Chapter 6

“Violence on the Forecourt.” The headline in the paper was accompanied by a picture taken from security footage of two customers in the middle of a fist-fight, with a long line of cars idling in the background.

“In South Auckland yesterday frustration at long lines and high petrol prices boiled over into violence, as two customers argued over who had priority at the pump. Police were called to the scene…”

I flicked to the world section: “President: War justified.” They had found a suitably unflattering picture. “The President of the United States today responded to stinging criticism from Russia and China over the handling of military operations in Saudi Arabia. The Russian representative to the UN Security Council yesterday called on the US to outline their intentions in Saudi Arabia. The President responded that all countries had a stake in the stability of the Middle East region and that military operations had been planned to minimise the danger to civilians caught in the violence in Saudi Arabia…”

On the front of the Business section was a picture of the US dollar with the headline; “USD Reserve Status under fire.” It continued; “Speculation continued yesterday that oil exporting countries were likely to switch away from pricing in US dollars as inflation pushes the value of the dollar lower…”

I put the paper back in order and tucked it under my arm.

“I’ll take one today I think Susan.”

“That’ll be $1.50 thanks, Paul. Are you going to come along tonight?”

“I’ll be there, and I’ll make sure Jeanette comes along too.”

Susan had got together with Dave, the campground owner, and a couple of the other well known locals and had organised a town meeting. They had managed to persuade a member of the Regional Council to come out and address us. I still wasn’t entirely sure what I expected would come out of it, but it did seem like a good opportunity for everyone to get together in one place, which was an achievement in itself. I had felt a little bit reluctant at first, feeling like an interloper, but Susan had been very insistent.

“We need all the ideas we can get.” She had said.

I wandered home. I had been planning on going fishing, but I was put off by the weather. Truth be told, I had started to lose interest in fishing. Not to say I didn’t enjoy it, but I found that I was less tolerant of slow days, and less persistent for the big catches.

I sat in the caravan and read the paper front-to-back. Coverage of the events within Saudi Arabia was sparse. There were no embedded journalists this time, no nightly briefings and only the bare minimum was being passed to news sources. No oil was being pumped yet, that much was obvious. The last tankers to have left Saudi were now arriving in their destinations, but the loading facilities in the gulf and the Red Sea were still resolutely closed.

I put the paper aside. I was suddenly overcome by a wave of tiredness. It was the middle of the afternoon. Time for a nap.

As I drifted off to sleep my imagination furnished me with the missing news footage of the war in Saudi Arabia. Tanks rolled across the vast empty dunes, pipelines erupted into flaming, smoking ruins, soldiers fought street to street in towns. I slid into sleep and as I slept I dreamt:

A man came up to me on a long deserted stretch of road. “Shouldn’t you be fighting?” He asked. I was very offended and punched him in the face. He fell down on the street and didn’t move. I looked around in desperation. In the distance I saw, coming towards me, a tiny little car. As it drew up beside me I could see the driver was a huge fat man. He opened the door and motioned me in. I sat down beside him and he started driving, reaching down and jamming the gear lever this way and that, weaving all over the road. He was sweating copiously. He started talking to me about the fuel efficiency of the little car. I pretended to be interested. Then he started telling me that it was for sale, and that I should buy it off him. I told him that if it was so good that he should keep it. He said he couldn’t. Just then the car sputtered and the engine stopped. We got out. The man looked unconcerned. He took his bag out of the boot and started walking. I stood beside the little car, which seemed to be deflating like a very old balloon, and watched him go. All of sudden, while I was standing there, another car came around the corner, speeding, and slammed into the shrunken little car. Glass and plastic sprayed across the road. I jumped back in fright and the sensation of hitting the ground woke me with a start.

I had been asleep for an hour and a half. I rolled over in the bed and pulled back the thin curtain. A drip of condensation rolled down the moist window and into the aluminium sill. Outside a watery calm had broken on the afternoon. I could see a bird hopping along the guttering of Jeanette’s place, pecking at the small clump of grass that had been let grow near the down pipe.

