The black magnetic beaches of Piha

A couple of weeks back we decided it was time again to go on what Pooh Bear would undoubtedly call an expotition. At the suggestion, Maya groaned and asked if she'd be expected again to walk miles and miles. Max looked up and asked if we would be visiting friends. The answers, yes and no respectively, did nothing to perk up the younger members of the family. The promise of ice-cream and a picnic, however, did wonders to the morale of the troops; so, armed with our debit card (called an "eftpos" card here) and a picnic pack stuffed to overflowing, and with the inclusion of beanies and scarves being our one concession to the ominous autumn weather, we set off for the wild, surf-battered Tasman coast: the untamed western landscape that irreverent Aucklanders call "the West Island"; where the undercurrents (both oceanic and social) are unpredictable and undisciplined, where the "Westies" (think Pretoria West, Benoni or the Cape Flats) reign supreme and the very basic holiday cottages called 'baches' (from the term 'bachelor pad') still bear a resemblance to their original form (unlike the millionaire holiday retreats we find out east where we live).

Thus we picknicked on Piha, origin of the reality sea-rescue show originally entitled "Piha Rescue", where the magnetic black sand meets wild black waves and roaring western winds; and whose forests and perilous mountain passes are reminiscent of Fangorn forest and where one imagines quite easily the sudden appearance of prehistoric creatures peering between the giant tree ferns and misty bearded fronds. We dared the winding, narrow road down the beautiful, eerie black beach called Karekare where "The Piano" was filmed, and splashed through the river mouth along the narrow path between craggy peaks of the gods' most recent creations to stand in wonder at the vast expanse of fine black volcanic sand on a feral beach that is simultaneously peaceful and vehement, but always intense.

We drove along curving tracks where still grow the forests that time forgot, which until so recently had never known the tread of mammals or the stench and screech of modern machines. Here, so close to Auckland, we stepped into a time bubble where only a short time ago the world's largest bird, the moa, and its largest eagle, the Haast eagle, foraged and hunted in what must have been an avian paradise; where, unhindered by predators, bright and melodious birds bejewelled the forests of the land mass Zealandia. Here, the archaic curling tree ferns and ancient gnarled tree trunks still bear witness to history even though the song of so many birds is long silenced, and a centuries-old Kauri tree with a girth of seven metres still stands tall. Some of these trees and plants remain virtually unchanged from the time that dinosaurs splashed in pools among their roots.

It was a good day. Maya learned about birds and allowed herself to be chased by the waves. Max enjoyed his hot chocolate and bonded with his dad. We indulged our spirit of adventure and romance and intrigue. We all breathed deeply the oxygen-rich air of the rolling Waitakere forests. And when we got home, with black-sanded feet and wind-tangled hair, bellies full of ice-cream and excitement, we all sleep deeply, and well.

I know. It's shocking. Simply appalling. No blog entry for nearly three months. What excuse could possibly serve?

But perhaps this silence is diagnostic: rather than offering an excuse, perhaps I could offer our cyber-silence itself as an explanation of where we are in our process of acculturation, acclimatisation and accommodation (succinctly, perhaps: aKiwisation?). To spend time writing, or even simply pleasantly cyber-doodling such as posting photos, Skypeing or Facebooking, requires making this a priority over all else. And leisure (including such acts of self-actualisation through the creative act of writing) is something associated with the highest levels of Maslow's hierarchy, waaay past the scrabble for survival, food, sleep, shelter - past safety and security - beyond friendship, family, belonging - following even confidence, self-assurance, respect from and for others. No prizes for what emigration - and the need for dual-income families - does to all that.

Not accidentally, the dearth of blogs coincides with my engagement with paid employment outside of the home (notice how I didn't say "when I began to work", for obvious reasons). Since then, day-to-day life has largely become a case of doing things that win the bid in the top 20 need-to-do-priority lotto, with things like blogging, writing letters and Skypeing not even in the lotto. We had grand visions of keeping in touch with everyone in our lives once in NZ - Skype, email, and snail mail would turn us into creative gurus whose brilliant and witty correspondence would be worthy of publication, perhaps not even posthumously... We had not imagined the amount of time this would require. Consequently Willem has quickly made a name for himself as Worst Facebook Friend (all he does is benevolently accept Friend requests, but no more), Email Emo (sharing aspects of his life in cryptic verses which provides the sensation of intellectual contact at least) and Skype Hermit (he rarely answers the Skype ring). I at least churn out the occasional email in the dark hours of the night, but that seems to be the extent of it. Trying in this forum to explain that I am just too damn tired at the end of the day makes me feel like a Spoilt White Medem - but there it is, and it's true (the tiredness anyway; we could probably debate the spoilt bit too).

