Outdoor Wednesday: Rock at Otuataua

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At the stonefields at Otuataua, we climbed this baby.

My World/Outdoor Wed: Volcanoes in Auckland

Amaryllis (pronounced /ˌæməˈrɪlɨs/[1]) is a small genus of flowering bulbs, with two species. The common name "naked lady" stems from the plant's pattern of flowering when the foliage has died down.



This is the crater of Mt Eden. We often walk up the volcanoes and take friends up there. The Crater is very big, and is a Sacred area. Visitors are asked to respect this and asked not to climb over the barriers and climb down the slopes.


One year, I went there with a New Zealand friend. To my surprise, 1/8 of the slope was covered with flowering lilies. My friend told me that in this country they are called Naked Ladies. When they are blooming, their leaves dry up and hence they called called as such. I was wondering, why only that patch of the crater has the Lilies.

We sat down to appreciate the flowers and the view of Auckland. Being mothers, we talked about the pink lilies are like mums, they suffer and almost die at child birth, and being resilient, they pop up again the next year and bloom beautifully.

In my heart, I was thinking, how many mothers feel naked with empty arms when their babies don't survive. So each year, at this time, when I see the Naked Ladies, I think of all my sisters, who like me, didn't get to take their babies home. Because their babies have gone ahead of them. Something unnatural against the rule of Nature. You don't bury your child. It should be your child burying you.

On Sunday, I watched the science writer Adam Wishart 23 Week Babies: The Price of Life (BBC2), which dealt with a similar dilemma and an even more harrowing subject.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/2011/mar/09/23-week-babies-tv-review When I watch such documentary, no one talks, Because Mum is somewhere else. Mum is teleported to National Women's Hospital and in a time machine to 22 years ago. I was told Andrew was a worst case scenario and he was dying. I didn't have to make the horrible decision to pulling the plug. We were at peace when we accepted the doctors' advice to let nature take it's place. But I pity all the parents who were left to make that decision.

I facebooked my new friends I had made at Sands, mums who had lost their babies. One told me she lost 3, and little did I know, that it was the anniversary of one of them on Tuesday. I am sure she would have cried buckets. I did.

I wrote in my book, "Diary of a bereaved Mum," The day when Andrew was due. Andrew was born 3 weeks early. I was sitting at the corner of his ICU cot, and staring at him. I was staring at him, and wondered why he came early. I had the irrational thinking," Shove him back! Shove him back! He will be born normal."

The due date of a deceased baby is extra hard for a bereaved mum. What if he/she never came early, but on the date he/she was supposed to come, would he/she be a bouncy baby like all babies should be?

This post is for S and all other Sands mums.
We often walk up the volcanoes and take friends up there. The most prominent is an island Rangitoto which is at the harbour.

Rangitoto was formed by a series of eruptions between 600 and 700 years ago. I have been there, and it is so young that the sea ward side of it is still barren volcanic rocks. The land facing side has scrubs.

http://www.gns.cri.nz/what/earthact/volcanoes/nzvolcanoes/aucklandprint.htm

The volcanic formations within the Auckland region have developed within the last 140 000 years. Volcanoes are a conspicuous feature of the Auckland city landscape. In some cases their form is emphasised by their preservation as reserves and parks, while in others they have been quarried to meet the city’s demand for building materials. Within a radius of about 20km centred on Auckland city there are 49 discrete volcanoes; this is the area referred to as the Auckland volcanic field.

The area covered by each volcanic centre is generally localised (less than a kilometre across) and the total volume of erupted material is small. However, five of the volcanoes (Mt Mangere, One Tree Hill, Three Kings, Mt Eden and Mt Wellington) are of medium size. The largest, Rangitoto, is an exceptionally large volcano for the field, representing 59% of the total volume of erupted material. It is significant that the five medium-sized eruptions occurred between 20,000 to 10,000 years ago and that the largest eruption was only about 600 years ago.





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Bart with my Aunt and Uncle, my cousin Lee Lee and his wife.