Lying there in the little caravan I felt a long way away from anyone, a feeling I remember from childhood. It was the feeling you got when you had been playing alone for some time and you suddenly realised that it would be fun to have someone to share your games with. It had taken me many months of travelling and fishing but I had done with solitariness. I resolved that I would call Anton the next day.

But first, this town meeting. I took a plastic container of left-over stew from the caravan’s tiny fridge and put it in a pot on the little hot-plate. While it warmed I mulled over the motivations behind tonight’s meeting. Obviously Dave and Susan were worried that if petrol continued to be rationed, then both of them would have a difficult summer. Everyone had an interest in seeing Susan stay in business and, more generally, wanted to be reassured that necessities would still be delivered from over the hill. I supposed too that some of the local fishermen would be there to put their point of view. Neville might even come along. I ate my stew, deep in contemplation.

Once I had finished, tidied up and dressed for the fresh evening air I went over and knocked on Jeanette’s door. She came to the door dressed in her house-coat and a pair of sensible leather shoes.

“Come in Paul, I’m nearly ready.”

I sat down in the kitchen. There was an Ezi-buy catalogue on the table, which I riffled through while Jeanette busied herself packing her handbag and straightening her outfit.

“Shall we?” I asked, offering her my arm. She seemed a little surprised, but took it any way. I laughed. “Come on, it’s a long walk.”

Out on the street we could see a couple of separate groups of people walking ahead of us. The sun was going down and a light wind was blowing off the ocean. We made our way along the main road, past the line of houses facing the sea, and on to the stretch of road between the main township and the campground. It was about a kilometre, but an easy walk. A couple of cars passed us going towards the campground and when we got there we found about a dozen or so vehicles. One had just pulled up as we got there and the five occupants disembarked.

“Looks we might get a pretty decent turn out.”

We made our way, with the crowd, to the lounge area. It was a long room that had a television and some couches at one end, a ping-pong-table that was being used as a head table and a pool table pushed to one side. An odd assortment of outdoor furniture and armchairs filled the rest of the room. We sat near the front.

The seats filled up. The meeting was appointed to start at seven o’clock. At about ten-minutes-to the seat next to me was finally taken. It was the older man from the shop, the one who had tried to calm Neville down.

“Hello, I thought I recognised you.” He said to me.

“Hi. We didn’t get to meet properly – I’m Paul.”

“Yes I know. I’m Roger. Nice to meet in a situation that isn’t likely to end in violence. Although I suppose I shouldn’t speak too soon.” He was looking over towards the wall. Sure enough, Neville was standing near the door with a guy I recognised as one of the other fishermen.

“I hope it can be kept civil.” He said.

We sat and watched the knots of people chatting to each other, taking their seats. There would have been about two or three hundred people in total. Many were standing around the walls.

Susan, Dave and the man from the District Council had been standing at the back of the lounge. Now that everyone was settled they came forward and sat behind the ping-pong table. Once the murmuring died down, Dave got up.

“Thanks everybody, for, uh, coming along tonight. We felt that a meeting like this, was, uh, long overdue, and we also felt that we needed to hear what everybody thought, so yeah, thanks for being here. We’ll get right into it and I’ll hand over now to Rick Howerdell, a member of the Wairarapa District council and, uh, chairman of the rural development committee. Rick.”

“Thank you Dave. As I’m sure you’re all aware I have been invited to address you tonight about what the district council is endeavouring to do for you in light of the recent restrictions on fuel use introduced by the government. Just in case you are not fully aware what these restrictions are I will briefly outline those, so we can be clear. Car owners are restricted to using their cars on days that correspond to the last number of their number plates – that is even numbers on even days, and odd numbers on odd days, and both on the 31^st. Also, the speed limit on the open road has been reduced to 90 kilometres per hour. These are being enforced by the police…”

“We know!” Someone shouted from the back.

“…and I advise everybody, for their own sake, to abide by these rules. But obviously there are situations that make this difficult, especially in the country. The police have been instructed to use their discretion in rural areas. So you are not going to be prosecuted for driving your ute full of hay on the wrong day. Other commercial users of fuel have also been given special dispensation.

