Mission Bay with Paella!

Saturday to spend in Auckland...

A leisurely lunch at a smart Spanish cafe on the main strip along Mission Beach, a bit likeRose bay in Sydney. The paella we order is a bit ordinary but the Calamari are fabulous, best ever. I see a cinema close by and check out the sessions. 'Candelabra' is on so it's worth a look we decide. A choc-top to satisfy our collective sweet tooth and then the movie. Not an Academy award movie but top performances from the two main stars, Michael Douglas and Matt Damon. What a hive of hypocrisy was Hollywood in the seventies, but probably still is.

A nice drive back to Onehunga through the smart suburbs of Auckland and then a quiet night at home.Flight home to Wellington Sunday at 5 am. It's been a good weekend and P and P were marvellous Hosts.  

Weekend in Auckland

The despair of losing the last sudden- death race with the US in the America's Cup is short lived on Auckland's docklands. The sailors behind me are already talking up how well NZ sailed, and indeed they did. The Kiwi spirit, is, as ever, indomitable, and the life in Auckland is very much reflective of that.

I arrived last night on the last flight from Wellington, only forty five minutes and I was in a different atmosphere. The airport bus, a cool sixteen dollar ride to my Friday might destination of the Grand Rendezvous Hotel, was an efficient start of my weekend of medical updating and catching up with friends. It is a radically different city to Wellington, but then it is eight  times larger at one point five million residents in greater Auckland. The HIV seminar, to be more precise, was set to elucidate what is happening, if anything, on the front against the spread of the Virus.

Organised by Auckland Body Positive, it had a good range of speakers, but mostly quite predictable and nothing much I didn't know before. it was interesting all the same to see the New Zealand response to the epidemic in action. It was mainly preaching to the converted in a Drug Company funded day of treatment information. As conferences go, it was very low budget, and after a day of solid speakers I felt quite exhausted. 

At the end of the day I took a pleasant walk in balmy weather with the storms just recently dispersed, down the main thoroughfare of Queen Street to the famous harbour. I had a quiet reverie before I took a train to stay with ex flatmate P at Onehunga.  Am looking forward to catching up with news of her new job and new city, and new boy friend! The comparison of Auckland and Sydney is certainly strong in the air, as I smell the salt water and hear the sonorous sounds of the ferries as they depart regularly for the north side of the Harbour. It is a mini Circular Quay.

Concert Day

A nervous early departure for town so I won't be late for my inaugural Glamaphones Concert at St Andrew's on The Terrace. But first a quick visit to the quayside markets for fresh fruit and then to Tinakori Street to see if I can get my new watercolour framed and pick it up to-morrow. As luck would have it, the artist is there signing his work, Sir Michael Fowler, of some fame or infamy, and a long time mayor of Wellington and a foremost architect, obviously  former big-wig. The big Arts centre next to Te Papa is named after him. The watercolour I chose yesterday, very quickly, was of a market scene in Fiji, and a very appealing  one. The artist writes a note on the back as provenance, and I say I'll pick it up framed, tomorrow. All in order and another hour before we arrive at two thirty for a four o'clock start. After the concert I have, of course, my ballroom dancing, which also has its AGM tonight. 

So much to do but the sun is shining and I am in Red Dog Cafe on the wharf, with the towering Navy frigate HMSNZ berthed nearby. I order a soup of the day and settle to prepare for the concert.  The very hot pumpkin soup arrives with two handsome slices of natural crusty toast, just what I need to sustain me, but not too big.

The concert went very well with a near full house. Jean, the conductor, seemed quite happy with our singing. Afternoon tea, or drinks, was also packed out. Each chorister was asked to bring a bottle of wine, so naturally there was much imbibing. I played barman for much of the time as I knew no-one there.

Then on to the dance night which, as always, was good exercise and great fun. I declined an invitation to replace the outgoing President at the AGM which was a good decision I feel, lol!

Home, tired, to sleep a well earned  eight hours.

Turkish Disappointment

With an hour to spend before Glamaphones rehearsal, our last one as well before our big concert on Sunday, I am grabbing a bite in a so-called Turkish cafe on Lambton Quay. Although Wellington has a large proportion of Turkish restaurants, this one is a disaster and shouldn't have been allowed here. The comparison with good Kiwi food is odious, and I certainly will never come by here again. Which proves there  are always exceptions to every rule.

The horrible weather is over and we may start to enjoy, I hope, some spring type weather. It is 30 degrees in Sydney at present and flatmate A will need all her summer clothes to survive her ten days with her sister. She left this morning to allow a free entry for American F who arrives in the morning with another chapter beginning.

 The recent gale force winds have been the strongest I have ever experienced, and also the strongest Wellington has had for many decades. I was  forced to abandon my scooter en route to my home one night and battled the last few hundred metres against a raging storm. The next day I retrieved the scooter, still parked next to a camper van, thank God, where I hid it away from the wind until the weather softened up. It was at least two days before I could venture out again on the scooter. I now have some idea of the hurricanes in the US.

Pics of awful Turkish cafe!

Midnight Espresso

Why do I like this cafe? With a name nearly synonymous with the excellent movie starring the late Brad Davis, where the hero is caught smuggling hashish into Istanbul and spends an ugly time in gaol. Something which I had serendipitously avoided the same year, 1969, when I, young and foolhardy Aussie that I was, and perhaps, still am,  was invited to take a half kilo of the best Mt Ketama hash from Tangiers to Paris. I look back on that time with wry amusement as I could have easily been caught by the Guardia Civil in Spain, but,  as always, I was looked after from above, and survived my first month in Paris with the sale to new friends of a very good smoke.

