Volume 80 | Issue 10

SALIENT

10 ten

22 MAY 2017

Editors — Tuioleloto Laura Toailoa and Tim Manktelow

Contact — editor@salient.org.nz 04 463 6766 Level 2, Student Union Building Victoria University of Wellington PO Box 600, Wellington

Designers — Eun Sun Jeong and Ellyse Randrup News Editor — Brigid Quirke News Reporters — Billy Dancer, Mahdhi Osman, Marc Daalder, Siobhan O’Connor, Thomas Croskery, Laura Toailoa, Tim Manktelow Feature Writers — Lily Phillips, Dan Kelly, Ali Burns

Printing — Service Printers 258 Taranaki Street, Wellington Paper — Sun 90gsm Salient is printed on environmentally sustainable paper, with vegetable ink, and is completely FSC approved.

Typefaces — Wedge by Bruce Rotherham, Adobe Caslon Pro by Carol Twombly

Chief Sub-Editor — Georgia Lockie Distributor — Darren Chin Arts Editor — Cameron Gray Section Editors — Annelise Bos (Podcast), Cameron Gray (Games), Finn Holland and Mathew Watkins (Film), Hanahiva Rose (Visual Art), Katie Meadows (Television), Kimberley McIvor (Books), Olly Clifton and Lauren Spring (Music), Sean Harbottle (Theatre) Contributors — Sofia Roberts, Tessa Cullen, Elizabeth Gaiduch, Aidan Kelly, Rory Lenihan-Ikin, Marlon Drake, Indiana Shewen, Henrietta Bollinger, John Barclay, Hannah Wee, Gus Mitchell, Tom Danby, Shakked Noy, @LauraLives, Sarah Dillon, Hannah Patterson, Shariff Burke, Puck

About Us — Salient staff are employed by, but editorially independent from, the Victoria University of Wellington Students’ Association (VUWSA).

Salient is a member of, syndicated, and supported by the Aotearoa Student Press Association (ASPA).

Salient is partially funded by Victoria University students, through the student levy. Opinions expressed are not necessarily representative of those of VUWSA, ASPA, Service Printers, or the editorial staff.

Complaints — Please email editor@ salient.org.nz and if not satisfied with response contact VUWSA. Salient — 22 May, 2017 Volume 80, Issue 10

Advertising — Grace Gollan grace.gollan@vuwsa.org.nz 04 463 6982

CONTRIBUTORS & COLOPHON

CONTENTS Editors’ Letter.......................................6 Notices................................................61 Features We can’t take it for granted: Academic Freedom in Hungary...........29 News — Lily Phillips General News.......................................9 Into the Borderlands...........................34 Free West Papua..................................12 Going Bush: Students Belittled When Seeking Journeys beyond scene........................38 Sexual Health Services........................13 — Dan Kelly Refreshments Politics Political Round-Up.............................14 Between Merrill and me......................43 The Trump Front.................................15 — Shariff Burke The Party Line....................................15 Coffee thoughts..................................44 — Ali Burns Interview Grant Robertson..................................16 Arts Opinion Populist Reaction Unlikely..................18 Poem...................................................47 Books..................................................48 — Aidan Kelly Television...........................................50 Compassion Soup Kitchen..................21 Games................................................51 — Elizabeth Gaiduch Film....................................................52 Music..................................................54 Columns Podcast...............................................56 Presidential Address............................22 Visual Art...........................................58 VUWSA.............................................22 Theatre...............................................59 Te Ara Tauira......................................23 Super Science Trends..........................24 Philosoraptor......................................25 Puzzles................................................62 Voice of V-ISA...................................26 Comic.................................................63 VIC UFO...........................................26 Mauri Ora..........................................27 Token Cripple.....................................27 Sports..................................................28 Tinder Surprise...................................28

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Editors’ letter It’s approaching that time of semester when the pressure of assignments builds up and everything can seem overwhelming and too much. It is important in these moments to attempt to gain perspective, though this can seem impossible when you’re in the thick of it.

It can help to physically change your setting.

Going for a walk can help; breathing in fresh air and looking at something other than a computer screen can give you space from your overwhelming workload.

Watering a plant with a drink bottle, or having a conversation with a friend can also help. But some days, to tell the truth, these things won’t — you might still feel blue.

Managing your mental health is a very personal thing and something we both struggle with at times.

Seeking professional help is nothing to be ashamed of but, as recent media attention has reiterated, resources are limited and under pressure.

The announcement by Student Counselling that the services that will best meet students needs will be considered after six counselling sessions was a communications fuck up, and it is important to reiterate what Pam Thorburn told us: “We would never, ever cut a student off to the services they need.”

However this doesn’t deny that the sector as a whole is seriously under-resourced. Student Counselling at VUW is funded from your Student Services Levy, while Student Health, also funded by the levy, receives additional support from the government. University counselling services should receive adequate government funding and that they don’t just highlights how low mental health has been on this government’s list of priorities.

We thought we should use our space this week to acknowledge the desperate need for better mental health services. And to acknowledge that university can be tough, this time can be tough, and seeking help is okay.

To provide a distraction from the pressure of assignments, two of the pieces this week attempt to take you out of Wellington — right now soaking in rain and hemmed in with cloud — to the sun and dust of the South Coast in summer, and into the cool mists of the Tararua ranges.

Look after yourselves and stay warm.

— Tuioleloto Laura Toailoa and Tim Manktelow

7

NEWS SURVEY CONFIRMS THAT STUDENTS ARE OVERWORKED AND UNDERFUNDED ‘KAUPAPA PRISONS' MET WITH BACKLASH NATIONAL SEXUAL HEALTH HELPLINE UNDERWAY INCREASED FUNDING FOR DOC NOT ENOUGH EUTHANASIA CASE BEFORE THE COURTS EDUCATION AMENDMENT BILL PASSES FIRST READING PRESSURED LECTURERS, CHEATING STUDENTS FREE WEST PAPUA STUDENTS BELITTLED WHEN SEEKING SEXUAL HEALTH SERVICES

POLITICS POLITICAL ROUND-UP THE TRUMP FRONT THE PARTY LINE

V

A PRESEN

T S

S UW

TH E

a t e r GDE BATE TERTIARY EDUCATION EDITION

FRIDAY 26 MAY AT 1PM IN THE HUB JOIN US IN THE LEAD UP TO THE 2017 GENERAL ELECTION AS WE DISCUSS STUDENT SUPPORT, ALLOWANCES, EDUCATION AND THE COST OF BEING A STUDENT

FEATURING TERTIARY SECTOR SPOKESPEOPLE PAUL TODD GOLDSMITH BARCLAY · CHRIS HIPKINS · GARETH HUGHES · TRACEY MARTIN · MARAMA FOX NATIONAL PARTY

LABOUR PARTY

GREEN PARTY

NZ FIRST

MĀORI PARTY

9

News NEWS

SURVEY CONFIRMS THAT STUDENTS ARE OVERWORKED AND UNDERFUNDED Tertiary students are “regularly going without food or other necessities” because they cannot afford them, according to a survey of 2000 students at Unitec in Auckland.

Unitec is New Zealand’s biggest campus-based polytechnic, with 9100 full time equivalent students.

Half of the students surveyed, including two-thirds of Māori students surveyed, said their income was not enough to cover their living costs at some stage in the past year.

Unitec is asking its staff for donations of food and linen to aid students in need.

VUWSA President Rory Lenihan-Ikin told Salient that VUWSA had seen a steady increase in student hardship, with more and more people accessing their student support services.

“Unfortunately this is not a surprise, considering a lack of adequate government student support forces most students to live in poverty for the duration of their studies, and it’s only going to get worse if they don’t review the Student Living Cost and Allowance soon.”

All VUW students have access to the VUWSA community pantry, which provides a free food hamper for students.

“At the end of 2016, 649 food parcels had been given out to students, but the 152 applications which have already been processed this year indicate we will be giving out much more than that in 2017.”

Jonathan Gee, President of the New Zealand University Students Association (NZUSA), said that the necessity of part-time work alongside study made it difficult for students to cope. “There’s a tipping

point there in terms of how your part-time work affects your academic performance.”

Gee explained that insufficient student allowances created “a question of access.”

“A third of students seriously consider dropping out, mainly due to financial pressures. [...] Tertiary education should be a way out of poverty, but so many students are going into poverty in order to get through that tertiary education, and some of them don’t even make it out on the other end.”

NZUSA are calling on the government to increase the amount of, and access to, student allowances in the upcoming Budget announcement. Only 30% of tertiary students are currently receiving an allowance, which works out at $177.03 after tax per week for students under 24 living away from home, if their parents are earning less than $91,000 per year.

When asked by Radio New Zealand, “do you think it’s fair to ask taxpayers to pay more for students?”

Gee responded, “A couple of years ago, we were talking about students living on two minute noodles. What you see in this survey is that one in seven students can’t even afford those two minute noodles. I think when you see that a demographic of society are failing to meet their basic necessities of life, there’s definitely a concern there.”

— Brigid Quirke

‘KAUPAPA PRISONS' MET WITH BACKLASH Recently Labour MP and Corrections spokesperson Kelvin Davis proposed developing a prison run according to Māori values to address the over-representation of Māori in prison statistics. However, the proposal has been met with backlash from criminal justice organisations

such as JustSpeak and No Pride in Prisons.

While not solely for Māori inmates, the proposed prison would be run in accordance with Māori values, including manaakitanga, whanaungatanga, and aroha — “caring for others, respect, empathy” — as part of a “whole, systemic change, not just scratching the surface,” according to Davis.

“It’s really a conversation-starter about what do we have to do differently?”

Māori make up 50.5 per cent of the prison population, despite being only 15 per cent of the national population. Davis believes the narrative is now changing to recognise that the current system isn’t working.

Labour leader Andrew Little said the proposal was not party policy, but acknowledged that the current system isn’t working and change is required.

Prime Minister Bill English says Māori values are already incorporated into prisons where appropriate, and rehabilitation efforts “take into account what’s going to work for [Māori], as it does for any offender.”

The Māori Party raised a similar idea in 2009; a separate, rehabilitation-focused Māori prison, where inmates could prove they were serious about turning their lives around.

However, reform group No Pride in Prisons has criticised the idea, as the concept of incarceration is a colonial one at odds with Māoritanga. Spokesperson Emilie Rakete explained that prisons “were forced on Māori society through colonisation, so imagining a prison based on ‘Māori values’ is simply ridiculous.”

Criminal justice organisation JustSpeak also opposes the proposal. Chairperson Julia Whaipooti acknowledged that mass-imprisonment of Māori is “the most significant issue in our prison system,” but disagreed with the approach of having a kaupapa Māori prison.

Whaipooti told Salient that pris-

10 ons are a result of colonisation, and that “giving the keys to that vehicle to Māori” is not necessarily “the most transformative way that we can look to address the problems around mass imprisonment of Māori.”

“There are some key things that we need to shift to have better outcomes for Māori, and if we have better outcomes for Māori in our justice system, we have better outcomes for New Zealand in terms of our justice system.”

The Department of Corrections runs group-oriented “tikanga-based programmes” in prisons that “use Māori philosophy, values, knowledge, and practices to foster the regeneration of Māori identity and values to encourage offender motivation to address their offending needs,” according to its website.

However, Whaipooti said that these programmes are “a minority of what’s going on.”

“It’s not enough to put a little bit of money and give things Māori names, and give things Māori values, if they’re not being actually substantively practiced or supported throughout the system.”

— Thomas Croskery

News building a more effective integrated system to ensure victims of sexual violence receive the support and services they need. We want to better support victims of sexual violence through a long-term plan with a focus on prevention, and appropriate crisis and ongoing support.”

“We also want to ensure that funding goes to where it is most needed and where it can deliver the best results for New Zealanders.”

MSD told Salient that the helpline will run “24 hours a day, seven days a week via phone, website/online chat, email, text/SMS and social media.”

— Marc Daalder

INCREASED FUNDING FOR DOC NOT ENOUGH

The Department of Conservation (DOC) will see additional funding in the 2017 Budget.

Pre-Budget announcements from the Government indicate an advanced funding model for DOC, with $76 million allocated for boosting tourism infrastructure over the next four years.

The tourism infrastructure packNATIONAL SEXUAL age for DOC is part of a larger HEALTH HELPLINE package valued at $178 million to UNDERWAY facilitate New Zealand’s growing tourism industry.

DOC will also receive $21 milThe Government will be undertaking a competitive tender process for a lion for controlling predators in 2017, new national sexual violence helpline, following this year’s beech forest mast according to a joint Ministry of Social (seeding), which increases rat and Development (MSD) and Ministry stoat numbers. According to Minister of Justice (MOJ) press release issued of Conservation Maggie Barry, the “Battle for our Birds” will be the “one on May 12.

An MSD spokesperson told Sali- of the largest predator control proent that “this initiative is part of a $46 grammes in our history, across more million investment over four years to than 800,000 hectares of land.”

However these increases have better support victims and prevent sexual violence, announced in last been criticised as failing to address previous cuts to DOC’s budget, year’s budget.”

In the original press release, Min- and in a press release Green Party ister of Justice Amy Adams said that Co-Leader James Shaw stated they “the Government is committed to “will do nothing to halt the loss of

our threatened species.”

“DOC’s funding has been chopped by some $336 million since National came to power so DOC remains woefully underfunded.”

The issue of DOC funding has received attention in the media recently. Jesse Mulligan used his position on TV3’s The Project to push for an additional $100 million to be allocated towards DOC for the purpose of managing an increased number of species.

Mulligan says many conservationists, scientists, and front-line DOC workers have “warned us that New Zealand's ecosystem is on the brink of failure.”

Barry has dismissed these calls, suggesting that Mulligan should “cheer up.”

“It’s unacceptable,” says Green Party conservation spokesperson Mojo Mathers, “that DOC has to rely on corporate sponsorship to pay for conservation of our most precious species, and get payoffs from mining companies to pay for pest control.”

— Billy Dancer

EUTHANASIA CASE BEFORE THE COURTS Susan Austen, Wellington co-ordinator for pro-euthanasia group Exit International, pleaded not guilty to three charges connected with assisted suicide in the Wellington District Court on May 12.

The charges allege that in 2015, Austen imported Pentobarbital, a Class C drug often used in euthanasia; and that she assisted the suicide of 77-year old Annemarie Treadwell in 2016, who was also an Exit International member.

Exit International set up a crowdfunding campaign for Austen’s legal funding, which had raised $46,897 of a $50,000 goal.

Austen’s lawyer, Donald Stevens QC, entered the not guilty pleas on her behalf. Wellington District Court

11 Judge Peter Hobbs remanded her on bail until July for a case review hearing.

Assisting suicide carries a maximum penalty of 14 years in prison.

Euthanasia has been the subject of much moral and legal debate. The End of Life Choice Bill, which calls for the decriminalisation of euthanasia, received 21,277 submissions, from both sides of the debate — the most made on any bill at the select committee stage.

Care Alliance, a group opposed to the legalisation of euthanasia and medically-assisted suicide, reported that 16,411 of the submissions opposed legalisation, while 4142 supported it.

VUW student Louise Grey argues in her article published in the Public Interest Journal of New Zealand, “The Person Who Really Loves Me Will be the One Who Helps Me Die”, that the criminalisation of assisted suicide is inconsistent with the right to life, following the high profile case of Seales v Attorney General.

In 2015, terminally ill lawyer Lecretia Seales sought two declarations by the High Court — a declaration that her doctor would not be acting unlawfully in assisting her death; and (in the alternative) that the provisions in the Crimes Act governing murder and assisted suicide were inconsistent with the New Zealand Bill of Rights Act. Seales was unsuccessful in her case and passed away on June 5, 2015.

Grey argues in her article that the judge in Seales’ case “should have at least granted a declaration of inconsistency” based on a wide interpretation of the right to life to include the right to die in the Bill of Rights Act 1990.

Tasha Russell, legal director of Exit International told Salient that their organisation “believes that it is the right of every rational adult to choose when and how they die.”

“Suzy certainly believes this and has advocated for this to the absolute best of her ability.”

— Brigid Quirke

News

EDUCATION AMENDMENT BILL PASSES FIRST READING The Education (Tertiary and Other Matters) Amendment Bill has passed its first reading in Parliament and is before the Education and Science Select Committee for consideration. The bill amends the Education Act 1989.

Minister for Tertiary Education, Skills, and Employment Paul Goldsmith said the bill will “help the tertiary education system run more efficiently, ensure quality, and provide additional student protection.”

The bill would allow the Minister to increase funding to private institutions creating “a level playing field between providers,” meaning for-profit, independent tertiary education providers would be treated equally with universities, wānanga, and institutes of technology and polytechnics.

The Tertiary Education Union (TEU) described it as “controversial law that could see funding stripped away from public education and handed to private businesses.”

Private tertiary institutions are currently under the spotlight due to some failing to meet the standards required by NZQA. Linguis, a private institution which had approximately 1000 students, was recently deregistered due to unresolved problems with marking and plagiarism. Another private institution, International Academy of New Zealand, has been forced to sell to avoid deregistration.

The New Zealand Union of Students’ Associations (NZUSA) President Jonathan Gee told Salient that while the bill had some positive elements, NZUSA are “very concerned about public funding going to for-profit provider[s] who have no responsibility to society.”

The TEU has recommended a complete review of the sector before

any proposed reforms are introduced.

