Homevillage Glory

I’ve been away from my hometown for almost two and a half years. Since grade 12 ended, I haven’t spent much time there aside from a few holidays and as a transition between somewhere (wherever that is) and the cottage. Adele sings about her hometown, London, on her album 19. I thought I would take that song and alter it a little bit to reflect my hometown.

I've been walking in the same way as I did
Missing out the cracks in the pavement bridge[1]
And tutting my heel and strutting my feet[2]
"Is there anything I can do for you dear? Is there anyone I could call[3]?"
"No and thank you, please Madam Lisa[4]. I ain't lost, just wandering ‘cause you can’t really get lost in Fenelon Falls."

Round my hometownvillage[5]
Memories are “Fresh Fruit and Vegetables”[6]
Round my hometownvillage
Ooh the people I've met
Are the wonders of my world generally very old
Are the wonders of my world probably (or have been) employed at the local Sobey’s
Are the wonders of this world likely to be tourists
Are the wonders of my world listening to country music

I like it in the city village when the air streets is are so thick and opaque unplowed
I love to see everybody in short skirts, shorts and shades Skidoo suits
I like it in the city village when two worlds collide Canadian Tire is having a sale
You get the people and the government more people[7]
Everybody taking different sides buying tractors

Shows that we ain't gonna stand let our shit[8] go to waste
Shows that we are united agriculturally sensitive
Shows that we ain't gonna take it let John Deere go out of business
Shows that we ain't gonna stand shit
Shows that we are united sitting and operating our heavy machinery

Round my hometownvillage
Memories are fresh shared[9]
Round my hometownvillage
Ooh the people I've met
(Do da di di da da da da do do do do oh oh oh yaaaaaa yaa aye) (medley of strumming guitar strings and church bells)[10]

Are the wonders jewels[11] of my world the Kawarthas
Are the wonders jewels of my world the Kawarthas
Are the wonders jewels of my world the Kawarthas
Are the wonders jewels of my world the Kawarthas

Of my  world
Yeah
Of my world
Of my world yeah

I tease

But home is home

Even if it is Fenelon Falls[12]

---

[1] The iconic bridge over Fenelon Falls’ falls.

[2] This line is completely cut because no one in Fenelon would use those words.

[3] Not a change, but a clarification: literally call. Simply calling out into the open from one street will effectively reach one across town.

[4] Because 1 in 2 people in Fenelon Falls are named Lisa. Even the men.

[5] Fenelon Falls is, in fact, a village.

[6] The name of the stand that sells fresh fruit and vegetables where our bowling alley was burned down by an arsonist.

[7] Don’t worry, Fenelon Falls only has a population of 1,800 so “people and more people” isn’t actually a lot of people.

[8] manure

[9] We may be small, but we’re close.

[10] Fenelon Falls has 13 churches within a two-kilometre radius.

[11] Fenelon Falls is known as the “Jewel of the Kawarthas” (referring to the Kawartha Lakes)

[12] I just decided to make up that last part because I have butchered the song already but I also want to include that I really do love Fenelon even with its quirks and home IS home.

Also

to me.

4 Weeks Down

The blog has been seriously neglected these past couple days, but only because Em and I are being moderate in our internet use after reaching near capacity earlier in the month… we have a theory that New Zealand takes up way more bandwidth because it is far away from everywhere, but we’re not technologists so don’t listen to us.

I’ll do a little bit of a work update now because the travel updates are soon to come.

The Royal Society provides grants to New Zealand researchers to go abroad and do research in the field/attend conferences/make connections/see stuff that they can’t see in New Zealand that is beneficial to their work. Anyway, my job is to go through the scientist-written summaries of their travels and identify highlights. This sounds easier than it is… mainly because scientists very rarely know how to write reports to make them sound even remotely exciting. So there is a lot of scientific jargon and language that I just don’t understand AT ALL and basically I have to translate it and condense it for the Minister of Business, Innovation, and Employment so that he is convinced that money should be going to the Society so that they can fund these sort of worldwide travels for New Zealand researchers.

