Yes, I must agree with you Anita - just after writing that post I had a quick look and did discover that Tainui had made a 8.3 million profit, so I must correct myself there also, but I believe the generalisation still holds.
However, 'we' didn't trick them out of 'their' land. Myself, Dan Willis, did not trick any other living Maori person out of any land. Nor has the current Government tricked any living Maori out of any land.
We must must must must get away from the history that none of us had any hand in shaping, and focus on the future, where we can take steps to create a harmonious society.
One big step would be to honour the Treaty as a document intended to be conducive to the uniting of our society, and stop using it to create rifts and dissention.
The unecessary time and countless millions of dollars that has been wasted by both parties in attempts to settle petty claims and disputes is just ridiculous.
Disclaimer: This post will probably be fairly discriminatory, fairly generalised, and will portray the author as being fairly facist and thoroughly irked. If you don't like what I'm saying, then do something about it!
I'm well and truly fed up with all this ruckus over Maori claims. They want to be New Zealanders, but at the same time they want special exclusive rights. Well, they must be joking. Their track record is, in general, abominable. Maori organisations have wasted millions of taxpayer's dollars on pie-in-the-sky ventures that usually fold due to mismanagement and internal corruption (Maori TV, Tainui, etc). And the percentage of Maori beneficiaries compared with Pakeha? You all know what I mean.
Okay, say they want to be different. Say they actually should have all these claims honoured. The fact that in general(and there are exceptions, don't get me wrong) they've wasted whatever money they've been given, the fact that a significant proportion of them can't get off their butts to go get a job to support their own families - these facts alone show that as a whole, Maori are in no position to be given management of our country's natural resources. If they were as hard-working and successful as Indians or Chinese, it might be a different story - but as far as I am concerned, they have no credibility whatsoever when it comes to looking after stuff. Maori as a whole should really sort themselves out from the bottom up before even thinking that they're in some sort of position to manage beaches, seabeds, harbours and the like.
But even having said that, why should Maori have their claims honoured? If they want to be New Zealanders, they should work for stuff like everybody else. It seems like they're begging for apartheid. The Treaty of Waitangi was drafted with the intention of bringing the Maori and European cultures together harmoniously. Today it seems to be used to effect the opposite. In this generation, we are all born into the same culture, under the same law, with the same opportunities. Sure, it is perhaps the most important founding document of our present culture, but its time has passed - put it in a museum where it belongs, where it can live out its days in dignity, with a proud history, without all this foolish degrading misuse that we're seeing today.
Our government should grow a spine, and do what everybody knows is right and just, without catering to the every whim of the smallest minority for fear of offending them and losing their vote.
Go ahead, flame me.
For your viewing pleasure, one truck, with its load squarely jammed beneath the pedestrian overpass that spans Albert St, connecting my building (PwC Tower) with the Downtown Shopping Centre.
A nice little incident to keep our Tuesday morning from being boring.
Despite the fact I initially thought it was a tower crane several blocks away dropping its massive load from an unimaginable height, the homeless chap you can see sitting on his seat (in the top photo)didn't even move, and was asleep again in a matter of minutes.
I can hardly begin to imagine the great feeling of immense stupidty that must have overwhelmed the truck driver the instant his eardrums were shattered by the horrifically percussive grinding sound of concrete against concrete at 50kmph (or possibly more).
Oh well, I don't think any of us can pass through this life without being painted by at least one stroke of the idiot brush.
I know I have been.
[The Briefness]
I know you're probably all becoming bored, disillusioned, sad, disgusted, lonely, hungry (or all of the above) with the the increasing briefness of my blog posts.
And its such a shame that all I can post is the misfortune of another (regardless of how entertaining it was for hundreds of passers-by).
Oh well - shall we just call this a 'lull', and hope that it will pass?
Eye halve a spelling chequer
It came with my pea sea
It plainly marques four my revue
Miss steaks eye kin knot sea.
Eye strike a key and type a word
And weight four it two say
Weather eye am wrong oar write
It shows me strait a weigh.
