My trip to Haast

The year 2009 looks like a year of travels for me. As far as work is concerned, I have travels scheduled across the country at least once a month and in some cases, more than once a month. I will be heading off to South Africa middle of the year, then there is the trip to the Pacific Islands and Australia after that. If all goes according to plan, might even be heading back to Malaysia later in the year.

As soon as we came back from our holidays in the South Island, I was off to Tauranga for a field visit. From one end of the country, I went to the other end, Haast. Not exactly the end but it is literally almost at the end of the road as far as the West Coast of the South Island is concerned.

I was taken aback when I arrived at Haast, a township with a population of under 300 people and not so many sheep either. The town has no cell phone coverage, so if your car broke down in the middle of the road you will not be able to call AA for help. The town is not on the main power grid so electricity is at best as good as it gets. There are several backpackers and campsites but one hotel, one restaurant and bar, one minimarket, one petrol station and that’s it! No banks, no ATM machines. A stroll down the minimarket aisles, I found no fresh vegetable or meat. So I asked a local how do you get fresh produce. The answer was rather simple – either grow it, hunt it or trade it.

One evening I went down to the beach and found myself sitting all alone for hours. Not a soul for miles and miles either way. You could literally be washed out to sea or fall dead and no one would have noticed. This is the perfect place to run away to. There is no cell phone coverage, newspapers arrive after lunch, there is only one radio station and sometimes you can hardly even tune into it. If you can't wind down here, there is no where else you could do it.

Despite the isolation or perhaps due to the isolation, the environment is pristine. The landscape is stunning. Nature at its best. There is a sanctuary a few kilometres south of Haast and if you wait patiently and don’t mind the constant stinging of the sandflies, you are bound to see at least several native birds. Take a drive down to Jackson Bay, where the road suddenly comes to an abrupt end, you are more than likely to catch a glimpse of the Crested Penguins that call this part of the country home.

Here are some photos I took while in Haast.







































This is just the beginning. There are still many parts of the country I have yet to see and am looking forward to seeing.

I am off to Northland on Monday.

Fruits of my labour

Not only fruits but also vegetables of my labour. The vege garden is growing well although the birds are also having a feast out of it.

This is our black grapes. Only one just turning black and we only manage to get three vines. It is only the first season and hoping more will fruit next season.



Then there is the lemon tree which is growing all the time but the fruits taking forever.



The mandarin oranges never survived the Wellington wind. We had lots of flowers but with every wind they went flying. Now all we have are leaves and we can only hope for better luck next time.

The blueberries started flowering but a branch broke off due to the wind and now its recuperating. Hopefully it survives.

The apples had a lot of flower at the begining of spring and everytime the wind blew, some of the flowers would drop off. Thankfully some survived.



Our vege plot made up of several varieties of tomato plants. Some we planted and some just appeared, possibly brought in by the birds.







We had a least 3 bags of them already harvested and more growing.

Apart from tomatoes, we have cucumbers.



And gerkins.



Two varieties of chillies, the long large ones and the small super extra hot ones.





And finally the herb garden which is made up of rosemary (not pictured), mint.



Coriander.



Spring onions.



And finally serai or lemon grass.

Discrimination

What would life be like if you looked different? How would people treat you if your skin were another colour? What if you were a different gender? Or you had a disability? The Big Experiment is a New Zealand local series, a social experiment that radically changes people's identities and gives them the opportunity to walk a day in someone else's shoes.

We watched one episode of this series where a young white Kiwi lass was disguised as an Asian girl. She was dressed like a typical Asian girl and even taught to speak with a typical Asian accent.

This episode began by showing how she was treated at shops around Auckland when she was who she was and then again at the same shops after her transformation into an Asian girl. It was amazing how she was treated when she looked and talked like an one. At one outlet, she was completely ignored and at another one she was treated like she could not afford the items on display.

Until then I never really saw or felt discrimination in New Zealand. At least I never experienced discrimination here like I have in other Western countries I have been to. Maybe I was lucky or maybe I never paid any attention to it to notice it.

This aftertoon I went to the Harvey Norman outlet in Paraparaumu to print some photographs. While waiting for the photos to be printed, I was browsing at some cameras on sale. I asked a young white Kiwi how much they were selling a particular model. He said "I will be with you in a minute", and immediately walked to another customer who just walked in and attended to him instead. He looked at me from across the shop without feeling guilty about asking me to wait. After about 5 minutes seeing me still there, another sales person asked me if he could help. I politely told him that the other guy told me to wait but chose to attend to another customer who walked in after me and if he doesn't want my business, I will gladly take it else where.

