filling the nights

I am currently working nights - 11pm to 4am - and so I sleep from about 5am to 1pm every day, even when I'm not working, so that I don't exhaust myself completely. (It is currently 4:57 am in New Zealand.) This leaves a lot of space to be filled between around 9pm and 5am, hence, a lot of DVDs are being watched, and I have been compiling some utterly useless lists regarding male actors:

The actors that are not bad looking, even smoking hot, but undateable in real life simply because they have played some pretty convincing villains in their time

Cillian Murphy. After his creepy performance in Batman Begins (and I am sure he makes a wonderful villain in many other movies), he's just too villainous.

Andy Garcia. It's that mob look he's got going. Sizzling eyes but in a villainous sort of way.

Mads Mikkelson, of Casino Royale. This picture says a thousand words.

Mark Dymond, who played Captain Frederick Tilney in a recent version of Northanger Abbey. This photo doesn't quite capture the twisted smirk this actor pulled off when playing his womanising character. Actually, it's so convincing that even though he's drop dead gorgeous and plausibly successful with women in the movie that he becomes completely undateable.

David Anders, who played villain Julian Sark in the TV series Alias. (Isn't Sark a fantastic name for a villain?)

The actors who are just too beautiful to be dateable

Daniel Brühl, of movies like Goodbye Lenin, Ladies in Lavender, or Joyeux Noël. Good actor - too pretty.

Jonathan Rhys Meyers, of Bend it Like Beckham and the recent The Tudors TV series. I mean, seriously. Look at that photo. Is that ridiculous or is that ridiculous?

Jesse Metcalfe, of Desperate Housewives. Cute, but a little too perfectly so. This goes for a whole genre of Jesse Metcalfe-type actors.

Henry Cavill, of The Count of Monte Cristo, I Capture the Castle, et cetera. What an amazing bone structure, eyes, wistful look, everything - unfortunately, he would be a great statue, but doesn't seem dateable.

The actors that are just about right (and sometimes I can't explain why

James McAvoy. In a weird British way. It seems like everyone is drooling over him these days and it just seems so irrational because he looks nothing like a sex symbol should. He's got Something.

Humphrey Bogart. There are other classic film actors like Cary Grant or Christopher Plummer who make much more sense to have a crush on (and don't get me wrong, I think they're rather attractive) but Bogart, like James McAvoy, just has that Something that leaps off the screen at you and makes absolutely no sense.
Alan Rickman. Now, I don't understand the girls who have a crush on Snape. But Alan Rickman in every other role oozes Something.

Toby Stephens. I've always thought he was pretty great but his recent role as Mr Rochester in Jane Eyre blew me away. I'm not saying it was a perfect adaptation of the book, but on the screen Toby Stephens captured something of the attractiveness yet physical unattractiveness of Rochester that is so tangible in the book. He's a bit prettier than a Rochester really should be, but after a while I started believing him, that he was ugly, even though at the very same time I was falling in lurve.
Finally, and obviously, and probably uncontroversially - Daniel Craig. PHWOAR. Phwoar, phwoar, phwoar. Words are obviously failing me. What is it about him? Can anyone enlighten me? Before I saw Casino Royale, I was surprised that he was chosen as Bond because his face is almost ugly. Then I saw the movie, and all confusion dissolved. It is the only movie I have seen in years in which my jaw was literally dropping at how yummy he is. I am going to see Quantum of Solace tomorrow night and I can't wait!

food

I am a sucker for food. I have, in the past, decided many times to go on many different diets, which have not lasted longer than 24 hours - at the most. Most people have more stamina than that but food is just too good. At the moment I am trying to avoid eating too many carbs but it's not a diet as such, just a guideline that is broken without guilt.

I could never be an athlete of any skill because of my disastrous love for food, but it's not because I don't have the discipline. It's because I love food, and I hate the idea of food as fuel and nothing more. There is something very distasteful about loading up religiously with carbohydrates or protein or isotonics or whatever it is that sportspeople are supposed to eat. Eating the same thing every day, or at least the same type of thing, would be ghastly.

Food should be a celebration. Why should food be any less dignified a celebration of life than great art, literature, or music? We are not animals; we don't eat simply what our instincts tell us to eat; we can be creative and adventurous in our food choices. This doesn't mean we are eating irresponsibly, it means we are gleaning maximum enjoyment out of daily routine.

I remember, when my mother was dying, feeling incredibly sorry for her when her diet was restricted. Of course I hated what was happening but that was one of the major things that stood out for me. Mum's digestive functions were breaking down, and if she ate anything that wasn't processed and easily digestible, it could have hastened her death dramatically. So all she could eat were thin soup-like mixtures.

