Moving On

Perugino’s image of Handing over the Keys in the Sistine Chapel

It’s now Easter Monday, April 1, 2024, a public holiday. Kia ora!

What an interesting few days it has been.  I used to find the long Easter weekend boring and rather frustrating.  Most shops are closed; the roads are dangerous; prices are higher than usual, and many places are either closed or impose a surcharge.  But last week I had a busy and enjoyable week.  In my upbringing, Easter and Christmas were not celebrated; it’s rather wonderful to me to celebrate the Christian aspects of these festivals. This morning I finished listening to Bach’s St Matthew Passion, after unsuccessfully starting several times. One year there will be a wonderful performance of it in Wellington.  In the meantime, I listen to German or King’s College recordings.

Furthermore, JD and I watched the play Becket on television.  This is a rather wonderful 1964 film of one of Jean Anouilh’s plays.  I was familiar with his Antigone, from the Sophocles play. Oddly, I was just talking with someone about Anouilh’s Antigone.  And I’m familiar with T.S. Eliot’s Murder in the Cathedral, and Geoffrey Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales.

The film stars “smoldering eyes” Richard Burton as Thomas Becket, who becomes the Archbishop of Canterbury, and Peter O’Toole (who starred in David Lean’s Lawrence of Arabia), as King Henry II. The costumes are amazingly lavish and beautiful. John Gielgud (later Sir John) does a wonderful turn as King Louis of France.  The Pope makes a rather wise decision.  So it all fitted in rather well with Holy Week.  This morning I listened to an old Rest of History podcast where half the podcast was about Thomas Becket, who was murdered, in Canterbury Cathedral, on December 29.  He later became a saint and it is said that he performed miracles of healing.  He had been a great favourite of King Henry II, but it all went wrong when Becket found he had a greater loyalty to God than to the King, after the King made him archbishop.

Afterwards, late last night, we watched Mr Bates vs the Post Office, the mini series starring Toby Jones recently shown in England.  We watched two episodes, I think and hope that another episode is shown tonight.  

In this morning’s paper, I was surprised to read about Anzac Day remembrances – already, since it is only April 1 today. We didn’t get nearly as much about Easter. While remembrance of personal sacrifices should be done with dignity and respect, a greater sacrifice took place over the Easter weekend.

It’s now Tuesday April 2.

This morning on Morning Joe Mika spoke about a service she and Joe had attended on Easter Sunday, and about renewing one’s faith at this special time, whatever kind of Christian you are.  I think Chris Matthews spoke about Psalm 23, The Lord is my Shepherd. Yet Donald Trump, if elected, seeks to ban this channel!  I also noted on the Bulwark podcast Tim Miller speaking about Easter. What a lovely Easter message President Biden and his wife Jill gave!  As opposed to the Former Guy sending many messages on Truth Social that were not in any way Christian, despite his hawking of Trump-branded Bibles. It’s so interesting that America claims to be a Christian nation, despite – well, everything.

we watched the remaining episodes of Mr Bates vs the Post Office on television. What a wonderful series it is – Toby Jones is a magnificent actor, in my view. It’s shocking to think that this happened recently, and those affected are still trying to get proper compensation.

It’s now Thursday April 4.

It’s been a busy time. Yesterday morning I got up early and went to hymn singing; afterwards I had a cup of coffee with a friend. After I got home JD and I went up to Simmer Café for lunch. While there, I saw the woman who used to be one of our neighbours. She left when we were in Taiwan last year, and I hadn’t said goodbye to her. It was good to catch up. She’s moved to Tawa, so she’s not far away.

Meantime, the world’s horror at the war in Gaza Israel has been reinforced by the fact that 7 aid workers were killed by the IDF.  The situation there goes from bad to worse.

But when we got home, I heard about the big earthquake (7.2-7.4) in Taiwan! It must have just happened a few minutes earlier.  Actually the epicentre was off shore to the east of Taiwan, near a city called Hualien. Thankfully we heard from our son who lives there: messenger was still working. His family and his wife’s relations are all safe, thankfully. It’s hard to assess the damage in Taipei: the file pictures are shown over and over again, but the damage was far worse in the Hualien area, which had alarming photos of rescues and buildings toppled.  At my son’s apartment, there was a mess in the kitchen, and the shaking and aftershocks were fierce and scary. Today I heard that there is a long weekend holiday, so the authorities will be relieved that far fewer people will be travelling, especially on the underground public transport system. Some tourists are trapped at the Taroko Gorge national park, where I would have liked to go. There’ve been many queries about his safety. In Japan there were tsunami warnings for the islands near Taiwan, but these were later toned down. It has been difficult to get useful information about the situation in Taipei, but where my son lives (not in a high-rise building, thankfully), the power was still on. So scary times, but good to be able to communicate. It seems that 12 people died.

