This week’s pro­file takes us to the oth­er side of the Remu­taka Ranges for a very good cause. 

1. Hello! Who the heck are youse and what are you up to?

I’m Kylie, and col­lect­ively we’re the Parry/Hannen whānau. My 17-year-old daugh­ter and I are walk­ing across the Wair­ar­apa into Wel­ling­ton to raise money and answer ques­tions about rais­ing trans kids and being young and trans.  The rest of the whānau are act­ing as sup­port crew, provid­ing hugs, band-aids and pick-ups at the end of each day. Com­ing to a lib­rary near you from June 10th !

The timetable is:

  • June 10th, 2pm: Mas­ter­ton Lib­rary
  • June 11th to 12th: Walk­ing, phew!
  • June 13th, 4pm: Upper Hutt Lib­rary
  • June 14th, 4pm: Te Awe Lib­rary (Brandon St, Wel­ling­ton)
  • June 15th, 2pm: John­son­ville Lib­rary
  • June 16th: Rest­ing, whoo!

2. Why are you doing this walk? Is it some­thing you’ve done before?

We just figured it was some­thing we could do to help out and maybe answer some ques­tions for people. This is our third walk, but the first time we’re stop­ping to give talks and answer ques­tions. The 1st walk was ‘48kms in a day’ when Mindy was 12 and three years ago we walked from Castle­point to Waik­an­ae (as you do).

3. How can people sup­port you two now and also trans fam­il­ies in gen­er­al?

Well, since you asked… we do have a givealittle (money goes to Gender Minor­it­ies Aotearoa) and we’d love to see people at our talks. In gen­er­al, people could sup­port trans fam­il­ies by listen­ing to us, treat­ing us nor­mally and by gen­er­ally not being dicks.

4. Unfor­tu­nately with our coun­try filled with politi­cians and oth­er grift­ers dog whist­ling, it’s not exactly a safe time right now. How do you keep yourselves safe?

Yeah, safety is more on our mind this time. The gen­er­al feel out there is a bit scary (and ooo have we been called some names). We’re stay­ing safe by hav­ing a won­der­ful team of sup­port­ers to call on. This applies both on the walk and in our lives. We’re also very lucky and live in an awe­some com­munity who has our backs. Yay, Carter­ton! Not every­one is as lucky as us. So if you hear someone being hassled or someone mouth­ing trans­phobic bigotry, call them out on it (if you can).

5. What are some of the best things to do in the Wairarapa/Wellington? Be it activ­it­ies or food or whatever

Op Shops in the Wair­ar­apa and food. There are so many awe­some places to eat, and our op shops are the best. In Wel­ling­ton, I love the water­front for people watch­ing and spot­ting stin­grays.

6. What three actu­ally achiev­able things do you reck­on would make a sig­ni­fic­ant pos­it­ive impact on the great­er Wel­ling­ton region in the next five years or so?

Re-open­ing the cent­ral lib­rary, more GPs and free pub­lic trans­port.