Another perk of working with the Society is that I get to spend Wednesdays at an independent but still-related offshoot called the Science Media Centre, which basically is a really useful link between the media and scientific research in New Zealand. Canada has one too… and I could go into the difficulties the Canadian one is having with the current government, but I won’t… I’m sure you can imagine… So I get to do all sorts of stuff there, but one of my main jobs is to read all sorts of scientific innovation and research in New Zealand and to update a database with the key “movers” (there are a lot of them) in the community. This makes it easier for the SMC to access experts when they are publishing something to go to the media which, in turn, is seen by the all-might policy makers of New Zealand.

That’s my work update for now. I feel as if the first 6 weeks of it will be “observation” and the last 6 weeks will be “commentary.” Or maybe all 12 weeks will be me with a dazed look on my face... who’s to know?

Upcoming blog posts (seriously, I have half a dozen started): Wellington Wine Wednesdays (going to turn into “What I Drank This Month”), Homevillage Glory, Orange, Auckland, and Food.

It

My twenty-five minute walk to work is actually a significant part of my day. In celebration of having spent five hundred minutes walking to and from the Royal Society of New Zealand building, I have compiled my top five hundred (and by five hundred I mean ten) thoughts or moments or whatever that have come to me these past two and a half weeks.

1. Why do people read on their Kindles or Kobo E-readers or whatever while walking? Looking at a phone I can understand, but full-out dedicating yourself to reading a novel while hustling down a busy street? I don’t know if I should applaud the reader for his dedication or the author for her engrossing writing.
2. Cookies. There’s a store along Lambton Quay that is called “Mrs. Higgins Oven Fresh Cookies” or “Mrs. Higgins Biscuits” or “Mrs. Higgins Foodgasm Emporium” or something. The premise of the store is cookies and it is open to the street and it will make the fastest-walking pedestrian stop and smell the glorious smell of be right back sorry I’m drooling on my keyboard just thinking about it. Anyway, one day I will stop there and buy a cookie and eat it even though it is only 9:00am (who said that there was a restriction on when to eat cookies? …Mom…). And there is a small Indian man who works there in the morning and when I buy my cookie I will say “thank you, Mrs. Higgins” and hopefully we will laugh because I really doubt his name is actually Mrs. Higgins and that’s the funny part.
3. I usually have to wait at about 3 crosswalks on my way to work. The pedestrian rules aren’t the same in New Zealand as they are in Canada and you have to wait for the walking man to say go. As a result, I have gone back to my track and field sprinting roots (for those of you who don’t know about my running past, it’s true, I sprinted… sprunt?) and prepare for the green man to show up so that I can safely cross. People’s reactions times here are horrible and don’t realize that they can walk for anywhere from 1 to 2 seconds, so I figure I have saved upwards of two minutes with my preparedness.
4. I find it really ironic that there are usually a dozen smokers outside the building with the sign “Environment House” in front of it.
5. It is always good to walk behind someone with a good pace. It gives you a break while also challenging you to keep up, allowing you to arrive at your destination in good time. I’ve only been able to do this twice, though I have tried thrice. One guy was just too fast (I know, I was surprised that there was a Wellington walker faster than me as well).
6. Layers. Whenever my dad goes hiking in the winter he wears about a bajillion layers and I’m sure he ends up taking most of them off because even though it is winter, it gets hot fast. So that’s the mindset that has been drilled into my sister and myself, but in Wellington it is a little different… if you are walking at a good clip and you have a coat on, you’re probably going to sweat a lot if you are me. The entire walk faces the sun so it is boiling. Then on the other hand, you’ll need a coat if it decides to rain. Ok, so this point should really just be called “layer” but it is something I believe strongly in.
7. Happy thoughts. And just being positive. Sometimes work can get a little tedious just in its nature (staring at a computer screen for hours on end), so you just have to go into the day thinking about the good things that will happen. And walking home you get to think about relaxing and eating and spending time with your sister (d’aww)/
8. Something I really like is making eye contact with strangers. Not in a creepy way, but just doing it anyway. You kind of get a look into the person’s life for a second or two depending on how or if they look back at you, how long they keep eye contact, if they stop and then look back, if they do it from far away or at the last second… and there is something nice about being in a city and knowing that you aren’t going to see anyone you know at all. So you can be a little guilty and make someone feel awkward for a few seconds or wonder if they are purposely doing the same to you.
9. Keep to the left. New Zealand drives on the left, so rules of the sidewalk are the same. It has gotten to the point that I naturally move to the left, which is sort of nice/scary because it makes me realize how fast my Canadian self is leaving me, eh? sweet as!
10. Think. I know that this is a really meta point being that this post is about things I think about while walking, but just thinking is one of them. Thinking about things that are different than cookies and crosswalks that really allow you to reflect on what you are doing, how you are reacting to it, and the impact it is having on your life – whether “it” is positive, negative, constructive, or unhelpful. And you have lots of time to do this because there are so many “its” in life that you could spend five hundred thousand minutes walking to work and you still wouldn’t be anywhere near running out.