I'm sure it's horrible to die however it is that it happens, but it seemed so tragic to me to know that you were dying, and not be able to eat whatever you wanted. Like being on Death Row and being denied your final meal.

Anyway - for a long time my favourite foods have not been the most healthy choices, but for the first time in my life I find myself picking out healthy food over less healthy food. For a very long time, salad was only nice as a side dish, or if it had meat in it. Now I love it! Instead of going for the guilty pleasures of fish and chips when I get fast food, nothing can beat sushi or Subway now. Instead of eating junk food as snacks, I'm going for fruit - maybe because the season is bringing us nectarines, kiwifruit, peaches, strawberries, and soon apricots, feijoas, plums, and other berries. MMmm! Nothing can beat them. It feels good.

widgets

I have been browsing through widgets available online (witness the right hand side of this webpage, and the very bottom) and I found a few which amused me or which were in some way tempting:

The ultimate web translator with flags
This attractive little translator which I did not decide to use claims to be the ultimate in translation, with 30+ languages, including, amazingly, English, American, Canadian, and Australian! Where's New Zealandese? I want New Zealandese!

The Love Clock
How nice: "the eternal theme of Him and Her comes to life with Love Clock". I'm not exactly sure what that means, but you get to have an elegant timepiece on your webpage which is embraced by a man and a woman with blue hair.

The Grammar Girl Quiz
This is actually kind of cool - a quick quiz on grammar you can offer blog readers. It's a promotional for a book that has just come out so I didn't really want to offer free advertising, but otherwise it's right up my alley.

Liquid Clock
"Every second of our life is precious. The sixty seconds form a very precious minute. The sixty minutes form even more preciuos hour. The 24 hours form the invaluable day. Let's try to remember that preciousness and let our days be unique and happy!"
Well, I'm not sure that by putting this clock on my blog I'm going to achieve that.

Decorate Your Christmas Tree
Since my father is The Grinch and will not get a Christmas tree this year, this could be just what I wanted! A Christmas tree, with a Christmas countdown, and decorations for you, my blog readers, to embellish it. Yeah - it's a little corny - but I gave in and now my blog is seasonally decorated. See the very bottom of the page to help decorate.

Reverse Clock
"We used to believe that no one could turn time back. Now it's possible with Reverse Clock. Its hands move backwards but show exact time!"
My my, how extremely useful!

High There!
This handy little widget means that whenever I blog about weed, I can be featured on some stupid website. I can see this coming in handy.

It's hit the fan
A game of skill - guess what you throw at a fan!!

Amazon Wishlist
"With this widget, not only will people buy you things, but you can get paid when they do!"
Whoopee! I bet you all can't wait to begin!

ABAJournal Daily News
"Up to the minute stories" from the official legal news source of the American Bar Association. Snore.

The 4 Candles
Love, peace, faith and hope. Beautifully displayed in eternal candle form on your blog, for all the internet to see.

Tricks of the Trade
Rules to live by, callgirl style. Classy.

Well, I think that's enough. There are many more to find, however, on http://www.widgetbox.com/!

various

Several things that are too small for one post:

1. I am the proud owner of this t-shirt from cafépress!
Thank you, Stacy, for alerting me to that wonderful website.

2. Recently I have been reading the dictionary. I am nerdy, yes, but this is such a cool dictionary! I invested in a dictionary which is about the size of one of those big old family Bibles. Besides thousands of words, it has word history, editorial notes by experts (eg Richard Dawkins on evolution), usage notes, et cetera. These are some of my favourite words so far:

dybbuk (n.) /'dibek/ In Jewish folklore, an evil spirit that inhabits the body of a living person.

finagle (v.) /fi'naygl/ 1. to manage to obtain something using trickery or persistence. 2. to trick somebody into doing what one wants.

zeugma (n.) /'zyoohgma/ The use of a word to modify or govern two or more words, used in such a manner that it applies to each in a different sense. e.g. She opened the door and her heart to him.

3. I have been enjoying a blog called Pilgrim's Progress. This is the product of a family of two parents, eight kids and a grandad from New Zealand who are travelling the world on a budget for a year - they started in October 2008 and will be back in September 2009. Destinations are, broadly, South East Asia, Mongolia, the UK, Europe... with other places as possibilities to tack onto the end of it. They were recently in Penang, Malaysia, where they hung out for a day with my brother and his family, who passed on the URL to me. Read this blog if you like being amazed and envious.