As soon as a mist ache is maid
It nose bee fore two long
And eye can put the error rite
Its rare lea ever wrong.
Eye have run this poem threw it
I am shore your pleased two no
Its letter perfect awl the weigh
My chequer tolled me sew.
- via Delwyn
I got lotsa work on. And I'm always busy at other times. So I haven't been posting much good stuff lately. Sorry. No picture today either.
[Listening]
You must go here and download 'Strong Sad Rocks Out', by The Skate Party. I first heard it and thought, thats kinda cool, but pretty crap - but I listened to it a few more times, and its not too bad. Seriously.
New font of the moment is 'Tahoma'. I reckon its pretty cool. Easy to read. Hope you like it. Thats all.
PS: h*r is still awesome. Seriously.
- Nato has moved his blog. He's also written a goodly bit of stuff of late. Cynicism is good.
- Scotty shares his thoughts on collective ignorance and relates to us the tale of the Great Flood.
- mhjb brings us various interesting snippets - one of which tickled my fancy, regarding the concept of colour.
Best I be getting back to work.
...was pretty ordinary. House work on Saturday morning, and then went to help out at Covenant Presbyterian's new Preschool Centre. It is almost completed. I spent the afternoon re-terminating and testing data points that my brother had previously wired up wrong.
We'd recently been having trouble with our burglar alarm at home - it had been losing mains power periodically, for seemingly no reason. No breakers were tripping or anything like that. But what had happened is the installer had inadvertantly hooked the alarm power supply up to the hot water heater supply, which can be switched on and off remotely by the electricity supplier. So he came back to resolve that on Saturday evening, and then we went out to dinner for Michelle's mum's birthday.
This is all boring trivia.
[Today...]...is definitely Monday. Very cold outside. Lovely sun and cloudless sky, but bitterly cold (for Auckland, anyway). There is one of those big clock/thermometer things on the side of the motorway as you're coming in to town, and this morning at 7:15, it was reading zero degrees C - the lowest I've seen it.
Again, boring trivia
...is definitely Friday. I have that relaxed feeling, which, if left unchecked, can lead to unproductivity.
Hence this blog post.
So yeah..... I've been writing poems, but I feel bad about publishing them. Its an uneasiness - an exposing of oneself.
A baring of the soul, if you like. A boring soul perhaps, but still.
So here is another one - its probably far too hastily prepared to be of any literary worth. But I'm sure not too many people will actually read it anyway.
[as i see it]
pale blue ceiling
blocks scattered here and there
and beneath the toys, a green carpet
with puddles on the floor.
in a block am i trapped
midst the molecules of today
ultra slow-motion here where i sit
but all is tidied up in an instant.
[In Closing]
Today's word of the day - disheveled - is rather fitting. For me, anyway. (Word of the day now published on the links bar to the left, for those who hadn't already noticed).
jostling with the world
in my own lonely bubble
passing pockets of familiarity
walking away from silence and order
away from the inane, the unknowing
following the trail of powder as it burns
winding up to the place where we meet
but then on the outside is all smiles and formalities
the explosion muffled by protocol and fear
the hearing serving only to quash truth
and as it fizzles out, reality sets in
so back i fall, tending my wounds
back through the oblivious world
to the lukewarm and sterile
to dance on my strings
to leave the dream
My parents keep asking how school was. It's like saying, "How was that drive-by shooting?" You don't care how it was, you're lucky to get out alive!- rich g
[Dr Suess]
If a packet hits a pocket on a socket on a port,
and the bus is interrupted as a very last resort,
and the access of the memory makes your floppy disk abort,
then the socket packet pocket has an error to report.
If your cursor finds a menu item followed by a dash
and the double clicking icon puts your window in the trash
and your data is corrupted 'cause the index doesn't hash,
then your situation's hopeless and your system's gonna crash!
If the label on the cable on the table at your house
says the network is connected to the button on your mouse,
but your packets want to tunnel to another protocol,
that's repeatedly rejected by the printer down the hall,
and your screen is all distorted by the side effects of gauss,
so your icons in the window are as wavy as a souse;
then you may as well reboot and go out with a bang,
cuz sure as I'm a poet, the sucker's gonna hang!
