Today is the Board meeting and also later I have my much awaited meeting with Norma at the Auckland Art Gallery. They should be interesting, both of them.
The hotel room here at the Amora was great with a spa bath which I indulged myself in last night, a very relaxing way to end a long day. Now to try their breakfast.
View from 8th floor Amora...
The spa in my luxury bedroom
More views over Auckland
How prisoners are loose on the streets.
Nice breakfast at Amora
My favourite Kiwi movie wins award
Norma trying in vain her electronic skills...
In the lovely foyer cafe at Auckland Art Gallery
Well the Board meeting was very interesting indeed, with the Canadian coming up trumps. He will make a good difference to the whole of the Body Positive scene in New Zealand I am sure of that. His unmitigated North American attitude is a great bonus and his adoption of NZ as his new country is also going down well. He is married to a French ex New Caledonian called Lucien who has the nice title of the current 'Mr Bear New Zealand'. I think there will be some substantial changes in the next two years of his tenure. He is set to bring new initiatives in his job and not the least is the plan of educating new people to be leaders in the HIV education field. This was a program instituted in Ontario and taken on by Mebourne with some reported success. The trained leaders then can pass on their knowledge to the younger generation. It was altogether a good result and I went away feeling we had hopefully experienced something which bodes well for the future of Body Positive.
Immediately after the meeting finished at ten past two, I caught a bus luckily just around the corner, to meet Norma at the planned time of two thirty at the imposing Auckland Art Gallery. She was there waiting for me as though we hadn't seen each other for a just a week or so, whereas in reality it was thirty-five years!! After a very rapid catch-up of 'time gone by', it was time for her to catch a ferry home to Waiheke Island where she lives. The hour we spent chatting went by like a lightning flash. Our next meeting on December 27 should also be good at her home patch on the island, although my memories of our time together so many years ago were very dim to say the least, as were hers. That decade of the seventies was certainly a time that many have problems in recalling, not just us I believe, lol!
Leaving the Gallery soon after, as it unfortunately closed at five pm, I had no real time to explore it except for a few un-memorable rooms of predictable European Masters. Outside, I strolled through the Auckland Saturday evening street-scene, the main boulevards boasting a few more Christmas decorations than Wellington, I must say. The buskers were everywhere, and I noticed with interest that there were quite a few young people busking on street corners with their violin repertoire disclosing a solid background of good classical training. Again New Zealand showing off its talent.
Feeling tired I decided to cut my losses and grab a cab to the airport.
My youngish Indian taxi driver, named Kawal, was quite chatty during our near eighty dollar ride to the airport. He explained to me how difficult it was these days to make a living with taxis in Auckland, even saying to me how with one thousand dollars a week you were lucky to save two hundred, this being due the high cost of living in Auckland. That is a salary of fifty two thousand dollars a year! I do believe this is true, especially in this city of Auckland, where like in Sydney, few and fewer people can live because of the escalating cost of living. This is such a consumer society if you don't want to be a part of it you just have to leave the cities and hibernate in the country areas and make the most of living with fewer possessions and demands on the purse. Something which eventually I will certainly be doing myself.
At Auckland airport with three hours to wait, I find an empty bench to lie down on and catch a catnap for a few minutes. This is a skill I have luckily picked up in my many long hours of travel time and it serves me well. It is especially useful at this quiet and somewhat boring airport like Auckland Domestic. The weather is wet and grey, and the whole atmosphere is redolent of a near deserted city, clean, but empty.
The empty rows and lone aircraft..
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