Kakapo2's VirtualTourist Home Page

Favourite travel destinations:
Australia - Red Centre, Western Australia
New Zealand - of course ;-)
USA - South West, all those red landscapes; Joshua Tree Nat. Park
Chile - Atacama Desert
Peru - Macchu Picchu
Mexico - so many places... Best moment: top of Popocatépetl
France - Alsace, Britanny, Pyrenees, castles of the Loire, Médoc, Le Puy-en-Velay, Carcassonne, Provence... well, nearly every place!
South Korea - the mountains, all those nice people, kimchi and pipimpab!
Germany - Lake Constance (Bodensee), Ries (Nördlingen), Kesseltal (nearby), Schwäbische Alb, the Alps, Neuschwanstein, Heidelberg, Ostfriesland, Erfurt, castles on the Rhine... and let me remind you that the highest church spire of the world is not in Cologne but in beautiful Ulm on the Danube (Donau) where I lived more than 20 years!
Switzerland - all those pristine lakes and idyllic towns.
Belgium - the cities of Wallonia
... and so many other countries I have been to!

Favourite cities:
Barcelona - Paris - Rome - Brugge

Languages:
I speak German, English, French, Spanish...
I have forgotten a lot of my Portuguese and Italian...
(I had English and French at school, studied Spanish and the basics of Italian at university, learnt Portuguese in a language school in Sao Paulo)
I can read and write Korean
I speak some Czech

Esoteric Stuff:
I do horoscopes. In the meantime I have an astrology programme on the computer. To me horoscopes are less to look into the future but to analyse the present, and think about yourself. It is good to give people a chance for a self-assessment by discussing the analysis.
I lay Tarot cards.
I once was quite good in palm reading but not anymore... Not enough practice.
I believe in the magic of pendulums for finding energy rich spots in nature.
Mediums who say they can find lost and dead people nearly never prove it and just rip off people and play with their hopes.

Favourite writers and books:
Pablo Neruda's memoirs
E. Annie Proulx - for her art of describing details
Bill Bryson - travel writing at its best; especially his book about Australia makes me laugh from the first to the last page.
Mascha Kaléko - poems with words floating as softly as caresses

Favourite music...
... is too diverse to list everything but I only like music with clear melodies and not just noise.
Bands with unique styles like Queen, Dire Straits, Pink Floyd, Beach Boys, Rolling Stones, many Beatles songs.
Pop music from Coldplay, Matchbox 20, Ronan Keating, Bryan Adams, Jon Bonjovi, Dido, Take That, Robbie Williams, Roxette, James Blunt, Daniel Powter, and so on. Yes, I really like boy bands LOL
My all-time favourites are the Bee Gees.
Country Music from Johnny Cash, John Berry and Shania Twain.
Sexy Reggae.
The Ballads from Heavy Metal Bands.
Spanish, South and Latin American "cantantes" like Alberto Plaza, Ricky Martin, Enrique Iglesias, Ricardo Montaner and Luis Miguel.
French pop and chansons from Pierre Bachelet, Gérard Lenorman, Serge Reggiani, Charles Aznavour, Michel Sardou, Florent Pagny and lots more.
Italians like Nek, Umberto Tozzi, Zucchero.
The NZ heroes Crowded House, Finn Brothers, Dave Dobbyn, The Feelers.
My old Germans Drafi Deutscher ("Marmor, Stein und Eisen bricht") and Trude Herr ("Niemals geht man so ganz"), Peter Maffay, ... do not really know the new ones... just missed them, so far away from home, and "Aussie" (LOL Austrian) Peter Cornelius.
... and classic music light - which means, I am not very much into operas but love Mozart, Beethoven, Vivaldi, Smetana, Brahms, Johann Strauss, and the great voices Luciano Pavarotti, Placido Domingo, José Carreras, also Popera music from Andrea Bocelli, Amici, Il Divo.
My favourite classic piece is the "Va, Pensiero" Chorus from Verdi's Nabucco.

Films:
White Nights - Pappa ante portas (Loriot) - Dirty Dancing
March of the Penguins - The Postman (who delivers Pablo Neruda's mail)

Food:
Pasta, Spätzle (swabian pasta) with a thick creamy sauce

Drinks:
Margarita, Pina Colada, Pisco Sour, Caipirinha

Kimi is a very lucky bear because he has travelled a lot. He is the star of a New Zealand travel guide I have written but for which I have not found a publisher yet, although I have got some good critics of publishers. One problem is that sometimes I just contact the wrong publisher, another problem is that many publishers do not want to try something new, as children's books normally are illustrated with watercolour paintings and not with photos, and my book shows the bear in real situations. The thought behind it is that kids take their favourite toy animal on their trips, and Kimi could give them a lot of inspiration and make travelling double interesting.

