Norwegian Blue

Not a good time to be a Norwegian in New Zealand: a YouTube video's made the news, of five young men from there hunting here and not just shooting out-of-season birds and animals, but protected native species, like the woodpigeon, or kereru above. Bastards. They look so pleased with themselves on the video, dangling a wallaby by the tail, holding a dead tahr up by the head, taking aim at a sitting pigeon - as if anyone, anyone, couldn't shoot a woodpigeon on a branch, great fat things that they are. I once walked right up to one that had been feeding on berries on a bush: it was too full to fly away; and this one regularly hung about just above the deck of the bach we used to rent on Waiheke Island.

I hope they catch them and nail them; and the locals here, like the helicopter pilot, who helped them. The authorities in Norway are appalled and apologetic, too, and starting an investigation - unlike Germany when some of their ratbags tried smuggling geckos out of the country in their underwear and in their luggage to sell for around $10,000 each.

I liked Norway, when we went there years and years ago. It was in July, and I remember that it was light when we went to bed in our hotel in Oslo - and light again? or still? when we got up in the morning. The city's on a fjord (shallower than Milford) and we found it really expensive and, though pretty, not quite as appealing as Stockholm; but it had a fascinating Resistance Museum with a radio receiver made out of a set of false teeth; and another with a great collection of Viking ships - as you would expect. In fact, there was a whole cluster of well-presented museums and, as we wandered around the city, many clusters of other things as well: I've never seen so many full frontal bronze nudes in my life.