Plenty 14

Plenty culture :: media :: art :: food ahurea ao pāpāho toi kai

It’s Plenty 14 and we talk to the animals with Annis Parker, we spell Jenny Michie’s name right, we meet a man who makes murals and a woman who weaves, things get spicy on the food pages, and like it says below we’re into the galaxy with Leighton Fairlie.

FR E E M A GA Z IN E

ISSUE 14 plenty.co.nz

14

IN THIS ISSUE

FEBRUARY

TWENTY NINETEEN

Contents designed by the very talented www.ShevoneWillis.com

Plenty brings you the very best of the Bay. Kei a Plenty ngÄ tino o te rohe.

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The funny thing is...

Cartoonist Mig McMillan on the lighter side of life.

10

28

44

35

48

20

38

51

24

40

54

Flawless

Tāne Lawless on making murals and saving our birds.

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Dream Weaver Ataraiti Waretini on weaving, royals and keeping it real.

Calling it Home Architect Jenny Duck on our changing home sweet homes.

Leighton Fairlie Bay musician Leighton Fairlie talks Brazil and his new EP.

Shaping a life in New Zealand The Ōhiwa artist talks creativity with the Winsley Twins.

Te Hokinga mai The Return Home Monika Higgins puts Murupara history on the page.

The Best in Show Celebrating art in the Bay: the Molly Morpeth Canaday Award.

The Spice of Life There’s so much more to life than butter chicken.

Speaking with Mrs Parker.

Energy, healing and working with really, really big cats.

Fish and chips and hindsight Jennie Michie goes in search of crispy, salty goodness.

Cheers 12,000 beer cans.

In a shed.

Enough said really.

Flight Pioneer aviator and Go Girl well before her time.

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FEBRUARY TWENTY NINETEEN

They started a magazine

– you won’t believe what happened next!

Sound familiar? Yup, we’ve all seen those pesky click bait stories at the bottom of our news feed, and in moments of weakness some of us have clicked through only to realise that we wish we hadn’t. But fear not dear reader: this time you’ve clicked, or um, picked up and read, the right thing.

Because we’re three years into the Plenty journey and welcome to our fourteenth issue.

Yes, we know that fourteen doesn’t really go into three, but then an awful lot of things in Plenty land don’t compute. Cajoling some of the best writers, designers, photographers and cocktail waiters in the Bay into making the glorious piece of sugar free eye candy you hold in your hand and then giving it away for free doesn’t make sense - just ask our accountant (and tell him we said hi). Similarly, calling on friends, neighbours, old flames and trusted strangers to distribute our labour of love from Waihi Beach to Ōpōtiki, from Whakatāne to Taupō, and Rotorua to Mount Maunganui wouldn’t have passed muster on the Apprentice – you’re fired! – though it does work for us.

But some of what we do does make sense.

Perfect sense. Because in a world of click bait and fake news, where shady foreign funding affects elections and sandals are worn with knee-length socks in public, we think there is a place for Plenty. A place where you can read about the incredible creatives and freestylers that walk amongst us here in the Bay but fly

under the radar (you know what we mean).

A place where people like Jennie Michie and Wonder Dog Remus can run wild and free with a story brief. A place where articles don’t just read good, they look good too. A place where a beer can collection rubs shoulders with The Winsley Twins latest interrogation of an artist. A place where people who are passionate about what they are doing make a magazine about other people who are passionate about what they’re doing.

But – and we are not making this up – you really won’t believe what happened next. No, we haven’t launched a cryto currency, we’re having an exhibition. Yes, to celebrate three years of on-going madness we’re taking loads of the people who live in the place that is Plenty and letting them loose in an actual museum. What could go wrong, what could possibly go wrong. . .

So stay tuned for the gory details of The Plenty Story: We’re Gonna Need a Bigger Couch. You can get a sneak peak over on pages 04 and 05. And in the meantime enjoy 14.

Plenty Magazine is published by Plenty Limited. Copyright 2019 by Plenty Limited. All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced by any means without the prior consent of the publisher. Plenty accepts no responsibility for the return or usage of unsolicited manuscripts or artwork. Opinions expressed in Plenty Magazine do not necessarily reflect the views of Plenty Limited.

Plenty culture :: media :: art :: food ahurea ao pāpāho toi kai

Plenty

It’s Plenty 14 and we talk to the animals with culture :: media Annis Parker, we spell::Jenny name art Michie’s :: food ahurea pāpāho right, weao meet a man who toi makes murals kai and a woman who weaves, things get spicy on the food pages, and like it says below we’re into the galaxy with Leighton Fairlie.

F R EE M A G A ZI N E

It’s Plenty 14 and we talk to the animals with Annis Parker, we spell Jenny Michie’s name right, we meet a man who makes and a woman murals who weaves, things get spicy on the food pages, and like it says below we’re into the galaxy with Leighton Fairlie.

FREE MAGAZIN E

ISSUE 14 plenty.co.nz

ISSUE 14 plenty.co.nz

ANDY TAYLOR Editor/Kaiwhakatika Tuhinga SARAH LANE Designer/Kaiwhakatauira

Cover design by the talented Diego Oliveira behance.com/diegomunk

RAYMOND HINTON Sales/Advertising

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Informative, inspiring and absorbent.

Tired of fake news, endless advertorial, and click bait?

Want some relaxing you-time and to escape that endless rabbit hole of screen time?

Still undecided about whether you can pull off double denim?

We can’t help you with the last one, but boy oh boy or girl oh girl can we put you on the road to redemption for the forgotten art of great reading. Leave us wellthumbed and fashionably dishevelled on your coffee table. Keep a copy on your desk for when you need to tune out of the office. Or stash a back issue by the bathtub for when you can’t be bothered with the book club recommendation.

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Off the pages,

Onto the walls.

Plenty Magazine is exhibiting the Bay’s finest.

Exhibition July 2019

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If you like us in print and online, wait till you see Plenty in 3D! We’re bringing the best of the last three years to Whakatāne’s Te Kōputu with a multimedia extravaganza that will be a sight to behold, so watch this space.

plenty.co.nz

P L E N T Y. C O . N Z // F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 9

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Black pen, white paper, a dash of cynicism and a good dollop of humour.

It’s a simple list of ingredients, but the method has been years in the making. Mig McMillan is an artist who has the innate ability to cut through the fluff and see the lighter side of life. The way she lives is replicated in her art, and Mig is here to show us that there is power in simplicity.

INTERVIEW BY ALEXANDRA PICKLES

The funny thing is...

I’m not sure if it’s simply the name, ‘Mig’, or the fact that she’s found humour in quadratic equations? But I like her. Whether it’s her ability to self-deprecate, or just see the lighter side of life, she’s got a handle on things that, for many of us, are out of grasp. Mig McMillan spoke to me from a camping spot in Northland that surprisingly had cell reception, but little else to link it to 2019. I ask her to tell me a little bit about herself, and she tells me she has four children ranging from 10 to 19 years old. The psychoanalyst in me finds it interesting that she tells me about her children instead of herself, but the mother in me just sighs and thinks, “Yep, well that’s how it goes.” Mig has just moved back to Tauranga after a couple of years in Auckland, but had previously been in Tauranga for about 10 years. Before that, she lived in Te Kuiti, and the shift from the small town to the bustling metropolis that is Tauranga has been the largest source of inspiration for her satirical take on modern mumming through her tongue-in-cheek cartoons.

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Raised rurally in Dairy Flat north of Auckland, and having lived in every corner of the North Island courtesy of her husband’s rural banking background, she’s a unique blend of past and present, and notes that she’s a city slicker through-and-through, and she’ll happily live rurally, “so long as it’s in the middle of a city.” She notes that the Four Square on the corner is her pantry and she loves to have the letterbox chats and the freedom of intermittent conversation with passers-by. “If this is a rat race, then I’m a rat,” Mig proclaims.

I had the good fortune of having sniggered at a few of her greeting cards in a local gift store some time ago, unbeknownst to me of course that I would one day be interviewing her, and I’m intrigued to know how she got into this. “Well, I took art at teachers’ college, and I think everyone in my family thought it was hilarious and thought, ‘Why is she taking art?’ because they thought I’d be totally shit at it… and I was,” she recalls. “Well, initially. But it didn’t stick and I was fortunate as I’d had good exposure to art. My uncle owned an art gallery in Auckland and they would have a new exhibition every fortnight, which is just unheard of in today’s world, but it was a very successful gallery and I got acquainted with some great New Zealand contemporary art,” Mig muses. “But I guess having four kids, and having lived in so many different places, it does give you a good perspective on things. I do other sorts of art, but my cartoons are just a take on the ridiculousness of life,” she chuckles (in a way that makes you think she’s seen at least three highly-ridiculous moments in the last 24 hours – like the person I saw in a convertible using their window washer and getting sprayed in the face). I try to pull myself back from how I would depict that in cartoon format and realise that I’m talking to the Mr Miyagi (or Mrs, as it were) of seeing the lighter side of life. She has a diary that she’s kept for about three years now, and it’s in cartoon format. It largely features her family, and is therefore not for a wider audience, but oh how I’d love to see it.

I asked how she went from doodles and musings, to having a card series that’s available for purchase, and it’s a fairly organic tale. “Someone said, ‘Hey, why don’t you try making cards for people,’ and so I did.” But it was an Uncle who inspired the first card to be drawn up. He had cancer. And her card was along the lines of a goldfish saying, “Carpe diem”, and on the next page, a cat saying, “F#ck that”. And of all the lovely, fluffy, flowery cards he received, he said that was the only one he displayed and he kept. “And I’ve done them since, and people can come to me and ask if I can make a personalised card, which I enjoy doing.” We reflect on the silliness of the ‘Hallmark’ messaging and the challenge of finding a decent card for a challenging situation and Mig says, “You know, all you really need is for someone to say, ‘It’s shit. And I love you.” I think she’s right. I continue to like her.

“My cartoons are just a take on the ridiculousness of life” I ask Mig if she thinks it’s her honesty that people are drawn to. “It might be?” She says with an inflection. “I have a cartoon that I’m trying to remember and it’s something like, ‘Her handbag was a thing of beauty, but it did little to help the situation in Afghanistan’, so, you know.” I lol’d. She continues by telling me that she’s the absolute opposite of a domestic goddess and Annabel Langbein gives her the biggest pain in the arse. “Because everything always goes wrong and looks like shit, and it’s really not that important, you know? You actually can eat a bread roll and apple for lunch, and you don’t need to have matching cutlery,” Mig points out. “My real thing is that you miss a lot by not laughing at yourself, and if you’re trying to be perfect, then you must be quite an anxious person, and that’s quite sad, really.” At this point the call cuts out, I redial and we reconnect. “Sorry,” says Mig. “That might have been my chin.” To which I respond, “That’s ok, I have a few of my own.” We’ve bonded.

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We share a few reflections on raising teenagers, which leads to her sharing a bit more about her diary which features her family, each with their own character. Her own avatar has long hair and wears dresses (because they’re easy to draw) and her son is indelibly depicted as only ever wearing a basketball singlet (because that’s how he started, so that’s how he is) despite neither of them ever appearing that way.

These cartoons, whilst hilarious and cheeky, have a message.

“If things are too easy, there’s something missing.”

I ask Mig how she describes herself. A satirical artist?

An illustrator, perhaps? To which she responds, “I just say ‘I do cartoons’.” Fair enough. Call a spade a spade. I ask if she’s trying to ‘put herself out there’ and incite uptake. “I’m a bit shit at computers,” she says. “I did one of those free courses through the Council, but I was so crap at it, that I had to go back and do the course for people with special needs.” I’m not sure if I’m allowed to laugh at this, but her frankness is refreshing. She tells me her mother (who owns her own business) suggested that she should at least be able to use Excel, and it should be taught in schools, to which Mig responded that ‘the oboe should be taught in schools,’ to which her mother said, ‘You’re stupid’, to which Mig responded with, ‘Well, you’re stupid’. So that was a productive conversation. At least, for me, it suggests that Mig’s ability to be honest and ‘not too precious’ perhaps owes some credit to her mother? She confirms this observation when she tells me she’s just been living with her mother for a time, and says, “If you don’t have to live with your mother; don’t.” Which is supported by a story along the lines of folding washing and holding up knickers ‘that could be the sail on the Endeavour’ and saying. “Whose are these?!” But Mig notes that this experience was also great fodder for cartoons.

