There are some lovely songs up on bandcamp by New Zealand musician Ben Parsons. Very pretty, thoughtful music. Ben did the music for a dance production I directed back in 1996 called An Echo of My Trance.
One of the lads just sent this announcement through:
Kea JAPAN is honored to host an event with Brian Martin, Chairman of Japan New Zealand Business Council
This is a great chance for you to:
+ network with a business leader and innovator
+ learn how Brian worked to turn around Levis and Triumph
+ interested in doing business in New Zealand
WHEN:
Wednesday May 19th, 6pm to 9pm [ doors open at 5:50pm ]
COST:
2,500yen pre-paid or 3,000yen at the door
WHERE:
Club 57, B1F Roppongi, Minato-ku, Tokyo 4-2-35
Tel: 03-5775-7857 www.fiftyseven.co.jp
FORMAT:
standing buffet dinner with 1 glass of wine included
REGISTRATION:
Attendance at this event is limited to 150 places. Please register your
interest by sending an e-mail to judith at keanewzealand.com by May 14th.
Payments to be made by Monday May 17th by paypal.
All details will be provided on registration.
Any enquiries call Mark 080-3386-7558 or e-mail judith at keanewzealand.com www.keanewzealand.com
Don’t go to Roppongi too often even though it is just up the hill – but will have to check this one out.
Good news for our cricket team as Paddy Foleys registered their first victory of the season over the Predators.
Here is a little snippet from the second innings:
The next man in was one of their chief protagonists and Goldie noticing the lack of helmet promptly put a man close in at leg slip, sure enough a bit of chin music followed and the batsman was looking rather uncomfortable out in the middle. He did manage to stick around for a few overs but never looked like troubling the scorers eventually out bowled by John for a duck. The next pair put on 18 runs before Goldie picked up the next one caught behind. Goldie claimed the 4th as well LBW and we had them on the ropes at 4-30 but with opener Graeme still in and looking dangerous we new the job wasn’t done yet.
I didn’t make it to the game – have been a bit busy with work as per usual. Will have to get out for a hit and add to my momentous tally of about 20 runs in Japan – not bad for 10 years!
A nice little collection of Goodbye Pork Pie videos courtesy of youtube. Released internationally in 1981, Goodbye Pork Pie is a classic New Zealand road movie, which is sometimes compared to Easy Rider. Here is the trailer:
It has always been one of my favourite New Zealand films. Classic Kiwiana.
Here is the Wellington car chase scene. Eat your heart out James Bond!
Now, I am wondering where I can find a mini in Tokyo. And a haircut like that (working on that one).
And here is a remake. Bet you never thought you would see a Goodbye Pork Pie Part 2.
And another homage video this time on the Kaiikanui Hill (Northland, NZ) (resplite with graphic possum carnage, but no fish’n'chips):
Classic. But I have to dash. Have a ferry to catch.
This picture popped up on popurls (via reddit) and I thought it was too delicious not to post.
The photo was taken by Noface2 and the original can be found here.
That sense of humour is something I do miss about New Zealand. Here in Japan I have never seen a job post anything like that. Hope they find a good burger flipping existentialist.
Shouts to the team at Kiwiology for adding this blog to their directory of New Zealand blogs. Ka pai!
Kiwiology is…
Kiwiology is a directory of kiwi blogs – the stuff that makes up the New Zealand blogosphere.
Blog topics include, but are not limited to:
New Zealand blogs, Kiwis blogging overseas, blogs about New Zealand politics, the environment and sustainability in New Zealand (or by people based in New Zealand), New Zealand’s economy, Kiwi businesses and business topics, New Zealand issues and current events and kiwis’ personal blogs.
Recent blogs (as of this posting) added to kiwiology include:
Went shopping this afternoon, to the Yamaya supermarket in Aoyama-1chome, and was quite bemused to come across this sign in their wine corner. The flag on the top is the Australian flag, then it says New Zealand under the flag, and written vertically in Japanese is… Australia!
Not sure how they ended up with that sign, but surely New Zealand needs a new flag… and Australia could probably do with a new one as well!
By the by, we couldn’t find any penne pasta, and other shops seem to be out of it as well. Prices for other types of pasta are up as well. Global warning leads to anti-penne pandemic anyone?
Pretty strange piece of news this morning in the Christchurch Press. It appears that someone dressed up in a panda costume was involved in a hit and run and unfortunately a woman, quite unconnected to the said panda was injured during the incident.
