Sad week needs some joy Blue text = a clickable link. To highlight pictures please click themHas this been a sad week? It has for me. From reading my previous post, you'll know I'm aghast at the horror in Gaza. On a lesser level, I'm upset at our New Zealand election results. As a Christian socialist I can't be happy to see a clearly capitalist government overwhelmingly elected. And it's the 'overwhelmingly' that most bothers me. By accident, there fell into this unhappy week, a short film about Hinewai Reserve, a place I'd never heard about. Its advertising slide popped up alongside something else in YouTube's sidebar. I watched the film and was so thrilled and enheartened by it's story that I decided to write about it. Thirty minute storyOn the Happen Films website I read this introduction: 'Fools & Dreamers is a 30-minute documentary telling the story of Hinewai Nature Reserve, on Canterbury’s Banks Peninsula, and its kaitiaki / manager of 30 years, botanist Hugh Wilson. We learn about the commitment of Hugh and the Maurice White Native Forest Trust to regenerate marginal, hilly farmland into native forest, using a minimal interference method that allows nature to do the work, giving life to over 1500 hectares of native forest, waterways, and the creatures that live within them. In 1987, Hugh let the local community know about his plans to allow gorse to grow as a nurse canopy for self-sown native trees. The response was skeptical at best and an outright angry and disparaging farmer stated the plan was the sort to be expected only of “fools and dreamers”. Now considered a local hero by town and country folk alike, Hugh’s home at Hinewai overlooks a valley resplendent in native forest canopy, where birds and other wildlife are abundant and 47 known waterfalls are in permanent flow. Hugh is now considered a hero locally and across the country, An inspiring, charismatic personality, Hugh’s passion and enthusiasm for his life’s project come through in every sentence he speaks. A dreamer who has made his dream come true, Hugh has proven without doubt that nature knows best – and that he is no fool. Is 30 minutes too long to spend right now? If so, how about a two minute trailer? Two togetherWhen Hugh Wilson and the late Maurice White (died 2019) came together in 1987 to purchase a gorse infected tract of hill land something special happened. Maurice White was an accountant and businessman, Huge Wilson a botanist. Together they have clearly been the force behind Hinewai. I think their determination almost amounted to cheerful ruthlessness. They had a cogent conviction to stay with their knowledge and belief that gorse could work for them, not against them. They stuck to that for thirty years. They didn't plant. They didn't interfere. They let thrive the incipient growth they knew was there. I also admire their willingness to share. To let people, who were prepared to follow a few simple restrictions, to come and walk their paths without charge and see their 47 waterfalls seems to me a great example of what I know as traditional Aotearoa New Zealand generosity. Some joyFools and Dreamers, or more especially the reatity it shows, did indeed bring me some joy. I know it is by comparison with world problems a small local enterprise, but though I'd never previously heard of the project, it fills me with hope for preserving our earth. Would you like to see Fools and Dreamers in total.? Just click here. □ Yours John John McInnes Friday 20 October 2023 ##########
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