Thunderbear 272

However, it went without saying that the female leaders of the future, as imagined by Ms Steinem would be liberal ladies drawn from the thin corridors of leftist thought on the West and East Coasts. They would bear a striking resemblance to, um, well, Gloria Steinem.

Therefore, it would be interesting to learn what Gloria Steinem thinks of Gale Norton, Fran Mainella, and Abigail Kimbell.

All three women shattered glass ceilings; Gale Norton was the first female Secretary of the Interior, Fran Mainella was the first female Director of the National Park Service and Abigail Kimbell has become the first female Chief of the US Forest Service.

All appointed of course by that tireless glass ceiling smasher, George W. Bush..

In return all for that glass ceiling breaking, Norton and Mainella did their level best in breaking the environment and, according to the environmental gadfly, Scott Silver, Abigail Kimbell will not be left behind. Silver dryly remarked "For too many years, the Department of Agriculture (Forest Service) lagged behind the Department of Interior in its zeal to advance the privatization agenda. I expect that the gap will soon be narrowing."

On a more positive note, Ms Kimbell's immediate boss, Secretary of Agriculture Mike Johanns, said of her "Gail brings a wealth of knowledge to her new position. She is respected both within the agency and by our stakeholders. I am confident she will do a terrific job as Chief."

Senator Baucus of Montana is not quite as sanguine as the Secretary According to the Senator "She is inclined to raise fees, close campgrounds and otherwise make it harder for people to access their lands..."

Senator Baucus seems to sense that the "Stakeholders" that are so admiring of Ms Kimbell are not necessarily mainstream American people.

Nor is it 100% true that Ms Kimbell is totally respected by the rank and file of the Forest Service.

One reason is that she has a bit of a history of "eliminating" those perceived as opponents. This is alright if you are the protagonist in an Agatha Christie mystery novel; less O.K. if you are an agency chief.

This history is discussed at some length by Richard Artley, a retired US Forest Service Forest Planner, in an open letter to Chief Kimbell which he has kindly given permission to reprint. In THUNDERBEAR:

