Wellington has old architecture. Queen of this and that. Starting to look like every city. It’s the capital city of New Zealand. These are all British colonies so they are really looking the same to me now. There’s a George Street, an Elizabeth Street, Crown Street, and probably one for every king and queen and governor for the last few hundred years.

“Right Gov’na! If you’ve seen one George Street, you’ve seen them all.”

“Every old building has a Starbucks in it now, or the local equivalent of one. Whatever was there before is gone now.”

There’s a lot of coffee shops in these buildings. But, it’s tough to corner the market on coffee! They probably had torture chambers in there before, like every other place we’ve been to. It’s not every building though, some are still government offices or museums. You seem bored with it?

“Tourism can be tough! It’s only exotic for a while. And history is pretty rotten, I don’t need to see much of that to know what it used to be like. And some people want to bring it back. Idiots! We can keep looking though, I haven’t seen every bit of it. Maybe we will find something that stands out – somehow.”

“How about this?”

Only $19.99? Looks like a must-have. But wait, Jack Links! That’s about as exotic as Taylor Swift. Is it the same?

“Exotic like Taylor Swift? I think she’s a kind of hot dog, isn’t she? Idk.”

One man’s hot dog is another man’s lobster. Jerky isn’t exotic. Lobster dogs I say! Those are new and exotic! Maybe we should make them and distribute them. It could be our island enterprise. We could be the answer the locals are looking for. They are trying to sell lobsters right out of the ocean.

That’s too real, people like food that doesn’t look like it was just killed. They like processed and packaged.

“Hey! Those aren’t New Zealanders!”

“Ok, ok, I get your point. If we get really bored in retirement, we might run with one of these ideas.”

Nobody has done this yet. I keep looking. There are lots of lobster things but not what I’m thinking of.

Ling Ling is going to outlive us. We might need to leave something for her when we are gone.

“I think you are getting way ahead of things.”

Those dandelion pills are starting to hit!

“I thought I was the one with the imagination!”

Ling Ling Loves Me!

I asked her if her beautiful smile was hers or the smile they pay her for?

She said it is for me! When she sees me, she is happy to see me, and that’s why she smiles at me. That is what she said to me. She is interested in me. She asked about my life. She asked me if I am enjoying my holiday.

I said I don’t work anymore. This is life now and I said I am happy to see her too. When she smiles at me, I am happy too. I said this to her. I told her I want to take her home with me.

“You don’t have a home! You are trying to sell it so you can wander aimlessly with no purpose but to be happy in the moment, your last days, the winter of life. You have no future! You have nothing to offer a young girl. You are just playing a game for dopamine so you can feel good without ‘medicine pills’ from big pharma. You are talking nonsense! That tiny feel-good moment in return is all you can offer her. You cannot take care of anyone. It is the opposite.”

She said she loves me! She made a little heart sign with her fingers and held my hand. She is so warm and sweet to me. I am special. She loves me!

“No. She is young and attractive. You are neither. Did you get her phone number, email, or social media contact? Did she offer that to you?”

I said I would be on cruise to Hawaii with her in April. She said she loves me. I am special!

“We aren’t on the Love Boat anymore; this is starting to sound like Fantasy Island!”

I do see a lot of tattoos. The locals really love tattoos.

“You gave her money, didn’t you?”

Only a small tip.

“Small to you.”

I am special.

“You are 1 of 2,000 on this day. You are not special.”

No! I am different! I am not like them!

“You are snowflake special. A real flake”

You know that Prince Harry is so stupid. How can he fall for Meghan. You know she is just using him. It’s so obvious. She is fake like Kahn. Everyone sees it. Harry is dumb to believe it. Even if he is prince, she isn’t princess. Harry will never be anything because of her. She ruined his life. She doesn’t care about him. His brother will be King and brother’s sons will be Kings before Harry ever will. Meghan is dreaming to think she will ever be a real princess. She only wants what she wants and nobody else matters. She lies to Harry and Harry rationalizes lies and hopes past happiness will return but it never will. That was a total lie from a psychopath. Meghan’s mask drops and he sees, but it is too late. Now he has child with her. He can’t get away. So dumb!