Actually I am working on a DVD in which Kimi introduces you to the New Zealand animals.

I have photographed Kimi in any situation you can imagine, in the airplane, bus, car, on ferries, boats and the tramway, at the most beautiful locations in NZ, with birds, plants, in the supermarket, with fish'n'chips, at the teddybear picknick in the park, at the rugby, cricket and netball. The Maori group KoTane at the Willowbank in Christchurch even introduced him to Maori culture. And other friendly people assisted me to deliver a full insight into Kiwi life and lifestyle.

Kimi's most exciting experiences were with birds. Long time I had not dared to seat him beside a kea because I was afraid those cheeky parrots could destroy him. So I made a photo montage. But then my husband convinced me to risk it, with him right beside the bear to save him in the case of emergency. We put a little piece of grain bread on the bear's paw and waited for the kea to take it. But surprise, surprise: The kea did not dare! As he had never seen such a creature before he thought it would be sensible to first watch it. So the kea walked up and down, and up and down in front of the bear at a little safety distance, and stared at the bread but did not take it. Perhaps he would have dared an hour later... The proof how intelligent those birds are.

On the other hand we were surprised of the cheekyness and risky behaviour of the flightless wekas. I sprinkled some potato chips around the bear to attract the wekas and get my photo of them together with Kimi. When they had eaten all the chips they looked around, looked at the bear - and one weka approached him and bit him in the ear twice, so he fell over! I was too surprised to take this photo LOL But you can be sure I quickly saved Kimi from being attacked a third time ;-)

I still have a lot of fun taking Kimi to places and photograph him in new landscapes and situations. And I will carry on until I find a publisher ;-)

If you want to see more pictures of him and his adventures... He has now (October 2008) started his own VT page, his member name is Kimi_the_Bear.

For some years I have painted a real lot. First watercolours, later on silk. The silk painting had started with painting silk ties - fantasy flowers and birds, hobbies, professions, sports and humour. Then I started agglomerating panoramas of landscapes and cities in a vertical way, and this led to do the same on large silk screens. I have sold quite a lot of those ties back in Germany, also shops sold them.

But I could see, the more I wrote and the more time I spent on the internet, the less time I had for painting. So since some years I have not painted a lot, just in some intense painting attacks and then big, big breaks again. I have painted a dummy for ties with New Zealand motives but I have not really carried on yet. But I have everything ready on my mind ;-)

Since living here I was busier painting walls and ceilings. And the internet and Emailing my friends back in Europe takes a lot of my time. But I do have my artist's studio in the attic, and I am confident that I will find my way back into inspiration for this relaxing hobby.

If you are interested you can see more of my paintings on my external homepage.

Taking notes during a UEFA Cup game in the 1970s I decided at the age of 13 to become a sports journalist. I had always loved writing - I already wrote little novels for my friends aged ten, sometimes hidden under the sheets at night because my parents wanted me to sleep at night LOL But from then on it was journalism, and it was sports - which was the combination of my two major hobbies.

I had grown up in a sports-mad family, the main sport was handball - but I chose athletics because first I hated cheating judges in gymnastics, and second I was very good at throwing which was not common among girls, and I was rather successful at regional level, once even becoming discus champion of Württemberg. But my favourite discipline was javelin.

So already from the age of 15 on I wrote for the local newspapers, and carried on. I was accepted at the prestigious German Journalists School (Deutsche Journalistenschule) in Munich, and then joined the sports department of Südwest Presse newspaper in Ulm in 1980. I worked there as an editor and reporter until I emigrated to New Zealand at the start of 2004, and covered numerous Olympic Games, World Championships in many kinds of sports, the Tour de France, and lots and lots of games of the VfB Stuttgart football team which has just (May 2007) won the German title. Well done, guys!

Here in New Zealand I write as a freelancer for several German newspapers. I do not write a lot about sports as the major sports here (rugby, cricket and - worse - netball) do not interest Germans a lot. But I do cover big sports events in NZ and Australia if interesting German athletes participate, so my stories get printed and I can not only cover my costs but earn money on the trip. Normally I report about environmental and political issues but mostly about the oddities of life in NZ, including animal stories which are very well received by the editors.

