OMG, a post from me (Warren :))
For those with confused looks, we did not rush back to Sheffield in the UK to go to its annual Agricultural & Pastoral show. In fact Sheffield in Canterbury NZ bears little resemblance to its UK namesake having a population that can be counted using your fingers and toes, it might have a slightly bigger population than that but not many. Sheffield is our nearest neighbouring village being about 2Km down the road.
Being such a tiny village we had no idea what to expect so were pleasantly surprised to find the large crowds of people, as much as you find large crowds in NZ when away from town. The weather even managed to stop its cold/wet spell and give us some sun.
The show had everything you would expect such as best produce competition, stalls selling arts and crafts type bits and food, farm machinery, show jumping and livestock judging but it is also a chance for the community to get together and celebrate what they do.
It was the first time we had seen Llama and Alpaca close up. They are related to the Camel family, which is very obvious in their face. They are very graceful creatures, probably the long neck that does it, and appear to be very gentle. The funniest sight though is the poodle like cut that is given to many of them in the summer months to stop them overheating.
The demonstration that really let you know you are unfit was the axe men demonstration. This was a bunch of 60+ year old men making small work of huge lumps of wood with very sharp axes. The speed that they hacked through 1ft+ logs of wood was impressive as is the fact they have their feet still attached to their bodies as shown below. When they do the same, 12ft above the ground stood on jigger boards (special precariously balanced planks off wood you attach to the pole and hope they hold), then you really feel you should get more active.
Its great seeing a community get together in this way and it is also when you realise you are becoming part of the community as you recognise people you see in the local town and they recognise you.
Labels: canterbury, emigrate, immigration, new zealand, waddington
