AUCKLAND NOTEBOOK

New Zealand Listener, Volume 35, Issue 889, 17 August 1956, Page 34

AUCKLAND NOTEBOOK

IRST, of course, there were the ~Maoris. They had it good, according to the memory of my first telling. (I don’t think I heard anything about it at school.) They arrived fiendishly hungry in canoes, and there waiting for them was the fat, placid, peaceful Moriori, and the moa, fleshed out like a spring chicken in a Brobdingnag market. That vision held the record till Al Capp dreamed up the schmoo. Unfortunately, research seems to have demolished the Moriori, and our wild life experts in museums deny moa in quantity by the time the Maoris put their feet ashore. Still, the place must have looked good to them, even if there was only fern root to chew. Next was the colonist. My man was always whiskered, stove-pipe trousered, ever ready to fall on one knee before a lady, at church, or shooting a native, and unfailing in producing an O poem for an occasion. The one he wrote on landing at the site of Auckland started: O site! O clustered village yet unborn! Tip O tip your horn Of plenty toward this wight... I'd like to have put: . +. your corn Ucopia... but I don’t think that would have been a fair representation of my man’s style, poor wight. And last, were all the rest, amongst whom, lately, I° was. It was less cold than Christchurch in winter. I'll settle for that. Houses ° HE pictures in the glossy housing | magazines are great fun. They should be scanned every morning in-

stead of the daily newspaper. They’d give the tense last few minutes at home a relaxed glow which would last well into the working day. Here we are at the breakfast table, sun pouring through the vast, brilliantly clean windows, being served with a second cup of fragrant, freshly-ground coffee by the wife of our dreams. (A brunette, well made up, in a crisp) house-coat, with that radiant yet quizzical smile’ the artist uses to indicate that she loves us and understands our human failings because she has charming little failings, too.) Our two

clean, rosy children flank the table, the girl with her nose cutely buried in a glass’ of pasteurised milk, the boy chomping a bowl of nationally advertised cereal, We ourselves are in our shirtsleeves, indicating that someone must have set fire to the joint, because at that time of a winter’s morning a normal New Zealand home is still below freezing. The thought of normality returns us to the normality of our normal kitchen. Time to catch the bus. If we have any sense we shall kiss our wife goodbye, keeping our eyes closed, which will please her and not destroy our illusion. Thus, as we _ struggle through the rain we can still be so happy about our completely air-condi-tioned home. Probably it’s possible to build or buy the glossy type of house, if you have sufficient gloss on your cheque book, but the two houses I’ve found myself in during the last year were not built like that; neither were the neighbours’ houses. The first house is in Christchurch. It was designed shortly after World War I by a doctor. He didn’t live in it. He went to England and died. It shares a general heating principle with the second house, in Auckland. This principle, open fire, enables the individuall occupant to broil himself back or front (not both at once) while the rest of the house stays about the same temperature as the air outside. In Christchurch the winter temperature ranges between 20 and 45, in Auckland between 35 and 65. Auckland is a bigger town than Christchurch, although anyone will tell you the view from the Cashmere Hills across the plain to the snow-covered Southern Alps is magnificent. Both houses are wonderfully uncomfortable and wonderfully situated. Situation, often good with New Zealand houses, may be one reason why New Zealanders endure them. Another reason is that "the darned fools don’t know any better." (Quote from a Canadian friend.) 3 Country situations, close to towns, (keep us from the deadly plight of a

mechanised life. The Christchurch house was on a bird route, probably from the Sumner Estuary to Lake Ellesmere. At night it’s quiet enough to hear the grey and mallard winging over, and the slightly faster, shriller, whispering whistle that I think may be teal. Stilts I know, and the difference between swans and Canada geese. There are others of which I’m ignorant, but to wake in country quiet and darkness and to hear birdflight is marvellously healing for a city dweller. The Auckland house is next only to another house and a park. There is a scattered grove of old olive trees; unshaped, uncultivated, thank heaven. A flock of ewes wander round the hill. They have good feed, they are in remarkable condition, and seem likely to lamb about August, at which time the park will become understandably noisier. At present there are only moreporks at night, mynahs and a member of the dove family during the day. A few people walk their dogs (on the leash) night and morning, a few harriers and footballers-in-training go for their runs after tea. As they go past in the dark it’s so quiet you can hear their breathing, if you’re writing by an open window, as I often am. Vital Statistics Ice-cream cone manufacturers made 100,000,000 cones for the, industry in New Zealand last year. (Daily Press.) T seems likely that this is a round figure for an easily satisfied public, but the statisticians, bloodhounds to the last digit, will be working from the exact figure, and it is on that basis that I want to help them. They will be busy fitting ice cream into these cones, and finding out who ate what and why. They will take into consideration climate, age, race; comparing the per capita consumption of teen-age Maoris living at Bluff, with that of retired British Army officers (rank of captain and over) living at Russell. They will break down categories into sub-categories until our society is completely fragmented, but they may find it hard to be quite accurate about those citizens who move quietly from place to place. Thus, I took up residence in Auckland on June 14, fleeing from the unfavourable omens of a Christchurch winter.~During the past year (as of the moment of writing) I have eaten three ice creams, two in Christchurch and one sin Auckland. I admit I was not in the country continuously, having visited the Fiji Islands, but I ate no ice cream there. The ice creams I ate in Christchurch were both in cones, but I did not eat the cones because I do not like cones. The ice cream I ate in Auckland was in a dish, and it had a pink wafer sticking in it made of the same sort of cardboard that cones are made of. I did not eat that either. Thus, from the statisticians’ viewpoint I was out of balance both in Christchurch and Auckland, but they have electronic calculating machines to take care of that. Looking into the future, which is the statisticians’ meal ticket, I’d predict that although Auckland is more favourable climatically for ice cream eating than Christchurch, my consumption of ice cream will not vary, significantly, while my consumption of cones will remain constant. That is all the cybernetics for

now.

G. leF.

Y.