Happy New Year

As we near the end of the first month of 2022, I get to sneak in a Happy New Year message, before we reach February! But procrastination & delaying tasks is one of my weaknesses, and I am guessing that with a lot of humanity, I am not alone in that 😊

Anyway, as we reach the end of January, we will have Chinese New Year, so from that angle, I am right on time! Being born in the year of the tiger, I am excited to be welcoming the new year & the year of the tiger. I have studied a bit about Chinese Astrology & have been celebrating Chinese New Year since Tiger Year 1998, especially with two tiger friends (Cathy & Margot) here in Sydney. On Monday night, New Year’s Eve, Cathy & I will meet in Centennial Park for a picnic which should be fun. Parks & outside locations have become a good place to gather during the pandemic.

The last two years have been challenging & strange for almost everyone, all over the world. For a lot of people, schedules & plans fell over. For me, I have been pretty slack with my reading & writing, but my priority has been my wellbeing, and on that front, things have been going pretty well. Almost every day I go for a morning walk through Centennial Park, or down to Botanic Gardens by the harbour.

I was working from March until June last year, then things were in lockdown until October, which with me doing casual or substitute teaching, basically meant no work. I decided to stay away from schools when they reopened in October. As a casual teacher, you can be going from one class to another on the same day, going to different schools within the week, so much greater risk of exposure to virus. I had also had a vaccine that was possibly not as protective & I do get some asthma. Now that I have had a booster, I feel more confident, so will probably do some work in the coming months. Make hay while the sun shines!

My daily walk of about 8km has kept me fit & being out in nature is so good for our wellbeing. Both Centennial Park & Botanic Gardens are the perfect distance to where I am living. I continue to live in a shared house. In terms of Covid, it has been ok. Most residents have their own bathroom & kitchen, so most of the time, you do not see others; you just hear others going into their rooms. In terms of cost, it has been ideal, paying about $230 a week which is very cheap for Sydney. But it is a small room & I use a shared bathroom, almost no one else uses it, so it is mostly sole use. But when moving down the stairs etc, I always wear a mask to increase safety. I have my own kitchen to use just outside my room. And location wise, it is right opposite a park, so nature is fairly close in this urban environment, public transport & supermarkets not too far away, although I have avoided public transport since the end of June & walk everywhere instead. I like being able to walk to the city in 15 minutes.

Being a slacker on the reading & writing front, what did I do in 2021 given that I only taught for about 4 months? I watched a lot of tv series & movies that I had downloaded. The internet here where I am living can be erratic so streaming options like ABC iView or Netflix or SBS movies are not such great options. Downloading on the other hand allows me to watch programs without freezes, and if I like the series, I get to keep the series. My tastes are varied. Often SBS has brilliant foreign movies on the tv so I watch lots of those. Having been not travelling for 18 months, programs that enable me to experience different countries & cultures are awesome so I really love that. Lots of documentaries too on history, nature, cooking & train travel. I have had a couple of movies that I fanatically watch when SBS rescreens them too. “Land of the Bears” filmed in Kamchatka, Siberia, I must have watched 8 times now. Such amazing close ups of the bears as they go through their yearly salmon feeding frenzy before hibernating for their long 8-month winter. “Belle & Sebastian”, 3 films about a boy & a beautiful dog set in a small village in France around 1943-1945. Excellent stories, inspiring & beautiful.

I also like science fiction & comedy too. I am an addict for “The Office” and watch that most evenings. Its important to find things that you enjoy & go for it. Doesn’t matter if it is tv or anything. Just find the things that bring enjoyment. There have been a lot people suffering with their mental wellbeing with lockdowns etc, but I have always been ok with doing things on my own, so I coped ok with those strange months. But as I repeat, don’t worry whether others approve of what you do, but do focus on things that will be enjoyable to you & lift your spirits or give you a sense of purpose.

Other series that I have been watching & enjoying are “Babylon Berlin” set in the Weimar republic pre-Hitler, “The Crown” of course! Having been raised in New Zealand with parents that lived through World War II, everything to do with the British Royals is attractive & interesting, although the deviation from truth, is a subject for discussion. “The Man in the High Castle” set in US with Nazi & Japanese occupation was a shocking & captivating series, especially for someone like me who has always been interested in WWII especially learning about the holocaust. Another series that I finally watched all of in 2021 (anyone who watches 5 or 6 series in a row, knows that such viewings are a major undertaking!) was “The Americans” set in US in the 1980s about two undercover KGB spies. Another captivating series with all the subjects & music of the 1980s reminding me so much of my university days.

