Mozart deters crims
Since 29, in a downtown Christchurch mall, music by Mozart and other classical composers has been played over speakers to deter would-be criminals. The music has led to a steep fall in petty crime,…
News of New Zealanders via Global Media
Gud on youse
In an article entitled: ‘Culubrating thu daggiest ick-cent of all’ Clare Barry writes for The Age: “Back in the ‘7s, when John Clarke called himself Fred Dagg and got around in a black singlet…
Holiday hero
Hamilton sergeant Murray Stapp has received a bravery award from the Governor of Victoria, Professor David de Kretser, after a July 28 arrest of an armed man who had just dragged a motorist from…
Simply affordable
Earlier this year, director of Auckland-based S3 Architects Limited Stephen Smith won a Department of Building and Housing competition challenging entrants to come up with a design for a cheap, easy-to-build house which complied…
Transparency reigns
New Zealand has tied with Denmark and Singapore for first place as the world’s least corrupt governments and public sectors, according to watchdog group Transparency International (TI). Finland, Sweden, Canada, Netherlands, Australia, Switzerland and…
Positive Food Experience
Pupils at East Tamaki Primary, Meadowbank Primary and Peninsula Primary schools are learning to grow and harvest fruit and vegetables with the help of the Garden to Table Trust Programme. Inspired by restaurateur Stephanie…
Te Reo Quandary
Justice Joe Williams who is chairing an inquiry by the Waitangi Tribunal says the Maori language is in “crisis” and only urgent action will halt its decline. As older speakers of Maori die…
Unanimous decision
“New Zealand’s parliament voted unanimously in September to pass the Canterbury Earthquake Response and Recovery Act (CERRA), which gives government ministers the power to override almost any law in the country’s statute books,” Tom…
Shaky Lessons
In the aftermath of the earthquake that rocked Christchurch on September 4, an Arizona State University (ASU) geotechnical engineer says the US should learn from what New Zealanders did to withstand a recent powerful…
Who is the Typical Kiwi?
An international study on cultural stereotypes, led by the US National Institutes of Health, has concluded that there is no relation between supposed cultural characteristics and the actual traits identified in real…
Complete with diamond
Jeweller Michael Hill is offering a 22-carat princess-cut diamond to the “world’s best couple” in an international competition which will be launched later this month at New York’s Rockefeller Centre. American reality TV performer…
2025 and smoke-free
New Zealand has unveiled an ambitious plan to make the country smoke-free by 225, wiping out smoking in all public places. The only other country with a similar policy is Finland, which plans to…
Safety indoors
The legislative changes introduced in New Zealand de-criminalising adult prostitution have been a model for Canadian judges to do the same, with courts recently ruling Canada’s adult prostitution laws unconstitutional. Justice Susan Himel considered…
Centenary Spread
Marmite is celebrating its 1th year in New Zealand with a competition for New Zealanders living overseas to win one of 1 one-way flights home from anywhere in the world this December. Hayley…
Fletchers rebuild city
Though a regional disaster for most, the 7.1 earthquake which hit Christchurch in September will generate some serious business for New Zealand’s largest construction group Fletchers. While acknowledging the tragedy of the earthquake, investors…
Participant in History
“I am in the midst of a living, pictorial history as it is being etched into our nation’s collective memory and into the core of this unstable but stunning landscape of Canterbury,” Jacqueline Monkman…
On the Ring of Fire
In the early hours of Saturday, September 4, Christchurch was struck by an earthquake measuring 7.1 on the Richter Scale, the same magnitude as that which hit Haiti in January. The quake was shallow,…
Carbon trading issues
Three years ago, in anticipation of substantial growth in the voluntary and compliance carbon markets, governments and business groups around the Asia-Pacific region were jockeying to establish a regional hub for carbon trading, including…