— Siobhan O’Connor

PRESSURED LECTURERS, CHEATING STUDENTS A report conducted by Britain’s Office of the Independent Adjudicator received worldwide attention after a student was found using invisible ink, detectable only under UV light, to cheat during exams.

The law student was found with 24 pages of hidden notes inside the prescribed materials that were allowed in the examination room.

The New Zealand Qualifications Authority (NZQA) could not confirm whether similar incidents had taken place in New Zealand, but urged those with concerns about cheating and assessments at tertiary institutions “to come forward so that we can investigate.”

22 complaints of academic misconduct were made to New Zealand government agencies in April 2017, following the Tertiary Education Union State of the Sector report’s release in March.

The report revealed that completion rate requirements set by the Tertiary Education Commission put pressure on staff to award a higher percentage of passing grades.

NZQA said it had received nine complaints in the same period. One of the complaints had been referred to Universities New Zealand.

231 instances of academic misconduct were recorded at VUW from 2013–2015.

In trimester one of 2014, VUW recorded 34 breaches of exam rules, 21 of which were incidents in which students’ phones rang during the exam.

Only three students were found to have brought notes into their exam; two had done so inadvertently, and the other received a zero grade for that course.

— Mahdhi Osman

12

News

FREE WEST PAPUA The campaign for West Papuan independence has gained momentum in New Zealand following a visit by Benny Wenda, International Spokesman for the United Liberation Movement for West Papua.

Wenda spoke at Parliament on May 10 and was on VUW’s Kelburn campus the following day for a march in support of independence, which headed to the Indonesian Embassy in Kelburn.

In his speech at Parliament, Wenda said “I come on behalf of my people — they can’t speak.”

“54 years we live under Indonesian colonialism, 54 years we cry for justice, 54 years we cry for help, but nobody hear our cry for help.”

“We want a referendum.”

Following his speech, 11 MPs from across the political spectrum signed a declaration from the International Parliamentarians for West Papua calling for an internationally supervised referendum on independence.

Wenda established the International Parliamentarians in 2008 while in exile in the United Kingdom, following an escape from prison in West Papua in 2002.

He had been charged with inciting an attack on a police station and burning two shops in Abepura, however these charges have been widely disputed as politically motivated due to Wenda’s involvement in the independence movement.

The International Parliamentarians are a cross-party group of politicians seeking to highlight the invalidity of the 1969 Act of Free Choice, the human rights abuses suffered by West Papuans at the hands of the Indonesian authorities, and “the inalienable right of the people of West Papua to determine their own future through a free and fair referendum.”

West Papua was formally annexed by Indonesia following the Act of Free Choice 1969, a series of assemblies observed by the United Nations in which 1025 elders selected by the Indonesian authorities “voted” to relinquish their sovereignty.

The Act is referred to as the “Act of No Choice” by those who assert that the voters in this referendum were coerced and under threat from the Indonesian authorities.

Green Party MP Catherine Delahunty stressed

the importance of West Papua’s right to self-determination and told Salient that the referendum needs to be independently supervised by the United Nations, as it’s not something the “government of Indonesia has any credibility to run.”

“West Papua was basically invaded by Indonesia as a result of a fraud referendum.”

Delahunty described the event at Parliament as part of a process of “working toward a recognition by the United Nations that [the people of West Papua] need this referendum,” and suggested that “the number of MPs who support West Papua has definitely grown since 2013” — the last year Wenda visited New Zealand.

A spokesperson from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade told Salient that the Head of the Ministry’s regional division dealing with Indonesia “met with Mr Wenda during his current visit to discuss the human rights situation in Papua.”

However they pointed out that “successive New Zealand governments have recognised Papua as a part of Indonesia.”

Following the march on May 11, in which protesters were confronted by Firdauzie Dwiandika, a Minister Counsellor for Political Affairs, at the Indonesian Embassy, Salient approached the Embassy for comment.

In a three page statement Dwiandika said he had “been following Benny Wenda’s activities since his arrival” but suggested “his visit is not something that is sensational and crucial to be monitored.”

Dwiandika denied the illegitimacy of the Act of Free Choice 1969 and stated, “there have been many improvements done” to Indonesia’s human rights record.

He described the 11 MPs who signed the declaration as expressing “their sympathy and support to Benny Wenda” but stated: “I do not see it as something outstanding.”

At his speech at Parliament, Wenda stressed New Zealand’s importance in the campaign: “We are close neighbours. [...] You can help us.”

“We have to start here in the Pacific.”

— Laura Toailoa and Tim Manktelow

13

News

STUDENTS BELITTLED WHEN SEEKING SEXUAL HEALTH SERVICES VUW’s Student Health Service has left a number of students feeling “belittled” and “confused.”

While students’ experiences are “usually positive,” some have reported inappropriate or inaccurate advice regarding sexual health.

A student who completed their VUW studies in 2016 reported that when receiving an STD test at Student Health in 2015, she was told by the nurse that “because Student Health has to pay for them, [she] shouldn’t be having them willy nilly.” The previous STD test she had had was two months prior.

In a similar incident in 2017, a sixth year student who was unable to pinpoint the number of sexual partners they had had between sexual health checkups was told, “I hope you’ve got it out of your system now.”

Student Health’s Assistant Medical Director Sandra Bennett told Salient, “I would consider most of our GPs would be really open and non-judgemental.”

Bennett told Salient that although their staff did not have compulsory training in regards to sexual health above that required of all doctors, “we do regular updates for all of our team, and as part of that we touch on things pertaining to sexual health.”

A fifth year student told Salient, “I had one GP who had his Bible out on the table while he was very patronisingly telling me all the bad effects of the pill I had been taking for quite some time, which I just wanted to get a repeat prescription for.” This incident occurred in 2015, and the student believed the same doctor was still employed at VUW. “[That doctor] gave me really bad advice [...] it made me feel that my quite abnormal issues to do with my reproductive system were my own fault.”

Bennett said she was “surprised and really sorry” to hear of this experience. “It’s certainly not something we’d condone, or expect.”

Another fifth year student described her experiences with student health as “a mixed bag.”

“The first thing [one] doctor said to me — which I feel like you should never say — was, you are definitely pregnant.”

The student had several pregnancy tests and an ultrasound at the doctor’s insistence in 2014. “I end-

ed up going back to the same doctor about five times, and getting the exact same thing [...] but with no solution.”

“To a point, she instilled paranoia in me, because to this day, every time I have stomach pains my response is, I must be pregnant, because that’s what that doctor told me.”

The same student was prescribed a contraceptive pill by a Student Health GP, which she later discovered she “should definitely not be on,” due to a history of blood clots in her family. The student had informed Student Health about this history.

Both fifth year students had since developed good relationships with a regular Student Health GP, though through “trial and error” and having learnt “how to work the system to [their] advantage.”

While they had not made formal complaints, they had both requested not to be seen by specific doctors.

Salient lodged an Official Information Act request with VUW regarding the number of complaints received by Student Health, but VUW failed to provide a response within the 20 working day timeframe.

The latter student said that although she was happy with her current GP, her experiences had been traumatic. “I don’t think you should have to see so many different people, and be told such shitty advice for a long period of time [...] before finding a good doctor.”

— Brigid Quirke Salient is keen to hear about your experiences with the student health and counselling services at VUW. If you feel comfortable sharing, please get in touch with news@ salient.org.nz. Anonymity ensured.

14 14 vis split critics last week with a proposal to turn the existing Ngawha prison in Northland into one run on kaupapa Māori values. With supLabour and Māori port from the Māori Party, but Recently there has been criticism criticism from National MPs like and counter-criticism over Labour’s Paula Bennett, Little emphasised relationship with Māori voters. Elec- that the idea was simply a proposal, torate seats, education, prison rates, not a confirmed policy. and historic land disputes are all isThese issues are made even more sues dogging Labour in what looks pertinent with Helen Clark confito become one of the major themes dently declaring to RNZ on May 5 in their run up to the 2017 election. that she did not regret her handling At the centre of the discussion is of the foreshore and seabed issue, the decision by Labour’s Māori elec- saying her actions had “stood the test torate MPs to remove themselves of time” and she would do nothing from list positions and stand solely differently given the advice she had. for Māori seats. Some have criticised Political commentator Matthew this decision, pointing to the fact Hooton tweeted on May 12 that that there are now no Māori candi- only “dumb and docile” Māori would dates in Labour’s top 15, and Māori vote for Labour. However many were Party co-leader Te Ururoa Flavell quick to come to Labour’s defence, went so far as to suggest the MPs with one Wellington Twitter user were “whipped” by Andrew Little. describing Hooten as “the closest However, this has been disput- thing NZ twitter has to that one ed by the MPs themselves. MP racist uncle who gets rat-faced on Kelvin Davis was quick to defend eggnog and shits himself at Christthe choice, arguing that, on current mas lunch.” polling, there would be 12 Māori MPs in the Labour caucus after the election: “We’re going to have dou- Mental Health ble figures of Māori — this is going The increasingly focus on mental to be history-making.” health in New Zealand over the Additionally, there has been last couple of weeks has culminatdebate over the inclusion of broad- ed with the resignation of comedicaster Willie Jackson on Labour’s an and mental health campaigner party list; with proponents pointing Mike King from the NZ Suicide to his work with the Māori organ- Prevention External Advisory Panel. isations like the Manukau Urban Last week The Spinoff published Māori Authority, while opponents King’s damning resignation letter, pointed to his involvement in the in which he described the panel’s 2014 Roast Busters scandal. Jackson draft proposal as “deeply flawed, and was placed at 21 on the Labour list, being conducted in bad faith,” a placement he disapproved of so adding “it would be funny if people intensely he flew to Wellington to weren’t dying.” voice his anger in person.

The resignation follows Action Labour’s negative position on Station releasing their People’s Mencharter schools was also in the spot- tal Health Report on April 19, a light recently, with their stance being story-based inquiry into 500 people’s called into question since the inclu- experiences with the New Zealand sion of Jackson, who was the driving mental health system. force behind the charter school Te The report called on the govKura Māori o Waatea. ernment to increase funding for the Finally, Labour MP Kelvin Da- mental health sector and expand

POLITICAL ROUND-UP

POLITICS access to relevant education, as well as adding to recent pressure for a Royal Commission of Inquiry into mental health services. This was followed by a supporting petition of 12,000 signatures.

The report and petition bring attention back to a January report on mental health services in Wellington, which criticised a lack of essential psychiatric attention in a series of cases which resulted in patient deaths. At the time, Mental Health Foundation Chief Executive Shaun Robinson emphasised that these issues were present across the entire country.

Reaction from the halls of power has been mixed. Health Minister Jonathan Coleman has dismissed the issue, claiming Action Station is “left wing” and “anti-government.”

However, United Future leader Peter Dunne has optimistically promised to “have a chat” with Coleman.

Labour’s Andrew Little spoke at a Health Care Summit held by Parliament on May 11 to promise a $43 million boost to mental health services through a rollout of specialist teams throughout the country. Coleman criticised this plan as being poorly thought-out, citing its lack of specificity in regard to where these teams and resources would be sourced from.

The Health Minister has walked a thin line throughout the discussions, emphasising that National values mental health as an important issue that it seeks to improve, while at the same time playing down the problem. Coleman admitted the rise of demand for mental health services, but also framed the issue as one of people not reaching out to “generally high quality” existing services.

Reaction on King’s resignation was muted, with Bill English saying he was not surprised.

— Sofia Roberts

15

Politics

of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, who was investigating him on counts of conspiracy? Mate. This is Ummm, so, drama. Our ol’ mate, the not good. This is not good at all. original wannabe-gangster himself, — Tessa Cullen Trump-dog made a move that may have finally pushed the entire world over the edge and proved he is poTHE PARTY LINE tentially the most imbecilic person in existence. News broke from CNN, at On May 3, it was revealed that the Ausaround 5.00pm on May 9, that the tralian Government had decided to stop Director of the FBI, James B. Comey subsidising New Zealand citizens and Jr. had been terminated from his Australian permanent residents to study position and was to be officially re- at higher education institutions from the moved from office immediately, due beginning of 2018. The decision means to his “mishandling of the Clinton that affected students will be charged the Email Scandal.” The backlash was domestic full-fee rate and, according to RNZ, this will push the amount they instantaneous.

Okay, so we need a bit of back- would pay to study in Australia from story here. Old chap Comey was the about $7,000 a year to about $24,000 a individual that our gal Hillary cred- year. Is this decision fair? ited with losing the election for her, after he relaunched the investigation Vic Labour into her email misuse two weeks out We have always had a close relationfrom the election last year. Trump ship with our mates over the ditch, spoke publicly after this relaunched but with their continued poor treatinvestigation, stating on multiple oc- ment these last few years, this relacasions that Comey “had guts to do tionship is losing the heat and sizzle what he did” and that he (Trump) of a good New Zealand vs. Australia has “great respect for the Director.” test match.

The poor leadership of succesHowever, it would seem that Trumpster changed his tune significantly, sive National Prime Ministers in stating (in a tweet lol) that Comey this area will result in New Zeahad “lost the confidence of almost landers living in Australia losing more rights, while their brothers everyone in Washington.”

It MUST just be a silly little co- and sisters over in New Zealand incidence that Comey was heading continue to receive preferential the investigation into the collusion treatment. Student fees at $7,000 a between the Trump campaign and year is already too much for many the Russian government during the families to afford; $24,000 a year is an insult to our close relationship. election.

National has failed to look after But wait, there’s more! Trump tweeted *eye-roll #455* on May the interests of New Zealanders and allowed us to be pushed around by a 12 that: “James Comey better hope that there bully of a big brother that needs to are no ‘tapes’ of our conversations before be reminded that our relationship is a two way street. Labour will stand he starts leaking to the press!”

Apologies for the increased pro- up for New Zealanders’ rights. fanities today, but what the FUCK is he doing? Do you realise that Trump Young Nats — Lower North Island is literally threatening, VIA A SO- The National Party has been CIAL MEDIA PLATFORM, that very clear that the special relationhe potentially wiretapped his con- ship between Australia and New versations with the former director Zealand is key to both our nations

THE TRUMP FRONT

and must be built upon by respective governments.

On the issue of student fees, the Young Nats fully agree with Prime Minister Bill English that the proposal undermines traditions of equal treatment and that a serious discussion needs to be had between Australia and New Zealand around the intent of the policy and how it will affect New Zealanders studying in Australia.

The flip side of the Australian announcement is that New Zealanders will now be eligible for student loans from the Australian government for the first time. Although this does not solve fee increases for New Zealand students, it shows the Australian government still values the special relationship with New Zealand and is not planning on abandoning it anytime soon.

— Sam Stead Greens at Vic Absolutely not. The Green Party recognises that student debt has reached crisis level and is only acting as a barrier which prevents New Zealanders from furthering their education. New Zealanders living in Australia, including many teenagers now finishing high school, are now forced to choose between enormous debt or leaving their friends and family behind. This is simply unacceptable.

The Green Party supports a return to the fee-free public tertiary education system as well as debt write off schemes and a progressive loan repayment system. These are not radical or unaffordable ideas. New Zealand and Australia are both very wealthy countries. We can afford to follow in the footsteps of many European countries who offer free or affordable tuition to both domestic and international students. Limiting globalisation is not the answer — making it work for people rather than profit is.

— Kayden Briskie

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• INTERVIEW WITH GRANT ROBERTSON • Grant Robertson is a Labour electorate MP and has held the Wellington Central seat since the 2008 election, in 2014 he won by a majority of 8,267.

Salient talked with him about local body politics, housing, immigration, and mental health. Below is a considerably shortened transcript of the interview — the full version can be found at salient.org.nz, and the audio will be broadcast on Salient FM. *** In 2014 the National Party was represented [in Wellington Central] by Paul Foster-Bell.

This year it’s Nicola Willis.

Do you think the entry of a new candidate and the continued presence of James Shaw [Green Party] will erode your majority?

We’ll have to see. As I say, I’m confident that I’ve worked hard and that people know who I am. Nicola is working very hard as a candidate, attempting to lift her profile. That’s great, that’s what it’s all about.

Equally, James has been around for a while too, people know him. I have a feeling we’ll end up with three MPs from Wellington Central in the Parliament next time. From a Wellington point of view that’ll be an increase in representation in Parliament.

Given your constituency includes a lot of students, what have you been doing and what will do to make sure you appeal to them?

On a day-to-day basis, being a constituency MP is very much about helping individuals out. We work with students from VUW and Massey University around Studylink, access to the support that they need, and accommodation issues. We’ve had a lot of students, this year especially, where we’ve been trying to help people get into flats and support them through dodgy behaviour by landlords and things like that. [...]

In March, Stuff reported that the housing crisis in Wellington has “an estimated shortage of 3500 homes.” If elected, what would Labour do to ease the pressure on the rental market for students and young families?

There’s no one single answer with housing; it is a complex issue. But we’ve committed ourselves to building tens of thousands of more affordable houses and some of those will be built in Wellington [...]. This is our KiwiBuild Policy.

Those home are built by the government, they’re not built to make a profit. That takes those first home buyers out of the private rental market which reduces the pressure on that market.

Do you think that’s one of the biggest challenges for the housing market, that there’s not enough houses — preventing the movement from renting to buying — or are there other factors at work here?

The problem with housing is that it’s a market that has completely failed. To make a market work, you need demand and supply to be in some kind of balance, and it’s completely out of balance in New Zealand so there’s massive demand for housing, but the supply hasn’t kept up. We want to build more houses, we want more houses to be available both for purchase and for rent. But you also have to manage the demand side, and that’s one of the things we announced at our congress.

