Posts by Paul Brown
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Well Harold, I never expected to see a post about ferro cement boatbuilding on Public Address. I, also built a ferro yacht (along with 3 other) on the North Shore in the early 70s.
It was a stretched Hartley Tahitian 50 ft ketch named Aokautere. When we started we thought it would take 18 mths to build and cost about $12000. Three years and $36000 later we launched it, still not finished
In Dec 76 we left NZ to circumnavigate. I had $60 my mother lent me and did not return for 5 years. My mother moved into a home recently and going through the house I found all the letters I had sent my parents. Some were up to 12 pages long. It was good to see the stories I tell,l were not too far from the truth. Though they were censored, there was no mention of drink. drugs or sex.
We successfully circumnavigated. Our biggest achievement being the same 4 crew that left on the boat returned together (just!) -
I found the mods and rockers story interesting. I do not remember many mods in NZ in the late 60s, however there were many confrontations between rockers and surfers. there were continuous running battles on the Shore at one stage.
Back in the late 50s we lived in a state house in Cox's Bay (or Cox's Creek as it was then) The house backed onto the reserve and the gangs of bodgies had a circular bike track there. They would carry bike chains as weapons and would race round whacking opposite gang members during the races.The reserve was built on landfill and the tipping carried on until the 70s. I laugh about all that expensive housing on the edge of the landfill.There were no environmental restrictions on what could be dumped in those days and I am sure it is still leeching out. Mind you we used to make corrugated iron canoes at the base of the tip and cut ourselves frequently with no ill effect. -
Up Front: To the Letter, in reply to Joe Wylie,
My father kept a diary of the years he was in North Africa and Italy in WW2, but his longhand is very hard to read. He did not get leave with the second Echelon but I remember that he sympathised with the 'mutiny'.
We do have 3 fantastic photo albums of life in the desert and Italy, including shots at Cassino. He was a stretcher bearer and nurse with the field ambulance. He never talked about it much, apart from tales about looting wine and drinking. Late in life, he started to tell some horrendous stories about what it was really like. -
We have just been cleaning out the family home after mum went into care. We found all the letters I had sent home while I was sailing round the world in the 70s. Some of them up to 10 pages long. I think I only rang home about once a year over the 5 years we were away. It was good to see the letters pretty well match my stories. I thought it would be a good exercise to write parallel uncensored letters detailing what really happened.
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Hard News: The Crazy Gang Nation, in reply to Paul Brown,
I am talking prescription drugs here!
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Hard News: The Crazy Gang Nation, in reply to Gary Young,
I have just returned from the States. My monthly drug bill there would be in the region of $1200 a month. Here it is $30. In Britain (I have dual passports)it was zero.
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Southerly: Getting There is Half the Fun, in reply to Bart Janssen,
LAX provided one of our worst experiences of years of traveling with our daughter. She was about 4.(just pre 9/11) We arrived to find a huge queue at immigration. After 2 1/2 hours in the queue she went into full meltdown. Such was the commotion they put us in the faster American queue. When we got to the counter we were sent for a further interview. The reason being that, although I had a work visa my partner and I were not married. After a half hour of being interrogated we were allowed to leave with the parting words of the interviewer " Perhaps this will teach you to get married now"
Part of the problem in the States is the chronic inability of the immigration officials to realise that there are people in the world who do not wish to live there. I am in the States now so I hope the NSA are not reading this.
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Dont knock nailguns. Nearly all the old builders I know have tendonitis in the wrist and elbows. They wish the nailguns had been around years ago.
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I'm 60, working 16hr days in Rio and starting to feel that perhaps middle age is coming earlier than expected. I did get off the station at Facebook too.
My father is 93 though, and into email and Skype.