My girlfriend is beautiful, I couldn’t start a post about us travelling any other way.
I entered Auckland this morning expecting to be refreshed by a crisp, modern, urban Polynesia. Yet, beside her, the sky tower looks awkwardly down at its own foundations and pretends to examine the concrete mildew beneath. And while the famed white sails that fill the harbour flutter and hang loose, the yacht owners stand on deck, taut with envy. For the Pacific wind has a new ensign to play with, and Angahard’s soft brown hair lifts gently as the air unfurls in welcome around her.
Unconstrained by mast or foundations she is free to roam, to hold court with the forests and the beaches of her choosing. Yet, within the dark clouds forming above the city lie a group of Taniwha, great iridescent guardian lizards who now gaze down upon the hostel where she sleeps.
“Who knows she has come?” One of them hisses.
The oldest Lizard responds slowly, “They all do. The wind boasted to the ocean, the ocean told it to the streams and the streams fed into the hills.”
The other lizards stir, tails twitching. “But do the.. Did the hills tell..?”
The older lizard nods and looking south says, “The hills told them; the fight for her affection has already begun.”
All the Taniwha look towards the now glowing corner of the sky as the volcanoes rise, Tongariro screaming fire.
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