We are in the New Zealand, once part of the old British Empire, and things are quite different here. Quite. It’s a foreign country though Americans don’t think of it that way due to language similarity. There are things I admire about the Brits, of course. They certainly bring gentility to social situations, their voices moderated and words polite at all times. And they seem to be better educated than Americans, or at least have that aura about them.

Of course, the Brits have an aristocracy, and that group has visited more bloodshed and suffering on the world than Stalin ever dreamt of. As a matter of policy, Brits always encouraged the second and third greatest powers around to ally and bring down the first, and then if at all possible sat back and watched the carnival. They spared no limit of other countries’ young men. In the First World War they simply ran out of money, and so had to sucker the Americans into it, JP Morgan assisting, of course. It was as pointless a war as was ever fought, not to conclude until 1945. Brits were behind the rise of Hitler, and the Round Table, known in the USA as the Council in Foreign Relations, operates as a real power behind the scenes in the US to this day. It is, of course, counterbalanced by other power centers, and not omnipotent.

But that is the nature of people and power. It isn’t that there was anything of terrible importance to conquer in the Boar War, for instance (where Brits gave us the concentration camp, interning and maltreating families of rebels to draw them out of the hills), but not to take what is there is to make it available to others. The power game knows no rules other than to prevail. When it became clear to the Brits that they would have to fight Hitler (they merely wanted him to destroy Russia), Churchill sent Stalin Hitler a coded message. He destroyed the French fleet in Tripoli, killing 1,243 of his day-before French allies. The message: “Look, Adolfo, I am every bit the nasty mother you are, and then some.” Indeed.

Dresden was another master stroke – Brits and Americans avoided nearby military targets, and instead concentrated on killing as many civilians as possible. Dresden was a refugee center for people fleeing the advancing Red Army. It was a massive war crime, but one of hundreds. We know about Dresden for some reason, and not about the scores of other cities the Allies attacked. Love them Brits, of course, and Americans are their spawn.

That’s just the way it is. Humans are, unleashed by proper bounds, a ghastly cruel species. Brits bug me more more than other races, however, as they as so genteel at the same time, patting your back and consoling you as they pee down your leg. But that is what we are, us humans, in different forms and manifestations.

All that is OK. that’s the human condition. There are two other things bugging me about the Brits: Eggs Benedict, and putting damned mayonnaise on everything. I curl into a ball at the taste of Hollandaise sauce, and bloody barely cooked runny egg yolks give me goose bumps.

Other than that, I am OK with the Brits. They are just like the rest of us, only more cunning.

Cuban President Raul Castro is demanding closure of Guantanamo and return of land illegally seized as part of the normalization of relations between the two countries.

The Obama administration has said it wants reform of Cuba’s one-party system as a part of the process, making no offer of any reforms in the US one-party system in return.

See link at Daily Mail, a British government-controlled news source.

Queenstown is a small resort town of perhaps 30,000. The heart of the place is a merchant district with shops, restaurants, bars, all very expensive. I needed some socks, as I forgot to pack more than wool hikers, and I will not divulge how much I paid for two pair other than to say that it is comparable to a tank of gas right now in the states.

I also wondered where they buy their toilet paper, and we discovered a grocery store this morning that sells such basics, outside the tourist district. There is a tram up a steep hillside to a restaurant, and hang gliders and a bird refuge up there. It is $45 to take the tram, and an all-day pass to the kiwi reserve is $65 or so. So we are just walking about enjoying the free parks and stuff, waiting to meet our group tonight and head out on Milford tomorrrow. There will be no Internet for five days, always a cleansing experience.

We know nothing of the other 19 people in our group, but have found in the past that hiking groups are generally lively and interesting.

Bruce Veinotte, originator of the School Sucks Project, has done some tutoring in his post professional “teacher” career. One of his charges was taken in by tales of ancient aliens and extraterrestrials. Rather than set him straight, he encouraged the child to explore the avenues of this field, helping and guiding him not by telling he what it is proper to think, but rather in how to think.

The kid, on his own, came to realize that there was not enough bankable evidence to support any beliefs in extraterrestrials and the like.

That places that kid miles ahead at any kid who simply took comfort in a teacher advising him to avoid the subject.

The schools should not “teach” intelligent design, but should allow the kids to examine it along side other belief frameworks, and so work their own way through it without being told anything other than the proper technique for analysis of ideas. Otherwise the kids have not learned anything but to follow authority.

But schools do not allow, much less “teach” critical thinking. Kids are deeply indoctrinated and by the time they graduate, jump bare-assed into the deep end of the pool with ducky water wings. They join the military, plunge into college debt, 30-year mortgages, find unfulfilling “jobs” and breathe our advertising-soaked consumer culture without pause for reflection, school having done precious little to set them free. And when the TV says something is true, they do not question.

Veinotte makes the case for processing abilities, that is, consider this: At Charlie Hebdo, we were shown pictures of hooded gunmen and were told who they were.

Most people, just about everyone I’ve read, take that information in, and read it back unchanged. They do not process it. They are brainwashed. They do not have the desire, much less the ability, to question the authority of the news media.

Not only are they brainwashed, they are boring.

Settled in our room in Queenstown after 24 hours of traveling, but oddly feeling good. The time difference is twenty hours between here and Denver, but in terms of daily clock it is only four hours. That is, once you get to twelve hours, you count backwards. So no jet lag. It is not much different from flying to the east cost from Denver.

Our email ticket confirmation from United Airlines said that our flight over the Pacific was 13 hours and “no meals.” We booked New Zealand Air through United, and I guess United was being jealous. Once you get off American-based airlines, service is excellent. On New Zealand Air we had two meals, snacks, and as we slept an attendant occasionally went down the aisles offering water to those who were awake. United Airlines would be more likely to be pilfering luggage looking for hidden money as we slept than offering water to thirsty travelers.

People here speak King’s English and are extremely polite. Air is fresh, water pure.

We’re going to hang out here for a couple of days before setting out on Milford Track, covering 34 miles, I think, in four days. But the climbing is not severe, not like the Himalayas and Andes. Our worst day is a 3,500 foot ascent. The rest is relatively rolling and flat. So I am told. We meet our group tomorrow evening.

Here’s a line from a book I was reading as we flew yesterday:

“He was dressed, as usual, as if he had been shot by cannon through a Salvation Army clothing store.”

The blog for the next three weeks will be a travelogue, that is, if we are in range of WiFi. We are off to New Zealand, South Island. The first week will be on the Milford Track. House sitters are coming in, so I have to do the usual, you know the drill – hide the pot, get rid of the Nazi paraphernalia, Stalinist literature, and of course my ISIS flag. Some time on Wednesday, the other side of the date line, we’ll be in Queenstown.

It is good, when it is winter here, to be someplace where it is summer. Right around the time of our return, pitchers and catchers report in Phoenix for spring training.