What an amazing day! I’m surprised that it seemed somehow easier than I expected – although I have to admit I’m feeling my age. I’ve been watching my mum and auntie over the last few days, with their gammy-hipped walks, and today I started to walk like that myself! Sore knee, bit of a blister coming on, but so worth it.
The Natural Magic Pirates entertained and got the energy going in the morning and led us off once we got going after Rachel’s brilliant interview with NewsHub. After no training, very little experience and a normal aversion to public speaking, Rachel is doing it like a pro. Concise, relaxed, authentic and relatable. Pity NewsHub seems to have lost it.
We were blessed with such fantastic weather and a good crowd in the morning, about 40 people left Cathedral Square – many in strollers! It was great to see all the parents and young ones. My mum and uncle joined us all the way down to Merivale and peeled off to go back and hang out with my Gran. At one point Pita walked into an old lady’s garden to give her a flier about the hikoi which was a lovely moment of connectedness.
There was lots of great conversation as we walked, and Pauline said it was really easy walking with a large group of really interesting, lovely people, the kilometres just disappeared. Pita ran up & down, with seemingly boundless energy and counted how many we still had by Chaneys Corner – 29, made up of 6 kids and 23 adults.
Walking across the Old Waimakariri Bridge was a great experience, one that I may have done many millenia ago on a scout walk to Blue Skies! I could have leapt into that water I felt so hot, it looked like the 100% pure fresh mountain melt. Is it? And our apologies and thanks goes out to those people who we held up briefly and many thanks to Christchurch NZ Police who gave us a police escort.
Right now it feels really late, but I’m involved in a scintillating conversation with our host here for the night and I can’t write and talk! We are talking politics and TPP and climate change and new economics. Sound unusual for me? Our other host Lesley has taken Shane to Bealey Clinic to get some stitches after cutting his hand doing dishes. What does this say for the future of balanced gender politics?
My only excuse for still being up at 11.45 pm is that I want to get a blog finished and posted!
Well, our first day was a resounding success. Stunning weather. Fascinating people. No dramas. Time for some groovy dreams.
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Our Children's Future Hikoi 
woohoo! awesome work whanau xo