A Funny Shade of Green

One thing I have missed while here is my bike. There’s so much good cycling to be done, some of it spectacular, some of it spectacularly challenging. There are a lot of bikes about. I’m not sure if I would have cycled in to work along the route I walk, though. It’s not so much the thigh-busting hills, but the speed at which cars go down them and the inconvenience of traffic lights popping up mid-hill, necessitating either fearsome hill starts or rapid braking. My shoulder still remembers the effects of a relatively low speed collision on London Road. However, if I had arrived by bike this morning I could have claimed a free breakfast in Aotea Square, part of a week’s events to promote cycling as pleasure, fitness and crucially, transport.

Transport is a mixed bag here. There are cycleways in various parts of the city, but I have not come across any. Auckland traffic can be fairly hairy at rush hour, so it needs a committed cyclist to don helmet and push on the pedals at those hours. There are plenty of buses which come into the city centre from the far-flung parts of Auckland, but of course they take their time to negotiate a way through the traffic. The train service, as I’ve discovered, is pretty good, clean and reliable, but the network is limited. The south of the city is well served, but other directions are limited. Crucially, the North Shore, an enormous population centre, is only accessible over the Harbour Bridge, which is gridlocked every morning and evening. There is no cycleway and no train service. Many of our students come across from Devonport on the ferry, but they have to get to Devonport first.

New Zealand is very much a country of the car, with one of the highest ratios of cars per head of population in the world. Much of this is comprehensible, of course, as so much of the country is rural and sparsely populated, making public transport unfeasible. The country’s total population is also just a fraction of London’s. Despite recent price rises, petrol is very cheap compared with the UK. But longer distances are where opportunities are lost. “Here, you drive or you fly,” I was told once. These two options are the most polluting modes of transport, and indicate the Kiwi confusion over the country’s green credentials. Take the Overlander, the big intercity train which runs between Auckland and Wellington. It makes an hour’s flight or a ten hour drive into a twelve hour rail journey. It has four carriages. There is one train a day. It’s no wonder it is advertised as a tourist-see-the-country-in-a-leisurely-way service, rather than as an efficient way of getting to Wellington.

There are a number of things which don’t add up. New Zealand makes a big and important claim to be nuclear-free, but the Government refused to put pressure on the insurance company it uses to invest pension funds when it was revealed that they invested substantially in companies producing nuclear weapons. The airport is running with dogs to sniff out the merest scrap of a forbidden apple in passengers’ baggage, yet the country does not seem to be serious about traffic pollutants. Indeed, it makes a big claim that it is far greener to produce apples in New Zealand and ship them to the UK than to grow the fruit in the UK. While on the one hand there is a good recycling scheme which runs alongside household waste collection, carrier bags are given out in huge quantities. One supermarket is aware of the recycling problem of these bags, and invites customers to pay extra for recyclable paper bags, which is not, it seems to me, a recipe for mass take-up of paper bags. Energy is another issue where the country lags behind. All our kitchen appliances proudly display their one star out of six energy efficiency ratings, and TV advertising is beginning to suggest that higher efficiency might be a good idea. From TV advertising too, it seems that insulating your home is a fairly radical idea. Certainly our house, lovely in summer, I can see would be problematic in winter, with clear draught gaps around the doors and little insulation either under the floor or in the wooden walls.

And yes, they are even talking about hosepipe bans in areas of the South Island.

A Loving Smack

New Zealand is currently caught up in a to smack or not to smack debate, following a Green Party bill in parliament which seeks to outlaw physical punishment of children. This has clearly hit a nerve; one website has been closed down by Google because it posted threats to the welfare of the MP behind the proposals, offering, in the spirit of free political debate, to break her nose and make her the subject of New Zealand’s first political assassination. Take this sample of letters from the New Zealand Herald:

“I will not support this form of namby-pamby do-goody cobblers offered by pseudo green politicians who do not really understand the necessities of modern life.”

“This country will produce a generation of P (a recreational drug) addicts, gangsters and criminals because their parents’ right to discipline them was taken away. I will continue to smack my child when she ill treats others, is disrespectful to her elders and does not obey the rules of my home.”