In fact, the only reason I am writing now is that I felt inspired this evening to the extent that I dared forfeit sleep. The source of the inspiration was literary: in a moment of fiscal recklessness I booked tickets to take Maya to see Cats next week (in the noble interests of mother-daughter bonding and an all-round education, naturally); and in preparation for this we watched the DVD production of Cats this evening, which I ordered online from the library together with TS Eliot's Old Possum's Book of Practical Cats and picked up from the mobile library bus which parks a short way down our street on Wednesday mornings. (I love this country!) The DVD inspired Max and Maya to dance around the room in what they imagined were frisky feline poses, and reminded me of how much poetry, art and music delight me. So after a bedtime story revolving around the exploits of Macavity (with many embellishments in a-b-a-b-rhyme, which made Maya chortle and twist herself into further cat-like knots on the mattress, and which sent Max into a fearful, wide-eyed jitter of being stolen away by the Napoleon of crime), I left the dishes to the ants, piled the freshly laundered towels into the tumble dryer and put it on a long cycle, resisted the temptation to read a textbook, do some online banking or reply to my emails, and started cutting and pasting fragments of emails to put together a meagre blog offering for our friends and followers, who, like Zuma's supporters, amazingly don't seem to lose hope that we will deliver on our promises.

Speaking of friends. We miss our friends in SA something fierce. We miss being part of a circle of old friends, where comfort and energy can be derived just from being in their company, and where company and entertaining replaces rather than drains energy. Maya is still struggling to make new friends and my heart bleeds for her - she pines for her best friend in SA. Max has made friends at school but misses his grandparents and his nanny Emma. He often asks when we are going back to SA and occasionally demands "white pap like Emma used to feed me" for breakfast, lunch and anytime he's feeling hungry, grumpy or fragile. (It is salient to mention here that mielie pap is nonexistent in Kiwi society and can only be obtained with some effort and at no small expense from a South African speciality shop. The closest thing I could get from the local dairy, in desperation last Sunday morning, was polenta.) It is still an effort to remember not to insert Afrikaans words or expressions into our vernacular, and to use words that are common here (knickers not undies, jumper or cardie not jersey, chook not chicken, togs not swimming costume, traffic light not robot, tea or dinner not supper, dairy not cafe, and so on). Argh! I catch myself becoming morbid. Time to change to subject.

Our work is very demanding, but also very exciting. Willem works with the very bad (sex offenders), and I work with the very mad (chronic schizophrenics), and we both relish being in the thick of things and at the cutting edge of what we were trained to do. It is immensely satisfying, but horribly scary, not only because most of the time we feel as if we have no idea of what we are doing, and are confronted daily with our discomfiting lack of knowledge and skills and the sense of floundering in a sea of as-yet-unmastered knowledge. We love our jobs and love the fact that we can build a career here and expand our skills is multiple directions, far more than we ever could in the field of clinical psychology in South Africa. Yet it is not a comfortable place to be for two professionals who were very comfortable with and skilled at what they were doing before. I personally despise feeling like a green intern all over again. And all learning is painful. And tiring. (Have I mentioned tiring?)

Unfortunately, demanding jobs, no matter how interesting, mean that we are wasted when we get home. When the car pulls into the driveway, Shift 2 commences (homework, play dates, mediating midget wars, making endless healthy snacks for the constantly-ravenous Audrey II and III (if you don't get the allusion you shouldn't be reading this blog), ballet and swimming lessons, doctor's and dentist's appointments, house cleaning & maintenance, washing, cooking, dishes, bedtime stories, teeth-brushing, toilet-seat mopping, picking up clothes and wet towels scattered by diminutive trolls, etc). After this, Shift 3 starts (more dishes, PhD, correspondence, ironing, home admin and internet banking, possibly even some grownup conversation that is more than just a scheduling meeting, or - first prize - collapsing in front of the TV and the fire with a DVD series of 'House'). Theraafter we retire to bed for the start of Shift 4 (sleep, usher shivering kid back to bed after bad dream or loss of duvet, cat wants out, sleep, take kid back to bed, cat wants in, sleep, get kneed in groin and find kid in bed, move to kid's bed, cat wants out, sleep, kid wants hot chocolate and a cuddle, sleep, cat wants in... Shift 1 starts).

In a nutshell: life is very full and also very exciting, but the ups and downs are extreme. In all of this craziness, we draw strength from small moments in the present, the love and enduring connections with our friends and family, and the vision of a time when our children will call this country 'home' and when we will have worn comfy me-shaped dents in our life-mattress. We do not regret moving to NZ at all, but the effort it requires is great and the toll it exacts is no small pound of flesh. Paul Simon (whose upcoming concert the new emigré could not afford to attend) sums it up better than I do: "The thought that life could be better is woven indelibly into our hearts and our brains".

So don't hold your breath for blogs. But somewhere, in the smoky office of my mind, an old typewriter is clacking away, tapping out the minutiae of our lives that are for each of us as we live them masterpieces of insight and wit, emotion and reflection. More than this, in a corner of the ramshackle office is a stage, with a red velvet curtain, and every now and then, when my mind-manuscripts manage to draw breath through connection, through reaching out beyond time-space boundaries, clocks or schedules, temporality or inscription to touch the people I care about and who care about me, the curtains open, and the lights go up.

And then, and then, and gloriously then, I become a Jellicle Cat.