Although I enjoy covering big sports events from time to time - mainly to check if I can still work in a disciplined way LOL - I do not miss the daily life as a sports editor. It is stressful, you work late at night, drive back home from football games late at night, have to finish your story by the end of the game, work on Saturdays and Sundays, have little or no social life, have no time when your friends have time, have your days off when your friends work, are away for days and weeks, and in the office you have to cope with nice and not so nice colleagues who cause you stomach pain, like everywhere, meetings, senseless discussions, noise, deadlines, and so on, and so on. It is not the glamourous life you might imagine although I have known many interesting and famous people, and travelled a lot, and have seen places I would never have seen without being in this job. All this can boost your self-confidence which is a good thing.

Of course it is nice to know Jürgen Klinsmann and Jogi Löw, and they know who I am, and be at the same party as Ruud Gullit and touch Diego Maradona. But it is not what makes you happy. When you are old and grey I can still look at the photos which show me together with them, and think of the hectic and funny times, and be grateful that I had such an exciting and interesting job which was my life. But none of them will be around - only your partner, your friends. Never forget about them while leading this exciting professional life. You could end up lonesome.

Now I have less money than before, and I never know how much I will have at the end of the month - but I can breathe free.

I have problems to throw away things. That is why I have been collecting a lot of items over time. So my emigration to New Zealand was probably a good move to get rid of stuff, and reduce my collections, as I just could not take everything with me.

In this big clean-up I gave up my collections of sugars and paper napkins from all over the world. I sold about 30kg of wrapped sugars on ebay - but had to keep the small container you see on the right of the photo because the lid would absolutely not open. It is a nice reminder of a fantastic collection with really rare series, especially from France.

With the introduction of the Euro I had already been forced to carry my 1- and 2 Pfennig coins which I had horded for more than 30 years to the bank LOL I had kept them so long because it was a tradition in my home country Germany to collect Pfennig coins for buying the wedding shoes, and, well... As I married very late in life, I had a big collection... And finally did not even buy new shoes for the wedding LOL

But I have kept the collection of about 200 dolls in traditional dresses from my trips around the world, and I still have a lot of toy animals. Well, the latter is not a real collection... I just cannot resist to buy them when they look at me with their big eyes, looking for a better home than the shelf of a shop ;-) That is how I have become the owner of four big koalas, my favourite animals, and several small ones... Or Kimi the travelling bear whom I discovered on a South Korean market in 1988. Also Lukas the Gorilla, Catlin the Penguin, Jean-Claude the Tour de France bear, Russell the Wombat and several more animals found their way into my heart and home on overseas trips. Two Fritzle alligators, mascot of the VfB Stuttgart football team, remind me of my two decade long coverage of great and not so great games and my career as a sports journalist.

As I also keep an archive and brochures for the VT pages, there is also a lot of paper in the house...

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My successful Comeback as an Athlete

By now you should know that I have always been very much into sports although I have lots of other interests. But I am convinced you start ageing dramatically if you do not move your body, and as I am trying to avoid looking like Granny Smith in the near future, I work out in the gym, go jogging, cycling, and walk up the hills at near-running speed. But I would not be human if I did not find excuses to not work out on some days. Especially I have a big dislike for the boring gym. I go there because it is great for upper body strength and flexibility. But as said, I find excuses...

Everything changed when in September 2007 I saw a brochure of the New Zealand Masters Games. This is a competition for oldies over 30 ;-) I checked the results of the previous year and thought I could do rather well. So I started training for this event, with an unlucky five or six week break after injuring my wrist by kayaking too much in the Abel Tasman National Park...

I participated in the Masters Games in Dunedin on the first weekend of February 2008. And sure - I won three gold medals :-) I competed in discus and shot-put, and as javelin was the last discipline I also dared to compete in this discipline. Sure, javelin had always been my favourite and best discipline but especially after a break of more than 20 years it also is highly dangerous and injury-prone. (Well, I withdrew after one great throw for safety reasons because my ellbow was sore ;-) The funny thing was that I delivered the relatively worst result in the only discipline I had really trained (discus). Just did not get a feeling for those slippery new apparati... I had trained with a prehistoric wooden discus which I got rather sticky with some drops of saliva LOL

I have not done the special training in 2008 and not participated in the Masters Games in 2009, this would have been too much of a hassle to travel to Wanganui in the North Island. I hope to throw again in 2010 in Dunedin. You need some challenges in life... ;-)

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I have always liked birds but since I have been living in New Zealand I am a bird lover. Not a birder yet because I do not know everything yet. But I know a lot about birds, I recognise a lot of them, some even just from their song. I often take the camera and go bird watching.