Mordor

Part of me feels horrible for stripping the Tongariro Alpine Crossing of its actual name and instead calling it [Peter Jackson’s] Mordor, but the other part of me appreciates the ability for a place that actually exists to so accurately depict what is, for all we know, fantasy. Also, I’m conscious enough to know that Mordor doesn’t actually exist (YES IT DOES), so I’ll let myself have fun with it. Emily and I didn’t wake up in Tongariro National Park this past weekend expecting to actually walk the path to Mordor, but what do you know, we did. Let me take you through the events that led us there.

We had read that doing the Tongariro Alpine Crossing, one of New Zealand’s “great walks,” was a hefty journey that is less easily traversed during the off-season months (May being one of them). The tramp itself is about 19km long and is expected to take 6 hours and 20 minutes to complete. The weather changes easily, and for this weekend the forecast was looking pretty dismal, so we decided to instead do some shorter walks around the park that weren’t quite as perilous.

Our shuttle driver from the National Park Village into the actual park drove past the turn-off to the small town that served as the centrepoint for the smaller walks we were going to do. There were two other groups in the shuttle with us, so we figured that he was just going to drop them off at the beginning of the big walk and then loop back around to drop us off. So we drove for several kilometres and the landscape started to become more and more gorgeous and as the sun rose higher in the sky the weather became more and more appealing. As mountains and hills and valleys appeared around us, we started to wish that we were prepared enough to do the crossing, but alas, we were not.

The shuttle reached the beginning of the track, the driver got out and gave the seven of us in the vehicle a low-down of what to expect for the day. There were no other hikers at the car park and the weather looked excellent; he said that it would be a great day to do the crossing. At this point, Em and I realized that our driver had forgotten that we had previously said that we would only be doing the short walks. I turned to Em to see if we should say something, but it turned out she was reading my mind. When I looked at her, she mouthed: “LET’S DO IT.” And so we did it.

Our travels are generally rather well-planned, so there is little room for error or for things to go awry. However, this was one “accident” that turned out to be absolutely glorious, as I will let the pictures explain. We set out, unsure if we had enough water (we did), confident in our food supply (no one has ever said that a Jackson will go hungry), and optimistic. I’ll let my sister’s photographs narrate our journey.

This was the beginning of our walk. That’s Mount Ngurahoe in the background, also known as Mount Doom in Peter Jackson’s The Lord of the Rings trilogy.

The mist rolling in… added all the more mystery.

Me seriously geeking out at the fact that I AM STANDING IN FRONT OF MOUNT DOOM.

So volcanic and just beautiful I don’t even know what to say.

“I’m glad you’re with me, Sam.”

Delightfully desolate.

So yeah a volcano we passed by just erupted in August and is still active. We felt like Shrek and Donkey trudging off to save Princess Fiona (sulphuric).

The red crater. Looked like a slice of red velvet cake. And just the fact that these colours occur naturally is awesome.

Headed down to the Emerald Lakes.

Magical.

Again, I just loved how the landscape changed so much within five minutes of walking.

The steaming volcano.

We got rained on for probably an hour and a half pretty steadily, but that did not dampen the experience at all. We ended up finishing the crossing in 5 hours and 45 minutes (go us). I actually cannot describe how happy this walk made me… and not because the landscape was somewhat recognizable (though not all of it is pictured in LOTR). I was happy because of the wonderful mistake that it was that we actually ended up walking it. And just the fact that we jumped into something so spontaneously without really planning ahead of time for it… I will be the first person to tell you that planning ahead is essential, but sometimes things just happen and when they do the resulting experience can be enchanting and wonderful and awe-inspiring.

Of course, you might end up getting into a little tiff on the slopes of Mount Doom with someone named Gollum, but luckily that didn’t happen on this journey to Mordor.

