Art Festival

There is an Arts Festival in progress at the moment, I am not quite sure what is going on with it all but the greatest evidence is the vast rows of aerial photography positioned on the Strand by a photographer whose name has slipped from my memory (if you are a regular reader you will know that many things slip from my memory). The Photos are very good and generate a great deal of debate among onlookers. The start of the festival coincided with the opening of the new art gallery (the council got this open just before the philistines got elected). There was much controversy surrounding this, with the usual "what a waste of rate payers money and no one will visit it". I am glad to say 8,000 people visited it in its first 3 days . Joyce and I paid it a visit last week, it is a building well suited to the purpose, but what makes or breaks a gallery, is what hangs on the walls. Now I come from the "Emperors new clothes" school of art appreciation, and if I think a piece looks like it was painted by a blind 3 year old having a temper tantrum, then I say so. It does not matter to me if the artist has given it a name like "exploration of transcendental mood in the microcosm of social interaction in d-minor". If it looks like someone has been sick on a canvas then I say so. I am sure someone with an art degree will tell me I am missing the point, but then they would , they have to justify having got into debt to do a degree course in "opinion" at art school. I probably missed the point of another exhibit, it had a fine sounding name, but all I could see was a 6x3 piece of chipboard hanging on the wall, it had been painted black. I initially looked on the floor to see if the exhibit had fallen down, no, perhaps it had been taken away for cleaning, no. The painted chipboard was in fact the exhibit with the poncy name. I suppose that does mean every one of us is an artist in some way, its quite uplifting really, so kids just remember when mum tells you to tidy your room, just tell her it is a work of art in progress and she is stifling your creative juices. I do enjoy looking at art, I have a couple of Van Goughs hanging on the living room wall, one is "sunflowers" the other one is "the one with the cafe scene with the starry sky". Now if you look at the quality of painting, it is pretty crap, and you can see why he didn't sell anything when he was alive, but they have a certain something. (by the way the man in the market said they were genuine and a bargain at a tenner each, I agreed). I seem to be going off at a tangent here, so back to the gallery. Upstairs there was an exhibition of press photos that do not make it into the "propaganda press". Now I love a good photo, it should tell a story and allow you to empathise with the feelings of the people portrayed, all in one shot. These photos did just that, with harrowing scenes of world conflict. A couple of documentaries accompanied the photos, and both Joyce and I spent the afternoon discussing the subjects and emotions covered in the exhibition. The more people who can see this exhibition the better, we all need to be able to step outside of our own "Reality Bubble" once and a while and see what is really happening in the world. A good afternoon and a great start to the life of the Gallery (shame we wont have a museum now though to entertain and inform).

Small town attitudes and racism

I have a bit of a bee in my bonnet this week with the two subjects in the title. The first is the "small town" view of things. With it being Labour weekend there is normally a big influx of visitors to the Mount, but not this time. This will be a big relief to so many people who live here and hate the idea of "outsiders" coming into "their" town. I was talking to one customer who really was quite bitter that she can't get parked in the summer in "her" town because of all the outsiders. Others just hate the idea of any rate payers money being spent on expanding the attractions of the town "its just for the outsiders" they go and the councillors who stood on a platform of don't spend money on the town, won the day and the museum project and a new walkway have been scrapped. There are so many people that lament the development that has taken place and really wish the mount was how it was 30 years ago (a mosquito ridden, wind swept sand dune). This is a real contradiction to the image that the tourist industry tries to project. They want the Mount to be seen as the premier beach resort in NZ but it will never be this. There is less and less casual accommodation, three motels have been pulled down this week to make room for yet more holiday homes that will stand empty for 10 months of the year. There are no hotels in the area and if it rains you have nothing to do, and the locals want nothing done that might bring more people to town. Yet those people that come to town spend large amounts of money in the local economy, but it is those who have retired here who shout the loudest, they don't care about the livelihoods of the young, they just want to get parked.
The second item of this weeks rant is racism. There really is a "we are better than them" attitude among elements of the white population and what really gets me is when they finish a conversation with "yeh but at least we don't eat people" WHAT!!!! no the "civilised" white people of the world have just tortured people in ways that only the sickest of minds could dream up, they have destroyed cultures the world over, and even today, Iraqis are paying the price of an empire expanding. I will say I have no problem whatsoever with the Maori population, I find them polite and respectful and friendly (there are of course exceptions, as there are in all peoples) and I feel honored that I have been allowed to settle in their land. The racist elements hate the idea that any recompense is paid in the land disputes (soon to end) and they keep saying that we are all New Zealanders now and should be treated the same. This is kind of like saying if Germany had invaded Britain in the war and renamed it New Germania and made German the official language and 150 years later were telling all the native Brits to stop whinging because we are all New Germanians now. There is a huge cultural difference here and I applaud this, the world would be a boring place if we were all the same that's for sure.

