RANDOM REMINDER

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31786, 17 September 1968, Page 19

RANDOM REMINDER

LET-DOWN

It is improbable that any part of New Zealand has had a more remarkable and romantic history than the West Coast, and there are many who regret the passing of those colourful days and ways which gave rise to so many delightful stories, so many legends. One of those who occasionally bathes in nostalgia about the West Coast is a man who likes to recall his first visit there, as a young executive of his firm. There he was, all eagerness for the job, and feeling pretty important that he was being sent out on an important assignment: Hollywoodbased ideas of the success story filled his head. The West Coast soon relieved him of any extravagant ideas about prosperous and dazzlingly successful young business men, impeccably dressed, living in luxury on an expense account, filling the order books, becoming an outstanding social success. He went to Karamea. The hotel into which he

booked was not a bit like Hollywood, and when he found his room, he could hardly see where to hang his new expensive suits. The town was on a local electricity supply and he was in his room when the power came on. There was a frightening reverberation and great chug-chug-chug-ging, and a small bulb in his room responded wanly; there was a sharp fluctuation in the output with each chug of the machinery. A little later, the smooth young operator asked the hotel owner what voltage the place was on, because he had an electric razor. He was advised that if he wanted to use the thing, he ought to go across the road to the garage in the morning. So it was that at 8.30 a.m., washed and dressed, but feeling very unlike the sort of person he thought he should feel like, he took himself and his razor off to the garage. The place was closed. The young man stood there despondently, and after

a little while an elderly gentleman arrived on a bicycle. The new arrival spoke first. “O.K. I’m just opening up—l’ll start her up straight away.” He thereupon disappeared through a little door, opened a big door, and our hero was invited to enter and pick his way through an astonishing litter of engine boxes, tools, old pistons, etc., most of the stuff in an advanced stage of decomposition.

The host cranked away at his generating equipment, invited the guest to take a bulb out, and plug in. So the shaving process began. And the garage proprietor became so interested a spectator that he proclaimed his intention of having a shave himself that day—an announcement clearly of some consequence. So he plugged in alongside, and there they were, the two of them, with the morning sun on the old camshafts, not at all like the usual conception of business executives.