When Kiwi’s Fly

You’ll have to forgive me if I sound parochial but I love a single-minded kiwi (the world is full of them, just ask anyone who knows one). Burt Munro was a passionate motorcycle enthusiast. He was the owner/builder of his beloved 1920 Indian Scout motorcycle. The movie, ‘The World’s Fastest Indian’ is his story. It made me feel proud to be a kiwi. But not for the reasons you might think.

For me, it goes to the fact that “you’re never too old to follow through with a dream.” There is a generation of my New Zealand forbears that held to the idea that you simply got on with life no matter what you came up against. And while I am a lot younger than some of that generation, I have to say, I agree. I like to think that’s how I’ve lived my life.

Maybe we’re just a bloody-minded mob that rarely take no for an answer or maybe we’re just so thick skinned that getting through to us is darn near impossible. Whatever you think, at the end of the day, we’d also just as soon as share the spotlight than keep it for ourselves. It’s who we are in our core.

If we waited for the belief of others to give us the green light one might desire when venturing off into unchartered waters I’m of the opinion some of life’s most intrepid adventurers would be still stuck in dry dock waiting for the day. I take my hat off to Burt Munro and those of his ilk. Theirs is the intestinal fortitude of an everyday hero. His was an against the odds debut both in life and on the salt flats of Bonneville, Utah.

Imagine it, reaching speeds of over 200 mph (that’s miles per hour as clocked in his first time trial on the flats) on a pieced together machine that was the laughing stock and disbelief of his fellow competitors and racing officials. The word ‘crazy’ comes to mind.

And so do gutsy, passionate and wholly believable because who else would dare to dream outside the bottom of the earth aka Invercargill, New Zealand to a world beyond the quiet weatherboards and owning your own section mentality of that era. Burt did.

And it’s true what they say. Kiwi’s can fly and if peeing on lemon trees was the very least of the idiosyncrasies associated with that ability to do so, then finding a lemon tree is entirely do-able not to mention a great relief I should think!