“…my children agree that they would rather get the strap for misdemeanours…”

“…smacking given in a controlled and loving manner.”

There were one or two letters on the other side, supporting the bill, but their level headedness paled into insignificance beside the hot-under-the-collar opponents. The Herald cartoon featured a couple in a shaking house. “Is that another earthquake?” asks the wife. “No,” replies her husband. “It’s another of the neighbour’s loving smacks.”

Catching a Wave

The intention was to drive north to Goat Island, a marine reserve of reefs inhabited by shoals of fish which are easily viewed, either by snorkelling or by glass-bottomed boat. I had been told that it needs good clear conditions to see the fish at their best, so with a bright clear day in Auckland we piled into the car and headed north over the Harbour Bridge. As we continued north, the clouds piled up and it looked murkier and murkier. We decided to stop at Orewa and review our options. When we got to Orewa, the town was cordoned off for an unspecified ‘event’, so we headed back to Red Beach to see what that was like.

Red Beach, we discovered, had been taken over by the junior Surf Life Saving competition. We were in time for the first race and stayed until the end, so interesting was it, occupying a morning with a completely unplanned slice of Kiwi life. We had watched a short video at the Arataki centre about the surf life savers at Karekare, and clearly these events make a sport out of training young people to be volunteer life savers. All the races were either U14 or U16 boys and girls, and included surf races which were swimming, board races where a surf board was manually paddled out then ridden back on knees, racing kayaks (which were referred to as skis), and rescue races, where the first person raced to an off-shore buoy, and signalled for their partner to come and rescue them with a ‘tube’, a flotation device trailed behind which opens to form a semi-circular life ring. There were also multiple events, where the youngsters had to swim, then board, then ski, and relays where different individuals took the legs. Of course making their way outwards, through the surf and incoming tide, took technique and stamina. Many times we saw individuals thrown off their boards or kayaks time and time again before they made it out. Getting back in to shore was a matter of timing and technique, using the power of the waves to assist progress. Often a handsome lead was lost because the person behind timed their wave ride better and shot past the leader. The final approach to the shore was a judgement between running and taking the incoming wave.

There were teams there from throughout the North Island, coming up from Hawkes Bay and Wellington, as well as the South Island, with a team from Otago. Clearly there is real purpose and commitment here: it’s a long way to travel for a weekend competition and the kayaks are apparently too long to travel in an aircraft hold, so they must all come by road. Sponsorship must be important, and one of the teams, we noticed, was sponsored by DHL.

It was a fascinating and impressive morning, and when the competition finished we headed back to sunnier Auckland. Rosanna and I did head down to one of the local beaches on our return, but our swimming was perhaps not quite as impressive as that we had witnessed during the morning. It was a refreshing way to end the weekend, though.

And back in England, Happy Birthday Martine!

Volcanoes

First earthquakes, then… Fear not, this one erupted 600 years ago and is not expected to blow its top again. Today we took the ferry across to Rangitoto island, Auckland’s newest volcano (full name: Nga Rangi-i-totongia-a Tama-te-kapua, The days of the bleeding of Tama-te-kapua). It slopes perfectly up to its cone and is composed of nothing but lava, there are no streams and no soil. Nevertheless, it hosts New Zealand’s largest pohutukawa forest and has a unique microclimate and ground conditions which make its flora fascinating. After the introduced possums and wallabies were eliminated in the late twentieth century, it has become a reserve, giving a crucial foothold to native NZ flora and fauna, particularly birds. Having said that, Deborah was convinced that she saw some unidentified mammal as we descended at the end of the day, so we may have to let the conservation department know their job isn’t over yet.

Heat bounces off the lava, so it was a hot walk to the summit, but worth it to see the dramatic drop into the centre of the crater. The elevated position also gives great views of Auckland and the Hauraki Gulf, so we enjoyed the summit before retracing our steps back to the wharf. Once there, enjoyment was somewhat dampened by Louis cutting his foot on a shell (“Who would have thought the young boy had so much blood in him?”), but he survived manfully, enabling us to catch the last ferry back to the city, pick up the car and drive home.

