A visit to Awhitu…

Friday 13 February: we set off for our first visit to the Awhitu Peninsula since leaving earthtalk@awhitu in April last year. We stayed at a favourite holiday haven – Spyve’s Cottage, right on the beachfront at Orua Bay Camp Ground.  Beautiful swims morning and night for two days! We visited Alison and Steve, the owners […]

Pride

The Auckland Pride Festival – an annual celebration of gay, lesbian, transgender, bisexual and other people of alternative gender and/or sexuality – has grown to more than 80 events this year.  We went to the opening of the Lady Love art exhibition at the lesbian Charlotte Museum on 1 February; great to catch up with old friends and meet new […]

Diverse Delights

In this last week, we’ve enjoyed dance, food and drama from around the world. We went to the Okareka Dance Company’s Summer School final performance, exploring the theme Kiwi Ingenuity, by 15 talented secondary-school age students, coached in contemporary dance by Tane Mete and Taiaroa Royal.  www.okareka.com On the way home, we stopped to eat […]

Mr Turner – hilarious??

We went to see Mr Turner, a film about Joshua Turner, the painter, which has been very positively reviewed. David Larsen of The Listener described it as “one of the funniest films I’ve seen this year” and as “hilarious”. What we saw was a film about a man, albeit a painter of genius, suffering Asperger’s […]

Summer Solstice Greetings to you all.

The longest day is here, with huge lemon-scented magnolia blossoms… We will  celebrate Summer Solstice with family and friends,  at Earthsong.  Tanya will harvest a bed of garlic, and we’ll be feasting on our new discovery –  delicious blueberry-cashew ‘raw food’ cheese cake – plus savoury snacks  and colourful summer salads…           On Christmas Day we hope […]

Treasures in the North

We discovered two very different treasures during a few days in Northland this month- Te Mirumiru in Kawakawa, Earth House in Peria Valley -and enjoyed special friends in a lovely landscape. Te Mirumiru… Te Mirumiru is an award-winning childcare centre in Kawakawa. Ngaati Hine have built this eco-friendly and inclusive early childhood education centre, in which 80 children – […]

Media Minutes…

We do find time for some media indulgence  – more often the media seem like a penance. Each month we’ll try and mention something outstanding – where posible with a link to something we think is specially worthwhile. Grandpa Herald…   The front page of the NZ Herald, most days, is repulsive – another celebration of violence […]

RANUI PATAKA KORERO- Ranui Storehouse of Knowledge

At 5.30am on Friday 3 October nearly a hundred residents of Ranui and the wider community gathered for the dawn blessing of Rānui Pātaka Kōrero, the new library for Ranui and Swanson people. Leaders spoke about its significance to the community and the special importance of learning to all our young people.         […]