Outdoor Wednesday: Trampoline

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My son enjoying himself.

My world Tuesday: Samoan Fales

http://showyourworld.blogspot.com/

Seen in a suburb on the Gold Coast of Australia, some one has a Samoan Fales lookalike at the gate. He just has to look out of his window and imagine he is in a tropical paradise.

The word fales came to the forefront when the Tsunami struck Samoa last year. My students tell me that their relatives still fear for another Tsunami coing.

save the world: save our trees

http://reducefootprints.blogspot.com/

Trees can be replanted, but it takes a long time for them to grow. A good idea is to recycle what we already have used.

An Abmirimba ( the largest in the Marimba family) is on loan to our school. It is made of 100% recycled timber. It is not weather proved so we have to take it in every evening. It is brightly coloured and very attractive to the young students.

The marimba is a musical instrument in the percussion family. Keys or bars (usually made of wood) are struck with mallets to produce musical tones. The keys are arranged as those of a piano, with the accidentals raised vertically and overlapping the natural keys (similar to a piano) to aid the performer both visually and physically.

The children love making music during their morning tea and lunch break. It makes a much nicer sound if you hit with beaters at the sides of the keys ( which are colour coded) and not the tops of the keys.

Sunday stills: Statues

The Auckland Domain is Auckland's oldest park, and at 75 hectares one of the largest in the city.[1] Located in the central suburb of Grafton, the park lies mostly within the crater of the Pukekawa volcano.

During the 1920s & 1930s local businessman William Elliot donated several of the marble statues in the Wintergarden complex. Here are just some of them.









All the above statues are located at the Winter Garden of Auckland Domain.

I couldn't resist this "Live" Statue. This man was alternating standing and squatting on the base. If you don't look carefully, you will think that he is a statue. He was there for a long time looking at the ducks in the duck pond.
http://sundaystills.wordpress.com/

Sunday Stills, the next Challenge: Statues or Figurines

I figure everyone has access to one or the other so have some fun and get some practice with macros on the figurines..:-)

Friday shootout: Auckland in a day

This is Auckland city, population 1 million, summed up in one day on the opening of Mangere Bridge. The people were big hearted. It was a cold winter day. There were many groups of fund raisers.


These two boys were selling raffle tickets. The taller boy joked," Now you took my photo, you must buy a ticket." I didn't dare reply, "I will make you the world's most famous scouts."
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This elderly gentleman in his mobility scooter couldn't have walked the bridge because there were many steps and the road leading to the bridge was muddy. He was a fund raiser.

All the workers volunteered their Sunday off and became PR persons to the visitors. This guy was on clutches. Kuddos to him.

I was attracted to his facial hair.

Aucklanders love their dogs. Every where you go, you are bound to see them with their dogs.

The Maoris were the first people to arrive in New Zealand. This is their craft. It is the head of a statue in the Mangere bridge township.

On the beaches, we have a lot of mangrove which is very important to our ecology. Some parts are protected beaches.

Parks, parks, lots of parks.

Beaches. beaches and more beaches. We are an isthmus and are almost surrounded by sea.




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Theme for August 27th - "Shooters Choice" and chit chat
The theme for August 27th is ....... your choice!!

What would you like us to see or know about your town. What is special, unusual, unique, stunning, vibrant, black and white, sepia tones, macro, bokeh. Use it all!! Show your creative side. Tell us a story of your town.

Outdoor Wednesday: Power lines repair technicians

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I was arriving at school when I saw these two handsome hunk. I took their photos and the one on the ground asked why I took his photo. i smiled and showed my thumbs up.

My friend R. asked if I got this thing about people in uniform. I cheekily said "yes." Yesterday, it was the boy in blue, our local police constable and I got a whole stash of people in uniform photos.

My World Tuesday: Mt Albert Suburb.

Mt Albert Shopping Centre had been known to be a sleepy place. There is not much activity, but this has changed.

Our neighbourhood has quite a buzz these two days. Just a couple of blocks from our Church, 43-year-old Bruce Allan Jones, an unemployed man died whilst intruding into a Pharmacy. Apparently 68 year old pharmacist Grant Gillard - who was confronted by an intruder in his shop early yesterday - struggled with the man and was holding him down before he went into cardiac arrest.

Police tried to revive the intruder, gave him CPR but he died on the floor of the Mt Albert pharmacy.

Today, we had arranged for some special guests to come and speak to our ESOL students. It is a coincidence that the guests were the police and the Neighbourhood Support Group. They had come to talk to our students about the work of the police and the neighbourhood support group.