One of our most important priorities at the moment is freight. The government is working with shipping companies to shift long distance freight movements into rail. That doesn’t affect you directly, obviously, but it will mean that those places that are serviced by trucks are more likely to retain that. This will be very important even in the short term and we are hoping that business owners and other freight users will come to the party on this.

“The district council has been working on a plan to increase the public transport capabilities of the region. This is a difficult task due to the large area that needs to be covered, but we are having some success in persuading people to start riding the mini-buses we have been running. We are also in the process of drawing up a detailed priority document of fuel use. This is something that the government has requested from all of the districts in the country, in order to better manage the distribution of fuel. A special working group is being set up to find solutions to the difficulties of distribution – basically they are thinking of people like you, that live in remote locations, that have an even more pressing need for fuel than somebody that lives in, say, central Auckland. The government is doing this right now, and they are sitting tomorrow evening to pass legislation to take windfall profit taxes from the oil companies, to pay for any additional services that will need to be provided.

“As far as our priorities in the district go, we obviously need to put farmers at the top of the list. The farming community is the backbone of this region. We are determined that stock movements will continue and that farmers will have access to all of the resources necessary to stay in business. In that same line we have put commercial fisherman high on the list as well, because of course, nothing will happen without fuel for your boats.” He motioned towards Neville and the other fisherman.

“The next thing to ask is what are we going to do long term. It doesn’t look like we are going to be back to the previous level of oil products on the world market in a hurry. So we have about 15% less energy available to us, and we cannot expect the amount available to increase any time soon. What this means for us is very important, because we have been used to amounts of fuels increasing, but we must face up to removing fuels from areas of our everyday lives and leaving them out permanently. So I would hasten to add that while we are trying our best to initiate changes in the way the district functions, and we are ensuring that the government is appraised of our situation, in the final analysis long term changes will start with you as individuals.

“Here are a few of the things that we are suggesting. The first and most obvious is, when you are going anywhere, ask yourself whether it is absolutely necessary. Secondly, ask yourself whether there is any way to share the trip with someone else. The next thing that will prove to be very useful is to get into a mind set of saving things, even little things. You may laugh at me but the collections of lengths of string your parents and grandparents had, from before the war, are what we are talking about. Minimise your waste, because I can tell you right now, it is already difficult for us to keep running dumps and rubbish collections. Lastly I would say to that you should start looking to each other for all sorts of things. Find out if anyone in the area has a garden patch they may need help with, offer your services for things like car repairs and other jobs that might otherwise require a trip over the hill. We need to be more community focussed, and that is what this sort of thing is about.” He indicated the meeting with a sweep of his arm.

“In the bigger picture I don’t think any of us can pretend to have an easy answer for the root causes of this oil crisis. We are in the same boat and all need to pull together to make our lives more efficient, to conserve where possible and to identify innovative solutions. This will not be easy because oil is so important to our modern lifestyles, but we must succeed!

I’m not going to stand up here and rabbit on, but I would like to hear any questions or comments from you.”

Silence ensued. A few people looked at each other across the hall. Then someone from the back asked:

“So, can the council guarantee that food will still be delivered out here?”

“What we can guarantee is that food distribution is at the absolute top of our priority list. But remember of course that we are only one district, and this is only one of many isolated communities. In the long run, and it pains me to say this, we are still not at a stage where we can absolutely guarantee anything.”

“Does that mean that we may be forcibly evicted from Castlepoint?” From near the first interrogator

“That is not an option we have on the table at the moment, and it is something that I personally can see little immediate benefit in. We don’t have the resources to relocate entire communities like that, so I would say no.”

“I get the feeling that we are going to be let to wear away – you know, benign neglect - and that our issues are going to get harder to deal with. If we start to lose basic services will our rates be dropped?”

“At this stage there has been no discussion of rates movements…”

“So the council is solvent?”

“… and the council is in no position to ask cash strapped families for money they will certainly need, in excess of that already being collected. We must of course all realise that this is going to be very difficult time and we are going to all have to make sacrifices to get through. Services such as rubbish collections in the towns may have to be more irregular, by necessity, but we will all cope, I’m sure.”

