Kiwi On The Loose

Well this is kind of a continuation of Steven. In fact lets end the Steven story here.

He was a lovely gentle man, he had been ripped off by his employers out of his work inheritance of like 61 thousand, lost his apartment, his mates on the street had taken his clothes and his tax return more than once, AND he smoked the cheapest of cigarettes. Had he smoked more expensively I would have questioned his sincerity. AND he didn’t smell of booze. I like Steven, the sheet metal worker, more to the point in that brief talk I loved Steven, and would have gladly become friends. I have looked for him since and not seen him. Perhaps he’s avoiding this knowledge & understanding hungry kiwi. LOL. Can’t say I blame him. I avoid myself sometimes!

Now to todays image.

As promised, this is almost a generic picture (of the male kind @ least, there are woman and younger than this, though I think a bit of age tampering goes on) of beggars at the crossroads and lights in Denver.

Its a fairly typical cardboard sign. This guy came out crossing himself and I thought he had the look of Moses down from the mountain, which this guys equivalent may just have been leaving the fast food outlet after a feed…invisible @ stage left. Moses eyes would have burned with the presence of God. Wouldn’t yours? I spose it depends if God is a Republican or a Democrat. This guy had the mystical unbalanced look and body language of a zealot.

Speaking of body language, I like John Mc Cain BUT I wish he’d stop pointing to people in the crowd………stage left, stage right…..LOL. who me, what’ve I done. But at least he has a point!

Back to the prophet of the moment. So this is pretty typical. I have it on good authority from  fellow beggars that these guys are well looked after by the churches…feed, clothed, showered and loved.

They have chosen a path……………not just the one to the River Platte to sleep.

Steven was worried with winter coming on. He’d been rained on the night before…..it was getting cold and the shelters didn’t open until October.

As to the burning Bush part of the title.

No doubt Democrats bash Republicans for the problem and visa versa…………………I just thought it was a good play on words.

And you don’t see this kinda thing in New Zealand………..I never have but I guess I haven’t frequented K road.

Please let me know if you have seen this in NZ.

You can see a larger version of this CLICK HERE

Well I have been in Denver tooo long so today I was taken on a trip to Colorado Springs. I had heard so much about that placefrom early contact with a group called the Navigators, ( a christian para-church organisation). Well today was the end (opps forgive me re the Steven story, I am getting back to that  and the round of thinking about poverty and street life in USA. There are new developments !)……today was the end of 90 days of prayer and continuous worship for a church in the Springs. The prayer was directed towards the nation & freedom, and the worship to perhaps an all to forgotten God. BUT not by some. Definitely not those there and many others across Woody’s land.

It was neat to be there, and neat to balance the images of Broadway and Colfax with the images of people who may in fact be poorer, but who represented those who loved a long forgotten Saviour and king.

These people despite their media stereotype are not narrow minded or old or boring or all wearing some kind of cross brand. The only cross they carried was for the love of America and for America to get back to  the God of the founding fathers.

How far America has fallen..and falling and will continue to fall until some sense of black n white in a grey world is re established. I sense in myself even the fear of black n white, so grey I may have become.

There are grey areas for sure, but the problem is that the areas that need to be black n white have become grey, some non negotiables have turned to grey, no thanks to the supreme court and liberal politics.

But the tide is turning.

Yes its war. But the weapons of this warfare are spiritual. Thats what this 90 days was about.

The unraveling has begun.

Humility starts a lot of great changes.

I promise to get back to Steven……but I need to post this picture in honour of some friends I have spent some time having fun with  ( eh Walker )and to get back to daily postings..

Spending time with these people was the nearest thing I have come to feeling like I am in New Zealand.

People are people where ever you are……..but these are really cool cats. We had a deadline and I loved helping out.

Here they are.

These people are really special.

Back to Steven tomorrow!

I just had the opportunity to wander around glaze eyed The Home Depot. Sort of the USA equivalent to Mitre 10, Bunnings or  Place Makers. However there were some real differences.

It is almost wood heaven. AND the wood seems MUCH cheaper than in NZ.  Its a lot of pre - cut to length type deals mostly in pine and mostly for the home handy man. I felt empowered as a home renovator come ‘Tim the Toolman type’.

I got down right excited.

There is so much diversity here. There were tiles I had never ever seen like with cuts already in place for mosaics etc. I struggle with too many ideas@ the best of times and my mind was racing.

So here I was wandering the aisles, check’n out the price of tools and bits and pieces AND I thought hey why not get some photos. Being the polite cheeky type I asked someone important, who then asked someone else more important than them………..who bought back the message that they needed to ask someone more important than them even………..like corporate office!

DANG! Then the less important guy said just take photos on my phone. So I did. Very clandestine it was too. BUT I would have loved to have got my 30 D out and really got some good pics.

I share them below.

Americans are really clever. Some of there ideas are silly BUT many of them are brilliant. It does not come I believe from having anymore brains, definitely not that, BUT rather in comes from having a higher population for the benefits of numerical evolution. The more people you have, the more ideas you have, the more workers you have , the more people applying innovative type thinking, do you get the picture. AND so we have a cold chisel with something called a target protector installed on the top. MADE awesome sense to me being one who has hit his hand in such a situation. I see things like that often in America.

HOWEVER it does point out something special about kiwis too tho. We don’t have the high numerical evolution thing happening because of our small population, but we have worked, and maybe our tenacity to get the job done as opposed to finding an easier way was from limited resources being available @ the bottom of the world.

That being said we are also innovators in the extreme. Perhaps our mindset hasn’t been how can we get this job done more easily BUT how can we get it done more efficiently or cleverly.

BACK @ the Home Depot I was drinking in all the different products and solutions you never see in New Zealand.

It was a lovely time.

Here are some of the images of that wonderland.

I took a trip with Susan to Mt Evans. In the USA it is the highest sealed road in the whole of USA. the road goes to 14,285 ft. On the day we went there were huge numbers of people also making the pilgrimage to higher altitudes. JUST how high is Mt Cook in the Sth Island of NZ. Better do the Google thing. It illustrates my whole point however that until you need to know you don’t find out in a way that is meaningful for you to remember it. about your own country by a living feet on the earth breathing the air (or what there is of it)of another country…….it all makes sense in the mental filing system of meaningful information. So here we are on top of Mt Evans., Co. USA. There are some sheep up there that don’t look like no kiwi sheep…….and beautiful wildflowers.

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!

You may be interested in seeing my gallery of images on pbase. I have come to see through the lense. Its neat to go back and look again. I saw a small as part of USA in this way to, thru a lense. Those images are in a gallery called The American Dream. All other images are of Aoatearoa/ New Zealand.

Photo Gallery Here

Please leave a comment if you find your way there.

Here is a gallery of the person that has helped me to see New Zealand in a new way. she’d love you to visit and comment on her work. I personally love how she captured this country.

Susan’s New Zealand gallery on Pbase.
She loved the cleaness and light of New Zealand.