2AWA: Most Needed

Here are the nominees for the Most Needed category for the 2nd Annual Wellingtonista Awards (2AWA)

Wellington most needs:

Wellington’s pretty close to perfection, but there are a few things that we need. More smart people to participate in local elections so we don’t end up with Kerry again. A living wage for the Wellingtonistas. More celebrities, apparently. And also these things:

(nominees after the jump)

A. A tiki bar

For a country that actually has Tikis as part of the culture we have no way to celebrate that culture by drinking ourselves silly in some sort of tiki related manner. How hard is it to nail some bamboo to the bar, serve drinks in pineapples, coconuts and Tiki mugs? Until we get a proper tiki bar you can find us sitting in the tikified corner of Hadyn‘s lounge drinking Zombies from his scorpion bowl.

WINNER!!!
B. Light rail to the airport

In case you haven’t noticed, the Wellingonista are very pro-public transport. Unfortunately, the council aren’t. Light rail won the vote at the last Wellingtonista awards, but still hasn’t been implemented. That’s just not good enough. After all, we are officially the self-proclaimed official voice of the people, and we demand it!

C. Muji

We have to been to the Japanese design chain Muji many times. Thrice in London, twice in Paris and over and over again in Tokyo. Every visit had a bad effect on our wallets but a soothing effect on the eye and mind. Whether it was bags, or pants, or designer stationery or linen or furniture or cities in a bag, we couldn’t get enough of the Muji stuff. They opened their first store in New York recently, it also happened to be the first store in America, so Wellington might be a ways off yet, but we can dream right?

D. A 24 hour diner

There’s only so far kebab shops can take you. Kenny’s and Midnight Espresso are not enough – we need to get all Americanised. We need a diner with cosy booths and bottomless coffee to fuel our intellectual discussions. We need a place to go after our late-running gigs so we can talk shit. We need a place to hook up over curly fries and burgers. We want to be able to order waffles at 3am.

E. Wagamama

For some of us it was over a decade ago, yet still we have fond memories of noodle chain Wagamama‘s original below-ground level Soho and Bloomsbury branches and their minimalist decor, long tables, and their cheap(-ish) but tasty and great take on Japanese noodles. So we were, it has to be said, mildly jealous to find that a branch (or three) had opened in Auckland. Perhaps the concept is getting a little old, and perhaps Wellington’s own Chow could be argued for instead, but nevertheless we’d love to see a Wagamama here.

Voting opens on November 19.