Is that a golden dahlia daffodilus?

Today, I started working on research on pest management for an upcoming policy paper that the Society will be releasing. For those of you who do not know, there are a lot of animals, plants, and diseases that have been introduced to New Zealand throughout the past hundreds of years. Some of these introduced species have produced a negative impact on the country’s native flora, fauna, etc. As a result, there has been an ongoing quest to contain/control/eradicate these invasive species so that New Zealand’s environment, people, and culture (as the unique ecology of New Zealand is very much part of its culture) can be maintained.

That’s basically what I know about the issue right now, and in the upcoming days as I delve into hundreds of journal articles about pest management I am sure I will become more academic about the entire topic. As a result, I want to get the silliness out of my system before I think what I am going to post below is ridiculous.

I see myself contributing through this research to the eventual eradication of harmful species to New Zealand. As such, here are just a few of my enemies that I will face in my quest.

Exhibit 1: Oryctolagus cuniculus. European Rabbit. These bad boys eat the grass that cows need in New Zealand to survive. Also, when they breed like crazy they can start to burrow and erode the soil and mess up water stuff. In the past, they have been shot, poisoned, their burrows have been fumigated, and rabbit-proof fences have been erected.

oryctolagus cuniculus: cow killer

Exhibit 2: Mustela furo. Possum. The Ministry for Primary Industries is updating information on the possum, which must be good… but to put it into perspective, there are more possums in New Zealand than there are people in Canada.

looks like me when i wake up in the morning

Exhibit 3: Mustela erminea. Stoat. Pretty sure this one is already stuffed, but they are pesky too. Kind of like smaller ferrets… which is also an unwanted organism, but the ferret populations have been controlled.

stoats can actually be kind of cute but a cute picture would have ruined the effect

Exhibit 4: Trichoglossus haematodus. Rainbow Lorikeet. Yeah, I didn’t even have to Google “evil [insert animal name here]” for this one. They naturally look like they’re gonna mess you up.

"did u say sumthin 2 me?"

Exhibit 5: Lampropholis delicate. Rainbow skink. Basically this one came from Australia and the only reason it’s unwanted is because it competes with New Zealand’s native skink. That’s a whole other story though. Also, skink is going to be my new insult word (e.g. “you’re such a skink!”).

what sound do skinks make i wonder

Exhibit 6: Periplaneta americana. The cockroach. On the plus side, IT’S TIME FOR REVENGE! (For those of you out of the loop, see here for my cockroach experiences.)

this is a cockroach preparing to cook up your body once it kills you in the night

So those are just a select few species that I will be learning about and reading case studies from around the world in an attempt to control them within delicate New Zealand. All in all, I feel like Rabbit trying to keep his garden free of pests. Ironic since rabbits are on "the list," but appropriate nonetheless.

Post-script: I think that someone should think of renaming this unwanted organism. I'm not sure if the ministry in charge has realized the historical implications that come with "eradiction of Wandering Jews." Just a thought.

Here's An Idea

Here's an idea:

Some sort of device that you hook up to both your iPod and your pulse and you enter all of your physical information and what activity you are doing. Then, your music will only play at the correct speed according to your pulse or speed or distance covered or whatever. So if it calculates that you are going too slow, then your music will play like this:

nnnnnnnnnnnevvvvvvverrrrrrrr miiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnnnnnd i'llllllllllllllllllllllllllll ffffffffffiinnnnnnnnnnnnnnnddddd sssssssssommmmmmmmmmmmmeonnnnnnnnnnnne lllllllllllllllllllllllike yoooooooooooooooooooooou

But if you are going too fast for your level then it'll be like this:

BUTISETFIRE2THERAINWTCHDITBRNASITCHEDURFACE

So you have to do it just right.

And that is how I am going to become a millionaire.

Not Knowing Is the Fun Bit

This whole “summer job” deal is, to be honest, a new concept to me. During high school, I saw my involvement in non-academics as my job, as I committed as much (or perhaps more) time and energy to them as I would a paying part-time stint at the local grocery store, Tim Horton’s, or restaurant. This involvement paid off in the end, but it certainly left the notion of working in the summer months one to be discovered after my first year of university. If you’ve read the 2012 entries in this blog, you will know that I spent last summer working in India, England, and Germany. So, as I take on this second experience this summer, I only have my India adventure with which to compare working at the Royal Society of New Zealand. Here are some of the similarities and differences I have drawn between the two. India is in orange, New Zealand is in green.

