On one side, the Western one, New Zealand is rainforest. On the other, it's rolling hills. I almost believed I was in the UK, possibly southern Scotland or northern England, as we drove towards Wedderburn across impossibly extended farmland, like a stretched version of what you see in the sheep farming areas of Britain.
Then Sophie and Trudy drove me to the beach near Auckland where The Piano was shot. Totally different scene. Strange lifeforms on the beach and strange plants, ferns and palms, not unlike rural Taiwan. Black sand.
It struck me forcefully that agriculture has an aesthetic that is somewhat hostile to contemporary ecological concerns. The farmer we hung out with for instance, was one of the principal resistors of wind farms—why? Because the turbines would spoil the horizon line.