We’ve got a package of things that are designed to crack down on people who are speculating in the property market: people who’ve got multiple rental properties to extract capital gain. We’re going to make sure that if you’re offshore and

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you’ve got no intention of coming to live in New Zealand then you actually can’t buy an existing home. We’re going to extend something the Government brought in, which is if you do sell an investment property — within five years, you’ll be taxed on selling that. And thirdly, we’ll crack down on this thing called negative gearing, which is essentially when people offset losses on their rental properties against their overall income and end up paying far less income tax.

We hope to reduce speculation in the property market, and therefore the demand from speculators to buy reduces and then there’ll be more properties available for others.

Health Minister Jonathan Coleman announced National’s plan to launch a new programme to increase funding, particularly to mental health and addiction services. However, National have not committed to completing a mental health inquiry to look how this funding should be allocated. You’ve expressed support for an inquiry into mental health if Labour gets into government — what would that look like?

We are seeing in mental health services some huge problems, here in Wellington — in the acute mental health ward we’ve got reports of staff working back to back shifts, not enough staff there, and people being moved out of that ward before they’re actually ready. Then you’ve got what we’d call the mild to moderate end, people who are just feeling stressed and mentally unwell, not being able to access services or find specialist services. We’ve still got horrifically high suicide rates both here in the Wellington region and more generally around New Zealand. Really big pressure, and the feedback we’re getting from inside the profession is we need a bigger overall look at what’s happening in our services to make sure we’re not letting people fall through the gaps. So that’s why we want an inquiry.

But actually there’s a lot of stuff we’ve got to do right away no matter what — one of which is to make sure that in every state secondary school [we are] providing that early access to services for young people. At the moment the government runs that programme in decile 1–3 schools. But the issues go way beyond that. [...]

In regard to youth counselling services, Evolve and VUW counselling for example, both are currently under-supported. The university counselling is funded by the Student Levy, not by the government, and Evolve almost shut last year. Are there any specific things that can be done?

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I have a lot to do with Evolve. I visited them not too long ago and they are just extremely disturbed at having to close their books because the essence of those one-stop youth health shops, is that there’s an easy availability for young people who either can’t or don’t want to go to their family GP [...]. I’ve made a commitment to Evolve that when we’re in government we’ll fund them properly.

You’ve made the point that the student counselling is funded out of the student services levy, and I’d like to see that increase, but ultimately I can’t control that decision. Although this happens because mental health is not given the priority by the government.

The government sets the funding for the district health boards (DHBs) who then organise how that’s spent in their region. The National Government removed mental health from the list of priority targets. The DHBs whose fundings have shrunk over the last nine years, have not effectively kept up with the demand for mental health services. It all stems from the fact that the Government has not made it a priority.

One final question, what’s your favourite colour?

What do you think? Red. — Laura Toailoa and Tim

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POPULIST REACTION UNLIKELY The political zeitgeist of the Western world today is undoubtedly populism, the ideology which favours a “pure people” over a “corrupt elite,” according to Political Scientist Cas Mudde. Populists have gained a number of victories recently.

In the Brexit referendum in June last year Britain voted to “take back control” from what many saw as a hostile foreign elite in Brussels. Donald Trump won the American presidency by positioning himself as an outsider who would “clear the swamp” of Washington DC and prevent ostensibly corrupt elites from holding on to power — as seen in his tendency to call his Democrat opponent “Crooked Hillary.”

The extent to which populist politics will spread in the world is difficult to predict. Fears that populists would gain power in Europe early this year were soothed by the electoral defeat of Geert Wilders and Marine Le Pen who led far-right parties in the Netherlands and France respectively. Yet uncertainty makes some New Zealand commentators question how far populism will impact this country’s politics, particularly in the upcoming general election in September.

Political Scientist Bryce Edwards wrote last year that New Zealand could experience a “popular revolt” due to declining levels of trust in Kiwi politicians, frustrations that the public are not getting what they vote for due to the “blandness and similarities” of the major parties, a crisis of economic inequality, and dissatisfaction with high levels of immigration. Some politicians have been characterised as populist by commentators and their colleagues in Parliament. NZ First leader Winston Peters has been “likened to Trump more than any other MP,” according to journalist Claire Trevett.

Other political figures have embraced populism. Gareth Morgan, leader of the recently-formed Opportunities Party, compared himself to Trump when he launched his political project. But while populist ideas clearly appeal to some voters in this country, it appears the likelihood that populism will thrive in New Zealand is low.

Income Inequality For populist leaders, inequality can be a powerful factor in gaining political support. Once the population begins to blame their unequal living standards on the “corrupt elite,” they place their faith in demagoguery. As the gap between rich and poor widens in New Zealand, voters may lash out both against what they see as a political Right vested in the interests of the rich, and a political Left, which, in its anxiety to be seen as less radical and more centrist, does little to stem rapidly rising inequality.

However, people who suffer most from economic inequalities are the least likely to vote. Philip Walker, a survey manager for Statistics New Zealand, said in 2014 that “people who feel they don’t have enough money to meet their daily needs are also less likely to vote.” Even though inequality can often cause voters to reject established political elites, as seen in France this year, the record levels of low turnout during elections in New Zealand makes it unlikely that voters would become inspired by any radical new populist movement at the moment.

Immigration However, populism thrives on public animosity towards immigration. In the United States in recent years there was little desire among lawmakers to radically

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Corruption The theme of the “pure people” against the “corrupt elite” is a fundamentally populist principle, but New Zealand politics has so little corruption that a populist backlash against dishonest lawmakers is unlikely.

The Corruption Perceptions Index ranked the country 90 points out of 100 this year, same as Denmark — often seen as the benchmark for quality of life and good governance. When politicians are found to be unethical, like Judith Collins’ meetings with her husband’s company Oravida during a state-funded tour overseas in 2013, they are often immediately reprimanded (Collins was forced to resign her Cabinet position). (Continued...)

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State Sovereignty Populism takes state sovereignty seriously.

The 52% of British voters who chose to leave the EU did so partly because they felt that their country’s sovereignty was being undermined by an unelected group of Belgian bureaucrats. They voted to “Take Back Control,” as the main Leave campaign slogan put it.

Anxiety that New Zealand’s national sovereignty is being eroded arose over the National Government’s decision to join the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP), a free trade agreement with nearly a dozen countries in the Asia-Pacific region. Critics of the TPP believe that it undermines parliamentary sovereignty by allowing international corporations to sue the government if it takes any action that challenges the corporations’ interests.

Anger over the TPP is winding down however, partly because President Trump announced that the US will no longer be part of the Partnership. If voters wanted to “take back control” in New Zealand, they would find it difficult to argue that parliamentary sovereignty is being eroded when the TPP itself is being undermined.

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reduce immigration levels. Republicans understood that a steady supply of cheap labour was essential to their businessowning supporters, and Democrats often equated opposition to the free movement of people with racism and ultra-nationalism. US voters who opposed immigration began to feel as if they had no political choice in this matter, until Donald Trump gave them a chance to “build a wall” along the Mexican border.

Uneasiness over immigration is growing in New Zealand, with immigrants coming to be seen as burdensome for urban infrastructure and an already over-stretched housing market. In what Duncan Garner has labelled an “expensive addiction,” New Zealand’s immigration levels have reached a high of 70,000 immigrants entering the country per year, meaning that the country’s total population will reach five million in 2019, according to some estimates.

Despite this, unhappiness among the electorate over immigration is unlikely to spur populism in New Zealand. Voters have a choice over immigration issues in the upcoming election: they can side with the currently pro-immigration National Government, which believes migrants are good for economic growth, or they can support Labour, which recently announced it will cut immigration by the “tens of thousands” if elected in September.

According to a recent Newshub Reid Research poll, just over half of New Zealanders favoured reducing immigration.

Despite bitterness over this issue, antiimmigrant parties are just not popular enough to encourage populist ideas to enter our mainstream politics.

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But populism is as much about countering perceived corruption as it is about countering actual corruption. The UK was perceived by Brexit supporters as being controlled by dishonest elites in Westminster and Brussels, yet it placed tenth on the Corruption Perceptions Index.

Part of the reason of this perception of corruption is that news media in the UK and US are viewed as a stooge of the lawmakers, doing little more than public relations work. Donald Trump railed against what he saw as the “fake news” media bubble, where newspapers and television networks were supposedly biased towards liberals and unfairly antagonistic towards conservative politicians.

However, there are few people who claim that the major newspapers and media outlets in New Zealand have a bias towards any one political party or movement. There are political blogs and some opinion columnists who often favour certain political parties and stances, but the media organisations report events honestly without favour to any particular group.

Establishment Politics Populist leaders are more effective if they are seen to have nothing to do with the political establishment. Figures like Donald Trump, who had no political experience prior to his election, and France’s Marine Le Pen (who, despite being part of the Le Pen family political dynasty, was always on the fringe of mainstream French politics), became trusted by large numbers of voters who saw them as the polar opposite to the career politicians who they despised.

New Zealand’s own “populist” leaders are still seen as part of the establishment

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that they themselves criticise. Winston Peters, for example, despite being described by former Prime Minister John Key as “the Nigel Farage of New Zealand” (Britain’s UKIP party leader and one of the staunchest supporters of Brexit), is no political outsider, having served as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs in two different governments between 1996 and 2008. A political veteran, Peters has been an MP since 1978, when Green Party co-leader James Shaw was five years of age. Peters does not have the benefit of being a political outsider, which is the hallmark of successful populist leadership.

Successful populist movements require leadership from a demagogue who holds the establishment with contempt, but New Zealand’s apparently populist leaders are either of the establishment, or too unpopular to come close to parliament. For example, Gareth Morgan, who sees himself as a version of President Trump, is unlikely to enter parliament. One Newshub poll in March found that the Opportunities Party, polling at 0.8%, is well under the 5% threshold. Populist leaders gain support from members of the public who are politically alienated. The issues which affect them are important to address, and parties would be wise to take note of them in the upcoming election. But for now, a populist backlash will not characterise New Zealand politics as it has all over the Western world.

— Aidan Kelly

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COMPASSION SOUP KITCHEN

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housing inquiries. Meals are provided from Monday to Friday, with free breakfast and a small $2.00 contribution for dinner.

Most importantly, there is no judgment here, but a welcoming environment where understanding and compassion are key in creating the foundation of this organisation.

The Compassion Soup Kitchen’s Te Hā Tangata: Human Library on Homelessness (with support from Kahungunu Whānau Services, Massey University, and the New Zealand National Commission for UNESCO) is a beautiful project that provides a platform for the guests of the Compassion Soup Kitchen as the “books” and the public as “readers”. It allows the homeless community to tell their story in attempt to generate understanding and compassion for people in different circumstances than our own. Each story is told in their own words, and far too often these voices and stories aren’t given an opportunity to be heard and appreciated.

To find out more jump on the Facebook page: Te Hā Tangata: Human Library on Homelessness.

Their survival relies on donations, and this week is is their biggest fundraiser — their Annual Street Appeal on May 26. They will be on the Kelburn campus, so if there are any coins scattered at the bottom of your bag, maybe reconsider donating them to the Lab. If you’d like to get involved and volunteer, check out the Notices section for more information.

Although it may seem easier to turn the volume up and look the other way, the reality is that “unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better.”

— Elizabeth Gaiduch

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It’s a classic wet, windy Wellington day; your face is numb from the ferocious wind and your spirits are only slightly heightened by your toasty hands from your gloves nana made you last Christmas. Your “trash music” Spotify playlist is booming in your ears as you forget the readings you have to do. As you walk out of Kelburn you see her, looking around anxiously as she grabs her bedding from the boot.

As she looks up, your eyes meet, and you see the ingrained fatigue caused by the thought of spending another night driving around to find a place to park that won’t attract too much attention. You bow your head and look the other way as you pass.

The problem of homelessness in New Zealand has slowly gotten worse as the “most developed and socially accepting” century has blossomed. A study by the University of Otago showed that since 2013 one in 100 individuals considered themselves homeless: living in severely crowded houses, motels, boarding houses, in cars, or on the streets. The New Zealand Census concluded that 41,075 individuals fell under the definition of homeless; that is 1.5% of the overall population.

The fear that this problem is not getting better may seem disheartening. However there is always something that we can do: donating, volunteering, or just stopping to listen and understand.

This is where Compassion Soup Kitchen — Te Pūaroha comes in. This organisation has been one of New Zealand’s longest running community groups, aiding people in harsh living conditions for the last 116 years. Based in Te Aro, people are free to come and relax here, with access to computers, internet, and printing three days a week, as well as social workers who provide emotional and health support and help with practical needs such as

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PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS Last week I had the pleasure of watching more than 2200 VUW students walk across the stage at the Michael Fowler Centre at graduation.

If you were one of them, congratulations!

You did it. Graduating is no mean feat.

Although, if you graduated and are reading this it probably means you are still on campus doing further study, so before you’ve had time to say ALOHA UNIVERSITY you’ll be walking back up the Kelburn hill. I salute you, and I hope that you have taken some time to celebrate.

I’ve been lucky enough to hang out with the graduation speakers at each ceremony, and have heard some bloody great speeches. It’s been a reminder of the phenomenal people that make up our student body, and the vastly different and extraordinary things they are doing.

Rebekah Fistonich gave a powerful and compelling speech challenging our institutional spaces to break down what is often a Pākehā male worldview that shapes them, and become more inclusive for all. It was heartening to see truth to power being spoken in a forum like that.

Liam Malone of course was not your usual grad speaker. How he managed five papers while training to win two gold medals, I do not know.

Let us just sit and be inspired by that.

For all of you who are scrolling through your feed seeing glamorous photos of gowns, trenchers, and big smiles — graduation can seem like a distant fantasy. It is the glowing gates of heaven while you are currently in the depths of hell — a.k.a. hunched over a laptop in the Hub at 2am crawling your way through an essay.

Although it may seem as though the thousands of students who graduated are superhuman, they’re really not. They found the support they needed to get through to the end, and you will find it too.

— Rory Lenihan-Ikin

VUWSA “I ain’t never seen @MarlonCDrake at a club, or doing activities!” — @markyman90.

Well shit, @markyman90, that’s quite a twitter beef you’re starting there. But seeing as I haven’t exactly publicised what I’m up to, and I haven’t been in town for a while, I figured this is a good opportunity to give you an update what’s been keeping me busy.

The last couple of months have been a blast.

On the activities side of things, being a part of our Living Wage Day on May 10 in the Hub was a highlight. The atmosphere was charged, and we had brilliant engagement from students and staff who all supported a living wage for those working at VUW. The Living Wage at Vic movement is one I am immensely proud of and am fortunate enough to have played my humble part in. Our work is not done yet!

Keep an eye out for the movement and how you can get involved.

On the clubs side of things, I’ve happily attended a bunch of club events with members of the VUWSA team to see what our campus clubs are getting up to, and have begun to look at how VUWSA can help out. This has included a French Society Breakfast just downstairs in Room 219 of the Student Union Building, to the VUW Athletics Club’s University Relays all the way out in Paekakariki. We provided a marquee for the relays which is a perfect example of one of the ways VUWSA can help. If you want us at your event, just slide me an email!

Behind the scenes, the Clubs Council have chosen our three goals for the year and split off into working groups, making sure VUWSA is going to provide for clubs this year.

Presidents, keep an eye out for resources as the year progresses.

Colleagues, if you haven’t joined a club already, it’s never too late!

— Marlon Drake

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TE ARA TAUIRA Dear Janices Everywhere “I’m sick of hearing that Māori need different treatment, if they don’t want to live in our society then how about we put them all on an island and leave them to it.” — Janice This statement would be easier to dismiss if our tamariki weren’t the ones suffering.

It’s problematic — statements like this only kindle the negative stereotyping of an oppressed culture. It is what justifies the awful correlation between being Māori and being poor, uneducated, or criminal. The ones who lose in the end are our tamariki. Because they are brought up in a world where they have to prove, in fact, that being Māori has nothing to do with any of those things. I am proud to be Māori, I am not proud of how Māori are treated.

We’ve seen the statistics. We know that Māori are more likely to be subject to socio-economic situations including high unemployment, low educational achievement, poor housing standards, and poor health.

And we all know how this narrative ends, because each of these factors lead to a higher propensity for crime. After considering these factors, it is not surprising that Māori make up the majority of the prison population in New Zealand.

Now let’s stop there for a minute and take a look at our criminal justice system. In August 2016 the Waitangi Tribunal held an inquiry into the Department of Corrections. A claim, brought by Tom Hemopo, sought accountability for the Department’s failure to reduce Māori reoffending rates. Attempts to improve rates of reoffending have been ineffective, and this (arguably) is because the government’s interventions use tikanga as an add-on, rather than an integral part of intervention. The appointment of Māori cultural experts, the use of pōwhiri, and the inclusion of Māori language in parts of therapy means that the Department of Corrections can tick the boxes — but it’s really not enough. It just doesn’t make sense — why use a predominantly European system to engage with a population that is significantly

Māori? It seems obvious: to achieve meaningful participation we need a system in which Māori can express ourselves and build aspirations.

Sir Eddie Durie highlighted two goals that are paramount to rehabilitation for Māori; the development of a secure identity, and the strengthening of relationships across spiritual, mental, physical, and social experiences.

Durie believes an understanding of whakapapa, relationships, history, and tikanga Māori is paramount to spiritual, cultural, and physical wellbeing. And to deny these connections is to deny people their birthright to their identity, and the kaupapa that has been passed down by their ancestors. The main difference between models such as Durie’s and the current system is that Māori take a more holistic approach.

