A Very Long-Overdue 2022 Posting

 An apology to my loyal but modest numbers of blog followers: It has been seven months since my last entry, an unusually long period of time. The blog silence is multi-factorial, but largely because I got a new laptop with Windows 11 and they didn’t include my usual photo-editing program and I haven’t had the time or energy to sort that out. Also, life has seemed a dystopian monotonous purgatory. Things aren’t getting simpler, and just when you think maybe the COVID cloud is lifting, no, it’s just morphing. MONKEYPOX….REALLY! Did we need this? And the brutal war in Ukraine reminds us, “You think things are bad? Did you forget war is the stupidest most cruel and barbaric thing humans do to one another?”

In the on-going spirit of this endeavor as part diary, part travelogue, part musing, I will briefly recap my 2022 so far.

 HOLIDAYS 2021/BIRTHDAY 2022

Christmas Dinner 2021

Back to the USA, expecting a family Christmas at the cabin surrounded by snow, omicron upset all that. With omicron spreading rapidly resulting in hastily re-calculated exposure risk, we did not go to the mountains but celebrated modestly with dinner with David N. and a day with Karen K.

Early January plans were scuttled due to massive travel disruptions and flight cancellations. I had a much appreciated birthday celebration with family and friends in Richmond, CA.

 

NEW YORK

When it became relatively “safer” to travel, our first stop was in New York State to catch up with Fayne’s family. Her younger brother Gary had been quite unwell for months and visiting with all the family was essential. Sister Mary and family and Gary’s son Jason could not have been more warmly welcoming and hospitable.

I actually enjoyed the bitterly cold weather in Syracuse. It felt Christmasy to me.

L to R: Christina, FML, Ryan, Dan,Anna, Mary, Fred, me

Clinton Square, Syracuse NY

GEORGIA

From NY it was down to Kathleen, Georgia to visit Sofia, Marquise, and the Grandchildren. They are growing so fast! We got to take the kids to the Georgia Aquarium, the only place outside of Asia to see the awesome whale shark.

The star of the show

Digital image of us about to be devoured by a Great White

A collage of our fun with the kids (clockwise from the upper left): whale shark, at Buc-ees, Sea turtle, exploring the neighborhood, Motoro rays, touching pool, and us in the center

FORT BRAGG AND THE BAY AREA

After our adventures back East we spent the rest of our time between Fort Bragg and the Bay Area.

In 2009 a ship's propeller killed a 73-foot female blue whale which washed up south of Fort Bragg. With much care and dedication the Noyo Center for Marine Science now has the skeleton available to view. They are hoping to raise enough money for a proper permanent exhibition hall.

Photos of the processing the carcass

Pizza in the garden of the Cafe Beaujolais in Mendocino

Back in the Bay Area, sister Athena tipped us off to an art exhibit called Lands End  at the historic Cliff House perched overlooking Ocean Beach, the ruins of the Sutro Baths, and the blue Pacific. 27 artists had installations reflecting on global climate change. 

Ocean Beach to the South

Sutro Baths to the North

Maja Petrić’s ‘Lost Skies’ diptych from ‘Lands End’ at the Cliff House | Photo by Robert Divers Herrick

It's great to have easy San Francisco access by ferry from Richmond.

The statue of Gandhi overlooking the food stalls at the Ferry Bldg. Farmers' Market

Cousin Christopher (lower L. corner) for SF dim sum. Yum!

BACK IN NEW ZEALAND MARCH-JULY 2022

We returned to NZ from the US the end of March, not sure what we would await us. What I found was plenty of work for me, but not as much in Timaru as I had hoped, so I am working more in hospitals around the country. If you consult your New Zealand map you can find places I have or will be: Hawke’s Bay, Invercargill, Greymouth, Whangarei, and New Plymouth. People are generally nice and appreciative of me coming to help out. Perhaps the administration in Timaru takes my services for granted but there is a great need for doctors throughout NZ and they appreciate the help. This experience has reaffirmed I still have a passion to work as a physician and find it infinitely challenging and interesting, and I still have more to give.

The COVID delta then omicron variants have breached this fortress island nation. The numbers are stunning, over ½ of the population having contracted some form of it. However, as the vaccination rates are in the 90-95% range, it hasn’t been the hellscape of death seen elsewhere in the pre-vaccine days. That doesn’t mean that it doesn’t remain extremely disruptive. For example when I worked in the Southland Hospital in Invercargill there was an in-hospital outbreak. Every day more patients were isolated and room after room had more positives. The facility had “planned” for up to eight patients, but there were three on Monday and over 20 when I left on Friday. Challenges included: more and more sheets of plastic draped about to climb through; constant donning and doffing PPE; staff being out sick; inability to discharge patients due to their testing positive; and disruptions of regular medical and surgical care.  Everyone admitted to the hospital is unwell, and while COVID might not be their primary problem, it complicates everything.