Abigail Kimbell Regional Forester Northern Region US Forest Service
Dear Ms Kimball,
Why am I not surprised that you have been selected to succeed Dale Bosworth as the next Chief of the Forest Service?
It is clear to most thinking Americans that Bush has no regard for the environment. Bush's staff and their corporate allies spend an incredible amount of time and money to seek out people who will carry on Bush's anti-environment legacy long after Bush is gone from the White House in January of 2009.
I knew you, Abigail, on a day to day basis at Oregon State University from 1979 to 1980. We were pursuing our master's degree in logging engineering. I could not understand at the time why you were never able to envision a tree as anything other than several logs. To you, a tree was a "piece" that weighed so many "kips" to be hauled to a "landing"
It never occurred to you that these trees you wanted so desperately to log were part of a forest picnic site for a family....or a critical piece of wildlife habitat...or that these trees might shade a blue ribbon trout stream.
I never said anything to you at the time. I felt you might grow out of it. I thought that once you left academia and actually started walking alone in the forest, you would see the majesty of the natural world without human tinkering . I was wrong.
Based on your history (shown below) it's obvious that your skewed sense of values stayed with you and became even more bizarre after you left college.
Your Bighorn National Forest mistakes.
You were selected as the forest supervisor for the Bighorn National Forest in 1997. Prior to your arrival on the forest, you knew that in 1994 some Bighorn N.F. employees wrote a letter to their regional forester stating that the Bighorn forest supervisor had created a hostile work environment for his employees and was mismanaging the forest in several ways (see below). Rather than thanking these employees for their work, you reacted differently.
Within a year after arriving, you decided to abolish 14 positions with forest reorganization. Of the total 14 positions that you proposed to be abolished, 5 were the positions of the 6 people who signed the letter of complaint that were still working on the Bighorn National Forest. You told the press that the reorganization was necessary to stay within you budget.
Over the next two years, you used the WRAPS process (Workforce Reduction and Placement System) to reassign four of the 1994 letter signers to other stations. One of these 4 people was reassigned to a position in Arkansas that he had never performed and had no prior experience in. One letter signer had his job abolished and was able to be re-employed on the Big Horn only after various members of Congress spoke on his behalf.
By the year 2000, only 2 people remained on the Bighorn who had signed the 1994 letter to the Regional Forester pointing out massive mismanagement of public land.
The Government Accountability Project (A non-profit law firm) defended the employees that were threatened by you, Ms Kimbell. The GAP attorneys alleged that the reorganization was an attempt by you to discipline whistleblowers.
The GAP was right. It was no coincidence that your reorganization had eliminated the jobs of most of the employees on the Bighorn that signed the 1994 letter.
Abigail, you carried out all this punishment and caused so much heartache for these splendid employees because they told the Regional Forester in their letter that the previous forest supervisor, Larry Keown, had approved timber sales that damaged caribou habitat, abandoned his legal reforestation commitments, cost the taxpayers money by favoring politically-connected timber companies, abandoned his wilderness preservation commitments, violated employees' civil rights with sexual harassment and failure to enforce handicap access regulations, approved the construction of roads through Native American Sacred Sites, and indulged in the "Pattern and Practice" of whistleblower retaliation.
On April 23, 2003, US Office of Special Counsel (OSC) announced the favorable settlement of the whistleblower retaliation complaints filed by the Government Accountability Project (GAP) on behalf of former and current employees of the US Forest Service's Big Horn National Forest in Wyoming. Under terms of settlement, the Forest Service was ordered to pay a lump sum of $200,000 to be divided between these eight people. The Agency was also ordered to provide corrective personnel actions for 2 of the 8 complainants, mitigating a 14 day suspension to a reprimand, and providing an interim bridge appointment to a former employee who experience a break in federal service after he was removed for refusing to accept a geographic reassignment.
Special Counsel Kaplan stated, "This was an unusually complex retaliation situation given that it covered a lengthy period of time and through a dubious reorganization that took advantage of WRAPS protection.
Unfortunately, one employee who signed the 1994 letter lost her job after her ecology position was abolished before the settlement proceedings had begun.
Most forest supervisors would have been grateful to these caring employees and rewarded them for revealing such mismanagement of public land. Not you, Ms Kimbell
With this one act, you had just placed yourself at the top of Bush's search-list (which would consist of potential anti-environmental candidates for either BLM Director or Forest Service Chief.)
If any readers would like to check the accuracy of the Bighorn information presented here, please note the Office of Special Counsel, April 4, 2003 press release at: www.osc.gov/documents/press/2003/pr03_10.htm.
Your promotion to Associate Deputy Chief of the Forest Service
You were named to become the Associate Deputy Chief of the Forest Service in 2002 to lead the Timber Management Program on national forest land, a Bush administration decision. They wee now grooming you to be Chief. After your Bighorn performance, they knew you were exactly what they wanted.
Your promotion to Regional Forester:
You were named to become the Regional Forest for the Forest Service's Northern Region in December 2003, again a Bush administration decision. This was your reward from the Bush Administration
Few American citizens know that much of your time at your last job as Associate Deputy Chief in DC was spent in authoring the tragic Healthy Forests Restoration Act of 2003. The vast majority of the statements you wrote in the Act were contradicted by the general scientific consensus. You knew this, yet you wrote them anyway.
You now knew that you were on the fast-track to the Chief's job, the first woman to hold that position; time to lay low and make no mistakes, appear to care for the public land.
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to connect the dots of your past.
Your job as Chief of the U.S. Forest Service:
You and your new boss (USDA Asst. Secretary Mark Rey) will get along great. You have so much in common. You know this, since you have worked with him before. You can continue to trade stories about Mark's previous employment as a timber industry lobbyist.
Abigail Kimbell, you shouldn't be Chief, you should be ashamed.
I can only pray that your stay in the Chief's office will end with Bush' departure in January 2009.
Every person in America that cares about their public land, will be watching your every move like a hawk, including members of the new congress.
Sincerely,
Richard Artley (Retired Forest Service land management planner)

Well now, neighbors! While Mr. Artley may still be Smokey's Friend, clearly he has some reservations about Abigail and the direction she and the President are taking his favorite agency.

He said she had not replied. This is understandable. As a Regional Forester trying to cut back on staff and expenses, Ms Kimbell had, no doubt, frugally reduced demands on the regional public affairs staff.

However, now that she is Chief all the world class Flack and Spin Meister artists of both the Forest Service AND the Department of Agriculture will be at her command.

Should she desire, expert government wordsmiths, so skilled in debate they could refute the Sermon on the Mount and The Gettysburg Address will be glad to answer Mr. Artley's letter and in all fairness, THUNDERBEAR will be glad to print it.

