12 Days of Christmas Deliciousness 2019 Edition

Posted on December 26, 2019 by Andrew Frame

For many Christmas is a time of tradition.

For the Napier in Frame family the lead-up to Christmas has become a food tradition.

Each year, in the twelve days leading up to Christmas, Mrs In Frame makes a “Twelve Days of Christmas” menu – alternating each year between the traditional (Partridge in a Pear Tree) and New Zealand (“Pukeko in a Ponga Tree”) versions of the Christmas carol.

This year it was the turn of the traditional version.

Wherever possible she tries to tie in part of the carol lyrics to the dish – i.e. “Partridge in a Pear Tree” will usually contain pears or some kind of bird reference to some degree.

Due to the rather prolific recurrence of birds in the traditional carol (Partridges, Turtle Doves, French Hens, Swans, Geese..), there may also be some sort of alliteration or similar tie-in, otherwise we might as well have the “Twelve Days of KFC”….

When all else fails, a fair chunk of artistic license is brought in. It really takes a fair bit of dedication and imagination to pull off!

I’ll do my best to explain the theory behind each dish as we go.

So sit back and enjoy as I reveal what my true love made for me over the Twelve Days of Christmas Deliciousness for 2019:

Day 1 – A Partridge in a Pear Tree:
Meal: Pork with Pear and Mash!
Reasoning: Reasonably straight forward, first up – The Partridge in the carol nests in the Pear Tree, hence the pear. Pork represents the “P” alliteration, and they both nest in the mash!

Day 2 – Two Turtle Doves:
Meal: Prawn and Avocado Tacos!
Reasoning: Like turtles Prawns have shells, and the hard outer skin of avocados acts as a shell too! The taco tortillas, when folded, look like doves’ wings, too!

Day 3 – Three French Hens:
Meal: Chicken Salad!
Reasoning: Pretty straight forward – The theme becomes the meal!

Day 4 – Four Calling Birds:
Meal: Muesli!
Reasoning: The oats, fruits, nuts and seeds in the muesli make perfect bird food for the Four Calling (“Colly”) Birds!

Day 5 – Five Gold Rings:
Meal: Stromboli!
Reasoning: This type of Stromboli is basically a wrapped up pizza. When you cut through it you can see its rings!

Day 6 – Six Geese a Laying:
Meal: Devilled Eggs!
Reasoning: Reasonably simple this time – Geese lay eggs (although these were regular chicken ones) and they can be right little feathered… “Devils” (careful, this is a family site)..

Day 7 – Seven Swans a Swimming:
Meal: Floating Islands!
Reasoning: White, fluffy meringue, just like white fluffy swans, swimming upon a pond of custard!

Day 8 – Eight Maids a Milking:
Meal: Custard-Filled Profiteroles!
Reasoning: Focusing on the lactose aspect today – This custard was made with milk, and the profiteroles KIND OF look like udders. If you close one eye and tilt your head slightly…

Day 9 – Nine Ladies Dancing:
Meal: Nashville-Style Fried Chicken, Cornbread and Collard Greens!
Reasoning: Mrs in Frame has said she thinks she was a cowgirl in a previous life. This explains an otherwise inexplicable fondness for country music, line dancing and Billy Ray Cyrus. Nashville is the home of country music, cornbread and collard greens are popular foods in US southern states, where country music, line dancing (and Miley’s Dad?) are also popular.

Day 10 – Ten Lords a Leaping:
Meal: Popcorn Chicken Salad!
Reasoning: This is reasonably straight forward: Lords (allegedly) like to leap, just as popcorn leaps as it “pops”!

Day 11 – Eleven Pipers Piping:
Meal: Chicken Parcels
Reasoning: I though this was because they were “piping hot”, but apparently not. Mrs’ reasoning for this is the parcels, when cooked, puff up and look like the bag on a set of bagpipes – hence Pipers Piping!

Day 12 – Twelve Drummers Drumming:
Meal: Rolled, Stuffed Turkey Roast!
Reasoning: To finish off #TDoCD2019 we have gone with a play on words: Drummers + Turkey Roll = Drum Roll!

So there we go, another year of deliciousness done and dusted!

Many thanks to all the Facebook, Instagram and Twitter friends and followers who liked and commented on the dishes!

Wherever possible, we sourced ingredients locally – from our own garden, Napier and Hastings Farmers’ Markets, local greengrocers, butchers etc.

