‘Lonely Planet’, a popular tourist guide book, put Christchurch at number six in their list of the top 10 cities in the world for 2013. Number one is San Francisco. No other New Zealand city was on the list.
Christchurch has had many big and small earthquakes in the last two years. Most of the central city is still closed while more than 1,000 buildings are demolished. However, this weekend the Re-Start centre celebrated one year of successful business. This is the street of 30 shops inside shipping containers. They are colourful with attractive gardens and seating around them.
Cafés, restaurants and pubs have opened in other parts of the city, some in shipping containers and one in an old bus. Large tents in parks are used for music, theatre, comedy shows and other events.
Gap Fillers are filling empty spaces where buildings have gone. Gap Fillers is a group of volunteers who think of exciting ways to fill these gaps. Sometimes it is a garden, a stage, some seats or a piano painted in different coloured squares. For a short time, they showed movies outdoors, with cyclists pedalling to make the electricity.
While the demolition of so many buildings is terrible, many exciting things are happening in Christchurch.
Vocabulary
• demolish (v), demolition (n) – pull down a building
• gap – empty space
• volunteer – someone who helps without getting paid
• pedalling – riding a bike which is not moving, turning the pedals with their feet