Allan Dick’s Blog -Part Two

 Read more of Allan's blog entries by clicking here.

 Read Part One here.

SIMON AND GARFUNKEL AT THE VECTOR ARENA — AND THE MOUNTAINEER

 
Could anyone who ever saw the opening five minutes of the 1967 movie, "The Graduate" not have become instant, lifetime Simon and Garfunkel fans? "Sounds of Silence" was a haunting, unforgettable overlay as young Benjamin flew home from college to learn about "plastics" and live.

The "official" version of the history of Simon and Garfunkel shows that the pair met in primary school in 1957 and immediately embarked on a rocky on and off relationship. The split in 1971 looked permanent but they got back together again in 1981 for the legendary Concert in Central Park and that pretty much relaunched their career. In that 10 year interval there were also two recorded one-off reunions — June 1972 in a benefit concert for presidential hopeful George McGovern and a three-song TV appearance in October 1975.

For the rest of that 10 year split they went their own ways — Paul Simon continued with his music while Art Garfunkel took up acting. Their relationship was often deep, but always fragile.

Both were successful but it was obvious that the old magic was missing, even with a stream of big selling songs for Paul Simon.

Fans of the duo breathed a sigh of relief when they got back together for the 1981 concert in Central Park — but did a little known incident in New Zealand several months before pave the way for that memorable reunion?

Paul Simon came to New Zealand as a solo performer in 1980 with concerts in Auckland and Christchurch, followed by a short holiday in Queenstown.

Unknown to him, Art Garfunkel was also in New Zealand on holiday at the time with his then girlfriend, actress and director Penny Marshall. They had walked the Milford Track and they too followed this up with a few days in Queenstown — coinciding with Paul Simon's visit.

But there was an even greater coincidence — both arrived at the Mountaineer Nightclub in the town on the same evening.

The story, as told by the late Mike Baker who was there, goes that both men were so surprised at seeing each other in such a distant corner of the world they gave an impromptu performance to a small, but stunned audience in the night-club.

The event was largely kept a secret among those who were lucky enough to be in the Mountaineer that night.

Which brings us to the Auckland concerts by the duo in June this year.
 
The basic format of the New Zealand, Australian and Japan tour was laid down as far back at 2003 by a concert in New York. Anyone who attended the show in Auckland and bought the celebratory CD/DVD package could not miss the similarities between the events — right down to the spoken bits between the songs. So much for ad-libbing.

Only one show was originally scheduled for Auckland at the 18,000 seat Vector Arena, but when that sold out in about 19 seconds after ticket sales opened, a second show was arranged for the following night — and it too sold out, taking only fractionally longer time.

Crowds on both nights were largely baby-boomers because the 1960s were the time of Simon and Garfunkel. But this was not just a couple of old codgers simply going through the routine for the money. They were on stage for almost two and a half hours delivering many of their best known and much loved songs with passion, burning up energy like 18 year olds.

It was always Art Garfunkel's sweet, soaring voice that gave the unforgettable translation to Paul Simon's genius song-writing ability and even after 50 years and thousands of renditions, that old magic is still there. At 68 years of age Garfunkel had only minimal trouble reaching the highest notes of "Bridge Over Troubled Water".

When you've been around for as long as Simon and Garfunkel have and sung familiar songs so many times, there's a temptation to introduce variations in an effort to freshen the songs. Sometimes this works, most often it just annoys the fans.

For the most part, Garfunkel stuck to the script — close your eyes in the opening verses of "Bridge Over Troubled Water" and you could almost have been listening to the original. Simon, as befits the author, did stray from the original sound and phrasing, but these shifts improved rather than detracted.

It was a mistake to give Art Garfunkel three solo songs — "Brighteyes" was acceptable enough, but the other two were forgettable.

Fittingly, Paul Simon paid tribute to the Everly Brothers who provided the inspiration for the close harmonising that is the Simon and Garfunkel trademark. The Everlys also inspired The Beatles, the Beachboys and other top groups.

Highlights of the Auckland shows? Right up there was the tribute to the Everly Brothers in the form of "Be Bop A Lula" (a song that actually "belongs" to Gene Vincent) was certainly a surprise. Also totally out of left field was breaking into Buddy Holly's "Not Fade Away" in the middle of Mrs Robinson (originally intended to be Mrs Roosevelt but changed for the movie "The Graduate" where Simon and Garfunkel's music was so integral).