It is interesting that we see things only after it was brought to our attention. Maybe discrimination is still being widely practiced, maybe this was a one off incident. After having lived in New Zealand for almost 4 years, I think most Kiwi's accept you for what/who you are and discrimination is not as bad as it is elsewhere in the world. I have real great Kiwi friends and none have made me feel that I am any different from them. But then, all it takes is one person to change the way you think.

Carols By The Sea

Tonight we followed 20,000 other Kapiti residents and spent an evening singing Christmas Carols by the sea.



We had the traditional Christmas songs and Christmas songs with a twist like the New Zealand version of the "12 Days of Christmas".



Along with carols, there were free sausage sizzles, drinks and bouncing castle for the kids. And obviously the Man himself. What would Christmas be without Santa!

Food Glorious Food!

My summer creation

Summer is just around the corner and the day is getting longer as we speak. This calls for summer food.

Last week Vera made her Thai dumplings called "Thoong Tong" for one of her clients and I had the good fortune to sample some before it went away.





Not to be left behind, I did my own summer creation, the sambals.



This one is the Malaysian Sambal Belachan.



And this is the Indonesian variety I learnt while living in Indonesia some years back. It is Sambal Terasi Tomat which simply means Shrimp paste and tomato sambal.



Before I left Indonesia, I bought a book of 40 different Indonesian sambal from across the archipelago. One day will complete the culinary tour of the archipelago with my mouth watering chilli. For now am waiting for the summer chilli picking season to start, which should be around the corner. My chilli plant has just come out of hibernation and soon will be full of red spicy chilli.

Durian

After more than 3 years, we finally got to eat the King of Fruits - the Durian. It brought back so many memories although this was a frozen one.

Can't wait to get back to Malaysia to have the fresh one.

My new baby

Just got myself a new baby! Isn't she a beauty?

Guy Fawkes day or rather night

The Gunpowder Conspiracy of 1605, or the Powder Treason or Gunpowder Plot, as it was known at the time, was a failed assassination attempt by a group of provincial English Catholics against King James I of England and VI of Scotland. The plot intended to kill the king, his family, and most of the Protestant aristocracy in a single attack by blowing up the Houses of Parliament during the State Opening on 5 November 1605. The conspirators had also planned to abduct the royal children, not present in Parliament, and incite a popular revolt in the Midlands.

Now this historic event is celebrated primarily in the UK and in some of its former colonies including New Zealand. As this is not a widely known event outside the English world, I am assuming many residents here who come from the non English speaking world wouldn't have a clue why we are celebrating the foiled attempt of this bloke who tried to blow up Parliament some 400 years ago!

However, what is easily associated to this day, and quite visible as well, is the sale of fireworks. In New Zealand, the sale of fireworks is bannned in general but you get a window of 3 days (formerly 10 days) to sell them. During this 3 days, shops go frantic selling fireworks with signs posted at every corner of the street, motorway, up on trees, tied to bicycles and this was good - a man in swimming trunks holding a placard near the beach on a cold night! It was windy and snowing in the South. I wonder how much he got paid - or how much profit there was in it for him.

Diwali

It's Diwali around the corner but there is little festivities unlike back home. We went out for lunch at the Fisherman's table to mark the festival of lights while the temperature outside was single digit.

Art Splash 2008

Last Thursday schools around Wellington took part in the 2008 World of Wearable Arts festival - Art Splash! A total of 20 schools took part in choir and wearable art made from various craft material.

Ashwini represented her school, Paraparaumu Beach School, in the choir. She was the smallest in the whole group and looking at the size of the entire group, it is unlikely that you may be able to spot her.

Up close and personal with a Hector Dolphin

As part of my job, I regularly visit some of the work that is being carried out by my colleagues around the country. This time, I had the opportunity to visit the Akaroa in Canterbury. This is a beautiful part of Canterbury about 40 minutes drive out of Christchurch.

To get there, you will have to drive a rather winding road up Port Hills and down to the other side to a fantastic, jaw dropping sceneray of the volcanic water ways. The day I was there, the weather turned out to be absolutely georgeous! Blue skies and the sun fully turned on.



We took a boat trip down to the existing marine reserve and the proposed marine reserve right out to sea. All the way, you could see the sea teeming with marine life.







I saw a few blue penguins happily swimming in the sea, one seal taking a leisurely evening swim and playing in the water, a few on the rocks - sun bathing and a number of the endangered Hector Dolphins. There are only about 700 of them left in the wild and the shores of New Zealand are the only place where you can spot them. As you would have guessed, spotting these dolphins is a million dollar industry.





The dolphins were rather small in size. About a metre in length and were very friendly as they were swimming about the boat not bothered about the cameras or the attention. During summer, you could actually swim with them. And depending on the weather, you could literally see hundreds!

But for this trip, I had to settle for four!