Next time, I will get a job at wahtung.travel/"Wah Tung Travel Service Sdn Bhd. in Kuching, Sarawak Malaysia.

Monday, June 27, 2011

Save the world/my world Tuesday/outdoor wed: wrapping your fruit

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In many parts of Malaysia and Singapore, fruit growers use paper bags, plastic bags, sacks to wrap fruits to protect the fruits. Hence reduce the need to spray insecticide. These fruits are healthier to eat.

When I was living in Singapore, I was told wrapping the fruit aka saronging the fruits, it reduces another kind of pest, the two legged type. I was living in the staff residence of the Nanyang Technological University. I grew beautiful papayas and bananas and they went walking before I was fast enough to harvest them. A Malay cleaner told me to sarong them. The logic behind this was traditionally, in the kampong, fruit trees were communal. Anyone was free to harvest the fruits. But saronging/wrapping it, this signals to others that this tree is private. I worked. You need only to sarong one fruit.

Outdoor Wednesday: Parent Power

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Parents and grand parents were out in force pushing the little ones in the fun run. Some dads carried their kids on their shoulders.

Outdoor Wednesday: Students at Zero Waste

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These international students from Korea, Vietnam and China spent the whole of this last Sunday at Okahu bay volunteering as our zero waste educators. Often they went round picking up rubbish that festival goers carelessly throw on the ground.

I was partnering with Lien from Vietnam. She was unfazed by people who dump rubbish at the wrong bins, and she would bent over and reach into the bins to sort the rubbish. I enjoyed the ten hours with her under the hot sun getting to know about Vietnam.

As for the students, they went home tired but happy with priceless experience of sleeping in a marae, enjoying the Maori hospitality and powhiri/welcome and a knowledge of recycling. There will be memories of celebrating our National Day with a difference.

Ka Pai and paki paki Lien, Annabell, Richard and Jay, and their teachers Linda and Kath who brought them.

Christmas in Rocket Park: Outdoor wednesday

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To organise an event of this magnitude entertaining 4000, a lot of volunteers are mobilised.

I like the employees of ASB bank who wore yellow T- shirts saying, "I work in the bank, but today, I serve you." In deed they served a lot of BBQ sausage in the famous New Zealand sausage sizzle.

I like my ESOL students too who helped in giving away goodie bags and sild about ten flavours of ice cream. This can be quite daunting and challenging when you are an English student.

Ka Pai to all, and Paki Paki to all, and to Mt Albert Baptist Church who organised this and all our sponsors.

Outdoor Wednesday: Mud

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I was watching the CBS Survivor series, and I just love the challenges. As I see them rolling in the mud, I remember this photo my niece took. She and her friends went to the same place the first Survivor series were filmed in Sabah Malaysia.

"I think I caught a fish, I think! I hope it is not a snake. We should have enough protein to win the next immunity challenge."

Outdoor Wednesday: Cemetery

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This is the stuff you read in books or watch in movies. I am most upset that people actually do go to cemeteries and steal babies' identities. Many of you know that my baby died, and I would not only be flabberghasted but be extremely angry if some idiot had stolen my late baby's identity and use it to apply for a passport.

New Zealand Acts party hard line law and order spokesman MP David Garrett has told Parliament he created a false identity by applying for a passport in the name of a dead child 26 years ago.

In a statement to the House this afternoon, the MP said he had used the method outlined in Frederick Forsyth's novel The Day of the Jackal to apply for the dead child's passport.

Mr Garrett said he had applied for the passport as a prank - to see if it could be done - and had never used the passport, which had since expired.

Mr Garrett was arrested years later as part of an investigation into bogus passports, conducted by the police in the wake of the discovery Israeli Mossad agents had used the same method to obtain New Zealand passports.

The MP said he had expressed remorse to the parents of the child and written to apologise to them. Today he said he would carry the remorse with him for the rest of his life.

I took this photo of a baby's grave. It is not my son's.

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.