I am disillusioned with New Zealand politics

After the result of the US elections yesterday, the upcoming New Zealand election on Saturday just seems so unexciting.

As a columnist in the local newspaper, Rosemary McLeod, wrote in The Press today:

"I'll be voting without passion on Saturday. ... What would it take to make me think highly of politics? Some real idealism would be a start. I'd like to hear from politicians who looked to principle before pragmatism; who believed in something they could put a name to other than self interest, power for power's sake, waffly generalities that could mean anything, demonising other sections of society, or scaremongering. ... they wouldn't focus on punishing vile wrongdoers at the expense of elevating the unfortunate. They wouldn't talk about family as if they had a monopoly on the subject, or as if family could only mean one thing, or indulge in doom-saying and breast-beating about the state of the planet as if it was dead already. They'd believe so strongly in equality of opportunity and access to help for everyone that they'd make it happen. Idealism is great. ...
We are a weird little country, and getting weirder. Our politics are not uplifting. We know everyone, the bullies and the swots, the prefects and the ratbags who smoke dak in the toilets. And this time next week there'll be a bunch of new entrants. Maybe there'll be a future leader among them. Maybe the country will become a better place for their arrival. Maybe a lot of things, but mostly, I reckon, maybe not."

Having just come home from the central city, where I came across several parties doing their thing in Cathedral Square, including John Key, leader of the National Party, leader of the Opposition, who is probably going to become Prime Minister on Saturday - I CONCUR.

Labour Party supporters, wearing red t-shirts, trying to shout down the National supporters. They soon become very, very tiresome. I say to one of them - "you know, I hate National too, but you're actually making me hate National less." She looks a bit embarrassed and promises they won't shout when John Key speaks - a promise that is not kept.

John Key arrives, an hour late. He walks straight to the media, and starts shouting into the microphone about how America has voted in change, and New Zealand will vote for change too on Saturday. It's rather ironic considering Key has much more in common with McCain than Obama. He insults Labour, thanks his supporters - a crowd of business suits - and then it's all over.
Uh-uh, John. I didn't wait in the rain for an hour to hear you tell me you are going to win and that's all there is to it. I wanted to be persuaded, to be convinced, and you didn't deliver.

The two major parties of New Zealand are disappointing. I will vote on Saturday, but as Rosemary McLeod wrote, I'm not voting with any enthusiasm. I will be disappointed if the wrong people win, but I won't feel like it's the end of the world.

Surprisingly, as I stand listening to the Green Party - the party of environmental concern, legalisation of marijuana, and social engineering of whom I am usually very suspicious - I am nothing but impressed. Their leaders are there, available. They point out errors in the political practice of other parties, but without malice. They hand the microphone around the crowd, and answer any questions that are put to them, respectfully and sensibly. Above all, they are dignified, idealistic, articulate and passionate. Although I don't agree with everything they stand for, they have made me wonder if perhaps I would rather have people in power, or influencing power in a coalition government, who care more passionately about the future and people of this country than in scoring points off the other parties.

Well, I don't know. I'll be thinking a lot about it over the next two days. Who knows? I may completely shock myself and vote Green.

wanderings

It was only two nights - but I escaped the city! I'm back now from holiday and am about to describe it. My friend J. and I left Christchurch early-ish on Thursday morning and drove to Tekapo, where we were staying in this little cabin on the lakefront:

Lake Tekapo is home to the tiny and beautiful Church of the Good Shepherd. The lake was formed by a glacier so is a beautiful, almost turquoise colour, with mountains framing it.

The weather was good on Thursday, so we took the opportunity to go to Mount Cook National Park, leaving Tekapo almost as soon as we arrived. Mount Cook, the highest mountain in the southern hemisphere, is about an hour and a half's drive from Tekapo, and is best seen when not covered in cloud, so if possible, good weather is a big plus when visiting. On the way to Mount Cook you drive past and around Lake Pukaki, another glacier lake with even a more brilliant blue than Tekapo, and surrounded by bigger mountains and forests. This photo was taken on the day we drove to Mount Cook:

And this was taken the next day, when we drove past the lake again on our way to somewhere else. It seemed like every time we saw the lake it had changed colour slightly.

Although the weather was amazing for most of the drive, Mount Cook National Park was a bit more blustery. We went up the Hooker Valley track anyway. I love this country; it's rocky and big and dramatic. This is me at one point on it:

The swingbridge! This is always fun but I promise it is even more of an experience when the wind is strong and gusty. It hangs maybe 33 feet above the Mueller glacier river, which was crashing away below as we crossed:

Unfortunately we didn't get quite as far up the Hooker Valley as I would have liked, partly because of the worsening weather, so we didn't quite get around the corner that gives you a sudden view of Mt Cook - but it was enough to be there in the mountains in the fresh air with absolutely no control over your hairstyle.

