Christmas 2008 BBQ with Stu

For some reason I was featured in most of the food shots.

Our department from Wellington had a Christmas cookout.

Kiwi Christmas and the arrival of Angus

 

So it’s Christmas time in New Zealand.  It is very weird.  It is coming full on in to Summer complete with shorts, flip-flops and beach BBQ’s.  The malls are all decorated with pine wreathes and Christmas bulbs, but it all has a very “Christmas in July” feel to it.  I can not help but feel like I’m in an old mall that just hasn’t taken down its decorations yet.

Last weekend we attended a Christmas festival in Avalon Park in Lower Hutt, not too far from our home.  We only knew it was a Christmas thing with some fireworks at the end.  We went with our friends Aaron & Lisa and their kids Sam, Emma, and Sophie.  Sophie could be a dead ringer for Cindy Loo Whoo who is just more than two.

It was a bit of a walk through the park to get to the festival proper where we discovered the festival was really more of a concert in the park.  It was awesome! They had blues, rocking Christmas carols, the Funky Monkey’s (kids performers), and hip hop dancers.  We had two stars from “NZ has Talent” perform and The Beat Girls did a rocking segment on great 60’s music complete with shimmering flapper dresses.  We even had an opera singer from Auss join in on O Holy Night.  It was fantastic.  The fireworks at the end were great, but combined with Feliz Navidad it was an amazing Christmas celebration.  Totally unlike any other Christmas party I’ve ever experienced--all for free and each moment a surprise.

The next exciting thing to happen was the arrival of Angus—a new black/brown long hair cat.  For the whole year we have been here, we have struggled with making a responsible pet decision.  We loved our Lucy sooo much and missed her when we moved, but we knew we couldn’t replace her just be getting another cat.  We also were not sure how a pet might affect our travel ability.  But after a year, we felt we could make room for a pet.

Times are bit tight right now and I have struggled to come up with good Christmas “gifts” for the family.  A cat would be quite special, but any new cat would come with several hundred dollars of expenses for shots, de-sexing, supplies, etc.  But Amy found several listings on our trade site, TradeMe, for free cats.  I know “free ain’t free” when it comes to kittens, but Angus was full grown and his owner was including all his stuff, 3 months of food, and 2 kitty beds.  We thought we should check him out.

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     Angus is the much loved cat of a Kiwi family.  He is 12 years old.  The woman who owned him, Moira, had been married to an American.  She was moving to Scottland basically to travel and see long lost family.  Her son’s were in Auss or unable to care for him so she had to give him away.  We felt immediately that it was exactly the situation we faced in the US.  We couldn’t take our Lucy with us.  It was mandatory that we found her a great home.  We knew exactly what Moira was going through and we knew we could be a great home for Angus.

He arrived Monday night.  Amy is over the moon to have a purring kitty to sleep with again.  He has adjusted extremely well.  He even flopped on the floor with us last night.  He seems ready to make himself at home.

Amy says that a house isn’t a home until it has a cat in it.  Welcome Home, Angus! Merry Christmas everyone!

 

 

The Little Boy who Loves the Red Train

Nearly everyday I see a little boy about 3 or 4 with his mother getting on the morning train in to Wellington.  At 7:40 AM he is full of energy while his poor mom tries to keep up.  She is a young mother and sometimes I think she just doesn’t know what to do with this little man in her life.  She carries two large bags—one for him and one for her.  She’s tired and I think a little self conscious of the small child who likes to run around the station making car noises.

At this particular time in morning, Wellington’s older train comes to our station.  Most of these cars are from the 1950’s or 60’s.  They have old electric lights (the kind with real bulbs and not fluorescents), decorative metal vent covers, and those seats that flip direction so the rider can always face front on a train that can go either direction.  Wellington has a pretty large fleet of these aging carriages.  But it has precious few red carriages.  These are the original trains of the metro line.  The old “Cyclops” carriages and they are kept their original fire engine red colour.  The train may have only 3 of these carriages in a line of 12 cars for the morning rush.  They end up clustered together usually in the middle or the back of the train.

The little boy loves these red carriages like Christmas.  I think it might actually be that strong a love.  He runs in circles when he sees the red cars at the end of the line yelling “Yay! Yah! Red carriage!”  No matter how large the crowd is in the morning, he must be the first to leap on board.  He never waits for help even though the step over the gap is just large enough to make my parent instincts cringe.  Mum often waits at the back to get on.  But most days there are no red carriages or, even worse, they are at the front.  Tired mom isn’t going to run to the front where they would both end up standing for the ride around the harbour.  Oh the terrible tiny outrage on these days.  He yells at the train and gives it copious rassberries—and those are the good days.  On bad days he’ll refuse to board or simply wail forcing tired mom to drag him screaming aboard.  I’m sure she feels terrible.