For the more specialised ingredients, we went to Chantal, Gourmet Direct and Vetro – any Napier foodie’s best friends!

Have a Merry Christmas and a safe and Happy 2020!

The Bird Was the Word

Posted on December 9, 2019 by Andrew Frame

Caroll Spinney died on Sunday

You might not recognise the name, but you will certainly recognise his alter-egos:

An eight-foot-tall, bright yellow bird, and a green, furry Grouch who lived in a trash can.

Caroll was the pupeteer behind two of Sesame Street’s first, and most iconic characters – Big Bird and Oscar the Grouch.

Named “Caroll” by his mum, because he was born on Boxing Day 1933, Spinney first met Jim Henson at a puppeting festival in 1962.

They met again at the next festival, but due to a technical hitch with the lighting his performance did not go according to plan and Caroll was very dissappointed, but Henson saw potential and asked if he would like to “talk about the Muppets“.

Spinney joined the puppeting cast of Sesame Street for their first season in 1969 and officially retired after voicing a few pieces earlier this year after being part of Sesame Street for FIFTY YEARS!

While still “Big”, Big Bird’s head was not so full-some of feathers in the first season and Oscar the Grouch was actually orange, not green! These features would change soon afterwards.

Launched in 1969 by Joan Ganz Cooney and Lloyd Morrisett one of the things that made so many people love Sesame Street has been its cast centrally featuring Jim Henson’s Muppets, puppets and Monsters.

Often zany and silly but never condescending to its young audience, Sesame Street has become the inspiration and benchmark by which many people judge not only children’s television, but all television since.

While teaching pre-school basics like the alphabet, counting, colours and opposites, it also deals with making friends, manners, feelings and other important social and personal issues.

Spinney’s Big Bird acted as the viewers conduit into the world of Sesame Street – While 8′ tall and feathered he still had the eyes, inquisitiveness and wonderment of a child – the show’s target audience.

Big Bird was often the one dealing with big issues – One particular Sesame Street piece has burned itself into my memory (have a box of tissues handy):

When Will Lee, who played shopkeeper “Mr Hooper” (“Hooper’s Store” still bears his name as a memorial) died in 1982, rather than recasting the role, or saying Hooper moved away or retired, Sesame Street’s producers decided to deal with the issue head-on and created an episode that taught their young audience about the difficult topic of death in an honest and straightforward way.

I would have been five when the episode originally aired and some of my earliest memories are of going to the funerals of elderly grandparents and relatives, while not fully understanding what was going on.

That episode made things much clearer and easier to understand.

I cried watching it.

I still cry watching it today.

I wasn’t the only one – Legend has it the piece was shot in one take and there wasn’t a dry eye in the entire studio, in front of or behind the cameras, once it was done.

The antithesis to Big Bird’s wide-eyed Pollyanna, was Oscar the Grouch.

Always grumpy, curmudgeony and liking the opposite of everything everyone else on Sesame Street liked, it was fitting that Spinney played him, too – the tragedy to the comedy, the cloud to every silver lining.

But what Oscar did was show it was OK to be different – everyone accepted him, despite his grouchyness.

One of the first gifts my now wife got for me when we started dating was Spinney’s book “The Wisdom of Big Bird (and the Dark Genius of Oscar the Grouch): Lessons from a Life in Feathers“. I read the entire book the night she gave it to me.

Jim Henson’s work and his creations blossomed from Sesame Street, as did the world’s love for them.

When Henson died in 1990, leaving behind a legacy of Muppets, movies, Fraggles, Sesame Street and many other beloved shows all his creations got together for one last show called “The Muppets Celebrate Jim Henson”.

Whilst the special centred around Henson’s other most well-known creation – “The Muppet Show” for the finale – a song called “Just One Person” almost all his creations appeared to sing a gorgeous eulogy to the great man, the amazing talent from where they came.

I cried watching that too, because being an only child, television had been one of my biggest inspirations and windows on the world before I started school.

The Muppets, Fraggles and Sesame Street characters had become more than just puppets to me – they were MY FRIENDS.

I saw what Henson and his Muppeteers could do on multiple levels – Not just cute, fluffy, talking toys, but almost sentient beings with a drive behind them – to teach, to care, to love.

I believed in them.

