Me And The Natural World

Last year I bought a t-shirt from my University's tramping club because it had a kea on it. When asked if I wanted to join I said no because I didn't want to hold everyone up.

I'm pretty sure the guy thought I meant it was because I was slow or not up to a long hike but it was actually because I have a habit of dropping down to inspect some unknown plant or standing still to listen for bird calls.

If it's about the destination you don't want someone like me along because, if you do get there, it will be in a delayed fashion and probably after enduring several lectures on avian behavior.

My need to capture an image of a small plant called a bidi bidi led a group of trampers coming up behind me to believe I had fallen and hurt myself. I was laying down on my side and they couldn't see my camera.

Must photograph, identify and catalog!

In the above photo my friend Hill caught of picture of me crouching to photograph one of the two carnivorous plants that inhabit this Alpine trail. Hill is one of those people who takes an interest in flora and fauna wherever she goes so she can tolerate nature walks with me.

I also have a tendency to pull faces and do really dumb stunts which usually put us both in hysterics. For example, I thought it would be neat to get a couple of action shots of me running in terror from the giant moa statue at the Bealey Hotel.

My. God.

Something happened to my face. My mouth made a melting sausage shape and my eyes were reduced to two tiny tadpoles swimming furiously towards each other.

And my chin? Whither my jaw? It was as if the back of my head was swallowing the front bit.

Although we both laughed until the tears came, I was quite discomfited that I could look that awful.

Anytime I get too full of myself all it would take to shut me down is someone whispering, "remember the great moa stunt of 2017?" And that would be me silenced.

Hanging Out With Friends

My friend Hill recently came to visit from America and she has an awesome camera and a great eye for photography.

We visited Arthur's Pass and saw several Kea. I noted their tags so I could report the sightings on the recently launched kea database.

Alex Whispers His First "Trick or Treat"

We have an American living with us at the moment and she's fond of observing American traditions such as Christmas and Halloween.

In order to facilitate the proper observance of Halloween I thought we might escort my son out around the local neighborhoods.

This last minute decision saw me turning one of his printed black t-shirts backward, pinning a pillowcase around his neck, placing a borrowed pointy hat on his head and labeling him "baby Gandalf."

A lot of Kiwis don't like Halloween. They think it's incredibly rude to knock on a stranger's door and demand sweets (or anything else for that matter). The implied threat of a "trick" doesn't go down either.

Alex, being a true kiwi child, didn't take naturally to asking strangers for candy. He silently watched as candy was put into his bucket at the first house. At the second he handed a piece of his candy to the little girl who gave him a goody bag. At another house he whispered "trick or treat" so faintly the man at the door leaned down and said, "what was that now?"

We found that it was almost impossible to tell who was giving out candy and who wasn't. Some people made a slight attempt to decorate with a spiderweb over a light fixture and others just sort of watched for you from a doorway with no decorations at all.

At one house a woman held out a bowl with a skeleton over it and when Alex went for a piece of candy, she pressed a button that made the skeleton come down on his hand and give an evil laugh.

Alex was horrified. I marked that moment as a time my son would later discuss in therapy. "Why am I apprehensive of strangers with bowls? Let me think back..."

We did a lot of walking for very little reward but the other American seemed happy and Alex didn't care so that was okay.

When we got home, Alex was allowed to pick out one piece of candy while his chaperones taste tested the rest of it for "safety reasons."

And that was Alex's first Halloween.

A Song That Brings Hope

We finally have a new government and a new Prime Minister in New Zealand.

Jacinda won and Labour has formed a coalition government with the Greens and New Zealand First.

After keeping us in suspense for several weeks, Winston Peters finally made his choice.

So shines a good deed in a weary world.

With all the mind numbing stupidity brought by the Tangerine Prince of Comb-overs, it's really uplifting to have a woman of my age getting ready to take the reigns of power in this country.

Today I made a discovery that has given me so much happiness.

I know the birds in my garden. I know their Latin, common and Maori names. I know their songs and nesting habits. I know if they're natives or were introduced from Australia or Europe.

Recently I noticed a clear and lovely voice which rang out above all the others.

It was solitary and never answered by another of its kind.

I had a suspicion it was a bell bird or Korimako but I was doubtful because they've been driven out of this part of the Canterbury by the loss of habitat.

They are nectar eaters who love the blossoms of the flax plant and kowhai.

