Just ignore me guys, Run of the mill Lurker registration.

[Kiwi303]

Hmm a little about me.

 

34, Kiwi (Since this is an Aussie forum, expect a bit of ribbing whenever the Wallabies lose a match) Grew up in Te Kowhai in the same primary school class and later the same high school as Max Clear's son with Max's wife as my teacher aide in class at primary school for a few years, so pretty familiar with the B22 Bantam and been up for a few joyrides. I have heard Max died a few years back and Micro Aviation was taken over by some folks down Invercargil way somewhere, RIP, Max was a good old bugger.

 

Roll on 20 years or so and I'm now in the SI working in Rakaia and spending the off season in the Nelson Lakes where I've been up in the Nelson Lakes Gliding Club Grob twin glider a few times.

 

Back in 2010 there was a short period where I was tossing up choices between getting my PPL or Microlight cert, Getting my Class 6 and a motorcycle, or going overseas teaching english somewhere. I spent Nov 2011 to Dec 2012 in Chongqing in China, with trips to Hong Kong and the Philippines. You can guess where the saved cash got spent, lots of flying, but no GA.

 

Back in NZ, found a job, stable enough to have a little petty cash to burn, enough for a few hours a month flying anyway so am again looking at a PPL or MPC.

 

I'm deaf as a post, though using a Hearing Aid means I can pass a Class 2 with a no-radio clause but would never make Class 1 so a commercial career with CPL is out of the possibilities.

 

Currently digging around a bit for what it would cost to get a PPL these days, due down to start the new season in late July so a couple months to get the income flowing again and start classes maybe early Sept with either the Geralding flying club from Rangitata aerodrome or the Canterbury Recreational Aero Club at Rangiora both with microlights for a MPC, or Ashburton Flying Club with C172s for a PPL. Ashburton would be more expensive, but PPl gives more options, including GA aircraft not just Microlights, plus recognised overseas as a ICAO PPL in countries where MPC's aren't recognised.

 

Meanwhile I'm lurking, reading, researching, and generally getting ahead on the theoretical side of things. I already know Lift/Drag etc. Air Law and Nav etc, the more I learn now the less the workload and brain fade in exams later while doing the course of study and tests.

 

 

[Litespeed]

Welcome KIWI,

 

enjoy the forum, ask anything,, contribute and have a laugh at our expense.

 

Phil

 

 

[Aldo]

Since this is an Aussie forum, expect a bit of ribbing whenever the Wallabies lose a match

Welcome

 

I expect that's all we will hear then, the Wallabies aren't capable of buying a game in the foreseeable future.

 

Aldo

 

 

[kgwilson]

Welcome Kiwi 303. Presumably that is the calibre of your wing guns. Plenty of Kiwis and Kiwi ex pats on this forum so don't feel lonely. I knew Max Clear well from his early days of building aircraft, watching him do aeros in the Pitts from my veranda in the evening about 3km from his airfield at Te Kowhai. It is a pity his family did not want to keep Micro Aviation going. There were a lot of active RA & GA pilots using the airfield and Max was in the process of setting up an Air Park when cancer took him. The property is now for sale so if you have a spare $4 million it would be a great investment. You get a bunch of hangars, sheds, clubhouse, workshops house & garage etc with an AirBP Avgas facility and a superb strip. I first flew there in the late 70s and it just kept getting better until Max's untimely death.

 

 

[Kiwi303]

Oh, I Certainly will laugh at your expense when the wallies drop the ball :D

 

for 4 mil you'll have to tell me what the winning lotto numbers are this Saturday, including the powerball, with 20 mil in my pocket I could even put up a few extra hangars and buy the farm at the end of the runway to expand. Back when I was still around Te Kowhai Phillip had zero interest in his dads planes, not every son is eager to follow in his dads footsteps, last I heard Phillip was doing a Bachelors of Sports Science, he always was a good swimmer, through not olympic class, he did have a good shot at qualifying for the commonwealths but I don't think he every made it. I was up to Hamilton in Feb for a day and gather from stopping in the village he's still in Te Kowhai somewhere with kids at the same primary school he and I went to.

