City Living

More and more Kiwis are trading their suburban section for an apartment in the city. Is it a passing fad or a lifestyle trend that is here to stay. FitzBeck writer, Mike Fitzsimons, reports on his recent 6-month stint of city living.

It was time for a change, we said decisively. The kids were spreading their wings, ending a 17-year phase of family living on the Miramar plains. Farewell to the lawn-mower and the tree-trimmer, farewell to the cricket pitch and the soaring 737s. Farewell to the wretched northerly and the battered birches and those stunning early-morning bike rides around the peninsula.

Our aim was to sample Wellington city living, to try being urbanites for six months and see if anything rubbed off. So in no time the house was sold, the removal men were in and we had temporary digs in the heart of Aro Valley – Palmer St to be precise.

Palmer St is an enchanting little street, just off the top of Willis St, a stone’s throw from the bypass. By day this dead-end avenue is as quiet as a cloister. A couple of high-rises, among the city’s earliest, dominate the skyline. Gracious residences sit cheek by jowl with a variety of dog-eared student accommodation. As the sun goes down on a Saturday afternoon, some neighbours spray their roses while others pile up beer cans.

So here we are living in a two-storey villa, skinny and tall, with three of its four walls constructed with corrugated iron. It is a triumph of compactness. It makes up for in charm what it lacks in space, boasting a pocket handkerchief of a courtyard, open fire, cosy living room decked out in raging red, and quaint kitchen tucked in under the stairs.

Best of all it’s just a ten-minutes walk to work and a quick stroll up the hill for the time-challenged university student in the house. The city swirls around us in all directions but 50 yards away we can barely hear a hum. Birds sweep by on a mysterious flight path from the Karori sanctuary.

We quickly settle into our new niche. French bakery Le Moulin, which makes the best baguettes and danishes in town, is a constant temptation. Up the road is the famed Aro St video store, flanked by a proliferation of boutique retailers. A gym is just 20 seconds from my front door, so the first move of the day is usually onto the treadmill or a brisk walk through Central Park. Some mornings I get the urge to head to the waterfront where the sea and the light are always changing. I usually don’t bother with the car between Monday and Friday.

The gentrification of Te Aro continues at a fast clip. The turn-of-the-century heritage buildings are all done up and shiny, standing there in their emptiness looking magnificent on the city’s edge. New kowhai trees and hebe shrubs line the bypass. In the early morning, a river of walkers flows from the valley and the Brooklyn hill into the city.

Most days I wander to work down Abel Smith St into upper Cuba St, past the builders and the bohemians enjoying their first coffee of the day. There are few suits on display, but plenty of woollen hats, black boots and pierced flesh. Cuba St is about eating and flowers and sex shops, it’s about music and romance and the appetites. There’s lots of street action, not all of it decent, and the friendliest fruit-shop in town.

After work I head to the city supermarket for essential supplies and walk home past the converted dental school and the big rambling house where the police made their terrorist raid last week. As often as not I bend my back into the southerly.

Action comes with nightfall. A tide of students takes the short-cut from the Aro Valley down Palmer St to the pubs. Our bay window in the lounge, six inches from my head, is irresistible. It must be knocked and tapped. We lie in bed listening to the tragedies and the comedies, the sweet talk and the fury, the reasons why relationships can’t go on, they must go on, they will go on. Parties combust about ten, skate-boarders take to the clattering streets at midnight. Night voices are on megaphone, cheering and swearing and whooping and crying. Sometimes it’s hard to tell the difference.

One evening, early on in our stay, there is a sharp rap at the door. A bunch of students present us with a couple of pizza bases. Do we have anything to contribute to their ‘community pizzas?’ One of them has a guitar, so on request they are happy to sing for their supper. They’re good enough to earn two green peppers and a red onion.

Moments later, another knock at the door. “Do you have a phone? I want to ring the government.” “But it’s nine o’clock at night. The government’s gone home.” She is desperate to make the call and leaps off into the darkness.

This morning the southerly has died away and nothing much moves. I look out on a sprinkling of broken glass and realise our six months will soon be up. It is not an easy decision, but we are heading back to the Miramar peninsula for our next chapter of Wellington life. This time we will be perched on the eastern side looking out on the plum-coloured hills where the sun rises. It’s back to gardening and painting and fixing things, tasks for which I am spectacularly ill-suited.

I’ll miss our city walks, the frantic Sunday morning vege market where we buy all sorts of authentic Asian greens that I don’t know how to cook. We’ll miss the spontaneous movies and meals out and the sheer convenience of city life. But in the end, I suppose, we have decided we are more of the coast than the city. It’s a vote for green and open spaces, and the unrivalled sound of the sea.