Driving between different spots we stopped often and took lots of photos. This is the entrance to the Irishman Creek sheep station which may give Stacy a sense of déjà vu - a photo I took of this hut years ago was one of our Halfway Down the Stairs covers:

I also loved these fields... although not so much the reminder that the election is coming!

On Friday we visited the Clay Cliffs, near Omarama. The nice thing about this: it's on private property, accessed by a gravel road, so it's not quite so popular a destination as the Church of the Good Shepherd and other spots in the Mackenzie Country, and you're not always competing with busloads of tourists for photos (for, as we all know, I have a right to be taking photos but no one else does!). They're rather different from the standard diet of lakes and mountains when travelling in this area and it feels a little like you're walking into a mini-canyon:

On our way back from the Clay Cliffs, we took a turn-off to Lake Ohau. This is another spot that isn't quite so busy, tourist-wise, and I can't quite understand why, because it's beautiful. Maybe it's partly that we weren't expecting something quite so stunning, but we ended up sitting on the beach at Ohau for about an hour, enjoying the wind, the waves, the mountains. I realise that some of these lakes don't look all that different in the photos but this certainly felt different:

So those are the different places we visited. We also did a fair bit of reading or just relaxing on the Tekapo lakefront. One of the cool things about the place we stayed is the incredibly friendly wildlife. There were several families of bunnies that hung out fearlessly by our cabin, and some very fat and well-fed sparrows that would hop almost right up to you in the hope of food. We ate out... the first night at Pepe's, one of my favourite pizza/pasta restaurants, and the second at a Japanese restaurant, where I had delicious local salmon (there are salmon farms in the canals around this area). On Saturday we left pretty early, because I started my new summer job in the evening, and there was really nothing we wanted to do that would fit in before we had to leave. But I could happily and easily have spent a week there. I've started having fantasies about going and living in a tiny country house overlooking a lake with a big window and a desk, and just sitting there and writing books. Of course, in this dreamworld there's no such thing as money!

for your information

Suddenly my blog is a symphony in ... brown. I would never have thought it.

Anyway, this is just to let you know that, having asked your opinions a couple of weeks ago, I am going away on holiday tomorrow with a friend of mine to the Mackenzie Country. We'll be staying at Lake Tekapo for two nights and hopefully going to Mount Cook for a daytrip - if the weather behaves, fingers crossed. It's my 22nd birthday tomorrow so it feels like a fantastic birthday present! I'll probably thrust on the blogosphere a very long-winded and photo-filled blog post on my return.

who am I?

Now, a title like that can't be encouraging if you're looking for a breezy, lighthearted blog post. Rest assured I'm not going down an existential path here... more a geographic one.

As I said several posts before, I've been craving the mountains. Specifically, New Zealand mountains. I couldn't stop thinking about them while I was away from New Zealand last year; sometimes I felt like being away from things that felt the same way as those mountains made it harder and harder for me to do the ordinary things like breathe... Sounds dramatic when I write it like that! As beautiful as Australia is, and as good a time as I had there, it is just so completely different to this country. I felt oppressed by the heat, by the redness, by the smallness. That doesn't make a lot of sense because Australia is vast and empty whereas New Zealand is small and a lot of Australians feel quite claustrophobic here, apparently. But being in Australia felt, for me, like everything was on a tiny scale, vertically. You could drive for hours without approaching any sort of gradient.

Anyway, this is a tangent. What I mean to say is that I know I am a New Zealander because of this, my love for the land and the seas of New Zealand that make me miss them desperately whenever I'm away for long. At risk of going overboard, I feel a connection to the environment around me. And also to the people - I feel I belong with them and I understand them, even if I don't always get along with them. We are all equal.

I think this is quite recent among New Zealanders. Not that long ago - one or two generations - Pakeha* New Zealanders still talked about Britain as Home, and felt completely out of place in New Zealand. One of my favourite poets, Allen Curnow, wrote in the 1930s a poem that expressed this, ending with the couplet:
"Not I, some child, born in a marvellous year,
Will learn the trick of standing upright here."

