TRAVEL PATCHWORK

New Zealand Listener, Volume 12, Issue 312, 15 June 1945, Page 6

TRAVEL PATCHWORK

The Unofficial Side Of An Official Tour

Y travels began on official V-E day, and we rose up over the quiet suburbs just before the trams stopped running for the day. No one seemed to be abroad, and it had felt like Sunday morning as we drove out to ‘the aerodrome. We swung away ‘over the water and climbed to 7000 feet. Soon I had forgotten about being nervous, and started worrying instead about the clouds 100 miles ahead that threatened to spoil the view. Many vivid impressions crowd into your mind when you fly for the first time -:-a short joyride in childhood hardly counts in my case-but the ones I chiefly remember from the flight happen to relate to painters. In some crazy unptunctuated long paragraph, Gertrude Stein somewhere puts forward a theory that certain contemporary painters — Picasso in particular-have seen by their own intuition something about the world surrounding them that other people who | lack that particular visual insight do not notice, and proof of its existence, she Says, comes to those who fly. There is a good deal of truth in the idea, even if you don’t go all the way with her in her interpretation of it, which is almost to suggest that the new view of the world which aviation affords was actually anticipated by French painters. In fact, an ugly suburb can take on a sort of cubist beauty when you are above it. And when we flew above the hills between Kaikoura and Cheviot, looking down between scattered clouds at slopes in the shadow. I found myself believing what some of our own New Zealand landscape painters have tried to show me in oils and water colour. Some of them insist on using certain ingredient colours which others, having conventional ideas and less insight, never use. The experimental ones are right, whether they have flown or not. You can see from the air colours you thought were "artistic license" when you saw them hung in the exhibition. All of which may support Miss Stein in her suggestion that good artists can-see by a

kind of mental elevation of their own, what the rest of us can’t see without an artificial aid. n x ae ANOTHER artist who came repeatedly and irresistibly to my mind as we flew over the Canterbury plains, is one

who can hardly be connected with the Stein theory of aerial art, because his relationship to what I saw is more an accidental one. His name, Eric Ravilious, may not exactly be well-known here, but’one small aspect of his work is -he engraved the endpaper designs and colophons for the modern Everymgn’s Library edition. If you have in your mind a general impression of his style, then the Canterbury Plains seem to be covered with woodcuts by him. Probably the autumn was the best time. to see it. Ploughed fields are everywhere, and the . shadows are marked, and. the autumn sowing has not.come on enough to obscure the patterns. Ravilious.was a designer and engraver whose death during this war a great loss to English art. He was lost while flying over the north Atlantic, near Greenland, where he was at work as a war artist. * § «&* * N a big factory you notice something . about people that you forget when you. see a crowd in the street. You realise that there are thousands of human beings all around you who hate their work, Either they must hate it, or if they don’t, then their feelings have been numbed by that providential arrangement of things that makes it possible for a human being to endure what is apparently unendurable. The insensitivity of women’s ears to eight hours a day of deafening roar and clatter must be’ something. like the numbness that comes like a God-send with a shocking wound. You see rows of women operating with mechanical deftness the same process they have been at for hour after hour, day after day. Some giggle and smirk when you come in with their boss and you wish the floor would swallow you up. You see weedy men, pale meh, over-muscular men, men who look as if they have never known the joys of good health. You see every kind. of human weakness alongside the inhuman efficiency of multiple machinery, and you wonder why those people should have to be there. But afterwards perhaps you wonder where, they would be if they didn’t have those jobs. ,

