A Glass Full of Water

‘Flying under the radar’ means to remain inconspicuous. In today’s blog story, maybe it’s time to ‘spread the word’ and highlight a wonderful but relatively unknown initiative in New Zealand’s biggest city.  Tom Rose, a journalist at the NZ Herald wrote an article on the 20th May titled, ‘Auckland students undergo ‘Champions for Compassion’ workshop to learn the power of empathy’. I read the article and smiled.  Glenfield Intermediate students recently took part in workshops on compassion, resilience and empathy. ie. practical tools for kindness. I can’t recall having any such lessons when I was a student in Auckland many years ago…  Chefs for Compassion who organise the workshops is led by a Birkenhead local Marty Smith. Marty said, “I thought about what I truly wanted my kids to learn - not just how to pass tests, but how to be decent, grounded people.” Music to my ears! The one day workshops are run by Auckland University’s Dr Selina Tusitala Marsh, a distinguished Pac...

Do you sometimes admire the pictures and patterns that some baristas make in the coffee you have ordered?  Val and I were recently in a Thames cafe (Coromandel Peninsula). The barista made and delivered the coffees to our table. My coffee had an amazing picture of a smiling bear in it. By far the best example of coffee art we have ever seen, so we told her so. She explained that she spent many hours of her free time perfecting her art form. A few minutes later she unexpectedly and excitedly returned to our table to show us photos of more clever creations.  Further up the coast road at Te Puru, Val complimented the co-owner of our accomodation on her beautiful and extensive gardens. The amazing view from the property was enhanced by her efforts and expertise. The next day and to our surprise she left us a variety of  plants and cuttings for our home garden at our unit door. The plants included dahlia trees, ferns, a variety of grasses and some spring bulbs. She said that s...

It was time to pay for our Easter Holiday accommodation at Taiharuru, Whangarei Heads. Cash was carefully snuggled away in Val’s wallet, along with her bank cards. To our horror the wallet wasn’t in Val’s bag.  Isn’t it such an hassle when this sort of thing happens! Our lovely friends Bob and Grace offered to pay for us and we would pay them back at a later date so the immediate problem was solved. Time to slow our thinking down…The last time we used cash was in Waipu on Good Friday. It was now the following Tuesday so we resigned to ourselves that the money etc was gone forever.  Just before we left to go home we got a phone call from the owner/manager of the Waipu Four Square Supermarket and I immediately recognised his name. Steve Price, due to him being the ex captain of the New Zealand Warriors Rugby League team. He told Val that a young employee had picked up the wallet outside his store on Good Friday (A very Good Friday!).  Such an honest, thoughtful young man an...

Younger sister Jenny had an exercise plan for the start of 2025. She would swim and survive the 2km Waiheke Nani Island swim.  Her son in law Avi had won the race and her son Michael had also finished well in previous races. Jenny desperately didn’t want to come last. Or even worse, a DNF (Did not finish) by her name.  Avi offered to swim with Jenny this time. Competitors lined up, high fives were exchanged and the start signal blasted around the beach. Jenny was consumed with self doubts.  ‘Why are you doing this? What were you thinking?’ You will get noticed for all the wrong reasons.’  My sister is stubborn and began to swim. Within five minutes the other competitors had left Jenny behind, way behind, but she kept going. She wanted to make her family proud and wanted to live less of a sedate life. Avi stayed with Jenny,  constantly encouraged her. He was never too far away and she felt secure with him being close by. Avi kept smiling at Jenny and telling her ...

The swift current was forcing us closer and closer to a sheer rock wall. Pumping adrenalin, pumping paddles and pumping hearts! At the last possible moment, the same river current took us away from the wall and downstream, to now quietly view more stunning scenery of the Whanganui National park.  Our Canadian canoes each held two paddlers and all our gear was in plastic barrels strapped securely to the inside. Falling out was almost expected and after paddling all day was almost wanted.  We were in a group of 12 paddlers and our next overnight stop was the campsite at Tieke Kāinga Marae. We were ready for our Pōwhiri (welcome) and had chosen my twin brother Chris as our speaker. Our Waiata (supporting song) was ‘Ten guitars’.  In the evening we had delicious damper around the campfire and then took turns in introducing ourselves and our families (Mihimihi). Some people just can’t stop talking and laughing so we had minimal sleep. We could hardly see the river the next mor...