Another source of inspiration comes from Mig’s addiction to listening to Radio New Zealand (which she calls the ‘National programme’, so I know she’s a legit long-time fan) and she’ll be listening to something which sparks a need to draw a cartoon, and occasionally share with them, I’m assuming, on their social media pages, but from all accounts, she may actually still be rocking a fax machine. She mentions she’d been working full-time and I’m wondering how cartoonism is paying these days, but then I realise she’s referring to her actual job as a primary school teacher.

“They were so desperate for primary teachers in Auckland, that they actually employed me!” Mig exclaims. I know she’s selfdeprecating again and I reckon she’d be a kick-ass teacher. It was an interesting time for Mig, who had been a full-time Mum for so long that going back to work meant they were so rich, she could “afford to go and buy a cup of coffee and the kids got more than half a donut and a glass of water. But…” Mig says, “We’re back to being poor now, because we’re back in Tauranga and all the teachers from Auckland have emigrated to Tauranga and they know how to use a computer, so I’ll probably never get a job.”

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“We reflect on the silliness of the ‘Hallmark’ messaging and the challenge of finding a decent card for a challenging situation,

“You know, all you really

need is for someone to

say, ‘It’s shit. And I love you.”

We talk about play-based learning and the state of the education system, and we’re led to Mig’s impetus for sustainable living. I ask if she describes herself as a ‘greenie’ and then find out that they’re potentially one of New Zealand’s greenest families and this article could well have been solely on how they only walk and cycle to where they’re going, and how Mig used to write an environmental column in the Weekend Sun, or how they were on TV for being green and they won the ‘Sustainable family of the year’ award and are very “anti-plastic”.

So, what were Mig’s final thoughts before she resumed her camping holiday in remote Northland? “I think being not-rich is good for you,” she proclaims. “We pretended to be rich for five minutes, when we went and stayed at a resort, and it’s just so easy. You use your credit card to buy lunch instead of making yourself a marmite sandwich.” And from this I surmise that these cartoons, whilst hilarious and cheeky, have a message. “If things are too easy, there’s something missing.” Well said, Mig.

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FLAWLESS (ADJECTIVE) 1. HAVING NO DEFECTS OR FAULTS, ESPECIALLY NONE THAT DIMINISH THE VALUE OF SOMETHING; 2. HAVING NO DISCERNIBLE BLEMISHES OR SHORTCOMINGS

After yarning with a few mates over a cold one or three, it seems we all wanted one of what we coined the ‘Big Three’ skills. We either wanted to be able to run fast, sing great or be able to draw stuff real good. Clearly this wasn’t a particularly noble or scientific survey of aspirational abilities – we left our neurosurgery and environmental research – but we did try and keep it vaguely grounded in reality – so invisibility and x-ray vision were deemed inapplicable early on.

There are quite a few among us that can put on a turn of speed when the need arises, and we’re all Stan Walker around the house, but drawing – well, it’s hard to fake that one. Especially when you are doing it as a mural, on the side of a three-metre wall. But as far as that side of things goes, Taupō’s Tāne Lawless has it well and truly covered.

Founder of the Flawless Clothing Company and design firm Poutama Prints as well as being an acclaimed mural artist, the man is flawless by name and flawless by nature. “I grew up in Taupō and when I was younger I developed a love of the New York bombing (graffiti) scene,” he says. “I’d always loved painting since primary school, and I spent a lot of my younger years mucking around with ideas, working on my own stuff, just putting heaps of designs on to paper.”

This New York art influence is just one elements of Tāne’s artwork, with intricate Māori design intertwined with his own kiwi flavour, all of which relates back to his passion for conservation and in particular the monitoring of the karearea, or New Zealand falcon.

The infinitely intelligent among you will recall back in Plenty 12 that we covered some great work being done by the team at Wingspan in Rotorua; this charitable trust has been going for decades, helping to care for our native birds of prey, some of which are actually more in danger of extinction than the venerable kiwi.

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“The karearea can lay their eggs on the ground, so once I hear about eggs it’s a rush to get there to keep them away from predators and give them the very best chance of survival.”

WORDS MATT MORTIMER IMAGES SUPPLIED

Tāne has some similar responsibilities in the Taupō district, watching out for the falcon here for the Wingspan crew and also working to raise awareness of its plight.

“I try to live off the land as much as possible: living the traditional way, eating wild meat and wild plants, breathing that fresh air and freeing the mind of the concrete jungles we live in these days. And knowing where our food comes from and choosing what to take is important. There’s a lot of restrictions in life, and living off the lands is our only freedom, and great for our kids.

“I try to live off the land as much as possible: living the traditional way, eating wild meat and wild plants, breathing that fresh air and freeing the mind of the concrete jungles we live in these days.

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It’s one of few traditional things we have left where we can connect with nature. So I’m a hunter, and the karearea is a hunter too – so in some ways it’s about just helping out a mate, a fellow hunter.”

“It’s pleasing to know that awareness of these birds is increasing – I’m getting forestry managers calling me with sightings and new nests on their sites. The karearea can lay their eggs on the ground, so once I hear about eggs it’s a

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rush to get there to keep them away from predators and give them the very best chance of survival. There’s so much to do in being responsible for our environment, and these birds are one part of that bigger picture. All animals – including us – take from our environment, and I’m about keeping a balance, and respecting our part within that kaitiaki or guardianship of the land, not just in our rohe, but throughout the whole country.”

ROHE (NOUN) TO DESCRIBE A TERRITORY OR BOUNDARIES OF IWI (TRIBES), ALTHOUGH SOME ROHE ARE DIVIDED INTO SEVERAL TAKIWĀ.

Growing up in Taupō, Tāne has honed

and developed the skills of kaitiaki as well as working on his obvious gifts in regard to art. While it’s easy for a lot of us to dream about what we’d like to do and where we’d like to be, Tāne is a shining light for someone just going after it. He gained some national recognition with a mural of All Black legend Richie McCaw that he created for the 2015 Graffiato festival in Taupō, but he still has his day job as a full time mechanic.

That makes it all the more remarkable that he finds time to persue his passion on such a scale outside of office hours.

“I first got involved in Graffiato in 2012 because it was a local event in Taupō. It wasn’t easy juggling a full time job with being an artist, doing murals, designing and my screenprinting business, as well as having the Flawless Clothing Company in the background.

When you get into it, it flows well, but yeah it means being very busy, and my main priority always comes first, making the best times with my family.”

Tāne co-sponsors events in Taupō like Jedi J@m freestyle BMX gig, as well as having a branding deal with a Rotorua based stock-car with the Flawless brand, so don’t be surprised if you see his name around. We’ve got a feeling we’ll be hearing a lot more of Tāne Lawless.

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DREAM

WEAVER

From creating a traditional Māori pākē (rain cape) in London via internet instructions from her mother, to meeting royalty and starting her own business, Ataraiti Waretini has come a long way from her Bay of Plenty home. But as Plenty finds out she remains true to her roots.

INTERVIEW & PHOTOGRAPHY SARAH LANE WORDS JENNIE MICHIE IMAGES SUPPLIED

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PLENTY Tell us your origin story, how did you get here?

AW I was born and raised in Rotorua, my parents both worked at the then Māori and Arts Craft Institute and I went to Te Kura o Te Whakarewarewa where I learnt Te Reo Māori, so it was total immersion up to intermediate school. Later we moved to Auckland and thanks to my mum it was understood that I would go to university so I studied television at AUT. My first job out of uni was Marae DIY at Screentime and then I worked on a lot of programmes, for a different company called Kura Productions.

One of those was Tōku Reo, teaching Te Reo Māori using Professor John Moorfield’s Te Kākano books. We did a lot for Māori broadcasting and my last job here before I moved back over to London was Māui’s Hook which is the docudrama trying to get away from the taboo of not talking about suicide within whānau.

PLENTY What took you to London?

AW Ever since I was a child I have always wanted to travel and to work in TV. So I just gunned for the goal; education and get the degree. I moved to London when I was 24 and now I’m 31. And I still work in television.

PLENTY I’ve heard about the cloak you created

by getting tutored by your mum on Facebook.

AW My friend Joylene Fenikowski was turning 50 and she looked after me when I moved to London, which I’ve done twice, and when I went back the second time I stayed with her for four months and she never made me feel unwelcome. I thought I’ve got to do something really amazing for you because she’s the type of person who looks after everyone. She would give you the shirt off her back and she doesn’t have much herself.

“It’s really special to be able to represent your culture, because it’s not just your culture anymore, it’s the whole country.”

My mum, Maria Waretini, is a weaver so I said to her, “I would really like to do this for my friend, can you help me?” and she said, “No!” Because it’s a lot work, not just for me to put in, but it’s a lot of work for her to teach me.

I was in London and she was here in New Zealand and the only way we could do it was over social media, but she finally caved in and agreed. We did a karakia (prayer) first and she took me through all the values that are outside of the actual raranga (weaving), and she said, “If you are feeling bad don’t touch it because you don’t want to put that energy into it”.

PLENTY Where did you find the harakeke (flax) in London?

AW My friend had a massive flax bush in his backyard that he cared for a lot; wrapped it up in winter to make sure it was warm and all that.

I said I was going to come and get it and he’s like OK, as long as you are going to use it. I was there a couple of times cutting it out and I had to take it home in a taxi! When you have a really good purpose, a really good teacher, and a really good source, when it all lines up like that, then I think it’s just meant to happen.

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PLENTY Making the pākē AW Mum drew everything that I had to do even down to the clothes

PLENTY Do you make the

pieces specific to the person?

I had to wear. She drew the harakeke, how to cut it, what to look out

AW Yeah. I love the process of thinking about

for and then how to get out the muka, which are the fibers inside the

the person; what they are like and even if I don’t

flax. She said to boil it and then hang it up in your shed. Because we

know them I find out a little bit about them and

don’t have sheds in London I had to find another way to dry the flax.

then try to replicate that story in raranga art form.

I was so lucky it was summer. After I boiled it I had to hang it out my

It’s like tā moko, it has got so much skill in it just

window. It looked so cool but it smelt so bad and I’ve got flatmates!

like a raranga. I love to tell a story with my hands

So I kept the window open at night and then during the day made

but it takes so long, and to be able to do justice to

sure it was aired out. But once it was dry it was fine and easy to

that person with that story in the shape and form

work with, not that mahi raranga is easy, not at all, it’s the weave -

that we can with raranga. So I think about the

the putting it together, that’s the easiest part but even so, I’m working

person, I draw the design, then I do it up on my

full time at the same time. I’m going to work, finishing about 6-7pm, if

laptop, because tāniko is all about maths – you

it’s a shoot day it’s longer, then I come straight home and I’m straight

have to be good at numbers and I am not!

into it. Some nights I stay up till 3am and then get up in the morning and then go out and do it again. All in all it took four months.

PLENTY What are you currently working on project-wise?

AW I have just started my business Maru Creations and I’ve got a couple of orders to make some pākē (rain capes). I really love colour and there are some fabrics that bring out bright colours so I use those fabrics to make pākē and necklaces. I’ve just gifted one to the American rapper Cardi B!

PLENTY Thank goodness

for computers and technology.

AW It’s a lot of counting! And then I weave up the piece and make sure that the finish is really good and I get mum to check the finish just for quality control! So even then it’s a whānau thing, it never stops being about your whānau. I do karakia and make sure everything is protected throughout the whole process, at the beginning and the end and during weaving of every piece.

