New Zealand

There is a way of putting up you guard against he sight of perpetual tragedy. You steel yourself against starving women and bony children, you fix your gaze just beyond the slums and lean-to huts. Everything is seen from behind a veil, from behind the bus window, behind a notebook, behind the security of always knowing you will go home.
But nothing, nothing, can prepared you for the velvet curve of a New Zealand hill. It enters your heart by way of your eyes and then expands inside you. There is simply no way of stopping it, and entering New Zealand is dangerous unless you are prepared to be forever heartbroken, always longing for the glistening bays and the floating islands. The sheep speckled hills melt into mountains and the mountains melt into sky, and after a while you feel the tears fill the spaces between your eyes. You realize that this is so beautiful that it is sad. It is so beautiful it makes you wonder what else could possibly matter...the slums melt away, and that woman's toothless mouth moves silently. The hunger and suffering in the world and in your soul are blown away with that breeze that fills hollow valleys. You can give yourself to the water that turns your body to ice. You can give yourself away. And that is what breaks my heart.