The predominant cognitive behavioural therapy model focuses on altering dysfunctional thoughts and beliefs, but whānau concepts such as Te Whare Tapa Wha view overly selfreferential thinking as unhealthy.

I’m not saying that prescribing these models is the answer to everything. I am saying that it is time we considered a different approach.

Because currently, Māori make up about 50% of the prison population, despite being only 12.5% of the total New Zealand population.

So excuse me Janice, if you think that Māori get “preferential treatment”. But a biscuit won’t really cut it when you’ve been starving us for 177 odd years.

It is so clear that our current system cannot and will not cater to Māori. As Betty said to Riverdale, “we need to be better.” It is time that we took a different approach, the status quo is not working. It is simply not good enough to use a Pākehā-oriented programme and just slap on a few Māori words to call it “Māori”.

Ngā mihi.

— Nā Indiana Shewen

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Super Science Trends

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TO THE AUTONO-MOBILE!

There’s an old writing adage that a good sci-fi writer imagines the car, but the great sci-fi writer imagines the traffic jam. And now that we’re beginning to make science fiction into science reality, we have to start working out how to prevent those traffic jams before they happen. When it comes to self-driving cars (or autonomous vehicles, if you’re fancy), this isn’t even a metaphor. If we’re going to give our cars intelligence to avoid accidents, we have to give serious thought to how they are going to use it to keep us safe.

Currently, Uber and Google are both in the process of rolling out their own autonomous vehicles, and most Tesla cars come preprogrammed with an Autopilot(™), which uses a combination of cameras, radar, and ultrasonics to give a complete 360° view around itself, like a cyborg dolphin on steroids. The car can “see” perfectly through rain, fog, snow, and even past the cars around it, allowing it to judge its perimeters to avoid pedestrians and obstacles to decrease the risk of accidents — you would never have to worry about drunk drivers ever again. But this won’t stop accidents from happening altogether, and this is where we get into Rick and Morty territory.

Every first year philosophy student and their cornered relative has heard of the trolley problem, the thought experiment where you are faced with choosing the path of an out-of-control rail tram.

There are five people tied to the tracks ahead of the trolley, but there is an alternate track with one person on it. You have the choice to either do nothing and let the trolley barrel through and kill five people, or flip a switch that will divert the trolley’s path to the other track and kill only one person. While it’s likely you’ll never be in this situation in your life, the trolley hypothetical becomes a reality when considering the ethics of the self-driving car.

For instance, if an autonomous vehicle carrying passengers was approaching a crossing and its brakes failed, the car could make one of two choices: either (1) swerve to avoid crossing pedestrians, hit a wall, and potentially kill its

passengers, or (2) run over the pedestrians and continue on its path, leaving its passengers unharmed (at least, physically). The car’s designers will need to program it’s software to solve these ethical issues in real time, giving thought experiment concrete answers, putting philosophers out of a job (not that they have any anyway, hey-oooooo!).* If you really want to have to some fun with this and/or question everything about your own interpersonal ethics, MIT set up a website called the Moral Machine (http://moralmachine. mit.edu/) where you get to play the role of an autonomous vehicle and decide which out of two deadly scenarios you find most ethical to live with, with some ridiculous but not entirely implausible qualifiers. Would you run over two doctors and a fat person to spare your passengers of two cats, a dog, and a pregnant woman, or collide with a wall to spare the pedestrians, but kill your passengers? It’s the trolley problem ad absurdum, but it raises some interesting questions about what we prioritise in our personal ethics and what sacrifices we’re willing to make in the name of safety.

So if we really want to make self-driving cars succeed, we’ll also need to make them into philosophers. Next time you go to your dealership, you may have to choose between a Sun Subaru, a Rene De-Car, or a David Vrume. *Jokes, I minored in Philosophy for BSc points so I am One To Talk.

— Gus Mitchell

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PHILOSORAPTOR What does it mean to possess true freedom?

Although we traditionally believe that freedom consists in protection from direct restrictions on our actions, some philosophers believe that this conception does not adequately capture what we mean by “freedom.”

Elizabeth Anderson provides an illuminating example: consider two alternative societies, one that lacks traffic lights and traffic regulations (call this Society A) and one that has them (Society B). In Society A, there are no legal restrictions on my freedom to drive as I wish, so in the traditional sense I am completely free; but at the same time, all of the roads are clogged with traffic jams, such that I can barely drive anywhere. In Society B, despite the fact that the government interferes with me coercively by banning me from driving through red lights, I can more easily drive wherever I want.

The traditional definition of freedom would suggest that I am more free in Society A; but it seems that in the truly important sense of freedom, the sense that I would actually care about, I am more free in Society B. This notion of freedom as consisting in “what we can actually do” has been deeply explored in philosophy. In particular, it forms the basis for the Capabilities Approach, a theory created and developed by the philosopher/ economist Amartya Sen and the philosopher Martha Nussbaum. The approach seeks to offer a comprehensive method of measuring individual and social well being. It argues that we should evaluate people’s welfare by their “capabilities” — their actual ability to pursue their goals and projects. A person’s capabilities depend on a wide variety of factors: their social and political freedoms, their economic well being (it’s difficult to pursue your goals if you’re living in crippling poverty), their health, and so forth. The Capabilities Approach thus offers a very holistic picture of the well being of societies and individuals.

Sen and Nussbaum believe that their theory is superior in many ways to other theories of social well being and regulation: for example, utilitarian theories which state that we ought to maximise total happiness, or libertarian theories which claim that the state should never interfere in people’s lives. They emphasise two advantages in particular. The first is that their theory is value-pluralistic — since it imposes no restrictions on what people’s goals should be, it does not privilege any particular lifestyle over any other, and is committed to the liberal values of tolerance and diversity.

In this sense it is superior to utilitarianism, which reduces everything to happiness and may not care about lives which are unhappy but contain many other valuable elements.

The second is that it strikes a balance between caring about individual rights and caring about actual outcomes. In this sense it is superior to libertarianism, which cares only about rights; the Capabilities Approach is more permissive, for example, towards redistribution which radically improves the lives of the worst off.

Philosophical discussions are often confined to academia, and it is rare that a philosophical idea has a profound impact on the real world.

The Capabilities Approach is one of those rare instances. Sen and Nussbaum’s work has influenced policy makers, development economists, and many other social scientists around the world: for example, Sen’s writings on capabilities strongly influenced the development of the UN’s Human Development Index, a measure of a country’s well being which aims to rival traditional, solely financial measures like GDP or GNP. — Shakked Noy

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Columns

VOICE OF V-ISA How to cope with homesickness: a beginner’s guide 1) Virtual tours via Whatsapp, Messenger, Viber, or Wechat Alone in a strange new country and want to explore but no friends or family to do it with?

Take them with you, virtually, by spamming them with messages, pictures, and videos.

Example: Me: Hey bro what you up to?

Come with me for a hike?

Bro: Work. Sure.

Me: I’ve just reached the summit. Check out the view from here!”

Me: *sends panoramic views* *sends video of trek to the top* *sends lengthy paragraphs describing the entire experience.* 2) Make friends back home jealous with all your new experiences They may seem like they’re having all the fun, but what’s stopping you from topping that?

Example: Go for a kayak at dusk. Take shots of Wellington harbour bathed in gold.

Instagram said shots. Hashtag #purenewzealand.

Wait for jealous friends to come and visit you in this amazing place you now live in.

3) Go to events even if you don’t actually want to You know that movie night you’ve been ummaaahing about for two weeks — take some advice from Shia LaBeouf and JUST DO IT. You won’t regret it. Well you might, but take a chance that you will actually enjoy yourself even though you didn’t spend the evening tucked up in bed with a milo in the company of your three best friends: you, yourself, and you.

4) Teach other people about your culture and add a little bit of your world to NZ Wellington is already a melting pot of cultures, but we could always use a bit more! Think how great it would feel to know you’ve left something more of yourself than just the “______ waz hea” scrawled on a table in KK303.

— Hannah Wee

VIC UFO CW: sexual harassment, sexual assault I have been scared for most of my life. I am scared of the boy on the bus who sits down next to me even though there are plenty of free seats. His hand is on my leg and I try to convince myself it’s an accident. I am scared of my housemate who looms above me, and when he shows me how much stronger than me he is, it makes my heart jump. I am scared of the men I work with who laugh about lad nights out and their pack mentality.

I am scared of the man who walks behind me in the dark as I come home from town and I pull out my phone, pretending I am talking to someone, praying he will go away. I am scared of my cousins who make jokes about girls in the kitchen and comment on the length of the skirt of a girl we know, forgetting that she is underage, not realising they are sexualising a child. I am scared of the tutor who seems a little too smiley and wants to see me alone and logic tells me there is no reason to be afraid but past experience tells me otherwise. I am scared of my lecturers who rush through slides on feminism and who do not condemn students who scoff and say how unnecessary it all is.

I am scared of the man double my age who held me down on his bed and put his hand up my dress and only stopped when I fought him off and ran.

I am scared of the boy who continued to have sex with me after I told him not to, after I cried out no, after I tried to push him away.

I have been scared for most of my life and now I am very scared for my daughters.

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Columns

MAURI ORA At busy times everyone is stressed, lecturers and students alike. In times like this, the Serenity Prayer is my go-to: “…Grant me the serenity to accept what I cannot change, the courage to change what I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.” I’ve always struggled with the wisdom bit myself, but find the rest really helpful.

I can’t change the past: not having a topic a week before due date, not writing anything until the day before, my dog dying, Trump sacking the FBI director, my flatmate’s meltdown, my neighbours’ domestic (leading to my mind prioritising the potential murder next door), and my lecturer’s penalty for late work. I’m not always good at controlling my internal state — anxiety may hijack my attention when a “perfect storm” of stressors is upon me.

So, I need a dose of serenity. Perspective helps.

Reminding myself of other important areas of my life — connecting with friends, physical exercise, appreciating nature, remembering that in five years this all-important assignment and the odd failed course will be lost in the mists of memory.

A dose of courage also helps — e.g. the courage to acknowledge that an assignment is important to me, and to make room for difficult feelings when I dare to start early.

“But what about the uni giving me a break,” I hear you cry. The Assessment Handbook is a mine of useful information for advocating for ourselves and others — http://www.victoria. ac.nz/about/governance/strategy/academic-policies.

Student Counselling encourages students to contact their lecturers directly and ask for latitude. Don’t be put off by lecturers who say in advance that extensions will not be given in any circumstances. Lecturers must give latitude in certain circumstances. Ask the question and seek advice if your course coordinator seems unduly harsh. No one benefits where students fail.

— John Barclay

TOKEN CRIPPLE I am fourteen or so lying on a table for an x-ray. This is a familiar prone position, I lie and look up at the machine and breathe out, wait for the gentle click, the light that makes me feel like I am being photocopied. I notice the body of the machine has been decorated with bold, cheerful stickers to entertain and distract small children while they lie there — stars, smiley faces, clownfish; the usual suspects.

This is a familiar event. Since I was born ten weeks early and with Cerebral Palsy there was always a concern of hip-dysplasia, where your hips come out of their sockets, and scoliosis, curvature of the spine. The scoliosis has been aggravated by spending the large part of every day since I started school seated in my wheelchair leaving me stooped and shorter than both my identical twin and younger sister. My hips however have stayed firmly in place. Every year when this is reported I feel a little proud of them for exceeding expectations.

Being born with a disability is to have a body that is full of potential. A body perpetually in a state of becoming. A state that is more accentuated than the usual ebbs and flows of living because more people talk it about more often. My body has always existed in relation to a body it could have been (able-bodied like my twin’s) and/or one it could now become (more or less able relative to itself ). In both cases the desired direction was towards more normal.

Particularly when I was still growing, the objective of doctors, physios, and parents was to get closer to this elusive measure. Though my parents never wanted me to feel like having a disability was a “bad thing” per se, they also wanted to maximise the number of ways I could be independent from them in the future. They had that expectation of me just as they did of their other kids, part of my being normal.

Being born with a disability also means that my abnormal body is normal. Not in comparison to other bodies around me, or what it could or might have been, but that it is normal for me to inhabit. As a general rule I trust it to function well albeit within a different set of parameters to other bodies.

— Henrietta Bollinger

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Columns

SPORT TOO MUCH OF A GOOD THING

Winning does strange things to a fandom.

Since their first test match in 1903 the All Blacks have maintained a winning percentage in the high 70s and have only lost to seven of the 19 test playing nations, with Ireland securing their first win over the All Blacks in 30 matches just the other year. Yet reading the Stuff article following the All Blacks World Cup win in 2011, an ignorant reader could be forgiven for thinking they were a historically tortured team.* On the other hand, nothing strengthens a fandom more than consistent losing. It makes a fan hard and cynical, but the curse of fandom is a short memory, as all past pain must be forgotten by the next match when redemption is always possible. In New Zealand this type of fandom is exemplified by the Warriors. Like little brothers to the All Blacks, the Warriors have yet to win the National Rugby League (NRL) title, though they have come bitterly close. Yet every new season the same old adage is expounded by media pundits and fans alike: “this is the year.”

The All Blacks exemplify the inverse of this theory. Consistent winning has soiled the taste buds of the fandom. Winning is the expectation, rather than something the All Blacks do; “winning” has become something they are.

This in turn has required the denial of “losing”, the very thing that makes winning taste so sweet.In this context winning has become less a triumph and more a slow, excruciating release of those expectations and the tension that maintaining them creates. Hence why that Stuff article reads like a funeral avoided rather than a celebration of winning.

That is to say, I would rather sit with a Warriors fan when they lose than to sit with an All Blacks fan as they win. *http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/rugbyworld-cup/5838469/All-Blacks-are-Rugby-WorldCup-champs — Tom Danby

TINDER SUPRISE I thought this week I would write about something that all of us could relate to (well most of us, unless you’re super lucky and can afford laser hair removal): pubes.

No teacher in health class told us that hair grows not only on our pubic mound… but all around the back too?! Who cares about armpit hair — no one told me I was gonna get butt hair. Growing up I was insecure about my pubes. I remember when I was young a friend asked me why I had drawn pen on me, which was pretty embarrassing.

God I hated my pubes — I thought something was wrong with me.

When I was a teen and venturing into the new world of sex, I thought that as a women I HAD TO remove my pubic hair (a dumb concept tbh). I shaved lots but it was so fucking itchy when it grew back. I had my first ever brazilian in 2014 — it hurt, but it was nice because trying to shave your pubes in the shower was getting a bit difficult.

After being single for a year and engaging with a lot of different humans in a sexual manner, I realise that most people don’t actually give a fuck about your pube status. I used to worry that most people fucking me from behind would be turned off by my butt hairs but I think they’re more focused on their genitalia feeling good (my theory anyway).

So anyway, I would like to dedicate this week to pubes. Your pubes are your own and you can do what you want with them.

Shave, wax, tweeze, laser, or give them a wee comb and condition. Love your pubies!

Much intimacy, Tinder surprise xoxo

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Features

WE CAN’T TAKE IT FOR GRANTED: ACADEMIC FREEDOM IN HUNGARY Written by Lily Phillips

Academic freedom is under attack in Hungary, where a new law could see the closure of a prominent independent institution, the Central European University (CEU). On April 4, the Hungarian parliament passed a motion to regulate the country’s 28 foreign universities by requiring them to have a campus or offer courses in their country of origin. Observers believe the Hungarian legislation, fast-tracked through parliament without public consultation, is designed to exile the CEU from Budapest.

Under the new rules, the university will need to open a campus in the US, and teaching staff will require work permits; stringent requirements that could effectively force the CEU to close its doors. Of the 28 foreign universities in Hungary, the CEU is the only one affected by the provision that now requires a university to have a campus in its country of origin. In a statement, the CEU called the law a “premeditated political attack on a free institution.”

Founded by Hungarian-American billionaire George Soros in 1991, the CEU was intended to revive intellectual freedom and act as a bastion of liberal thought and democracy in post-Communist Eastern Europe. Accredited both in New York State and in Hungary, the CEU has over 1400 students from 108 countries, and provides outreach initiatives to refugees.

A Victoria alumna studying at the CEU described the recent events as a shock. Students were informed of legislation targeting the CEU, “but none of us knew the severity of it. It happened really quickly and took us by surprise.”

The university could face closure as early as 2018 if it cannot comply with the law, jeopardising the future of its students and over 600 staff. The strong academic community at the CEU “is why people care about it so much, and why the threatening legislation has been met with so much shock and outrage. It’s not just shutting down the university — people have lives here.”

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Features Guides

But the CEU is not going down without a fight.

An estimated 80,000 protesters took to the streets of Budapest on April 9 and protests have continued over the past month. They have gained support from academics, institutions, and public figures around the world. The alumna said, “it’s been amazing to see how the students and community — the staff, teachers, and alumni — have mobilised, and to see academics round the world supporting CEU.” The protests by the people of Budapest “show the important place of the CEU in Hungarian academic culture and Budapest.

It’s not just a school for international students, it has a greater significance and role.” For Hungarians, the targeting of the CEU is far from random — it’s deeply symbolic.

• The CEU has been drawn into a broader conflict about the future direction of Hungary and has come to represent freedom of speech and freedom of inquiry in an increasingly repressive society. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Mihály Orbán has argued that “the era of liberal democracies is over” and Hungary must “construct a new state built on illiberal and national foundations,” naming Russia, China, Turkey, and Singapore as models.

