There is art in smokey chimneys, I decided one frosty, cold and bleak Central Otago evening. The black night sky was filling fast with a wave of moving grey particles in the middle of Alexandra. It was intriguing and worth a photo. To think that inside some of those homes, people were desperately shovelling coal and firewood onto their fires to keep warm - never mind what's coming out the other end, escaping into the atmosphere. I know a man who relies on oxygen to keep him alive. Every time he goes outside into the smoggy air it takes him 10 minutes for his body to stop heaving from the load in his chest.
But he also relies on his wood burner - which barely
heats his lounge, where he now sleeps in winter. The chimney is choked up and so is he. There are no winners in winter.