In a detective novel I've been reading, written by New Zealand's Ngaio Marsh in 1943, this is expressed as well, in a suspicion of the natural environment.
The main character is looking at a poster of the English Cotswolds.
"It made Dikon, the New Zealander, ache for England. By shifting his gaze slightly, he saw, framed in the sitting-room window, a landscape aloof from man. Its beauty was perfectly articulate yet utterly remote. Against his will he was moved by it as an unmusical listener may be profoundly disturbed by sound forms that he is unable to comprehend. He had travelled a great deal in his eight years' absence from New Zealand and had seen places famous for their antiquities, but it seemed to him that the landscape he now watched through the Claires' window was of an early age far more remote than any of these. It did not carry the scars of lost civilisation. Rather, it seemed to make nothing of time, for it was still primeval and its only stigmata were those of neolithic age. Dikon, who longed to be in London, recognised in himself an affinity with this indifferent and profound country, and resented its attraction."

Well, Curnow's prediction seems to have come true. I feel able to "stand upright here", sure of myself and my surroundings, with the result that a lot of Ngaio Marsh's book just annoys me, with all of her references to the "terrible New Zealand dialect" and all the people longing for England and all of England's constraints. It's not against my will that I love the New Zealand landscape as my own landscape. There are still issues - it's difficult now to be unaware of the cost to the Maori of European settlement, and I recognise that the Maori have a claim on the land that goes deeper than the European claim. I will never be quite "indigenous".

Here comes the problem. I was talking recently to my supervisor, who is Welsh, who is extremely well-travelled, and who knows I want to see Europe someday. After asking me about my passions, which all turn out to be cultural - music, literature, drama - he said to me, "you know, you are actually a product of Europe. When you get there, you will understand what I mean." And he also said, "when you are in England or in Europe you really have a sense of walking on the bones of your ancestors."

Suddenly I'm aware of this tension. Maybe it was easier to be one of those past New Zealanders who never really settled down here, always looking back "Home", never becoming anything other than British. I am, I think, as much a New Zealander as it's possible to be, and I am part of the landscape now, but I am also drawn to Europe, to where my roots are, to the culture that has influenced me the most. And I'm not quite sure if I'll ever balance this. Maybe, after all, I haven't quite learnt the trick of standing upright here yet. If I'm here, maybe I'm not fulfilling myself in a cultural sense. If I'm away, I'll be longing to come back and be where I belong, physically and geographically.

We are still a young country, obsessed with these questions of nationhood. Maybe we all feel this tension; after all, the places we talk about as our nation's roots are on battlefields far away - Gallipoli, the Somme, North Africa, Crete, Monte Cassino... Who are we? How are we different from Europe, from America, from Australia? (Especially Australia!) Why is it that everyone else seems so secure in their nationhood and we are still confused? If anyone else can tell me exactly how long it will take, that would be great!

* Pakeha = of European descent

2008

So my academic year is over, and I am no longer an inhabitant of the Honours Room. Honestly, I feel like I should be declared Citizen, or at least Resident, of it because I've spent so much time there this year. It's almost sad to go, especially when I think that hardly any of the people who have made this year so much fun will be continuing next year.

In honour of them and in honour of the big room full of desks that became like a second home, I present ... [drum roll] ... HONOURS ROOM QUOTES of 2008. These were recorded faithfully over the year on four big pieces of paper we had stuck on the wall. Some were quotes from history books we happened to be reading which we found particularly amusing, others were quotes from us which were particularly funny, especially out of context. I'm not including all, because some could be interpreted as ... inappropriate. But almost everything we said this year that we thought worthy of immortality is on this post.

The characters have been listed before, in the Honours Room Murder Mystery. But one term you may need to know is:
480 - this was the university coding for our Research Paper/dissertation/thesis - whatever you would like to call it.

Wisdom of historians

"Only in terms of alcohol consumption was the East outstripping the West."
Mazower on Eastern Europe under Communism.

"When I was first a research student, my supervisor said to me, quite seriously, at the end of the first term: 'Now don't work every day of the vacations; do take Christmas Day off.' I fear that I took Boxing Day off as well."
Elton.

"Shakespeare predicts Trotsky betraying the Soviet Union for Fascism."
Lion Feuchtwanger.

Walter Duranty on the 1932-33 Russian famine: "There is no actual starvation or deaths from starvation but there is widespread mortality from diseases due to malnutrition."

"The cock-up theory is much better than an intentionalist theory."
Miles Fairburn.

And wisdom of the Honours students

Several of the same theme, which just had to be recorded for the utter irony...
27 April: "I think my 480's going to be quite straightforward."
Amendment #1, 1 July 2008: "Oh f***."
Eric.

