Reporter’s diary

Press, 17 December 1985, Page 2

Reporter’s diary

A reply ANN Macdonald, a Halswell resident who came out to New Zealand with her family from England two years ago, saw a letter in the "Manchester Evening News” that she could not let pass without a comment. The letter was from another Christchurch' ; woman who had emigrated from England. She was referring to this country importing doctors, Mrs Macdonald said. The woman’s letter said that New Zealand would want their skills but not their company. Mrs Macdonald said the letter ran down the Kiwis and everything in general here. She wrote to the paper, which printed the letter along with a cartoon of a map of Italy made over into one of New Zealand. Her family’s . experiences had been almost completely opposite to those

of the other woman, whom she does not know. “Yes, people call us Poms, but

that is not an insult and you must take it as intended,” she wrote. “After all, .they call themselves Kiwis, birds which are almost extinct.” Her family had found both Maori and pakeha Kiwis to be warm and friendly, eager to know about the land emigrants had left, but justifiably proud of their own country and culture, With all their belongings still at sea, the Macdonalds moved into their .first home with nothing. By that evening, they had everything, they needed, from beds to knives and forks. Everything was on loan from people they did not know. Dance, Cockie TWO cockatoos, Cockie and Charlie, were stolen from an Akaroa aviary at the week-end. The front of their cage was ripped off on Saturday night where they lived at the Akaroa Auto Centre in Rue Lavaud. Cockie. had been there for some years, while Charlie, a timid female which was there for courtship purposes, had been borrowed from a local retired couple. Cockie is a gregarious bird, ■a great dancer and talker, which will be remembered by many people who came near him over the years. He has quite a few things to say. He calls himself Polly sometimes (because so many people have called him one, asks “What are you doing?” and uses other words common to talking

birds. He does not swear. He will dance, toss his head around and jump up and down on one spot. Because she is shy and timid, Charlie may not be so talkative at first. “Charlie want a beer” is one of the things she says. If you are at all suspicious of a bird being offered for sale, say “Dance, Cockle” and see what happens.

Generations A FAMILY living in a Shirley house wonders whether it might have a record for generations of the same family living in the same place so close to Cathedral Square for so long. The Cresswell Avenue: house is 4.8 kilometres from the Square. Since 1876, five generations of the family have lived on the same property. Three separate families have aIT lived in the house, but they have been related to the original owner. The land which was divided up over the years, originally held a slaughterhouse built by the first owner.

Protection THE tramways strike of the early 1930 s was' different from the latest stoppages. Strikers then did not just march and chant, they also threw rocks at trams that were still running. Steps were taken to prevent the number of windows being broken in the confrontations. A Christchurch man remembers his mother standing at the long shelter in Cathedral Square and saying that she was not going on any tram that did not have windows protected by phicken wire. Reporter BEVAN Dunlop, who had been sole reporter for the Rangiora-based “North Canterbury News” for 10 years, retired recently. He was one of a number of contributors when he began working for the weekly paper in. 1972, then took on more of the reporting rounds. Because he is disabled, he had to do much of the work by tele- ' Ee from his home. He up a good network of contacts, and was taken to meetings and other occasions by his mother. He made {kindreds of friends in the joM’ He told his paper

that the world had been brought to him when he had not been able to get out to meet the world. Although he will no longer be a full-time reporter, Bevan will write a regular column and occasional stories. The odds STATISTICS, he was saying, could be used to show just about anything. He was an airline pilot, and had heard a good example recently. It was said that the odds against being on' a plane with a bomb* aboard were one million, to'one.'But if those odds were not good enough, you could take your own bomb aboard. The odds against being bn an airliner with two bombs aboard were a billion to one. :• Santa Girs STORIES about Santas, and how believable they are, reminded a Christchurch man about , a Father Christmas who used to work at the D.I.C. Gus Bagley may have been the first regular Santa, at least the first in a department store, in Christchurch. He would arrive at the store in a Cobb and Co. type coach that tvas driven from the railway station: He had a touch with children, and their parents, that was practised throughout the year. When he was not being Santa Claus, Gus was the D.I.C. cleaner. He would do his rounds speaking to everyone in rhyme. He did it so he would be ready when the next Christmas season came, he said. He had to be able to listen to a child’s requests, then talk about them in rhyme.' > Likeable Santa A FEW years ago, a neighbourhood father agreed to play Santa Claus for the Avonhead Play Centre. The big question on everyone’s mind was whether his little boy, Hamish, would recognise him, or even talk to him. Hamish was rather shy. Even so, he was seen approaching Santa and talking to him for a few minutes. He was asked later what he thought of the encounter. “I like that Santa Claus,” he said. “He’s got a watch just like my Daddy’s” — Stan Darlfeg