There are worse places to be stuck, that is true. And I’ve not been turfed out of my accommodation, I’m not running out of money, and so on. But this has now become my life’s longest-ever flight delay, or indeed travel delay of any kind, and I may not even be halfway through it yet. I am trying to develop a stoic outlook on life — as this guy appears to have done.
Oh yes, Lucky, I am still here. It seems I will be here for at least a little while longer yet. You don’t have to look at me with such disdain, though. I know you don’t like me, and I have tried.
I have no idea about the actual identity of this species — and I think these are buds rather than the mature plant — but tell me you don’t think the name is appropriate. Look at the one third from the right on the stalk, it even has an eye in the right place.
St Helena has been subjected to many invasive species since humanity first arrived here five centuries ago, some deliberately planted or otherwise introduced, some accidentally so. In the background, New Zealand flax (Phormium tenax), which a while back someone decided would be a good cash crop, it being the basis of things like rope and mailbags. The cash for it stopped flowing fifty years ago, but that doesn’t mean it all decided to stop growing. In the foreground, well, you know what bird that is (Gallus gallus domesticus, according to the biologists): much the same thing happened, but as a chicken is for life and not just for Sunday dinner, when there stopped being much economic point in people looking after them, out into the environment they went. There are now large numbers of feral chickens on the island.
Another bird, yes, but I’ve been trying to get a decent shot of a red fody, a.k.a. common fody (Foudia madagascariensis) since my first visit here. He — and this is definitely a male — really is that red: I’ve not tweaked the colour settings at all on this one. As the species’ Latin name suggests, they are originally from Madagascar, but have made it over to the other side of Africa by one means or another down the centuries.
Lucky is the guy who really runs the place where I’m staying. “He doesn’t like strangers”, I’ve been told. This seems to be true. Steadfastly, he continues to show his disdain for me. Even rubbing up against car exhaust pipes seems to be preferable. I feel suitably rejected.
Whatever the wind farm on Deadwood Plain is doing to help St Helena generate power in a sustainable way, this particular turbine ain’t contributing. The cows seem stoic about the situation, though, as cows so often do. I passed on my way up Flagstaff Peak behind, at 2,257 feet above sea level. A century and a quarter ago, this place would have been crowded with tents and huts — it was a prison camp for those captured in the Boer War (fought so the British state could get its hands on gold and diamonds, before anyone tells you it had worthier motives).
Mynah birds are everywhere on St Helena, and considered something of a pest by the locals, though I have to say I quite like them, they are handsome creatures I think. Two of them were the subject of the photo taken on my first full day here, in quarantine, back in November 2021 and it’s time one made a reappearance. This is the 60th shot taken on the island, and considered as a country, it thus draws level with Russia on the stats, ready to overtake it tomorrow and become the 5th most depicted one on here (after England, Australia, Scotland and Norway). And I doubt I’ll be going back to Russia any time soon — but there is more to be seen of St Helena yet.
Another movie reference, courtesy of the exhibition currently running at the Design Museum in London, featuring a range of drawings, models, photos and other artefacts that have poured out of the head of director Tim Burton over the last 50 years or so. Two things are apparent; 1) the guy can have done very little in his life other than pour out this endless stream of creative work, more or less constantly; 2) there is some seriously weird shit going on inside that head. Worth seeing though.
An early post today as I now sit at Heathrow Airport waiting for an overnight flight. Unless something goes seriously wrong, the next three weeks of posts will all be coming from places a damn sight warmer than this one.
I cannot think of any comment other than: How cute. And all with a burst of golden sunlight in the background, and there really hasn’t been a great deal of that in December (though in this country, there never is).
Being 42 