And so, following requests for a photoshoot of our $300 beauty, here it is:

Kings and Coronations

Back to King’s on Friday. Same jolly announcer at the station, but this time a smooth-sided British style train, although unBritishly clean in its interior, and still pushed along by a big boxy engine.

I’m feeling quite at home at King’s now; sign in to Reception, then told to just wander up to the Common Room and get myself a cup of coffee while the chapel service reaches its conclusion. After six years of travelling around to give courses to teachers, this is my first induction into giving courses to students themselves. It’s a bit odd, as of course I am far more used to standing up and pontificating in front of students, but in this context, it’s more unusual to be in front of them than in front of teachers.

This day involved a session with IGCSE students, two sessions with AS students and one with A2 students. I was holding forth in King’s rather grand lecture theatre for the whole day. I did point out to the students that my school and theirs were in many ways very similar, and while theirs perhaps beat ours in sheer grandeur of buildings, ours comfortably beat theirs in terms of history. There was an audible gasp when I said that St Albans School traced its history to 948, which gives us at the very least 900 years head start.

The students were, though, very good. They listened carefully, answered prompts, and even better, felt that they could ask questions as we went along, which always makes for a much more active, interesting session. Fuelled by King’s excellent lunch, it was a very enjoyable day.

Friday evening was the date of the Cambridge International Examinations New Zealand Awards Ceremony, and although I’m not a great one for Award Ceremonies, I felt that, as a CIE principal examiner based in Auckland at the time, I ought to attend. For a number of reasons, I’m very glad I did. From the politically aggressive speech about CIE qualifications from John Morris, Headmaster of Auckland Grammar, to the variety of cultural mannerisms when accepting awards, it was a fascinating evening. I was able, for the first and probably the only time, to meet the candidate who won Top of the World in AS Literature in English and congratulate her on finding my questions so stimulating, and also to see a young man receive four awards – three Top in the Worlds and one Top in New Zealand at IGCSE level. And the subjects spanned the sciences, history and English.

It was also good to catch up with some old friends, including Mark Vella, Director of Studies at Auckland Grammar, and John Morris himself, who apart from being a Boltonian, is actually circuitously responsible for us being here. It was his offer of a job five years ago, which I felt I couldn’t accept, which led to me requesting a sabbatical. By telling him this, I was able to assuage his mock anger that I was in Auckland doing part time work at Senior College rather than the Grammar.

All Shook Up

While it may not compare with Emily’s earthquake in A High Wind in Jamaica (that’s for Ian), the active geological features of New Zealand made themselves felt last night, with earthquakes shaking the Auckland region. Sitting quietly working on the laptop, I couldn’t work out who was shaking the sofa, then noticed the window blind rattling and things in the kitchen banging and shaking, all to the accompaniment of a very low rumble. It lasted for about ten seconds or so.

Apparently, that was the strongest of three tremors, measuring 4.5 on the Richter scale, the epicentre being out in the Hauraki gulf to the east. Such things are quite rare in Auckland, and this was the strongest since 1970, but other parts of the country, like Wellington, cope with them on a regular basis. No connection with Auckland’s 50-odd volcanoes, though, as the source of the quake was well away from the volcanic field.

Conrad’s Mid-Term Review

Hello blog readers. As requested by James Hartley, I (Conrad) am writing an entry on the Cassidy New Zealand blog. For those of you bothering to read this I don’t have a clue what I’m supposed to write about (Yeah, yeah, I know, New Zealand, but what specifically? So much has been going on!) So just hope for the best! Here we go then…

So far New Zealand has been awesome, with mostly great weather (although I’m sure you have all heard about our soaking in the Bay of Islands!) and cool scenery. Our house, sitting near Auckland city centre, is nice as well.

I have recently started school and, believe it or not, I am quite enjoying it! The picture below is me in my uniform (if you hadn’t guessed already). There is no geography at school plus I leave just before all the exams! There is a downside though – no art! Ah well, you can’t have everything.

