Sebastian's stories

14 September 2019

Cherry Tree Cottage

Cherry Tree Cottage was where I came from. It was my turangawaewae. It is still my spiritual home, even though I left it when I was nine, and have returned to it only once. It still inhabits my dreams and excites romantic longings to go back to visit.

The house was around 350 years old, with stone walls thick as my arm and wooden beams so low that my father had to stoop to get under them. There were worn-down flagstones on the floor, a 'priest's hole' at the back, and two uneven staircases, going up to three bedrooms under the thatched eaves. In one of the beams there was a secret opening that nobody knew about. When my father visited the place many years later, when it had been turned into a guest house, he found that the mementoes he had placed in the cache were still there, undiscovered.

There was also a garage, with a thatched studio room above it. My parents turned the studio into a village library, and when the squire started to use it, then the villagers followed suit, and it became well-attended despite some of the views people had about my parents. 

My father was also an excellent gardener, and I remember helping him by topping and tailing blackcurrants and gooseberries for bottling.The gardens were big, and dominated by a cherry tree and a laburnum beside it. There was a grape vine that went around our house and the other houses attached to it.

We walked to school along Robert Street (always called 'Bob Lane'). I remember stone walls and little flower gardens. The school was made of stone, with a slate roof. Outside over the road from the school was a bridge over a tinkling stony river. The church I dragged myself along to each Sunday was also built from stone. My brothers, however went to the Methodist church down the road.

That was school. Behind our house was quite different. There was a large playing field, a grandstand, and a grove of pines. We had our own private access, except when there was a fair or other major event. It was there that I tried my first damp cigarette and had my first embarrassed kiss. I was only eight, and very shy.

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Christmas in England

I remember our Christmases. They were among the few times our 'front room' was ever used. Over Christmas we always invited others in to our comforting fire. We also started a practice of visiting neighbours, friends and lonely acquaintances with bells, cakes and mince pies. Christmases at home always had a comfortable formality about them. We opened our stockings (which were ordinary long socks – not at all these huge red monstrosities that are now the fashion). The contents of the stockings were similar for everyone – a little string bag of chocolate coins, a chocolate Father Christmas, a hooter or other noisemaker, a pencil with a rubber on the end, a water pistol, a few other small items, a jaffa orange, and large sprigs of holly bulking out the sock. There was always some little present specially chosen for each of us.

Christmas actually started a week or more before. We made daisy chains out of dad's printing paper cut-offs. We puzzled over the presents we could give – often hand-made . We helped make cakes and sweets. We were full of excitement and tears. My mother, however, got out all her art supplies and made a Christmas card or tile for all her many friends and relations. She was a wonderful artist. On one tile, for instance, was a tree that had apples representing the family.

Christmas is really quite a charade, of course. We knew that Father Christmas would come down the chimney and fill our stockings. We also knew, as though it was our personal secret, that our father would already have filled each companion sock and attached a red string to hang them on the bedposts. We all tried to secretly spy on him as he went from room to room, to see if he was wearing a red suit and hat.

Of course we had a special fry-up for breakfast, after the mess from the water fights had been cleared up. Then we would have a quiet time before going visiting. We opened our presents in turn, one by one, at set times during the day. Visitors were welcome and often turned up unexpectedly. There were always nuts and home made sweets, as well as a large cake. In the afternoon.we might have a friendly crichet match or visit anyone who might be lonely. We also played Knight's Square Game, or Up Jenkins or other group activities. (And if you don't know either of those games then you have NEVER lived. Not in our household in any case).

CND and the Vietnam War

Every Easter between 1961 to 1964 my younger brother Vallis and I would go down to Wellington to march against the development and testing of atomic and hydrogen bombs. We were young members of the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CND). The first year's march started at Waikanae and went on to Parliament. That march consisted of a raggle-tag of people, young and old, many of whom later became leaders of the Labour Party or the Trade Union movement. Waikanae at that time consisted of just a small scattering of dwellings and, I think, a single shop. But the march grew as we went along the road, stopping for the night at Paraparaumu, Paekakariki, and Porirua. By the time it had reached Parliament it numbered a couple of hundred people. The last stage of the march, down the Ngauranga Gorge and along the Hutt Road, was undertaken in silence. That's how I remember it.

The second march was better organised and much bigger, especially on the last day. The third one went from Featherston over the hill to Wellington. The hill road was much steeper and more treacherous than the present one, and it had a stopping off place so that cars could cool down and fill up with water. The on his way to his Easter break, Prime Minister Keith Holyoake stopped his car to talk encouraging words with us. But unfortunately for him his cat escaped from the car and ran down the steep slope into the bush, thus giving him the unwelcome obligation to continue making conversation with the Labour politicians and trade union leaders who were on the march.

At the Lower Hutt Agricultural Hall the next night our numbers had grown considerably, and were further augmented by members of the newly formed Committee of Seventy-Five, which later became known as the Wellington Committee on Vietnam, and it was rumoured that the government would support the Americans and send troops. The next day the combined group marched silently along the foreshore to Parliament. The final crowd was estimated at 5,000 people, which was probably the biggest demonstration in New Zealand's history till that time.

