Around 7,300 people live in our suburbs, and amongst them are many local identities who contribute much to the colour of our community, but receive little recognition for their contributions.
Ngaio Crofton Downs has decided that we will write profiles of people within our community so that their stories can be known. Our committee member Carol Jenkins has taken on this role, and her profiles are published in our newsletter, and then here on this page.
Anyone that you think should be added to our list?, please let us know at info@ngaio.org.nz.
Isobel Reid of Ngaio
November 2020, published in our February 2021 newsletter
The thought of a European spring and summer in a small rural village in would appeal to many of us who dislike the cold of a Wellington winter. But add all the restrictions of an enforced lockdown spent alone with neighbours growing increasingly wary of the slightest contact with one another, and a long separation from one’s partner, and the picture becomes a little less rosy.
When Isobel Reid said goodbye to her husband Nick and set off in late February intending to see her daughters and their families in Tuscany and in London, and to pay a visit to her second home in the south of France, little did she realise how complicated her travel plans would become.
Luckily, Isobel is a fluent French speaker. Fortunately, she is adaptable; when her first daughter was small, she spent several years teaching in the remote mountain regions of Papua New Guinea, so she is not easily fazed by changing circumstances. And the situation changed rapidly as soon as she touched down in Europe. Total lockdown confined her to her house in rural France with a 20km trip once every three weeks to the nearest market town to buy groceries. Her only communication with her family was through emails, phone calls and English Zoom lessons delivered to her young grandsons in Italy.
By July borders were open so her daughters and their partners and her grandchildren were able to visit her. One young grandson, Robin, stayed with her a little longer after the others had returned home. She drove him back to Piedmont then home to her village some 500kms away, still avoiding contact outside the family because of the pandemic.
Finally back in New Zealand in September, Isobel found quarantining in Auckland the easiest part of her trip. “I was very well looked-after” Determined not to spread the virus, before returning to Wellington, Isobel spend an additional fortnight with Nick in a cottage in Whanganui – “Just in case.”
Now happily back in Ngaio, loving the walkways, green hills, birdsong, and the freedom of our wonderful neighbourhood, Isobel is throwing herself into local activities. These include Ngaio Agile classes on Monday mornings and the Monday afternoon Craft class at the Ngaio Union Church, and the Friendship Group activities coordinated by Crofton Downs resident Miriam Hassam who won the Community Award at the Cummings Park Picnic this year. Isobel will be attending the AGM of the NCDRA at 7.30pm on Wed 18 Nov 2020.
As well as being involved in community affairs, Isobel has a well-developed world perspective. At the recent Meet the Candidates meeting at The Ngaio Union Church she asked an important question: “We in New Zealand seem to be doing well during the Covid crisis; what are we doing to do for humanity?”