"She wears Diamonds on the Soles of Her Shoes" was pure African Rock. It didn't really work on the original album, but it sure worked in Vector Arena.

"The Boxer" and "Sounds of Silence" were brilliant and the finale, an all-in, party mood version of "Feelin' Groovy" was a happy way to end a concert that had been jam-packed with class, nostalgia — and emotion.

Memorable! Ten out of ten and worth every cent of the $760 it cost us for our two seats down the front.

PRIORITIES

In the week where the “Waterview” affair dominated our news — front page on the Herald, lead stories on radio and TV — the Otago Daily Times got it right. The issue was two paragraphs, in the briefs, on page 3!

The importance given to the Waterview roading tunnel/motorway underlines the Auckland-centricity of our news. If it happens in Auckland, the rest of the country will learn about it whether they want to or not.

Still, it’s impossible not to feel sympathy for people who’ve lived in their homes for decades and are now going to lose them for the motorway/tunnel.

But there is a balance. This is not new — the Waterview Connection has been on the drawing board for decades and the route defined.

If I had loved my home, altered it, renovated it, planted gardens, had gnomes in the garden, put in a pool and loved the place to death, I too would be mortified at losing it — even with proper compensation.

But I would also need reminding that virtually every inch of motorway I use around Auckland was built at a cost — someone either lost their homes, or a precious slice of environment was lost and how concerned was I then?

The people of Waterview who are going to lie down in the path of the bulldozer should remember the houses that were lost when Newton was bulldozed for a motorway, when homes were moved and St Mary's Bay filled in for the Auckland Harbour Bridge and when historic graves were shifted in Grafton.

ROADS OR PUBLIC TRANSPORT?

Of course the environmental lobbyists say that instead of building the Waterview Connection, the money should be spent on public transport. I understand the principle of what they say, but the supporters of public transport are missing the bigger issue.

I reckon the biggest single issue facing us in terms of roading and transport are trucks. Trucks clog our roads; commercial pressures for the drivers to get places on time mean many trucks are driven too fast.

They are intimating, they are dangerous, they are involved in a proportionately high number of crashes and they are destructive of our roads.

The anti-road, pro-public transport lobby would get my support if they focused more on getting trucks off our roads.

About 70% of goods in New Zealand are shifted by road — that’s incredibly high when we have a railway system that’s capable of carrying ten, twenty times what it does and is currently losing a fortune.

One of my passing interests, as I drive around the country, is looking at where our railway system used to go — you can trace the route decades after the lines are pulled up.

I’m not a railway romantic — I simply think we should have more emphasis on rail for moving goods. I’m not talking about across town — I’m talking about between cities and towns.

As always in New Zealand we lurched from one extreme to the other when we deregulated the trucking industry. Up until then, you needed a permit to carry stuff by trucks beyond a certain limit. Rail was king.

Trouble was it was out of control. Rail was overstaffed and it was a refuge for crooks and unemployable people. Not everyone of course, there were also many proud “railwaymen” — but there were too many thieves, vagabonds and rogues.

Pilfering was rife; goods sent to Wellington might end up in Westport, or get lost forever.

What went on in the NZR was colourful to say the least and the stuff of legend. It needed a nuclear bomb under it. It got it.

Muldoon’s mates started it. His trucking pals got in his ear, he listened and the trucking industry was deregulated, unleashing a flood of trucks on our roads. And poor old rail couldn’t compete. The coup de grace was given by Richard Prebble.

NZR had gone from being a grossly inefficient monopoly to a joke.

Trucks ruled then and continue to rule.

The trucking industry has a powerful lobbyist in former National cabinet Minister from the Muldoon era, Tony Freidlander.

The number of big trucks we have on New Zealand roads is not only dangerous, but destructive. The big rigs pound our second-rate roads — and yet there are suggestions to adjust the Road User Charges on diesel so that big trucks pay less and small diesel cars pay more. Crazy stuff.

I write this as Transport Minister Steven Joyce pledges that the government will spend an extra billion dollars on our roading system — a pledge that will have the public transport lobby wailing and gnashing their teeth.

As a passionate motorist, I should be welcoming this extra billion, but the reason we need it is more to do with trucks than the rest of us.

This is a nod in the direction of Freidlander and his mates.

I reckon the billion should go on upgrading rail and getting trucks off the road.

This isn’t the first time I’ve said there we have too many trucks and they are too dangerous — the last time I got a bullet in the mail with a death threat attached.