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PLENTY Weaving seems to be experiencing

a renaissance at the moment.

AW The whole of Te Reo Māori is post renaissance. Tā moko is becoming “normal” and more and more women are less afraid to have moko kauae (female chin tattoos) on their face.

You hear Te Reo a lot more now even on the News. I think it’s all moving together and weaving is going with it as well. I follow many beautiful weavers on Instagram, and they’re all trying to figure out different ways of working and keeping it traditional at the same time.

PLENTY Do you think we are in an age where the acceptance and the use of weaving seems very natural?

AW In the supermarkets they are getting rid of plastic bags, so it’s normal to see small kete to put your food into. It’s a beautiful art form and because of the cultural significance it’s more than art to me.

If you put on a tattoo that’s for life and if you weave

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www.whiteisland.co.nz

something for someone, that’s part of your life too because you put so much energy into it.

PLENTY Can you tell us a little bit

about the London Māori Club?

AW Ngāti Rānana London is the London Māori Club and they were established in 1958. They were a group of Māori who all got together at someone’s house initially and had kapa haka practice once a week and their Pākehā mates wanted to learn it too, so it’s a very inclusive group. Now 60 years on it’s held at NZ House, which is the NZ Embassy over in London. When I first joined I had been working in a pub in London for about a month and was feeling a bit homesick. You know when you just don’t click because the people around you don’t understand you like when you go ‘you are such an egg’ to someone. But as soon as I got into the London Māori Club it was like an instant family.

It’s such a beautiful place to be able to practice your culture because everyone is so accepting and inclusive. I was privileged to be given so many different opportunities that not even British people get; I have performed for royalty, I performed the haka with Jonah Lomu just before he passed away which was quite special. When Joseph Parker was there I did the karanga for him at his final weigh-in.

“(Raranga) is a beautiful art form and because of the cultural significance it’s more than art to me.”

Recently one of the most special things I have been able to do is help with the opening of the Oceana Exhibition at the Royal Academy of Arts, which holds a lot of all our taonga. Because I am Māori, because I’ve got a bit of the knowledge, not a lot because I am still young, but I’ve got some knowledge to be able to help that group welcome the people and open it up as it should and do justice to it as much as we can. So that was cool, and I got to meet Meghan again!

PLENTY So Harry and Meghan and who else have you met?

AW I did the karanga at Westminster Abbey for the Commonwealth celebrations last year and that was with the Queen, Charles, Duchess Camilla, the Duke, William and Kate, Harry and Meghan as well. I didn’t go to the performance afterwards but my friends did, and they said that Charles asked them “Who was that woman who filled the abbey with her voice?”

I was so touched. It’s so nice when someone else says that about you. It’s really special to be able to represent your culture, because it’s not just your culture anymore, it’s the whole country.

PLENTY Sheesh you are so fancy AW Not even fancy. Just really, really grateful, really lucky.

You have to give back as much as you receive!

Top: Earrings for Jeanine Clarkin’s runway show at London Pacific Fashion Show.

Centre: A hongi with Prince Harry at the 2017 Hyde Park ANZAC Dawn Service (photo Peter Livingstone).

Bottom: Flax make drying in Waretini’s London flat.

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Join us this events season Whakatāne is fast becoming the Bay of Plenty’s latest major events destination.

WHAKATĀNE VISITOR CENTRE Corner of Quay Street and Kakahoroa Drive, Whakatāne P. 0800 942 528 E. whakataneinfo@whakatane.govt.nz

Our feature events celebrate the sunshine and diverse spectacular trails and coastlines of the Whakatāne District, which is blessed with an abundance of wild food and artisan food producers. Whether you're after a sporting challenge or foodie heaven, there's something for everyone.

What’s on in Whakatāne 28 January - 30 March

Summer Arts Festival

21 February – 3 March

Air Chatham’s Sunshine and a Plate 9 & 10 March

Ōhope Twin Waters Golf Tournament 9 & 10 March

Port Ōhope SUP Festival 23 & 24 March

Oxfam Trailwalker 6 April

Sun to Surf Half Marathon, 10km and 5km Fun Run 13 April

Robinson Law Monty’s Revenge For more information visit whakatane.com/events

whakatane.com

whakatane.nz

Ho g n i l l Ca it

Home

WORDS AND PHOTOGRAPHY ANDY TAYLOR IMAGES SUPPLIED

Jenny Duck’s life has been full of challenges. From giving three brothers a run for their money in backyard sports to competing on the world stage playing hockey for New Zealand at the Olympics, Jenny has always pushed herself to achieve at the highest level. Now a resident of the Bay, Jenny recently found a new challenge in setting up the Tauranga branch of Herriot Melhuish O’Neill Architects (HMOA), an award-winning architecture practice that also has studios in Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch. Plenty caught up with Jenny to see how our home sweet home is changing.

Switching from top level hockey to architecture might seem like a bit of a leap, but it makes perfect sense for Jenny Duck. “I’ve always been driven,” she says over coffee in a very un-architecturally designed café as Tauranga bakes in the sun outside. “I never really sit down and say, ‘This year Her sporting life as a New Zealand representative took Jenny I’m going to achieve this far and wide, from Australia to Zimbabwe and lots of places in and this,’ but I like to have between. The challenges in her new field are equally exciting. outcomes to work towards.

In sport, that was all about New Zealand is facing a serious housing crisis and Tauranga is improving skills and fitness, now one of the most expensive cities in the world to buy a home. and focussing on the “It’s time to think differently next round or match. I’d and smarter,” says Jenny, always been interested in “The traditional model of architecture, in the spaces building cookie-cutter boxes we live and work in, and is unsustainable, we need once I felt I’d finished with to rethink the spaces we the challenges of sport, spend our lives in. We are I knew I’d enjoy where moving away from the kinds architecture might take me.” of homes and work spaces that suited our parents and grandparents, and looking for something fresh, something that suits our changing lives at home and work.”

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om Well-designed homes and work spaces are more efficient and sustainable than our traditional models.

It is an exciting time.

Architecturally-speaking, our priorities are changing in what we want from our homes and offices.

“Kiwis have travelled more and experienced more; we’ve seen what it’s like to live and work in smaller, well-designed spaces.

Apartment-living, for example, has its own benefits and allows certain freedoms,” says Jenny.

“Working with an architect is a staged and collaborative process. People should realise it’s not like The Block, it’s not a competition that has to be rushed through before the ad break. It’s about creating architecture that will enhance lives.

The traditional model of building cookie-cutter boxes is unsustainable

We need to rethink the spaces we spend our lives in

Raumati Beach House KAPITI COAST

Photo: Paul McCredie

A deceptively simple form discreetly folded between neighbouring properties, this beach house demonstrates that modestly-sized homes can still be made of luxuriously large spaces. With rooms that are large but few, open but enjoying complete privacy, this house includes all of the bach necessities: open living spaces, an outdoor shower, and direct beach access. Thoughtful design has ensured that this is not just a summer house; in winter it becomes a cosy vantage point to watch as storms approach while the open fire blazes.

“A carefully judged amalgam of the New Zealand bach and the modern pavilion, this opens generously towards the water yet neither dominates nor claims the beach edge…” NZIA Awards Jury.

Awards: NZIA Local Award.

Architecture is about solving problems, whether it’s budget, planning rules or the specifics of the site. It’s all about understanding and working with the client who is going to be living or working there.”

Jenny explains that there are so many factors involved and other professionals who form part of the team, “Unfortunately, we’ve lost a lot of the craft in building; the good old carpenters who did everything from the floor to the timber windows”.

Factors like site, views and how a client wants to live need to be carefully considered. A well-designed home is not about resale or following current trends.

Photos: Andy Spain

Peka Peka House II KAPITI COAST

Nestled in behind the sand dunes and bounded by a forest of ancient kanuka trees, this Kapiti Coast beach house favours privacy and shelter over sea views. Our brief was to provide the best of indoor and outdoor living, hence the decision to position the house opening out onto a sheltered internal courtyard protected from the prevailing coastal winds. Clad in two contrasting cedar weatherboard profiles, the main house sits on one side of a glade of native trees, while a separate sleep-out provides protection and privacy from neighbours.

“The beautifully consistent and controlled detailing completes what is a very pleasant picture.” NZIA Awards Jury.

Awards: NZIA Local Award.

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Ho It s time to think

differently and

smarter

“Colour and materials can really make a home work, but more often it comes down to the quality of the design. We’ve all been in spaces that just fill you with joy, and that is what we should be looking for in our homes, not ‘statement’ kitchen splashbacks and master en-suites”.

Havelock North Townhouse HAWKE’S BAY

Photo: Richard Brimer

On a small but prominent corner in the leafy Hawke’s Bay town of Havelock North, this ‘L-shaped’ townhouse is a conversation piece.

To maximise the site, this new family home was positioned as close as possible to the West and South boundaries leaving space for a private, sunny courtyard and swimming pool. A stunning, cantilevered box extends right out to the street boundary.

“The accomplished layering and ordering of space and treatment of light

and external apertures is complemented by fine but not fussy detailing Jenny is proud that HMOA is a founding to produce a very livable, urban family home,” NZIA Awards Jury. member of the Diversity Agenda, which aims Awards: NZIA Local Award; NZIA Resene Colour Award. to see more women in the field. “Architecture is still a male-dominated profession, but that’s starting to change,” she says, “As a Registered Architect, I am part of that change and have the best of both worlds in that I can run my own studio, but always know I have the support of the wider HMOA team behind me at every stage.”

“I work closely with the team across the four studios. With modern technology, it’s pretty easy, and it’s a huge benefit to be able to reach out to the other offices and share the knowledge and expertise. The directors are also always available to meet with clients and be engaged in my projects”.

If someone has a project in mind—be it an alteration, a new build, residential or commercial—the best place to start looking for an architect is to go to their website. On HMOA’s site, you’ll get a feel for their projects and see the wide range of award-winning work they’ve done over 22 years.

Just like her sporting achievements, Jenny relishes the creativity and complexity of architecture, and the opportunity to work with great clients.

Go to hmoa.net.nz or give Jenny a call on 021 2366963

Photos: Andy Spain

A new community building for Lower Hutt’s busy Riddiford Garden.

The pavilion features two full-accessible public toilets and a kiosk.

It also cleverly disguises an old electricity substation.

Robust and highly-functional, the pavilion meets the challenge of the security issues of such a public site. It has also been designed to fit in with Hutt City Council’s recently redeveloped (by Architecture+) administration building and sits comfortably facing a busy main road. Skilful lighting design makes it attractive day and night.

Awards: NZIA Wellington Award, Resene Colour Award.

NZ Best Design Awards, Gold Pin.

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Riddiford Pavilion LOWER HUTT

om Sign up, change over, and save!

Sign onto a monthly plan with Ezebiz and change to Xero from your desktop accounting package (or other accounting package) before 31st March and you’ll get three months free Xero subscription (worth $60 + GST per month for a Xero Business Plan).

There has never been a better time to change over to Xero so that you’re all set and ready to go at the beginning of the new financial year on 1st April 2019.

And the Ezebiz team will assist with the conversion to Xero as we are Migration Certified Gold Partners with Xero. This is a limited offer so be in quick to save!

Call us on 07 308 5576 7 Domain Road, Whakatane ezebiz.co.nz facebook.com/ezebiznz

From the Bay to Brazil and back WORDS MATT MORTIMER IMAGERY SUPPLIED

Leighton Fairlie has released a truly great single, and is set to follow it up with a much anticipated EP (that’s Extended Play, as in longer than a single but not quite an album, for you millennials), and has built up a dedicated following here and in South America on raw talent and hard graft. Plenty’s very own house DJ Matt Mortimer caught up with him to find out how a humble musician from the Bay of Plenty ends up touring Brazil?