Here is the Mt Albert Community Constable Darren Calkin and Barry Hyde, the Chairman and Liaison person talking to the students. A third guest, the editor Johannes Dimyadi is not in the photo. It was good because Johannes could speak Mandarin and answer questions of our Mandarin speaking students.

Thank you Darren, Barry and Johannes for coming. My students appreciate your coming.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/video.cfm?c_id=1&gal_objectid=10668702&gallery_id=113442Police discuss the incident where a man broke into an Auckland pharmacy and died following a struggle with the pharmacist.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/video.cfm?c_id=1&gal_objectid=10668702&gallery_id=113431
A security guard who went to an Auckland pharmacy after its alarm was activated found the body of a man inside the shop.


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Sailing round the world at 14

Laura: Courtesy New Zealand Herald


New Zealand children are taught water wise at a very young age. Seen in the photo, are young children learning to sail. My school which is a primary school, sends our ten and eleven students for sailing lessons.

New Zealand born Dutch fourteen-year-old Laura Dekker hopes to become the youngest person to sail around the world by herself. Yesterday the schoolgirl finally set off from Den Osse harbour for the start of a two-year odyssey which will see her journey for months on end without support or company through some of the world's toughest seas.

For the opening stages of her voyage to Portugal she will be accompanied by her father. "We want to be sure that the boat, 38ft yacht Guppy, is completely ready, so this is the last test sail," Laura explained. "From Portugal I start officially by myself, sailing towards the Canary Islands."

She will not try to circumnavigate the globe in one go, opting instead to take regular stops to meet her family. She will also avoid the ocean during stormy seasons. Her route will take her across the Atlantic, through the Panama Canal, across the Pacific, past Malaysia and Thailand, around the southern horn of India and through the Gulf of Aden, a stretch of water notorious for piracy.

We are proud of Laura and wish her every success.

Friday shootout: Answers

The white spot is a snow flake. A joy to behold from anyone from the tropics seeing snow for the first time.


I gave away the answer on my Sunday still post.

Yes, it is a bowl of rice, but the answer is more than that. It is a special bowl of glutinous rice fermented to give a mellow rice wine flavour. It is made by the Northern Chinese. It can be eaten as a dessert or drank as a mild wine. My friend gave it to me. The hole is in the middle is where you scoop the wine from.



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"The theme for August 20th is "What Am I?"
One, two or three mysterious photos of something in your town. Something that will not be readily recognized. We shall all have fun guessing what it may be. And I am suggesting that you schedule on your blog the whole picture of the "What Am I?" on Sunday. (so we all can check back and see if we guessed right!) I know this theme is different than what we have ever done. Hoping it will be something new and fresh and get us out there shooting and thinking.

Happy Shooting!!
Posted by Doreen

Sorry I participated this week's challenge late.

save the world: save our glacier

http://reducefootprints.blogspot.com/
Ten years ago, we went to the glacier land and went right to the terminus of Franz Josef glacier. It was a majestic sight and we were in awe. There was a sign which told us to stay off the roped off area. Last year, two brothers from Australia died when a big chunk of ice fell on them.

Today a massive chunk of ice has fallen off the Tasman Glacier in Aoraki Mt Cook. Glacier watchers estimate it would have weighed about 50 million tonnes before it broke off and crashed into the lake sometime over the weekend.

Before and after photos (which can be seen in the video) show which part of the glacier face has broken off. The calved iceberg is enormous - only 10 percent of it is visible above water.

"The calving that's occurred is way bigger than we ever imagined," says Dennis Callasen, Mt Cook Tourism manager. "It's about 30 to 50 million tonnes."

The iceberg has since broken up. There are at least 20 smaller bergs floating in the Tasman Glacier terminal lake, all at least 50m long, "the largest of which is 300m by 200m by 40m high" according to Mr Callasen.
Click on the link to see the amazing sight.
http://www.3news.co.nz/Tasman-Glacier-drops-50-million-tonne-iceberg/tabid/309/articleID/172215/Default.aspx

What is causing the calving of these icebergs? Is it global warming?

Fridayshoot out: What am I?

http://mytownshootout.blogspot.com/

http://mytownmrlinky.blogspot.com/
"The theme for August 20th is "What Am I?"
One, two or three mysterious photos of something in your town. Something that will not be readily recognized. We shall all have fun guessing what it may be. And I am suggesting that you schedule on your blog the whole picture of the "What Am I?" on Sunday. (so we all can check back and see if we guessed right!) I know this theme is different than what we have ever done. Hoping it will be something new and fresh and get us out there shooting and thinking.

Happy Shooting!!
Posted by Doreen