Shift in Aid Delivery
“In an effort to get more value from taxpayers’ dollars, the government wants better co-ordination between development agencies in the Pacific,” Johnny Blades writes for the Guardian. “The type of aid approach…
We Must Talk About It
New Zealand’s chief coroner Judge Neil MacLean has made “an impassioned plea for people to speak more openly about suicide calling for a re-think of laws and self imposed restrictions on what Coroners can…
In Defence of Milk
New Zealand dairy giant Fonterra Cooperative Group Ltd. is defending products sold to China two years after the 28 milk scandal, in which at least six children died and 3, were sickened from milk…
Record latching on
Hundreds of women throughout New Zealand have taken part in an attempt to set a breastfeeding record as part of the annual Latch On campaign. Former Silver Fern Julie Seymour, 39, and 27 other…
Copper’s collection
The Public Trust Building on Dannevirke’s main street has been transformed by former Hamilton Senior Sergeant Bruce Lyon and wife Maureen from a brothel into The International Police Museum. The Museum also serves as…
Justice argued
Rob Hamill — whose 28-year-old brother Kerry fell into the hands of the brutal Khmer Rouge regime when his yacht was captured in Cambodian waters in 1978 — was in Cambodia for the sentencing…
Changing family units
Couple without children in New Zealand are expected to surpass two-parent families as the most common household formation by next year, according to Statistics New Zealand figures. National Family and Household Projections released on…
More than family
In an article entitled ‘In Praise of Whanau’, the Herald Scotland’s Catriona Stewart writes that “for someone who can count blood relations on her fingers and still have digits to spare, the whanau is…
Mourning Moko
Tauranga’s favourite dolphin Moko has been found dead on an island off the coast of the port city. Department of Conservation area manager Andrew Baucke said Moko’s death was a sad loss. “The way…
Suitcase treasures
New Zealand descendants of a British officer stationed on St Helena, from 1815 to 1821, have sold a number of his collection of Napoleon Bonaparte mementoes at an auction in Auckland, including a lock…
Temple for Story
Prizewinning author Lloyd Jones — whose novel Mister Pip made the Booker shortlist in 27 — has established the Bougainville Library Trust in Arawa, Papua New Guinea, enabling locals to fundraise and build their…
Prison fag ban ahead
New Zealand is to ban smoking in prisons from 1 July 211. Corrections Minister Judith Collins said high levels of smoking were a risk to staff and prisoners. Opponents are concerned that violence in…
Own your own town
Remote Southern Alps township Otira, population 44 is for sale. Selling for $1 million, the deal includes a hotel, fire station, town hall and 18 houses. The Otira Hotel, which started life as a…
Wwow What a Wwoof
From their wwoofing holiday in Northland, Californian couple Jacob and Kendall Madden describe their time spent working on five organic farms in the region in a guide about what it means to be a…
Maintaining meaning
Each year, Whakatane ta moko artist Rangi Kipa has some 2 clients fly into the country from the UK or Europe eager to make a statement with a unique Maori tattoo. Kipa says the…
Tracing her roots
Each year, New Zealand Genealogical Society head Aucklander Jan Gow, 7, travels to Salt Lake City to browse ribbons of microfilm and endless volumes of maps, cemetery and property records tucked inside the Utah…
Peace reigns supreme
New Zealand has been named the most peaceful nation for the second year running in the fourth annual Global Peace Index (GPI). Compiled by global think tank Institute for Economics and Peace, the report…
Working class knight
Wellington-born Peter Leitch, known to his fans as the “Mad Butcher”, has received a knighthood in this year’s Queen’s Birthday Honours. Leitch, a butcher, former gravedigger and avid rugby league fan, says…
Splitting Cells
“New Zealand has found a cheap and quick way to build its prisons by converting used shipping containers into cells to deal with a record high number of inmates,” writes Philippa McDonald for the…
Mucking In
