It’s a little bit odd as I sit here and attempt to write a conclusion on our life in New Zealand while doing it from a rural village in the hills of Japan. New Zealand, and specifically Dunedin, was our home for seven months. When we were getting ready to leave it, I was actually eager to do so, excited for Japan and a little tired of this town at the bottom of the world. In fact, Japan, as it turns out, has rapidly risen to top country on my slowly growing list of ones visited. But nevertheless, as I look back over photos and lapse into fond memories from the land of the long white cloud, I have come to realize just how special New Zealand is and our time there was. As perhaps tiring as it is to talk about, the landscape of New Zealand is so profoundly unique. It is only after I’ve left that this fact has truly set in. Ironic certainly, but perhaps necessary, the constant saturation of changing landforms—mountains, cliffs, glaciers, waterfalls, rivers, beaches, forests, and far more—almost make you numb to it. Like visiting a great number of Gothic Cathedrals, one after the other, you sadly see Notre Dame as merely one of many. It’s an unfortunate condition and one that certainly isn’t obligatory, but, to a certain extent, happened to me. Now with some space between me and my time there, I don’t necessarily yearn to be back, but deeply love and treasure the time we had there. Despite being blessed to have lived near and visited some grand landscapes, there wasn’t a day spent in New Zealand that some element of nature didn't decide to impress.
As mentioned above, the Maori name for New Zealand—Aotearoa—means the land of the long white cloud. When I first heard this I thought how apt as New Zealand seen on a map indeed looks like a long white cloud, stretched along and amidst the sea. If considered for longer, however, New Zealand would not be known to the Maori from an objective aerial view but rather seen from the horizon, both on approach from the sea and when on the island itself. The land of the long white cloud therefore isn’t pictorial, but experiential. Clouds linger in long lines above mountain tops or just along the coast. Storms sweep over the island, bringing wave after wave of grey and white and wind and rain. And if without clouds, the sky’s horizon changes the mountain tops themselves into clouds through a distant haze. But beyond the physical phenomenon of what nature brings, there’s something metaphysical about the place itself. The land of the long white cloud, perhaps more than anything, hints at the subtle magic and splendor kept in a place far off in its own world. That was our world for a little while.
Dunedin itself became a temporary home, a jumping off point for periodic adventures, and a resting place for the in between times. It gets its name from the Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh and if not obvious, was an early Scottish settlement. It is nestled in at the base of some small mountains, bordered to the east by the harbor and south by the sea. It wasn’t always perfect, but it was often what we needed. When I was fourteen I had dreamt of living in New Zealand—being old, retired, and near the ocean. In a funny twist of fates, it came at the age of twenty six, in between work and a return to school, and near the ocean. Dreams give us hope and often feed our life, though they rarely manifest directly into reality. I’m beginning to think that’s okay. For better or worse—with all the faults, follies, heartache, happenstance, and unexpected delight—my lived reality often far exceeds my wildest imagination.