Anyway back to the cafe, Midnight Espresso, it's not that it has good food and coffee, but there is such a vast array of personalities who attend the bar and who frequent the cafe. A whole coffee-table book of photographs would not do them justice, as this is the real Cuba Street, seemingly a direct descendant of New York's Greenwich Village in the sixties, when I was there for a brief sojourn, and which totally does it justice. With no hyperbole, I can say that this cafe, without a skerrick of pretension, carries all the alternate culture that the Village did at that exciting time, with probably a greater variety of accents to boot. See photo!

Saturday brekkie on Cuba and the Oz elections

 It's a beautiful day in Wellington, a far cry from the past few gale-ridden days, and I am out to enjoy Cuba St. It's always a buzz and Caffe Scopa has seduced me today. Always great coffee and atmosphere. And I am away from the doom that is the impending Labor defeat in my home country, one reason I left it!  

On the home front A's son Dan and his friend Scott,  came by to deliver the much-awaited TV and vacuum cleaner from their flat. And I jumped on my bike to get into town, also to catch perhaps two home grown Kiwi movies at the Film archives in Ghuznee St, just down the road from Scopa. The kiwis indeed are some of the most intrepid and courageous people on this planet. The new movie about Edmund Hillary's conquest of Everest which is debuting at the Toronto film festival typifies the Kiwi can-do attitude. They are perhaps not as laid back as the Aussies, but in the category of facing the odds, they are unbeatable. I don't think I will ever become a real kiwi, but then, I am not here to become one. I booked my return flight from Auckland today, for the treatments Seminar. It was a cheapie, so am really onto the kiwi attitude, 'just do it'! A's friend Jen is coming for the night and we may share a glass listening to the Oz debacle unfold, and the probable new OZ PM just happens to be married to a kiwi girl, of course. So it was she who gave him the opportunity to do what he does, and also three gorgeous daughters. This quaint fact is not lost on the kiwis.

I am now in the Film Archives, a real gem in the Wellington crown of cinematic arts. They show much home grown product, and have a lot  of history available for the film buff. I am nicely served by a very Irish sounding attendant who dares no ask if I wish the Senior's discount. I always forget ask for it, but next time I will, as it adds up to a solid reduction if you attend many movies as I do. Again I order my favourite kiwi hot drink, lemon honey and ginger tea, and quietly take it in to see 'The Pictures'.

Floriditas on Cuba

 My first visit, but i'll be back. great coffee and beautiful service...

The food looks good too. but the decor is fabulous, and music, background, phado fantastic! A trip to Sao Paulo!

My new class

Wow! They really know how to teach Maori language inWellington.

I went on Tuesday night to my first class, their fifth, and joined in seamlessly. However there may be red tape I can't bypass which could prevent my coming in so late. Kerry, the main teacher, was enthusiastic however. The class was run fabulously, with lots of singing, movement and laughing. I really want to join this class. There is a whole new culture awaiting me if I can speak their language. and such a rich indigenous culture which in Australia was as denied to me with our awful racist politics still in effect, literally if not theoretically. it was a very exciting class and I know I can make some friends there. already the is Rachel who sings Piaf songs at the Bayside Hotel on Fridays.

So I am very hopeful that my Maori experience will really take off with this thirty week class.

But now to the weather...Wellington is windy, as we all know but last it was more than windy, it was gale force winds and I was forced to abandon my scooter a few hundred metres from my home as the Southerly was so strong I feared being blowing into Cook strait. I rapidly dismounted it on Evans Bay Pde after coming home at ten p.m. after my Scottish Dance class, and positioned it behind a big car to protect it from the icy blasts. Early this morning at seven I rushed to find it still there and I parked it in sheltered place down in Oriental Pde away from the direct wind. Wellington weather has to be respected and I am slowly but surely learning that important fact.

Coffee at Kirkcaldies and Staines

After a very interesting day yesterday, when everything seemed to go wrong, today is a sunny Spring morning and people are out to show they know it's the end of a long and somewhat violent winter.

I haven't spoken since my Interfaith meeting which was exceptionally interesting and it ended with an election of the new Committee, of which, I am now one! mission accomplished, so far. lots of committed people attended and it will be something to attend to and see what happens. Viva came and supported me and nominated me for the post. All good.

Then on Sunday a lovely farewell lunch at the excellent Caffe L'Affare, off Tory. What a buzz and what great food. the four of us had a great degustation, that is Pam, her best friend Ellyn and Aime and me.

But on to the disaster of Sunday afternoon. The Scooter, new and invincible, broke down, twice.    Couldn't open the gas tank, the ignition didn't work, it was a total disaster. I couldn't believe it so I just  HUed and all turned out OK. A few lessons learned when I had to abandon the scooter at Lyall Bay overnight. Jamie, who sold me same scooter, kindly, (at a fee), said he'd pick it up and fix the ignition, after all, it was still in warranty. but while this was going on, my glasses finally broke into  pieces, the zipper on my jacket disintegrated, and I just thought it was time to surrender. which I did and all was, at the end, perfect. today I am off to get new glasses, pick up the four pictures I  extravagantly bought yesterday ( was that the reason I wonder?) LoL!

But lots to do to prepare for the arrival of the new flatmate next Friday, 13th, her special day. With Fir, Saturday is her day at the Synagogue, and it looks like I am about to embark on a real Interfaith experience with her arrival.  Am quietly excited about this and think she will b a great foil for Aime, who is desperately seeking Something, she knows not what!

So on to coffee and cake at the great established department store in Lambton Quay, Kirkcaldies. It is very 1900s!