FEW days after I saw the factory; circumstances threw me into the company at supper-time of a businessman, a contractor, and a builder. We drank tea and ate sandwiches, and one of the. three employers .started to talk. about workers stopping for morning and afternoon tea. "J dén’t know," he said, "but the other day my head clerk came and wanted permission for the office staff to have ten minutes off for afternoon tea-instead of drinking it while they got on with their work, you see. I told him I’d think it over. Well I did, and look-if you work it out, it’s no bloody good this business. Take my show, on the outside job, where the award says they must have time off. Some of the chaps are right up on the scaffolding. The fellows down, below give them a shout, and it takes them five ‘minutes to come. down., The. billy’s on, and they make tea; Some of them go to their bags and get a snack. They come: back. All that»takes time... Then

they drink their tea. Then they put away the mugs. Then they have to have a roll, and the ones that don’t smoke stay and talk. Then they get back to the job, and it takes some of them a few minutes to get back to their work. And all in all you might, say they take the best part of half-an-hour. That’s twice a day. And there’s twelve and a half per cent of your production gone!" * * * . HAVE been to Mt.-Cook only once, and then stayed no more than three hours. The journey there was a frightening one, made in a public Works truck which went for the purpose of delivering a box of detonators to some men on a blasting job. The box slid around in the dashboard cubby-hole while the empty truck bounded over the roads, and I remember that it was a very unpleasant journey indeed. I had been told that. the contents of the box were sufficient to destroy a human body within six feet, and there was always the possibility of hitting a telegraph pole. Nor were my three hours at Mt. Cook much more enjoyable. It was the off season, and hardly anyone was around. I wandered off down

a track only to find it completely barred by the huge rotting maggotty carcase of a, sow..I feel that I have now learned far more about the mountain from a remarkable painting of it-in tempera, I think -by CC. Aubrey, which is to be found just on your right as you emerge from the lift on the top floor of a southern hotel.. Its colours are magnificent, and quite unlike those of any other painting I have. seen of the Southern Alps. All the rock and the ice is conceived as shattered into a million crystals, and the river comes tumbling noisily from the terminal. face of the Tasman glacier, only to form a still pool a few yards away which is. none the less effective for being completely unreal. I had not heard of C. Aubrey before. * * ® F you are not a superstitious person, you tend to be ignorant of the various taboos. When I was told in one country hotel that my room was 12a, I thought at first it would-be some sort of annexe. After inspection of the neighbouring doors it finally dawned on me that. I was being protected from: the visitation of some dreadful -misfortune. Rain had been pouring down, and it was our intention next day to cross a wild stretch

of country by car, count six creeks past the turn-off, go another mile, and in the red gate. Before dark I opened my window: and looked for signs of improvement. Perhaps the roads would be blocked. It was the first rain for months. I looked at the clouds. Then I looked ‘down through the rails of the fire escape into what would be called in a police statement "the rear portion of the adjoining premises." I saw a kitten. Another one joined it. I called "Puss Puss’ and made inviting sounds with my lips, Another cat appeared, and more kittens, until seven appealing faces were turned towards the window of room 12a. Perhaps seven cats are even more unlucky than Number 13. That night after I had sunk into a deep asleep, the night porter switched on my light. The local busdriver, whose advice we had been seeking earlier about the state of the road, had sent him up. He shouted "Your road’s got blocked. You'll have to go back the way you came." It was true. We had to turn back and lose about 150 miles. And for all I know, the red gate still stands open, waiting for us. * * * T was some time before we could leave next day, and I had time to fill in. I wandered through the township, bought a rare kitchen utensil logg gone from the city shops, and strolled over to the main road bridge. The river was in high flood, and huge logs and conglomerations of driftwood were coming’ down one side. I watched enough firewood go past in a couple of minutes to last any ordinary household a whole winter. I cursed the rain-the first for monthsthat had turned us away from our most important objective on this part of the trip. I cursed the arrangement of things, whereby it was ordained that I should haye to buy bad firewood at a price that works out at 2d for a piece nine-inche long to put under coal that won’t burn, while in this town people could have all the manuka and totara they wanted for the trouble of collecting it. An old man with a white beard came along ‘the bridge. He was the real backblocks type, from his huge muddy boots to his ancient hat. He had been out in the wilds all his years, by the look of him. If I had told him I had seen women in the city with their hair dyed bright purple, he would have called me a liar. As he came by, he said to me, "She’s been a great rain, eh?" I said "Sure." * * . VEN the best of scenic roads is dull going. when you are in thick rain down in the valleys, and thick cloud up * (continued on next page)