I saw myself in Big Bird, too – I was that same tall, gangly, wide-eyed kid with that same enthusiasm and inquisitiveness for everything, always asking questions – albeit thousands of miles away from a street in New York.

Like me, he was taller than everyone else, but they accepted him for who he was, and he accepted them.

In a roundabout way it made utter sense that Spinney, as Big Bird, sang “(It’s Not Easy) Bein’ Green” at Henson’s memorial service:

I never had the Bird’s penchant for rollerskating, though.

This feat was made ever more impressive / crazy, by the fact that Spinney COULDN’T SEE OUT OF THE BIG BIRD COSTUME!

While he had one hand stuck straight up in the air to operate the bird’s head, mouth and eyes, Spinney got his vision from a small TV monitor strapped to his chest and got his references from the TV cameras viewing him’s perspective – working blind and/or backwards effectively!

Big Bird almost didn’t make it to Sesame Street’s 50th season – He was initially meant to be on the disasterous 1986 Challenger Space Shuttle mission!

NASA had been in talks with Sesame Street to have Spinney record some segments on board the shuttle to teach children about space, but the costume’s sheer bulk in the small confines of the space ship inevitably, and fortunately, saw the idea canned.

Big Bird and Oscar will, naturally, continue to exist on Sesame Street, played by Matt Vogel and Eric Jacobson respectively (Vogel was Spinney’s understudy for the bird for almost 20 years!), but today is a sad day for generations of youngsters-at-heart around the world who grew up with Big Bird and Oscar, as another original member of The Muppets passes on.

Thank you Caroll.

You taught me it was OK to be tall and different, and inquisitive. But it was also important to be kind and caring.

And that it was OK to be grumpy, and cantankerous sometimes, too.

I hope I can live my life to the standards your feathered and furry personas set.

Who Are You?

Posted on September 10, 2019 by Andrew Frame

New Zealand commercial media’s fixation on “fame” and too few consumers have made it short-sighted and threatens its own future.

Radio New Zealand’s Wallace Chapman posted a picture on Twitter a few weeks ago praising NZ’s medical system after a member of his family suffered an illness.

This is something I can closely associate with having experienced and written about a similar experience a few years ago.

Mainstream media site Stuff picked up Wallace’s post and made a story out of it.

Wallace’s original Twitter post was soon removed, and fair enough.

The post’s quick removal would likely indicate Chapman didn’t know about the picture being used as a news story and he deleted it to regain some privacy.

While he is a public figure, Wallace and his family are entitled to a private life, and it’s called “Private” for a reason.

Being the caring, social, media Twitter is, Wallace’s situation received a lot of sympathy – several hundred “likes” and loads of supportive comments.

But you wouldn’t know that from the article, because the item chose to focus on how:

Celebrities > Sub-Editors / Proofreaders, apparently..

This isn’t the first time Stuff has blatantly ignored mere social media mortals like myself.

While I was annoyed at that NewShub incident, it wasn’t so much because I might have missed out on “a Warhol” (a “Fifteen Minutes of Fame” unit), rather it was the terrible “netiquette” of using something I’d written or explained without the manners to ask first, or give credit where it was due.

But it does go some way to highlighting how commercial media seem to have issues with their “Social” counterpart.

“Local news” used to be precisely what local media did – Local people and local issues.

But corporate takeovers and simulcast networking ripped the “local” out of local news.

New Zealand’s regional centres started hearing less and less about their own neighbourhood, and more about the big cities, where their papers’ and radios’ management were now based.

It would be like Auckland getting its news feed via Sydney.

But that doesn’t happen, does it?!

Many places, like regional New Zealand, just “didn’t matter” any more.

And neither, evidently, did regional New Zealanders.

Given New Zealand’s abysmal mental health and suicide statistics, it would be incredibly irresponsible of our media to reinforce a perception that half to two thirds of New Zealand (the proportion of NZ’s population that isn’t Auckland-based) “doesn’t matter”!

Along with this “Big City” focus came more attention on “Big People” – The “Noteable“, “Famous“, and “Celebrities“.

Not only could a majority of New Zealand media’s “target markets“, “demographics“, “consumers” and “customers” (all big words those in the media like to throw around to justify ignoring local news) no longer identify with where items their media was producing were from, they now couldn’t identify with those who featured in them!

So regional New Zealanders, in their usual “Number 8 Wire Mentality” took to social media – creating their own, locally-relevant news sites on the likes of Facebook and broadcasting their local news and issues on Twitter.

