COMMENT
A year or two ago, I visited Pompeii. It is a small Roman town halfway around the Bay of Naples. It was buried when Mt Vesuvius erupted in AD79. The town was "rediscovered" in 1748, and then excavations began. They have continued ever since. People from all over the world are drawn to the site to get a glimpse of life 2000 years ago.
Tourists get to see the houses that ordinary people lived in, the mosaics that decorated their bathroom floors, the frescoes that adorned the walls of their bedrooms. They see a small arena where gladiators fought to the death, temples to the myriad Roman gods, even the pornographic pictures that presumably added to the zest of contemporary life for those rich enough to afford such graphic extravagances.
The stone fields are relics of a time before there was an Auckland. In their vague sketched-out form they remind us of where we came from and what we have become.
All these things are accessible in hundreds of other Italian towns but here in Pompeii they have the poignant mystique that comes from their rapid and total demise. They were not destroyed by conquest or economic factors, but rather through a dramatic geological event. Pompeii today (the one outside the gates), is an unremarkable satellite town which, along with Herculaneum, is part of the ugly conurbation of modern Naples. Close by are the tourist magnets of Sorrento and Capri, but the greater the Neapolitan area these days is mainly famous for street crime and the home-grown Mafia known as the Commora.