3 June: "As soon as I hand in this essay, the rest of the year's going to be really really easy."
Bella.

31 July: "Screw everyone, I'm doing what I want now."
Allison.

Allie and Bella, a friendship of discovery:
Q: Why do dictators have moustaches? (Allie)
A: Because they're stupid. (Bella)

Q: Why do Marxists write in the future tense? (Allie)
A: Because they're stupid. (Bella)

Q: Anything.
A: Ask Michael [our supervisor].

Also related to our brilliant supervisor:
"Michael doesn't read books. He absorbs through osmosis."
Josh.

Out of context creepiness:
"I wish I was Stalin. You can be Trotsky, 'cos you've got glasses."
Allie. I promise you, this made perfect sense in context.

"Murder is always very relaxing."
Allie. Ditto.

"It's not mass murder, it's purifying the human race."
Nathan. Again, out of context.

"It takes a pretty honest man to send hundreds of thousands of men to their deaths."
Nathan. Seriously out of context.

Blame alcohol:
"The frog was saying, 'Eric, you're my man'."
Eric.

"There is an inherent flaw in the fact that there is beer in the fridge."
Eric.

General:
"I need to be hit with the motivation stick."
Liz.

"Kill, maim, eviscerate."
Eric.

"Mugabe doesn't count as a standard guy."
Bella.

"I'm going to go slap von Ranke around for a little while, show him who's boss."
Eric. This needs explanation: Leopold von Ranke, the father of modern academic history, was the subject of one of Eric's essays.

"Now Allie, the Engineers Registration Act of 1924 is always relevant."
Bella.

"Roosevelt and Hitler: Brothers in Arms."
Eric. Who thought this would be a bad/awesome title for a thesis.

Coining of new words:
"Mortopsy" (Bella)
"Reconstored" (Eric)
"Chroniclology" (Eric)
"Noviet" (Allie - Nazi + Soviet)
Literary historians are "literaristorians"? "literistorians"? "literians"? "literararians"? (Allie, Bella)

And finally:
"We're here to learn?!"
Bella.

it's (kind of) up to you!

Today I handed in my dissertation. Ta-da!!!! :

The year is now finished for me, and I think I'm going to struggle finding things to do over the summer, having been so continuously productive and hard-working all year round. First on the list, though, is something I have been craving for months now - getting out of Christchurch.

I can't really afford this, but I'm going to do it anyway! This is my only chance before my summer job starts, and I'll only spend one night away, possibly two if I find somewhere to stay that's cheap enough.

The problem is, I can't really decide where to go. So I have a list here of several different options, all of which are close enough to Christchurch to visit without churning through ridiculous amounts of petrol. And I'd love to know your opinions on them. There are three areas I'm thinking of visiting, with several options about where to stay within these areas.

1) MACKENZIE COUNTRY.
Inland and south of Christchurch.
Mount Cook across Lake Pukaki.

Option one: Above, Mount Cook, the highest mountain in New Zealand and, I think, the southern hemisphere. If I go to the Mackenzie Country at all I'll be going here and doing one of the tracks in the national park, because I have been craving these mountains for yonks. There is also the option that I could stay here at the backpackers or at the campsite. Probably a bit more expensive, but imagine waking up and walking outside to see... that!

Option two: I could stay at Lake Tekapo. This is a peaceful, beautiful spot to stay, as long as you avoid the tourist buses passing through. It's only about ... an hour? an hour and a half? from Mount Cook so it wouldn't be a problem getting there. A bit cheaper, and it also has a FANTASTIC pizza restaurant!

2) THE WEST COAST.

The coast on the other side of the island from me! Much wetter, much wilder, and full of sandflies!

Option one: I could stay at Okarito, a tiny village on Okarito Lagoon. Classic West Coast beauty, with a gorgeous beach and a kayakable lagoon. Not too touristy. From here I could easily visit the glaciers, and it would be a little cheaper than staying right near the glaciers.

Option two: Or I could stay at the township near Franz Josef glacier, which would allow me to easily visit the glacier and also visit other spots around the southern West Coast.

Option three: Punakaiki. Famous for its "pancake rocks" and stunning coastline. Beautiful rivers, also kayakable. A little too far away from the glaciers to visit them, but that's okay, there's plenty to do around Punakaiki itself.

3) KAIKOURA

North of Christchurch, on the coast.

Kaikoura is a small town with delicious, FRESH seafood, and a thriving whale/dolphin watching industry. Some beautiful mountains are a backdrop for the town, and there's some nice walks along the coast. A little bit more expensive than the other places, probably.

