Milford to Takapuna Walk

Ended the week and enjoyed the balmy daffodil day weather with a long walk from Milford to Takapuna along beach, rocks, stone walls and beach again, pausing at beginning (for picnic lunch of ciabatta and Nosh's salmon dip/cum spread), in the middle for the Swiss Bakery's superb bishop's hat cookies, a large triangular butter cookie, encasing a hazelnut and cinnamon paste filling,

with coffee to go from that excellent glassed-in beachfront cafe near the Takapuna Camping Ground, and at the end, to go the Takapuna Library for a rest and a read. A blissful day and just one of many similiar pleasurable ones recently.

Winter weekend

Went to Waiheke for the day on Saturday, had the usual pleasant walk along Oneroa beach after taking in the latest exhibition of works by local award winners at the Community Art Gallery.

Last weekend visited the Wynyard Quarter in bitterly cold blustery conditions. Took refuge in the Fish Market for a few minutes espying these beautiful fish staring balefully at their prospective consumers.

On Sunday took the bus to the North Shore and after listening to a chamber music concert by Westlake students at a local church walked along Takapuna Beach in the late afternoon sun.

Brought in some of the fragrance and colour of the garden inside where it can be appreciated in warmer conditions.

Knitty-Gritty

The icy winter conditions beginning last Monday prompted me to finish the hot water bottle covers I had been knitting in response to a plea from the Christchurch City Mission. One was in a mock cable, the other in basket stitch. Am trying to decide whether I should make myself one now, seeing the nights are still so cold.

Malkovitch has a new hiding place - he spent a whole day sleeping in this bag of fleece wool on the windowseat recently and it is now his favourite sleeping place. I am prompted to do some spinning again, now that I have nothing else crafty on the go.

Discovered some hazelnuts in the kitchen cupboard which needed consumption so made this Linzer Torte - a spicy cinnamon and ground hazelnut dough , filled with Barkers raspberry jam with a lazy lattice top. I used a Mary-Anne recipe from my scrapbook from the 1960s in which I pasted cut-out recipes from the Auckland Star.

Music (Therapy) and Me

Our first concert at the Centre for Brain Research Christmas Party 2009





Shortly after I was diagnosed with Parkinson's a couple of years ago I went to a Brain Research seminar where I heard about the CeleBRation Choir which had just been set up for people with Parkinson's and aphasia. It was a very small group and quite enjoyable and very nice people, both the people running the choir and the participants. I looked forward to it every week as although I didn't have any speech problems I felt I wanted to keep these undesirables at bay as long as possible. But the main reason was I had never been in a choir and nursed a secret hankering to be part of one and here was my opportunity.

I also appreciated the benefits of music in my everyday life as a calming enriching experience, as long as it was not too loud. Music seems to facilitate my cognitive ability to do two things at once too, which is very useful. I can listen to music and have a conversation, do a crossword or sudoku much faster, concentrate more somehow, certainly exercise at the gym better. (However occasionally the music is very loud there and I have observed that some of us with Parkinson's find it unbearable and not definitely not condusive to good coordination). Daily exercise at the YMCA as part of the Never 2 Old Programme is the other essential keeping me fit and well.

Anyway they are now doing some formal research on the benefits of the choir for people who have Parkinson's and others who have had a stroke. Yesterday I had an interview and was surprised how eloquently I recalled the benefits of regular music on my life over the past two years - The choir once a week , daily listening to music round 4pm, and weekly attendance at lunchtime concerts in the Central Library. Long may it last!

German Architecture in Samoa

Went to a very interesting meeting of the Goethe Society last night at which Christoph Schnoor of Unitec, an architectural historian, spoke about some of the old buildings in Samoa, many of them in Apia, and their architect, Schaaffhausen. Some of these buildings , one in particular, the old Apia hospital, are in grave danger of being demolished , unless the Prime Minister or somebody high up like him, acts to preserve these buildings for posterity. They are just what tourists like to see and visit and they are part of Samoa and Germany's history and New Zealand's to a lesser extent.

It is sad to see them in such a state of disrepair as we did a few weeks ago when we were in Samoa on holiday. Some of them are along the waterfront road like the Court House built by Stuenzner, with extensions by Schaaffhausen a few years later in 1907.

The old Apia hospital, 1902 was supposedly designed in Hamilton. There were fales added to it for the Samoan patients and Schaaffhausen designed other adjacent buildings for the Chinese contract workers. It is this main building that is in dire threat of being demolished unless someone intervenes. I did my bit and sent an e- mail to the address on the Prime Minister of Samoa's website.

We were saddened to see the former Catholic Cathedral on the main road reduced to a big pile of rubble, demolished recently. I remember going to Mass there one White Sunday in the early 1980s.

Another building, the Museum of Samoa which we visited was formerly a German school.

In 1914 Schaaffhausen went back to Germany for a few years, returning in 1923, working as an architect for the NZ administration. During WW2 he was even interned on Somes Island in Wellington Harbour. Incidentally my mother was considered for internment there too but was not considered a threat to national security according to notes on her in the National Archives.

Schaaffhausen returned to Samoa in 1944 and lived there with
his Samoan wife and family, designing churches among other things. He died in 1960 and is buried in Samoa.

The lower picture is of the Robert Louis Stevenson house which was occupied by the German Governor after Stevenson's death when the house was sold. It is one kof the few heritage buildings that tourists can visit. How authentic the renovation/restoration is, is disputed.

Woven on Waiheke

Went back to Waiheke and bought one of the woven rugs I saw at Upcycle a few days before. Felicity Stewart weaves them, and also cushion covers with thin strips of old woollen checked blankets. They remind me of the floor rugs that weavers made in the 1960s using twisted
slivers of unspun wool. She also incorporates the labels off these old woollen blankets into artworks.
There was one on display in the Commmunity Art Gallery Members' Exhibition.

The tea cosy was woven by Marjorie Philcox in the 1970s, using hand-dyed softly spun yarn and a lovely rosepath or similar weave

Oneroa was still silvery grey as on my previous visit so took this picture of it from the deck outside Wai Cafe which has great food and views.

Knitterati sets sail for Waiheke

occupying ourselves knitting on the ferry as we caught upon the previous month's news. Some of us are still knitting hot water bottle covers for the Christchurch City Mission.
Bussed up the hill to the Artworks and library complex, looking first at a nice arty craft shop by the name of Upcycle before toddling down to Oneroa for a lovely lunch at Wai. I ordered a roast pork belly bap, with

caramelized onions and salad garnish which was succulent. Beautiful views out to the bay, though the water was rather grey and silvery instead of its usual blue.

Looked at another couple of arty crafty book shops - Tivoli, which had a very interesting large knitted doiley on the wall with little articles of clothing , rather like those paper cutouts we used to make using folded paper, but all knitted in red yarn, and , Island which has lovely clothes which I have bought on a couple of occasions ones , made by Belinda. She does mosaics too, using old china and I have often passed on my shards to her for recycling.

Then back to the Community Art Gallery for our final dose of visual culture. There was a great array of mainly local Waiheke art which was good for the soul. There is an excellent shop there with local and "imported" crafts and arts.

Two of us went back to our bach for coffee and a walk along Surfdale beach at low tide, and the others all got earlier boats back. Opened a packet of fresh German Melitta coffee and enjoyed it with Venetian biscuits, fig crackers and fruity cheese I bought in Perth. Yum.

PS The photos are of Oneroa Bay earlier in the year, and the bach which is nice any time of the year.