I don't know what it is in the human psyche that prompts spur of the moment decisions but what ever it is sees us spending three nights in Hamilton over the Xmas period.
The city does not endear itself to me, as a 1996 Council decision saw my museum directorship made redundant as with that of the Chief Librarian, the Head of the City Zoo, amongst others.
It was of course a cost cutting exercise that was doomed to fail, as was proved a decade later when the Museum and Library once again came under the stewardship of their own directors. But that as they say, is another story.
What is of interest is that the CEO at the time, he who devised the 'brilliant' Hamilton City restructuring plan, is now the CEO of Christchurch City Council; a city still experiencing devastating earthquakes (three more significant quakes over the last 24 hours).
This gentleman has just been given a $70,000 pay increase which naturally is drawing howls of outrage from the ratepayers who are faced with a ravaged city and personal prospects that are not much better.
Has he publicly declined to accept this raise - me thinks not!
But back in Hamilton as I write the weather is as humid as Singapore's with rain threatening. For the first time since our return from the Republic we are using the air-conditioning to beat the humidity.
The afternoon was spent visiting supermarkets, fighting for parking spaces and shopping trolleys and looking at prices of items that have been raised in the past week. Why one want to scramble for mince pies and Xmas hams defies belief. The same items will be discounted the following week.
Postscript:
Today is Christmas Day and there is a deathly hush over the city - most of Hamilton seems to have either deserted the ship or slept in, or both.
Our motel proprietor wished us a merry Xmas as he handed me a replacement rubbish bag and coffee sachets. Ours will be a quiet one as we don't celebrate the festival; perhaps a trip to the renowned Hamilton Gardens if the weather holds and they are open.
The Xinmsn article included the following sentence " Between January and November 2011, REACH received over 45,000 feedback inputs — a jump of 53 per cent compared with about 29,450 in the same period in 2010."
One has to ask, why is the standard of written English so poor, on a website which is strictly controlled and presumably edited?
What exactly are " feedback inputs" ? They sound like public service jargon to me. As for "compared with about", this phrase is simply poor grammar.
Disappointing, as the article itself expressed the ongoing dissatisfaction of Singaporeans on matters related to transport housing and immigration and was worthy of serious consideration. Being part of the Christmas shopping rush aboard a crowded MRT train is an experience one does not wish to repeat too often.
From the ridiculous to the sublime; the famous Christmas buffet has reappeared in Singapore' hotels. Not all of these are strictly traditional. Take the Marina Mandarin which is serving up Buah Keluak turkey served with chestnut and mushroom glutinous rice, Nyonya Chap Chye, Thai style pumpkin lasagna and Fuji apple and Chestnut pudding.
And if you still have a space left to fill the next day you can amble over to the Sheraton Towers for Buah Roast piglet stuffed with yam and sour apple sauce, Escargot Bourguignon as well as Poached stingray and baby shark with spicy mayonnaise and garlic aioli.
As for me, I shall be dining on a festive sandwich filled with "feedback inputs" which, depending upon the ingredients, may rapidly repeat becoming feedback outputs.
The Xmas silly season seems to come earlier and earlier to our shopping malls. Orchard Road's lights have been lit up to celebrate a festival that is still a good month away and the local malls in New Zealand are already trotting out their Xmas specials.
Even if you don't subscribe to the religious overtones of the celebration, there is something vaguely obscene about being so blatantly commercial, so early.
The traditional twelve days of Xmas seems to have become the 'twelve months of Xmas'.
Xmas Santa - Rural South Australia Photo: Roger Smith
In fact, the twelve days of Xmas commence on Christmas Day and conclude on the eve of January 5th. - the origins of the song coming from France rather than Britain.
Mind you in Singapore the erection of Xmas decorations is reasonably uneventful whereas this year in Auckland we have witnessed a rather spectacular helicopter crash that occurred when a large artificial tree was being constructed in the Viaduct Basin.