I went to a talk on “Media in Hawke’s Bay” last year where the editor of NZME’s Hawke’s Bay regional paper criticised the likes of Facebook, complaining it took so much of the press’ business away from them.

Yet his paper seems perfectly happy producing stories online and in print that have been reaped from local Facebook pages and groups in the days and weeks before newspaper publication.

Such items are often then mocked and derided by commercial media stable-mates and staff for their “regional New Zealand-ness”.

But don’t get me started on that…

Recently the head of one of New Zealand’s commercial news media networks had a public whinge via his own network platform at how they were struggling to survive, while semi-“State Broadcaster” TVNZ no longer had to produce a dividend to their shareholders (the NZ government).

“The small public broadcasting news operations and the commercial players can no longer provide enough news to keep our society healthy at a local and national level.” he said.

“Can no longer provide”?!

For the last 15-20yrs NZ’s commercial media networks have actively gutted regional coverage & newsrooms to increase profits for their big city headquarters & shareholders!

If half to two-thirds of New Zealand is good enough to be an income stream for these commercial media networks, then surely, MORALLY, they are good enough to deserve equal news coverage!

And you know what?

If media outlets started paying more attention to their local consumers again, then the locals might become more interested in buying their LOCAL paper/news content again, rather than turning to social media!

Businesses might even start advertising in traditional local media again!

But what would I know?

These network execs “experts” have been regurgitating the same things for years and years and expecting a different result.

And I’m just a writer from regional New Zealand.

I “don’t matter”.

But if I don’t matter, then:

The Councillors Doth Protest Too Much!

Posted on September 5, 2019 by Andrew Frame

Who is writing the script for Napier City Council these days?

It seems part Shakespeare, part George Orwell, with maybe even a touch of farce, or even Franz Kafka.

There certainly appear to be a lot of actors – An Acting Mayor, Acting Deputy Mayor and an Acting CEO.

There is also a lot of strutting and fretting upon the council and electioneering stage in reaction to what could readily be described as “Big Brother”- like activity from council management.

Napier’s Acting Mayor, Faye White, last week criticised her fellow Napier City Councillors for voicing their criticism and concern to media after it was revealed council management ordered the trawling of social media profiles of councillors who were opposed to the development of the Prebensen Drive pool complex in what appears an attempt find possible breaches of the council’s contentious Elected Members’ Code of Conduct.

How did the Acting Mayor air her opinion on the matter?

By criticising those fellow councillors in the media!

Acting Deputy Mayor Claire Hague had done similarly in an earlier August Talking Point that not only echoed the Code of Conduct, but also did the exact thing she was criticising her fellow councillors for – “publicly criticising (our council staff, not to mention the mayor and) other councillors”!

“These actions go a long way to eroding the level of trust and confidence that our community has in the council” she claimed.

But then went on to say, “Real or perceived errors in our work need to be discussed and remedied in private”.

Secrecy, this perceived “gagging” Code of Conduct, and a lack of transparency and public representation in council business have been major issues in Napier politics for years!

Discussing or remedying errors involving public money, public representation, or public facilities should NEVER be done in private!

THAT is what has eroded public trust in this council – potentially beyond repair.

If councillors are basing their votes upon incorrect, or potentially biased information who is in the wrong?

Those who have mis-represented data, or those who merely rubber-stamp everything put before them without doing their own due diligence, first?

Anyone with a thread of moral fibre must put accountability to the public they serve before their own dignity in these cases.

“Sorry” isn’t the hardest word and “denial” isn’t a river in Egypt.

Interestingly Councillor Keith Price claims the EMCC prevented him from going ahead with an interview regarding pollution in Pandora Estuary recently. “The (possible) breach being described that it may give me, as an incumbent councillor, an unfair advantage over those seeking new election.”

So, as the incumbent (“currently holding office”) Acting Mayor and Acting Deputy Mayor don’t these published opinion pieces criticising those standing for office (neither White, nor Hague are seeking re-election) breach NCC’s Code of Conduct?

Or would that only apply if they had voted against the Prebensen Drive pool?

White “would rather wait until I have all the relevant facts in front of me before deciding on next steps” in relation to what must quickly be becoming a serious employment issue between the democratically elected council and their sole employee – the council’s CEO, who council management and staff report to.

