than any other? Truly to all those who have been a part of this: Thank you. (And Winter isn't over for another week and a bit!)

In Memorial

On Saturday just past, Noel Muller passed away. Despite being handicapped both physically and verbally by a stroke, he was always a strong, engaging and kind individual and I enjoyed the opportunity to discuss things with him. I went to chat with him weekly not out of a sense of obligation or charity, but the desire to spend time with him. I will miss his company.

Spring, Truth and Allegory

My weekends haven't gone well lately; even ones with promise have taken unexpected dives. This weekend bucked that trend and is hopefully a start of something new.

I had planned to go on a road trip by myself. Before the morning of departure all I had in mind was to go to Rotorua for a hot spring and then onto Taupo to stay over at a friend's. Going down, I sighted a familiar mountain, one that I had wanted to climb but had been prevented by weather. It seduced me (I just love mountains looming over highways). So the hot springs had to take a backseat as made a sharp turn and zoomed off to the cute town of Te Aroha, and its distinctive toponymically named mountain.

I rocketed up with my usual gusto, but two-thirds of the way up I was hit by either my lack of fitness or the difficulty of the ascent. I struggled a little and eventually summitted (a quick time of 1 hour 40 minutes). The view was outstanding. Standing on the Kaimai-Mamaku ranges means you can see the whole Bay of Plenty, the East Coast and the Hauraki Plains (and if weather had been better, the central plateau mountains). I saw the most ragged possum ever, which stared at me then ran. I felt compelled to complete the loop that the summit track was but a section. I couldn't find the sign for it; perhaps it was down a metal road. I descended the road for about 10 minutes but there was still no sign. This is a fairly common walkers experience: Do I continue with the route or cut my loses to avoid complete disaster? I chose the latter, but coming out of it, retracing my steps back to the summit was horrible but then it was a simple route to the base and freedom. I saw the same ragged possum, which stared at me and ran. So back down the summit track I went. Later I heard that if I had persisted down the metal road I'd have gotten to the trackhead soon.

I thought on the way down that all of the above could be an allegory for life. But the themes will always enmesh our lives to be learnt from if we desire. Or not, perhaps to our detriment.

Now boy-racers enjoy their needs for speed and danger by hurtling themselves in metal missiles down suburban streets. The tramper version of this is superior. Running down mountain tracks is the most exhilarating experience you can have tramping. Your eyes are fixed on the path searching for the safe places for your feet. You swing on branches. You jump over obstacles and duck low hanging branches. Of course there is always a risk you'll miscalculate and it could be your end or at least a chance of serious injury - but at least it isn't like the thick-skulled boy-racers who often imperil the lives of others.

I emerged at the bottom and the dashed over to my car. Unfortunately the adrenalin was still in my veins and on the way to Taupo was usually over the speed limit. Bad Daniel. Arriving, I discussed my topic of the year: Relationships and love. Later we played board games - it has been quite some time since I had.

The next day I did some things for the first time: abseiling and rockclimbing. The former I'm yet to really accept and the latter I'm getting the hang of - mainly that my mind has trouble accepting that it has to give confidence in the physical attributes of things out of faith: The foothold will hold. My leg can go to the groove. The shoes won't slip.
One thing I had faith in that didn't live up to expectation was the crotch of my pants, which must have given up during some of the climbs I did. I only climbed up the steep face three times but I am satisfied. I might try the rocknasium sometime.

Heading back, I trusted the directions given to me by one of my rock-climbing companions. "Take the left at the next T-junction, then right at the next one. Then there will be a sharp left and then a sharp right and then you'll be in Kihikihi" To a townie like me, that sounds like a piece of cake. Like where to walk to find a shop. But of the four directions given, getting to the first junction took an hour, the second another 40 minutes, the third 30 minutes and then the fourth 1 minute. It is strange how the briefness of the directions didn't represent the distance I'd be covering. But I trusted them and I was delivered to Kihikihi, a perfect example of how a suburban town should look.

I returned home to Auckland. The joy of my new location means I can shoot up the motorway and then from off-ramp to carpark takes only a minute. This is going to suck of course when I need to get back in rush-hour, but that is for another day.

"It's warmer now." I hope this weekend is a nice marker for the beginning of Spring, even if I do generally wait for the Equinox to celestially indicate its arrival. May this winter be buried post-haste.

New surroundings

Well, on the good side I've landed in what seems to be a pretty good pad where I'll stay for at least the next six months. The good:

• Good location: 150 Symonds St (Unit 4), with all the conveniences of the city, an easy walk to the Domain and Newmarket Pool, Rialto, oh yeah and two clients.
• Cool flatmate and landlady: Both are chatty and positive, no psychobatch for sure. And I need to have chatty people.
• Spacy bedroom: I have the most space I've ever had in a bedroom, a huge bed (and very supportive mattress). It is dry: The rooms I have lived in for the last 8 years have had major dampness problems, which probably hasn't helped my health or the quality of my books and papers. I have afternoon sunlight coming into my room. And I have my own bathroom. The landlady provided all the furnishings; I have bookshelves galore (I was going to be choosy with my books but there is no necessity to be so now).
• Almost everything I need is here: Except for some bedding and some bathroom stuff which would be beyond what you'd expect anyway! Broadband is nice (Listening to Radiohead now).
• It has stairs (until I next sprain my ankle, this will be fun).
• It has a wonderful lounge and cute kitchen. Good for entertainment purposes.

The not ideal:

• The room is facing the road. The first night wasn't bad though and it is one of those things that you just get used to. They have soundproofing.
• The price was actually higher than my price range but the above considerations and timing were far more important to me.

So, if anyone has time in the evening, give me a text and come on over.

Intensive care

'Moving on' so far has seemed something far from linear, but rather something akin to Snakes and Ladders. A misstep sends you back several lines, or potentially back to the beginning; I can say this from a place not far from square one. Snakes and Ladders is not a game of strategy, but one of luck. I'm not sure if moving on is the same - I hope not; I've tried some strategies but have been left here. I've just undertaken the most extreme strategy I can contemplate: complete isolation from the source. A ladder would be falling for someone else. That might be where the luck comes in.

I can feel great. I can believe I'm better. But it only takes three words to bring me to the brink of tears, and a poorly chosen fourth to take me down all together.