Growth

February 6, 2002-Littlies

Do you remember the couple that was trying to get pregnant? They are the parents of an18-month-old. Well, we just got an email that they’re pregnant & it may be twins. They had been trying for 18 months (that’s what they said) & she had been taking fertility drugs. Now Australia will have one or two more “littlies.” Yes, that’s the diminutive for small child. I guess we’re guilty of calling kids “kiddies,” so we can’t throw stones in this case.

February 9, 2002-Immigrants

There are 133 ways to apply for immigration to Australia. Shall I count them? We had dinner at congregant's the other night. He’s the Columbian who has been trying to get his relatives a permanent visa for Australia. He finally succeeded in finding a bureaucrat who’s sympathetic to his cause & the plight of his nephew. If you recall, the nephew is an architect who was working on a government building. His life was threatened by the guerillas unless he left the project. He’s now unable to work. Things are looking up & the nephew, his wife, & three children will be moving into their uncle's house when they arrive. In fact, the uncle is planning to make it a permanent arrangement & will be adding a second story to their home to accommodate the family. They’re amazing & generous people. I also heard of a man who was trying to get a permanent visa as a retiree. They made him lose weight. I guess they take physical health seriously when they plan on paying for your medical care.

We received an eviction notice yesterday. Evidently, the congregation signed a 6-month lease for our apartment & it’s up on Feb. 28th. They have the option of extending it for 3- months at a slightly higher rental. David was really concerned about the notice. I thought it was funny. At worst it would mean we’d have to move in with the Bruces or leave early. We need to get visas for India & Kenya when we return from New Zealand, so we’d need a couple of weeks for that. It might mean we’d have to spend extra time in Australia on our own. Believe me, we could fill it. We gave the letter to Syd Bruce last night & we all had a laugh. He’ll handle it. No, we’re not leaving early.

As a matter of fact, David called our Akron travel agent this morning & finalized our itinerary. We leave here on April 4th after David mails our last parcel to the U.S., picks up our rental car, & we each get haircuts. We’ll travel into New South Wales by way of the ACT (Australian Capital Territory) to see Canberra. Then we’ll head for Sydney. We leave Sydney on April 12th & fly to Delhi, India by way of Hong Kong. We’re flying Cathay Pacific so there’s no way to avoid Hong Kong. We have a 7-hour layover there so we’ll go into the city. We’re in India for ten days before going to Kenya. We tour Nairobi & go on a safari until May 3rd. We then head for Cape Town, S. Africa for six days. Amsterdam is our last foreign destination since we’re flying KLM. We’re there three days before winging it to Detroit & Cleveland. After juggling all the flight times & time zones, we’ll get home on May 12th, Mother’s Day.

I just got a voucher for $30 towards a haircut at the shop I’ve been going to. It’s automatic when you’ve spent a certain amount. They noted in boldface that my “expiry” date was 7-4-02. It took a while to realize that it meant

April 7, 2002

We had a wonderful Japanese dinner at Cha Cha’s. It had been a long time since we were in Japan & we were ready for that taste again. A lot if not most of the restaurants here are BYO. In this case, they didn’t have beer or diet pop so David took a walk to the bottle shop up the street to get our supplies. No worries.

We pick another set of friends up at the airport in Brisbane tomorrow at 8 AM. We’ll tour with them all day & only take them back to the apartment at night if they beg us. We’ll take them to the Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary so they can get up close & personal with the koalas, roos, & emus. Then we’ll head to our favorite spot in the Hinterlands, O’ Reily’s. There we’ll once again do the treetop climb of the rainforest. We’re up the next morning to go back to the Brisbane airport to fly to Auckland, New Zealand. When we’re on the road I’ll try to avoid the use of apostrophes so you don’t get gibberish in your emails.

Colonies

Now, to give you a head start on learning about New Zealand. You’re about to learn more than you ever wanted to know. Although it was a surprise to me, I’m sure many of you more geographically cognizant recipients of this email knew that New Zealand is part of Polynesia. It’s one of the most isolated countries in the world & the last to be inhabited by humans. When the Maoris came just 1300-2000 years ago, they called it Aotearoa, “land of the long white cloud.” The descendants of the Maoris came from Polynesia, by way of Hawaiki. Yes, there’s a reason there’s so much similarity between things Hawaiian & Maori culture & language. Abel Tasman, a Dutch explorer sighted the landmasses in 1642, but the extremely aggressive & warlike Maori tribes deterred early Europeans who tried to land. Good old reliable ever-present Captain Cook mapped the islands in 1796, & the first mission was set up in 1814. In 1840, the British declared New Zealand a colony. Brits & Maoris in the Bay of Islands area of the North Island signed the Waitangi Treaty. The trouble with that was that there were two versions. There are still disagreements & negotiations going on that stem from that treaty.

With a population of around four million inhabitants, the joke that sheep out number the people is true. Although a small & new democracy, New Zealanders have been in the forefront of social reform. In 1867, four Maori seats were established in Parliament. New Zealand was the first in the world to give women the vote in 1893. They established compulsory, free schooling by 1877 & a free health system by 1938. The country declared its non-nuclear stance in 1986, which resulted in non-alignment of its armed forces with those of the U.S. & Britain. In 1933, a woman was elected a Member of Parliament. There is presently a transgendered woman as a Member of Parliament. In 1997 they elected a woman as Prime Minister. The only indigenous mammals are two varieties of bats. But the best thing is, there are no snakes. The introduced mongoose ate them all.

Toby