Time taken to walk to work: twenty-five seconds

Time taken to walk to work: twenty-five minutes

Work building: open-air rehearsal hall

Work building: earthquake-proof office building

My day is spent: sitting

My day is spent: sitting

While I am sitting, I am: watching Shakespeare in Persian

While I am sitting, I am: researching academic journal articles on green technologies (for example)

At work, I wear: t-shirt, shorts, sandals

At work, I wear: shirt, pants, shoes

Percentage of coworkers who speak English: 33%

Percentage of coworkers who speak English: 100%

Number of coworkers with a doctorate degree: 11

Number of coworkers from a country with the 7^th lowest life expectancy: 12

I drink: tea

I drink: tea

My ability to understand what everyone is talking about: low

My ability to understand what everyone is talking about: low

My interest in what I am doing: high

My interest in what I am doing: high?

The last comparison is sort of the point of this post, and the question mark is not an unedited piece of punctuation. One of the wonderful reasons I am able to work in New Zealand is that I received a grant, to keep the explanation short, that partially covers travel and living expenses. This applies for my three years of university, however, each summer has a different “theme.” This one happens to be public policy.

There is definitely a Devon that everybody knows who is wildly interested in politics… but do they see him working in public policy? Probably not. They probably see him in a theatre somewhere. Now, as he slips out of this highly annoying third person narration, one might be confused when s/he hears that I am working in an office building… with an organization that deals primarily with science and technology… much less in the external affairs (what does that even mean, s/he thinks) sector. On paper, this job sounds a lot less exciting or diverse than, say, travelling to India to work with an Afghan theatre troupe and then touring Europe with them. But I’m ok with that, because it is a completely different, sort of incomparable experience. Ironic, I know, because I just made ten comparisons above, but that’s the delicious paradox of it all. I’m ok sitting in an office doing “academic” (and I use quotations deliberately in acknowledging the loose definition of the word) work that may never directly contribute to my eventual career(s). I think what matters is that I go into everything I do with a positive energy and that I focus on staying happy throughout… because once you are unhappy, then you have a problem.

And so I head into week 2/12 of my grand policy adventure, prepared to give it my all even when I’m not sure how much I have to give. But not knowing is the fun bit because it means that there’s a chance to surprise yourself.

My First Week at Work

Ok, time to talk business.

Since you have invested in reading this blog, I’ll just be straight up with you about the content. The main reason I am in New Zealand for these three months is to work at the Royal Society of New Zealand. Here’s the spiel I gave people who asked what I was going to be doing before I got here:

“The Royal Society of New Zealand is a non-governmental organization and their external affairs sector, with which I will be working as a policy intern, provides expert advice on science, technologies, and the humanities to members of the New Zealand legislature so that they can make informed policy decisions on these topics.”

I slowly watched people’s eyes glaze over as I droned on about this, and frankly, I think I would too if I heard it from someone. However, I swear there’s a lot more to the job! … all which will be revealed to you within the next eleven weeks as I take on projects at the office, all with the goal of hopefully influencing policy in one way or another. I am sure I will, but my contributions might be less obvious than the more-apparent members of parliament.

But enough of that! Part of the fun is that this is the first time I will have ever worked in an office! So that, of course, comes with so much fun awkwardness and unfamiliarity to provide at least eleven weeks of entertainment to an outside viewer. Here’s how my first day of work on Monday went down.

First of all, it was pouring. And I mean POURING. The streets of Wellington were flooding. Luckily, most of the twenty-five minute walk to work through the downtown and up to a small suburb of the city called Thorndon is sheltered under storefront overhang, but the five minutes that I had to walk without any overhead protection was enough to soak me through to my underwear. So I arrive at the office, drenched, and politely tell the receptionist, “I’m Devon Jackson, I’ll be interning with the Society for the next twelve weeks.” [no answer] “Sorry that I brought the Great Lakes with me.” [polite laugh] “Is there a washroom I can clean up in?” [Devon proceeds to wring out his socks] Luckily, I was wearing black pants so I didn’t look too wet… only my spirit.