 

Kiwi303 is my monicker on a bunch of forums here and there across the web, Kiwi because I AM a Kiwi, .303 from my SMLE. the second forum I ever joined was a gun forum, the first was a hunting forum. Tells you where my other interests lie, what with having a couple of .22s, a neglected 12G (i'm not into molesting birdies, fur rather than feathers is my target), a recently acquired SKS and my trusty old first gun, an Ishapore 1940 SMLE No 1 Mk III*

 

It's easier to remember just one username and a bunch of varying passwords than it is to remember lots of names AND passwords.

 

 

[robinsm]

Visited max a few years ago when I was looking to buy a kit. Interested in the Bantam at the time. Was visiting family in Hamilton at the time. My brother lives at Te Kowhai, not far from the airfield. Welcome to the forum...

 

 

[facthunter]

It might be primarily an Aussie forum but we have people from everywhere here. The main reason you people fly well is the wind never stops, so you have to be good or you bend it.. Welcome Kiwi 303. Nev (nev er stop learning)

 

 

[nomadpete]

Good to see that you have got your intentions out in the open, right from the start.

 

Welcome, run-of-the-mill lurker !

 

You'll fit in perfectly, just over there between the run-of-the-mill trolls.

 

 

[recflyer]

Welcome. I would not worry too much which license to get initially. All flying is awesome and the sooner you start the better! ( in my very humble opinion). Even if you start off with microlights you can always use that experience to tranisition to ppl at a later stage (although im not sure how easy this is in nz and you would need to look into the specifics) but that route is certainly an option in aus and many people do it.

 

I put flying off for ages, like most people I wish I started way earlier!

 

Enjoy and let us know when you start.

 

 

[Phil Perry]

Allo Kiwi,. . . .

 

Welcome to the forum, I am truly sorry that you have a problem in the hearing dept., but as you have already said, this won't prevent you from flying. The only bonuss, if you could call it that, is that you can only READ most of the insults, rather than hearing them ! !

 

The gun stuff sounds interesting too. . . I agree with your comments re shotguns, although I have yet to have a go at shooting clays, that looks interesting, and it also looks easy. Bet it isn't and my days as an ace marksman with various rifles woun't really help in that discipline, I have no doubts there.

 

Keep us posted about what you're doing anyway., sounds like you have a bit of varied experience already. I fly three axis appliances and weightshift trikes, have flown helicopters and gyros, but they give me bad dreams, . . . . one night I woke up sweating so much, I nearly slid off the wife. . . .

 

Phil

 

 

[bexrbetter]

I'm deaf as a post,

HI KIWI, WELCOME!

 

 

[Phil Perry]

Just ignore him Kiwi,. . . he just doesn't panda to anyone. . . . .

 

 

[Kiwi303]

It's a small world, He's only a coupla hundred miles from where I was at 重庆交通大学

 

 

[bexrbetter]

. he just doesn't panda to anyone. . . . .

No grey areas with you Phil, it's always laid out in black and white.

 

It's a small world, He's only a coupla hundred miles from where I was at 重庆交通大学

I love visiting Chongqing "the furnace city" which I have done many a time over my 10 years here. I always stay in a Hotel on the peninsula just near where the rivers meet and sit and watch the ore ships struggle against the current of the Yangtze. 2 hours from Chengdu on the fast train.

 

 

 

[Kiwi303]

That photo actually looks like you are on the north bank in Jiangbei looking across at Yuzhong, rather than being in Yuzhong near the meeting at Chaotianmen.

 

I lived for a while a in Nan'an district, on the south bank of the river, at the campus on Xuefu Dadao, University Avenue is a close translation for the non-chinese speakers on here :D there were 4 universities spread along the several Km from the river to Ba'nan district in the south, plus more within a couple of blocks each side of the road. I'd often go up to Jiefangbei in Yuzhong district, quite often to Hongyadong where a tea shop had a nice view over the river and earl grey tea. Plus Subway of course, other than McDonalds, KFC and Pizza Hut about the only western food around if you didn't feel like cooking your own. Never got as far as Chengdu :D I explored south. Flight to Guilin in spring festival between the semesters, last week Jan 2012, few days looking around, bus with a student to a town near her home village, met her family and saw small town life in Guangxi, bus to Wuzhou, few days looking around there, bus to Guangzhou and later Shenzhen, through Honkers to the airport and 5 days escaping a continential winter with 5 degree days in the tropical heat of Cebu, back to Honkers and through the subways again to SZ airport and off to Wuhan where I met a fellow I met in my students home town who showed me around his college and around Wuhan, flight back to CQ, subway home, dump my bags at 11pm and lay out the next mornings clothes ready and 7am I was in class again teaching the first class of the next semester. a nice trip.