But where will she get these facts?

From the same people who recommended the Napier War Memorial needed renovating, its memorial elements gutted and packed away into a shed at the council’s Austin Street depot while the Eternal Flame is sheltered by what looks like a rubbish tin lid?

From those who said Napier Skating Club did not have the “operational expertise” to be involved in running what would become “Bay Skate” despite 61 years of NSC operation?

Hopefully not from those who caused the Friends of the Onekawa Aquatic Centre to lose faith “in council’s ability to negotiate a fair settlement out of court. After weeks of poor communication, misinformation and obstruction.”

Or those who seem so determined to have a new pool complex at Prebensen Drive, despite overwhelming public support for a 50-meter pool at the current Onekawa site prior to the 2018 Long Term Plan consultation, that they will apparently search through social media for anything to try and undermine the elected representatives who oppose it?

Maybe Napier’s Acting Mayor should pay more attention to the suggestions of “outside commentators”, rather than just dismissing them.

In 2017 Mayor Bill Dalton warned that “Napier City could be the first council destroyed by social media”.

Few could have predicted how prophetic those words would turn out to be!

This call to action prompted an unsuccessful complaint to the Office of the Auditor General that it gave the impression of bias, or predetermination – something not allowed in local governance – in the council’s CEO selection process.

Jack was reappointed CEO by the council soon after.

At that time, in her role as Deputy Mayor, Faye White spoke of her sadness that “the mayor can’t send a confidential email to his councillors” without it being leaked, saying “When the trust goes … it’s never quite the same.”

Indeed.

Napier deserves better!

*A copy of this post appeared as a “Talking Point” in Hawke’s Bay Today on Thursday 5 September 2019*

A Visitor From Hawke’s Bay: Part Two

Posted on July 24, 2019 by Andrew Frame

“A Visitor From Hawke’s Bay”

It used to be a term of snide derision.

The moniker for any unidentified person in the society photo section of Auckland’s Metro magazine in the 80s.

Whether they had their back turned, or were wearing a lampshade, they were “A Visitor From Hawke’s Bay”

Some in our region may have even aspired to it, but not many.

Certainly not me.

Yet, over recent months I have been an actual “Visitor from Hawke’s Bay” to Auckland several times, on account of surgery I needed to undergo that could only be done in the city.

Rather than the local tourism board paying for my visit and lavishing me with luxury accomodation and gourmet food as Hawke’s Bay’s agencies do to visiting Auckland media, the Ministry of Health paid for my return travel and equal nights’ accomodation in both motel and hospital beds, and I had to hunt and gather my own food, except when my kind social media friends shouted me a coffee or lunch. (Disclosure statement ends.)

Planes, Trains, Ferries and Lime Scooters

A little over a month after my last trip to Auckland I am waiting at Hawke’s Bay Airport for the flight which will take me up for my operation in two days time to arrive. Strong cross-winds have seen the in-bound flight delayed and diverted to Palmerston North, with the plane eventually arriving in Napier two hours late.

It could be worse. Those on the flight from Auckland all had to disembark in Palmerston North and are being bussed up to Hawke’s Bay.

There’s always someone out there worse off than you are.

The flight to Auckland is smooth and far quicker than my previous commute.

I spend most of the trip with my head plastered to the window. While I’m almost 42, the “magic” of flight still fascinates me and I eagerly soak in the airborne views of our magnificent country – Forestry operations in the central North Island, glistening lakes and rivers and even the Firth of Thames and Coromandel Peninsula are all things I get to see far too infrequently.

I am due to be admitted to hospital for two nights, one either side of my operation, but before that I have a night in a motel equidistant between downtown Newmarket and Auckland’s Central Hospital.

As I ride there on an airport shuttle I become very aware of just how many cars there are in Auckland.

They are EVERYWHERE!

You get an idea of just how bad vehicle congestion could get in the city when you see the sheer volume of cars lining residential streets. They almost out-number fallen leaves on the more arbourous thoroughfares.

It’s strikingly evident that when/if the Zombie Apocalypse strikes it would be only the cockroaches and cars that remain in Auckland.

My accomodation is on the lower northern slopes of Mount Eden – a Maunga I had intended to summit on my last trip, before car trouble scuttled the attempt.

A look at the nearby clouds and realisation that I forgot my jacket scupper any thoughts of doing it on this occasion either, so I head in towards Newmarket as raindrops begin to fall.

