Adventures in Paradise Volume 2 #14

 

Kia ora! Our excellent adventure continues with some thoughts on gratitude and appreciation.  It is summer here in New Zealand and with the temperatures soaring into the low 30’s, it is difficult to imagine that winter will arrive with a vengeance sometime in June. But winter will arrive none-the- less and with that arrival will come the need for much warmer clothing. I have been warned that we will need all the sweaters, coats and warm socks that we can locate and we know that we did not arrive adequately prepared. We had a baggage weight allowance and I had a choice between packing a winter coat or cute shoes. Perhaps I was a tad short sighted, when I opted for the peep-toe pumps with the grosgrain bows instead of a parka!

At any rate, we will be shopping for items that will keep us toasty, and high among my priorities is the purchase of some items made from New Zealand wool. In truth, I can hardly wait to have a good excuse to shop for a coat and some sweaters fashioned from the wool shorn right here in our own backyard. After the events of this week, there is a new appreciation and deep gratitude for all of the people who work so hard to make those sweaters and coats possible.

Earlier this week, we had the unique and unexpected opportunity to spend some time in a shearing shed. These sheds are scattered through out the Gisborne countryside, but until this week, we had not seen any activity around them. We had noticed, however, that the local sheep were getting pretty wooly and I suggested to Ward that those fluffy animals might be a little uncomfortable wearing their coats in all the heat. Suddenly, as if on cue, we noticed that those same sheep were now “coatless” and we became curious as to the process. I will admit to having fallen slightly in love with the actor, Byran Brown, as he portrayed Luke O’Neill, a dashing sheep shearer in the movie, “The Thornbirds”. In that movie, Luke competes with other shearers and against time to win the local shearing championship and in the process, the heart of Meggie, the movie’s heroine. The aim of the contest was to shear as many sheep as possible in an allotted time period. The camera would pan from Lukes’s handsome, sweaty face (be still my heart) to Meggie, who was watching him in admiration. Of course, Luke won the contest and the girl as well, but there was no indication of just what a difficult and backbreaking job shearing actually is. But I suppose that reality would have certainly taken something away from the romance of that particular movie scenario.

The truth is that shearing is a back-breaking job. We have that on good authority from our friend, Ross Honey, who is a former champion shearer. Ross, who is my age, suffers from constant back pain. His hands and knees are always playing up as he describes it and he shows the stress of his job in his prematurely-lined face. He is tired, but loves to relive his glory days by telling a few shearing stories to anyone who will listen. He proudly recounts that his shearing record still stands in many communities. One day, at the height of his prowess, he set the shearing record of 416 sheep in one eight and a half hour session!  Just imagine picking up and wrestling a mature ewe weighing between 100-220 pounds 416 times in one day. There is no romance and no retirement. There is only hard work for as long as you are able.

So, earlier this week, we gained new appreciation and respect for yet another group of people who work so hard to make our lives more enjoyable. The shearers work in teams and when finished at one shed, they will move on to the next shed in another part of the country. The team that we met is by no means local, as they work what they call “The Circuit”. That circuit involves shearing in New Zealand for three months, then three months each in America (starting in Idaho) and Australia, finally ending back in New Zealand for a second round of shearing here. Each shearer has someone who feeds the sheep into the holding pens, someone else to sweep up the wool as it falls to the floor and

they all share the person who tamps down the loose wool by jumping into the bale and stomping in down while doing what appears to be a fancy high-stepping jig.

Each shearer is paid  $1.10 per ewe*, so there is incentive to work quickly. The average time to shear one sheep is about two minutes!  One young man told us that he was pushing himself that day, but having spoken to our friend Ross, we were acutely aware that there would come a day when that young man would no longer be young enough to work that hard.  I thought it interesting that the shearing boss would let the crew know that it was time to go back to work after a break by simply turning the music back on. The sound of the music combined with the bleating of the sheep and the hum of the razors was all there was to hear.. There was no talking among the crew. Complete concentration is needed to keep both animals and humans free from accidents.

We learned a lot that day. We were again reminded how grateful we should be for all of the effort that is expended on our behalf in so many ways every single day. I will never again buy anything made of wool without remembering the afternoon we spent in a dimly-lit shearing shed in New Zealand. The people we met were friendly and gracious. They took time to show two strangers what they do and how they do it. They patiently answered each of our questions and seemed pleased that we were interested. The next day, we took homemade brownies back to them as a thank you and were informed that it was the first time that anyone had ever done such a thing. We also left a special book with our contact information should anyone be interested in talking with us.

 

Hopefully, we will take the lessons we have learned this week and remember to be more aware and grateful. At first I was thinking, as I observed how hard those people worked, that I was so grateful that I personally, did not have to work that hard. But then I realized that I should appreciate the fact that someone else is willing.

As always, we are happy and trying to work our own kind of hard. We are mindfull of so many who do so much to make our lives comfortable and enjoyable. I’m also thankful for parents who taught us the value of work and for all of you who are such good examples of working in service of others. Thank you!

Love, Ward and Susan     Elder and Sister Belliston, serving in Gisborne, New Zealand

* Of the 1.10 paid for each searing, the government takes out .35 in taxes.

Waiting for the music to start 

Each shearer has his favorite electric shears

This is literally back-breaking work

 

All this is done is less than two minutes!

 

Tamping the wool into bales

 

 

The sweeper is always on hand to keep things tidy

 

The shearer always starts at the feet

 

Then moves up through the body towards the head

 

 

This crew consisted of four shearers, four sweepers and one tamper

 

The wool comes on the sheep in strips about four inches across

 

This typical shearing shack has a holding pen to the left. The sheep are actually sheared in the building on stilts, so that they can be sent down a ramp back to ground level. Each shearer has a counter that he hits every time he finishes and the boss counts the number of sheep in each shearer's holding pen to make certain of the tally