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The other night, we had the pleasure of attending the local Matariki celebrations here at Tryphena on Great Barrier Island. What a fantastic community experience!
Picture a hundred or so locals piled into the local community hall. The children from the island’s three schools had made paper lanterns, and these were suspended from the ceiling of the hall. Each lantern was lit from within, and when the hall lights were turned off, it was quite a spectacle.
A kapa haka group from Kaipara were the special invited guests, and treated the audience to a fantastic performance.
Then all the locals and guests piled outside to a marquee packed with food for a gorgefest and chinwag.
I must now apologise to the citizens of Blenheim, who I dissed last Christmas after I spied their community Christmas Party in the flesh. Although my commentary at the time was jestful, it also undervalued the magnificence and specialness of our local kiwi community spirit. Here we were, ensconced in the Tryphena Hall, and delighted by the effort people had gone to on a cold, dark winter’s night on an island in the middle of nowhere. We were experiencing the local community at it’s best.
Bravo to the Island Arts Trust who organised the event. All for free too. Good show.
We’re back on Fantasy Island now, having dragged a truckload and boat load of goodies across with us. The truck was loaded to the max with building materials for our winter projects, and boxes of our prized possessions (i.e. crap we’d collected over the years). The boat carried our quad bike, it’s trailer, and a huge statue of Tutenkamen (yes, that’s right, more crap for the garden).
The truck got up our new driveway with ease, so we’ll be back to the mainland in a few weeks time with another truck and a larger trailer to move even more stuff. I reckon that if we continue moving at the rate of a truck a month, we might be fully moved by July 2015!
Perhaps we might need to start parting with some of our prized possessions? Nah! Silly idea!
Now readers, be warned that you should not try this at home. Also note that this segment contains nudity that might not be appropriate for younger viewers.
On a cold and blustery night at Waiwera recently, we decided to fill the spa pool, and muggins here, seeing we were short of chlorine, opted to use large chlorine tablets designed for swimming pools instead.
By the second night, the whole chlorine tablet had dissolved (not that we’d noticed), and a strange tingling sensation was noted by the bathers.
Later that night, as we emerged from the spa, we noticed the bright red rash all over our bodies, and muggins decided to test the spa water with a dipstick. Well, it seems I was the dipstick. The chlorine levels were well off the chart! We were effectively soaking in Janola!
The next few days were torturous, as one experienced burns and peeling in one’s nether regions. I tell you, one’s nads aren’t designed for peeling!
So the moral of the story is to always follow instructions on packets, and not use your own body to ‘test the waters’. Readers will be relieved to know that we promptly dumped the pool load of water, and after a week of difficulty, all is back to normal down below.
Nothing like a chemical peel to make one feel a little younger!