Will the People’s Republican Army be mobilised? Will there be an initial bamboo relief supply drop over Christchurch?
Panda impersonator sought after hit-and-run
By JO McKENZIE-McLEAN – The Press | Tuesday, 13 November 2007
Police are on the look-out for an injured panda impersonator who was involved in a hit-and-run in Christchurch.
A person dressed as a panda, hanging out a front passenger window, was one of up to four occupants of a car that ploughed into a pedestrian without stopping at 2.25am on Saturday in Riccarton.
Constable Moira Wyeth said the woman was getting into her white Toyota Vitz, which was parked on the west side of Riccarton Road beside a dairy near Wainui Street when she was struck from behind.
“As she partially opened her door she was hit in the back by a vehicle.”
The impact of being hit caused the woman to be thrown into the front seat and her front driver’s door was ripped off.
The woman, who was alone, sustained back injuries. A passerby waved police down.
The vehicle is described as a red, four-door sedan, mid-1990s and last seen heading west on Riccarton Road.
There was a blonde woman sitting in the back seat, and the panda possibly sustained upper body injuries, Wyeth said.
Anyone with information should contact Wyeth on (03) 3637400 or contact her via email: moira.wyeth@police.govt.nz
A small New Zealand Brewery had a laptop stolen earlier this week and in a bold move are offering a life time supply of beer (well 12 bottles a month) for anyone who can name the thief.
Who would do such a dastardly thing? I hope they catch the thief and make him (or her but lets face it, him) drink fosters for the rest of his life. That will serve as a stronger lesson than anything the courts can send down.
I was very glad to get a copy of Lloyd Jones’ Mr Pip earlier this week. I mentioned Mr. Pip briefly in an earlier post, and with the awards ceremony for The Man Booker Prize just around the corner I thought it might be nice to give Mr. Pip the once-over.
The Man Booker Prize is the world’s leading book award and has been won previously by a New Zealander with South Island author Keri Hulme picking up the prize in 1985 for her classic novel The Bone People. Unlike the Nobel Prize for Literature, the Man Booker Prize focuses on choosing the greatest novel of the year, so if Mr. Jones were to pick it up for Mr. Pip it would be an honour indeed.
Mr. Pip is a delightful read. It is a story told through the world of Matilda, a child growing up on the Papua New Guinean Island of Bouganville. Named by the Australians who controlled the extremely valuable and productive copper mines on the islands, Matilda’s story brings us right down to earth at the very juncture between many different memes. During the period the story is set in – the 1990′s – the island was blockaded by the Papua New Guinea government as the island was rollicked by war.
Themes of innocence versus power, the effects of industry on an island people, intelligence versus christianity drive this book in a delicate and informed way that both intrigues and stimulates the mind. It would be easy given the themes that this book deals with to drop into glibbly patronizing the characters but Lloyd deals with the themes in an elegant manner that inspires the reader.
Those of you familiar with English dinosaurs may recognize the character from the title – Mr. Pip – as being drawn from Dickens’ Great Expectations. Mr Pip as a novel works in layers and the Dickensian Mr. Pip is several of these. On the island there is only one white man – a certain Mr. Watts who ends up teaching the children. Untrained as a teacher he teaches in a ‘novel’ way – by reading Mr. Pip to the kids. But in a sense he also becomes Mr. Pip. I really enjoyed the way this layering creates a sort of palimpsest enticing the reader to dig between the layers to create their own meanings and interpretations.
This book conjures up images of author such as Gabriel Garcia Marquez and The Unbearable Lightness Of Being‘s Milan Kundera. It does, very slightly miss the lightness that makes A Hundred Years of Solitude such a magnificent read. I think Jones is on the verge of greatness – perhaps just one novel away from creating his own masterpiece.
For a rating I will give it nine carriages of drunken salary-men on the Yamanote line out of ten.
There is a nice review from Australia’s The Age here (thats where I got the photo) and if you want to pick up a copy from Amazon then click here.
There are some lovely songs up on bandcamp by New Zealand musician Ben Parsons. Very pretty, thoughtful music. Ben did the music for a dance production I directed back in 1996 called An Echo of My Trance.
Kea JAPAN is honored to host an event with Brian Martin, Chairman of Japan New Zealand Business Council
Pretty strange 
A small New Zealand Brewery had a laptop stolen earlier this week and in a bold move are offering a life time supply of beer (well 12 bottles a month) for anyone who can name the thief.
I was very glad to get a copy of Lloyd Jones’ Mr Pip earlier this week. I 
.