The Rose in the Lily Pond

The guard clips my ticket with a look of concern. I smile bravely back in return trying to reassure him and myself that  I am a confident independent traveller half way through a 23-hour bus ride from Boston to South Carolina and I’m riding the greyhound with my fellow, too-poor-to-fly, passengers. It was only later that I discovered many Greyhound passengers catch it because they are criminals who are on the 'no fly' lists.  I board the bus and am greeted by a gangster. He looks like a drug dealer from ‘The Wire’ with all the frills. Five sizes too big jeans, baggy shirt, gold chain and bandana intact. He calls me down to a spare seat at the back of the bus. No thanks. I grab a seat close to the front. Rattled, I eaves drop, “Cuantos hijos tiene?” a Latino man asks a woman with a baby how many children she has, and my muscles slump into the chair, my heavy eyes close. I am just another immigrant riding the bus.  The lights shut off. I feel a body shift into th

Climbed Tokatoka peak, an icon in Dargaville. I have been living in Dargaville now for six months, SIX MONTHS! I can’t believe it. Here’s five things this not so sleepy town has shown this former city girl: Where food comes from: The moo cows down the road I walk - they always stare at me as if they are plotting a take over... We killed the brown cow the other day. When I say “we” I mean the butcher who does home kills but I was certainly an accomplice. I have watched her grow while I have been living here – I almost told her to slow down as she chomped away at the grass so she got to live longer. Grant and Cherry, who I live with, rear cattle and now there are three cows left in their paddock wondering where their mate went... Yes it’s sad – but if you eat meat then an animal has to die, that’s the reality of it. Mixing with people you wouldn’t normally is refreshing: A 24 year old single mother of two young boys has befriended me at work. My close fr