Kiwi On The Loose

Well the Democrats are dancing.

An historic but very eye opening election.

My name is john .I moved to usa 16 years ago.I married an american woman.I always saw usa as a country that was arrogant interfering and cocky and I also saw it as dirty and mostly concrete and steel. It was so big ,I did not like it when I got here .After I met people and started working I realised that most of the cocky nature was just pride in their country and I saw the same behaviour in kiwis .I think they are louder etc because of their freedom in some ways and big cities you have to talk a little louder to be heard.I used to hate the French due to the rainbow warrior bombing and the rugby coverage.Then I watched the tour d france bike race and saw the popy feilds and country out of the city and reilised that they are humble farmers and people just like us.USA I found to be a lot like home ,you have to go to a craft sale or a school function to see and meet the real yank not the one on tv.We all got to work go home deal with the kids home work ,the morgage, the boss etc just in a different place.It is hard to like the richest guy on the block or the sports guy who does the dance when he wins untill you meet him at the hospital whith a sick kid and you talk a little and see he is not so different.Come visit us in Wisconsin usa usa kiwi

Well as promised heres a little bit of pig hunting ‘kiwi’ styles. It so just occurred to me how if this boar had been hunted in England how different this picture could have been ‘old chap, eh wot and all that’. This is so New Zealand.

This is in fact my old dad in his younger years. Not only has it done me good to look @ this picture from a ‘let’s celebrate kiwiana who am I perspective’, but also from the fact that this is my dad . Inside myself I have this welling up of, WOW! and it makes me realise whose I am, and where I came from genetically and geographically. I walk away from this computer straighter, a fuller chest, emotionally richer, and a little less beaten by life. This image oozes testosterone and freaken Brad Pitt, Richard Gere, Arney or Harrison Ford and all the stars AIN’T got nothing on this nor all the AllBlack Gods. AND he’s my DAD!

This is the real deal.

SO I wonder… how many kiwi Dads are there out there who look at the bullshit (excuse the French but they deserve it) on television, the movies, the eye candy men, the heroes in womens minds and inside they think………………….?

Well I am sure they actually don’t think a lot because society and all its bullpucky (such a descriptive kiwi word) has demeaned and reduced their acts of manhood, courage, adventure and valor into nothingness. Unless you have abs like the 300, (assisted by makeup I might add) or have the ear of the media your exploits mean NOTHING. You are a legend in your own mind. You sit in your lazyboy and remember when……when ……….and you die slowly inside, walk more stooped, drink more, talk less……….there is no voice or even an ear for the stories compared to the strength on the medias NEW heroes. The billboard breed.

I am so guilty of not being interested BUT when I look at this picture I need to be. I so need to be.

The silence of living in obscurity in your own mind is deafening, when they could have made a movie on your life……….and you replay it in your head and come up with the sad untruth that you were nothing special.

If it wasn’t pig hunting it may have been any number of things…………I want to go home and hug my Dad, sit at his feet while I can.

He’s a heroe and I am his son.

As to the pig story. That better be another Kiwi VagaBond post.

Here’s the challenge!

Have you really seen your Dad lately?

Have you really seen your Mum?…..your grandparents if you are so lucky?

Have you really seen anyone lately?

There’s a heroe…..music please….(any of the heroe songs……………just please not ‘I did it myyyyyyyy way’………. it’s too close to the Hollywood bull___t, ole’ blue eyes was a ganster)

I am encouraged by some of the responses to the online exhibition idea.   Several have  indicated strong interest by email. I think some people are shy of blogging. It makes me realise how kiwi I am in a way. We have had to be out there to do well in this space down under, but we also have been happy to be removed. We are sometimes both of these states.

I am an out there a bit more than a be removed type. Don’t be shy, your thoughts and words are needed by the world. Just do it!

Hit respond.

Hi. If you received an email regarding this blog or the perhaps this exhibition I hope you will have a look around and see where I am coming from philosphically.
This is all about Aotearoa/New Zealand.
I’d love you to contribute in some way through your work or words. I hope we don’t see to much of the good ole kiwi knocking machine (not one of our better traits), but rather our ‘let’s do it attitude, why not, lets have an adventure kinda response! It’s what birthed us as a nation like at Gallipoli, or sending our products half way round the world to sell. This kind of attitude has left us with a legacy of impacting the larger world in such a way that is far beyond our size .
So lets do it!

Well it was summer last week! AND darn I still can’t mow the lawn. I don’t know how KiwiVagabondish it is in general to be kinda glad you don’t have to, that you have a legit excuse. I have mown the lawns in the rain before. Kiwis are not wussy. (woosea)as in wood =oosy or pussycat! No we aren’t. But I wonder if that is a kiwi thing or if other members of the male cave bear clan are glad sometimes when it rains and they don’t have to mow the dam lawn.

I wonder.

Lawns are part of NZ life, we love ‘em and we hate ‘em. Personally I love the smell of mown lawn then its off to the beach.

The New Zealand masport mower is an iconic lawnmower.

Well here I am in whats sometimes typical NZ kinda weather. Summer rain. Its warm today and its an excuse not to have to work outside and do all those things you have to, like mow the lawn. So I am gona go down town, have an iced chocolate and frequent my favourite second hand bookshop. The Piggery. Why the name? well it started its life aat Whangarei heads on a farm in an old pigsty. Now its moved in to town and the names stuck, as it should because stuck is kinda what they do to pigs here in NZ. get the dogs to bail em up then go in with the knife. If you are a real man that is. Me I am the kinda kiwi that will just stick to the piggery. I will see if they have a site. Give me 5mins.
Alas they haven’t. Hmmmm……wonder if I could help.