WELLINGTON

After saying goodbye to Taupo I caught the 10:05 Intercity to Wellington. I sat next to Colleen, a 72 year old Anglo-Indian lady who lives in England. We had an interesting conversation and both fell asleep at odd times. The bus stopped at various places and it was an uneventful trip. One stop was the town of Bull w here the businesses made puns out of the town’s name such as a bank called “bankabull” and a designer label clothing store called LaBull.

In the morning I caught an early bus to the bottom of the cable car and took it to the top, to the Botanic Gardens. I spent more 1½ hours there and walked back down to the city, past a 1988 sculpture by Henry Moore called “Bronze Form”, and a sundial that when you stood on a spot marking the date, your shadow tells you the time.

I looked at the “Beehive”, part of parliament. National Portrait Gallery. Out of the suhxty suhx New Zealanders there, the only person I knew anything about was Edmond Hillary. I walked to Te Papa where I stayed till closing time at 6pm.

Next day I had to change some money to catch a bus to the airport so I went to the ANZ bank. Outside it was a shrine to “Blanket Man”. He was a well-known 54 year old vagrant who died in Wellington Hospital last Sunday. Hundreds of people left flowers, blankets, candles and other items, and wrote messages of condolence on the walls and on cards, including “thanks for standing for what you believe in” and “love to the man in the blanket”. He was a sad and lonely man who was once happily married with children and had a steady job before his life took a turn that saw him descend to a pitiful existence on the streets. Only he knew how he ended up there, though his guilt at killing a close friend in a drink-driving crash appears to have been a major factor.