 

I had a good time over there, but the whole experience had a rather sudden and character building end. I was working for the International College within the university rather than the Department of Foreign Languages, the DFL had US Peace Corps volunteers funded by the US state department while the IC paid us teachers themselves, come the time that the end of the contract was looming up and I approached the department to renew for the new year, "Sorry, were won't be renewing your contract" so off to find a new job, ended up living in Shapingba district and working an hours bus ride away in Jiefangbei in the New York Tower a couple hundred meters away from the war memorial cenotaph. Later conversations with my former students I kept up with revealed I and the other two IC TESOL teachers had been replaced with more Peace Corps volunteers. Simple economics, why pay teachers when the US govt will pay teachers...?

 

So I was working for Britain VNII, a private english language school I found was owned by the number 4 ranking cop in CQ, Plenty of pull to direct the PSB immigration and work visa section raids elsewhere so no rush to deal with getting me a working visa for their school, it took nagging and nagging and pointed questions about when I would get a legal visa before they bothered to set things in motion at last.

 

After a holiday period I worked a month, came in to work at the VNII offices the middle of the next month (they paid monthly, tot up what hours you worked the previous month and pay that in the middle of the month) expecting to get paid... padlocks on the door! Bankrupt. The owner had been accepting cash from the parents and pocketing it rather than passing it on to accounts to be used for running the school! so there I was out a month and a halfs work with no money to show for it and a visa suddenly gone worthless, since a bankrupt school equalled a bankrupt visa.

 

To cut a long story short I ended up in Honkers (Hong Kong) missing pay, having spent savings on a holiday, more on the quarters apartment lease, and the air fare. No end-of-contract bonus or airfare, bugger all cash left, just enough for a call home and a few days living in HK. A call to mum didn't get through, after several days of calling and no response I tried a neighbour and no answer either, I posted a grumble on facebook and got a post back from my brothers girlfriend, Try the Fax number, then line is buggered. Got mum the next call and arranged for her to sell my emergency "If the shit hits the fan" fund and buy me a ticket home. So two old cows grazing forgotten out the back of the farm got a quick trip to McDonalds via the ground beef plant and I came home dead broke and skint.

 

Character building... stories to swap over a beer round a BBQ, but hardly conductive to peace and quiet while they were happening :D

 

So I spent a year looking for work back in NZ which was scarce as hens teeth for a deaf guy, Nil receptionist, can't hear the phone, Nil outside work in wet weather, $2500 of sensitive electronics behind my ear which doesn't like getting wet, Nil hazardous machinery jobs, Health & Safety would have a fit at the though of someone who can't hear "Watch Out" over machinery noise, Nil this job, Nil that job. Finally found one after 18 months looking. Paid off mum for the cows, got a bit of cash sorted and my feet under me financially again and can look around for a bit of fun on the side again instead of head down, arse up, nose to the grindstone life.

 

Before I left I looked at China, Motorbike or Flying.

 

Been to China, so that leaves flying and motorbikes. Through a Russian friend is trying to entice me to join her in Siberia teaching in her friends school, I'm not really convinced about living somewhere with -30*C winters however...

 

 

[bexrbetter]

That photo actually looks like you are on the north bank in Jiangbei looking across at Yuzhong, rather than being in Yuzhong near the meeting at Chaotianmen.

100% Yuzhong. If I panned left a little more you would see the twin golden buildings almost directly across from my hotel.

 

You have had an adventure to remember, China takes a little bit of getting to know what's going on, can be a very difficult learning curve.

 

 

[nomadpete]

Sounds like an easy decision, -30 degrees is not very conducive to motorbikes (well, not for fun anyway). Hope to hear that you are soon into the air and loving it as much as we all do.