We waved at Ewen from the railway platform when we spied him watching us through his binoculars from his balcony. The LP walking tour sufficed as the $10 tour without local guide and commentary and despite a noon departure, we had a tour of Parliament and Government Buildings, strolled the glamorous shopping area and the more edgy Art Deco Cuba Street, were impressed by the number of theatres, an opera house and other arts venues, rode the cable car, strolled in the Botanic Gardens, visited Te Papa museum and bought some noise-cancelling headphones before heading back for another bottle of Piper Heidsieck and a splendid blue cod dinner. Despite it being Gail’s first day back at work, we didn’t turn in until rather foolishly late. The headphones are like Ewen’s – Adrian wants them particularly for the phone!
The significant civic buildings are all protected from earthquakes by extensive base isolations, effectively replacing the foundations with hundreds of steel, rubber and lead blocks to enable the building to oscillate as a whole entity, independent of the ground. As a retro-fit it was stunningly expensive, though less so for the new museum. This, however, being on land recently risen from the ocean, has to be compacted, and regularly assessed and blessed by Maori elders, in case of bad omens. In Parliament, the various ethnic groups have a well-considered role and New Zealanders are justly proud of their democracy and relative social cohesion. Following a fire during ‘works’ in the 1990s, restoration has been magnificent and the ornate European caskets conferring the keys of various cities sit comfortably alongside the Maori décor and quilted hangings. Structure, design and protocol are of course derived from Westminster, down to the colour of the benches in the Chamber, but the upper house was abolished and the monitoring function is fulfilled by Select Committees. Women have been able to vote since before Britain and all opportunity to assert the state’s egalitarian credentials are taken.
All this provoked in me a curiously maternal instinct – as if a favoured student had gone on to do well in the world, demonstrating the principles one would hope to have inculcated but also, caused me to reflect on the relative complexity of 64 million people/4.1 million, a thousand years of political history/150, a murky colonial past/isolation and colonising an empty land (Maoris first, Europeans soon after). It’s sobering to reflect that folk had been boozing in the Rose & Crown and worshipping in St Peter’s for 600 years before humankind set foot on these islands.