revisiting the past

I had the opportunity to

revisit my 'old' life on Thursday and Friday last week.

 

It was the 2015 NZYF Contest Grand Final in Taupo

and my 'new' job is now a sponsor.

We were spotted two tickets for the Awards Dinner on Thursday night.

 

(terrible photo I know but the OSPRI logo is up there somewhere)

 

It's a funny old thing going back.

Things were basically the same,

a little more shambolic,

frustration was at about the same level,

as was the fun quota.

 

What was nice was to sit and have the dinner happen around me.

To relax knowing what was going well and not,

but it not being my responsbility.

I loved hearing what everyone had been up tp.

This was more so for the Young Farmers than the staff.

That was super nice.

 

I enjoyed catching up with so many people,

even getting a hug from Spud!

The last and only time that happened was when I left NZYF.

 

I spent Friday wandering the Grand Final Contest paddock

watching Grand Finalists complete modules,

chatting to farmers about OSPRI things,

and having a say on the old stockjudging comp.

 

 

I miss stinky cattle.

Grand Final 2013 - getting there

It's Grand Final time again.

It was Grand Final time,

last week,

which seems about five minutes ago.

My fulla and I headed off on a sunny Friday morning

from Christchurch to Picton.

The weather was fine and we made good time.

We got to Blenheim (the town before the Picton harbour)

and discovered my work credit card wouldn't work.

No worries.

This was followed closely by a txt from the 

Interislander Ferry people 

letting us know that our ferry was delayed due to extreme weather.

Long story short.

Our 6:30pm sailing finally left at 10:30am the next morning.

We took a wander around Picton.

You sure can't mistake the toilets in Picton.

For some reason I posted on Facebook

that we were delayed and voila!

We got a phone call from lovely Claude to say 

come and stay with her family. 

Being polite and naive we really believed we would be sailing soon.

Gosh the ferry people said we would.

We had a 1:30am, 6:25am and finally a 10:30am sailing.

Our hosts thought we were a hoot.

They knew better.

They use the ferries all the time.

We set out early to make sure we were at the front of the car queue.

So that meant breakfast on the road.

Chicken sandwiches.

I love rotisserie chickens.

While waiting in line,

my fulla bumped into his mate from home.

They hadn't seen each other for about five years so 

a catch up was in order.

Culturally this requires sharing food.

Thank goodness for a handy dandy fruit loaf on hand.

We set out on peaceful seas.

Through the Marlborough Sounds and out into 

Cook Strait.

I now hate Cook Strait.

For goodness sake, I have traveling on these ferries

since I was a baby.

My Poppa would take me and Punky Pete across

in the highest of seas and let us run wild

while he propped up the bar and

yarned with his old railways mates.

This was the day I was introduced to sea sickness.

I puked.

I never puke.

My fulla took his sweet time to get a sick bag for me

but I held on,

then I puked and felt so much better.

we stayed with my super uncle for the night

then headed off to Auckland.

We got a flat tire on the very heavy trailer.

Thank goodness for my fulla cause

in  all seriousness I would have sat down and 

cried if I had been alone.

I couldn't even figure out how the jack worked.

And it was already dusk.

And I was super tired.

But my husband saved the day.

We hadn't even got near Auckland.

It was already a long week.

rural awesomeness

Just so you know,

no self-respecting rural person would use the word awesomeness

unless they are a relatively uncool 13 year old

but it is the most appropriate word for the

2012 National Bank Young Farmer Grand Final.

This guy Elliot Scott was the man in charge

of a team of a fair few people who pulls together a massive,

a huge, an epic year of organising, planning and challenging

all for their fellow Young Farmers.

Early in the morning inside Forsyth Barr Stadium, Dunedin,

looking down on the modules on the concrete at the right end and

on the field the AgriSports set up to be raced through in a few hours.

So this is how the volunteer side of Young Farmers works.

We have these great young people who

join Young Farmers.

They blithely go along to meetings,

having a few jars,

meeting people,

talking harvest and calving stuff.

Then they enter the National Bank Young Farmer Contest.

At first they are having a good opportunity for a skills day with their mates.

They have a go at skills modules welding, building, digging, or calving/lambing

(really gross defrosted, limp dead calves or lambs).

They do this for a couple of years

then one year they make it through to a Regional Final.

Then after a couple of goes a Regional Final

they might, might make it through to a Grand Final.

Only eight from each Region make it through to a Regional Final,

only one from each Region makes it to Grand Final.

Katherine Tucker (Northern Region Grand Final Contestant)

in the dairy module at 2012 Grand Final

Along the way the Young Farmer volunteers

will have chaired a Club,

run a District/Regional Contest Final,

organised fundraising, bus trips, hunting trips,

a million and one social activities

and

making really great, life lasting friends.

Chris Will, Cam Lewis (elected the NZYF Board just now)

and Cam Brown (Regional Chair, Taranaki/Manawatu)

Contest is like no other event in anywhere in the world,

the rural world or otherwise.

Three levels - District, Regional and National

400 enter, then 56 (8x 7 Regional Finals)

then just 7 at Grand Final

then just 1.

There is only one winner each year.

We've have been doing this Contest for 44 years.

There have now been 44 Young Farmer of the year.

2012 is Michael Lilley's turn.

That's Micheal in the cloak with his wife Kelly

and the six Grand Finalists.

Grand Final is a gruelling three day event

that has a day of mental challenges,

a day of physical challenges

then a night of conquering rounds of mastermind type ag questions

all the while being filmed, photographed and interviewed.

There are only seven each year.

Only one wins.

Don't worry we train them young these days.

We have AgriKids with their own Contest in teams of three

and TeenAg in pairs.

Training Grand Finalists for the future.

We have a TV series called

The Road to the Young Farmer Final 

so click above and hopefully TVNZ will be generous

and allow my overseas peeps to watch a little of what we do.