“Ling told you a story about a co-worker who went on holiday with his wife to Thailand. How he fell for a Thai girl and divorced his wife for that girl and has a baby with her. Even though he still lives in England, he is divorced from his English wife and has a baby in a foreign country.”

So? What does that have to do with anything? Ling Ling connected with me in a special way. I asked her where in China she is from. I know something about China. I have been to China several times. I know what’s real. Ling Ling is real.

She said she is from a tiny town in SouthWest China. I know this part of China. It is the land of Panda bears. She knows all about Panda bears! They are so cute.

“They are like koala bears. They are boring and lazy. They do nothing but eat and sleep. You didn’t make a connection with her because you think Pandas are cute. They are hot dogs to her. And she certainly has seen the movie Kung Fu Panda, which is now in its third sequel! A character in the cartoon movie is ‘Ling Ling’. You think you are saying she is extra special but she is thinking you call her the name of cartoon character because she is from the land of Pandas. There is no connection. You are silly stupid! She is paid to be nice to you and you pay her even more so she is extra nice to you. Everyone else can see that. You look dumb like Harry.”

No! I am special and you are jealous of her! You don’t want me to be happy because you are nothing without me! You need me and are afraid of our connection!

“Ling Ling is the name of a famous panda. Nee hen how can dummy. She’s laughing at you.”

Ling Ling has a beautiful laugh. I hope I can make her laugh and be happy together soon.

“You are as fruity as that drink. How long do those dandelion pills last anyway?”

Until we get to the next port, Napier.

“Now here’s something to see! This little town has character! And they are welcoming us like a good tourist town should! Not uppity like Akaroa was.”

That was a French town. They really aren’t known for friendly attitudes. They are mostly known for eating snails and being nasty.

“Well, I like this a lot better!”

“This town wasn’t built by slaves. I like that about it. Even though it was a colony.”

Re-built by loyal subjects – for pay. That sounds better than the others. We won’t fact check that.

That’s history. Fortunately, we aren’t responsible for what other people did. And we can’t take credit for what they did either. All we can do is remember. That’s called heritage. Nobody owns that. Some people want to claim all the good things their ancestors did and forget about the bad things. They have even tried to erase history in some cases. That’s another story though, or maybe one that runs through all these places.

Isn’t that where Clark Kent worked?

That’s pretty cool! These old people play dress up and entertain the tourists with their old cars and memorabilia. You can tell these guys have fun and probably make money doing it. You can take a ride around town in their cars like the old days.

“The beach is nice too. And the town is friendly, at least as far as a tourist will go into it.”

What the port is like really tells you what the local government is like. Every port charges fees but only some of them use those fees to maintain or improve the port. They offer services like tourist info and free Wi-Fi. Some other ports just take the money and use if for whatever they want while the port has no services at all and is crumbling. A couple of them even look to steal from the tourists by playing the border police game. The cruise line has a survey at the end and I hope people bring it up. The cruise lines represent the tourists so they can avoid those ports if enough people speak up.

“Did you?”

Doh! I forgot to. I’ll try to remember in the future.

“Well, that topic deserves to be a chapter on its own.”

Probably belongs with the propaganda chapter. It’s pretty dishonest what they are up to. Say one thing, do another, get mad if you call them on it. We got a name for those people and what they are doing with tax money.

“Psychopaths? Politicians? Graft? Corruption?”

Names aren’t as important as actions, but yeah. It’s very short sighted to bite the hand that feeds. Tourist towns can dry up real fast if they get a bad reputation. Napier is a great port to visit. 

“I like it too. Not every New Zealand city is a place you want to visit. A couple of them were pretty shady.”

Because of the government. You would think this isn’t a democracy by their actions. A real throwback mentality to the days of royals and commoners. I’m sure individual experiences vary, but not that much. They only hurt their own citizens when they treat tourists badly. 

“Their jobs must be pretty secure to think that way.”

Like royalty. I just assume it is a democracy. Maybe it isn’t.

“Since we are talking old British empire stuff, I’ve been wondering, is plenty a real amount? Is buttload is a real measure?”

🤔

Yes. Buttload is about 63-140 gallons. It’s not an exact measurement.

And plenty is also not exact, though it usually means more than needed.