The pre-Xmas advertising in NZ has been somewhat overshadowed by the General Election which reaches its climax this Saturday. Whatever the outcome there will not be too many 'stocking fillers' to lighten the economic gloom ahead.
A partridge in a pear tree might be all that we get.
Image by Reggie Wanvia FlickrWe braved the Boxing Days sales yesterday in our local town centre. For once they reminded me of the till queues experienced in the good old days of the Robinsons Sale; a Singapore institution.
The origins of 'Boxing Day' are believed to come from the practice of the British rich distributing their largesse to the luckless poor, thereby accentuating still further the class divisions of the times.
In large households the servants were expected to work on Xmas Day and were compensated by being allowed to take the next day off. Their masters gave them a box and based on their performance over the year, varying sums of money which were placed inside the box.
Am I alone in spotting the similarity of this Victorian custom with the annual performance bonus which features so largely in Singaporean working lives?
This year we have had the "Boxing Day" sales a week or two before the actual day as the New Zealand retailers desperately canvas for customers.
Unlike Singapore which has recorded respectable economic growth despite the recession, New Zealand has very narrowly avoided a 'double-dip recession', a term which may sound like a chocolate dipped NZ icecream but is in reality far less palatable.
The Singapore government's tight stewardship during the economic turbulence is to be commended and the results are for all to see.
As a trading nation far for its markets and with a strong dollar against our major trading partners, New Zealand has some major economic challenges. This has not be helped by the past excesses of the welfare state.
Despite the gloom and doom, sport remains high on the list of leisure pursuits in this country and with the traditional summer holidays upon us, many New Zealanders head to the beach.
Fishing is a very popular activity with local television channels featuring fishing shows and the customers purchasing cut-price rods and reels in the Boxing Day sales.
I have very fond memories of this sport with fly fishing for trout as well as rod fishing off the rocks for a catch from the sea featuring in my past. I have done neither in recent years but the thrill of the catch is still a fond memory.
Source: Straits Times
In Singapore the fishing experience is somewhat different and I must discount fishing for one's supper at a local prawn farm.
Travelling to a raised platform called a kelong is a preferred method and nowadays with few of the Singapore kelongs remaining, Singaporeans go across to Malaysia for their sport.
Boxing Day was not a good day for Singaporean fishermen with the news that three of them drowned and another two were missing returning by ferry from a kelong in Pulau Sibu, off Mersing.
As per usual, the problem was a grossly overloaded ferry which capsized in strong winds and a treacherous current near the Tanjung Leman jetty.
Ferry capsizes in South East Asia happen with monotonous regularity, especially in the Philippines and Indonesia were maritime rules are flouted in a grab for more profit.
Malaysian incidents are fewer but do occur and arresting the captain and boat operator post-event is not going to curb such negligence.
Is prawning fishing?
Meanwhile back on land, hedonistic spending ensures that the mall tills continue to jingle a happy tune.
Crowds are returning to the Singapore malls with Vivo City recording a million more visitors compared to the same period last year and their security staff remain vigilant for any kind of misdemeanor.
According to the Straits Times, pickpockets, shoplifters and even molesters enjoy the festive season. Here in Auckland the 'molesters' usually make the malls off limits but shoplifting has always been a problem.
Both countries though enjoy a good deal and in Singapore the newly Groupon-acquired site Deal.com crashed under the weight of bargain hunters.
Even then, the online option is probably safer than venturing out?
Boxing Day in our southern city of Christchurch was an eventful one with a series of earthquake after-shocks rattling customers and the shelves that were groaning under the weight of bargains.
When I think of Christmas I think of the lights of Orchard Road as they used to be ten or twenty years ago. In recent years the lighting has been a 'shadow' of what it used to be.
The impact of satellite malls has made themselves felt. This year will be the first time in five years that I will not be experiencing a Singapore Xmas. Even a watered down version of Orchard Road lighting is better than the limp affair in New Zealand cities.
This wasn't always the case but as the spirit of the festive season has been steadily eroded by commercial greed and avarice, the little personal touches have been lost.