So - what do you think? I'll be honest and say I'm leaning towards Mackenzie Country, simply because I've been craving the bigness and stillness of the mountains for so long now. All the same, when I look at those photos of the West Coast I start to salivate a little. And to drive to the West Coast I'd have to drive through the mountains of Arthur's Pass National Park, and so I could get my mountain-fix on the way there or back. I also salivate when I think about the fish of Kaikoura. :)

I can't promise I'll follow your advice. But I would like to know what you think!

politics schmolitics

John McCain? Barack Obama? Meh.

Helen Clark, on the other hand. John Key. New Zealand is gearing up for an almost certainly heated election on November 8.

Helen has been our Prime Minister for nine years now. Head of the Labour Government, she stands for slightly left of centre values. I like her. She is one of the few politicians out there who, I am sure, does not have dirty baggage. She actually looks like she's telling the truth. She promises money for students. Her Deputy used to be a historian. However... I'm not so sure I like a few of her policies. And I'm not sure Labour always lives up to the centre left thing. And she's almost certain to go into coalition with a smug greasy old politician called Winston Peters of whom I'd really like to see the last.

John Key is the newbie, the Head of the Opposition, the leader of National. An ex-businessman who made himself a cool multimillion dollars before giving it up for politics. He promises tax cuts for high income earners (something that always makes alarm bells ring in my head and I'm not sure why), he wants to privatise the health system, and I don't trust him. His name rhymes with Donkey. However... is he any worse than Labour? And, maybe, given the recession and all, having someone in power who knows a thing or two about finance wouldn't be so bad a thing. And, if National becomes the leading party, one of my friends has a pretty good chance of getting a job as a policy analyst with one of their leading MPs.

I don't know. Last election, I ended up making my decision based on the rude reception of Helen Clark by the Young Nationals at my university. As soon as she arrived, they started shouting her down. Result: no one who had come to actually HEAR what she had to say had any luck, and Helen had to leave.

And on Saturday night, friends of mine started talking about politics. It's not quite as extreme here as it is in the States with people telling you "if you are Christian you will vote X" but all the same, they tried it out on me. There is nothing that annoys me more. A few years ago, Labour passed into law a civil union bill and a prostitution reform bill, and suddenly a lot of Christians decided Labour was evil. Now these National supporters have the effrontery to tell me that I'm a single-issue voter, because Labour supports students, and that I don't take a moral stance, and that I should vote National. a) Their objections to Labour are based on, er, SINGLE issues, and b) I take a very moral stance. No way am I eager to vote for people that want to give rich people more money and take easy access healthcare from the poor. I don't see how that is any less Christian than their own stance.

If that paragraph didn't make any sense, ignore it.

Anyway, the point being: it seems like every time I vote, I really make an effort to make a cool, calculated, sensible decision. However, I end up deciding who to vote for based on what I don't like about the supporters of other parties. Is this just me?

By the way: thanks very much for the messages of support and the prayers for my nephew. He is doing well and has just gone home from hospital. More details on my other blog if you're interested.

prayer request

I have a baby nephew, he's about two and a half months old, and today he was admitted into hospital for heart surgery next week. I would really appreciate any prayers for him and his parents.

Update 8/10/08:

My nephew's operation was yesterday afternoon. Everything went to plan and he's now recovering! Thanks very much for the prayers.

the best advice my parents ever gave me

I have decided to move out of my dad's house next year. For many reasons, including that I can now afford it, and that it seems a bit odd to be doing a masters and still be living at home. So I've started looking at flats, and there are at least two places near university where friends of mine need a new flatmate next year - exciting.

Recently on the radio, whenever they interview someone slightly, quite, or very famous, they've asked the question, "what's the best advice your parents gave you?" Often it's something like, "never give up", "believe in yourself", or "work hard".

It got me thinking - now that I'm moving out of the family home, what advice can I take with me? What catchy little slogans have been inculcated in me over the last twenty-two years by my parents?

Actually, nothing. I was talking to my dad about this last night, and he said he never wanted to be the type of parent who is always telling their kids the best way to live. He thinks it's more important to set the best possible example, instead of preaching slogans he will never live up to.

My mum was the same, pretty much. She'd advise me on very specific things, i.e., "if you don't work harder on your exam study, you will fail Calculus" (a prophecy which came true). Probably the most bittersweet memory I have of her is our talk soon before she died, in which she knew she was supposed to give some pithy, meaningful advice but found the idea so funny and alien that she advised me to "wash your clothes, keep your room tidy, and be patient with Dad", with a slight twinkle in her eye. But neither of them ever said, "y'know, Allie, life is just like a [insert metaphor here]. You've got to [insert instruction here] or you'll [insert horrible fate here]. But if you [insert unlikely task here], you'll be blessed with everything you ever dreamed of!"