A while ago we went to Rotorua, which was great fun. We saw some pretty crazy things (bright green lakes, hot bubbling mud, geysers erupting and shooting water high in the air, etc). It was really funny because there was this eggy smell around Rotorua (something to do with chemicals) and the others (especially Rosanna) thought it was unbearable, but I could barely smell a thing!

We have also been to Waiheke, a cool little island where we went kayaking.

So basically I’m having a great time. See you in one and a half months!

Oh, one more thing. (Louis doesn’t really want me to mention this but I have to). At the motel we stayed in when we first arrived there was this swimming pool, and one time when Louis was swimming he got out of his depth and started struggling, so guess what happened? Yep, I jumped in, fully clothed, and rescued him. I’m such a hero.

That’s all, folks; I’ve got a huge mountain of homework to get through. (I’ve not really got that much, but that last sentence sounded cool.)

Adios!
Conrad

PS: On today’s blog birthday roll, it’s time for Espe. Come on down, Espe; have a very happy birthday!

I Support Two Teams…

Alison, next door neighbour Rob’s sister-in-law, rang up on Friday to invite us round to their house on Sunday afternoon/evening. Then on Saturday morning, Peter, Rob’s brother, rang to ask me whether I was interested in cricket. Well. What a question. Having informed him that I did indeed have a more than passing interest in the great game, he then invited me to Eden Park to see the second Chappell-Hadlee one day international between Australia and New Zealand. What an opportunity! While making that Waitakere and Vineyard tour five years ago, England was playing a ODI against New Zealand at Eden Park, and hearing that I was a bit of a fan, John the driver made a detour on the way back and drove to the top of Mount Eden so that I could catch a very distant glimpse of the game. That’s the closest I’ve been to Eden Park. And with Australia reeling not only from England’s shock win in the recent tri-series, but also New Zealand’s historic 10 wicket win in Wellington on Friday, it promised to be an interesting day. There was the possibility of further humiliation for the Aussies, or an Aussie backlash.

Although there were a couple of early wickets, it looked like an Aussie backlash. I could write extensively on a great and exciting game, but I am aware that the blog readership is divided between a number of diehard cricket fans and a number of people for whom, strangely, the attractions of the game have not made themselves evident. I shall attempt to please both parties, in giving a summary and flavour of the day at Eden Park. Certainly the Blackcaps bowler Shane Bond was a class apart, virtually unplayable in his first spell, but the back up bowling was not controlled, so after early pressure, the Australians managed to post a match-winning 336-4, with a fine century from Michael Hussey and 97 not out from Brad Hodge, who has clearly learned most of his batting craft from his time with Lancashire. New Zealand started brightly, then were held back, as the Australian second string bowling was far tighter than the Kiwis. All seemed lost when the asking rate was above 9 an over, despite a well-timed century from Ross Taylor. However, it was his departure which brought Macmillan in to bat, who clobbered a fifty from very few balls. With four overs to go, twenty four were needed, and a single was taken from every ball of the 47th. Seven came from the 48th, then Brendon McCullum swung the second ball of the penultimate over, from McGrath, for 6, after which it was a formality, the Blackcaps amazingly winning with eight balls to spare. Peter had joined me and Rosanna for the start of the NZ innings, as he had had a band practice, and we had clapped our hands sore by the end of proceedings. For those who would like a fuller picture of the match, follow the blogroll link in the right hand side.

Eden Park, though a major stadium, retains a sense of intimacy, and the very partisan crowd certainly created an atmosphere, noisy, ironic and humorous. There was some ribald chanting at times from the terraces, but also some wit. There was appreciation not only for boundaries, but for sharp fielding and deft quick running, but the biggest celebrations came from Australian mistakes. No greater cheer was there before the end than when the six was finally signalled after the catcher of Peter Fulton’s second successive six carried the ball over the line. Plenty of good humoured ironic booing of the umpires when they failed to signal wides when Australia were bowling was another sign of the real tangible sense of enjoyment which the TV can never catch.