Sure I am proud if I can watch and photograph a rare bird. But I most love those with whom I can interact a little. The small birds here are less shy than back in Germany, obviously they had no predators in the early days, before humans brought all those horrible rodents, cats, dogs and wild pigs into the country, so many bird species are extinct now.

So my favourites are the fantails as they come into the garden and have a little chat. Some of them I meet nearly every day, and they do not only come close to check if there are insects around to feed on. Every year there are two or three who stay for minutes and seem to chat, and if I talk to them they answer, and nearly sit on my hand. Most times I stand beside a low tree branch, so the fantails can sit there and have their conversation. And me, too, of course! ;-)

Also the silvereyes are super cute. And they are clever. In a cold winter when I feed them and the aggressive starlings chase them away, I go to the deck, and the starlings fly away. The silvereyes stay and feed, feeling protected and favoured by my presence. Also, when starlings argue with each other and start to fight, the silvereyes take their chance to get food from the feeder behind the starlings' backs.

Also high in my list are the robins and the tomtits. The robins know no fear and it happens that they sit on your hand or hat when you have a break in the bush. Their relatives, the tomtits, suddenly sit in front of you to check who has intruded their territory. They approach without making a sound whereas the fantails are chatting and beeping the whole day. When I hear a fantail beep I whistle or talk, and they come. Absolutely amazing!

The bigger ones, the tui and the bellbird, often stay a long time singing if you answer their song. I feed the cheeky wekas on the West Coast, and all those nice ducks all over the country.

I also love interacting with keas although people who live close to them do not like them because those cheeky mountain parrots can do a lot of damage. Perhaps I would react in a similar way if I could not leave anything outside unattended. As this is not the case I enjoy watching them because they are incredibly intelligent.
See my 5 kea travelogues on my NZ South Island page.

Finally... the penguins. Who does not love them when they waddle across the beach and fall on their beaks struggling their way up a hill. Since seeing the "March of the Penguins" I love them even more, as they are such caring and dedicated animals - with even human behaviour. Good human behaviour. They have deserved to be protected, as all the other birds.

Many people are a little disappointed about New Zealand's fauna, as here are no koalas, kangaroos and other exotic animals. And - apart from some keas - no flocks of fearless parrots like in Australia. You have to be rather patient and quiet to enjoy New Zealand's unique animals.

Sorry folks - I do not like cats and dogs. Generally spoken. Sure there are cute individuals. Even super cuties. My general dislike is not the animals' fault but the owners'.

I do not see the point why I should like to clean up the droppings of other people's dogs - here in Lyttelton you have to walk in a slalom around all the poo - in our driveway, and it is disgusting to see all the dog dirt along walkways and other people's gardens. (And I do know that this is not a NZ problem only but universal.)

I do not appreciate either to get my hands into the sh1t dug in my garden beds by other people's cats. That is why I had to cover garden beds in weed mat although I do not like it, and put bark all over the place, and I would not dare to work in the garden without gloves on. I cannot leave a door open in nice weather if I do not sit right in front of it because then one or two of our neighbours' cats walk into the house, and why should I let a cat into our house that sh1ts into our garden?

I do not want to be woken up by an ever-barking neighbour's dog because they leave it alone outside. Why should neighbours cope with this negligence? And why do people hold dogs if they do not walk them and have no time to look after them?

I do not want to interrupt my jogging because people do not hold their aggressive dogs on a leash, and I do not want to stop my bush walk because a free running dog does not like my walking poles.

I do not want to read any more stories about penguins being killed by dogs on the West Coast, and 150 kiwi being killed by a dog in one single night, as it once happened near Dunedin.

I do not want my neighbour's dog on our property. Ok, we will partially finance a big fence, so he can enjoy his dog on his completely unfenced property.

And if I wanted a dog to lick my hand or leg and if I wanted to play with a dog (as the dog owners always say when their dogs molest other people) I would have my own dog. "He only wants to play", they say when their dog runs towards passers-by or jump on me and others and scares me to death. But I do not want to play!

I will keep on shooting at the cats in our garden with my water gun because I love birds and want to protect them and not pick up their dead bodies after the cats have killed them. The bird paradise New Zealand has become a strange place after the arrival of humans and their predator pet animals.

So: Thank you to the few people who have their dogs on a leash and clean up after them. It is a pleasure to meet you on Bridle Path and the beaches.