DON’T JUST STAND THERE!

I’m pretty relaxed about most things, but if there is one thing I can’t stand, it’s wasting time. With each birthday I realise just how precious every second is and you need to make the most of it. At which point every reader will be nodding their head and saying, “yes, yes”.

Okay then, if you agree that life is to be lived and enjoyed to the maximum, can you explain the following.

Why do people stand on the down escalator? If there are stairs we walk down them — sometimes two at a time. But if there is an escalator, we stand.

Watch next time. People take two steps on and then stand still and ride down — until two steps from the bottom, when they start moving again and walk the last two steps. Everyone does it. And they will invariably put their hand on the escalator hand rail — a place that research has shown to have one of the highest concentrations of bacteria out of anything we come in regular contact with — including the inside door handles of public toilets.

So, next time you are riding the escalator, wasting perhaps 30 seconds of your life, and you hear heavy footsteps crashing down two at a time behind you — stand aside, that’s me in a hurry to get to the bottom.

In the UK they have a rule regarding escalators — if you want to stand, you do to one side. I think it's the right hand side and that leaves room for those who want to get on with life. But in NZ we don't.

AUTO PILOT

The reason that people do stand on the down escalator, and also on those horizontal travelators at airports, isn’t necessarily because they’re lazy or tired, it’s because they are on auto-pilot.

You see it in the way we drive as well.

In the city we travel along an urban road that’s single lane. When we come to a traffic-light controlled intersection, many roads split into two lanes. Sometimes three. But most motorists simply follow the car ahead, leaving 20 cars in the outside lane and only one or two in the inside lane.

And on the open road. We are travelling at say 95km/h and come up behind a slower driver who is travelling at 90km/h. Most of us simply adjust our speed, fall in behind and play follow the leader. Then another car cruises up behind, and another and another. Soon you have a cluster of cars all travelling in a herd, at the pace dictated by the leader.

If you come on this herd, but are actively thinking about what you are doing and don’t want your life dictated by others, it is almost impossible to get through the herd and get on with life.

MICROWAVES — AGAIN

A colleague (let’s not mess around here, his name is Mark) has just been out to buy lunch. He went to Sliced, a café/bakery not far from our new office and arrived back with a brown paper bag of health food — a huge sausage roll.

I know that they cost $5 each because I have bought them from Sliced as well. These are not your regular sausage rolls, these are gourmet sausage rolls, made from pork and wrapped in a thin skin of pastry.

Sliced is definitely a foodie place — you can see it in the gourmet sausage rolls and all of the other food in the cabinets. It’s prepared with loving care and pride. And the place is always busy with SYT — smart young things.

The first time I bought a gourmet sausage roll I was asked, almost as an afterthought, “You want it heated?”

To which I, the arch-enemy of Hitler’s death ray, responded — “Do you use a microwave?”

“Yes, we do.”

“I’ll have it cold thanks.” And it was so delicious I’ve been back several times for more.

Mark, who has a photograph on the wall next to his desk of himself on a trail bike 50 feet in the air and thus likes to live dangerously, brought his sausage roll back heated.

I asked him how the pastry was — “Wet and soggy,” he replied.

Serves him right. That’s what microwaving does — it destroys food and I can’t understand why foodies, like those people at Sliced, condone the practice.

Mind you, it all comes down to the customer. They might think they know all about what constitutes good coffee and great food — but when it comes down to it, they are prepared to accept garbage.

WHATEVER HAPPENED TO . . .

As a nation we seem to have 20 minute attention spans. Despite the near hysteria and blanket coverage of Christine Rankin's appointment to an outfit that we'd never heard of before, nothing had happened — except we got bored with the story and moved on. Christine Rankin is still Christine Rankin, she still has bad taste in earrings, wears her skirts too short for a woman of her age and she's still a Families Commissioner!

Similarly, the pig farming furore has disappeared despite the best efforts of Paul Holmes. Those pork chops or the bacon you bought at the supermarket this week were probably donated by a pig that lived all of its life in a cage not big enough to move in.

It will be the same with Richard Worth. We had almost forgotten what the fuss was about a day or two before he finally resigned as an MP and quit politics, but by the end of next week he will simply be, as they say, fish and chip wrapping.

