Tommy Kapai: All part of a winter wonderland

Saturday mornings in our whare is all about netball now that winter has knocked on the door and my daughter has let it and the netball season inside.

I guess it was the same for me growing up as a ninth grade Mountie footy player. It was all about getting down to Blake Park as fast as I could on a Saturday morning to make sure Syd Maxfield, Hank Luke or Dick Barnett had me in the starting lineup.

So it was on Saturday for my daughter and her cousin. Even though it had been pelting down all Friday night, there was no way we weren't jumping in the waka and heading to the same place I played footy as a kid, Blake Park netball courts.

And when we arrived, sure enough it was still raining, but there huddled together on court 6 like a gaggle of drenched ducklings were the rest of the team - waiting and hoping the game was still on.

And it was.

Nothing was going to stop these Te Puna tamariki from turning up and having a crack at their opposition, Tauranga Primary School, and there standing and shouting up each side line of court 6 at Blake Park were a colourful collection of brollies and coats, swan dries and scarfs. All worn by proud parents who wouldn't have moved even if Noah had sailed right past them in his ark.

Forty wet and wonderful minutes later, it was a 3-3 draw and ducklings with their duck mothers (plus the odd drake) waddled off back to their cars for shelter.

That's when the daddy duck had a bright idea. "Let's go to the hokohoko (second hand) shop to get some dry clothes so we can stay on this side of the bridge and go to Bay Fair for a kai."

For anyone who hasn't shared in the joy of visiting the hokohoko shop over at the Mount or any of the great ones here in Tauranga it's a treat. Before you could say Bananas in Pyjamas, daddy duck had his two ducklings dressed up ready to take a little waddle on the wild side at Bay Fair.

However, the choice of apparel in the end after arriving at Bay Fair happened to be a matching pair of purple pyjamas, and the looks from passersby was worth every cent of the pittance I paid from the Salvation Army hokohoko shop to get them there.

Pyjamas, purple or any other colour worn in public is an interesting clothing concept given the looks we got.

Some smiled in adoring admiration; others couldn't hide the curious look and then another more curious stare straight after the first one. Some frowned in disapproval with a stare that said: "What kind of parent couldn't bother to change his kids before going to the supermarket?"

The classic quote from a darling dotting old lady: "Wear cute pyjamas in bed young ladies. You never know who you're going to see in your dreams" made my day.

I guess they had some satisfaction in seeing that my two little ducklings were happier than almost any other two little ducklings waddling around Bay Fair.

Mind you, in January 2012, Michael Eilliams, a commissioner in Louisiana, proposed an ordinance prohibiting people from wearing pyjamas in public as it was in his words "corroding away the moral fibre of the community".

The supermarket Tesco in St Mellons, Cardiff, United Kingdom, started a ban on customers wearing pyjamas in January 2010.

However, in China, it is not unusual in the late afternoon or evening, for adults to wear their pyjamas in public around their local neighbourhood.

Turns out pyjamas and loose trousers have been a long-time custom of the Chinese. Gives them heaps of room to hide all that kiwifruit money and maybe that's the score why the meat isn't making it ashore?

Yes, life is all about scoring I guess. For the Warriors, it was a cricket score against them, the Chiefs just by a couple of points.

But for the two little Te Puna tamariki, who sang in the rain in their purple pyjamas, the 3-3 score was just the beginning of a magic netball day. A day that was going to be a winner from the moment they woke up.

Tommy Kapai is a Tauranga author and writer.

broblack@xtra.co.nz