Stuff our readers like
We have a guest post for you by the voluble Anna Jane Wilson who also likes hats, boots, coats and scarves.
My goodness, it’s already July – I can’t quite believe we’re halfway through our Roman calendars, but all evidence says – 10 July 2009. July, albeit cold and windy in this wonderful city, is going to be a large one.
The four main things that keep me warm in winter are jazz, walking, films, and dance. I’m new to Wellington, but apparently this city has a lot of jazz, thus, my soul will be kept very warm.
continues after the jump…
Something to mull over
Having observed a steaming hot urn of it at the Southern Cross on Saturday night, surrounded by blankets and hot water bottles, we want to know: where can one get the best mulled wine in Wellington, how much will we have to pay for it, and approximately what alcoholic percentage will it be?
Do our work for us in the comments section. Thanks!
A Bit Of Love for an Old Organ
The Wellington Town Hall is rated amongst the top ten in the world for acoustics [citation needed], and this was a significant argument in the 1970s and 80s when the demolition of the Town Hall became a possibility. The organ in the town hall is 104 or so years old and is reknowned worldwide for being one of the few Edwardian organs in the world that has survived to the present day without alteration.
Once again Wellington City Council is running a free Organ Concert Series on Sunday afternoons featuring our City Organist, Douglas Mews, and other guests. After a spell in Europe checking out a myriad of baroque instruments and playing the occasional organ recital, Douglas says he’ll be full of inspiration and enthusiasm for his concerts on Sunday 9 August and 6 September.
[the details after the jump]
The Whimsical Work of Drypnz
Drypnz will be familiar to many Wellingtonians with his distinct street style gracing the streets, alleyways and gallery walls around town. From the paid mural work and other commissions, to paste ups and throw ups around town which are a gift to the city, Drypnz is a prolific, hard working artist who deserves plenty of recognition (and to get paid). The Wellingtonista were lucky enough to have a sneak peak at the new show opening at Manky Chops tonight, and gotta say, we are not disappointed. Those luscious juju lips with their geisha girl pouts were there in abundance of course but there is a range of work, different sizes and mediums and there will be prints and T-shirts available tonight as well.
Head on down from 7:00pm until about 9:30pm tonight, the crew at Manky Chops are always friendly and put on a good party.
Take your wallet, I suspect the smaller works are going to sell fast.
Dub Encounters Volume One
As Wellingtonians, we love dub, right? [citation needed] Sometimes to a fault, even? [citation needed] Anyone else remember that famous review a few years back in Pavement magazine of some local outfit that read:
More effing trumpet-dub from Wellington
Anyway if its to your taste, there’s some serious dub trickery coming down in the next couple of weeks…
[the details after the jump]
Breaking news: Pleiades visible at dawn
So today is the official start of Matariki, for some time now there has been a push for Matariki to become a public holiday, Minister of Maori Affairs Dr Pita Sharples last week announced the Maori Party had drafted a bill to make Matariki a public holiday. See what the Prime Minister thinks of the idea here.
Some accounts have Matariki as a mother and her 6 daughters assisting Te R? as he turns around and heads south. I like this story better than the Greek version of Pleiades which has the seven daughters of Pleione and Atlas turned into stars to ‘save them from Orion’s dishonourable intentions’. Where are the kick-arse goddesses of legend when you need them? In Japanese legend the sun goddess Amaterasu was lured out of her cave by a good old bit of burlesque dancing and silliness performed by the voluptuous goddess of merriment Ama-no-Uzume. That is certainly one way of coaxing the sun out of a funk.
There are a range of things around Wellington planned help get the Matariki celebrations rolling:
The Wellingtonista visits Snapper
Some of us at the Wellingtonista are rather fond of the old Snapper card. We worked through its teething troubles and are now happily tagging on and off as we bus about the city.
So when Miki Szikszai, CEO of Snapper, asked us if we’d like to visit Snapper HQ and learn a bit about what’s new in the world of the magical talking fish box, we (well, Alan and I) jumped at the chance.
After the jump – what we found at Snapper.
Nocturnal Sunshine
Well today there is time to squeeze the out the last of solstice by squeezing out a quick post to mark the occasion. Mid-winter is officially here with the end of the shortest day, the end of the growing power of cold and darkness and the start of the growth of warmth and light. While there is plenty to celebrate about mid-winter (mulled wine, boots, hats and scarves spring to mind) there is something heartening in the knowledge that the days will be getting longer and us hardy Wellingtonians can give ourselves a pat on the back for surviving the worst of it with our love for Wellington intact. After all, there is no such thing as bad weather, just bad clothes.
You may or may not have noticed but the energies of the Wellingtonista have been diverted into the twitterstream somewhat of late, but hey we find plenty of our readers there these days too! Solstice is getting a few a mentions around the place and I found this charming tweet:
@RowanSmith Went to Druids’ solstice do at Stonehenge Aotearoa. Druid: "We give thx to the powers of the East and to the guy holding this light for me"
So we are curious, do you mark Solstice? Are you planning anything for Matariki this week? Let us know in the comments or on twitter @wellingtonista, a post on hot tips for Matariki is planned for tomorrow.
Snapper, re-visited
It’s been a long time since we’ve mentioned Snapper in these pages.
In the meantime it’s become so much of an everyday part of life in Wellington now that it hardly seems worth mentioning anymore. Or is it?
Recently we got an email from Snapper asking us if we’d like to come and see what they’re up to. It seems they’ve had a few other things on the go as well as the recent Valley Flyer conversion and they’d like to let us know about them.
Sounds good. But it doesn’t have to be a one way thing. Now’s our chance to ask Snapper what they’re doing to bring some of our public transport "most needed" items into reality:
- fully integrated ticketing across all public transport providers in the Wellington region, and
- our bus stops equipped with real time bus information – we may not want much, but we want the best, and at the moment we have to admit that Christchurch, at least in part, Has It.
What about you? If you could ask the Snapper people a question, what would it be? Is there something you’d like changed? Is there anything about the present system that bugs you?
Let us know, below, and we’ll pass it along.
Whare ’nuff
This Thursday the 18th of June, Deidre Brown’s "Maori Architecture: from Fale to Wharenui and Beyond" will be launched at the School of Architecture in Vivian St.
The celebrations will start with a mihi at 5:45pm, followed by a lecture at 6 and drinks at 7. If you’re interested, please contact Christine McCarthy (04 463 6164 or christine.mccarthy@vuw.ac.nz) to RSVP before the end of tomorrow (the 16th).