(continued from previous page) ~ on the summits. You get tired of the same clay banks, thistles, clumps of fennel, tussock, and cocksfoot. When rain is pouring down the windscreen, and yellow mud is flying up past the side windows, there is something absurd about the big sign by the hotel "HOT SPRING-Golf, Tennis, Croquet, Riding," and you dash past without a pause. Further on you see little knots of people waiting in the rain at gates, and you know there is a service car expected along this "way soon. Big Maoris with suitcases, tiny little Maoris with baskets, waiting by the milk-can shelter, usually with a dog, watch you closely when you pass. And if you wind your window down, put your arm out and wave, perhaps you will get a great big smile. * . * * NE thing you will notice everywhere up the East Coast is the New Zealand Army hat-lemon-squeezer variety, troops for the use of. The hat issue must have been a windfall to the rural Maori population. The biggest Maori and the tiniest little Maori will wear it, puggeree and ‘all; you will see it in the milkingshed, on the roadside, anywhere. What the East Coast Maoris will do for new hats if there isn’t another war in 25 years doesn’t bear are about. — ‘p>

= -_ _ {VEN when your itinerary allows for over 300 miles in one day, you take in some impression of oddities by the roadside that were passed in a flash. The Japanese prisoners, the Polish children playing in the cold wind; the crazy V sign someone made by winding pink rag round two sticks and fixing them on a roadman’s hut, miles from anywhere, the kind of spot where you wouldn’t expect to meet anyone if you passed it every day for six months; the roadside guest: house run by a woman who knows a good name when she gets it, and puts it on a board gutside: "Mrs. Paramore, Prop.," the surprising sign "Subway," -miles out in the wilderness, that makes you look for something umusual, and then when you round the corner you find the road merely ducks under red girders

carrying the railway line; the arrogant white rooster that apparently waits all day until a car approaches at high speed, and then leisurely crossed the road. (we narrowly missed him one day, and the next day. when we had to retrace our steps, the same bird went through’ the same act at the same spot); the gigantic viaduct that towers above road and river, and seems so vast incomparison

‘with the two men on a jigger chugging across the narrow railway on top. * * * HESE are the things of a moment. They come into sight suddenly and soon are lost to view, if you are hurrying. But whether you are in a hurry, or idling along at a mere 35, there is one unwelcome sight you don’t quickly forget: the rear view of two or three hundred head of cattle, Out on the Takapau Plains, a pale mass on the road comes into view a mile away, and you recognise a mob of sheep. You breathe relief when you get close enough to see that they are coming towards you. You slow down to walking pace, and the dogs get them past you in a few moments. But up in the: winding roads between Gisborne and Morere, you come on a herd of beef cattle without warping. You swing round a bend and there they are, spread out along 200 yards of narrow road, the hill on one side, a steep gully on the other. A Maori rides behind them in his Army hat, swishing a stick. You resign yourself. The drover is shrewd and drops back, to let your car do his work for a while. You contemplate the hind quarters of the sluggish beasts for what seems an hour. Each bend raises your hopes of finding a place to by-pass, and perhaps you get past a dozen or so. It is no use talking or muttering or even tooting, for there is really nothing to do but wait for the open gate where they will turn off to new pasture. % * * . [N younger years I studied Boyle’s law, and heard vaguely of Grimm’s Law. In recent times I have read with more enjoyment of Mencken’s Law: "Whenever A annoys or injures B on the pretence of saving or improving X, A is a scoundrel." And now, after what is admittedly a limited experience of New Zealand hotels, I feel ready to propound my law, which establishes a relationship between (A) the distance in any given hotel of the light .switches from the beds and (B) the distance of the given hotel from Civilisation -as understood by (1) automatic telephones, (2) automatic lifts, (3) decent coffee, (4) rude, impossible waitresses. I claim to have established that as (B) varies in units of 20 miles, (A) varies in units of approximately one inch, In other words that the light switch moves away from the bed about an inch for every 20 miles distance added between Hotel and Civilisation (as defined). :