We’ve all had that parent or wider whānau member with the ability to ‘party play’ the guitar or sing a waiata over a few brewskis at home.

Musician (and damn good bugger too) Leighton Fairlie was blessed with a Mum who had a guitar in hand – and who just happened to also be a kapa haka tutor. Nice beginnings for a guy who grew up listening to the Eagles with his Dad and whose musical tastes later expanded to include Michael Jackson, N.W.A and everything inbetween, including Metallica and White Zombie.

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“Listening to Metallica, I would visualise me playing that guitar riff, me being up there – me doing it,” he says, and it got deeper than that pretty quickly as he started really listening in, past what each of us normally hear or recognise in a tune we like.

“I started listening to the arrangements; how different artists layered every instrument or line together,” he says, with these arrangements became a sign of things to come, the background of a man layering a song piece by piece. Leighton uses a looper in his craft, honing the skills by sampling drum beats, laying guitar rhythms, bass lines and much more to put his songs together.

“I start with a few chords, humming a melody over the top and it just grows from there. I’m always changing it up; a new guitar line there, replacing one with another – that kind of thing.

Looping is awesome in that you can achieve a band sound, without a band being present.”

This technique has paid big dividends, although he does have two fantastic – and very much real life – horn players accompany him, Fabiano Fava and Laurence Brown, which fills the sound out and brings an awesome extra layer as accompaniment.

“Fabiano has been playing with me right from the start, he put together the horn line for my single, Galaxy,” Fairlie says. “I met Fabiano and Laurence while playing in a local cover band in Mount Maunganui in 2015. Fabiano is from Porto Alegre, south Brazil and has played in various professional bands throughout South America, including Brazilian band Second Hand, who opened for kiwi legends The Black Seeds during their Brazilian tour in 2016. Laurence joined this project mid-2017 to form the full brass section.”

Fairlie enjoys the New Zealand music scene, finding inspiration from bands such as Salmonella Dub, Fat Freddy’s Drop, Shapeshifter and reggae and ska legends Kora. (As a side note, check out Leighton’s collaboration with Camo MC on social media – it’s a randomly filmed backyard jam that is awesome!

And if that ain’t enough see Plenty 06 for an interview with Brad Kora of Kora).

“THE NEW ZEALAND MUSIC SCENE IS REALLY SUPPORTIVE. GETTING TO PLAY AT THE SAME GIG AS THESE BANDS WHO INSPIRE ME IS A DREAM IN ITSELF”

And having spent a bit of time in the New Zealand music scene, he’s been able to play at festivals and support some of Aotearoa’s finest home-grown talent.

This has been a thrill in a burgeoning career, getting the opportunity to open for acts such as Salmonella Dub at the Mount and being on the same bill as Katchafire, Strangely Arousing (see our story on them in Plenty 10) and The Black Seeds.

“The New Zealand music scene is really supportive.

Getting to play at the same gig as these bands who inspire me is a dream in itself, there seems to be mutual respect amongst us all; it’s very chilled. It is part of our kiwi culture, I suppose.”

But the journey isn’t confined to here in the good old land of the long white cloud, by just joining music festivals around the place and playing a couple of dimly lit pubs.

Nope, Fairlie’s gigging has taken him as far as South America, to Brazil in particular, and it was there, strangely enough, that the newly released single ‘Galaxy’ was refined.

This is pretty amazing in itself, going to South America is the trip of a lifetime for most, but to go there in 2016 and then get recording time and not have to pay for it is a huge deal. Especially when it’s owned by some pretty great musicians.

“We had some friends there, and I was lucky enough to get two free days of recording,” he says. “Ex member of Sepultura, Jean Dolabella recorded and produced my songs over the two days I spent at Family Mob Studio in São Paulo.”

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Distant, left, and Galaxy, right; cover art as good as the music.

Sometimes we gotta ask the hard questions here at Plenty – go deep, not quite the meaning-of-life-orwhat’s-out-there-in-the-galaxy deep – pun intended – but more what makes you tick. To which the answers from Leighton were nothing short of just, well, damn cool.

LOOPING IS AWESOME IN THAT YOU CAN To the uninitiated, Sepultura are a heavy metal band from Brazil, who have sold a ridiculous amount of music and, it’s pretty fair to say, black t-shirts after 14 studio albums and almost 20 million sales worldwide. So yeah they’re pretty good.

“Working with Jean Dolabella in the studio was an amazing experience, the musical knowledge he has is unreal. There were moments of disbelief, I had to pinch myself at times. How did this Māori boy end up here in Brazil recording with a rock legend in a world class studio!”

Leighton returned in 2018 to do a short tour of Brazil, performing shows in São Paulo amongst others.

“I got a great reaction. I guess they didn’t know what to expect, but it was an amazing experience.”

We’re now in the age of a smartphone recording a gig, and illegal downloads seem to be rife. So how does an artist get on in this day and age in the music industry, how does a new artist make enough money to survive, let alone record and tour?

“It’s a hard one with so many phones at gigs now.

We can’t do much about that, but by uploading my material, it’s free promotion in a way… and as much as it’s frustrating to know that people are illegally downloading too, obviously I’d prefer people to pay, there’s not much I can do about it.”

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ACHIEVE A BAND SOUND, WITHOUT A BAND BEING PRESENT.”

We led with the obvious: “What’s the end game bro? What’s the dream?”

“I would love to have as many people as possible resonate with my music. Just make a positive impact through music I guess. For me, that’s the ultimate goal.”

An awesome sentiment, from an awesome musician.

He really is a humble chap, with thanks to give across the board to the aforementioned horn players, Fabiano and Laurence, and to Cy Sifu from Knights of the DUB Table for recording and producing Leighton’s debut EP due for release in April 2019. But as all good men do, Leighton, with a touch of class, directs the final word to his supportive partner, Jordana Dos Reis.

“She’s been to almost every show. Her reaction… it’s like she’s watching me for the first time, every time.”

So if you haven’t had a first time, check out ‘Galaxy’.

Hell, do yourself a favour and buy it. And watch out for the forthcoming EP, because we think you’re going to love it and you’re going to be hearing a lot more from Leighton Fairlie.

16 george street, whakatane / open 10am-5.00pm mon-sat.

SHAPING A LIFE IN

NEW ZEALAND An interview with Pete Radley

In a world where everything is fast-paced and immediate, Pete Radley has the good fortune of possessing a talent that allows him to escape. He’s naturally inquisitive, has a special connection with the Bay of Plenty, and is inspired by the simplicity of nature. Helene Lees took some time to catch up with Pete to discover more about his journey in the world of art and sculpture.

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INTERVIEW THE WINSLEY TWINS WORDS ALEXANDRA PICKLES DESIGN NICOLA DOBSON PHOTOGRAPHY ANDY TAYLOR & IMAGES SUPPLIED

The ideas tend to reflect what is going on around me or things that I’m feeling, and that is a cathartic and creative use of my energy.

That is largely why I do it.

You were born in Yorkshire.

What was the reason for your move to New Zealand?

PLENTY

PR I was in my early 20‘s and it was the Margaret Thatcher years in the UK. I wasn’t comfortable and so was looking for somewhere else to live. I had a brother who married a Kiwi girl from Napier, and I came out to visit and realised that New Zealand was the place for me to be.

PLENTY What was it about New Zealand?

PR At the time, I was very struck by the open honesty of the people. I was also taken by what appeared to me to be the lack of human imprint on the landscape that, of course in later years, I discovered was far greater than I first perceived. But the bush, the nature here after Europe was a revelation. Just the relaxedopenness of the people, and the quality and egalitarian nature life here. I remember the first trip I did down through the South Island and the West Coast; running out of petrol and having not enough cash in my pocket. I didn’t realise how far apart the communities were down there and I was not only picked up and taken to a petrol station, but given petrol which I paid for by cheque without any ID, and then taken back to my vehicle. It was all very heart-warming and the openness just did it for me.

So, when did your interest in art first begin?

PLENTY

PR Early in the 1970s, I went to Art School in Cornwall, having had some years of travelling. I started as a mature student at college and mostly, at that time, worked in screen print. Part of the move to New Zealand was that we had a fire at the college and I lost most of my work. The college offered me a year out or to move to another college, so I decided to take the opportunity to come out to New Zealand and actually never went back to complete the course. I ended up getting residency and then New Zealand citizenship in the late 1970s.

PLENTY

Where did you live?

PR Hawke’s Bay was where I first established in New Zealand. I was working for a printing company, and didn’t have the confidence to rely on the sale of my own work – that took me until my forties to take a punt on that, and I was very lucky. I feel like I’ve ridden a wave in the field of arts through the 80s and 90s, and managed to make a frugal living from it. I am grateful to ZeaYou Gallery in Taupō, and Kura Gallery in Auckland and Wellington for their encouragement and support over the years.

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PLENTY Sounds like you have worked in a lot of disciplines in the arts?

PR Yeah, I guess I have always had an interest in wood and a lathe, and woodturning. I started off selling a mix of screen-printing T-shirts and woodturning at the Ōhope market when we were living in the back blocks of Ōpōtiki. We then moved to the Central Hawkes Bay for 15 years, but really wanted to come back to the Eastern Bay – there is just something about the scale of the landscape here, and the richness and culture of the Eastern Bay – it really appeals to us. In between, I was working with wood and stone. I would collect stones from a beach in Hawke’s Bay that were spherical and would incorporate them into the wood work.

Then one day I had this vision that instead of using stone, it would be very appealing if I could cast them in glass, so that I could have colour and light coming through the work. So, I did a weekend seminar with a woman in Hamilton on how to cast glass, but I am basically self-taught.

PLENTY Do people come to you with an idea for a garden feature and you design it?

PR No. I spent many years in the central Hawke’s Bay making furniture to order for people, but I got tired of working off a tape measure all the time. So, I decided I would make stuff from my own innovation, and find the sale for it rather than doing work on commission. It changed the conversation from what the client want to what I want to express, and that shift has been richly rewarding for me. I use the sculpture as a way of understanding the world, and what I’m feeling about the world around me. The ideas tend to reflect what is going on around me or things that I’m feeling, and that is a cathartic and creative use of my energy. That is largely why I do it.

PLENTY I know you do some quite large pieces too, don’t you?

PR In Taupō I have a pair of large wooden koru which were accepted into the Events Centre some years ago. They are about two metres high, hollow and are lit from the inside. I enjoy feeling that they have been adopted by the community at large and have been used in many local events over the years. I probably have only made half-a-dozen pieces at that scale because the opportunities don’t come up that easily or frequently.

Do you have an engineering background?

PLENTY

PR Not really; I’ve got basic building knowledge.

Many years ago, I worked for a company in America building geodesic domes – which this chap, Buckminster Fuller, had the vision to create.

He was an interesting man, as he was dyslexic and he came up with this mathematical formula.

So, I built a geodesic dome that my wife and I lived in for some years in the back blocks of Ōpōtiki.

PLENTY I sense that you teach yourself everything?

PR Yeah, I work on intuition a lot, and physically work things out according to what I need. I’ve always been lucky with hand-eye coordination and yes, just practice. It’s the ‘10,000 hours’ thing.

But you like doing that, you like learning?

PLENTY

PR Absolutely, because in the process of doing it, you learn about the material, but you also learn about yourself in the process. Over the years I’ve learnt how to focus on something that contains an element of beauty, and strip down to its essence, by simplifying it to a point where the natural elements are obvious and easy to appreciate.

PART OF WHAT I AM INTERESTED IN,

PLENTY Sometimes simple is best, isn’t it?

PR Absolutely. We went to Japan last year and I was re-inspired with the simplicity of design and the design traditions over there, so that has come out a little bit in my work since. It’s taken a long time for it to filter through, but life has been busy with other things. It has rekindled my desire to keep my work as simple as possible because I think it’s more accessible to people. In the process of simplifying it, you actually learn what the essence of the thing is that you are trying to feel or emulate or reflect, and finding a still environment to do that in is important, because it’s only in having the time to look in depth at what you are witnessing that you actually see these things.

