We’ve had four very different experiences in the last week which could all be called “Inside Out”- very fitting for spring weather, this time of challenge, change and new growth: • Gurmon Sup (“Dark Forest”, an installation at Te Uru Gallery by an Auckland-based Korean artist and tomato grower) • New Voices (readings […]
Inside and Outside the “Dark Forest”
September 19, 2016 by Leave a Comment
Gurmon Sup (translated into English as “Dark Forest“) was an extraordinary installation at Te Uru Gallery in Titrangi by Jae Kang, an Auckland-based Korean artist and passionate tomato grower. She used recycled irrigation materials to create sinuous snakes and coils, piles of black polyethylene tubes, pipes and fixings invading rooms, hanging down the handsome golden spiral staircase […]
New Voices
September 19, 2016 by 2 Comments
All four sessions we went to at the exciting annual Going West (Books + Writers Festival) in the Titirangi Hall last Sunday morning were stimulating. Barbara Brookes talked about the writing of her recently published A History of New Zealand Women, a wonderfully inclusive and thoughtful work, turning many common ideas about our nation’s story (especially regarding women’s […]
Tonga’s history – treasured or trashed?
July 26, 2016 by Leave a Comment
Within an hour of our arrival in Tonga we had learnt a little about Tongan government failure to protect an area of heritage and environmental sensitivity from housing development. The Tonga Heritage Society is a diverse group of Tongans and others – residents, expatriates, academics, business people -which was established to protect this area at Popua. […]
Autumn at Earthsong
May 18, 2016 by Leave a Comment
Manabu has helped Tanya harvest the kumara – a good crop to be shared around the community – and has planted the onions for their six-month growing season. Garlic goes in next month, of course, on the shortest day or thereabouts. We are also gathering copious quantities of persimmons, tamarillos, apples, guavas and feijoas, and the […]
The 1980s – the forgotten decade that changed NZ forever
May 18, 2016 by Leave a Comment
On Tuesday 17 May, Charmaine spoke at one of Ika’s Salon evenings… Laila Harre, the owner of Ika Bar and Grill, asked Charmaine to describe some of the huge changes in Auckland and Aotearoa in the 1980s, their effect on her personally and politically, and on the students and staff of Auckland Girls’ Grammar School […]
Whakapirau Bay
April 19, 2016 by Leave a Comment
A lovely water’s edge house filled with colourful art works in flax, mosaic and paint, looking across an inlet to Pahi, on the north-eastern Kaipara Harbour…a very restful place to take a break. We read books on the fascinating local history – including Dick Scott’s Seven Lives on Salt River, about early Maori occupation and […]
Who Owns Our Water?
April 19, 2016 by 3 Comments
When I saw this heading in huge capitals on a one-page article in the NZ Herald… SHOULD ONE RACE CONTROL NEW ZEALAND’S FRESH WATER? my first thought was “could this be an article about how Pakeha colonists have taken over the country’s natural water sources and used, abused, bought, sold, polluted , drained and destroyed so many, […]
Earthsong Eco Neighbourhood
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