EELS

When I headed to the West Coast for the feature in the upcoming issue of NZ TODAY I was always going to catch up on Peter Coburn. Peter and his elder brother Mike grew up in Brighton and I babysat them a few times. Peter and his neighbours in Westport have a stream at the bottom of their properties and they have actively encouraged eels to live in the stream. They've been so successful that there are now hundreds of them — maybe thousands. Big, fat — and so friendly they are literally pets. I watched as Peter called them and he stroked one as he fed it.

On radio, I loved talking about eels because you got so many incredible stories.

Eels are mysterious creatures that leave the countries they live in to travel thousands of kilometres to spawn. On the other side of the world the Sargasso Sea is one of these places while the New Zealand eels are thought to go to near Tonga.

But there are some who get trapped, or land-locked and they just stay here and get bigger and bigger and bigger.

I could fill a book with stories of these monster eels — more than two metres long and as thick as an All Black prop's thigh.

As a kid at Brighton, I saw not just ducklings disappear in front of my eyes, but also fully grown ducks. Just pulled down by a lightning strike from below by a big eel.

On radio I was told of horse that was taken to a pond for a drink of water and had a monster eel attack it, grabbing the horse on the nose, causing a serious wound.

A farmer told me of having to shoot an old work horse out the back of his farm. He butchered it for dog tucker and rolled the inedible "working parts" down into a gully where there was a semi-dry creek bed. As he was leaving he heard a noise and looked back into the gully to see two or three huge eels that had come up out of the glutinous mud, attacking the horse's innards in a feeding frenzy. He described these as being cousins to the Loch Ness monster.

And a work colleague from "up north" tells of a farmer's pet dog, a small house dog like a Fox Terrier or similar, swimming across a stream and being pulled under by another monster eel. The eel drowned the dog and they could see it eating the carcass.

Have you got an eel story? Love to read it.

Send your contributions, including photographs, to editor@nztoday.co.nz, or post to Allan Dick, NZ TODAY, P O Box 78 070, Grey Lynn, Auckland 1245.

The hunt is on for New Zealand's biggest eel!

CRIMINAL MEMOIRS

I have no idea what made me think of this, but here are a couple of unconnected crime stories that just ran together in my mind recently.

I began my radio career in Dunedin in 1980 and one day I got an anonymous tip-off that a handgun had been traded at a local high-school. I looked into the matter, decided it wasn’t in the public interest to use it as a story, but I informed the police.

They acted and cleaned the matter up before anyone got hurt.

By way of thanks, they offered to put me in touch with Dunedin’s leading criminal. I thought I knew all the crims by name and reputation because Dunedin isn’t that big, but this man was completely unknown to me. He was smart and had very, very few convictions.

I sat down with him and had a two-hour, very candid one-on-one.

He was big time all right. You'd call him a crime boss. Burglaries, robberies and, if I wanted someone’s leg broken, he could arrange that too.

He was also a fence. He would buy stolen property and find a home for it, at a profit. To do this, he had a financier — someone who he would go to and say he need X amount in cash for X days and he would repay the advance with very large interest.

What stunned me was the ease with which he gave me the financier’s name; Prominent Citizen would be the words you’d use.

I wondered what sort of muscle this financier had access to if my Leading Criminal ever welched on a deal — there would have been an enforcer lurking in the shadows.

I often wonder what became of that man — the criminal. I know about the financier — he's still a Prominent Citizen

TREASURES

When I moved office recently, I came across something that made me feel very uncomfortable. It was a white plastic ruler with a child’s name painted on it. I used to have a matching ballpoint pen — one of those big, fat, triangular ones, but it’s been lost along the way.

These went back to that period in Dunedin I write about above.

It was a week before Xmas and I had an early morning call that there’s been a house fire in Mosgiel and five people had died.

I headed out there and learned it was a young couple and their three children who’d perished. I walked around the property — saw the family car half in and half out the garage, saw kids toys around the back yard and looked at the house with its fan of smoke black above the broken windows. I thought of the Xmas they’d never have.

It transpired the young husband had been under financial pressure and the day before he’d had a serious meeting with Inland Revenue. He’d got up in the early hours of the morning, killed his family, set fire to the home and then killed himself.

It was a tragic story and there were questions about “how he could do it”.

On radio I mused over the man’s anguish. How he must been so wretched as he walked around the house in the dark, driven to despair.

Later that day, I had a visit from, a young girl — she was the sister of the husband and she gave me the ruler and the pen — they’d been Xmas presents destined for one of the kids.

 Read Part One here.