A good city hotel either has a light switch thoughtfully built in by the bed, or if the building is old, an extra reading lamp with its own switch clipped on to the head of the bed. A day’s run by car, and you climb into a strange bed, read for a while, and then in reaching for the switch, only just manage it without toppling out. Another journey, and you climb into bed and get warm and settled, after reading until your head feels ready for the pillow, only to discover that you have to traverse a wide area of cold linoleum in order to reach a cord switch that could just as easily have been put in the corner where the bed is. Decent hotels have carpets, anyway. x rs x HERE may be a law governing bedside light-switches in hotels, but it would be hard to extract a principle from the vagaries of casual meals. In a town in a sheep-farming area you eat among men who wear sports coats and grey flannels, tan shoes, with brilliant check _(continued on next page)

TRAVEL PATCHWORK (continued from previous page) waistcoats or mustard-coloured sweaters, and wide-brimmed hats. Here you pay half-a-crown for a fair luneh. But if you should ask for beer at the table, the waitress shifts uneasily from one foot to the other anf says, "I'll see." If you remind her, she says "Oo, I don’t know ...- The man at our table, who later turned out to be a reporter from a country paper who often ate at this hotel, said it was the first time he had heard anyone ask for beer at the table there. Further up the island, you may get beer, but your waitress will be sullen instead of shy. And you will pay 4s. for a meal that was not much better than the last. Further oni still, in the heart of dairying country, you will go to a hotel that looks

and functions like a good city hotel, have excellent soup, a piece of fish, tender steak with three vegetables, pudding, and coffee, and wonder if there has been some mistake when you're told that the total charge is 2s 6d. ESE * NE place where we stopped for petrol was a desolate spot, so barren and remote that you wonder what could make any human being live there at all. The hills bear the marks of the savagery of the wind and rain, so ugly that it is hard to believe Guthrie Smith when he says this is no calamity, and fertile soil is in fact being uncovered by the erosion. The elements must seem cruel there at any season — the intemperate summer sun would be as hard to escape as the biting wind we felt, for trees are few. The

store by the road had one display window — bare boards behind dusty glass. There were five hurricane lamps standing in it, a faded red and white notice about a patriotic concert given months ago and miles away, and hundreds of dead bluebottles, drying in the window. We went round the back and knocked. The woman came out with the keys for

the pump. She said, "Good afternoon," but hardly anything else, as I remember. Her features and manner seemed to be a challenge to all the enmity in nature that was about the place. You don’t

smile at her, because you aren’t expected to, and yet it is a friendly hand that works the pump handle back and forth. It sends petrol flowing into your tank, and you feel grateful as when a warm handshake greets you in a strange place. * * x OU don’t expect to meet friends on the inter-island steamer. If you do meet someone you know, as often as not it will be someone you would rather avoid. So I was surprised when I went into the Auckland air terminal in the dark before dawn, to see two passengers off on the flying-boat, and found that of the remaining passengers I knew two quite well, and two others by, sight. One said to me: "I’m getting out.... I’ve had it... . They only want yesmen here." He was going to a better job overseas. Another, whom I thad not seen for months, said, "I don’t know what I’m letting myself in for. I suppose it'll be O.K." He had been offered a transfer, and had decided to chance it. The weighing-in was finished and everyone moved on through the building. Those of us who were not travelling expected to be held back, but we were courteously told we might go as far as the signpost. It had bird-shaped pointers -Sydney, Singapore, Calcutta, Hongkong, Alexandria, Durban, London — and the mileages all in four or five figures, The passengers went down and disappeared into the flying boat. Soon one propeller started, then another, and two more. Mooring ropes fell into the water, and the machine moved off. It seemed to be ages getting out into the open water. For a short time it stopped and we could only just see it glistening from the faint light now showing in the east. Then spray spurted up behind and it moved more and more quickly towards the light. Someone said, "She’s up," and the machine swung round against the red sky above Rangitoto, in stark silhouette. A small gull lent a touch that seemed to belong to a Fitzpatrick travel-talk by flopping across the field of view, also in silhouette. A woman’ nearby, moved to triteness, turned to a companion with whom she had been seeing off a young woman. She said: "Oh well, she’s got a new life in front of her now if she likes

to start all over again." —

A.

A.