Both of them were more likely to go out of their way to help others on a regular basis, to work hard for people that weren't going to give them anything in return, to care about people in practical as well as vocal ways, to be responsible yet generous with their own money, and to keep things in the ultimate perspective that God comes first and that fame or success in the world isn't really what we should be trying to achieve. If it came, good for you, but if it became the most important thing in your life, there was no point in having it. Neither of them ever told me this in so many words but I think I could fairly say that that's what they have taught me - and I'm not sure I would have listened if they'd said it in so many words.

It may even sound a bit corny having put that into words. For me, however, although there are things about my parents I don't want to be like, everything I've written above is something I will try to keep in focus for the rest of my life.

fa la la la laaa la la la laaaa

It's September! What better time to start selling Christmas decorations?

Sadly enough, when I walked through Kmart yesterday, I came across a whole row of artificial Christmas trees, including this: (or something very like it)


A Yuletide palm tree!

The Kmart one had multi-coloured lights, but otherwise it's very similar.

If I ever start buying fake palm trees made out of glitter with multi-coloured lights and claim that it's somehow related to a spiritual festival, please slap me.

academia

Today I went to a departmental seminar about historiographical nationalism. It was a very last minute decision because it can be quite daunting going to these seminars with big scary historians, especially if you walk in late. But you get Brownie points with the staff for attending, and I think it was worth it, because academic criticism can yield quite interesting people-watching.

I wouldn't have known it, but apparently this seminar was a bit controversial. Immediately after the speaker finished, and the request had gone out for "Comments? Questions?", one of the particularly scary professors, who is rather old, fierce and stuck in his ways, gave some quite provocative-sounding criticism. At least, it sounded so to me. Then the other resident staff started putting in their two cents. It was all very amicable but given that I've just decided to do a Masters, it's terrifying watching the door open into the world of peer review and criticism. Not that we don't get criticised now - it's just we're so liable to burst into tears if they do it aggressively that I think they've learned that Honours students are not to be dealt with carelessly.

Then, as the speaker was summing up his final defence, he said: "Of course, his book is the perfect antidote for fretful sleepers."

I laughed.

A few heads turned my way. One professor who could stare down a Basilisk fixed her eyes on me for at least FIVE WHOLE SECONDS.

What did I do wrong? Wasn't that supposed to be a witty historical insult?

It wasn't until later that I realised Fretful Sleepers is a famous book in the New Zealand history world.

I think I can sum up with what one of the current Masters students said to me via Facebook a few days ago, when I was complaining about essay-writing. Hang in there, it will soon be over, and then you can come and join me in the world of self-doubt and academic criticism!

[By the way, regarding the Masters decision (as I did ask your opinion) - this isn't a rejection of the Russia trip idea but simply a postponement. I think it makes a lot more sense to do a year of undergrad Russian language at uni next year while I do my Masters, and then go, instead of plunging straight into Russia next year without a word of Russian other than "do you speak English?"]

I LOVE spring!

Last year I think it would be fair to say I missed spring. I was in Australia, and Australia doesn't have a real winter, and so September just feels slightly warmer and flies begin to annoy you. Back in Christchurch, however - it's like the first day of September is a sudden, uncanny change. Winter is no more. Spring is upon us! We may have had a few days of icky weather in the last two weeks, but it's the icky weather of spring, not the icky weather of winter. Best of all, flowers are suddenly appearing. Everywhere!

The daphne bushes are out in flower - my favourite smell in the whole wide world! [This is not my photo.]

At uni, the trees are blossoming around us...
I was going to be a good girl today and study hard, but as soon as I got to uni and allowed myself to be distracted by the sun and the flowers and the general niceness, I got a sudden urging to go into town, to Hagley Park, with the rest of Christchurch, and wander lonely as a cloud among the daffodils.

At this time of year, daffodils, snowdrops and bluebells carpet the floor of the Christchurch Botanical Gardens and it's rather lovely to join everyone else in wandering and admiring. It's one of those genuinely beautiful things about Christchurch that not only tourists enjoy.

I thought these two girls were particularly cool for finding parasols for the occasion.
Now I am back at university, about to start writing my essay. I wanted to share this final photo, though. This is a tree just outside the History building. Apparently the tea bags are an addition by a Fine Arts student. They looked horrid during winter, limp brown sacs hanging on bare branches, but for some reason, with the blossom coming out, I rather like them. At least, I'm intrigued. Is it supposed to be a tea tree? or is that too obvious? Is there some deep significant meaning inherent in the act of hanging old tea bags on a tree?