After a couple laps of Broadway I have run out of things to see or do and with no supermarket nearby I hop on a train and head into the CBD.

I do some browsing and pick up a few bargains and some dinner along High Street and its lanes, including another trip to Krispy Kreme (for dessert), before searching out a supermarket.

My search takes me through the recently developed area around Britomart, which I have to say is quite stunning! Old and new seamlessly meld together for offices, restaurants and shops.

I wander back along the waterfront and catch a train back to Newmarket, walking back to my hotel past a wide range of asian eateries.

While waiting for a crossing light I absently look in the window of one restaurant and watch a young pakeha woman teaching her children how to use chopsticks.

Fusion cuisine AND fusion people!

I also feel a little homesick for a moment.

The next morning I am up and out early to see a man about a Travelator.

Yet another train ride reveals some odd train etiquette – Despite the train being quite full of early morning commuters, no one ever talks to, or looks directly anyone else! This is quite a challenge for someone like me who is usually quite chatty and inquisitive, but apparently its “a thing” all over the train-commuting world.

I get off the train at Britomart, cross the road and hop on a ferry to Devonport, to meet David Slack – another long-time (well, by Twitter standards) friend, who takes me for a tour around his neighbourhood and up his maunga – Mount Victoria – something I have been wanting to do again since I climbed it early one morning while on a course in Auckland a decade and a half ago.

A Man About a Travelator and a Visitor From Hawke’s Bay

David is marvelous company. We have coffee and chat at a village cafe after exploring Devonport and viewing its surrounds, then I must start heading towards the hospital.

The ferry ride to Devonport and back is great fun too – After my tachycardia episode I have taken greater pleasure in the little things like viewing things from different perspectives – Whether it be from the air or the sea they are fun experiences.

From the ferry building I slowly make my way up Queen Street, aiming to be at the hospital at my check in time of 2pm.

A Hospitable Host and a Visitor From Hawke’s Bay

I stop here and there to get gifts for my wife and daughter, before meeting another Twitter friend, Mark Graham, who has kindly offered to buy me lunch at “The Kimchi Project” – an smart, narrow “Asian Fusion” restaurant on Lorne Street with a great big garden bar out the back.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I have been very fortunate to meet some great people on social media. When used correctly and kindly, as it should be, it really is a SOCIAL media!

I thank Mark and make my way to the hospital after eventually realising the “north and south” of my Google map does not necessarily equate to what passes as the M.C. Escher-esque reality of Auckland geography.

I cross Grafton Bridge on foot and make it to my ward for admission right on time.

My visits to Auckland have coincided with the boom of Lime E Scooters in the city. It is as impossible to miss coverage of the new mobility devices as it is to miss the scooters themselves.

You regularly see people riding past on them, but even more often see clusters of them on footpaths, awaiting their next hire.

I would have been more likely to give one a try were it not for the number of reported incidents and injuries involving them.

I’m already going to hospital for an operation. I don’t fancy a side-trip to the Emergency Department!

I stick to walking.

After some preliminary admission tests I am given licence to wander off until tea time, so, seeing the Auckland Domain and the War Memorial Museum beside the hospital I decide to go for a stroll through there.

On my stroll I find myself overcome with emotion.

When I was young I had an unusually large head for a child and we were sent up to Auckland Hospital for an MRI scan (apparently my head knew I would grow to be 6’8″ before the rest of me did and was merely getting the jump on things).

I clearly remember playing with one of those cheap 80s pull-cord plastic helicopters on a hill in The Domain with Mum and Dad (it must have been in between a scan and seeing the doctor about the results).

As I crest one of The Domain’s hills (likely the very one we flew the pull-cord helicopter on) I have a quiet moment & cry thinking of Mum and Dad, who are no longer with me.

While recovering from my operation the next day I have time to reflect on my recent experiences of Auckland as A Visitor from Hawke’s Bay.

Welcome Home

Auckland is a marvelously, multicultural city!

Middle eastern and African teenagers have served me American fast food. I ate at a Korean restaurant, was operated on by a Indian surgeon and a Sri Lankan anaesthesiologist, both of whom had “Oxbridge” accents, and the night after my operation I fell asleep listening to a sweet old lady praying in Tongan.