IS FINDING A VISUAL LANGUAGE THAT APPEALS TO ALL CULTURES ACROSS HUMANITY.”

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PLENTY When you have started a piece, are you quite disciplined?

Do you want to see it finished?

PR I tend to stick with one thing and see it through, because I always find that it’s difficult to get back the level of focus that you generate if you take too much distance from it. When I’ve started something, then I am focused on it until I am done. One thing at a time.

Who or what would you say has been the largest influence in your art?

PLENTY

PR Part of what I am interested in, is finding a visual language that appeals to all cultures across humanity. So, for the last 20 years I’ve been exploring common boundaries of Māori and Pākehā culture. I’ve been inspired by Gordon Walters from 1950‘s NZ, in terms of sculptural simplicity of line and form, and also Brâncuși, who was a Romanian sculptor in the 1930’s. Few people have created better simpler forms than they achieved. I am open to art on all levels; it all speaks to me and it all influences me and I’m of the belief that few things in life are truly original – they are more to do with soaking in and re-presenting what you have assimilated through your own experience and feelings, so anything you do will be the accumulation of influences of the environment you live and work in.

PLENTY Is Māori symbolism important in your work?

PR Absolutely, because it is a large part of living in the Eastern Bay of Plenty. It’s also a great source of joy to my wife and I to experience different cultural views and to be part of local community life here. This is where I choose to live, so it’s important to be part of all aspects of the environment here, which includes both Māori and Pākehā cultures, but also other cultural influences.

These bring new and interesting elements but, at the core of it all, it’s all about being human, so that’s the point from which I start.

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PLENTY

Do you start with sketches?

PR I don’t draw a lot. I use photography of nature, in particular, as a source of reference to go back to when I’m creating a new idea. I’ll refresh my mind through photography or drawing to remind myself of what the forms, colours, shapes and feelings are around that subject, but I don’t sketch. I draw as a reminder of the idea rather than as a finished item in itself.

You have worked with a lot of different materials. Are there any you still want to explore further?

PLENTY

PR Well, I have only cast one piece in bronze and I would like, at some stage, to see some more work in bronze, pottery or on canvas perhaps.

PLENTY What’s the biggest thing you get out of what you do?

PR The biggest thing I get out of it is getting lost in the process of making. It’s mindfulness - a world away from everyday life where I am just lost and absorbed in the doing, and I find that the richest place to be.

Pete Radley’s work can be found at the following galleries: in Taupō at ZeaYou Gallery, in Wellington and Auckland at Kura Galleries, and in Hamilton at Inspirit Gallery.

“I’M OF THE BELIEF THAT FEW THINGS IN LIFE ARE TRULY ORIGINAL – THEY ARE MORE TO DO WITH SOAKING IN AND

RE-PRESENTING WHAT YOU HAVE ASSIMILATED THROUGH YOUR OWN EXPERIENCE AND FEELINGS.

Te Hokinga mai The Return Home Call it a stroke of luck, or that it was meant to be. ‘The wairua works in mysterious ways’, and in this case, someone just happened to know of someone, who knew somebody. . .

And after many decades, a box of old documents that was destined for the recycle depot returned home to where it began – Murupara. Monika Higgins tells the story of how a lifetime’s work was lost, then found, and how she helped guide it on to the printed page.

I

T ALL STARTED WITH A CHAT on the porch with my brother Rab and Des Palmer of the Waewae whānau, Ngāti Manawa. He was researching his whakapapa and had heard many stories from Rab on this porch. One of them was about the rock carvings in Murupara, and it rang a bell with him about some discarded documents he’d seen that had been sent in for proofreading with a view to publishing back in 1976. That proofreader was a Mr Williams, who happened to have a grand daughter married to one of Des’s brothers. We made a phone call to Mr Williams, then 94 years young, at a nursing home in Auckland, and hearing how very important these documents were to the people of Ngāti Manawa, he was delighted for them to be in the right place – back home in Murupara.

The Murupara Rock Carvings lie hidden amidst the pines, their secrets intact.

And so, 30 years after they had been sent for proofing, a box of documents and photographs came home. There was a mixture of emotions when we received it. Curious and excited for what we may find of Ngāti Manawa heritage, but also saddened that there was no one alive in the rohe to confirm the stories passed down by our old people.

But we took delivery of the box believing it would maybe help fit together some pieces of the puzzle to our stories of yore and how they impact on who we are and where we belong. In particular, because I am Ngāti Manawa and Murupara is my hometown, I had quietly anticipated some extraordinary revelation about our people.

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Monika Higgins with some of the documents contained in the box

I

NSIDE THE BOX we found a manuscript, drawings, graph charts, and a collection of black and white photographs, each meticulously labelled and filed. The documents were type-written on oversized A4 sheets and the negatives and photos looked like they were taken with a Box Brownie. But the title instantly captured my interest: ‘Murupara Rock Carvings or Archaeology with a Difference’ by Martin Wilson.

Martin had taught at Rangitahi College for several years, and he lived in the schoolhouse at the back over-looking farmland and the Whirinaki River. Above it rose the Tawhiuau and Te Ika Whenua ranges; a perfect setting in the heart of Ngāti Manawa to embark on a journey a few miles from Murupara.

Martin was originally from Scotland, but had lived in Otaki on the Kapiti Coast for many years where he became fascinated with Māori folklore. By the time he came to Murupara he was researching into whakapapa and history and working on several publications that would eventually lead him to Te Ana a Maru, which he refers to as the Murupara shelter. Most people now know it as the Murupara Rock Carvings (or The Caves), and though there are a lot more visitors to the area than in Martin’s day, the stories of this wāhi tapu site are still only known by very few, with very little of this history written down. The Murupara Rock Carvings lie hidden amidst the pines, their secrets intact.

Murupara was once a thriving timber town, and it is ironic that pine-trees are now the biggest threat to the rock carvings. Although a protective fence surrounds them, the elements and the forest put these taonga at risk as moisture seeps in from the dense forest surroundings, in addition to their spiritual significance being lost through ignorance.

The challenge for us is to preserve and protect this ancient relic so that our descendants, and all people, may share in the mysteries and knowledge of a bygone era and the box of documents seemed to hold the key to this.

Having read the manuscript and scrutinised the photos and graphs, it seemed obvious that the carvings represented an important part in our country’s history; they were significant to the way of life, traditions and spiritual beliefs of its first peoples.

I was also intrigued by the depth of research Martin had done in Murupara and other historic sites in Ngāti Awa, Waikato, Hauraki and Tūwharetoa rohe.

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His work posed two questions: how is it Ngāti Manawa have no knowledge of their origins, and how old are the carvings? At the time Martin was doing his research, archaeological theories were supported by scientific fact rather than tradition and spiritual beliefs handed down from tīpuna for hundreds of years, despite the fact that they too were experts in their field. Since the carvings were uncovered in 1925 various theories about their origins have been put forward, but they remain largely overlooked. I believe the Murupara Rock Carvings will be the greatest archaeological find in the Bay of Plenty for Ngāti Manawa once the information in the book is known more widely.

The challenge for us is to preserve and protect this ancient relic so that our descendants, and all people, may share in the mysteries and knowledge of a bygone era and the box of documents seemed to hold the key to this.

O

NE OF THE THINGS Martin wanted to tick off his bucket list was to one day have the ‘story in print’ for the benefit of future generations. He believed education and a little effort

was the key for growth and knowledge, and I felt the information in the book to be of too great a benefit for it to remain unpublished.

So I was eager to see Martin’s dream fulfilled and the information made available and I began a search for his descendants through mail directories, media, electoral rolls, census and the like. This was to no avail however, and so I began to seek funding to publish the book for libraries and universities. This too was unsuccessful, so I decided to fund the publication of the book myself, and what followed was a steep learning curve about modern publishing technology!

I was heartened that a most learned and respected koroua, Kingi Porima, kaumatua of Tainui and Moewhare, a former Chairman of Tainui Trust Board and Kaingaroa Logging Company Manager for many years, had shared the same whakaaro. Through his encouragement to publish the book for ngā tamariki, ngā mokopuna ano hoki.

Discovering the truth of our history, its vibrant culture and who we are as a people, was a humbling and poignant experience. They were my inspiration and reason to ‘put the story in print’ and publish the book. It was both an honour and privilege to have learnt so much more of our beginnings, and I hope one day to be able to present Martin’s descendants with copies; my search for them is ongoing even now.

The carvings today, protected from humankind but not the elements.

The book cover in black is my interpretation of Te Po- In the beginning was Darkness, the white print Te Aothen came Light and the chevron depicts niho taniwha- the ‘bite’ of Maui.

The flax represents whānau, mokopuna, whakapapa, and mana whenua.

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best

in show

WORDS WHAKATĀNE MUSEUM AND ARTS IMAGES SUPPLIED

MMCA: now, and then…

Today, the Molly Morpeth Canaday Award is one of New Zealand’s most vibrant national contemporary art awards.

It’s also one of the longest-running, and has undergone a few transformations over the years. However, the slick award – that this year attracted an international Guest Judge - has maintained its Eastern Bay of Plenty roots…

The first iteration of the award was established in 1985 by two progressive Whakatāne women - Jacqui Hughes and Lynne Dawson - to launch the Whakatāne Community Arts Council (now known as Arts Whakatāne). In 1986, the Arts Council launched a multidisciplinary annual arts festival, which was held in the Whakatāne War Memorial Complex. The Shell Art Award – named after its primary sponsor, Shell Oil New Zealand - for painting and drawing was a major fixture of the festivities.

In 1990, Tasman Pulp and Paper stepped in as the major sponsor of the then $3,000 award.

In 1991, the Molly Morpeth Canaday Trust stepped up from being a merit award sponsor to become the principal award sponsor, and gained naming rights for the exhibition and its programme (though Arts Council still managed the running of the event).

Since then, the name has stayed. The Award moved out of the War Memorial complex and into Te Kōputu a te whanga a Toi’s galleries when the new facility opened in 2012. Whakatāne Museum and Arts have joined forces with Arts Whakatāne as exhibition partners.

The prize pool has expanded to a whopping $20,000 thanks to the support of sponsors. MMCA now alternates between being a Painting and Drawing Award and a 3D Award, and draws hundreds of entrants yearly (2019 brought in 500 entries!).

The aim of the 2019 Molly Morpeth Canaday Award is to encourage and celebrate the development of painting and drawing on a national level, and reward artists who create outstanding works.

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Molly and Frank

what’s in a name?

There’s dedication to the arts, and a touch of romance, behind the names of the Molly Morpeth Canaday Award and its major award sponsor, The Molly Morpeth Canaday Trust.

Mary Russell “Molly” Morpeth was born in Wellington in 1903.

Encouraged by her father Charlton Morpeth, she followed creative pursuits at Wellington Technical School. While on a 1928 trans-Tasman voyage with her parents, she met businessman and advertising executive Frank Canaday.

A long-distance relationship ensued, and they were married in 1935.

Molly continued her art training at the Toledo Museum of Art School of Design, and went on to study and make art with a passion throughout her lifetime. Her work was widely exhibited.

the 2019 programme Molly Morpeth Canaday passed away in 1971. The following year she was honoured by the Toledo Museum of Art with a retrospective exhibition. From 1974, Frank made numerous grants to New Zealand art institutions (including the National Art Gallery, the Auckland Art Gallery, and the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery).

In drafting these grants, Frank worked with Molly’s cousin Mr Rex Morpeth (Rex Morpeth Park’s namesake!) on the wording of trust documents. Rex was mayor of Whakatāne from 1965 to 1976) and it is through this liaison that the Whakatāne connection was born the Molly Morpeth Canaday Trust was formed.