After the game we went back to Peter and Alison’s, where Deborah and the boys had arrived during the course of the afternoon, to meet the Ferguson clan: grandma and grandpa, Caroline, Natalie and Adam, and Joy. We had a lovely evening, with great food and a supply of anecdotes from Joy which I will not publish here. I did learn, though, that we had missed Rob’s birthday last week, so here is another blog birthday greeting: Happy Belated Birthday, Rob! And for Monday, Happy Birthdays too to Kathryn, and Sam, who share a birthday. We hope you all had, and have, a great day!

The Wild West

After a Friday post-work social drinks and nibbles for the English Department and Simon Higgins, the CIE representative, the children asked “Can we do that every Friday?” One of the finer moments was Simon’s disappearance over next door’s fence to rescue a football. What is it with us, next door neighbours and fences?

We set off relatively early on Saturday to drive out west, to the Waitakeres, the range of hills, bush and forest that runs down the Tasman coast on the other side of the isthmus. For me, this was revisiting ground I last saw on my first trip five years ago, when I spent a day on a ‘Rainforests and Vineyard’ tour, and it is one of the places I was keen to take the family to. We passed through Titirangi, then drove along the aptly named Scenic Drive, a long, winding and hilly road through the forest, tall trees and tree ferns on either side of the road, with glimpses of the green sea caught through the odd clear patch. We stopped first at the Arataki visitor centre, which is the information point for the Waitakeres, with some fascinating displays of the flora and fauna of the area, Maori culture and information on walking tracks. A wooden walkway runs around it, giving fantastic views over Manukau Harbour and the Tasman Sea. The range of shades and hues of green on the stretches of forest is amazing.

From there we drove down to Karekare beach, where The Piano was filmed, finally approached down a long, incredibly steep and twisting narrow road. There was more than a whiff of hot brakes when we parked, which made me very relieved that we had taken the mechanic’s advice and replaced the rear brakes when we had the car serviced. Other than that, the dear old banger performed admirably today, tackling the twists with aplomb. Karekare is a popular surfer’s beach, and the roar of the waves and the rocky, tree-lined surrounding make it reminiscent of Cornwall, except for the fact that the sand is black and the sun, out of the wind, was burningly hot. With the big waves, there are strong current on the beach, and the lifeguards, when in attendance, position flags to demarcate a safe swimming area. Although the lifeguards to not appear particularly vigilant, they are obviously monitoring things, because over the course of the afternoon, they shifted the flags several times. They were never more than about fifty metres apart, which indicates something about the dangers of the beach. The children explored the dunes, played a bit of football and got swamped by the waves.

When we finally left the beach, we took the loop road out in the other direction in order to spare the car the task of climbing back up the road we had descended by. This was a good idea, as although quite a bit longer, it was far less steep, thought the narrowness on the bends gave us a couple of hairy moments when we met cars coming the other way. Deft hands on steering wheel and brakes required. A quick stop in Titirangi for an ice cream – Titirangi is supposed to be the favoured area of the arty, bohemian, slightly hippy set (there is a Steiner school there after all), but they weren’t very much in evidence.

After that, the drive back home to wash the black sand out of the children’s swimming costumes and hair, and also to discover that someone close by is having a reggae party very loudly in a neighbouring street. And why weren’t we invited?

Valentine’s Day

Commercial claptrap it may be, but I am used to Valentine’s Day being essentially tokens between two people. Not so here. It initially took me aback when one of my students wished me a happy Valentine’s Day, but then it happened several times, and the whole thing seemed to be a general celebration of the day. Apparently one student went into his art class and gave a rose to everyone in the class, and certainly many students, not all female, were wandering round the college today carrying roses, mini helium heart-shaped balloons and the like. And last period one of my male Korean students walked into the classroom, wished everyone a happy Valentine’s Day and handed out Ferrero Rocher chocolates to everyone. Since we were looking at aspects of Gothic fiction, I pretended mine was an eyeball and ate it with relish, which rather took the romantic gloss off proceedings.