There is, however, as Lieutenant Columbo used to say "Just one little thing that puzzled me".

Your kindly editor asked around and got four or five different answers, mostly vague and none, very convincing.

I even asked my Senator, but so far have received no answer. (To be fair, her office said it might take a month to reply.)

Most answers seem to boil down the fact that the Forest Service Chief doesn't HAVE to be confirmed by the Senate.

Readers will recall that Mary Bomar, Bush appointee to the position of Director of the National Park Service, was confirmed by a recent Senate hearing.

True, the Bomar Confirmation hearing was rather perfunctory and pro forma but it did have its amusing moments (though not, I'm sure, for Ms Bomar).

You will recall that an unsmiling Senator Wyden (D-OR) glowered down at our Mary and asked "MS BOMAR, ARE YOU A CROOK?"

Senator Wyden said he was glad to hear that as the Inspector General of the Department of the Interior Earl Devaney had intimated that a significant percentage of Interior Senior Executives were some sort of criminals or at least consorted with same.

The still unsmiling Senator said he was glad to hear that Mary was on the side of the angels, but just to be on the safe side, he extracted a promise from her that she would not, figuratively speaking, filch the Liberty Bell or otherwise end up as an indicted co-conspirator during her term of office.

Now neighbors, can you imagine how much MORE fun could have been had if Abigail Kimbell had appeared before a Democrat dominated Senate confirmation hearing?

The Forest Service closet door would have been yanked open and enough skeletons to stock a paleontology museum would have crashed out on the floor (Particularly if PEER had shown up to testify.)

Clearly, this would have been distressing. Understandably, the Forest Service prefers not to do Senate Confirmation hearings.

There are a number of excuses, but the one we like the best is the "WE'RE TOO EDUCATED AND PROFESSIONAL TO STEAL!" gambit.

That is, to be Chief Forester, you had to have a heavy duty applied biological degree from a recognized institution, usually, (but not always) a forestry school. There would thus be no reason for laymen like Senators to question us because we are trained professionals who know the correct answer to any question that might arise.

Wonderful! You say. Such requirements save our National Forests from Greedhead Political appointees who would despoil and rape them for profit.

Well neighbors that might have been the original intention of Roosevelt and Pinchot, but where there's a will, there's a way.

Forestry schools were handsomely endowed by such disinterested parties as Georgia-Pacific, Weyerhaeuser, and Potlatch; entities that desired a more "balanced" ecological outcome than that provided by John Muir or Aldo Leopold.

Such "professionalism" quickly gave rise to talented forestry engineers like Abigail Kimbell who were very good at "getting out the cut" as the mantra goes.

So how could an environmentally responsible Administration find a simpatico Chief Forester in such a stacked deck?

Well, they had to be imaginative and creative. The Clinton Administration reached past the Foresters and Forest engineers to the Fisheries biologists in the Forest Service.

You see, trout and other fish do not do well when their environment is subjected to massive clear cuts. Fisheries biologists often have a large bone to pick with their Agency.

One such fisheries biologist, Dr. Mike Dombeck was appointed by President Clinton and became, according to Dick Artley, "Probably the best Chief the Forest Service ever had."

On the other hand, Industrial Foresters and Industrial recreation proponents would probably give the "Best Chief" accolade to Kimbell's immediate predecessor, Dale Bosworth, another Bush appointee.

So who would be right? Well now that would be a pretty subjective call, depending on your choice of environmental outcomes.

That's why it would be handy (and democratic) to submit the Chief Forester nominee to a Senate Confirmation hearing, regardless of whether the appointee was a no nonsense saw log forester or a tree hugging environmentalist. The public would have some idea of what they were getting and the appointee would have to explain controversial incidents in their past careers.

All in all, it would be a step toward that distant Nirvana, Governmental Transparency.

So write your Senator and ask him or her why we don't have Senate Confirmation of the Chief of the US Forest Service and maybe that it might be a good idea

NOTES ON LIFE IN KIWI LAND

New Zealanders are extremely competitive (even "tramping" (hiking) is competitive!). When Samoa beat them at their national sport, Rugby, a few weeks ago, the Kiwis were crushed.

However, their spirits were buoyed when INTERNATIONAL LIVING newsletter announced their ranking of nations in its annual "Quality of Life" ranking.