The Molly Morpeth Canaday Trust was established by Frank Harrison Canaday (1893 – 1976) in memory of his wife and artist Molly Morpeth Canaday (1903 – 1971) to assist New Zealand galleries.

The 2019 Molly Morpeth Canaday Award showcases 80 artworks, hand-picked from a massive entry pool by MCMA Judges.

The works are exhibited across all three of Te Kōputu a te whanaga a Toi’s gallery spaces in a stunning visual display of painting and drawing.

This year’s winning works are selected by leading Australian art academic and critic Dr Christopher McAuliffe. Come to the galleries at 11am on Sunday 17 February to hear his take on the show and celebrate the first day of the exhibition!

Come along to the Locals Morning for a chat with the Mayor and a gallery talk, learn about the art practices of the other talented MMCA Judges, and ask questions at the Panel Discussion. Remember to cast your vote for the People’s Choice Award while you’re at it – your favourite work may be recognised as a result!

(Top to bottom) Preliminary Judge Kirstin Carlin Guest Judge Dr Christopher McAuliffe Preliminary Judge Ane Tonga Preliminary Judge Andrew McLeod

20 9 molly morpeth canaday award

painting and drawing exhibition opens

17th february exhibition closes

public events sunday, 17 february, 11am to 12pm

7th april

judges talk: dr. christopher mcauliffe

saturday, 23 february, 10:30am to 12pm locals morning: tea with the mayor, talk by sue whale

saturday, 9 march, 11am to 12pm gallery talk: preliminary judge, andrew mcleod

saturday, 16 march, 11am to 12pm gallery talk: preliminary judge, kirstin carlin

saturday, 30 march, 11am to 1pm panel discussion: on art matters

location

arts WHAKATANE

te kōputu a te whanga a toi whakatāne library and exhibition centre hayley hewer, manifestation of impulse, acrylic paint and marker on panel, 2018

event information

mollymorpethcanaday.co.nz/programmestalks

Explore a little,

Come with friends and share a new dish

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e c i p s e Th of life WORDS AND PHOTOGRAPHY ANDY TAYLOR

Indian food has taken Aotearoa, and the world, by storm, but we’re here to tell you there is a lot more to it than butter chicken. To get the real deal on the subcontinent’s finest we went straight to the source with the good guys at Kope Indian Restaurant, in the food Mecca that is Whakatāne’s Kopeopeo, to find out how to add some spice to your life.

It’s hard to imagine that up until a little over a generation ago the only overseas cuisine the average Kiwi would take a chance on was from one of the obligatory Chinese restaurants that had made it to the suburbs and the regions: they wowed us in the 70s and 80s with chicken chow mein and fried rice, and boy we were loving it!

But fast forward to 21st century Kiwiland and you are spoilt for choice: Turkish kebabs, Japanese sushi, Italian, Mexican and Thai – we have a veritable United Nations thing going on here now. But one overseas import above all others has been embraced by Kiwis in remarkably quick time. Yes folks, we’re talking about Indian food, in all its

spicy, hearty, yummy glory. Rich, creamy sauces.

Tender, tasty chicken, lamb, beef and seafood.

Tangy condiments. Naan. There’s just nothing else like it, and every Kiwi has a favourite. But before you opt for your ‘usual’ at the local Indian restaurant, remember that all curries are not created equal.

Joshi Vinod, owner and head chef at Kope Indian Restaurant has been specialising in northern Indian cuisine for more than 20 years, having worked in places like Hydrabaad, Bangalore and Delhi. Northern Indian food often features garam masala, and things like naan, samosas and palak paneer (spinach and cheese) – all staples of the Kiwi Indian food scene – hail from the north. In the south, rice lentils and stews predominate.

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Vinod says the secret to great Indian food,

whether from north or south, is simple, but you can’t cut corners. “Fresh ingredients are vital, and we are lucky here in the Bay of Plenty because we can get excellent produce, meat and fish.

Secondly, the chef has to have experience. If you don’t know what you are doing and do not get the spice combination right, you can overpower the flavours of the ingredients.” And he should know: like the others at Kope Indian Restaurant, Vinod is formally trained with a three year degree from Uttarakhand in India and many years at the stove.

Kope Indian

Goat Curry

Start out with hot oil and a little ginger/garlic paste, then add boneless goat. The spice combination is key: garam masala, Kashmiri chilli, coriander, cumin, and turmeric. Once this is simmering nicely, in goes fresh tomatoes and a little garlic paste. The Kope Indian secret is to serve it on a hot sizzling platter with samosas.

“It is also really important that a dish is made freshly. Curries that are prepared in advance don’t have the separation of flavours that a freshly made dish does, and also a good dish should have no artificial flavours like MSG added. The natural spices are all you need!”

Which is why at Kope Indian Restaurant they prepare each dish fresh, just as you order it, instead of calling on pre-prepared base meals.

“Kiwis are travelling more and trying different flavours,” Vinod says, “so it’s time to try new Indian flavours too. In a properly made, fresh Indian dish all the different flavours come through and are unique, with a richness and depth. So explore a little, come with friends and share a new dish – you won’t be disappointed.”

To put it to the test we got the Kope Indian crew to come up with a northern Indian classic and we asked the Plenty editorial team, who have blagged food all around the world, to be impartial judges.

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Owner and head Chef Vinod Joshi (IHM Uttarakhand), Chef Maddy (IIHM new Delhi and Edinburgh Napier University), Chef Dwarika Prasad (IHM Bangalore).

Our verdict: Exquisite. And the critics at Tripadvisor seem to agree, rating the Kopeopeo crew very highly indeed.

Don’t take their word for it – get in and see for yourself.

You can find them on King St, Whakatāne, contact them on 07 307 9498 or check them out online at www.kopeoindianrestaurant.com

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Meet Annis Parker. She’s raced cars in Sri Lanka, performed triage in overseas disaster zones, and served as a theatre nurse in Sri Lanka, New York, UK, Australia and New Zealand. She also runs workshops on using the pure power of energy to heal – and she talks to animals. Plenty catches up with her to find out why you should lower your eyebrow right now, and to see if we can get through this article without a Dr Doolittle reference.

S p ea k in gw it h

Mrs

WORDS ANDY TAYLOR IMAGES SUPPLIED

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“A lot of owners do have difficulty

understanding exactly what it is I do,

but then again...

a lot of them don’t care as long as

they see results.”

PHOTO ANDY TAYLOR

Let’s get this out of the way right now:

Annis Parker is used to scepticism, and in fact she welcomes it. “There are an awful lot of charlatans out there,” she says over the second cuppa of our meeting at her Tauranga home. “There are a lot of people who know that there is a ready market for those who just want to be told what they want to hear. It’s always been like that, and I expect it always will be like that, but the modern age, with social media and the like, means a certain type of fraud can flourish.

Fake news, pseudo science, call it what you will. So people are right to be sceptical of things. But I’m not here to convert anyone. Who has time for that!?”

No, Annis Parker doesn’t want to convert anyone, and she doesn’t tell people what they want to hear either.

In fact she is mostly about listening, albeit listening to energy. And the type of healing she practices

is no Facebook sensation, it comes with pretty strict guidelines; for a start it’s a structured course certified in the United States and recognised by their medical insurance system, which is something of an achievement in itself.

But before we find out more about that, let’s find out a little about Annis Parker. “My upbringing was multicultural and multiphilosophical,” she says as we start on the third cup of tea, “so I knew about clairvoyance, chakras, and the like. And I kind of always knew about energy systems – it was only when I went nursing that I discovered that other people didn’t know about these things. That was a bit of a surprise to be honest. I was going to be a vet, but in those days that meant going to Australia to qualify and we didn’t have that kind of money.

My poor vocational guidance teacher at school tried to get me to try all sorts of things, but it wasn’t until P L E N T Y. C O . N Z // F E B R U A R Y 2 0 1 9

45

There was never really a light-bulb moment,

I’d always been very aware of energy and its power to heal.

Don’t try this at home; Annis Parker on the job.

she suggested theatre nursing that I clicked; there is something about the high-tech, high-speed aspect of it that is in my DNA, so I specialised in that, and it took me all over the world.”

United States – so it had come from a practical background – and it has very structured standards of practice and codes of ethics. When I first heard about that aspect of it, that is what locked it in for me.”

The first place it took her was Sri Lanka – or Ceylon as it was known in those days. “It was a great time to be there,” she says, “full of animals and adventures, including a bit of off-road car racing! I loved the place so much I thought I’d never leave. Politics proved otherwise however.” Instead of staying with the elephants of Ceylon, Annis and her husband moved to New Guinea, where their children were born, before finally returning to New Zealand and a clinical practice in Christchurch. Along the way she also worked in disaster relief, both in the field and in emergency preparedness, as well as in oncology and bone marrow transplant and teaching. In 2014 she relocated to Tauranga. Let’s put it this way, she has a lot of letters after her name and a lot of stamps in her passport, but she also has that steadyas-she-goes practicality that only real experience can bring. But we have to ask what made an experienced theatre nurse shift disciplines and embrace a form of therapy that many people are not quite sure about?

“The easiest way to explain what I do is that it is similar to dousing – only instead of finding where to sink a well, you are finding where the energy fields have been disrupted, and then putting them right. We know what a healthy energy structure looks like, but people are so highly stressed in our current world, that though they rise to meet that stress, sooner or later they plateau and then they are in trouble physically, mentally or emotionally.”

“There was never really a light-bulb moment,” she says. “As I say, I’d always been very aware of energy and its power to heal, but what initially drew me to healing energy was that it grew out of nursing in the

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“So what we do is a sort of an evaluation, or what you might call a rebalancing. The body knows what to do, it just sometimes needs a reminder, because it’s been unsettled by stress or other factors. I say to people that I’m the jump-start cables and that I will get your cells off the couch so that they can go back to doing the job they are supposed to be doing rather than sitting there with their arms folded. It’s about creating an environment for the body to heal itself.”

What Annis is perhaps best known for though is how she applies this to our feathered and furry friends.

Her 2014 book Talking with Tigers received great reviews, and her success in working with animals large and small has seen

her treating everything from big cats at The Wildcat Sanctuary in Minnesota, to San Diego Zoo, Orana Wildlife Park in Christchurch, and with horse owners pretty much everywhere.

“I grew up on a sheep station, so animals have always been a part of my life, and it seemed that energy healing had so much to offer animals. A lot of owners do have difficulty understanding exactly what it is I do, but then again a lot of them don’t care as long as they see results.”

Seeing results is how Plenty ends up on a farm 20 minutes outside of Tauranga, where a decidedly unruly chestnut horse is letting everyone know that it’s really not happy. As in really not happy; rearing aggressively, manoeuvring for a good kick and giving sidelong glares the likes of which we last saw in a Taranaki pub that shall remain nameless. The owner confirms the horse is ‘a challenge, to put it mildly,’ and the Plenty photographer confirms he is a coward by switching to a long lens and steering well clear of everything.

Annis however, gets right in there, up close and personal with the animal, talking softly, while swinging what looks like a small wooden plumb bob around

fetlocks and hooves and reeling off a list of the ailments the plumb bob is detecting. All energy in health spins clockwise no matter where we stand on the Planet. It is a diagnostic tool – nothing more or less. It identifies tissue which is not functioning properly. Various techniques, which can be taught to anyone, using the fingers only, can clear and realign the tissue frequency to allow the body to bring itself into dynamic health. It’s a strangely evocative process that takes 15-20 minutes, and the transformation is – even to our untrained eyes – remarkable. The horse visibly calms, lowers its head, comes in for a nuzzle, and seems no longer interested in taking a shot at the photographer or anyone else for that matter. Other horses around it also seem to treat it differently, shifting in closer and lowering their guards, and even our lily livered lens man summons the courage to take off the telephoto and come in for a close up.