The Olivenhain garden of New Zealanders Maury and Heather Callaghan in Southern Californian is an “expanse of lawn and beds of perennials” with a tall, fragrant banana shrub and burgundy-leaved smoke tree “creat a…
Shechita forbidden
New Zealand has banned kosher slaughter after a new animal welfare code mandated that all animals for commercial consumption be stunned prior to slaughter to ensure they are treated “humanely and in accordance with…
Positive pitfalls
According to a New Zealand 3-year study people from positive family backgrounds are more likely to suffer depression, anxiety, alcohol dependence and drug dependence, tending to suffer more seriously and need more treatment. Researchers…
Making a stand
The trial of anti-whaler Pete Bethune, 45, of the Sea Shepherd marine conservation group, who was arrested after clambering aboard a Japanese whaling ship in February, has begun in Tokyo. The trial opens as…
Wacky Winter Stunts
Queenstown’s Winter Festival hits the southern town for the 35th year this June with an estimated 6, revellers expected to attend the week-long festivities. While there are big-ticket items — free concerts (Dragon headline…
Meeting of mooers
Auckland-based Bob Carpenter, 57, creator of Filipino social networking site MooPlace, says the name of the site came about because of the high ratio of cows to people in New Zealand. MooPlace members are…
Police Found Culpable
The death of New Zealand anti-fascist protestor, Blair Peach, in a London demonstration against the National Front in April 1979, “marked one of the most controversial events in modern policing history”, writes the Guardian’s…
Philanthropist Awarded
Owner of Kauri Cliffs and Cape Kidnapper’s golf courses Julian Robertson Jnr., 77, named New Zealand first honorary knight in January this year, has been awarded the recipient of the Hedge Fund Industry’s Lifetime…
Widow’s Wish
Jan Arnold, the widow of legendary mountain guide Rob Hall, who was one of eight people to lose their lives on Mt Everest during a severe storm in 1996, has asked that his body…
Not Humpty Dumpty
Should the New Zealand-bred champion horse Phar Lap be “put back together again” asks The Sydney Morning Herald. Victorian Racing Minister Rob Hulls is seeking to “re-unify” the skeleton (from Wellington) and the heart (now…
Oregon Legal Beagle
New Zealand-born, US-raised Kevin McCulloch, 27, is Linn County, Oregon’s newest deputy county attorney. In 2002 and 2003, McCulloch returned to New Zealand to study political science at the University of Canterbury. “I had…
Rakaia Salmon Dance
Canterbury’s Rakaia River will be the setting for an intriguing Native American Indian ceremonial dance, which is to centre on an apology, to be relayed to the river’s salmon asking them to return to…
Albert Lit Up
Auckland’s 11th annual three-day Chinese Lantern Festival was held in February at Albert Park and featured performances by one of Shanghai’s top music ensembles Moon, Beijing-based Mongolian folk rock group Hanggai and rolling lantern…
Whiskey Windfall
From the ice outside Shackleton’s Antarctic hut a team from the New Zealand Antarctic Heritage Trust have found three cases of Chas Mackinlay & Co’s whisky and two containing brandy made by…
Extreme Shearing
Shearing sheep in New Zealand is included in Time magazine’s list of ’25 (More) Authentic Asian Experiences’. “Schweebing and Zorbing not your thing? While many pumped-up tourists go to New Zealand to…
Courting Kiwis
Prince William, 27, has officially opened the new $80.7 million Supreme Court building on Lambton Quay in Wellington, now the country’s highest court of appeal. Architects Warren and Mahoney modelled the courtroom on a…
Record Warm
New Zealand has had its warmest decade since records began 150 years ago. National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) climate scientist James Renwick said there are plenty of causes. “Natural variations, such…
Y2K a Decade On
University of Canterbury professor of philosophy, Arts & Letter Daily founder and author of The Art Instinct Denis Dutton writes a New York Times op-ed about the turn of the century at the turn…
Peter Snell Knighted
New Zealand three-time Olympic gold medalist Dr Peter Snell, who is based in Dallas, was honoured twice this year for his athletic career. Snell was knighted in August and his likeness commemorated in a…