When the copy of your floppy's getting sloppy in the disk
and the micro code instructions cause unnecessary risk,
then you'll have to flash the memory
and you'll want to RAM your ROM.
Quickly turn off the computer
and be sure to tell your Mom!
- found on the bulletin board at work.
Well, as many of you may know, this last semester I completed another paper towards my engineering degree. I received the results this morning.
I achieved an overall grade of 'B+', which is totally legendary, for me. It has to be close to one of the highest marks I've ever got.
I can now feel the sun on my face as I climb above the cloud cover of mediocrity.
[Misc.]
- It starts with the stop signs [via scotty]
- USB watch
Yes - I know - I are been slack of late. But I have good reason.
Michelle moved back home on Saturday, and so time spent blogging has been reallocated for use as time spent with my wife. This is a good thing. An even-better-than-blogging thing.
So, thanks to you all for your prayers and support - they are bearing fruit, and your continued faithfulness will be greatly appreciated.
[Britomart]
Yes, it sounds like a good name for a laundromat, but the new Britomart Transport Centre took its first train yesterday morning. I popped down there at lunchtime today to see what all the fuss was about, and found myself walking into another country, a country where they actually have underground railway stations. I would have thought that, like other countries, there would have been more shops and stalls in the station, but then of course, its not even finished properly yet, and there may not be the volume of passengers to warrant any retail even when it is all finished. But we shall see.
Lots of dressed concrete, and a subtle, yet effective use of coloured lighting. The pedestrian subway under QEII square is lined with those little white ceramic tiles, which gave me the impression someone had dug the subway in the seventies, just waiting for it to be unearthed for use in the Britomart complex thirty years later. Oh well, I'm sure in thirty years time they'll have a two-centimetre-thick coating of rock-concert posters.
Another random discovery was that the escalators move slower than average.
On the whole, I like it. I'm not at all up with the play on modern architecture or design, but I would say that this has been executed tastefully, and rather simply. It looks easy to maintain, and there is plenty of space - it is quite a bit airier than most other underground stations, but then it does have the odd window in the roof that allows daylight to be seen.
If you're looking for it, the new station is under the old CPO building at the bottom of Queen St - right on QEII square, which is soon to be reopened for bus traffic only.
I'm off home in fifteen minutes - so you all have a good evening!
I love fire. But I'm not a pyromaniac - maybe more of a pyrophiliac. I have figured out how to build roaring hot fires, of the kind that are so hot you can't get near enough to put more wood on without burning yourself. And thats only using wood - wait till I get me some coal.
Unfortunately, all the convectional heat goes up the chimney, so its only the radiant heat that actually does anything. The immediate vicinity of the fireplace is almost too hot, whilst the rest of the house is still cold.
Perhaps we should get some curtains.
[Fondue]
In full Swiss tradition (Michelle is Swiss, for those who were unaware) we are having a cheese fondue tonight at Michelle's parent's place. I love Swiss food and stuff. In fact, I love Switzerland - I could live there easily.
We spent 10 days there in July of last year - their summer. I'd love to go back there in winter and get into some skiing. A white Christmas would be nice, too.
[Farewell]- (three 'F's)
Anyway - the end of my working day has passed, so I shouldn't really hang around here much longer, or I'll get roped into helping someone. Take care, and you all have a great weekend!
This actually made me cry....
Why did it make me cry?
I'm not sure. The article makes it clear that Rob had many offers of support, so it was obviously his own choice to live the way he did. No need to cry about that. It seems sad to me to think that he once had a job and also a wife. What happened to him to turn him away from society? What changed inside him that made him comfortable living in poverty in the bush? What made him refuse much-needed medical treatment?
Despite the fact that it was his choice to live the way he did, it is still such a sad image - an ill, lonely man, maybe even knowing his end is near, with all his worldly posessions, kneeling down in the gutter, in the pouring rain, to simply die.
- The Neverending Soda
- This found my blog.
- This is the coolest tool evor. Seriously. (Cheers mhjb)