We may not really understand what Annis Parker does, we may not really have to, as long as it works. And for this particular horse it seems to have lifted a weight from its shoulders, eased some pain, and put a spring back in its step, so who cares; it’s certainly glad that it has met Annis Parker.

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That doyen of publishing The New Zealand Herald recently decreed that it had found the best fish and chip shops in the country. Two of them were in the Bay, and because we love hot chips here at Plenty (and pies, and sausage rolls, and . . . yeah, you get the picture) we decided to send Jennie Michie to find out all about it. We tucked enough paper money into her pocket for a scoop and two fish at both purveyors of deep fried delicious-points and gave her a lift to the main road. But instead of hitching to Vegas for lunch at Devon Sea Foods and then to Bobby’s Fresh Fish Market in Tauranga for dinner she wandered instead down memory lane, ended up in Ōhiwa, and faxed this in from somewhere in the 90s. If we’d foreseen this was going to happen, we would have gone with her. And while we didn’t get a Michelin review about NZ’s national dish, we did get . . .

Fish and chips and hindsight

WORDS JENNIE MICHIE ILLUSTRATIONS KATRIN KADELKE

IF I HAD KNOWN THEN WHAT I KNOW NOW I would have eaten that damn fish raw, whole and straight off the line.

It was my first time by myself at the fingertip end of the Ōhiwa peninsula. It was a glorious summer day and my brand new rod and reel worked perfectly, none of the snags and tangles, lost tackle, hooked thumbs, blood and sand and disappointment that would mark nearly all my subsequent efforts. I caught a handful of young fish one after the other but they were small and certainly illegal so I righteously set them free. I was then, and am still, an ignorant novice in the ways of the ocean and of the art of fishing so when something powerful and fast hooked my line and set the reel spinning I didn’t have a clue. It raced up and down the water and I hung on with a face splitting grin; my rod bent and throbbing with the life at the end of the line. After an exhilarating twenty minutes I finally pulled in an indignant teenage stingray; flapping and twisting and looking thoroughly pissed. Squatting down to peer at my catch I could not for the life of me think what to do with it. Eventually I wrapped a cloth round my hand, gingerly unhooked it and slid it back into the water, mulling over the fate of Steve Urwin.

Aussies.

Naturally after that disappointing experience I went directly to the Ōhiwa Oyster Farm for fish and chips. It’s been years since I’ve been there. So long that I can’t quite recall how good it was. So in the interest of factual reporting I am going to leave you here and go there now to find out if my memory, possibly impaired by age and alcohol, is reliable.

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I picked up my friend Louise, with the promise of a swim and fish and chips and drove over the hill to Ōhope and on to Port Ōhope. Past the Top Ten Holiday Park and the Ōhope Golf Club to literally the end of the road. It was about 3pm and scorching. We parked under the shade of a pōhutakawa tree and walked down beach towards the harbour entrance. After sunbathing and swimming for an hour or two in water the temperature of a bath you’d forgotten about, we packed up our gear and as much sand as our towels, bathing suits and bodily orifices could hold and walked back to the car.

As usual there was a small crowd at the Ōhiwa Oyster Farm (we overheard one woman say they’d come all the way from Kawerau for a decent feed) but luckily there was no queue. Unluckily they were out of mussels but we ordered fish and a dozen oysters (no chips; we are women in our late 50s after all and one of us is much fatter than she used to be) and sat in the shade on the grass right on the shore to wait and watched the seagulls scrounge leftovers.

When our order number 142 came up it was good. Finger-licking good, fresh, crispy, hot and delicious.

While we ate we talked of old times like old friends do. I recalled when my children were little my mother and I used to bring them to the motor camp in Port Ōhope every year for a week or so. Mum and I, armed with gin, sherry and a boot load of library books, would relax and read and the kids would be in the loving and constant care of the Hi-Dee-Hi type boot-camp for tots with activities every hour on the hour. Every so often we would be called back to reality by some incident or so; my son splitting his head open after falling off the trampoline springs to mind and the grand finale to each holiday was the kids’ talent quest.

When my daughter Rose was five she decided to enter. Being of the minimalist school of parenting I had no idea what she was planning as we took our seats.

First up was a tiny ballerina who executed a complicated and graceful series of arabesque, echappées, grand jeté and temps levé.

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NEXT, I SWEAR TO GOD, was a two year old with

a violin. Suzuki schooled of course and he played I don’t know what but it was bloody good. I began to feel just a little bit of trepidation for my daughter who is wonderful in every respect but to my knowledge had no particular skills or talents. After a thunderous round of applause for the fiddling toddler the MC announced my daughter and she entered the stage.

MC: Hello Rose and what are you going to do for us today?

Rose: Hop. MC: (clearly puzzled) Hop? You mean hip hop? The dance?

Rose: No. Hop. And she duly and solemnly hopped from one side of the stage to the other. And then, just as portentously, hopped back again.

The audience, mums and dads, grandparents and siblings all, sat silently for a few long moments. Just taking it in.

I could keep it together no longer. Hissing and spluttering the giggles rose up and as giggles do, infectiously took hold all around us. Rose took a bow and left the stage to the happiest applause I have ever heard.

Kids and summer. Perfect.

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Nowadays my kids are all grown up and perfectly accomplished thank you and I share my summers with the next best thing, my dog Remus. A border collie who has the mental age of a five year old but, on the plus side, he never fights with his siblings, nor demands the same story to be read to him night after night nor is picky with his food and he never grows up and moves to Timaru. On the down side he is most certainly likely to die before me and he sure sheds a lot.

I’ve leaned on his company over the past few years when I was essentially an economic refugee in my own country. Despite having a home I love in Whakatāne, necessity demanded I work in Auckland.

I am employed by the NZ Howard League for Penal Reform, which is an organisation helping offenders become legal drivers; this both helps break the cycle of offending and gets them ready for work, and if you haven’t read it already, I highly recommend you go onto information superhighway and check out Plenty 05 for the full story.

Anyhoo. I was commuting back to the Bay every other week or so and staying as a part-time boarder with a friend in Birkenhead, essentially living in her daughter’s bedroom like a teenager. It was exhausting. Both trying to keep my footprint small in someone else’s home and the commuting itself. Not to mention the Auckland traffic.

But last year the Howard League was granted money to expand its driving programme and so I’ve moved home to Whakatāne for good and am now working, along with my colleagues Rawiri and Tipu, as well as the fine people at Corrections (and let me say, some of the nicest offenders I’ve yet to meet) here in the Bay of Plenty; home to NZ’s most-loved beaches and officially some of the best fish and chips in the country.

WORDS AND PHOTOGRAPHY ANDY TAYLOR

For Plenty it was something of a holy grail. Admittedly, as journalistic holy grails go, it wasn’t up there with the Pentagon Papers or Winebox, but it was our holy grail, damnit, and we weren’t giving up.

It had loomed large in our landscape for way too long and something had to be done. We’d heard about it back in 2016 and had originally planned to feature it in issue 01, then 04, then 09 – you get the picture – but things just kept getting in the way and this elusive location taunted us from the horizon as we crisscrossed the Bay in search of lesser stories. And then, in the Indian summer of 2018/19, it happened. We made it to the Galatea Beer Can Museum.

Kope Gold; produced by Independent Breweries in 1997 for Whakatāne’s Kope Liquor store.

It’s not as if the Museum is hard to find. Barry Steiner, who owns and operates it, is in the book and you can Google anything these days.

No, it was more a matter of us not being over that way at the right time, but once we saw the collection Barry has built up over the years we were glad we’d made the trip.

A lot of people collect a lot of things – from big to small, from the sublime to the ridiculous – and the amazing arrays that life in garages up and down the country never cease to amaze. But there can be few collections closer to the heart of many kiwi males as having 12,000 beer cans in your shed.

Twelve thousand. Beer cans. From all over the world – 150 odd countries – and yes all of them are different but, let’s be brutally honest, sadly they are all empty. (The cans will last longer when they are empty than when they are full, which is an old adage we’ve lived by for years.) There’s also a huge collection of breweriana, which is a word, and a car collection just to fill the gaps between the tinnies.

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It all began back in 1985 – like so many great stories do – when a young Barry found two Australian beer cans on the side of the road on his way to school. Being Aussies they were lightweights – made of aluminium instead of the Kiwi steel cans – and they caught his interest straight away. He put them on a shelf at home and other cans quickly joined them as the collection grew. Soon there were 20, then a hundred. By the time he was legally allowed to consume some of the contents, the collection had reached 2000.

Barry still picks up cans from around New Zealand, but he gets a large part of his international collection by trading with collectors overseas or at the national swap meets held twice a year. And of course there is eBay.

Where it all began: a 1935 example of the world’s first beer can.

Beer cans have actually been around a lot longer than you might think, with the first one being produced in the United States in 1935. Barry has an example of that first can in his collection, as well as some 1930s cans commemorating the coronation of King George VI and a royal visit. It’s not known if the royals actually cracked a tinnie during their time here, but we like to think they did.

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The first cans produced in New Zealand rolled off the Leopard Breweries line at the Watties factory in Hastings in the early 1960s, with Dominion Breweries and New Zealand Breweries following suit soon after. There was some initial trepidation from the public, who preferred bottles and flagons, but by the 70s men in stubbies could be seen from Invercargill to Kaitaia with a can in hand. By the 80s, beer cans were ubiquitous, with more being sold in the little aluminium tubes than in bottles, but because of their disposable nature very few were saved and early examples are becoming rarer and rarer. Some of the most intriguing examples in Barry’s collection are not the oldest or most expensive but the cans produced by some of the smaller makers.

Walking around the Museum you are struck by the sheer volume of the collection. There are cans from China, Australia, the Czech Republic, the UK, Germany, Austria and the USA to name a few, and while many companies go hard with their branding others go with themes: seasonal motifs on Japanese cans, patriotic symbolism on American cans, and, um, what can only be described as page three kitsch on British and German cans.

There is probably a thesis to be written on beer can imagery and its relationship to national identity, so if you are currently working your way through your PhD and need a topic then give Barry a call.

Or if, like us, you’d just like to see a 12,000 strong collection of beer cans then the Galatea Beer Can Museum is the place for you: Facebook Beer Can Museum Galatea.

Middle: For for a royal: the purple can was produced for King George VI’s coronation in 1937; the other for the Royal tour of Australia and NZ in 1949 on the HMS Vanguard.

Bottom: Simpler times? These themed cans were produced in Scotland from the 1960s up until the 1980s.

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FLIGHT The Jean Batten Story WORDS ANDY TAYLOR // IMAGES SUPPLIED This is a story that begins in a cottage in Amohia Street in Rotorua and ends in an unmarked grave in Spain; in between it traces a remarkable arc, from up above the clouds, to Buckingham Palace, it sees world records broken, and shows the world that Kiwis – and especially Kiwi girls – can fly. And yet while every New Zealander knows her name, the star of this story remains very much an enigma.

How did Jean Batten, Garbo of the Skies, fly so high and fall so far?

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Colourised By Brendan Graham (www.Brendan-Graham.com) 2019 from an original black and white image by Leo White of Whites Aviation, courtesy of the Alexander Turnbull Library.

Jean Batten in Auckland, 1931, aged 21.

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A little night music in Amohia Street Any retelling of the Jean Batten story must begin with her mother, Ellen. By most accounts a striking figure – tall, elegant and attractive – she was often seen riding a white mare through Rotorua and was a respected actress in local theatre productions.

Fred, Jean’s father, was a popular dentist who excelled at sports and led a small neighbourhood instrumental group that played in the evenings. On 15 September 1909, Fred’s small ensemble played in the front parlour of the family home while Ellen gave birth to Jane Gardner Batten in the next room. In fairness, he had offered to send the musicians home, but Ellen had asked that they play on, so the soon to be famous aviator entered the world to the strains of Schubert’s Trout Quintet played quietly in Amohia Street.

