Spem in Alium Nunquam Habui*

26 February
We heard it raining during the night and the morning dawned grey, quite cold and, of course, windy. Shock, horror: Gregg in long sleeves and long trousers.
We walked through the city to the cable car, doing a bit of window shopping on the way (Chris certainly feels she needs different clothes). The shiny red cable cars built in 1902 go up a steep one-in-five incline to the top of a peak. We took one of the numerous paths and set off down the hill through the Botanic Gardens – a huge collection of native trees, shrubs and flowers with sculptures dotted around the park – including one by Henry Moore. There are also formal flower beds and a huge rose garden with over 300 varieties but this being towards the end of summer they were past their best. At one side of the rose garden is a large glass house with tropical and temperate zones, it also houses the inevitable café where the much-used phrase “two flat-whites, please” was used yet again. Of course by now we were regretting the long sleeves as the sun was out and it was getting very warm.

After the Botanic Gardens we walked through the old cemetery, which, like Wellington was founded in 1840. The stories on the headstones reflect the growing pains of a colony – poor sanitation, lack of welfare, fire, racial tensions as well as the growing prosperity of the city. Many of the oldest graves are no longer visible because the grave markers were made of wood which has rotted away. As the settlement prospered, more permanent materials were used and it is noticeable how many people were living into their 80s and even 90s. We sought out a few graves. The first was that of Samuel Duncan Parnell (1810-1890), a carpenter, who is credited with creating the eight-hour working day. Arriving from England in 1840 where working days were far longer, he caused a stir when, contracted by fellow passengers to build a store, he insisted that his days should be eight hours work, eight hours relaxation and eight hours sleep. Other carpenters supported his demands and the eight-hour working day was born! The second was that of Henry Edmund Holland (1868-1933), originally Australian, he was a painter and decorator by trade who became leader of the New Zealand Labour Party from 1918 to 1933. He wanted to be buried on a windswept cliff and at that time his tomb would have overlooked Wellington city and harbour – today that view is totally obstructed by high rise buildings. The tomb is marked by a very striking sculpture of idealised figures and is carved from Carrara marble by Richard Goss who also designed the Cenotaph sculptures.
We then went on to the City Gallery which houses a changing collection of modern art and also has a lovely café where we had lunch. Today is the first day of the NZ International Arts Festival and as part of the festival the gallery has an installation by Canadian artist Janet Cardiff called ‘A Reworking of The Forty-Part Motet’ for which she recorded each of the parts separately (but singing in unison) and they are played back through forty speakers strategically placed throughout the gallery. The speakers are arranged in an oval so that we were able to feel the sculptural construction of the piece by Thomas Tallis – it was possible to walk around the gallery and ‘through’ the forty individual voices. We could hear the sound move from one choir to another, jumping back and forth, echoing each other and then experience the overwhelming feeling as the sound waves hit us as all the singers were singing together. A truly beautiful, tingle-down-the-spine experience.
A walk back to the hotel along the waterfront made us realise that Samuel Parnell had started a trend – the bars and cafés were full of people and there were several groups of young men jumping off the dockside into the water. This is Friday and it’s not yet 4pm; perhaps POETS day is a big thing here. And writing of poets, there are lines of poetry in various places along the waterfront as well as a DIY poetry board as part of the festival.
In the evening we went to an altogether different performance; this was ‘Transports Exceptionnels’ by dancer Philippe Priasso who performed a dance duet with a large mechanical digger! Performed to the dramatic voice of Maria Callas the ‘dance’ is an intimate seduction between man and machine – don’t laugh it really is. Flesh meets metal in a tender give and take – the power and grace of a relationship has humour and honesty, poetry and industrialisation. G thought it was magnificent; C thought it seriously weird.

Last night we had dinner in the sky overlooking the city, tonight we had dinner by the waterfront – another excellent meal. On the way back to the hotel we caught a brief part of another Festival performance. Vladimir Ashkenazy was conducting the NZ Symphony Orchestra in an inevitably sold-out concert which was being relayed live to a giant screen in Civic Square but as the performance was of Mahler’s Symphony No.8 which neither of us is very fond of, we didn’t linger.
The Festival goes on until 21 March and has some wonderful events, including a concert by Calexico; a performance of ‘Eleven And Twelve’ directed by Peter Brook; a play about a Council flat in a tower block in the Walworth Road and a performance by Luna to 13 of Andy Warhol’s famous screen tests – all of which we shall miss.
We have warmed to Wellington, although the people are not as friendly as all the other places we have been in NZ – a bit full of their own self-importance. Despite the charm of much of its Victorian and Edwardian architecture it is, unlike many other places in NZ, a city firmly planted in the 21st century and consequently has a gritty side to it.