HAWKE'S BAY APRIL 2022 

The first stop out of Timaru was Hawke's Bay Hospital for two weeks. In one of several wine regions in NZ, the three main towns are Havelock North (where the hospital is), Hastings, and Napier (considered the Art Deco capital of the country). We have passed through a few times before, but had a chance to take a deeper dive, like taking a day trip to Cape Kidnappers/ Te Kauwae-a-Maui and the gannet colony there. The English moniker comes from Captain Cook's journal in 1769. He described what he thought was an attempted abduction of a Tahitian boy, but the locals saw as an attempted rescue of someone they mistakenly took as Maori.

It was a lovely day to visit the large nesting colony of Australasian gannets.

We had plenty of time to sample local treats and explore.

Mama's Donuts

Havelock North Farmers' Market

Napier Farmers' Market

Pania of the Reef statue in Napier

Panoramic view from Te Mata  peak

Maraetotara Falls

WELLINGTON/GREEK EASTER APRIL 2022

On our way back to Timaru we stopped over for Greek Easter weekend and stayed at the Rydges Hotel recently opened inside the airport, a concept Fayne loves and our now Wellington-based friend  Florry finds endlessly amusing.

 

We discovered a Greek community and Orthodox church in the shadow of the airport as well as the Roxy Cinema, a passion project of the local thriving Welliewood film community.

We didn't make it to church on time, but like an Easter miracle we had brunch at the excellent Mediterranean-influenced August Eatery. Our waitperson happened to be the co-owner with her Greek husband, and on our mention of missing Easter festivities, she presented us with two gorgeous traditional blood-red eggs. It made our day!

INVERCARGILL/SOUTHLAND MAY 2022

I mentioned my week in Invercargill/Southland DHB above in discussing COVID in NZ. The people were nice and enjoyed the hospital despite the stressful times, but Invercargill is of the southernmost cities in the world. It was quite chilly, especially being housed in a 100 year-old poorly insulated property across the street from the hospital.

About an hour before arriving at our destination we passed through Gore for about the 4th time. Oddly for a small rural town, it houses the renown Eastern Southland Gallery, which was closed during our previous visits. It did not disappoint. Located in a repurposed Carnegie Library from 1909, you will find two major permanent exhibits:The John Money Collection and the Ralph Hotere Gallery. John Money was a very famous and influential Johns Hopkins sexologist (a fascinating story itself) who had a passion for collecting quality New Zealand artists' works, as well tribal and ethnological handicrafts, especially from West Africa and Australia. Ralph Hotere (1931-2013) was one of New Zealand's most important artists of the last 100 years. His works and those of other celebrate Kiwis can be found here.

 

Moon, August (1965) by Rita Angus

GREYMOUTH/WEST COAST MAY-JUNE 2022 

After Southland, it was off to Greymouth on the West Coast for two weeks.

We have passed through Greymouth at least six times since 2010 and I always suspected I may work there briefly at some point, but not because I liked it. Quite the opposite in fact. Greymouth may be the only city in New Zealand I felt I would not want to live. In my limited experience, the weather was mostly miserable; cloudy, rainy, and windy. Even though it is just on the western side of the majestic Southern Alps, I usually could not see them. Also, it is the heart of coal mining in NZ and on the banks of the Grey River. As such, there is a long history of tragic mine accidents and floods. During our first stint in Timaru in 2010 the Pike River Mine disaster occurred, killing and burying 29 miners. A tragic air hangs over the area and feels much like West Virginia to me.

My friend and co-worker from years ago in Fort Bragg, Jon Pace, has found a home as a general surgeon there for about 15 years, and has always encouraged me to work there (as they are chronically short of doctors), and reassured me the weather is frequently pleasant. Perhaps I had bad luck and gotten the wrong impression. This was my chance to see.

It turns out I was wrong. The weather was much worse than I feared as I endured probably the most intense two weeks of howling winds, torrential rain, and violent thunder and lightning in my life. There is something about storms coming in from the Tasman Sea that hit the West Coast with a vengeance.

Jon Pace at work

Jon confided in me that he was planning to submit his letter of resignation the very next day to pursue a path of locums work similar to me. He will be very much missed I am sure. Actually, the work experience was interesting. The hospital is quite new and well laid-out, not like most NZ facilities which tend to be a jumbled patchwork of structures built piecemeal over the last seven+ decades. Manned mostly by GPs and more seasoned house officers, the staff and the patients demonstrate the toughness and self-reliance for which the West Coast is famous. I was rewarded by the sense that I helped provide some much needed and valued service there, and might even work there some time in the future (but NOT in the winter, that’s for sure!)

There was one three-day weekend, the Queen's Birthday (not really her actual birthday, but a holiday nonetheless), and the weather was nice for about 36 hours. We had time to drive south to Fox Glacier, a place we had a very positive visit last year, and again enjoyed the glacier view and walk and a good meal.

The Southern Alps and Fox Glacier from Lake Matheson.

Ronnie & Andy, two aggressively inquisitive Chinese hikers at Fox Glacier

We had one unique cultural experience whilst in Greymouth, lured in by an enticing poster promising eight ten-minute plays with dinner at a local pub and carvery, the Union Hotel. We were intrigued by this local company producing these plays of fair-to-say obscure playwright G. M. (Bud) Thompson from Grand Rapids, MI.