Kiwis of my acquaintance were quick to show me the article in the DOMINION POST (Wellington) that New Zealand had indeed beaten out the United States for fourth place in having the best quality of life

However, the Kiwi victory was tempered by the fact that their hated rival, Australia, had beaten them, coming in second after first place winner, France. (The Netherlands was third.)

Who did we Yanks top? Readers will be glad to know that we beat out Switzerland for 5th place.

New Zealanders are pretty laid back when it comes to customs and etiquette. Generally, good manners and common sense will suffice.

HOWEVER, according to one of my informants, there are a few things about us Yanks that Kiwis find irritating.

One of these is the "Texas" handshake as practiced by LBJ and George Bush Jr. That's where the President or other Yank businessman grasps the hand of the person with his right hand and then grasps the shoulder or upper arm with the left hand, while gazing intently into the other person's eyes.

This is supposed to indicate great "sincerity", but most Kiwis and Australians regard it as phony and ALL Maoris regard it as offensive and aggressive. (And they are pretty big people.)

As the Prime Minister of New Zealand, Helen Clark will visit "Dubya" in Washington this month; I would imagine that someone in State Department protocol will see that he doesn't create an international incident.

Tramping or hiking in New Zealand can be quite arduous and even a bit hazardous due to spectacularly sudden changes in weather. For this reason, many non-Kiwis prefer to hire a licensed guide. This makes sense as in addition to safety and route finding, the guide will be able to tell you about the plants, birds, and geology of the area as well as Maori legends and European history of the region.

Visitors should be forewarned that Kiwis regard tramping as character building and that nothing is impossible if one has a "moderate level of fitness", proper clothes and equipment and a determination to succeed (No sniveling permitted!)

I interviewed Malcolm O'Neil, the owner of one trekking firm, ACTIVE EARTH, which specializes in long haul back country treks in the North Island. Malcolm, a humorous, shaggy sort who is a dead ringer for the young Edmund Hillary on the Kiwi $ 5 bank note, was nothing if not forthright. I asked him flat away if his treks were like Outward Bound. "Yes, but with better food!" He quipped. "If you read our brochure, you will never find the word "Holiday". When you're on an ACTIVE EARTH trek, you're not on holiday; you're on Discovery and Challenge!'

I was a bit curious if any Yanks went on his treks and if so, how we famously comfort loving sybarites did in the bush.

I was pleasantly surprised to find that while we were a minority of his clients, we were much appreciated due to our national characteristics.

"Americans are apparently taught at a very early age to think positively. They are always optimistic and can see the bright side of even a dicey situation. It is always good to have some Yanks along on a trek. After a couple of days of relentless American optimism, even the most whinging Pom (Complaining Englishman) comes to see the bright side of things"

ACTIVE EARTH can be reached at www.ActiveEarthNewZealand.com. Remember! If you decide to sign up, no sniveling, whining, or complaining! The Yank National Honor is at stake!

A QUIET DAY IN WANGANUI

Today's Kiwis take pride in their country as the bustling, innovative little 24-7 dynamo of the South Pacific and a leader in environmental sustainability (unlike SOME countries they're too polite to mention!). They are enterprising pioneers in many new technologies and open to all cultures and cuisines at virtually any time of day and night. (Well, ALMOST any time of day or night: We're still not talking NY or LA.)

Still it's true. New Zealand is now open on weekends and you can get pretty much anything you want anytime, even if it isn't good for you.

"It's better now, I suppose, but I can't help feeling we've lost something along the way; that people were kinder, more wholesome, looked out after each other back them" said our Kiwi, finishing off a Starbuck's Latté in a sidewalk café, neither of which existed 25 years ago.

The Kiwi continued amiably down Selective Memory Lane. "Back then, nobody locked their doors, because somebody might need to borrow a tool or something, bring it right back! We didn't need telly, folks made their own fun. Nobody had to work on the weekends, everybody in the district went off on a tramp in the bush or to visit relatives, Life is fast and stressful now. There's a lot to be said for the quiet days.

I was retracing the steps of the Scottish-American naturalist, John Muir, through New Zealand around 1900. I had served as park historian at John Muir National Historic Site in Martinez, California and had become engrossed in the life and adventures of this fascinating figure of environmental history. In the late Autumn of his life, Muir had the opportunity to take a trip around the world, visiting many of the biological hot spots that had intrigued him as well as just plain tourist attractions.