Following a landslide victory by the Conservative coalition of Fidesz (Orbán’s party) and the Christian Democratic Party in 2010, the Government used its supermajority to rush through a new constitution in only one month. The most controversial aspect of the new constitution relates to checks and

Protests in support of the CEU. April 9, 2017.

Bernadett Szabo. Reuters.

balances on governmental power, in particular the Constitutional Court. Fidesz reduced the Court’s powers by amending rules to allow the governing majority to appoint constitutional judges without negotiation with the opposition, increasing the number of positions on the bench, and filling these new positions with party allies.

With 11 Fidesz-confirmed judges out of 15, the court is no longer an effective counterbalance to government power.

Other reforms have included the possibility for the “emergency dismissal” of civil servants in cases of “loss of trust,” and fines on media for content deemed “not politically balanced,” as judged by a governmentappointed panel.

The main rivals to Fidesz are the Socialist Party, which secured a quarter of the vote in the 2014 election, and the far-right, radical nationalist Jobbik party, which gained 20% of the votes. However, even if Fidesz were to lose in the 2018 election, many policies are now enshrined in the new Constitution. Changes to social and economic policies entrenched in the Constitution are now off the table without another supermajority.

Orbán’s leadership has seen record low unemployment, a reduction in the budget deficit, and economic growth. However, health care and public education have suffered and the relative poverty rate has increased. Hungary has seen the largest increase in child poverty over recent years of all European Union (EU) countries. While their policies continue to exacerbate these social problems, Orbán and the Fidesz Party have taken the populist approach of presenting themselves as the saviours of a pure Hungary under attack from the EU, an influx of illegal immigration, and traitorous internal forces such as foreignsponsored NGOs. In response to the refugee crisis, a fence was built along Hungary’s southern border and a set of amendments enabled police to apprehend asylum seekers crossing the border and “escort” them back onto Serbian soil. Orbán’s strong anti-immigrant rhetoric has emphasised that Hungary must “preserve its ethnic homogeneity” and has sought to discourage refugees with legal status from remaining in the country by eliminating funding and supports for integration.

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Lily Phillips

We can’t take it for granted: Hungary and Academic Freedom Guides

Under a new asylum law approved by Parliament in March, Hungary will now be able to detain asylum seekers, including children, in camps surrounded by razor wire. The asylum seekers can be held until their cases are resolved, which can take months. Further, hundreds of asylum seekers already in Hungary may be relocated to the camps, which the government strictly controls access to, denying journalists entry. Orbán has rejected UN criticism of the policy as “charming human rights nonsense.”

• In light of this wave of illiberalism, the swell of support for the CEU following the legislation that threatens it with closure seems to have caught the Government on the back foot.

According to the VUW alumna, “Hungarians are more angry about it than CEU students are: ultimately the university will survive, but the biggest loss will be for the Hungarian people.

They’re angry and feeling the loss more deeply.”

In a Publicus Intézet survey, 63% of Hungarians opposed the Government’s targeting of CEU and only 14% supported closing the university.

When the 80,000 protesters took to the streets of Budapest on April 9, pro-Government media claimed protesters were bussed in or given free plane tickets. The Budapest Beacon reported strange visits from uniformed men to the homes of demonstrators, although the police quickly denied their involvement. These actions fit Orbán’s targeting of the CEU, and its founder, the Jewish billionaire Soros, who has been cast as the villain in Orbán’s nationalist narrative. The president of the CEU, Michael Ignatieff, has stressed that the university is an independent institution and not beholden to Soros. However, Soros is accused of using NGOs to meddle in Hungarian politics and encourage illegal immigration. Currently proposed legislation would see tighter scrutiny of NGOs, yet another provocative act that will test Hungary’s relations with the EU. On April 26, the European Commission announced it would start infringement proceedings against Hungary — an EU member state, beholden to its laws and membership obligations — over its new rules on foreign-

registered universities. Frans Timmermans, the First Vice-President of the European Commission, was concerned that the law unfairly targeted the CEU. The European Commission’s proceedings require Hungary to prove the legality of the legislation within a month.

However, any eventual legal action by the EU could take years — too late for the CEU, which would be forced to move elsewhere. Although rumours have circulated about relocation to Vienna, the CEU affirmed in a press release that it would fight to stay in Budapest.

For students, the sudden change in fortune of the CEU is a surreal experience.

The VUW alumna reflected that “it feels like I’m in a weird reality TV show right now.

In New Zealand, we’re used to earthquakes, but not things like this — this is massive.” In addition to attending classes and completing assignments as usual, students now have another task: defending the very existence of their alma mater, and of academic freedom in Hungary. “In the long term, I think the CEU will become stronger. People are still going to learn and teach. If there’s a chance to stay, people will fight for it.”

Although the fate of the CEU might seem far removed from New Zealand, which has a friendly relationship with Hungary, the closure of the prestigious university would set a worrying precedent for Europe and the rest of the world. With VUW facing its own questions around its Academic Freedom policy, the situation in Hungary is a wakeup call: “We should care because we take academic freedom for granted. What happens in Eastern Europe — it does affect you, in ways you don’t know. We should care about education as a principle, and we should give a damn about what happens elsewhere in the world.”

Olivia Hunter olivia.hunter3@gmail.com

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Written by Anon

Written by Anon

Features

SOUTH COAST, Wellington — When low down in the CBD it can be Hot as all hell. A 4WD roars by and hard to gain perspective. The dark green the plume of dustCOAST, stings in the light — Hot of Town Belt forms anand enclosing SOUTH Wellington as the all hell.

A 4WD roars by the plume dust stings the light wind.

We’ve been justfocus short inward. wind. We’ve beenofdropped justinshort border wall anddropped turns the of the Devil’s a kilometre Rocks carpark, andcurve of the of the Devil’s Gate, aGate, kilometre or soor so from Thethe cityRed is contained by the our packs are lined up at the base of the cliffs that were quarried to from the Red Rocks carpark, and our harbour and the way out isbuild clear north the airport.

Despite the Council’s attempt to restore the area the early packs are lined up at the base of the up the motorway, or in south via ferry, or 2000s, scars remain; impressive, giant — material traces of the cliffs that werethe quarried to build the to steps the hub that is the airport. city it supports. Before us is the sea, listless and blue. airport. Despite the Council’s attempt Yet another way presents itself: Packs on and up and over Devil’s Gate. On the decline we’re passed to restore the area in the early 2000s, to keep walking from Redwith Rocks. by a black 4WD handled by a mulleted guy wearing speed dealers the scars remain; impressive, giant steps There’s no set trail.

No handy an open bottle of Export Gold in the hand, not a drop spilled as his truck — material the the cityrocks. it supports. signsuptelling how rockstraces its wayofover He hoons DOC off kicking sand. Ayou layer of far to go.

Before us is the listless andforearms blue. and the There’s thatback band grime hassea, settled on my sweatjust on the of of mysand neck.and stone Packs on and upThe andsun over Devil’s rock that separates the Cook Strait Trudging. is high and theand mountains of the South Island poke haze.

Trudging. bogs the and hills slowsthat the feet andabruptly the Gate. On thethrough declinethe we’re passed

by Sandfrom jut up — the inside the and the mouth. a black mind.

4WDIt’s handled by aboots mulleted legacy of Wellington’s active fault lines. guy wearing speed dealers with an Occasionally there’s a little rough grass go dark, dark wind, earth. The rest is a open bottle of Export Gold“Sea in the andwith compacted Feet go heavy, heavy with sand.” hand, not a drop spilled as his truck slow and endless trudge through — Allen Curnow, “Wild Iron” rocks its way over the rocks. He the borderlands. hoons off kicking up sand. A layer of  4WDs cruise past, free wheeling. grime has settled on my forearms and Flicking up sand andI blasting East is the harbour, south is the sea, and north is where am from.music. the sweat neck. that in Wellington, They gathera in groups around an Buton tothe the back west? of It’smy a question citysmall nestled against Trudging.

Thesurround sun is high and opportune rock —than the occupants sizzle, the hills that Tara’s harbour, generates little more a halfthe mountains the South Island Whensome in black wetCBD water gear, others registeredof“Karori?” or “Makara?” low down in the it can be hardthe to gain perspective. dark green of the forms poke through haze.

Trudging.The Sand lounge andTown drinkBelt beer.

TheanRock FM enclosing border inward. by smile. bogs and slows the feetwall andand the turns mind.the focus plays.

We The walkcity by,isI contained grin a cracked the curve of the harbour and the way out is clear north up the motorway, It’s inside the boots and the mouth.

Two quadbikes pull up. Ministry or south via ferry, or to the hub that is the airport. Industries Police. The south of Primary another way presents itself: to keep walking from Red Rocks.

“Sea goYet dark, dark with wind, sands sheriffs with black riot helmets There’s no set trail. No handy DOC signs telling you how far to go.

Feet go heavy, heavy with sand.” and polarised wrap rounds. Fuck me, There’s just that band of sand and stone and rock that separates the Cook —Strait Allenfrom Curnow, “Wild Iron” too. the hills that jut up abruptlyblonde — the moustaches legacy of Wellington’s active fault lines. Occasionally there’s a little rough grass and compacted is a slow and endless trudge “Where youthe boys headed?” earth. The rest through borderlands.

East is the harbour, south is the sea, and north is where I am from. But to the west? It’s a question that in Wellington, a city nestled against the hills that surround Tara’s harbour, generates little more than a halfregistered “Karori?” or “Makara?”

“Makara.”

“That’s a long walk. You doing it in a day?”

“We’re camping.”

“Got all the gear?”

“Yes.” “On your way.”

Danger Electricity. 2017. Oteranga Bay

INTO THE BORDERLANDS

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And off into the haze ride the boys of the law. Chasing down errant SUV riders, catching poachers, shining through the lawless sands. Later, the sand cops are clearly elsewhere, we trudge past dirt-bikers doing turns.

They head up a big sand slope, and come back down the big sand slope.

And up and down. Seeing us they turn and hoon off up the beach, pulling wheelies.

We’re not more than two kilometres from the Gate yet this area is distinct from the city. It’s wilder.

The geography is rugged. Spiny rocks stick out of the deceptively calm sea; the jetsam indicates the height of the storm surges. Inland, to the north, rise impassable hills. Yellow in the sun, forlorn, with small dots indicating sheep.

The sheep belong to Terawhiti Station, whose southern border we walk along. The station was acquired

by Pākehā with “a subsequent alteration of the western boundary,” as the 2003 Waitangi Tribunal Report describes it, of the Port Nicholson Block in 1844.

The Block, with the expansion, covered 209,247 acres including Cape Terawhiti and consolidated the settlement in Wellington. The land was acquired for the New Zealand Company by William Wakefield who arrived

Into The Borderlands

on the Tory in 1839 and, according to Ranginui Walker, bought the land “before the establishment of an official administration that would regulate and control the price.” 120 muskets and accompanying munitions, various utensils, and numerous items of clothing exchanged hands.

Despite Ranginui Walker suggesting that “the idea was to replicate in the new land the vertical profile of the English class structure,” Terawhiti Station was slowly acquired by a young herder James McMenamen from 1853 onwards. He had driven cattle to the southwest under previous owners and came to call the land his own. Today it remains in his family.

Terawhiti Hill looms in the distance. After passing around a headland, Oteranga Bay curves inward, offering an opening to the hills. The bay is the last before Cape Terawhiti, which is the westernmost point of the lower North Island, and carves the line of the head of Te Ikaroa-a-Māui. A high-tech ship is moored in the harbour. Here the power cable that crosses the Cook Strait and connects Te Ikaroa-a-Māui to Te Waka-o-Māui dips its way underwater.

According to Vivienne Morrell, the “location was important to Māori for viewing the sea conditions prior to crossing Raukawa Moana (Cook Strait) and helping to control access to the northern end.” A concrete cube surrounded by razor wire marks the spot.

Pylons loop up the hill and hum, and we find a broken slab with DANGER ELECTRICITY imprinted upon it that was washed away in a storm.

From here we head up the Oteranga stream valley. You can carry on around the coast, and travel the furthest west line, but rumour has it you have to swim. Up the Oteranga valley there

is a paved road, built and maintained

by Meridian Energy for their West Wind Farm which was completed in 2009. The turbines were shipped to a temporary wharf at the bay and trucked up the road. Terawhiti Station Manager Guy Parkinson in 2014 said “without the wind farm it would not have been possible to have turned the farm around.” The station, which covers 52 kilometres squared, has sheep and cattle and was running at a loss before the wind farm, which gives an undisclosed sum to the landowners.

The land itself is harsh and windswept. We trudge up the wind farm road. After kilometres of sand each footfall jolts — the relief of firm ground not apparent. Goats hop around on the river bed and a scraggy bush covers the hills. In the valleys of side-streams the dark gloss of karaka, growing in groves, glimmers faintly.

The sun is low and scraping the ridge, it will be dark soon. In the valley it is cool and the light blue; we enter the accurately named Black Gully. We pass the remains of the Albion Gold Mining Company Battery which at the time we think is a tractor long forgotten.

The rusted boiler and wheels were once a machine that crushed gold carrying quartz from Terawhiti Hill in the 1880s. The equipment, like the wind turbines, were shipped to Oteranga Bay and carted up the road. The first crushing was mid 1883 by the Golden Crown mine; it was then used by the Albion Company from August 1883 to January 1884 when company management ceased operations due to being in £600 in debt.

The building that housed the battery burnt down in the 1900s, and only the rusted machinery remains.

Features

Half-sunk into the earth. A legacy of the gold-fever that captured Wellington during the economic depression of the 1880s. In the land lie remains of what past. And up the same road we trudge, now have traveled the windmills.

We reach the top and rest, looking down to Ohau Bay where we plan to spend the night. It is sunny at the top and quiet. A few cows glare, and along the hilltops the windmills churn, bright in the sun.

The way down is on a ridge of hard beige earth. We pass a copse of pine trees and a lonely hut is nestled in them, smoke coming from the chimney. We’re almost past. A yell comes from within.

“Oi, do you know you’re trespassing!”

A man with a ruffled gaze, not helped by slightly askew glasses, stomps over in gumboots. Before going on this trip we’d consulted a blog last updated in 2008 that said you’re probably okay to cut up inland to get to Ohau bay, though the comments section had suggested it was sketchy. He was not thrilled to find us ready to camp, but thought it worthless to call the cops given they wouldn’t arrive until late in the night. “Keep out of the way of the boss and leave early and you should be fine.”

By himself in this remote valley, we find out he culls possums for DOC and does odd jobs for the elusive “boss.” It makes no sense. There are goats running all the way through the scraggly bush, presumably eating any regenerating forest. He ruminates somewhat on the economics of the land — “a good billy will get you $100 easy mate!” — before letting us go.

Ohau Bay looking South. 2017

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“I’m out shootin’ tonight so if you boys get up to use the bathroom, take a torch, or I might put a bullet bloody through ya.”

We camp down by the beach, out of site of the top of the pass where we’d rested in the quiet sunshine. Light a fire and relax.

Tomorrow we will ascend up out of the bay on a farm track, will hear the roar of an approaching quad, the whistle of a farmer for his dogs. We’ll see the “boss” leaping over the hill, our path to the shelter of the mānuka forest cut off, hear him yell, “you’re trespassing!” And later, after explaining that you’re only allowed to walk on the “Queen’s chain” — the strip of land on the sea shore — see the anger in his eyes as he yells again, “if I see you on my land again I’ll shoot ya.”

Tomorrow we will quickly descend through the forest, onto the shore, and struggle further round as the wind

Into The Borderlands

whips and the sea rises; but tonight, on the beach of Ohau Bay, we lie beside a fire.

Can of beer no longer cold. The ridge clear in the evening, and the sky deepening from blue to black, stars glittering above the line. We lie against the sand, cool now, watching satellites weave their way overhead.

Clear and bright like running water It glitters above the rim of the range, You in Wellington, I at Jerusalem — James K Baxter, “He Waiata Mo Te Kare”

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WRITTEN BY DAN KELLY

Features

GOING BUSH: JOURNEYS BEYOND SCENE “Their hobnail boots clattered and struck up sparks from the pavement, while their waterproof ‘slickers’ stank of linseed oil and stale woodsmoke… Tramping men were disdained as members of the ‘The Great Unwashed’, while females were viewed with open suspicion, snubbed, and given a wide berth on public transport.”

— Tony Nolan, Tararua Tramping Club “When Barth came to account for the dearth of ritual ... or of any rooted belief — he concluded that the journey itself was the ritual, that the road to summer uplands was the Way, and that the pitching and dismantling of tents were prayers more meaningful than any in the mosque.”

— Bruce Chatwin, The Songlines There was one entry that stood out. The date was December 24; the location was Penn Creek Hut, some five hours into Tararua Forest Park.

It was a party of one. In the Visitors’ Book under ‘Purpose of Trip’ were just two words: “Avoiding Christmas.”

Our party was four. We’d left Wellington on Saturday morning, headed north up the coast to Otaki, putting along in a small brown van.

I flicked through the pages of the hut’s Visitors’ Book. It was a small building, painted green like the bush in which it sat, on a river flat in the fog, its roof and chimney red, corrugated iron, and a fire that wouldn’t start. It felt remote, miles from civilisation. What was our purpose? I wrote: “Tramping.”

There are more than 950 backcountry huts in New Zealand, the legacy of years of people going outdoors, leaving the towns and cities, and heading for the bush. Not all have been avoiding Christmas — but avoidance is part of the mix.