At least in Singapore the shops stay open on Christmas Day. In Auckland as happens elsewhere in New Zealand, everything comes to a grinding halt. This enforced break used to last for up to three days but thankfully now the supermarkets reopen on Boxing Day and the Boxing Day sales in the Antipodes remain a feature.
If we are into commercialism at Xmas let's go the whole way!
We have had two weeks of steady rain which has broken the back of the drought we were experiencing earlier in the month. While in Singapore the weather is cooler and wetter, here the weather is warmer and should be drier from December to February.
Our news is full of Kiwis stranded at Heathrow airport in the UK who will not be making it back to Godzone for the Xmas reunion with family.
According to a BBC report, Heathrow can only afford one runway sweeping machine to clear the snow and ice, so departure delays are expected to continue for some time.
Having experienced the diabolical atmosphere and attitude of Heathrow on more than one occasion I am not surprised by this news. Such unpreparedness would simply not be tolerated at Changi.
Perhaps the Brits could try amusing passengers stranded in the terminals by adopting the Bangladeshi approach to entertainment?
Dhaka's Shahjalal International inadvertently screened a pornographic film for a full five minutes before anyone realised what was happening. The presentation replaced their usual recorded documentaries about the culture and geography.
Things like Heathrow's service levels may never change but other things can change a lot.
Take the recent activity in my Singapore 'home town' district of Queenstown, an older estate in the Republic. Apparently the locals have taken to divesting themselves of their garments if this report is to be believed.
The heat at the bus stops used to get to me, but I was never tempted to strip. Apparently the gentleman concerned couldn't understand why he was not getting "fries with everything" when he divested himself of his gear at McDonalds.
"Run, run, as fast as you can.
You can't catch me!
I'm the Gingerbread Man!"
But catch up with him they did; the absurdity of human beings at times being simply mind boggling!
A politically correct Lancashire council have stripped Gingerbread biscuits stripped of their gender and renamed them gingerbread 'persons' on menus for 400 primary schools, leaving parents astonished about the change.
According to a report in Indian media the wording went out on the new autumn-winter weekly menu provided by the Lancashire School Meals Service.
Little wonder that spoofs of political correctness have been popular on the Net. One of my favourites is the Politically Correct Little Red Riding Hood which commences:
" There once was a young person named Little Red Riding Hood who lived on the edge of a large forest full of endangered owls and rare plants that would probably provide a cure for cancer if only someone took the time to study them.
Red Riding Hood lived with a nurture giver whom she sometimes referred to as "mother", although she didn't mean to imply by this term that she would have thought less of the person if a close biological link did not in fact exist.
Nor did she intend to denigrate the equal value of nontraditional households, although she was sorry if this was the impression conveyed.
Some interesting facts about the name 'Orchard Road'. It was named after the orchard of one of the earliest planation owners who lived in Singapore in the 19th century - William Scott.
Scott's Road is also named after Scott. His luxurious residence, which was called 'Hurricane House, was subsequently bought by His Majesty Somdetch Phra Paramindr Maha Chulalongkorn, the supreme King of Siam who visited Singapore often in the late 1890's.
It is now the Thai Embassy on Orchard Road and the royal connection and reverance for the monarchy is why the Thais will never sell it to the Singapore government nor any other party.
This morning's bus was dressed up as a cow. A large pair of white horns rose above the roof of the driver's compartment and a tail with a jaunty sweep decorated the rear.
Bus decoration is part of life in Singapore with the desire to get the advertising message out taking many forms, in this case bovine.
On the subject of decorations it is very surprising to see that the Christmas decorations are already going up in Orchard Road and Tanglin Mall is featuring its nativity tableau.
This a full two months before Christmas actually happens; the festive spirit seems to be coming earlier each year.
Reportedly with the big APEC gathering in Singapore next month the decorations have gone up early to make a good impressions for the delegates.
All of their Christmases will have come at once - literally.
