Whykickamoocow and Waipu?

I know, it should be 'Mille' but, hey, who cares, it is a wonderful link with Scotland and Gaeldom.

Whykickamoocow (pronounced Waikikamukau) is an absolutely splendid book by Nicola McCloy about curious New Zealand place names.

I'm sure that I shall be using it in the future to enlighten you about some of the more interesting place names here. Today, however, I am concentrating on the link between New Zealand and Scotland (there are a lot) and the settlement of Waipu just south of Whangerai in Northland at the North of North Island (where else would Northland be?).

The links with my Scottish home are many. Waipu has about 10 roads including The Braigh (very close to home), Argyle Street, Braemar and Nova Scotia Road.

Of course I've not just chosen it because of its pronunciation.

Waipu's founder was Rev Norman McLeod who arrived with his followers from Scotland via Nova Scotia and Australia in 1854. It was his hope to establish a Gaelic-speaking settlement that would be allowed to practise its own brand of Presbyterianism. They soon realised that the land at Waipu was good for farming, that the waters were good for fishing and that the New Zealand government would leave them to worship in peace.

Quite what Waipu means is not absolutely clear. 'Wai' means water but 'pu' has several meanings but the most likely in this contest would seem to be murmuring (the sound of the Waipu River). Whatever the meaning, however, the answer will always be 'Why not?'

Australia?

One of the great things about New Zealanders is their ability to keep things in perspective:

Andrew

Andrew - Self portrait

18 January is the anniversary of Andrew's birth. He would have been 36 today.

You may wonder why this posting is appearing on this particular Blog. The answer is that it relates to the reason why I am here and why I am alive and thus able to be here.

In early 2006 (Andy died on 4 June 2006) some of Andy's Blog postings were very harrowing. It has taken me a long time to pluck up the emotional courage to re-read them.

I am very conscious of the fact that I have no real idea what it is like to have cancer. Although I knew that I had cancer I suffered absolutely no symptoms nor ill health. For me from diagnosis to operation to a reasonable recovery took a matter of a few months. The great majority of people have to wait that long just to get an MRI scan. I had no time for worry, contemplation or any other emotion. Mind you if I hadn't had Dr Lawson as my doctor I wouldn't be alive (amazing that after that he came to live and practise in New Zealand a matter of 20 kilometres from where I now stay, before he returned to Lewis ). The Consultant told me that if I hadn't had the operation when I did then my life would probably have ended rather unpleasantly within a few months. Scary really. Every day I wake up I am grateful.

Andy wasn't so lucky. He'd known that he had cancer for many years and by the time of his death he had suffered more than most of us can even start to imagine - and I certainly include myself in that category. He suffered a lot more than many cancer sufferers. But Andy had tremendous hope and courage. On 2 January 2006 his thoughts on the year just past were:

so stitch that ya bas

2005. "Been a shitty year, but the show must go on" - kyle said it better than i ever could. at the start of the year, i had it all to look forward to. i'd worked my arse off for three years to get to where i was in march, with a masters degree, java certification, a new (dream) job, and an offer in on a new flat in leafy isleworth. what could possibly go wrong? well, we all know the answer to that. i'm not one to wallow in self-pity, i may indulge in it now and again but though it's fun for a while it doesn't really get you anywhere. having said that, it's frustrating to look at where i was a mere 9 months ago, and the shit i've had to go through since then. but i don't feel sorry for myself, i really don't. i've been very fortunate in my life, i've never wanted for anything, i've never gone hungry or cold, i've got lots of real friends and my own flat, a fantastic job in an understanding company, and i've been blessed with a great musical taste and fashion sense (oh yes i have). so what's to complain about? no matter what happens in this next year, whether they can operate or not, whether i have to give up work or not, and whether, ultimately, i get better or not, i don't feel sorry for myself. i've had a great life so far, and nothing can change that.

The postings for the next few weeks catalogued his illness. After a week of daily visits to clinics and some very upsetting postings came:

ka-boom? yes, rico. ka-boom. so i've been putting my great christmas present (the splendid champion juicer) to good use. every day i grind up a shitload of fruit and veg and chug the lot. well, after a while you get bored of the same old same old, so when i was in the supermarket i went to the juices section for some inspiration. and there it was - a bottle marked 'apple and ginger'. ooh - très exotic, n'est pas? so i grab a handful of ginger and a bag full of apples and home i go. i've never juiced ginger before. i cut up a piece, a big cube about an inch long, and chuck it through the juicer. juicer growls, and spits out a tiny wee bit of juice. hmm, that's not a lot, best chuck some more in. so in goes another big lump. still not getting much juice but i've used it all up now. oh well, never mind. in go the apples and i've got a pint of apple juice with a wee bit of ginger in it. cheers, i says to myself, and takes a hearty swig. five minutes later, i wake up on the kitchen floor. what's happened? someone's set fire to my head. is that blood? oh god, my mouth, i can't feel my mouth! my tongue has dissolved! help! snot is dribbling all over my face, tears stream from my eyes. i'd call an ambulance but without a tongue how can i tell them where i live? so anyway, the moral of this story is simple. never get ideas above your station, or your head explodes. seriously.

I miss him so much.

An Evening Cycle

I decided to go for a bike ride this evening before dinner. It was a beautiful evening and the sun was in the right position to get some lovely photos of a view from Rotowhenua Road near the end of the road where the post is dropped and as far as the public services go.

