Jim Hopkins writes that we should ignore the naysayers and doom-merchants - our country has a few good reasons to smile.
Gisborne, Easter Sunday morning, around 10.15am and 13 of us are sitting in the narrow fuselage of an Air New Zealand Beechcraft 19, about to whizz to Wellington - provided fog hasn't closed the airport or obscured the Wallywood sign and the winds are sufficiently sub-cyclonic to allow a landing reasonably close to the runway.
Suddenly, as the youthful co-pilot - scarcely past puberty, it seemed - came down the aisle to ensure we'd fastened our seat belts, a vehicle purred past the port wing and smoothly stopped.
It was a modest motor, efficient but anonymous, grey, with a flag on the bonnet. This first car was followed by a second, larger vehicle that wasn't grey and didn't have a flag - although it did have two passengers, as did the Beemer.
Gisborne had plenty of visitors over Easter, many of them attending the Eastwoodhill Arboretum's Centennial celebrations.
Hidden in the hills of Ngatapa, Eastwoodhill is amazing. Anyone who hasn't been there should go at least once, if only to see what wonders a dream can create and to remind themselves that we all need to leave some kind of legacy and plant some kind of garden, however modest it may be.
Not that Eastwoodhill is modest - anything but. It's a Taj Mahal of gardens, really, a labour of love and proof of its value, established in 1910 by William Douglas Cook - a man who, rumour has it, preferred to garden wearing just a hat and one boot.
Cook spent most of his life and all of his money creating a 131ha onshore ark, filled with all manner of taxa; Acer, Fraxinus and Sorbus plus a wide range of Quercus, including rubra, coccinea, palustris and mongolica.
For them as ain't botanists, that's maples, ash, something else and oaks - red, scarlet, pin and Mongolian. Fearing the Northern Hemisphere would be devastated by some natural or human violence, Cook wanted his trees to be used for renewal and revegetation. Today, Eastwoodhill has what may be the Southern Hemisphere's largest collection of Northern trees, more than 4000 different types, including 170 endangered species.
Imagine the hassles Cook would encounter if he tried to create Eastwoodhill today. Hone Harawira would insist the site was Maori land, the Greens would demand all the trees were natives, the regional council would spend two years studying adverse effects on water quality and the district council would levy squillions for roading upgrades and car parking. By the time the poor bloke got consent, he'd be in receivership and forced to sell to the Chinese.
Happily, that hasn't happened. Eastwoodhill was bought by Gisborne philanthropist Bill Williams in the 1960s and, in 2005 became our National Arboretum. Which explains why the Governor-General, Sir Anand Satyanand, was at the centennial dinner on Saturday night to make a speech and present an award.
And also why he was stepping out of his motor on the runway at Gisborne airport on Sunday morning. Like us, he was going back to Wellington before, quite possibly, heading on to another more agreeable destination.
There was a palpable frisson of excitement on our little craft. Life was no longer a Beech - it was a VIP Beech! "That's the Governor-General," whispered a lady down the back. Necks craned. Eyes widened. Some of us practised a quick kneel in the aisle in preparation for the bestowal of the sword.
The Governor-General and his entourage - one young lady from the Navy and a security guy with the obligatory earpiece - took their seats. No fanfare, no welcome from the pilot and no extra lollies either. They just got on and sat down and we took off.
Two thoughts flashed through my mind as the plane got airborne.
First, "Wow! I'm travelling on Air Force One!" And second, "Boy, if you needed a reason why we should never become a republic, this is it, son. This is it!"
Because there we were, 17 of us now, in a wee 19-seater that just happened to be carrying the man who could, hypothetically, had it been discovered overnight that John Key was a space alien or something equally unlikely, be required, as soon as he touched down, to dismiss the Government, dissolve the Parliament and call a new election.
And he wasn't in his own plane, with 50 aides and 200 journalists. There were no fighter escorts, Security Service personnel or top secret electronic countermeasures. Just a kid in a hoody two seats back who may have aroused suspicion in a bank but didn't on the plane.
There are many arguments in favour of our remaining a constitutional monarchy. One we should never forget is that it's splendidly inexpensive.
There's plenty of things we need to spend plenty of money on but a Head of State isn't one of them.
It's great to see the Queen's representative travelling economy class on a dinky wee aeroplane. There should be more of that kind of modesty in government right around the world. That fact that we've got it already is something - like Eastwoodhill - we should cherish and never lightly relinquish.