He had come to Australia to check out rumors of trees taller than his beloved California coastal Redwoods (none standing) and to New Zealand to see the legendary Waimangu Geyser at Rotarua, reputed to be larger than anything in Yellowstone and indeed the largest geyser in the world (true, but now extinct)

Tourism, even at that relatively early date was well developed in New Zealand and you could buy a packaged guided tour to most of the sights of New Zealand;

One of the sights of the New Zealand Grand Tour was the famed "Drop Scene" of the Wanganui River on the North Island.

As the Wanganui made its way though a deep gorge, it takes a couple of right angle turns, which creates the optical illusion that the river had somehow disappeared, having been suddenly replaced by a "drop scene" of sheer, impassable cliff.

I arrived in Wanganui on a Friday afternoon. As I was interested in the Environmental politics in New Zealand, I had made plans to meet the Labour Party Shadow Minister for the Environment, who conveniently happened to live in Wanganui.

The New Zealand Labour Party, roughly analogous to the left wing of the American Democratic Party was the most environmentally friendly party at that time. Labour was currently out of office, the government being in the hands of the National Party led by the enigmatic and rather sinister Prime Minister Robert Muldoon, roughly analgous to his contemporary, Ronald Reagan.

The concept of "shadow minister" is a facet of some English speaking parliamentary governments. It allows the party out of power to groom one of its members for a ministerial position in the optimistic hope that their party will be returned to office.

The advantages are obvious as it allows the shadow minister to study the demands and requirements of his/her future duties. A further advantage to the tax paying public is that investigative reporters can leisurely investigate the proposed minister for any egregious moral turpitude or conflict of interest.

This method of vetting politicians contrasts sharply with the American method of surprising the electorate with a surprise appointee who may or may not be a crook.

At any rate, I called on the Shadow Environmental Minister at his office, and found him to be gregarious and helpful like most New Zealanders. He plied me with tea, good humor and information.

"It will be possible for you to hire a jet boat to take you through the rapids to the Drop Scene on the Wanganui, though not just right now."

Now neighbors, the jet boat is, like bungee jumping, one of the more dubious Kiwi contributions to World Civilization.

It is a propless, extremely shallow draft (floats on morning dew!) power boat that uses water hydraulics to force water under high pressure from the engine (which is basically an ingenious pump) through tubes and out the jets in the stern to both propel and steer the boat, eliminating the need for prop and rudder.

The jet boat was invented by William Hamilton in 1954 as a solution to the eternal problem of "How do you go upstream on a river full of rapids?"

Although the obvious answer is "Why bother?" Mr. Hamilton was knighted for his efforts at improving New Zealand tourism and industry. Today, thanks to Sir William, there is hardly a scenic gorge or rapid in New Zealand that does not echo to the happy roar of jet boats and the screams of delighted tourons.

All of this was just getting under way 25 years ago and of course in Muir's time it was by done by oarsmens on the rapids and steamboats on the more placid stretches of the Wanganui.

"However," said the Shadow Minister, "I'm afraid you have run smack into the Great New Zealand Weekend, which (looking at his clock) I am afraid will begin shortly. New Zealand will be pretty much shut down till Monday, I'm afraid."

That is one thing that had spectacularly changed in New Zealand in the past few decades. New Zealand is now open for business 24/7/12. It's not yet like New York City, or even California, but if you indicate you want something and are willing to pay a fair price, the Kiwis will make an effort to get it for you anytime of the week. They have come to realize that when you are milking tourists rather than cows, you can't set an iron clad schedule.

This was not the case of the New Zealand of Robert Muldoon. I don't think Muldoon had anything particular to do with it, but the custom of the time was that the Weekend was sacred; a man should spend it with his family and God.

Now if you are of a mischievous turn of mind, it might occur that there were some Kiwis that didn't particularly like being with their families or even God on Sunday.

This seems to have been the case. Over the years enough Kiwis found they wanted a meal and entertainment on weekends and a corresponding number of Kiwis found they would like to make a spot of money on weekends, so the Sacred Weekend has sort of faded away, but this was not the case 25 years ago.

It seems that I would have to amuse myself on Saturday. He suggested some walks in the area and a swim in the river as a pleasant diversion. He also invited me to dinner with his family on Saturday evening.

I accepted his offer, wished him good day and found a campground to spend the night.