This afternoon I went outside and tried to pinpoint the source of the beautiful song.

My house has several large, established trees and flax plants.

I crept among the trees and looked up whenever the song was repeated.

And then I spotted it-a solitary bell bird flitting through the branches.

I mimicked it's song and it flew closer and answered mine.

If you ever go into the bush and start whistling all the nearby bell birds will hop over to check you out. This happened the first time I visited my uncle's house. His property is filled with manuka trees which they also love.

It gives me an enormous sense of well being to find this bird in my garden.

I know if we Cantabrians work to restore the native habitat, these birds will return and join the dawn chorus as they did before.

Conversation With A Young Man In A Shop

 My laptop crapped out. They always do. I don't know why it's still such an unpleasant surprise.

Getting a new one means a trip to a shop where some young salesperson will inevitably try to hornswoggle me.

I hate this process slightly less now that I've hit an age where I'm more assertive.

I went to the type of shop where they have huge televisions with gorgeous color saturation featuring images of blown glass and bright flowers.

No one came to help me so I went to the counter to wait for one of the young men to notice me.

The one who did was tall with blond hair, blue eyes and an American accent.

He looked to be in the shallow end of his twenties.

I told him what I was looking for and he asked where I was from.

We then established that I was from Alabama and he was from Utah. He was Mormon and I was raised Southern Baptist. He had been to the Dominican Republic for his mission and spoke excellent Spanish. I had lived in Mexico and loved cheap street tacos.We had both suffered from Salmonella and been hospitalized while living in those countries.

The following discussion happened throughout the negotiations over the computer I wanted.

He mentioned his fiance was studying Criminal Justice at the UC.

I asked if she had any classes with Greg Newbold and what she thought of him.

He said she loved him.

I made some facial expression that caused him to ask what I thought of him. I said I had read his textbook in which he claimed 60-80% of women who reported rape were lying and that he had cited Wikipedia numerous times which is just not done in academic texts. I said I was worried that he was teaching future law enforcement professionals to victim blame.

That's when the fresh faced young man told me that most women were to blame for getting raped because of the way they dressed and acted.

At that point I became a concerned mother type. My hand went to my heart and I said, "No, no, no you don't believe that surely?"

He did though.

I reminded him that women in Saudi Arabia who are covered from head to toe also get raped and he said he had read all about it and it was mostly domestic abuse.

My readings on the subject told me women reliant on taxi drivers because they weren't allowed to drive were often assaulted in those vulnerable situations.

And then he said men couldn't help themselves and if I knew what went through their mind all the time I would understand.

I said he was confusing a normal, healthy sexual desire with committing an act of sexual violence against someone without their consent.

I heard the sincerity in his voice and was reminded of myself when I was younger and fully immersed in my church's version of Christianity. Back then, I spoke with absolute certainty of my world view because I was steeped in it and no one ever came along to contradict or disprove it until I got out of my parent's house.

I had a comforting thought that one day he would think back on our conversation and be embarrassed of himself for saying such things. After all, I had.

But there again, maybe he won't.

There's a difference with how men and women experience most major religions.

His and mine are both set up to put men in positions of power and decision making. That sort of thing can be hard to give up.

I joked that if men were really at the mercy of their sex drive maybe they should all be locked up.

I'm puzzled by the church's portrayal of men as strong leaders meant to rule the world but also weak-willed sex zombies at the first hint of leg or cleavage.

Should they really be in charge if this is the case?

I changed tack and asked if we met and I was wearing a bikini would he lose control of himself and feel the need to sexually attack me.

No, not him. He would never.

"Well you see then, you can control yourself and there's hope." I said.

He declared that he was brought up to respect women.

That respect is highly conditional though.

It requires us to dress and act in a certain male approved way.

We mustn't like sex too much because that's unnatural. That's what men do.

If we are not good, modest girls then we deserve to be raped. We bring it on ourselves.

This is a horrendous way to view women.

It's not doing men any favors either. It assumes they're all sex fiends just trying to get through life without having to rape someone.

I found the exchange so disturbing that I went home and immediately called my mother.

"I don't think anything I said got through," I told her.

She thought it might have.

In a few weeks that young man will be going back to Utah to get married.

I hope his wife gives birth to a series of daughters and that each one is more outspoken than the last.