Treasure

I have said this before, I don't miss much from the UK, but it did have something to offer, as does every European country, and that is a real sense of history. I mention this now because a couple of things have rekindled my historical desires. Georgia is really keen on history, her knowledge is incredible for her age, she reads constantly and absorbs it all. She is however frustrated that there is nothing here for her to touch or look at, no magnificent Gothic cathedrals or Roman remains, no footpaths that have been trodden for millenia. Of course we knew all this before we came, having lived in Durham with its 900 year old Norman cathedral history was all around you and you become blase about it. I accepted that moving to NZ would end my love affair with historical buildings but since mixing with metal detectors and the hidden history they can uncover, an inner desire to find that history is growing within me. This of course then leads to ideas like living in France and finding Celtic gold along the trade routes of the Loire valley, do that for 4 months of the year (we have since discovered that metal detecting is illegal in France) then come back here for 8 months and so on. You will probably find if you live out here, that you will consider all sorts of schemes to fulfill all sorts of desires you have (the thing is, you don't quite know what you really desire till you get out here and have the freedom of thought to uncover those desires, if you follow me). So what I will have to do now is work out a scheme that gives us what we all want (I have one in mind), it is always so frustrating that earning a living always gets in the way of living the life that you want (if you know the life that you want that is, I get really confused sometimes). The photo I have include is Me, Georgia and Norman testing a Hi-tech detector on the beach. We found a spoon and a rusty old pair of nail clippers, oh and a large rusty nail which we have confidently dated at around 1400AD.

Packing their bags

First things first, my back is on the mend, (thanks Alison I will have to download Real Player before I can listen. ) It kind of feels like a weight is lifting from me and I got my first good nights sleep last night for over 3 weeks.
To the thread. I was standing in the post office queue the other day (I can do this without being scowled at Ref: Marrissa) and this young girl in her 20's was organising things ready for her departure to Australia that very afternoon. The bloke standing next to her made the comment "yes you and 5,000 others each week". I thought about this and from my personal observations you definitely become aware that there does seem to be a bit of an exodus, especially among the 20 somethings. A few of our customers have recently said goodbye as they go off to OZ and Georgia's good friend at school is on her way in November. So why? The answer is not hard to find really. As a young person it is near impossible to get ahead in NZ. Living costs eat up more than 70% of the average wage round here, so there is no extra for cars, holidays or house deposits. Go to OZ for a few months and your money worries can be over, and that is what people are doing. If you are young enough it seems to be a straight forward proposition. It does open your eyes to possibilities, work 6 months in the Mining Towns in WA and you could live for 6 months in NZ without having to work. (I am too old though, It seems if you are over 45 you are incapable of finding a job). Makes you think though, graft for 6 months then chill for 6 months. Talking of OZ I hope to pop over in May next year with my good friend Norman (he of famed curries). Norman is an expert in the field of treasure hunting with metal detectors, and has been helping with the development of a new gold finding version. This needs testing and calibrating for the Australian goldfields, so it could be a giggle. He has a contact out there with a prospecting lease and a dynamite certificate. So it will be interesting to see if a nugget or two comes our way, or I may just come back minus a couple of body parts. I have seen what to when you have been bitten by a snake (keep your trousers tucked in your wellies, stand still, if it still bites you, you have to wrap a bandage round the bite area, don't run around screaming and there is no need to catch the snake and take it to the hospital with you).
Onto another thread that has just popped into my head. With the big break from the robotic society and way of life in the UK, your eyes are open to a new world of possibilities, and there lies some dangerous ground. It is all to easy to imagine ones self doing all sorts of things, after all you have made that break and it it is relatively easy to do it again. Give me a routine for too long and some thing inside says "so is this it for the rest of my life? no it isn't because I can do what I want" another part of me says "don't be an arse , you have a great life" the man in the white coat says "take this Thorazine and have a lie down".