Tramping, as New Zealanders use it, means “a recreational activity involving walking over rough country.” It began with the early settlers, born of necessity and in often inhospitable terrain — “walking with purpose” as Shaun Barnett and Chris Maclean describe it in their book, Tramping: A New Zealand History. Of course, there were those before them, but one suspects that for Māori the forest and hills had different significance, not the obstacles feared and fought by those of Victorian England, but as a part of them: home.

Back at Otaki Forks the car park was full. There’d been a number of

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Dan Kelly

Going Bush: Journeys beyond Features scene

different groups on the trail — parents and their two kids, a tourist couple, four more like us, and a lone figure in gators, powering past as we looked at the view, out for a night in the wild. For most their destination was Kime Hut — first come, first served, as so many backcountry huts are — built in 2014, with 20 beds. Good odds, but we were after something different.

In other countries, “tramp” was a put down, an insult derived of capital: those who don’t have. “Tramps” had emerged in the early days of industrialisation, born of casual labour and the marginalisation that came with it — they were known euphemistically in England and Wales as “gentlemen of the road.” But not every transient wanted work. The word’s origin was Germanic, from trampen: to walk heavily, to stamp. There was a philosophic component, romanticism beyond economics.

By the 1920s “tramping” had entered the New Zealand lexicon and was in common usage, appearing in a number of different publications, its preference over the British “rambling” or America’s “hiking” perhaps a clue as to its purpose. In the reduction of life to its simplicities was a reconnection: to a deeper time than that which haunted the cities in the late 1800s — the wave of settlement that followed the land wars eradicating much of the lowland forest, and the bush that remained suddenly all the more precious.

In both Otaki and Greytown separate committees were established, their goal that of access to the Tararua Ranges, for the purpose of “scenery and aesthetic appreciation.”

As we wound our way up and away from the river, the bush started to close in. It was almost still pasture in the lowlands, small pockets of replanting, regenerating bush on the edge of the forest, mānuka and mamaku, tree ferns and scrub, some small kahikatea, and a broad gravel path. We looked back down to Otaki Forks, the meeting of two rivers where the track begins, rewarewa reaching above the canopy, the sun high and hot.

First officially protected in 1954, Tararua Forest Park is billed as “the largest conservation park managed by DOC in the North Island.”

Its peaks and gullies straddle the land between Horowhenua-Kapiti and the Wairarapa, a remarkable swathe of bush and high tops, huts and mud tracks — but a playground it is not. The range acts as a magnet for heavy weather and is notorious for the speed at which conditions can change, often with deadly effect.

We talked about what you’d do, the need to get down out of the weather, to stick together, to have been prepared. How hard it was to stay calm in moments of stress, the clusterfuck of poor planning and bad luck that produced “survival situations.” How easy it was to make the wrong choice.

The idea of landscape as “scenery” was a new one, imported at the time of settlement and soon elevated to identity. New Zealand had “the most beautiful scenery in the world,” a constant source of pride and the basis for what has become our biggest industry.

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Features

But as Geoff Park writes, it wasn’t always this way. Such thought takes a distant view of nature, spiritually detached — there as painting, now photos — something of which you aren’t a part. The “picturesque scene” provides the means by which to subsume nature, the roads that take us in always there for our return: exit but not escape.

Field Hut appeared and we stopped for a break, the relentless uphill taking its toll and there still a long way to go. Built in 1924 by the Tararua Tramping Club, Field Hut “is the oldest surviving recreational hut in the Tararua Ranges.” Named after its benefactor, Willie Field MP, representative for Otaki for more than 35 years and “a tireless advocate”

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Dan Kelly

Going Bush: Journeys beyond Features scene

for opening up the mountains, the hut is rumoured to be haunted by a ghost called Cecil, one of those lost to the snow.

A boy in a fleece t-shirt stood on the porch outside, sawing branches for the fire. “How’s it going?” I asked. “Yeah, good,” he said, sawing away.

“Not too many people round.”

We passed him in the bush up the path, pulling another branch out of the undergrowth. Stocking up firewood was one of the rules. You never knew who’d have to use it.

Guy asked him if he knew what the track was like towards Penn Creek. He looked up, “Ah dunno — I mostly just go round these ways.”

Round these ways. His answer stuck in my head, turning over and over as we walked, us of the restless nature, the search for new.

More than 680 huts and shelters were built in the years between 1957 and 1972, with more than 4,000 kilometres of tracks joining them.

For some it was too much. The New Zealand Alpine Journal complained of “the imperceptible whittling away of solitude”; and, several years later, New Zealand’s “Wilderness Areas” were created — not a single hut or built track among them. It was part of what Americans call the “recreation opportunity spectrum.” There were a few spectrums involved.

The years of World War II had been a boon for New Zealand’s introduced deer, and by its end their numbers and the impact they were having on the bush was sufficiently high to justify a large-scale eradication project. It was to this end that many of our backcountry huts were built, the idea of parks as places without people failing, and the scene they preserved at risk again.

On we walked, the moss thick and hanging, the air ever colder. I thought about the ritual of being in bush, the connection that had built these paths, these huts and those that had returned to them, time after time. How there was a paradox at play in conservation, a division received and recreated: the wilderness and us, humanity as distinct from nature.

The scene.

I thought about hunters and the world they worked in, killing to preserve the bush. How erosion of wilderness in its empty sense actually helped save it. The work they had done so I of city-birth could walk and know these hills, the tight packed forest and its hanging moss, the cold wet air and all it whispered.

There’s no pulling us from the world.

On the tops it was calm, the tussock grasses gold and bowed, not yet covered in snow. We reached our peak, turned left and down the valley, soon back in the bush, miro and kāmahi, the odd tōtara, fat berries on the forest floor, a breaking branch and the clumsy flight of a feasting kererū, jokes of dinners past.

We passed a dead tree, decaying on top of itself in the gloom, like our elders, gone but still giving. I thought about the bird life that used to exist, the huia that had flown in these hills, the last one spotted in 1903.

The flocks of more than a thousand kererū that had once chased the

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Features

autumn berries, 1080 and DOC’s programme to boost kākā numbers, how death gives way to life.

Down at the hut someone had left a tonic bottle half full of wine.

There was a note: “Didn’t finish my wine, maybe you can use it — Andre.”

“I hate people who leave shit in huts,” said Guy, “just take it with you!”

It was different story later. Dinner was done and our goon sack lay empty, Andre’s gift welcomed and us all admitting that perhaps it was okay he’d left it, even if we did get his trash.

Fog sat heavy around the hut, a half moon casting eerie shadows as I pissed in the wet air. The valley was quiet. We’d got what we wanted: no one else at the hut, fantasies of terra nullius left undisturbed. I thought about the things we’d inherited, both here and in my head, the networks of huts and track, the legislative framework that preserved them, notions of “wilderness” and who it had removed. How, as Geoff Park writes, “nature-as-scenery is the domain of the visitor.” How the best kaitiaki are of a place.

I breathed deep, thought of those who’d built these tracks, the hours they must have spent, the hours people still spent, volunteering and trapping and tramping, what their sweat and commitment meant.

The peace you got from bush. Down here, the scene seemed far away.

The river sang in the dark. It sounded like rain.

tea

B e t w e e n

& M e e Coffe r r i l l

Features Refreshments

43 “Tea tempers the spirits and harmonises the mind, dispels lassitude and relieves fatigue, awakens thought, lightens the body, and clears the perceptive faculties.”

— Lu Yu, Classic of Tea: Origins and Rituals.

I remember my first cup, it was with Nana. She had always made the best tea and I had always just attributed it to the milk; some high-grade New Zealand dairy perhaps. However, I was hesitant to accept this seemingly obvious answer. Going through it in my mind, a perfect cup of tea would consist of four elements. It couldn’t have been the sugar, or more mundanely even some type of specialist hot water. The last mentioned component here I realised, being the most important, the tea bag itself. I rustled through Nana’s pantry in search of the answer — seamlessly and unknown to me, he emerged. He was bespectacled, with the slightest of simpers. We acquainted for the first time. It was not Merrill in the flesh, but a picture of him in bleached white linen on a laminated box. A proud Ceylonese and a purveyor of tea, he happened to be “ethical” too. I was hooked.

Since then, Merrill J Fernando has seen a steady rise to fame. His TV commercials have granted him great success, his infamous “do try it” catchphrase I imagine being the common conversation in the office pantry, or better still a topic of bother for our Queen, her majesty, Elizabeth.

I became an avid supporter of Merrill and his brand Dilmah. Learning more about him and his sons, Dilhan and Malik, brought me closer to them.

Merrill was a businessman on a mission. At this stage in the early 2000s we hadn’t yet reached the fulcrum of celebrity CEOs or greenwashing, but I sensed Merrill was not like the rest of them. Merrill was saying something that spoke to me on the inside, and I owed it to myself figure out what it was.

Dilmah is branded on three main pillars. The first, “single-origin tea”, emphasises the non-mixing of tea leaves, which is common practice among other generic brands. Everything has to originate from the same source; in this case, Sri Lanka. To me this meant authenticity. Secondly, Merrill rejected “fair trade” labelling and instead created his own “ethical tea” label. His reasoning was long, but simply put, he wanted more wealth for his workers than “fair trade” would allow. To me, this meant sincerity and a big heart.

Lastly, Merrill is a Sri Lankan businessman, who sells Sri Lankan tea around the world. This, from a historical perspective, is an aberration, with almost every large generic tea brand existing as a perpetual legacy of the horrors of colonial exploitation. To me, this meant that Merrill’s brand Dilmah exists as a “post-colonial tea” — the good native in charge and beating his masters at their tea game. Merrill was nothing short of a renegade.

Growing up with Merrill’s figure looming large from the kitchen pantry, it felt like I had found my hero, someone who espoused all the values I admired and clung to, even better that I was the only one to know this, a secret between us. As I got older still, my grip on Merrill or his grip on me began to wane. I have come to realise that perhaps our one-sided relationship was really just about me, and that all I was looking for was to project the values I cared about and to be able to fit them into a warm and humble vessel.

— Shariff Burke

a n d m e

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Refreshments Features

According to the NZ History website, “Wellington’s café culture is today an integral part of its identity as a city.”

It’s true, everyone in this city seems to love coffee and we have an ample amount of cafes to keep the love brewing.

I have been aware of this for as long as I have lived in Wellington, but I never cared or wanted to join in on the coffee love. I didn’t care because coffee is bitter and yuck.

I resisted the pull of Wellington’s coffee culture for six strong years before caving; I feel like I am late to the coffee game. In the short period of time that I have been drinking coffee I have become aware that people have a complicated relationship with their coffee. They need it and they love it, but they also hate it and don’t want it.

I am starting my very own complicated relationship with coffee and I am unsure if I want to keep it up, but it seems like consciously I’m having less and less say in the matter the more coffee I drink.

This summer I drank a sweet milky cold brew out of curiosity because it seemed to be the hip drink of the summer and I wanted to be hip. It helped me talk to people and it made me faster and more productive. I remember thinking “is this how people feel everyday?!”

I had to wander round town feeling giddy and weird a few times before I had calmed down enough to be able to drive home. It was horrible, but I kept drinking it, and now I drink it almost everyday.

I feel like a baby entering this new world of coffee.

I don’t even really know if I like coffee, and I am trying to work out whether or not I should continue my relationship with coffee; here are my thoughts so far.

s t h g u o e Cof fe th Written by Ali Burns

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Ali Burns

//Coffee thoughts//

Do I even like coffee?

Being a coffee drinker is like having horrible a crush on someone. It sucks, you think you hate it but also you love it.

When you have coffee you are thinking about your feelings toward it, and when you don’t have coffee you are thinking “maybe I should have a coffee.”

How do I order a coffee? How do I know the barista is not judging me for my coffee order? There seems to be a lot of rules when it comes to ordering a proper coffee.

Is it worth learning these rules? I used to get really nervous going into a “serious” coffee shop. There are some parts of Wellington cof fee culture that seem weird and elitist. Even though I know heaps of lovely people who are really into coffee, that vibe still exists and I still feel uncomfortable sometimes in coffee shops.

I get so much more done when I have a coffee. Will I be more successful if I continue to have it? There is a scene in Fern Gully that I sometimes think about when thinking about coffee. The wise grandma fairy gives the young plucky fairy the glowing magical seed, and she says, “every seed holds the magic and power for creation, so too do you.” And then the plucky fairy goes on to conquer her demons, trap the villain in a tree, and be the hero she truly was all along. I think the old fairy was talking about coffee and that the glowing magic seed was actually a coffee bean.

Coffee breath makes me think people are tired. I remember being young and smelling coffee on my parents’ breath, I remember thinking that it smelt like they were tired.

I have smelt my own coffee breath and it makes me feel gross and sad.

c o f f e e

I can really relate to the legend of how coffee was discovered. An Ethiopian man named Kaldi saw some goats doing some really intense frolicking in the field.

He looked at them and thought, what the heck, why are these goats so filled with energy? This is how I used to look at people who drank coffee.

Kaldi saw that these goats were eating some berries on a bush and he decided to try these berries to see what would happen. Kaldi ate these berries and he suddenly understood the goat’s energy.

I am like Kaldi. I tried the berries on the bush and now I am part of the frolicking goat herd. It is nice to not feel left out.

A big reason I had my first few coffees is because it seemed funny. Coffee is funny.

It is funny to drink coffee. I am funny when I drink coffee, and it feels good to be funny.

Coffee is not funny when you are alone all day. It is like a really unreliable friend; really helpful one moment, and then the next making you doubt every decision you have ever made.

It is nice to remember that coffee has always made people happy and has been part of human routine for a long time.

It is also comforting to know that coffee has always made people feel weird and conflicted. Feeling like you are taking part in a regular human activity is reassuring.

’s ngton Welli o t d d s to a ffee. ought s about co but I h t y e are m yuck rticl These lection of a bitter and t now that i l s i o vast c ink coffee ue to drink h n t i I still bably cont ro will p tarted. s I have

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ARTS

47

Poem

Suiga o le Tau: About Climate Change They turned the sky over And its tears became a tangle of inflected waves Riding the houses and palm trees, Playing rugby on the pavements and shouting “TRY!” as they crashed onto newly-sealed roads, Carrying fridges and television sets and pieces of little children into fishing nets that were pretending to be volley nets for the sake of the tourism industry They turned the hand-me-down the right way around And the inflection became a reflection That poured down into empty tin cups And put out mosquito coils As they formed puddles that mimicked the faces of a fed-up, over-fed, not-in-a-Disneyanimated-film ocean That was on the verge of regurgitating the propaganda of Western aid My home crumbled into confused fragments Which international forums, the US, and China put into a professionally sealed envelope And promptly stopped giving a fuck about.

— Jasmine Koria

Books

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Swing Time — Zadie Smith

Hera Lindsay Bird — Hera Lindsay Bird

Zadie Smith was one of those authors who I’d heard of and completely dismissed because she sounded like another postmodern, overpraised, elitist circler of the prize-winning circuit. This was based on mainly the fact that she was a contemporary writer, and the design of her book covers. I’m a fickle, snobbish reader. Books are where I feel at ease, and therefore most comfortably judgemental. And I can’t stand narratives about contemporary adults making dumb decisions in their hollow suburban lives and then waxing clichés about it. So gross.

But then, as happens shamefully often, I opened one of her books one day at the library and read a page, and I thought to myself, oh.

Darn it. I like her.

She’s smart. She’s self-aware. And she has arguments to make, which I can respect.

Swing Time is the interwoven story of two mixed-race women who meet as children in a dance class in London in the early ’80s. Their respective contexts are at a stark contrast; one intellectual and upper class, the other looked down on as low rent. But their mutual love of dance and their shared identity as children from two cultures ties their lives together.

The narrative jumps back and forth over the following decades as their paths diverge and converge, as one travels across continents and the other is stuck at home with a growing family, as one touches the edges of fame and the other digs into bitterness and selfdestruction.

Smith seems to be searching for something concrete. For answers to questions she’s had bubbling inside for years. Through her writing she is working out her demons, and while she’s not her characters, she can’t help but speak through them. If you feel this search too, you might find yourself echoed in her words..

I know that everybody’s already read Hera Lindsay Bird You have scrutinised the poems...................and the poet But it’s late on a Monday and my flatmate is the books editor and I’m Doing her a solid.

— Kimberley McIvor

The thing with Hera’s poetry is........................ .................

It’s ineffable...............................................

“It’s like the World of Wearable Art.” There’s a reason she’s a local rock star.

There is a roving quality to fact and form The ramblings of a brain both besotted and bemused by This strange world ....................and she says “fuck” a lot.

Hera Lindsay Bird covers everything from bisexuality to Nostradamus It’s like a compendium to life in your twenties It’s a blistering conglomeration of think and feel It’s the Wellington millennial’s avant-garde Bible.

Her voice is all its own.................................... ............

Hence why this poem is so bad at emulating it.

“It’s a bad crime to say poetry in poetry...

But it’s boring to be so tasteful.”

This review is going to seem like a mockery I promise, it’s actually proving How very difficult it is to write like Hera Bird .......................And why you should read her book instead of this.

— Sarah Dillon

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Counterfutures 3: Incarceration

New Zealand society does not just have a tolerance for a high incarceration rate but an enthusiasm for it. This quote from Tracey McIntosh sets the tone of Counterfutures 3: a collection of critical essays, creative non-fiction, interviews, and reviews exploring leftist thought and practice regarding incarceration in Aotearoa.