New Zealand and Australian "Holiday Parks" are usually much more elaborate than the American version such as KOA. In Kiwi land and Australia, you can hire, depending on budget and preference everything from a bare piece of grass (no picnic table) to pitch your tent, to a cabin without plumbing (bring your own bedding) to a cabin with sink, stove and fridge, but no toilet or shower, to a fully furnished motel type room with cooking facilities, shower and toilet.

There was an "ablution block" with kitchen, showers, and toilets for those who wished to economies and didn't mind a short walk for such necessary luxuries.

The cabin was basic, but, as is normally the case in New Zealand, it was spotlessly clean.

This is an interesting thing about Kiwi land. No matter how basic, humble, or economical, facilities are almost always very clean. For some reason, Kiwis don't seem to brag about this virtue. The Kiwis are very, very tidy! Filth is not tolerated in New Zealand.

This is not the case in the U.S. Filth and vermin are very much part and parcel of poverty in the US. The poor may not get their fair share of the incredible bounty of America, but they are assured of more than their share of bedbugs, cockroaches, rats, mice, fleas, bad odors, and all pervasive depressing grime and dirt.

If you were to ask Reagan then or Bush today, you would be told that such unpleasant conditions are Milton Friedman's, if not God Almighty's prod to the poor to get off their duffs and work their way into the clean and sanitary middle class.

Next morning, after breakfasts, I hiked a few of the trails around the Wanganui and even went for a swim in the river where I met a couple of handsome first generation Kiwis of Dutch extraction, brother and sister. They had just returned from a trip to ancestral Holland and were delighted that their parents had the good luck and foresight to emigrate to clean, green, uncrowded New Zealand.

They quite frankly asked, in view of the Presidency of Ronald Reagan, if I had considered emigrating to the paradise of New Zealand, where seldom is heard a discouraging word, the skies are not cloudy all day and you can hide out from the arms race that was heating up between the US and the Soviet bloc.

I graciously turned down the invitation to become a late blooming Kiwi, citing age and other commitments. I also tossed them crumbs of wisdom plucked from the craggy heights of Experience.

America said I, had survived Richard Nixon, and while it was true that Ronald Reagan was even worse than Nixon, things were bound to eventually improve because they certainly could not get worse. (Little did I know that as I spoke, "worse" was being gotten in the form of an alcoholic Texas playboy who was in the process of bankrupting his first company and would later go on to bankrupt the United States government. I was indeed wrong; things can definitely get worse.

My Dutch Kiwi friends wished me well and I started back to the Holiday Camp to freshen up a bit before dinner with the Shadow Minister and his family.

There was an older model car coming toward me down the road, trailing a plume of dust.

I came to the stark, sudden realization that the driver of the approaching car was going to try to kill me.

Dr. Johnson's famous quip "Depend upon it, Sir! When a man knows he is to be hanged in a fortnight, it concentrates his mind wonderfully!"

Dr. Johnson was correct. My mind was now wonderfully concentrated. No more philosophical thoughts about emigration or politics.

The driver was coming fast, weaving slightly, more importantly; the car was in the wrong gear for the speed and flat stretch of road. The whine of a tortured transmission preceded its appearance. The driver was either drunk, very angry, or both. It was probable that the driver would be looking for a target.

The terrain by the road was flat unfenced pasture or farm land. there were trees and the beginnings of hills perhaps 100 meters beyond the road: Safety! I was tempted to run.

As a former sheriff and a natural story teller, Uncle George was always worth listening to. And I was a good listener. As a little boy back in South Dakota, I never missed an opportunity to go fishing with Uncle George and hear him tell stories of the Prohibition and gangster days of the 1920's and '30's and his role of sheriff.

One of the anecdotes could have been entitled "How to avoid being murdered by an automobile." I would find it quite useful.

There was of course, the possibility that I was merely being paranoid; that I was imagining things.

Just in case, I stepped off the shoulder of the road and walked diagonally across the field toward the woods.

The driver had spotted and targeted me. He swerved off the road, crossed the shallow ditch and came bucketing over the furrows toward me.

"The important thing is not to run" said Uncle George, drawing reflectively on his long thin cigar. "You must not panic. It's the one thing that will kill you."

"Did you draw your gun and shoot 'em?" I asked excitedly. Like every 12 year old, I wanted to kill bad guys.