In the last couple of weeks, I have been very lucky to be able to visit the apartment of some good friends who live down the road from me, as they often go up to their weekend retreat. Getting to watch Netflix, Prime & Disney streaming on a 51“ tv has been awesome! (Thanks Ann & Iver!) With Holocaust Memorial Day just been, I have been drawn to watch documentaries & movies on this topic. I recommend “The Devil Next Door” (a Ukrainian-US man charged with war crimes in Israel), “Operation Finale Munich: The Edge of War” (Chamberlain’s efforts to avoid war with Nazi Germany), “Shadowplay” (a series set in chaotic Berlin 1946), “The Last Days” (documentary about 5 Hungarian Jewish survivors).

I am still in contact with my friend Fred in Los Angeles, a survivor of Auschwitz & a great guy, currently in lockdown in his aged care facility & sending emails to his daughter. Fred will be 100 years old this year, so fingers crossed he makes it to that finishing line!

Currently my friends Ann & Iver & I are watching the complete collection of Star Wars movies. All being of an age to have seen the originals when they were released, we are all clear that Episodes 4-6 are clearly the best.

But my whole year was not just spent watching tv series, docos & movies on my computer!

A little bit of reading books, I read the trilogy of Peter Mayle’s Provence books as well as his “25 years in Provence”. Such enjoyable recounts of the life lived in South of France with the focus on seasons, good food & wine. Such enjoyable reads. When my Dad was alive, he loved reading these books too. I also read the first of the book series of “The Garden of Allah” set in golden era Hollywood, written by Martin Turnbull, an Australian living in LA. And I always read the latest Michael Connelly novels when they are released. It’s the one crime writer that I read. Excellent story telling.

I have made a commitment with my coach (currently a friend in Morocco, we are making monthly plans on what we plan to achieve) to read 2 books & write 2 blogs or articles in January, so the reading has been achieved & I am fulfilling on the writing as I write this. Making plans such as New Years resolutions are great, but when you share them, it becomes more effective, I find. It becomes like ‘I said I was going to do x, y, z so I better get it done’, not out of being in trouble or anything, but simply to do what I said I would do.

When I looked at my list of blogs/ articles for 2021, I was shocked to see I had only written one! I knew it would be only a few, but just one! But it was a good one. I did write a lot in facebook discussions especially re Covid. I will write more about that subject in another blog/ article, but suffice to say, there has never been a more important time for education in the world, with so many people spouting opinions as facts, and opinions that are dangerous to peace, security & public health.

The one blog/article that I produced has been read by over 350 people, so that’s great. Its about the need for a minimum income for all citizens of the world & how it can be achieved. I have published it at booksie as well, so if you have not read it yet, here is the link:

Creating an International Minimum Income, essay by grahamnzau (booksie.com)

After writing this article, I sent the link to government leaders in many countries as well as many at the UN. Not many responses, but the way I see it, all forces for progress are growing, but also the delayed state of education world wide makes it a dangerous time for ‘alternative facts’. We only need to study 1930s Germany to understand how dangerous ‘alternative facts’ aka invented & unproven ideas can be. Same applies with vaccines too. The people who deny masks & lockdowns or vaccines have any use. Here in Sydney, a lot of the time, nearly half of patients in ICU have been from the 5% of the population who did not get vaccinated.

Now that I am reading more & getting back into writing, I enjoy the process & I believe I have important ideas to write about & share. To develop your intellect & think about issues for the betterment of all, is a great thing to do. And an important one as well.

I believe the world situation with Covid is still unclear, so my plan for 2022 is to stay in Sydney, do some work & then go over to New Zealand later in the year. If all is going well in the world by early 2023, then I hope to travel beyond this region again & see more places & meet more people.

As I already wrote, Covid & travel restrictions have affected people & business worldwide, but especially in poorer nations dependent on tourism, so let’s hope the situation improves for everyone. With the restrictions on travel, there has never been a better time to use phone calls, facebook, skype & all that other amazing technology. So, I may have been staying in Sydney for the past year, but communication wise I have really enjoyed communicating with friends all over the world, especially new friends I made while traveling in the last 5-10 years.

There are challenges a plenty for so many people, but at the same time so much to be grateful for. Travelling has enabled me to see the economic challenges of so many in the world, so being here in Sydney with good food & living conditions is something that I suspect I appreciate more than a lot of others. We don’t need to have it all, but if we can really appreciate what we do have, we will be the winners for it.