Bring Them Down

I am delighted by the destruction being visited upon Confederate monuments in the South.

I can't think of any other place in the world where a losing side is so celebrated.

Look world, we had this war and got our butts handed to us! Hurrah for the South!

I've been thinking about what it must feel like as a person of color to see a bunch of white fuckwits trying to defend these statues with talk about heritage.

So yeah, let's look at that heritage.

To adopt the distorted Southern perspective you would need to do the following:

In order to be proud of losers you want to romanticize them as much as possible. To do this, make sure the local history books are filled with stories of how noble and gentlemanly they were.

You'll need to have an organization like the United Daughters of the Confederacy which will offer prize money to the young lady who can write the best essay about the bravery of her great-great- great grandpappy who fought the rebel scum with dignity.

To reinforce the romance of the old South you'll feature a yearly Springtime event where families get into their cars and drive out to the plantations to see the dogwoods and azaleas in bloom. To highlight the wholesomeness of this event you'll have a bunch of young white girls in hoop skirts, gloves and bonnets smile and wave at the passing cars. (Aren't those delicate Southern belles the best? So feminine. So unthreatening.)

When giving tours of said plantation houses you focus on the splendor and charm of the Big House. At no time will you allow the visitors to wander off out the back where the row of rundown shacks are located. If a visitor does manage to escape out there you'll laugh musically, redirect them to the official tour and mumble something about "tool sheds."

When teaching Southern history to older students you'll stress the fact that less than 1% of all wealthy people in the South owned slaves with the takeaway being that the Civil War couldn't possibly have been about slavery. You'll ignore the fact that during the time even the poorest of white trash had higher status than black folks and that every white person in the region benefited from an economy that thrived off of slave labor.

You'll use special terms to refer to this period of time. It wasn't a "Civil War" it was the "War Against Northern Aggression". It wasn't about the spread and existence of slavery, it was about "States Rights." Never mind if those rights let one type of person own another or let lawmakers draft discriminatory legislation which disenfranchised black people from sharing white spaces and having the right to vote.

When choosing a bumper sticker for the back of your pick up truck you will add the one with the Confederate flag that says, "Heritage, Not Hate." You will abruptly change the subject when an outsider asks why no black people fly or embrace this flag.

To avoid awkward mental exercises, you'll surround yourself with  like minded company. This will allow you to regularly proclaim that The South Will Rise Again! As everyone around you "gets" what you are saying you will be saved from having to explain exactly what this means or what it would look like.

Follow these tips and you'll be fantasizing over the character of the losing side in no time!

*****

Please tune in next time as I explore why so many members of the "master race" seem to be paunchy, weak chinned, illiterate, omega males with shithouse tattoos.

An Email To Jacinda

When I first moved to New Zealand I spent my free time working as a DJ.

One evening I saw a talk show featuring a young woman named Jacinda Ardern who was a politician and a DJ.

She was on her way to play at a music festival and I thought I would write her a short note of support.

I wrote to say I was also a DJ who had come to the country to pursue a PhD.

She wrote back with a kind and encouraging reply and I have liked her ever since.

I was always interested in learning more about politics in this country but had a slower progression in making up my mind on which party I wanted to affiliate with.

Unlike the U.S. where there is a stark difference between Democrats and Republicans, the National and Labour parties here are not as polarized.

You never hear either side discussing abortion or whether or not Jesus should be put back into the public schools.

But there was one clear winner for me and it was the Labour party.

Their policies are socialist and they have some of the most inspiring women serving as MPs.

I am thinking of the amazing Poto Williams who was once a single mother and who serves as Labour's spokesperson on the issues of sexual assault and family violence. I had a chance to speak with her at a Young Labour meeting in Christchurch and again when she came to speak at the uni during Wahine week.

I am thinking of former deputy leader Annette King who had empathy for the plight of my friend with the wrongful conviction and who shared a story of a similar act that happened within her own family.

And I am thinking of the amazing Jacinda Ardern who recently became the leader of the party and will become our next Prime Minister if Labour forms the majority government in Parliament.

I am also thinking of my local Labour candidate Tony Condon who has let me help out with his campaign and invited me to go to speaking events with him and see how politics works behind the scenes. He is a wise man of excellent character.

After the embarrassing shit show that is the Trump presidency, it's incredibly soothing to see so many wonderful people standing up to lead this country in a progressive direction.