"No", he said, taking up the slack in his fishing line after a tentative nibble. "Things happen pretty fast. You usually didn't have time to draw, shoot, and dodge. Besides, the guy in the car has cover. He's protected by the radiator and the engine block. Really, all there is to hit is that head sticking up over the dash board. If you think about it, while you're trying to hit that little head, all he has to do is aim his car at a great big target�you!"

(At the time, it was a grave disappointment to me that Uncle George had gotten entirely through his law enforcement career without killing anyone�though I'm sure Uncle George did not share that feeling.)

Well, I'm still here." He teased, blowing some cigar smoke onto hook and night crawler bait (killed the human scent and improved one's chances, according to Uncle George).

"Like I said, it's important not to panic or to run. It may not seem so, but you have the advantage; a car can go a whole lot faster than you, but you can change directions faster than a car can!"

The trick is not to look at the driver's face. If you do, you'll get hypnotized and you will get hit just like deer in the headlights.

The hard part is that you have to wait for exactly the right moment. You focus on one of the headlights, doesn't matter which one and when it looks like you could almost reach out and touch it, then you JUMP to one side. He will miss you. Generally, they make only one try. It takes a while to circle around for another pass and they usually just want to get away. Now remember that, it might prove useful." Uncle George laughed.

Neurologists tell us that we forget nothing we have ever experienced. Our supercomputer brains vacuum up everything we have ever heard, seen, touched, smelled, or tasted and filed somewhere in the grey matter for future use at the opportune time. This is the way it is supposed to work. Usually it doesn't. Or we would all ace every calculus or history exam we ever took. On the bright side, our inability to instantly access everything we have ever experienced prevents us from being constantly deluged with a thundering flood of unwanted information.

I was lucky that when the car with murderous intent first appeared on the scene, the head librarian in my brain went immediately to the correct file and selected and downloaded the correct DVD entitled "Uncle George's Timely Tips for Killer Automobile Avoidance" which is why I am around to tell you this story.

Uncle George was quite correct. Waiting was the hardest part; waiting and not running.

As Uncle George instructed, I focused on the right headlight. but not before I caught a glimpse of the driver's face, contorted with rage.

In a way, this was a relief, an answer to the puzzle. Why was this stranger trying to kill me?

No country on earth has dealt as well with the indigenous population as New Zealand has with the Maori. True, they were often cheated of their land, ridiculed, and abused and their culture denigrated. They were valiant warriors, fighting five wars against the settlers, coming close to victory in one of them; they won the admiration of the victors.

Today, Maori rights are heavily protected by law; they are guaranteed seven seats in parliament and other benefits and preferment and are integrated into society to a degree not available to say, Native Americans. Unlike Native Americans, they are a substantial portion of the population (12-15%) and the Maori and their customs have an every day presence in New Zealand life.

That said, some Maori still feel real or imagined slights to themselves or their culture on a daily basis. A proud and prickly race, they will react to perceived insults.

It was some perceived insult back down the road that was driving this Maori and his car at me, guilty of being a Pakeha in the wrong place and wrong time.

The headlight was getting almost close enough to touch. It was time to jump. I jumped.

He spun out, trying to turn. For a moment, he hesitated as if contemplating another shot, but as Uncle George said, "They usually just want to get away after they miss."

That he did, bucketing back over the field onto the gravel road and roaring away.

I hauled my journal out of my back pack and took some notes, though it was unlikely I would forget the event.

My next door neighbors, a young man and woman were analyzing their relationship. The prognosis was not good.

He had a low guttural voice with a Cro-Magnon accent, as if he was in the process of reinventing human speech.

She said that both her mother and her sister had advised her against the relationship.

She went on to state that her best friends had advised her against the relationship

(Not a promising line of questioning, young lady, I thought to myself, particularly if he is between you and the door.) I The Cro-Magnon did not answer, but demanded to know why his dinner was not on the table.

(Well, Yes Sir, If one believes in evolution, just about everything in our Phylum would be "better'n you) I thought to myself

AT LEAST I CAN READ AND WRITE!" She screamed "AT LEAST I'M NOT A FOOKING ILLITERATE LIKE YOU!

Strangely enough, it was this insinuation that he would never win the Nobel Prize for Literature that sent the Cro-Magnon off the deep end.

There was the sound of furniture tipping over, shouts, sobs, incoherent words, and sickening sound of someone being hard punched repeatedly.

She had tripped coming up my porch steps and was on her knees in the doorway, looking up at me beseechingly.