Some day I will tell her that I don’t mind—that her little boy is wonderful.  Days will roll by in to years and all too soon there will be no more leaps of joy at the red train.  After a few more years, she will even miss the tantrums.  I may see if I can find a toy red carriage.  I hope she doesn’t mind.  I hope she doesn’t find it strange that I might have watery eyes laughing at the little boy that loves the red train.

A 4 hour public transit odessy in Wellington

So… having decided to go to a brunch holiday coffee with Amy we got on the train to Kaiwharawhara station only about 3 stops down from ours at Hutt Central.  It was a gathering of other emigrants to New Zealand and had several friends that Amy had made here.  The coffee was lovely and in less than an hour we were on the stairs back down to the Kaiwharawhara station.  The trains are all above ground here so you have to climb up and over on pedestrian walkways.  Kaiwharawhara is only one stop from the end of the line at Wellington station.

We thought we were in luck as the train was just approaching.  Perfect! We thought.  We hopped right on and after a few minutes the ticket taker approached.  She took our passes and then doubled-looked.

“This train is going to Paraparam.” She said…

“Oops!” We said.

She laughed and gave us a transfer ticket and told us we’d have to get off at the next station and take the next train back.  The next station turned out to be Takapu Road which was a very nice station.  I had a hard time picturing just exactly where it was, but judging from the length of the ride, I’d guess about 5-7 kilometres from Kaiwharawhara.  Well about 15 minutes later we got on the return train.  After getting off we noticed the sign that shows which side of the platform to board for the train to Hutt vs Paraparamu… well that should be easier next time.

So we are on the right train.  All is good, right? Oops! The train in front ours breaks down.  Now we’re stuck on the tracks and it’s been about 2 hours since this trip began.  The crippled train inches to the next station (only 2 hops from home), but by now it’s well past lunch so we decide to get off at Petone for some food.  There is a nice spot called Kilim just a few blocks from the station.  We’ve eaten there a few times before.  The place is a little busy, but not bad.  It takes 45 minutes to get our food… LOL!  But it was very tasty.  We eat and go back to Petone station.

There are no confusing platforms at Petone, just going to Wellington and going to Hutt.  Easy Peasy!

Oops!

We managed to get on the one possible wrong train going toward Hutt, but veers off to Melling instead of to Hutt Central.  Luckily the ticket taker catches this in time for us to get off immediately and wait for the real Hutt line.  After about 40 minutes at Petone we finally get on the right train home.  The ticket taker this time is the same one that was on our very first train.  She had a good laugh at our journey.

We finally got home around 2:00.  Whew!  I guess we didn’t need to do anything anyway!

Paper Kings

"Yet I think, having used my words as the kings used gold,

ere we came by the rustling jest of the paper kings,

I who am overbold will be steadily bold,

in the counted tale of things."

One of the stone tablets on the harbour that I had not noticed before.  I read it today and was reminded of my writing and these words spoke to me.  We have dreams of being paper kings and may we all be counted in the tale of things.

The quote is from Iris Guiver Wilkinson under the name Robin Hyde.  She was a poet from New Zealand.

For Tom

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hey, I've collected the odd photo of the cool cars I come across in Wellington.  I think my step-father would get a kick out of them  The triumph was pretty wicked.  One of the guys here at work has a Delorian even... 

Blog Dump November 2008

Okay... I have a bunch of totally unrelated things to share.  I've been sitting on a couple of photos and just haven't linked them in to a blog yet.

First off... Turnbull House.  This was the location of the "Fright Night" RPG convention I attended.  It is right across the street from the Parliament house.  That puts it 2 blocks from the train station and therefore easy as to get to.  Details of the gaming can be found on my other blog.  I don't know the history of the house yet, but apparently it can be rented cheap as.

Spring has sprung in Wellington and I have captured bad pictures of it.  What I really enjoy even more than the pretty flowers is how wonderful the air smells every where you go.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And finally today I got off the train to this...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Cool as, eh?  I need to check out the web site.  http://www.cartooningforpeace.org

Sort of on topic for peace.  A NZ soldier was recently awarded the Victoria Cross--the highest medal awarded in the British Commonwealth.  He carried a fellow soldier to safety in the face of heavy automatic weapon fire from both sides while caught in a cross fire.  It was a miracle they both made it.  His friend would have certainly died.  Willie Apiata didn't want the award--too much publicity and he felt his unit all performed admirably that day.  It is the first time a Kiwi has been given the Victoria Cross in 60 years.  One of the benefits of being both American and a resident Kiwi is the ability to be proud of both.  I was happy to have two things to be happy about this week.

I am past 10,000 words on the "novel". WOOT!  I didn't think I would ever create 10,000 words on a single topic.