This morning I had the final session of my Thursday morning singing for term one. We celebrated by sharing a beautiful catered lunch after our singing.  After that JD came and picked me up: it was quite cold and wet and unpleasant outside.  When we got home, we found one of our sons was doing some tree-trimming and section clearing around the house. How quickly the trees grow! It’s lovely to have the trees, but they can become a little oppressive!

It’s now Tuesday April 9.

It’s been a rather busy time. On Saturday evening we had dinner at my son’s house; on Sunday I went to church for Low Sunday.  Saturday night was an extra hour long as we put our watches back one hour for the end of Daylight Saving. Thankfully the phone knows what time it is!  The days are suddenly much shorter, with it getting dark earlier, and being dark in the morning, too. It’s been very cold in the mornings, although we’ve had fine days on the whole. The other night I had the heater on in the master bedroom – that means it’s really cold! It’s still a puzzle as to what to wear – I remember that the temperature drops by several degrees once the sun goes down and it ceases to be a warm sunny day.

Yesterday I went to a new Tai Chi class – for beginners – at the Khandallah Town Hall. I would love to practice Tai Chi again, but, of course, everything is slightly different. Fern teaches a different style of Tai Chi from what I’ve been used to, although, of course, it’s similarly graceful and elegant.  There were several of us there; one woman was determined to “get it right”!  It takes ages, one is always learning, and one certainly doesn’t master it overnight, or in a single lesson. But I’ll persist, at least until we go away next month. Afterwards I didn’t have to wait long for a bus to Johnsonville, where I had a few errands to do. I was going to have my flu vaccine, but there were lots of people at the chemist in the shopping centre, so I decided to give it a miss,  After I got home, we went to Simmer Café for lunch, where we (again) shared a pizza.  I can’t eat Dominos pizzas anymore!

This morning we got up early (!) to go to a 10 am viewing of the Perugino movie at the Lighthouse Theatre in Petone.  JD doesn’t like this cinema, but this viewing was in a large theatre, and we were the only customers, so we could talk to each other throughout the film. I am ashamed to acknowledge that I had not heard of Perugino, but he preceded Raphael (and you can see his influence), and was a rather wonderful painter.  He only painted religious scenes, not mythological ones, as most of his contemporaries did. But in the rather crowded world of beautiful Renaissance painting, he was rather wonderful. The faces in his paintings are extraordinary (his patrons, perhaps?), and he inserts himself into one of his paintings. The faces are not quite symmetrical, and the hair is wavy. His subjects, especially the Baby Jesus, are well nourished, as a pathologist would say. What a treat.

Afterwards we went to Sea Salt Café in Days Bay for lunch – another treat, where the lovely lady in charge remembered us. Several patrons came in after us. We had entree-sized whitebait omelets with salad and fries, oat milk lattés, and shared a beautiful chocolate mousse for dessert.  When we got home, I got out my renaissance art books to look up Perugino, but sadly there isn’t much about him, apart from a fresco in the Sistine Chapel of St Peter being given the Keys (of the Christian church).

I missed a Bible Study this morning. The text was 1 John 3:1-7, a rather wonderful text about our being children of God. There are other references to our being children of God: John 1: 12 talks about people who received Jesus being children of God, and in the Beatitudes is says Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God. I think that is quite a wonderful thought, that we can be children of God, along with his Son who became a human being – “the Word became flesh”.  In fact we’re also heirs: Romans 8:17 “if we are children of God, then we are also co-heirs with Christ”. That is an amazing thought, that those who love God are not only redeemed by the risen Saviour, but we are also co-heirs with him.

It’s now Wednesday April 10.

This morning I got up early to go to hymn singing; this was followed by another Te Reo Māori class. Afterwards I caught two buses home, but I am very tired, for some reason. Today it was supposed to be much warmer than the last few days, but it is cloudy and quite windy, so not so warm.

Tomorrow I am meeting some of my usual Thursday singing colleagues for coffee.

Back here, Prime Minister Luxon keeps cutting jobs, at every government department.  So we’re in recession, surely?  That’s what CEOs do, of course;  they cut jobs.

In Ukraine and in Israel brutal wars continue.  In Ukraine, the Russians reportedly fired drones into the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant, which is controlled by the Russians, and is already considered to be at risk. In Israel, there are continuing calls for a ceasefire, and continued protests in the west, calling for a ceasefire.  It’s said there are calls for new elections.  They are both desperately sad occasions and needless wars. They did not need to happen.

That’s it for now. Slava Ukraini!  Ngā mihi nui.