An interesting homestead sign a few kilometres away

Detail from the sign

The Moon

The Moon has just passed its first quarter. It has been so clear the last few nights that I thought I'd try a photograph. So this is what I could see about half an hour ago.

The International Space Station: A Perfect View

Last night and tonight we have had absolutely clear skies in the evening. This has meant that New Zealanders have had a clear view of the International Space Station as it passed overhead. It was visible with the naked eye as it passed overhead.

Flying up from the south, at 8.59pm, it brushed the South Island's Cape Farewell and pass over the North Island coast from around Hawera in Taranaki to Whakatane in the Bay of Plenty. It was visible for just under four minutes. The advantage of tonight's viewing was that much of New Zealand was in twilight darkness but the ISS was in bright sunshine - making it much more visible.

The ISS is a research facility currently being assembled in space. The on-orbit assembly of ISS began in 1998. The space station is in a low Earth orbit and can be seen from Earth with the naked eye: it has an altitude of 350-460 km (189-248 statute miles)[1] above the surface of the Earth, and travels at an average speed of 27,700 km (17,210 statute miles) per hour, completing 15.77 orbits per day. The ISS is a joint project among the space agencies of the United States (NASA), Russia (RKA), Japan (JAXA), Canada (CSA) and several European countries (ESA).

Last weekend Russian Mission Control lifted the ISS's orbit by 5.25 kilometres to over 350 kilometres above Earth in preparation for visits to it next month by US and Russian spacecrafts.

Opossum World: A Most Unusual Museum

An Unusual Museum

Australian Bush-tailed Opossum

Most museums are devoted to informing people of things to be remembered or conserved. Opossum World in Napier is probably the only Museum in the world currently devoted to the extermination of a living creature: in this case the Opossum.

Its slogan is: Save a New Zealand tree. Buy Opossum fur products.

The imported Australian Opossum which is estimated to number 70 million in New Zealand eats an estimated 21 tonnes of foliage (mainly the young branch shoots of trees) each night - New Zealand's ecological nightmare.

The Australian Opossum or phalanger (Trichosurus vulpecula) was first liberated at Riverton, Southland, in 1858 with the idea of starting a skin trade. Since then innumerable recorded and unrecorded liberations have been made all over New Zealand, in Stewart Island and the Chatham Islands and in the outlying islands. There are now few areas without opossums, exceptions being the high country and northern Northland. There were at first very few complaints, but as opossums became established and increased in numbers and distribution they came to cause trouble, especially when combined with other animals, in native and man-made forests, in orchards and gardens, and in catchment areas. Admittedly hundreds of thousands of skins were exported each year, but on balance it appears that the harmful effect of opossums outweighed the profits from the sale of skins.

Legislation on the management and control of opossums reflects the changing attitude towards this species. A period of absolute protection from the date of introduction till 1920 was followed by a period of limited protection, when skins were taken by licence during a short open season. In 1947 all protection was removed and in 1951 a bounty system was introduced. This was followed in 1956 by further legislation which declared the opossum a “noxious animal”. At present the bounty system has been discontinued and opossum control is entrusted in part to rabbit boards [the mind boggles!] and in part to the New Zealand Forest Service. Trapping, used almost exclusively in the past, has recently been largely replaced by poisoning with 1080 (sodium fluoroacetate), or cyanide, and by shooting.

Geckos

Common Gecko, Green-tree Gecko Nautinus elegans
The largest New Zealand Gecko and one of the largest in the world.
They are about 14 cm long and can live for 17 years

I was trying to recall when and why I said that I would be doing a posting on Geckos. Then I remembered. It was A Quiet Day .

Geckos are small to average sized lizards belonging to the family Gekkonidae which are found in warm climates throughout the world. There are 1,196 different species of geckos. The name stems from the Malay word gekoq, imitative of its cry.

New Zealand geckos are some of the world’s most anatomically primitive geckos and were in the New Zealand region before its separation from Gondwanaland 80 million years ago.

Geckos have an excellent sense of smell, sight & hearing. Most are vocal, communicating by clicks & squeaks. When acting aggressively they arch their backs, open their mouths in a threatening manner, & flick their tails from side to side. There is a great variety in colour & size, from bright-greens & yellows to bark-like greys and browns. Geckos are renowned for their climbing ability, some being able to climb vertical glass using rows of incredibly fine 'hairs' on their toe pads.

Ranging in size from 55mm to 370mm (the size of the only known specimen of Kawekaweau Hoplodactylus delcourti the largest gecko in the world and now extinct), New Zealand's geckos are unique amongst the geckos of the world for many reasons, the most notable of which is that they bear live young, rather than laying eggs, generally giving birth to twins in summer.

Geckos live in a variety of habitats all over New Zealand, from forest dwellers to mountain ranges to shorelines. This diversity is also expressed by the hugely varied lifestyles of our native geckos - there are nocturnal and diurnal geckos, species that live in colonies of up thirty or forty and animals that roam great distances during the course of their lives.

I have yet to see one in the wild and photograph it. One day....

It's All in a Name

So is it pronounced Gebbie as in Debbie or Geeby as in HeeBeeGeeBee? I came across the road in Taradale on my cycle ride. It is named after Thomas Gebbie who owned land before Taradale land was sold in 1873. His son William J Gebbie was a founding member of the Forresters Lodge in 1886. Until 1903 he was a coach driver on the old Taupo Road. I thought you would all like to know that!

I Feel Sad

Every second Sunday I have a period of about 10 minutes when I feel very sad as I contemplate the shortness of my time here and how fast tempus fugit.

Every second Sunday I re-fill my pill box!