Fishing and More in New Zealand
by Barry Geller
March 6 to March 15
New Zealanders are known as the Kiwi country because the unusual, nocturnal, wingless Kiwi is the national bird. Learning the culture and traditions of New Zealand was one reason we came, but the main reason for our trip was to compete in the 2024 Fishing World Cup tournament, occurring once every four years. The tournament, founded by Father and Mother Moon, was a great success. 15 teams from many parts of the world joined. There were 71 participants. Participants came from as far as Finland, Uruguay, USA, Korea, Japan, Fiji, Philippines, Australia, New Zealand, Taiwan, Estonia, Scotland, Kazakhstan, Brazil and the Cook Islands.
The contest winners were determined by the kilogram weight of fish caught by individuals and teams. Uruguay won the team competition, and a New Zealander won the individual prize of $10,000.00 dollars. The contest lasted for two days. We fished in the beautiful waters off the coast of Auckland. In total, over a ton of fish were caught, mostly Snappers.
Above are the tournament organizers and the three prize winners.
Too bad we couldn’t count this 75-pound brown shark as part of our weight for the contest. I wrestled with this fish for 10 minutes.
Beautiful Auckland skyline at 5:30 AM.
Our young team members included Peter Abutin, Yoshio Ishikawa, Tyrone Clark and Eric Faucher.
Our elders included Hiro Matsuura, Tsugio Kumagai, Barry Geller and Hisashi Horibe.
After the tournament and a one-day conference about the ocean and how to care for it, we travelled to the south of the north island of NZ.
We visited a center for the Mauri people, the indigenous tribe of NZ. They served us a delicious organic meal, sang and taught us some of their traditions. Among the stops we made along our tour were the Glo-worm caves, a Kiwi sanctuary, Hobbiton (from Lord of the Rings) and several other points of interest. Upon our return, we went to the top of the Sky-tower in Auckland. We are grateful to True Parents for this great ocean tradition and to the tournament organizers and staff. We look forward to the next tournament in 2028.