A group of us went to the pictures that night at the Lido in Willis Street. We saw the Peter Sellers film 'Dr Strangelove, or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb'. We did not find it funny!

Wizardry

The last four days have been just right for gardening, so I've been carting barrow loads of compost onto the vegetable patch, which is ready and waiting for spring. The reason I enjoy the garden so much is that it is an excuse for my thoughts to go wild. What should I have done at university. I think I should have pursued anthropology as a career, rather than scraping through courses on languages. But then I think of my interest in words and their origin. I wonder if I would be able to work out crossword puzzles or write poetry if I had concentrated on anthropology.

Of course it is impossible to turn back the clock, and if I had I would probably now be pondering over the other possibilities of my life – conjuring, for instance. When I was 12 or 13 I had a yearning to become a conjuror. I even put on a couple of shows, before I realised how fumble-fingered I was. In metalwork I made a black box, in which I could hide a number of items. I painted a wand black with white ends, and was able to make things vanish inside it. But when it came to cards or coins or rabbits in top hats, then I was hopeless. I'm not sure where my box of tricks ended up. I did acquire a card that could stand up on its end, another that was two different denominations depending on which way up it was, and a few other trick props. I had a string of silks that I could make disappear, though it was a problem to make them reappear.

For a few months I went every Sunday night down to a workshop above a garage in New Plymouth. The owner of the garage, a Mr Grundy, was very tolerant of my poor attempts at wizardry. As well as being a car mechanic he was a member of the international Inner Magic Circle, and he told me of the time he rode around the Square in Christchurch at rush hour wearing a blindfold.

I will not say the usual things about being left in the dark, but all I can say is that there are too many people around who are experts at sleight of hand. And if you go to the poetry page you will see all about 'Hiding the Elephant'.

Shoes

One of the differences between England and New Zealand in the 1950s rand 1960s related to shoes.

In England NOBODY walked around without shoes on. It was the sign of real poverty. Shoes were worn outside and slippers inside. In New Zealand most people we knew preferred bare feet. When we lived at the Riverside Community, near Motueka, we walked about four miles to school across cow paddocks and through gorse hedges in bare feet. There was a sort of pride in us, that we were close to the soil, together with its cuts, bruises and brambles. In England there was not such a close connection. As Hopkins said, “Nor shall foot feel, being shod.”

I can't remember my shoes. We had little money, so I had just a single pair, which we needed to dye each time we changed to a new school with a different uniform. When I was in the fourth form my shoes and my navy school shorts both collapsed. At last I got a proper uniform.

Yes, shoes, uniforms, caps with their buttons bitten off, jerseys too small – I don't remember feeling too much shame about our shabbiness. The masters and the other boys knew we were really different, but we made friends, some of them lasting a lifetime. I think there was a real tolerance at the school, even for boys who wouldn't play rugby or undertake cadet training, and even if they wore shoes with holes in their soles.

Fish's Fighting Forces

'Fish's Fighting Forces' was the nickname given to all those students that were excused from cadet training. There was usually up to fifteen or twenty of us, out of s school roll of around 1000 students. Several were excused because of injury, while others, such as Jehovah's Witnesses, were excused on religious grounds. I refused to be excused on religious grounds, but argued against war on moral grounds. That was something new. I didn't support war. I would never fight, either on the rugby field or on the battlefield. I have held to that tenet all my life.

There was an odd relationship between FFF and the cadets in their uniforms. We would often be detailed to pick up rubbish around the school, but as there was little supervision, we generally dawdled along or marched behind the cadets on parade. It was an odd division. The teachers who were playing captains and squadron leaders and other fancy ranks were not in a position to deal with 'civilians' so we could do what we liked with impunity.

Because my brothers and I refused to do the cadet training, after a while we got less demeaning jobs. I was assigned to the art room with the art teacher 'Texas' Tett. We were supposed to clean the room up, but Texas was usually more interested in doing other things and couldn't be bothered with us, so we were on our own. We were not angels or even perfect students. It was rumoured that Texas was getting short-sighted so messages about him were stuck around the tops of the walls. But the most shameful thing for which I was culpable, along with a couple of other boys, was to take the little villages created by the third formers, and torch them into a holocaust using flames from the bunsen burners in the back art room, or else slowly winding down a press on the cardboard structures.

My only excuse was that I was not the ring leader, and was really quite horrified at what I had participated in. I was riddled with guilt. I was haunted by my capacity for destruction.

Music

'Texas' Tett was not the only teacher with a nickname. 'Hoppy' Lynch was the music teacher. He was a short man with a pronounced limp and a huge popularity around the school. His music room was a very old building that had probably dated from 1882, when the school was first opened. Hoppy was one of those teachers who welcomed students into his domain at lunchtimes and other breaks. He was the driving force behind the excellent music repertoire, which included two pop groups, a small choir, a larger choir, a brass band and a sizeable orchestra. These groups were often called upon to perform at different functions around Taranaki. On top of that programme he produced, in conjunction with the Girls High, a Gilbert and Sullivan Opera every year.

