Author: Alan

It’s Spring!

That’s what the cal­en­dar is telling us. As is the wind howl­ing through the trees, and short­ly, a string of cold south-west­er­ly thun­der­storms and gales. Stay classy, Welly Weath­er God!

Leav­ing that aside, the our eter­nal opti­mism finds expres­sion in the cel­e­bra­tion of grow­ing things that is the Spring Fes­ti­val, to start at the week­end (through to 3 Octo­ber).

The first event is the annu­al Otari-Wilton’s Bush Open Day & Plant Sale, which any aspir­ing sub­ur­ban­ite should be advised to attend ear­ly if they want to pick up the real­ly good stuff. Ear­ly bird catch­es the hard-to-find horoe­ka vari­ant and all that. But even if you’re not a gar­den­er, the ‘Bush is a very nice place for a stroll, espe­cial­ly on Open Days when after­wards you can reward your­self at the sausage siz­zle (and the last cou­ple of years there’s been a cof­fee cart there too).

Joel Salom’s Gadgets

Bizarre uses for ping-pong balls, mega­lo­ma­ni­ac robot dogs, fire jug­gling, and a healthy dose of audi­ence par­tic­i­pa­tion are just some of the ingre­di­ents in Joel Salom’s Gad­gets, which opened tonight at Down­stage as part of the Com­e­dy Fes­ti­val.

It’s a mix­ture of accom­plished phys­i­cal com­e­dy from Aus­trali­a’s Joel Salom, backed by Marko and Jim, a cou­ple of very tal­ent­ed musi­cian-per­form­ers who, from time to time, become part of the action.

Read on…

Predictive Bussing

We’ve long dreamed of being able to time our morn­ing corn­flakes to the actu­al arrival time of our bus, rather than hav­ing to wait 20 min­utes out­side a jammed bus shel­ter dur­ing a howl­ing souther­ly storm.

The dream goes a lit­tle like this. You’re hav­ing your cof­fee and your phone soft­ly blips. You look down. A mes­sage says your bus is 3 min­utes behind sched­ule and will be at your stop in exact­ly 8 min­utes. You have time to fin­ish your cof­fee before you grab your coat and go. And you arrive at the bus stop at exact­ly the right time.

Luck­i­ly for us this is, in time, becom­ing a real­i­ty.

Read on to to find out why…

revolution (for dummies)

One of the nicest things about the Fes­ti­val of the Arts is that there are almost always sev­er­al events that leave the realm of over­priced tow­ers of high-cul­ture and invade the every­day places. For exam­ple this year, we’ve loved the cir­cus events and the dancer with dig­ger in Wai­t­an­gi Park.

Right now, the fes­ti­val is get­ting a lit­tle more into the faces of the gold­en mile shop­pers and office lunchtime refugees with a series of shop win­dow instal­la­tions along Lambton Quay and near­by streets.

This is the Revolt of the Man­nequins, from French the­atre com­pa­ny Roy­al De Luxe. Every night, a new “episode” in each instal­la­tion is revealed; sto­ries are told against a wider nar­ra­tive of a rev­o­lu­tion of man­nequins against their oppres­sors. 

And while you’re busy check­ing out all ten offi­cial loca­tions (map here), put this track on high rotate, and let us know what and where you see the man­nequins next. For not all of the man­nequins are inside the shops (as the passers by who caught sight of the sniper yes­ter­day found out). 

And who knows — it could be that those that are not for the rev­o­lu­tion, are against it. 

the 12 Pubs of Christmas

Peo­ple say, some­times with even a hint of con­cern in their voic­es, that we at the Welling­ton­ista are over­ly con­cerned with drink­ing.

And it’s true. We are very con­cerned. In fact we’re writ­ing now to warn you about an upcom­ing event that may well involve some drink­ing. What’s worse, it’s the the sort of thing attend­ed by the Boys Your Moth­er Warned You About and the Girls Your Father Snuck Looks At When He Thought Your Moth­er Would­n’t See.

An Adagio Christmas

There’s a moment very ear­ly on in An Ada­gio Christ­mas when the whole the­atre gasped in uni­son, and both our daugh­ters stood up in shock. The moment passed, the shock fad­ed, but they nev­er quite set­tled back past the edges of their seats. Like the rest of us, from then on they were hooked.

An Ada­gio Christ­mas is a retuned-for-Christ­mas ver­sion of the ear­li­er Down­stage pro­duc­tion of the same name; a series of loose­ly linked vignettes whose per­for­mances encom­pass var­i­ous cir­cus skills as well as music, singing, danc­ing, and com­e­dy.

T4WA nominees: Wellingtonian of the Year

Vot­ing in the Fourth Annu­al Welling­ton­ista Awards is open from Decem­ber 1–15. Then come find out the results at our Awards Night at Mighty Mighty on Decem­ber 17!

To vote, vis­it this page.

Our nom­i­na­tions for Welling­ton­ian of the Year are all peo­ple who make our city a brighter, bet­ter place to live. Their con­tri­bu­tions are as var­ied as Welling­ton itself, and we’re so proud of them all.