She was startlingly good looking, as is often the case in these beauty & the beast mismatches, with delicate features not yet smashed and blue eyes not yet blackened. She had long blonde hair and wore a blue halter and white pedal pushers, she had a small tattoo of a butterfly on her shoulder. You remember details like that.

A not unlikely occurrence, as it seemed to be what people did on a quiet day in Wanganui.

Before I could answer, Cro-Magnon came on the scene, literally filling the doorway. He lived up to the stereotype with jail house tattoos on jail house developed muscles. He said "sorry" as if his dog had gotten off the leash, grabbed her roughly by the arm and dragged her back to his cave, she still screaming.

I was left standing in the doorway. John Wayne would have done it differently, but I was not John Wayne.

I found the manager and told him what was happening. He called the police and an ambulance. This being New Zealand, he quickly rounded up some public spirited volunteers among the campers.

She was lying on the floor, still conscious. There was internal bleeding, with a bright red stain on the crotch of the peddle pushers.

There was a murmur in the crowd as if considering similar treatment for Cro-Magnon

The sound of sirens dopplered into the park. The Cro-Magnon looked relieved; better to be arrested than lynched.

Our posse shook hands at a job done and I hitched a ride into town with someone going past the Shadow Minister's house.

The Shadow Minister, wife and two delightful children greeted me with a Kiwi barbecue and a glass of wine, the first of several.

THE SAFETY MESSAGE

Now neighbors, this is being a tad ethnocentric even for Gringos as quite a few people have expressed an interest in visiting Kiwi land and driving is the most flexible and convenient (but not necessarily the most comfortable or economical) way to see New Zealand.

The obvious question about driving on the left answers itself in the first minute . It is sort of like deciding on whether you should be a Moslem or Methodist in Mecca; the decision is made for you and to do otherwise is decidedly unhealthy.

On the face of it, driving around New Zealand looks like a cinch. It is a small country, a little smaller than the state of Arizona. Should be easy to see in two weeks, right?

It is possible to do it in two weeks, but you will be one tired and possibly unsafe gringo.

Although Arizona and New Zealand are about the same size, and have roughly the same mileage of paved road (NZ 57,000 miles and AZ 54,501) Arizona "cheats" by having 1,250 miles of four lane expressways that allow you to get around the state without too much stress. NZ has a miniscule amount of expressways in and around the major cities.

New Zealand's two lane roads are well engineered, well maintained, and are some of the best in the world.

HOWEVER, that said, seeing all of New Zealand's attractions (and there are many)is the equivalent of driving across the United States on a two lane mountain road. (There is little that is truly flat in this country.)

You will share these roads with the same proportion of 18 wheelers (often larger) and buses that you have in the United States, but on the aforementioned two lane mountain roads

In addition, the tourist industry has sold the Europeans on the delights of bicycling around New Zealand. (Which looks like pure hell in the usual driving rain and steep grades, but don't tell anyone.) This means you can expect Hans und Gretchen around every blind curve.

One way to tell a primary highway from a secondary is that the bridges have two lanes on the primary roads, just like in the US, There are, however, a lot of one lane bridges and there is a legal right of way to a car approaching from the specified direction.

Kiwi drivers are competent but competitive. The government takes this into account and provides passing lanes every ten or 15 kilometers, which relieves some frustration.

The biggest killer on New Zealand roads is not alcohol, but exhaustion. Driving in Kiwi land requires alert concentration. Billboards plead with drivers to pull over if fatigued.

Try not to drive more than 4 hours and 3 is perhaps best (I got this advice from a Kiwi in his 30's) plan your journey not on mileage, but one the estimated time the trip will take. Then there should be no worries, mate!

ABIGAIL KIMBELL

NOTES ON LIFE IN KIWI LAND

A QUIET DAY IN WANGANUI

THE SAFETY MESSAGE

Return HOME

© Copyright 2007 by P. J. Ryan, all rights reserved.
PJ Ryan can be reached at:
thunderbear@erols. com.

ABIGAIL KIMBELL

NOTES ON LIFE IN KIWI LAND

A QUIET DAY IN WANGANUI

THE SAFETY MESSAGE

Return HOME

© Copyright 2007 by P. J. Ryan, all rights reserved. PJ Ryan can be reached at: thunderbear@erols. com.

© Copyright 2007 by P. J. Ryan, all rights reserved.
PJ Ryan can be reached at:
thunderbear@erols. com.