Pacific Waters

Frenchs in Akaroa

07/05/2021 09:41
Few kilometres south Christchurch, almost in its outskirts, stands a large volcanic crater open to the sea in its south side. Kai Tahu for Maori, Banks, in recognition of Joseph Banks, naturalist aboard James Cook’s Endeavour, who in February 1770 was wrong to believe that it was an island rather...

Molokai

28/08/2020 09:20
- Who? Jack ... who?? - London, Jack London. And the man turned his back and not even bothering to say goodbye or look back he opened the door and left away. As briefly as he came. The man  was a local, half Hawaiian, half Caucasian, but wore a semblance that would not have disdained any old...

Christchurch, N.Z.

09/03/2018 16:28
The calm waters of the River Avon (the Hampshire Avon, not to be confused with Devon Avon, Bristol Avon, or Warwickshire Avon) placidly flows to the English Channel in Christchurch, near the summer village of Bournemouth. Setting upside down the globe we could say again the same phrase except for...

Napier, the Art Deco City

02/06/2017 08:43
Foxtrot and Dixie notes flow along the streets in an increasingly noticeable volume. Going ahead to meet the music suddenly appears a square where the playing band looks like any other coming from any Alabama or Missouri small town. Couples dance at the rhythm, dressed as if they were still living...

The Gates of Hell

16/06/2016 18:09
In early twentieth century the controversial Irish author George Bernard Shaw spent a few days around Tikitere, near Rotorua and the namesake lake. Like his character Pygmalion, transforming Eliza Doolittle, Shaw transformed the place renaming it. After his visit Tikitere became Hell's Gate....

The Lord of the Forest

13/10/2015 16:18
One of the first books I remember have read is The Secret of the Old Forest, by the writer of Belluno, in the Veneto, Dino Buzzati. In his tale, Buzzati, told about an ancient forest, where trees were inhabited by spirits, goblins and winds who had names and the gift of speech. State highway 12...

On the South Seas

19/04/2015 11:53
Some years ago, and begin to be many, in the sixties and early seventies, Editorial Bruguera published a couple of collections of adventures. Hardcover books interspersed with the text an illustrated version of the novel. In the spine four or five vignettes with main characters portraits. I think...

A Lighthouse at World's End

29/09/2014 09:02
Once I spend Christmas time in Kaitaia, in the north of the North Island, near Liquor’s King, a liquor store as the name suggests. There I bought a bottle of Lindauer Brut, a kind of local champagne to celebrate myself December 25 in the motel room, the Kauri Lodge, south of the main road of the...

Hawaiian Shelters

31/03/2014 11:30
Traditional Hawaiian cosmogony implied a close relationship between divine, human and nature matters. This meant strict codes of conduct, the kapu, taboo, governing uses and behaviour between different social classes. Breaking kapu could expose the transgressor to the most severe punishments. Taboo...

In the Bay of Islands

05/05/2013 11:36
Captain James Cook, responsible for much of the toponomy of the Pacific Ocean, liked to be inspired by Admiralty friends or the Royals. In other cases never abused imagination and preferred to refer to the obvious. That was the case of Bay of Islands where he anchored, between the islands of...

A Shoe’s Sole

18/03/2013 12:41
There is a curious piece in the Fiji Museum in Suva, the islands capital. It is simply the sole of a shoe. Yes, the sole of a shoe. And that's an uncommon element for a museum, it looks like out of place. Usually museums, maybe with the honorable exception of clothing and footwear, do not often...

Auckland All to Black

28/01/2013 11:30
In 1999 I used to meet with French fellows who lived in my neighbourhood. In those months of the end of the year the Rugby World Cup was at its heydays. Some were fierce supporters and  even one of them had played before, when he was younger. Optimism reigned. On October 24 they win the...

The Land of the Long White Cloud

21/12/2012 14:24
Is Ao Tea Roa, or New Zealand. At bird's eye view and if weather is clear, is easy to understand why Maori give some names to the islands. The South Island is Te Waka or Aoraki, the canoe of Aoraki, chasing the North Island, Te Ika a Maui, the great fish of Maui. To the south, now called Stewart...

Australia Adelaide

27/11/2012 19:04
Somebody said Adelaide looks like a British city. I found it rather an American one, thought its people are with no doubt genuinely Australian. The spacious layout of its streets and avenues is as rectangular as it could be Manhattan in New York or San Francisco's North Beach, with large murals and...

Australia A place called Alice

23/11/2012 11:40
Masiko's face reflected in the glass of the bus window. She sat in front of me. Numb, had left her meanwhile, kilometre after kilometre, the tiresome and monotonous landscape slid across the Greyhound Pioneer window. Green bushes coloured by the glass alternated with endless rows of huge termite...
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