As described by John W. Buttle in “Imagining an Aotearoa/New Zealand Without Prisons”: “Mass incarceration is not just about prisons, but includes the whole criminal justice system and the web of laws, regulations, and policies that constrain those who have been convicted, in and out of prisons.” As a collection, Counterfutures goes further than linking mass incarceration with vague theories, weaving together reflections on race, gender, politics, and power, and the way these concepts interrelate with incarceration and punitiveness. In doing this, Counterfutures asks not only why does incarceration look the way it does, but attempts to address how we contextualise and characterise “criminals” and “crime”.

Some pieces are informative, and historical.

Mark Derby and Warwick Tie’s “Feculent Hovel” paints a graphic opening image of the systemic discrimination in Aotearoa’s penal culture. Pip Adams’ “In the Car” explores a personal, reflective snapshot which humanises the experiences of those she has encountered within the penal system — their codes, practices, and patterns. Each piece is carefully selected, critically analysing a different facet of our understanding of incarceration. Ever-present in the text is an awareness of the powerful cultural hegemonies governing the political and social economies of both Aotearoa and wider frameworks of Western thought.

Perhaps most telling of the narrative that Counterfutures seeks to establish — and the centre/right narrative it wishes to disrupt — is “Demanding Explanations”, Ronald Kramer’s review of Greg Newbold’s Crime, Law and Justice in New Zealand, and Newbold’s response to this review. Newbold’s book charts “major crime related events from New Zealand’s

Books history,” and seeks to place these within broader social contexts. Kramer’s critique questions the ideologically-loaded approach with which Newbold undertakes this exercise.

It is pertinent, I think, to begin with Newbold’s conclusion — “In retrospect, if I had been able to read Kramer’s review prior to publication, I would have changed nothing.”

His rhetoric encapsulates the defensiveness and ignorance with which leftist discourse is often met.

Crime, Law and Justice, according to Kramer, fails to contextualise much of its empirical evidence, making reference to an indigenous “culture of poverty,” the women’s movement, and popular culture, without critically assessing correlative and causative links. For example, according to Newbold, while “there is absolutely no way of determining what percentage of rape complaints are actually true or false,” he has over a period of time “collected a large dossier containing hundreds of proven cases of false and malicious rape complaints.”

Newbold’s response to Kramer’s review, predictably, misses the point — confusing a series of smug pats-on-the-back from those in positions of power in the criminal justice system for a critical reflection on the robustness of his arguments. After all, “students at UC [University of Canterbury] love it.” This narrative weaves wider concerns about the way feminist, socialist, and Marxist discourses are marginalised as “radical” in the face of mainstream academic literature, and brings with it a level of intertextual awareness.

Counterfutures’ real strength lies within this degree of reflection. As posited in the interview with No Pride in Prisons, “we can’t separate the prison from the social system and the historical conditions that brought it into existence.” An awareness of this brings with it a sense of enlightenment — incarceration, while systemic in our society, does not have to be so. Decarceration, or prison abolition, may not be our present reality, but that does not mean it can’t ever be. To borrow a phrase from Moana Jackson, every change is but a shift in reality.

— Brigid Quirke

50

Television

TELEVISION Watching Stranger Things as a Horror-Hater who has no nostalgia for the ’80s

Recently I bestowed my sister with my Netflix password. Slightly idiotic, I know, but if it’s getting paid for out of my course related costs, I might as well spread the love around. The beauty of giving your younger sister access to your Netflix account is that she tries things I’m too afraid to.

Like Stranger Things.

I know, I know, how can this b!tch proclaim to be a TV buff if she hasn’t seen Stranger Things? It’s a seminal piece of television. I hear you. You are right. But to be fair, I did everything except actually watch the show. I read all the critique, engaged with my various timelines on the matter, watched the Emmys as those kids handed out sandwiches.

Alas, Stranger Things was just not made for me as a TV viewer. I was not alive in the ’80s and therefore have little to no appreciation for the style and effects of the time, let alone nostalgia for them. I cannot stand horror — I’m not entirely sure why, I’m just not big on scaring myself for no particular reason. I’m also, and I apologise profusely for this, not that into kids, in real life or on screen; I always skipped every time Ross’s kid showed up on Friends.

Sorry, but I just don’t like them that much.

That’s literally a trifecta of things that put me off Stranger Things. Sure, the poster and the theme music was cool, but I had no real desire to put time into it, especially with OJ: Made In America taking up so much of my attention at the time.

So when I woke up on Sunday morning and saw my sister watching the first episode, I couldn’t help but join her. Then, when she left for work, I couldn’t help but keep watching.

Then, as the expert TV watcher I am, I couldn’t help but binge the whole show and finish it that day.

It’s an interesting experience, watching a show for the first time that you already sort of know everything about, and getting the chance to properly form your own opinions about what you are watching — almost a year after everyone else has. For example, I really enjoyed the character of Nancy, and despite what that Saturday Night Live sketch might have you believe, we do see Lucas’s parents. Plus, the horror of this show can be avoided if you watch it in the daytime and can anticipate the jump scares.

Also yes, I am going to beat this drum too: Millie Bobby Brown is incredible.

There’s a lot of love out there for this show, and I get it, but I don’t necessarily share it.

The whole “government lab conspiracy” thing kind of grinds my gears, and I could do without seeing yet another down-on-his-luck male law enforcement officer who tries to drink his problems away but just ends up waking up on the couch with the sun streaming into his face, whereupon he picks up his next cigarette.

Maybe I’m a little more critical of the flaws of such a show given that I am not swept up in the nostalgic beauty of it (I have also, sorry, never read a Stephen King book), but that’s okay.

It’s important to remember that not all TV is for everyone, and you are bound to like some shows a lot more than I am!

It’s alright; I’ll just watch the second season ten months too late as well.

— @LauraLives

Games

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GAMES Cameron (Finally) Gets His Hands on a Nintendo Switch

Back in Issue 00, I wrote a piece about the thenupcoming Nintendo Switch; you might recall how I was cautiously optimistic about the hybrid console’s prospects. Now that I have a cool job that lets me play games in the office, it was just a matter of time before I spent nearly my entire first pay packet on a brand new Switch; now, after a few days with it, I feel ready to share my thoughts.

Taking the unit out of the box for the first time, I was quite surprised at how small it was: about the size of a small tablet. I shouldn’t be so shocked given the nature of the system, designed for both portable use and to be connected to a TV, but still. The inbuilt capacitive touchscreen displays at 720p, comparable to a mid-range smartphone, though it’s still a decent resolution for a portable system. I haven’t found any ways that the system takes advantage of the touchscreen though. The transition from portable to TV with the included dock is seamless and intuitive, not to mention that it will boost graphical fidelity.

The Joy-Con controllers are something of a revelation. I’ve written previously about how accessible they are, and having tried all sorts of ways of using them I feel confident calling them my favourite controller system ever. When used in tandem, it feels equally comfortable using them attached to the main console (giving it a form factor not unlike the Wii U Gamepad), completely detached, or in a controller grip. The haptic feedback, which Nintendo calls “HD Rumble,” feels amazing and is a vast improvement over even that of the Dualshock 4s, though I have a feeling it will be used the same as every other rumble feature.

Since I’m not made of money, I was only able to get one full-priced game with my Switch.

I chose to buy Mario Kart 8 Deluxe because it shows off a feature that could prove vital to the system’s success: instant multiplayer. Simply

hand one of the Joy-Cons to a friend, push out the attached kickstand, and away you go, racing one-on-one for the Mushroom Cup. Is there a better way to share your games with your friends? Also, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe is fantastic, an absolute must-own for the system.

I do, however, have some gripes which could hold the system back. Its Wi-Fi connectivity seems to be rather weak, a real handicap for any mobile device. Perhaps that’s why there aren’t any other apps for the system besides games — not even a proper web browser — even though these have been standard issue for every other console since the original Xbox. I would have loved to watch YouTube or Netflix on my Switch, and I certainly hope these will be coming soon.

It is still very much early days for the Switch, and this is reflected in the offerings on the Nintendo eShop, with only 44 games available at the time of writing, of which only Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Mario Kart 8 Deluxe can really be considered system sellers.

Consoles live and die by their software lineup, and while Nintendo have promised extensive third-party support, it remains to be seen whether this will follow through.

Having said all of that, I am incredibly happy with my investment in a Switch. It still has massive promise, and with it being the fastest selling console in Nintendo’s history, I hope it can live up to it in the years to come.

— Cameron Gray

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FILM FILM

Film

The two editors of this section agree on many things, film related and otherwise.

The Alien Films, however, do not fall into this category. We agree the first two are great, and the third and fourth are terrible, but things get tricky after that. If anything, the following exchange will illuminate how subjective film can be.

WHY I LOVE PROMETHEUS

I cannot see what justifies the hate for this film. Is it perfect? Absolutely not, but how many perfect films are there? Admittedly, one of the perfect films in the history of cinema is in fact Ridley Scott's Alien. However.

Prometheus is far different film and thrives on its own merits: Prometheus aims to tackle the beginning of life itself, as well as the philosophy and morality of said creation.

The film starts with the glorious landscape of an Earth that has not yet formed life, and introduces the Engineers, a species whose scientists have developed a method of creating life. Picking up in the near future, a group of scientists now seek the Engineers in hopes of answering where humans truly come from. In addition is the thematic depth of having an android named David on bord, who is faced with the reality of meeting his creator face-to-face every day. These ideas gave Alien fans far more science fiction than they might have been expecting.

Technically everything is amazing, from the cinematography and score to the practical effects and performances. Noomi Rapace and Michael Fassbender shine as Elizabeth Shaw and the aforementioned android. Rapace is as tough as Ripley, and scientifically savvy; her sheer will sees her through one of the entire series’ most white knuckle scenes. Fassbender plays the other end of the spectrum, with his seemingly perfect logic (and haircut) often unnerving other characters. It becomes increasingly obvious he has ulterior motives.

All things considered, Prometheus is not a film that deserves the rap it gets, and I think it's a case of audiences wanting one thing, and though what they get is good, they dislike it because it's different. It certainly is different, and is a wholesome piece of science fiction.

— Finn Holland

WHY I (MILDLY ) HATE PROMETHEUS

Visually stunning with a great cast and sci-fi theological elements, Prometheus by all rights should have been fantastic. Instead, it only left us with a ton of unanswered questions and disappointingly fell to the same tropes as most extraterrestrial B-grade horrors.

This isn’t to say I didn’t initially enjoy the film; I just find it very flawed.

Easily the biggest problems with the film are the high number of nonsensical routes the film drags you down, only to abandon you to pursue another dead-end.

Though it had some interesting elements to introduce, it followed through on hardly any of them, and with the inclusion of Covenant, it seems like there was no payoff at all for this film.There were a couple twists, but neither really made much sense or came across as important to the story arc.

Weyland turns out to be alive! (Why did he pretend to be dead?) Charlize’s character is Weylands daughter! (Why does that matter?)

Not only that, but I found myself frustrated with the sheer number of characters introduced to the story, only to die pitifully with no benefit to the momentum of the story. With the exception of David, whose motivations are still pretty unknown even now after a second film, the characters were one dimensional and uninteresting.

At the end of the day, this film is okay.

That’s it. It’s okay to watch when you’re bored for a bit of entertainment and to say to yourself “hey I wonder what all that was about?” But don’t bother hoping for any answers in the sequel which, if anything, only made Prometheus worse.

— Mathew Watkins

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Film

WHY I LOVE ALIEN: COVENANT

Evidently of the two of us I was far more excited for this film. Anyway, this very year Scott has graced us with another instalment in the Alien franchise, and given us a film that once again expands the mythos and takes the franchise in new directions.

When the colonisation ship Covenant finds an extremely habitable world millions of light years from our own, the majority of the crew are enthralled, while a minority are justifiably dubious. Shit happens. Alienesque things ensue. Certain chests do not remain unruptured.

The universe building of Prometheus is expanded in droves, with the complex genealogy of its creatures never getting too out of hand, and the rich ideas and themes never playing second fiddle to the straight up thrill and horror of it all. What has always been a strength of the good Alien films at least is the interaction between its crew members, and this crew is no exception. Once again there are divisions among the ranks, as well as divisions of faiths, and given that the crew is made entirely of couples there are some intense conflicts of interest.

What people don't realise is that sci-fi is more than guns and ship; it's about the themes and the philosophies. Prometheus and Alien: Covenant have gone this route with the question of life. The films are critical of those who play God, as seen with people’s greed and recklessness in the search for knowledge and power.

Alien: Covenant is an ambitious film with far more on its mind than murdering a bunch of side characters creatively. The film still does not give all the answers fans may want, but what's on show here is plentiful by itself. There must be something to say for the fact after seeing this film for the first time I simultaneously wanted to see the next film immediately, the current film again, and the old films for the 20th time.

— Finn Holland

WHY I HATE ALIEN: COVENANT

Ahh, the low hanging fruit of a Ridley Scott movie post-2000. Other than the Fassbender on Fassbender fingering and James Franco getting burned alive, this movie sucked. Scott once again lowers the collective intelligence of his cast in order to move the plot forward, fulfilling all the stupid horror movie tropes we’ve seen a thousand times before and can see coming a mile away.

Alien made you care about the characters because they were blue-collar space workers; the way they talked to one another about their lives back home, not having enough money, felt human and real. Also, obviously being essentially “truckers”, it’s forgiven that they have no idea how to handle the presence of alien life on their ship. However, when characters almost willingly walk into trouble like campers in Friday the 13th, it’s hard to have sympathy for their hardships.

Fuck you, of course you’re dead, guy who stuck his face directly in front of a toxic space mushroom. You too, asshole who put your face over a big slimy egg in the basement of an otherworldly temple lured by an AI you have no trust for.

Although the film itself fell short, the interesting ideas and mysteries that were raised in Prometheus were completely done away with in Covenant. It was almost like Scott was half-assedly apologising for making his audience think too much.

The script was dull and uninteresting, the set design was boring, and the special effects used to animate the creatures were laughable. All in all, it was a total waste of an opportunity to reinvigorate the franchise.

Easily the best part about watching it was eating the pineapple I brought with me in an ice cream container.

— Mathew Watkins

Fin.

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MUSIC

Music

Raw Collective, Jinz Moss, and Makeshift Movements I was not in a good mood when Pauly Lowe of Raw Collective asked me to review his band/collective’s upcoming gig/fundraiser, billed as their “last show for a while.” Stress of assignments and bouts of homesickness, coupled with the everyday hell of living at 222 Willis Street, had taken their toll on a usually positive individual, and I had come into Midnight Espresso only to get my standard affogato (don’t judge me, amateur baristas) then get back to work. The pitch Pauly gave was intriguing enough, however: a live ten person hip-hop experience, supported by the best and brightest of the Wellington hip-hop/reggae scene. Still, the proverbial coffee cup was half empty, and I felt worried about what I’d got myself into when I rocked up to Rogue and Vagabond on Saturday.

After having to convince the door staff that yes, I was supposed to be there to review the show and yes, although I wasn’t on the guestlist I had been invited by the band, I picked my vantage point from which to watch the support.

Makeshift Movements moved past the initial muddy mixing of their vocals and instruments to deliver a set brimming with confidence. Postrocky guitar leads were offset by reggae rhythms, breakbeat drums battled with ’80s synths. The sound was uncategorisable and incomparable, and better for it. While the rapping members gave it their all, the two female vocalists stole the show whenever they rode the mic, the band sounding much more comfortable delving into reggae-esque instrumentals than their faster, funkier cuts. Still, it was a confident set that had my friend convinced they were the headliners; high praise for any supporting act in my opinion.

Jinz Moss bridged the gap between the unusually excellent support and Raw Collective (who he also performed with), riding old school beats with aplomb and bags of confidence. As a temporary British expat of sorts, hearing an East London/Wellingtonian MC use Grime slang as part of his arsenal without sounding goofy provided a heady remedy to memories of Drake

warbling about “chit-chat tings” on More Life.

Moss only performed for about ten minutes, but knew exactly his job in the scheme of the night, getting people to the front, forcing hands in the air, and setting the tone for the main event.

Shouts out to whoever added A Tribe Called Quest’s “Black Spasmodic” to the playlist, too.

The best way that I can describe Raw Collective’s sound to anyone who has yet to hear them live is to imagine an alternate universe in which Dr Dre, riding high off the success of 1992’s The Chronic, had courted, seduced, and committed to a faithful and steady relationship with various members of The Cat Empire and Fat Freddy’s Drop, and that their offspring migrated to Wellington to start a band. The meticulous brass arrangements added an extra crispness to their sound; the crowd greeted singles like “Smash The Grips” as if they had been local anthems for years, and whenever a member had a chance to show off their individual talents they took it with ease. “I want to see the new age…” Raw Deezy gasped during one of the set’s brief quieter moments. He took a second.

Then, with a grin: “I want to see Donald Trump assassinated, too.” At another gig it might have felt unnecessary, attention-grabbing. But in the context of the night’s entertainment, it put a grin on my face too. In the artificial lights of the stage, my pint glass looked half full again.

— Sean Harbottle

MUSIC

Glass Vaults released their second album The New Happy last week, following their first full length Sojourn in 2015. The new album was recorded over the last two years in Blue Barn Recording Studios out in Mount Cook. The band is originally from Wellington with members now spread out to Christchurch and Auckland.