We weren't sure if anyone else would be there, or how this seemingly unlikely event came into being, but we did want to support the local arts. What I remember most is that for the first time since the pandemic started we found orselves in a crowded, cold room packed with unmasked eating and drinking strangers for several hours. We were an awkward pair, clearly outsiders, uncomfortably masked some of the time. The plays were longer than the ten minutes advertised, but as engaging as possible given our distraction and the luck-of-the-draw nature of earnest but uneven community theater.

WHANGANUI/NORTHLANDS JUNE

Whangarei Falls on the Hatea River

The 2 ½ weeks spent in Whangarei my longest locum assignment and the only one on a geriatrics and rehab ward. I was fortunate to work with an extremely capable, experienced, and friendly team (thanks especially to Vic and Wishva). It was nice to be able to finally have enough time to share some meals and see my colleagues unmasked enough to identify their sub-ocular faces. They also were quite short-handed, due to multiple factors. In addition to COVID and influenza over the last 2 ½ years doctors working in New Zealand have accumulated many weeks of paid leave, CME leave, and even 3-month sabbaticals to which they are entitled every six years. Here the usual Geriatric Senior Medical team is six, but was down to two (counting me) at the start of my stay.  

Our accommodation, a well-furnished roomy flat, had a tremendous view over Whangarei Harbour.

View from our flat

Features of the harbour include a rolling bascule bridge Te Matau a Pohe, which uses the counterweight of the graceful white “fishhook” to lift a section, allowing taller ships to pass.

The most obvious landmark in the town basin is the Hundertwasser Art Centre/ Wairau Maori Art Gallery (Hundertwasser and Wairau both translate to "100 waters" in German and Maori respectively) . 

It is dedicated to the art, architecture and philosophy of Friedensreich Hundertwasser, born Friedrich Stowasser in Vienna in 1928. After a difficult life surviving Nazi occupation of Austria, he studied and traveled in Europe and elsewhere developing his art and philosophy, finally in the 1970's settling in the north of New Zealand where he lived until his death in 2000. He abhorred anything with straight lines, and his art emphasized spirals and bright colors. His buildings strive to have all surfaces uneven with vegetation on the roofs. I previously visited his fanciful toilets in Kawakawa, but his influence is felt throughout the region.

Fountain outside the Art Centre

Hundertwasser-inpired Kawakawa Library

Kawakawa toilets from Wikipedia By Berlin-George

The centre was completed posthumously after 30 years of controversy and cost over-runs, and finally opened February 20, 2022. Personally, I have seen a lot of eccentric colorful buildings in other places around the world and an insistence on uneven flooring seems like a concept orthopedic surgeons would endorse. However, I found his paintings and posters compelling, reflecting his devotion to the environment and social causes.

A Tapestry

306A Sunset (1966)

Green Town

A poster

The area has a multitude of wonderful walks nearby. The Hatea River empties into Whagarei Harbour and features waterfalls (like the one above and below) and giant kauri trees.

Paranui Falls

Kauri tree

A brisk hike up the hill behind our flat leads to Mt. Parihaka with 360° vistas and the War Memorial. In town, surrounding the library, are ten Maori and Pasifika pou. [Pou is the Maori word for the main post in the palisade of a pā(fort).]

The War Memorial atop Mt. Parihaka

Tangata Whenua and Pasifika Pou

On weekends and holidays (like Matariki, the Maori New Year, which we honored with a night-time trip to the planetarium), there are so many scenic drives and beaches nearby.

Matapouri Beach

NEW PLYMOUTH/TARANAKI JULY 2022

Our last stop on what Fayne has dubbed our version of Cher's Farewell Tour, one that may never end, was a week in New Plymouth. When clear, Mt. Taranaki looms over Taranaki Base Hospital and the city.

A photo of the hospital and Mt. Taranaki from the Ellingtons in New Zealand blog.

We chose New Plymouth so as to spend a little more time with our friend Kate (formerly of Timaru) and new baby Harriet (AKA: Harry). New dad Steven was sequestered at work as an anesthetist and studying for exams. I enjoyed the work and Fayne had a grand time visiting, exploring the CBD, and attending the French Film Festival.

Me, Kate, Harry's head, F., and Steven from Wellington airport in April

 A brief respite in Timaru before returning to the USA

We have had about ten days to rest, organize ourselves, and prepare for our USA return July 26 through mid-January 2023. It was good to have one last chance to enjoy our previous weekly routine: Tuesday dinner with medical colleagues; Wednesday night pub quiz. At dinner, I met two new younger female doctors from the USA and felt the department will be in good hands. Team Leon produced one more quiz win and was awarded with frozen chicken (which I gifted to friend Mal).

Mal, chicken, and me

There was time to walk south along the coast and appreciate the beauty of Aotearoa morning. My transition will continue from work to retirement and New Zealand to the USA perhaps for the next few years. But as hard as it is to believe, I fear we will be returning to our home country that seems more dangerous, cruel, angry, divided, undemocratic, and illogical than ever before.

Timaru morning