“So the council is solvent then?”

“Yes”

Next to me, Roger raised a hand. Rick pointed to him.

“You mentioned helping neighbours out with garden patches. Does the council have any plans to help people start gardening, like seed banks or gardening courses?”

“These are not options that have yet been discussed. We appreciate that it’s not realistic to expect everyone to start growing all their food, but we are optimistic that there is a lot of knowledge out there. We can, as I mentioned, do a lot to help ourselves if we work together.”

“Well, I’m prepared to start giving people a hand. If you want to get some gardening tips then see me after the meeting,” Roger said standing up and looking around the room.

There were a few more questions about whether there were going to be minibuses going into Masterton (not at this stage) and whether there was any chance of blackouts (no increased risk currently). Then there was a question from the guy standing next to Neville.

“What happens if things get worse? If it gets to the stage where there isn’t enough petrol to deliver out here, what then?”

“I think we have probably all thought of the worst that could happen, and I can assure you that that is what we are working to avoid, but we are also not in a position where we can influence events on the other side of the world very much. We have to adapt, and if the worst happens and we do have to start making hard decisions about where petrol tankers get sent, then we will make sure that everyone is informed. It is something that we are considering, but we hope not to have to confront it.”

“So you’re saying, you’ve thought of some options and that’s all you can say.”

“Put it this way, if Castlepoint has to do without fuel so will a whole lot of other places and I can assure you that the district council will be getting a lot of direction from the government. The sort of scenarios we are envisaging don’t involve uprooting the whole town, as I said earlier, because that is just not practical.”

There was a quiet murmur in the crowd. Rick looked on with a grim expression. It didn’t look like anyone was going to ask any more questions.

Susan stood up and whispered something in his ear.

“Any last questions, folks? No. Well thank you for you attention. I’ll be available after we have finished to discuss anything you might want to talk about. Susan.”

“Yes, thank you Rick. I’ve only got a few things I need to pass on. There are going to be a few changes to the shop over the next little while. A few items are going to no longer be stocked, mainly the bakery goods and a few of the different fruit and veges. Also there are going to have to be some more price increases due to the freight charges going up. I’ve put all of the main things on a list here that you can take away with you afterwards. Also I am going to put up a sheet in the shop for car-pooling. If you are going in to Masterton, or Wellington or wherever, put it up in advance and that way everyone can see who’s going. Also before you leave tonight we would all really appreciate it if you could put your up-to-date contact details, phone, address, e-mail, mobile, whatever, in the book at the door there. You don’t have to but it would be very useful. Well, unless anybody has anything else they want to talk about, we’ll close the meeting. Thank you for all being here.”

The three at the front desk stood and walked out to the side. Before they even got past the front row, an elderly gentleman buttonholed Rick Howerdell.

Everyone else stood up and started talking quietly in little groups. A few guys started putting the lounge back in order, taking the outdoor furniture onto the lawn.

Jeanette and I stood with Roger and watched all the activity. I turned to Roger and said:

“I for one would be interested in learning a few gardening skills. Jeanette’s got quite a good patch, but I know very little really.”

“Well you should come out to my place one day – I’ll give you the tour and we can do an informal lesson. You too Jeanette, and maybe you’d be able to teach me a few things.”

Jeanette feigned embarrassment.

“I’d love to come out. Where’s your place?”

“It’s about a kilometre out on the main road. There’s a signpost at the road for Edendell, and it’s some four hundred metres up a metalled driveway. Come by any time. I’m almost always at home.”

Just as Roger was finishing saying this a middle aged woman came over to him. “I’d be interested in taking up your offer…” I heard her say.

“Shall we head home,” I said to Jeanette.

“Lets, shall we.”

We walked home in the brisk night air, passed only twice by cars from the meeting, all full. It took us half an hour or so. Jeanette talked about what Castlepoint had been like in her youth, and it sounded like it had changed very little in the intervening years.

I farewelled her at her door, and headed for the caravan, in a much more salubrious mood than earlier. Tomorrow I resolved, I would ring Anton.