Frontman Richard Larsen talked to Salient about the new record, and explained some of the band's influences and intentions with this new collection of songs. “The vibe came from the music me and Rowan were getting into at the time which was a lot of ’80s New York Vibe music. Listening to a lot of Talking Heads, Grace Jones, I think that really influenced the sound and production of the record.”

While Sojourn felt a little more wide and washed out. The New Happy is defined by its tight grooves and carefully selected sound set, showing the influence of those New York acts of the ’80s. The song “Brooklyn” (written after spending a while in New York playing shows) features particularly Talking Heads-y guitar stabs and a pulsing rhythm section. Larsen’s vocals are airy and washed out, jumping around interesting melodies in a way that reminded me a bit of Arthur Russell. I asked Richard about this: “That’s interesting, I’m not a massive fan, I’ve listened to a little bit, but Bevan who plays Bass synth and does all our production and mixing and stuff, he’s a big Arthur Russell fan. He has talked to me about being influenced by him for this record too.”

Glass Vaults are about to head out on a New Zealand tour with dates in Dunedin, Christchurch, and Auckland. The Wellington show is on the June 1 at Caroline with Terror of the Deep and Womb. “We hand selected the bands we are playing with.” Richard says “Charlotte from Womb is a really good friend of ours and I’ve always really liked her music and we’ve been talking about doing some shows together for ages.”

Check out The New Happy on all the regular streaming services or at glassvaults.bandcamp.com.

— Olly Clifton

GIG GUIDE

Glass Vaults

55 55 55 Wednesday: Eyegum Wednesdays with Aw B and Mongo Skato — Prepare for a deluge of doof doof, with delightful old school disco, techno, and house sounds bumping through San Fran until the wee hours. And by the wee hours, I mean probably 12.00pm at the latest because Eyegum is nothing if not purveyors of great nights where you are still able to be in bed at a reasonable hour. 9.00pm is the time to be there. Friday: Thundamentals “Everyone We Know” Tour — I’m gonna level with you all and admit that I haven’t the foggiest who Thundamentals are, and to me they look like a gaggle of run-of-the-mill self-satisfied fuckbois, but they also apparently play some rip roaring good hip-hop/r‘n’b and the show is free, so why bloody not m8? It’s all going down at Caroline from 9.00pm. Saturday: Prizegiving Australian Tour Fundraiser — Probably Wellington’s most delightful live band are spreading their sweet little angel wings and visiting the hallowed land of pingers and platypuses. But before they go, they are bestowing a bitchin’ show upon the fine folk of Wellington, and bringing along their friends Alexa Casino, Secrets, and Aw B. It’s going to be splendid, and it ’s going to be at Caroline from 8.30pm.

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Podcast

PODCAST Interview with

Get Your Hands Off My Dogcast

This week I interviewed Jamie Owers, Alisdair Armstrong, and Oliver Pol, the hosts of Get Your Hands Off My Dogcast.

How would you describe your podcast?

Jamie: We review... well, review is a strong word.

We talk about dog movies.

Alisdair: Movies that prominently feature a dog.

We do a different film each week, semi-review it.

Sometimes we just talk nonsense.

What made you decide to start the podcast?

Jamie: We were just kind of wanting to do a podcast.

We’re fans of this New Zealand podcast called The Worst Idea Of All Time. So we were like, “we should do a podcast, that would be a fun thing,” just to do something. Then I think Alisdair came up with the idea of doing dog movies.

Oliver: It was just something to structure our hangouts, really. We used to write scripts with each other when we met up, but then we thought maybe a podcast because we all liked The Worst Idea Of All Time.

We weren’t sure about the topic, just the format of talking about something each week that forces us to meet up fairly regularly.

If you had to recommend a dog related movie, which would it be?

Jamie: I’m a big fan of a movie called Turner & Hooch.

It’s got Tom Hanks in it, I’m a big Tom Hanks fan.

It’s probably the most adult of the dog movies — we’ve found that most are family films but this one’s kind of like a straight comedy Oliver: But there is also genuine emotion, you know, like the relationship being formed between Tom Hanks and this dog. I won’t spoil the end but there’s some pretty traumatic stuff that happens and it’s genuinely dramatic. In most of the films the final act is pretty disappointing because we don’t care about the characters, but this dog, it’s got a real big heart… but he makes a lot of mess!

Alisdair: That’s definitely the best one we’ve seen. If I was going to recommend a dog movie I’d probably recommend Foodfight! because I want people to suffer.

Jamie: To be honest, if I had to recommend one it’d probably be Marley & Me because it’s the most general, audience-pleasing one.

Alisdair: I don’t like that one.

Jamie: I mean, I think we all have problems with it...

How do you go about making the podcast?

Jamie: So I just have a USB microphone that I bought off the internet and we gather around in Alisdair’s flat and watch the movie together, then just chuck in the microphone.

Oliver: And immediately record after watching the film because we forget it pretty much immediately.

What do you like about podcasts as a medium?

Jamie: I like the fact that you can do other things while you’re listening. When I’m working on a project or something, because I’m a design student, I like to have a podcast going as I do it.

Alisdair: I think it’s definitely a convenient way to get information or humour or entertainment without having to sit down.

Oliver: And it gives people from other countries the opportunity to hear our nonsense that was previously confined mostly to us, but now people from America and the UK are downloading. I don’t know what their doing with their lives, but yeah.

Jamie: We have one constant listener in Ashburn, Virginia.

Are there any future plans for

Your Hands Off My Dogcast?

Get

Alisdair: Eventually, of course, we’d like to sell out and just make it a cash cow. How realistic that is, I don’t know.

Jamie: It’s really just fun to do.

Alisdair: Yeah, we’ll probably just continue until we get bored of it, or until we run out of dog movies, whichever comes first.

Anything else you want to say to

Salient readers?

Jamie: Check us out! If you like dog movies.

Alisdair: Or if you don’t.

Oliver: Or if you like dogs.

Alisdair: Or again, if you don’t.

Get Your Hands Off My Dogcast is available

on iTunes or through their Facebook page:

www.facebook.com/dogcasts/.

— Hannah Patterson

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Enhance your career prospects FHSS 205 SPECIAL TOPIC: THE FUTURE OF WORK (20 POINTS)

FHSS 302 BA INTERNSHIP (20 POINTS)

During this course, you will examine the changing nature of the workforce from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, including philosophy, sociology, history, media studies and commerce.

Have you always wanted to work for the Council for International Development, Te Papa Tongarewa or the Ministry of Social Development?

You will consider what skills are necessary to give individuals an edge as they establish their future careers. You will also work on a project for a Wellington organisation and make recommendations that may be implemented by the organisation.

If you’re a BA student, you can gain practical work experience AND points towards your BA through the BA Internship course.

Starting from Trimester Three 2017, students who complete FHSS 205 The Future of Work will be given priority for the BA Internship course.

OPEN TO ALL STUDENTS fhss-enquiries@vuw.ac.nz

www.victoria.ac.nz/working-ba

H

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Visual Arts

How to Learn?

A week ago now I went to How to Learn? A Discussion on Emerging Curatorial Education in Aotearoa at Enjoy Public Art Gallery. The panel, chaired by Sophie Davis, was made up of four emerging/mid-career curators: Andrea Bell, Curator of Art at Hocken Collections; Tendai John Mutambu, Assistant Curator at Govett-Brewster Art Gallery; Melanie Oliver, Senior Curator at The Dowse; and Balamohan Shingade, Assistant Director at ST PAUL St Gallery. They talked about how they got to where they are and what options are out there for emerging curators.

A meme stayed projected on the wall for most of the talk, leftover from Mutambu’s presentation.

I don’t know where the image originally comes from, but it’s a 21st century mise-en-scène with the Instagram tags visible: “Artist”, wearing trackpants and a crop top — her face is out of frame — twerks on “Gallerist”, also in trackpants and crop, her pierced belly button exposed, who is bent backwards in a bridge. “Gallerist” is being propped up by “Unpaid Intern”, who is using her entire body to keep the other woman from falling. “Collector”, wearing pink and grey pajamas and a cute pink sleep mask on her forehead, has got her hand on “Artist’s” ass, her mouth agape in what looks like excitement. “Curator” sits away from the action, clad in all black, taking photos on a huge iPhone.

It’s funny, in that meme-y way of being an exaggeration of real life, drawing on associations that aren’t obvious until they are.

Really, the most unlikely aspect of the image is that all the characters are black, and all are women. Everything else is possible after a few too many drinks. Mostly, I like the image in the same way I love reality TV: never guiltily, always totally immersively. How much fun! To imagine yourself in each and every role. How would you live if you lived a script? Would you be Kylie or Kim? Paris or Nicole? Surely no one would pick “Unpaid Intern”.

There’s a scene in the 2012 Bravo series Gallery Girls where Maggie Schaffer confronts her employer, the gallerist Eli Klein. It goes something like this: Maggie: I just can’t keep doing these internships for you…

Eli: I don’t want you to intern forever, and we only ever ask for a 30 day commitment from our interns. Do you think it’s been more than 30 total?

Maggie: [whispering and crying] I’ve done this since college. [She left university three years ago]. That’s all I wanted to say.

Eli: Okay, well I appreciate your hard work and dedication. I will see you on Monday.

The unpaid intern propping up the rest of the ridiculous scene is often praised for hard work and dedication, which is their contribution in a deal with an employer that usually promises to return experience, maybe a reference, and rarely — but ideally — a paying job. In a society like ours, where Pākehā women earn 13% less than the average male, Māori women 13% less than that, and Pasifika women 7% less again, to be able to accept a position which pays only in cultural capital is a luxury. An industry in which some kind of volunteer-work-asexperience is necessary to get a foot in the door leads inevitably to an industry that is lacking in diversity. That’s not to say that unpaid work is the only means of entering the sector, just that it seems one of the most common. It’s also not to say that unpaid work is necessarily exploitative, although it can be, but that it's often hard to say no to any opportunities — unpaid or paid — for fear of missing out on the experience. The problem is not that the system doesn’t work — it does, whatever its pitfalls — but that by its very nature it excludes people who can’t afford to risk working for nothing in the hopes that it will lead to something more.

— Hanahiva Rose

How to Lea

rn?

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THEATRE Olive Copperbottom — Penny Ashton As a general, unspoken rule of reviewing theatre, it is customary and even expected to commend one-person shows that don’t end in utter disaster.

The sheer scale of planning, the gruelling rehearsal period, the necessary charisma and repertoire required with different audiences each night, and the added anxiety of being unable to see how others might deride your creative genius is awful enough when spread out, and can be near excruciating when piled upon one person.

Not content with one layer of stress, Penny Ashton, the titular Olive Copperbottom, is credited as writer, publicist, producer, designer, concepter, and researcher in addition to performer. The fact that Ashton manages to get through one hour and ten minutes, portray about 20 different characters, and reach a resolution that makes sense deserves commendation in of itself. Yet her eye for satire, the consistently high level of laughs throughout, her marvelous physicality, and her sheer likability even when dealing with hecklers and slip-ups raises the bar for one-person shows everywhere. Oh, and it’s a musical, too.

In brief, Olive Copperbottom is a satire of Dickensian tropes and narratives from A Tale of Two Cities to Little Dorrit, with a wickedly dark edge (the piece is bookended by a sung ode to orphanages). We follow Olive from her tragic beginnings as a povertous child, to her occupation as a much maligned carer at her orphanage, to her runaway success as a star ukulele (or “midget guitar”) player, all the while trying to find out the identity of her mysterious benefactor. If that sounds all over the place, that’s because in a sense it is, just like much of Charles Dickens’ back catalogue (come at me, English course directors). But even with the addition of songs arranged by Robbie Ellis, Ashton’s performance carries us through on waves of laughter, exploiting with glee the number of outright stupid words in the English language and anachronistic references to Ticketmaster, Russian interference in the American elections, and New Zealand’s 100% green policy.

Theatre

Even though the musical element of Olive Copperbottom was the most stressed in its marketing, I found this the least compelling aspect of the performance. Ashton sings with conviction when not trying to cram in her usual 20 jokes a minute, but they only served to slow the breakneck pace Ashton seemed most comfortable with. The real delight came through her characters, each one with a different stance, accent, moral compass, and ability to draw laughs. In comparison to Hand to God, which I reviewed last week, Olive Copperbottom hit its stride early on and maintained its energy and mischievous attitude all the way into what Ashton herself admits, as an aside, is a ridiculous finale. Her asides throughout indicate that even with the pressure of repeating the success of Pride and Promiscuity, she is not afraid to laugh at herself and the potential plot holes she gleefully creates.

Through Olive Copperbottom, Circa Two was turned from a Bleak House into… a notas-bleak house. See, parody can be hard, but if Ashton can keep up her streak of delivering satire with a refreshingly non-serious edge, I have Great Expectations for what she and her team can do next.

— Sean Harbottle

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Features

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NOTICES COMPASSION SOUP KITCHEN

Friday, May 26, is the Compassion Soup Kitchen’s Annual Street Appeal. Their survival relies on donations and this is their biggest fundraiser. They will be on the Kelburn campus.

If you would like to volunteer, contact Hillary at hillary.w@compassion.org.nz with your name, number, and the time and location that’s convenient for you to collect.

To find out more or to contact you can email the compassion kitchen at: soup@compassion.org.nz and www.soupkitchen.org.nz Pop in at 132 Tory Street, Te Aro, Wellington 6011, or call (04) 385 9299.

SWAT MEETING!

The Student Wellbeing Awareness Team meets every Friday 4.00–5.00pm. We meet at Mauri Ora — come to reception and ask for us! There’s free tea, coffee, and food.

This week we have a guest speaker talking to us about how to manage self-care when the stress is on! Our meetings are always a chill safe space, where everyone is welcome, so come along!

PINK SHIRT DAY

May 26 is Pink Shirt Day — an annual event about preventing and raising awareness about bullying in our communities. SWAT will be hosting a bake sale in the Hub around lunch time as a part of Pink Shirt Day. Come along and buy some goodies and donate to a good cause!

UNICEF AT VICTORIA

UNICEF at Victoria are holding an open workshop on the May 23, 6.30pm in SU229, and are inviting all VUW students to attend. The event will focus on highlighting the benefits of NZ youth voicing their opinions.

CAREERS IN FOCUS FOR PASIFIKA STUDENTS

Thinking about where your degree can take you? Come along and hear from VUW Pasifika alumni about their work experiences.

Gain valuable tips on how to prepare for your career.

Meet graduates from MBIE, accounting and architectural firms, Ministry of Health, Xero, to name a few…

Date: Wednesday, May 31 Time: 5.30–6.30pm (panel session); 6.30–7.30pm (informal networking and refreshments) Venue: AM102 and AM104 Refreshments provided!

To assist with numbers for catering BOOK NOW on CareerHub!

VICTORIA ABROAD — STUDENT EXCHANGE OPPORTUNITIES

Why wait to go overseas after finishing your degree? GO ON EXCHANGE! Study in English, earn Victoria credit, get StudyLink & grants, explore the world!

Find out more on our website: http://victoria.ac.nz/exchange Enjoy past students’ experiences & photos on Facebook: https://www.facebook. com/VictoriaAbroadNZ/ Information Sessions: Every Wednesday at 12.50pm, Level Two, Easterfield Building.

Drop-In Hours: Tuesday & Wednesday, 1.00–3.00pm; Thursday & Friday, 10:30– 12.00pm. Room EA232

A listing in our notices section is free for all VUW students, VUWSA-affiliated clubs, and not-for-profit organisations. If you would like to post a notice please email editor@salient.org.nz and include NOTICE in the subject line. There is limited space in this section so notices will be prioritised at the discretion of the editors.

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CROSSWORD: ‘MOST COMMON'

Sudoku difficulty: Easy

SUDOKU

TARGET

LAST WEEK'S SOLUTION

Make as many words of three letters or more as you can. Each word must contain the letter in the central square.

Target goals: Good: 20 words Great: 26 words Impressive: 29 words

ACROSS

Puzzles

1. Gay woman who was Oscars host prior to Harris (9) 5. Ritual during Nisan with matzo (5) 8. Play or film locations (4) 10. British city 60 km from Plymouth - St Nicholas Priory is in it (6) 12. It's full of ink (3) 13. Fuck up, formally (3) 14. Not odd (4) 15. 2003 British rock song that starts "In pitch dark, I go walking" (5,5) 17. Gift prior to 'four calling birds' (5,6,4) 22. Folk guitarist (and 'Turn! Turn!

Turn!' musician and author) (4,6) 24. Syngman ___, 1950s politician in Asia (4) 25. It follows spring, to a Parisian (3) 26. Lamb's mum (3) 27. Curl up warm and snug (6) 29. Captain Hook's assistant (4) 31. ____ nous ("Just among us", fancily) (5) 32. Citation in MLA format, say (9)

DOWN

1. Downward shift (7) 2. Obtain (3) 3. Strain (5) 4. Christmas ___ (3) 5. Span (across) (7) 6. Burn through (7) 7. Co-star of Richard in 'Chicago' (and who won an Oscar for playing Ruby in 'Cold Mountain', too) (5) 9. Sight or touch, say (5) 11. Actor Stamp who was Zod and Billy Budd (7) 16. Guys who corral cows (7) 18. Forward 1-Across's famous Oscar photo, possibly (7) 19. Gist (7) 20. "____ Johnny!" ( Jack Nicholson's words in '28-Down Shining') (5) 21. "Now look at this!" (3,4) 22. Annoy (5) 23. Costar of 11-Down in 1978 and 1980 (5) 28. Look at 20-Down (3) 30. Guys or chaps (3)

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Comic