Day 25: Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head

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I have a lovely little single here in Te Anau. It's on the second, and highest, floor -- second in the American sense, fortunately, unlike my Queenstown room. Whenever it rains, I can hear rain on the roof.

It's a narrow room, but they've taken pains with it. Two walls are paneled; two are painted drywall. There are beams on the sloping ceiling, and, rather oddly, the heater is on the ceiling too. It's a great heater -- first time I've been warm enough at night without a space heater. There's a rainforest poster on one wall, a mirror on another, and a window on the third. From the window, I have a view of the lake.

It is customary here in New Zealand to identify public restrooms by a picture of a man in trousers and a picture of a woman in a skirt. Here in this hostel, the woman in a skirt is in a long, 19th-century skirt, and she has a bun on her head. She also has a hiking staff and a backpack.

There's a gas-log fireplace in the living room; it was lighted today. The kitchen is well equipped, but it's often crowded. There's a barbecue pit in the back yard, with outdoor seating around it. There are also a few indoor tables.

Anyhow, it had rained all night, and it kept on raining all day. But it didn't rain steadily all day, rather, it rained by fits and starts. Every time I started to go out, it would, quite suddenly, rain. When I came back in, it stopped. Often the sun came out in between the intervals of rain.

I asked the clerk at reception whether this sort of thing was usual, and she said this week's rain was the first they'd had in six weeks. My fault again, I expect. :>

I went shopping and bought myself a course of Robitussin and food for today and tomorrow. Other than that, I just rested and got my Milford Sound blog entry in order.

At 10:30 p.m., I walked to Midnight Mass at St. Michael and All Angels' Anglican Church, two blocks away. This was probably the only time in my life I'll ever walk through the twilight to a Christmas Midnight Mass. The sun had set only a short time before.

St. Michael's was a beautiful little church, with a river-rock altar and back wall, but the service was, by and large, very modern. For most of the service, the only point of commonality with the Prayer Book tradition was that there *was* a prayer book. I exaggerate slightly; there was one line I recognized: "It is right to give him thanks and praise," the modernized version of "It is meet and right so to do."

Mercifully, just as I was about to tune the entire service out in desperation, the third hymn turned out to be "O, Little Town of Bethlehem," which I knew and liked (to the right tune, too). Then when the actual moment of celebrating Communion came, the priest used the right words, and amazingly the servers did so too, though of course they were modernized and abbreviated. We also knelt at the altar rail, which was an improvement over Christchurch Cathedral, and drank from a common cup (though they were using two cups; I have no idea why).

The priest, hearing where I was from, said, "Are you Episcopalian, then?"

I replied, "Yes -- well, Anglican, now, actually. We split from the Episcopal church a couple of years ago."

The priest blinked in obvious startlement and murmured, "Interesting!" I don't know whether she did not know about the controversy at all or whether she was just surprised to meet one of the schismatics in person.

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Photos

Four Square Supermarket
A small-town chain, like the IGA.

Bicycle Rental Place
... of all things.

Comments

[K.Freeman]

How odd!!!
A bicyele built for six??? Did you ever see one being ridden?

[bbaggins]

No, I'm afraid not. I gather from the shape of the seats that everyone but the leader would have faced towards the center.