From London to Aotearoa and back again
I was born in London to Kiwi parents who were there on their honeymoon. You may think it must have been a long honeymoon but that’s a story for another time.
I was taken by ship and flying boat to Aotearoa and didn’t return to the country of my birth until I was 21. I was carrying a surfboard when I arrived at London’s Heathrow Airport. The customs officer stamped my passport and waved me through with the comment, “If you spear anyone with the fin of the board, make sure he is black.” “Well,” I remember thinking, “I wonder if all the English are like that, which would be ironic considering how their present prosperity is largely due to the African slave trade they indulged in and the often ruthless exploitation of the countries they colonised.”
Anyway, I stayed with my cousin David and his wife who had a flat in Earl’s Court, where most Kiwis on their OE ended up. David introduced me to the temporary accounting employment agency he worked through and a few days later I was sitting at a desk at Sperry Univac, one of the first computing companies. There was just one computer there and it was huge, the size of a small garden shed. My boss was a German called Rudi and one of my colleagues was an Indian guy called Rocky. After working there for about five months I was offered a transfer to Seoul in South Korea. Rocky had been at the company for way longer than me and was anxious for a promotion, so I said to Rudi that I wasn’t interested and why didn’t he ask Rocky. He told me that Rocky would never be promoted under his watch because he was Indian and therefore not as intelligent as the white accountants. “My god,” I remember thinking, “Are all Germans like that?”, but I never got to go to Germany and I never fought in the World Wars so I never found out. The Germans I have met since that time don’t seem to have racist views.
I guess there are people with racist attitudes in most countries, even here in NZ, which used to be recognised for its progressive race relations. I believe there is an innate negativity towards other races, especially Māori, just under the skin of some Kiwis. God help us if the Treaty Principles Bill ever reaches a referendum and attitudes like these are in a majority. Our steps toward an equitable partnership with our tangata whenua will be set back by years.
Anyway, after the Rocky/Rudi episode I decided I had saved enough money for a trip to India, Sri Lanka and Nepal. I was away for six months to escape the harsh English winter and on returning met up with two Kiwis and one Aussie friend and rented a beautiful old manor house in the Kentish countryside. The house even had a name – Barton Wood. It was a two-storied, 200-year-old mansion with a gatehouse, a pond, an acre of garden and old trees and was surrounded by undulating English farmland which included 40 acres of broad beans. I happen to love broad beans, especially served with parsley or cheese sauce, so from the time we took over the house in early spring, I enjoyed watching the newly planted seedlings clawing their way towards the sky. Little did I know that 1975 would be one of the hottest English summers ever and the beans were never harvested due to the lack of water. Well, you can imagine how many bean dinners were enjoyed by the resident antipodeans.
My housemate Dave and I decided we needed to make a little money so we made some signs which read ‘Gardening and Odd Jobs – 80p an hour’, and put them up in shop windows in the nearby villages. The work came slowly at first and word of mouth did the rest. I especially remember two of my employers. One was an old codger, who owned an estate nearby and needed a temporary gardener to fill in for the permanent one who was ill. He thought our rate of 80 pence (about NZ$2) was a bit steep and informed us that he only paid his full-time gardener 12 pounds a week (NZ$30) plus a small cottage to live in. We were happy we didn’t drop our rate, when we asked if we could take home a few heads of broccoli from the huge lot which were going to flower. He refused our request. The poor old bloke was as rich as our current prime minister, but as tight as Donald Trump’s corset … umh … Anyway, it made me wonder why some of those with plenty, plead poverty, while many of those with nothing will often give you the shirt off their back or even their undies. Like the little old pensioner who we called Mrs B who lived on the breadline – who wanted to up our rate, and even made cakes for us to take home, after we had fixed and replastered a wonky wall in her house even though we had never done plastering before. Bless her.
One day, my mum, who I hadn’t seen for a couple of years, wrote to say she was coming to visit me. Time often makes us forget our differences so off I went to the airport to pick her up, quite excited to see her after such a long time. Well, wouldn’t you know it, after about 30 minutes into our drive back to Barton Wood, we had our first argument. Even after two years, our old buttons were still there to be pushed. I had started doing yoga seriously in India, and had given up drinking alcohol and smoking weed. I thought I was pretty pure and marching toward some kind of enlightenment whatever that was going to be. I hit the ground with a dull thud and realised my old thought patterns and resentments were still alive and thriving thank you very much. So, when my mum offered to pay for the two of us to do a bus trip around Europe, I made the lame excuse that I had too much work on. Luckily, she met up with a Kiwi girl friend who accompanied her on the bus. “Whew,” I thought, but on reflection, perhaps I missed out on an opportunity to try and overcome the barriers between us.
In fact, even when she died 25 years later, I still hadn’t resolved whatever it was that prevented me from opening my heart to her, one of my only regrets in life. Why do we hold on to old stuff? Recently, my partner was consulting a clairvoyant who without prompting spoke to her about my mother. She told her, “Whatever was said or not said, it is all okay.” I took this to mean that my mum was doing fine in her afterlife or wherever she was, and for me not to worry. Who knows how things work after we leave this life but it doesn’t seem to matter to me, as it has somehow lessened the guilt I used to feel.
To be continued …
Words by Ross Liggins
Coromind: Coromandel’s Collaborative Magazine
Help us take Coromind Magazine to new heights by becoming a member. Click here
Change the Weather for Your Business: Advertise with Us.
Advertise your business in the whole Hauraki Coromandel in the coolest Coromandel Art Magazine, from Waihi Beach/Paeroa /Thames up to the Great Barrier Island.
Advertise Smarter, Not Harder: Get in Touch