I was a yeoman in 'The Yeoman of the Guards' and a shepherd in 'Amahl and the Night Visitors'. I was not a good singer, but enjoyed the music so much that I sang 'sotto voce' whenever Hoppy tried to find out who was out of tune. At home I tried learning the piano, and also the violin, and as a result discovered that my hand, eye and voice coordination was closer to a donkey's than to that of an operatic tenor.

Still, my musical adventures and lack of flair got me what I wanted. I arranged to have my lessons every day of after-school soccer practice. I had to play soccer on Saturday mornings of course. I played full-back, didn't know anything about the game, except that I should kick the ball as far up the field as I could. My soccer boots were second hand and found it hard to stay on my feet. And in one game I actually fell asleep on the field, while the ball had disappeared for a while up the far end of the field.

I met Hoppy Lynch again by chance much later. It was on a bus in Wellington. I recognised him at once, though would not have had any idea who I was even if I had given him my name. But we talked of old times and new. He had, I think, just been made the Principal of Taumaranui High School, and I think I was at that time Head of English and social studies at Porirua College. I felt honoured to have met him again, and the distance between us was just right.

Teachers and their little ways

Other teachers had their own nicknames and reputations. 'Fish' Hatherley's room was called 'The Aquarium' and was decorated with pictures of fishes.

'Greasy Bob' taught me social studies. I remember him leaning over me and stroking his moustache, saying “A lazy fellow, eh! Hasn't done his homework.” and, objecting to my blue shading of the sea edges of my map, sneering “What's this seaweed all around your map.” Greasy Bob made any person who questioned his authority go down to the bamboo patch and cut a cane to deliver his punishment.

'Johnny' Stewart, who later became Captain of the All Blacks, thought there was too much noise at morning break, so made all my class line up behind me and we were each given the cane.

Indeed, punishment was a fact of life at NZPBHS. The twins, John and Alan Boddy started a competition to see who could get the most notches on their belt. By the third term John's belt fell to pieces with 23 notches in it.

The school was rugby mad. It had 32 rugby teams. Those who didn't play rugby were called 'Tiddlywinkers' by Johnny Stewart and were regarded as wimps. In retrospect, I think there was quite a difference in attitude between the day pupils and the boarders, most of whom came from farming backgrounds. The school was modelled on English public schools, with a large boarding establishment, fagging, and strict hierarchies of students, based not on academic ability but on sporting prowess. Day bugs were regarded as an unfortunate inconvenience. The most important sporting event was the match against St Pat's College, Silverstream. A train was hired to take the senior students to the venue, and of course the train got trashed on its return journey. It was rumoured that any boy who did not attend the match would fail accreditation for University Entrance. And it was interesting how many mediocre students did manage to get accredited. My elder brother was so scared of missing accreditation that he took the train ride. I didn't.

This may sound as though the education at the school was not up to scratch, but that was not the case, at least not with the 'professional' stream. My brother wanted to do engineering, so my naïve parents enrolled him in the 'engineering and building' stream. They were soon told that if he wanted to be an engineer he should enrol in the 'professional' stream. Different teachers and different standards. I went back over the school certificate results for those years. Almost nobody passed any subjects in the bottom stream, while everyone passed in the top stream. The set-up was self-fulfilling.

My parents didn't like the crew cuts that were becoming the fashion in the 1960s and wouldn't allow us to have our hair short. At that stage there were all sorts of rules about uniforms. Girls were not allowed to have skirts more than five inches above the ground when they were kneeling. They also had to have their hair tied back, to stop it being caught in the machinery (ie typewriters). Boys had to have short hair. My parents objected, so one day some of the prefects held me down on the ground, with teachers watching, and cut my hair off. In a sense I got my own back. I appeared in a period American play at the New Plymouth Opera House. It was called 'Life with Father' and all the cast had to have long red hair. The rest of the cast had their hair dyed, but with me they used a spray-on colouring agent, so that I could easily wash it out. Well, the colouring agent did NOT wash out but turned a metallic green. So for several days I walked around the school with shoulder-length green hair.

Did I enjoy school? Not really. I didn't really make many friends. I was nondescript and quiet. My brother, in his sixth (6Sc) and seventh (6A) forms, had a much more exciting time. That class was so unified that almost every one returned for a reunion around 30 years later, and many are still in close contact with one another. They had incidents. One boy experimented with home made touchpaper and brought a suitcase of it to class, and it 'accidentally' caught fire and caused the evacuation of several rooms. There were regular pissing competitions on the terraces above the lower playing field. There was a toilet there, with a little high window, and the winner was the one who could get his stream out of that window. The two-story hall had classrooms around the central space, and each lower floor classroom had a little trapdoor in the floor at the back of the room. Most teachers spent much of their time writing on the blackboards, so they didn't see that their class was either getting emptied of students or had become standing-room only. On one April Fool's day a Mini car was found in the middle of the hall floor. It had been carried in there on its side.

The last time I sneaked through my old school the hall was empty and forlorn. All that remained of its old grandeur was the honours board behind the rostrum stage, and the wonderful arched wooden roof, still with some of the darts sticking in from its former boisterous life.