So I was nearly asleep late last night when I caught wind of a 2nd alarm scrub fire burning out of control on the Eastern Hills out in the Hutt Valley. I ummed and ahh'ed about whether it was worth driving out there or not... but when i got word that the fire was close to skuttling the Anderson residence, thereby correcting a lifetime of bastardry, i thought this i had to see.
I scrambled out of bed and ran down to the car, scanner in one hand, shoes in the other. As I hit the motorway, still some kilometers from the fireground, I could see a wrath of fire lighting up a beacon right across the city. By the time I got to Waterloo the flames pierced the night-sky rising to mammoth heights over the hills. I, like every other nutjob in town, drove directly to the fire, seeking the best vantage point possible. As I turned on to Riverside Drive, traffic came to a screeching gridlocked halt. There was nowhere to go. Cars to the left of me, cars to the right... everyone's bonnets facing different directions while everyone's eyes were fixated on the best show in town. As the novelty of the situation wore off and people slowly realised that this traffic jam wasn't going to fix itself, the people in the cars started to look at each other... each one as embarrassed to be there as me.
With the cars not moving there was little else to do but to get out and mingle with the people on the street. I've been to many a bush fire in my time, and what is really striking is the way that these events bring out the community. People come out of their houses, people drive, cycle and run from all directions just to get a better look at it. And people actually talk to one another. It reminded me of a fire I went to in Cannons Creek one year. A Samoan family had opened up their lawn, with the best view of the fire, so that rubber neckers could get a good look at the action as the helicopters whirled overhead. The atmosphere last night made me wish i'd called into the grocery store on the way down there and bought a big bag of marshmallows for everyone to roast.
Oh yeah and in case anybody wondered - the Anderson residence survived.
Office Space is one of my favorite movies. I have seen it an estimated 30-40 times since striking its gold on the video store shelves in 2001. I gotta level with ya, I am an Office Space fan.
Well i took the big step and moved into Wellington. Closer to work, and closer to the action. I am living on Crieff St, in the suburb of Northland. Pictured is the Northland Fire Station, which is at the very top of my street, although not accessible directly from my street by road. Crieff Street is one of several streets in Wellington affected by Colonial Idiocy Syndrome. Much of Wellington's street layout was designed in London by a bunch of beard sprouting, cigar smoking, top-hat wearing colonialists looking at maps. Maps are flat. Land in Wellington is not. Consequently, to reach the rest of Northland from Crieff St, you drive half way up and then walk a killer zig zag track up the hill. The fact that there is no direct road route to the fire station from my place is of little concern, as it has now been closed and converted to apartments.
Other interesting features in the 'hood include the Kelburn Viaduct (constructed 1934)...
..and the Northland Tunnel (constructed 1929).
Both of these were constructed to level out the gradient of the climbs for different tramways. The Northland tramline went through this tunnel and connected with the Karori line, which went downtown via Glenmore Street, which is the street that Crieff St intersects with at the base of the hill.
The tramlines have long since disappeared from Welington, wrapped up and replaced by trolley buses in 1964. However, Glenmore Street residents are unusually fond of the historic bus shelters left behind from the old Karori line. The one pictured is not in fact the original, but a replica constructed at much greater expense to the community than the plastic-fantastic adshell model after the original shelter was destroyed by an out-of-control trolley bus one tragic day in 1989. A memorial plaque on the replica shelter commemorates the work of area residents who so flagrantly wasted money which could have been spent feeding starving children.
This is the Chinese embassy, where most mornings a hardy group of falon gong practitioners gather across the road and silently do some wicked kung fu moves with their eyes closed.