Jean Batten, aged eight, at Melmerley College.

Strangely, Ellen had told no one that she was expecting and had attended a ball just two days prior, her pregnancy hidden by skirts. This air of secrecy was to be a recurring theme in the years to come, as was Ellen’s eagerness to propel Jane into greatness; not long after her birth, a newspaper clipping on the French aviator Louis Bleriot – the first person to fly across the English Channel – was pinned to the mantelpiece over her cot, a curious precursor of what was to come.

Jane soon became Jean after an uncle taught her to say “I’m bonny Jean fra Aberdeen” in a thick Scots accent, and though Jean soon became a somewhat sickly child she also began to show the mettle that would make her known around the world. As Ian Mackersey notes in Jean Batten: Garbo of the Skies, her brother John recalls a violent thunderstorm raging over Rotorua, with everyone hurriedly taking shelter indoors: “Then we discovered that Jean, who would have been about three, was outside, exposed to the weather, watching it with fascination and shouting with glee. . . There, bathed in the lightning flashes, she insisted on staying to watch ‘the pretty lights’.”

As Jean grew, this love of adventure grew with her. Fred put a latch on the front gate to stop her wandering and ending up in a hot pool, but Jean learnt to climb up and open it. Fred tried another tack: “Do you know what will happen one day if you go out the gate alone?” he asked.

“The suffragettes will get you and take you away from us!” This didn’t work either. It seems the only person who could control Jean was Ellen, and Ellen seemed quite content to turn a blind eye to her daughter’s wayward ways.

Jean Batten would remember her childhood in Rotorua fondly, with summer holidays spent at Mount Maunganui or on Lake Taupō, but by 1913 these idyllic times were about to draw to a close. First the family moved to Auckland and then, in 1917, despite being exempted as a family man, Fred volunteered and was soon at the Somme. In his absence money was tight and the family moved into a smaller, shabbier rented home, but Ellen made sure that Jean’s bookcase was stocked with biographies of people like Florence Nightingale and Joan of Arc. More importantly, she took Jean regularly to Kohimarama Beach, not to paddle but to oggle: magnificent men in their flying machines were being trained there for the Royal Flying Corp and the conflict in Europe, and these visits were to set their stamp on Jean Batten forever.

Watching a seaplane skim across the water, she would later write, filled her with “such a surge of exhilaration and a longing to be up there in it.”

For a time she satisfied her thirst for flight via a taste for speed; Fred had returned from France and together they sped through the Waitakares on a newly acquired motorcycle, Jean navigating from the pillion seat with Fred’s service compass. Then, in 1928, Fred took Jean to an Auckland reception for Charles Kingsford Smith, freshly famous for his San Francisco to Sydney flight, and Jean declared she wanted to learn to fly. The following year Ellen took her to Australia on holiday and wangled her a short flight with the great man himself, and this time Jean declared she would be the first person to fly from England to New Zealand. Prophetic words indeed.

By this stage Ellen and Fred’s marriage was over; like many others, it had not survived the war, and with that tie severed Ellen took the opportunity to launch her daughter’s career once and for all. Some close to the family believed that Ellen was living out her own ambitions through her daughter, but whatever the case, soon the family piano had been sold and Ellen and Jean had oneway tickets to the United Kingdom. They would remain virtual exiles for the rest of their lives.

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A penguin to water In her autobiography, Jean Batten claims that she “took to the air like a penguin to water”, but contemporary accounts paint a slightly different picture. Her first two instructors at North London’s Stag Lane aerodrome apparently gave up on her and an early Police hold back crowds as Jean arrives in Sydney in 1934 at the eight of her fame. overshot landing saw her crashing into a fence. Her third teacher, one Major Herbert Travers, was made of sterner stuff; in the war he’d served in a machine gun section and then the navy before becoming a pilot and shooting down five enemy aircraft, so no slip of a girl could scare off the Major. Batten described him as a born instructor with “divine patience”, and by 1930 she had her pilot’s license and followed that in 1933 with her commercial license; now the sky really was the limit.

It is hard to overstate the importance of aviation in the 30s. It had come of age in the war, and in the peace that followed it conquered distance and captured the imagination A STRING OF ADMIRERS of a generation still in shock from the carnage of the Western WOULD OFFER FINANCIAL Front. The aviators and aviatrix who broke long distance SUPPORT, PROVIDE JEAN records were the rock stars of their days, glamorous, fearless, WITH AIRCRAFT, AND famous and soaring high above the mud and blood the trenches had shown the world. Newsreels followed their BOOST HER CAREER, BUT exploits in flickering black and white, and newsreaders NONE WOULD EVER GET related their amazing accomplishments and glorious failures CLOSE TO THE OBJECT OF breathlessly across the wireless. Into this world stepped the THEIR DESIRE. strikingly beautiful, adventurous and driven Jean Batten.

The fact that by this stage she could also fly the pants off many of her male counterparts could only help.

But in addition to her flying skills Jean – undoubtedly guided by Ellen – showed an early aptitude for not just piloting an aircraft but marshalling resources and creating a persona. In April 1933, despite being a relative newbie on the scene, she was preparing for her first long distance record attempt, and was already exhibiting a propensity to marshal not just resources but male benefactors. In the years to come, a string of admirers would offer financial support, provide Jean with aircraft, and boost her career, but none would ever get close to the object of their desire. Some believed that Jean’s relationship with Ellen was too close for anyone else to figure in her life, while others felt that her heart belonged only to flying, and if the latter were true then what a heady romance it was.

In 1934, after two previous attempts, she flew a return journey from England to Australia, and followed that in 1935 by becoming the first woman HER SOLO FLIGHTS WERE GRIM, to cross the South Atlantic. In 1936 she took it a ARDUOUS AND DANGEROUS. step further and made the first ever direct flight from England to New Zealand, thereby fulfilling the prophecy she had made in Sydney and becoming the best known Kiwi in the world. She was feted wherever she went, starred in newsreels, and was mobbed.

The New Zealand Herald took to calling Jean ‘Her Serene Highness’ and offers of sponsorship poured in.

It all sounds so easy, but her solo flights were grim, arduous and dangerous. Fuel had to be hand pumped from reserve to main tank, all while flying and keeping coordinates. Sand storms loomed like solid walls before her tiny plane over the Syrian Desert and monsoons pummelled her over Burma. She

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often landed in total isolation, and bedded down beneath the plane for a few hours sleep before swinging the prop and carrying on. Mechanical failure was not uncommon; on one flight the engine self-destructed and Jean ended up making an emergency landing that saw her pinned under the upturned plane. In 1934, approaching Rome, Jean pushed her luck and fuel reserves too far and crashed once more, this time narrowly missing radio masts and the Basilica of St Paul’s.

THE AVIATORS AND AVIATRIX WHO BROKE LONG DISTANCE RECORDS WERE THE ROCK STARS OF THEIR DAYS, GLAMOROUS, FEARLESS, FAMOUS AND SOARING HIGH ABOVE THE MUD AND BLOOD THE TRENCHES HAD SHOWN THE WORLD.

The end of the golden weather

Jean shared some flights with a cat called Buddy, who was something of a mascot, but her mother Ellen, below right, accompanied her in spirit on her all her flights.

In 1937, Jean made another long-distance flight, from Australia to England, and set about publishing her second book, but with war clouds gathering public interest was waning. The glamorous flyers the world had fallen in love with were becoming yesterday’s news, and for a decade the newspapers would have a war to fill the front pages. Soon after the outbreak of the conflict, Jean’s beloved Gull aircraft was requisitioned by the RAF, and though she offered her services as a pilot, she never flew during the war, instead working first in a munitions factory and then as a speaker raising funds for the war effort.

She was popular with the audiences, but there was an increasing sense that the world had moved on from the daring-do of long-distance flyers, and when peace returned, the Battens, perhaps realising that the glory days of aviation were over, slipped quietly away from England.

Still inseparable, Ellen and Jean first moved to Jamaica where they built a house and mixed with Noel Coward and James Bond-creator Ian Fleming. In 1953, without telling anyone, they abruptly left Jamaica and began a seven year tour of Europe, living out of suitcases, before settling in Malaga in southern Spain. Five years later they were on the road again, to North Africa and the Canaries, and then Tenerife. And it was there that Ellen Batten, aged 89 died.

Jean was grief stricken; Ellen had been the driving force in her life, and with that force gone, she soon drifted into depression that would last for several years. She remained in Tenerife, living largely as a recluse, and frequently visiting her mother’s grave, and though she kept in touch with friends she seemed resolved to shunning the limelight she had sought for so many years.

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Plenty brings you the very best of the Bay. Kei a Plenty ngā tino o te rohe.

The Comeback

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SHE HAD BEEN SO RECLUSIVE AND ECCENTRIC IN HER LATER YEARS THAT HER FEW REMAINING FRIENDS WERE NOT OVERLY ALARMED. THEY EXPECTED HER TO REAPPEAR, IN HER OWN GOOD TIME. SHE NEVER DID.

If not for a remarkable piece of journalistic investigation by Garbo of the Skies author Ian Mackersey, Jean Batten may have joined Amelia Earhart in the list of lost aviators. With no word from Jean for years, Mackersey (who was working on a documentary about her) and members of the Batten family embarked on months of painstaking research that finally cast light on her last years and lonely death. Most of the authorities involved were indifferent, and only Mackersey’s dogged determination – something he shared with his subject – saw the truth uncovered, and the plaque placed by Batten’s family on her grave makes mention of the gratitude they owe him.

“In her golden years,” Mackersey notes, “(she) brought immense honour and lustre to New Zealand. And though it was not perhaps widely appreciated at the time, she became the finest woman pilot of the era, eminently superior in her navigation and airmanship and the consistency of her feats, to her more celebrated and better-remembered colleagues, Amy Johnson and Amelia Earhart. Although she lived in their shadow, Jean Batten was both a great risk taker and a greater perfectionist, a more brilliant organiser and a great deal more professional in her attitude to flying, creating more longdistance records than either of them. And where they both eventually killed themselves, Jean’s ruthlessly high standards, and her determination, kept her alive.”

T W E N T Y N I N E T Emessianic EN The Batten’s villa on Amohia Street is long gone, but her name now lives on in the Contents designed by the very talented but her name now lives on in Jean Batten Jean, on the comeback trail, revisits her Gull aircraft at www.ShevoneWillis.com the Shuttleworth Museum in Bedfordshire.

Square in Rotorua.

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IN THIS ISSUE

And then, in 1969, with dyed hair, a facelift and mini skirts, Jean attempted a comeback. She flew to London and immersed herself in aviation circles, and in 1970 she returned to New Zealand where she demonstrated her fitness, at age 61, by doing high ballet kicks. Sadly, many people had forgotten her, and younger generations had never heard of her, so the comeback soon ran out of steam. The final straw came when a chartered Concorde flight scheduled to retrace one of her flights, with Jean as guest of honour, was cancelled because so few people bought tickets.

In 1982, still stung by the public’s indifference, Jean finally left Tenerife, choosing instead to live in the small village of Palma on the Spanish island of Majorca. From that year on, mail piled up at her publisher’s office and her bank account remained untouched, but she had been so reclusive and eccentric in her later years that her few remaining friends were not overly alarmed. They expected her to reappear, in her own good time.

She never did. In November 1982, while out for her daily walk in Palma, Jean had been bitten by a dog; she sought no medical treatment, the wound became septic, and she died of a pulmonary abscess caused by the infection. The last person to see her alive was her hotel maid. And just as her later years were marked with anti-climax, her death was marked with a deafening silence - because no one in the world knew she was dead. Thanks to a bureaucratic mix-up, Jean Batten’s death had not been properly reported by the Spanish authorities, and her body had not been claimed by the New Zealand consulate. Instead, she had been deemed to have no next of kin and was buried in a mass grave in Palma, where she remains to this day.

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