Friday, December 16, 2022

Whetu Calls: Water Gate

 Whetu is an old friend of Fryday’s. Not that I think he knows that. He doesn’t have email or access to the internet. In fact, he is so far off the grid he thinks “the grid” is somewhere stockcars line up or steaks are cooked.

But, for all his isolation and frequency as a guest of His Majesty, he is a masterful observer of Man and, if his repeated success in finding me despite my efforts to avoid him are exempla, an astute detective.

I should know by now that if I get a knock on my door at a late hour, it will likely be Whetu. This happened to me yesterday, which I find doubly surprising and deeply worrying given that I now live in a gated community, and at that hour, the gates were locked. Nevertheless, I felt an obligation to respond. Here is how the correspondence went.

HE: Kia Ora, Bro.

ME: Whetu.

HE: You got new home?

ME: Yes.

HE: You didn’t tell me.

ME: It slipped my mind.

HE: But I found you.

ME: Despite those gates being locked.

HE: They is?

ME: Don’t take it personally.

HE: Been a long time.

ME: Yes.

HE: A lot of water has passed under the tree.

ME: Under the bridge.

HE: That, too.

ME: Yep.

HE: How much?

ME: How much water?

HE: How much money.

ME: What!

HE: How much money for that water? I come to collect. It’s called Three waters, not free waters. Auntie Mahuta told me that.

ME: She’s your Auntie?

HE: Yo, bro.

ME: But you are, what, twice her age?

HE: A distant auntie. Anyway, she made whanau in charge of three waters. I get water under the tree…

ME: Bridge.

HE: I throw that in for free. I get tree water, and

cussies get other twos.

ME: And what are those?

HE: What?

ME: What waters?

HE: Ah…. rain?

ME: And?

HE: Dirty.

ME: Dirty waters?

HE: Yo.

ME: There seems to be something a bit murky about this, too.

HE: No, that Four Waters. Hone handles murky.

ME: Hone Mahuta?

HE: Uncle.

ME: Well, whatever money you are asking for, I am not paying it.

HE: You’re not?

ME: No.

HE: No?

ME: No.

HE: Well, I tells you what.

ME: What?

HE: I’m thirsty. Give me a couple of bottles of Waikato instead.

ME: Waikato water?

HE: Waikato beer. I am not drinking that river water s**t.

 

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