Things perked up though, as I was shown around the beautifully modern and earthquake-proofed building that now houses the offices of the Royal Society of New Zealand. My boss showed me around and introduced me to everyone on all three floors of the office, then I went to my desk and started up my computer as I was assisted in connecting to the network. So that let to FUN computer times. Here are three slightly embarrassing things that occurred with the start-up of my computer:

1. My log-in screen picture is of Meryl Streep. So much for letting the cat out of the bag subtly.
2. My DVD player on the computer starts up automatically and blasts the end credits of Arrested Development, which my sister and I had been watching the night before, throughout the entire floor. 
3. While connecting to the network, the three coworkers of mine huddled around my computer see that my default computer name isn’t something standard like “Devon Jackson’s PC” or “My Computer,” but rather (in all caps) “TALLULAH.” Poor Tallulah.

After all that, I was basically debriefed on what everyone on the policy team does and then I got started on my first project. The Society is writing an “emerging issues” paper on promising green technologies, so I produced a literature review… basically sifting through hundreds of academic journal articles, figuring out which ones would best help answer the scope of the paper. And boy does this type of literature review take time. I won’t go into detail on the intricacies of literature review-making, but all I can say is that I was concurrently thorough and concise. It’s a difficult task. Anyway, I worked on that all week. Literally, all week. It was a little tedious, but interesting at the same time. And you sort of find out ways to make the work interesting/bearable. Here are my top three tips for making an academic journal article compilation bearable:

1. Drink a cup of tea as you sift through journals on green technologies and renewable energy policies and marginal abatement cost curves and societal challenges to technology uptake and so on and so forth. Reward yourself with a sip everyone once in a while. (Banana chips also work as a reward)
2. If you come across something that you don’t know, look it up! Wikipedia is a great tool for base-learning, and learning is fun! A lot of stuff is really cool and we just don’t know that it is cool because, well, we’re oblivious to stuff’s existence! (Ok, that last sentence was a stretch but I’m tired)

That’s it, actually. Tea and Wikipedia.

I’ll comment more on workplace dynamic and the actual building and Wellington itself later… but for now I must get some sleep because tomorrow we are rising early to visit the Academy-Award winning Weta Workshop! I feel like I’ve been there already from the special features on the Lord of the Rings DVDs, but I’ll gladly visit in person.

Here’s a reward for reaching the end of this very verbose post. Surprise: it’s a picture of me in front of my work (the weekend before work started though, I didn’t go in a t-shirt and jeans).

SURPRISE! Here's another one of me in front of a sign of a street we stayed on. There are actually a lot of Devon Streets in New Zealand; I've had a large influence on the country already.

Photos from the South Island

I do apologize for the lack of posts recently, I am afraid I have been quite tired/busy these past couple days to update everyone on the great Kiwi adventure. So, as I sit in our apartment living room watching a show about people driving on dangerous roads around the world (aptly titled “Dangerous Roads”), I am going to put together a blog post made up mainly of pictures from the rest of our time on the South Island. Emily is editing her wonderful pictures and panoramas (because really, what other way is there to capture a New Zealand landscape?), so I will take advantage of her storytelling skills in this post.

I have started work here in New Zealand, but I want to wait until I’ve finished a full week in the office so that I have something to write about workwise. You’ll just have to go without my witty commentary and musing about life for now (I was so much keener on being witty – or me thinking I was being witty – last summer, wasn’t I?) and enjoy the vistas of the Antipodes. Click on any of the photographs if you want to see them in their original-size glory.

This is a panorama of Milford Sound. I know you've already seen pictures of it, but I just wanted to show you this one as well.

And you've also seen this view of the Southern Alps, but again... a panorama this time.

This is up the coastline of Abel Tasman National Park from a boat.

Same as above.

After we landed on the beach ready to start our 12.0km hike along the coast.

View from a highpoint of our tramp.

Adele Island. Bird sanctuary. First European to reach New Zealand got moored out there, skirmished with the Maori, then peaced out. Europeans didn't return for about two hundred years.

Still in Abel Tasman. This reminded me of "don't... follow... the light!" Anyone?

So photogenic.

Photo of the front yard of the hippy-ish hostel we stayed at.

Last view of the South Island on the ferry to the North Island.

That's all for now. Coming soon... Wellington Wine Wednesdays, my first week of work, and Weta Workshop! SO MANY Ws!