A week or so after my operation some perennially privileged, pathetic pakeha politician trys to make some sort of inference in mainstream media about who are “real New Zealanders” and who aren’t.

This is our country and these are all our people. We are all kind, caring, compassionate kiwis!

The “JAFFA” is Dead

With more modern, inclusive times upon us, it’s reasonable to say the term “JAF(F)A”, an acronym for “Just Another F***ing Aucklander”, is dead.

To be fair, it was usually used as a parochial term for the “small fish, big pond” sort of person who moved from Auckland to regional New Zealand to try and assert the authority they felt they lacked in the big city upon provincial plebs. So maybe not as applicable to Aucklanders on their home turf.

It is (or was) the antithesis of “A Visitor From Hawke’s Bay”.

Everyone I encountered in Auckland was polite, kind and considerate, no matter their race, sex, or National Provincial Championship rugby affiliation. I would gladly see the back of its use, and that of similar terms.

I’ll see You Again, When the Stars Fall From the Sky..

A few weeks later I am back at Greenlane for a post-op check-up.

Flown there and back in a day it is probably the closest I have gotten to being a jet-setting-corporate-business-commuter-type.

With a couple hours to spare either side of my appointment between arrival and departure I get to do some more exploring.

Still unable to get up Mount Eden (next time!) through a lack of logistics (maybe those Lime Scotters aren’t such a bad idea after all..) I take a stroll through Cornwall Park and mount Maungakiekie, One Tree Hill.

The view is spectacular – Literally a 360 degree view of Auckland!

It also brings into stark relief another issue Auckland has – Space and housing.

There is only so much land to occupy on the Auckland isthmus and from my viewing spot it looks pretty much all occupied.

While many suburban Aucklanders seem quite averse to multi-story townhouses and appartments in their leafy streets, it would appear, as 80s band Yazz sang, that “The Only Way is Up!” to ease this problem.

This could have been solved earlier, of course, had previous governments and corporate Auckland just spread some economic love and shifted more business to regions like Hawke’s Bay!

I head back to Napier a content Visitor From Hawke’s Bay.

Auckland is a neat city with lots of diversity, but also a few issues.

As with most problems, though, I’m sure those issues could be resolved with help from, or by listening to others like regional New Zealand.

As I board my flight home I notice something that Paul Brislen picks up on via Twitter a few weeks later.

While the snide side of “A Visitor From Hawke’s Bay”, just like “JAFFA”, is well past its used by date, there is something a large number of those bound for Napier have in common – We have all been “A Visitor to (Auckland Domestic Airport’s) Krispy Kreme“.

Perhaps there’s an opportunity for an alternative nickname (or, at least a new regional franchise) there!

A Visitor From Hawke’s Bay: Part One

Posted on July 23, 2019 by Andrew Frame

To be fair I wasn’t Halfway Down, more like A Quarter Up…

“A Visitor From Hawke’s Bay”

It used to be a term of snide derision.

The moniker for any unidentified person in the society photo section of Auckland’s Metro magazine in the 80s.

Whether they had their back turned, or were wearing a lampshade, they were “A Visitor From Hawke’s Bay”

Some in our region may have even aspired to it, but not many.

Certainly not me.

Sadly it appears some old habits die hard. Or not at all..

Yet, over recent months I have been an actual “Visitor from Hawke’s Bay” to Auckland several times, on account of surgery I needed to undergo that could only be done in the city.

Rather than the local tourism board paying for my visit and lavishing me with luxury accomodation and gourmet food as Hawke’s Bay’s agencies do to visiting Auckland media, the Ministry of Health paid for my return travel and equal nights’ accomodation in both motel and hospital beds, and I had to hunt and gather my own food, except when my kind social media friends shouted me a coffee or lunch. (Disclosure statement ends.)

So Close, Yet So Far.

The last time I was in Auckland was in 2011 for a Foo Fighters concert at Western Springs.

My wife and I stayed in the centre of town and we were in the city for about the same length of time it took to drive there and back.

It’s not that we didn’t WANT to visit more often, it’s just with IVF, the birth of our daughter, buying our first home, the death of my Dad, my month-long government-funded stay in Wellington, and the death of my Mum all coming hot on the heels of that concert trip, we simply hadn’t had the time or opportunity to go back to Auckland.

So, odd as it may sound, I was looking forward to this operation. As it gave me an opportunity to have a nosey around!

There and Back Again: A Hawke’s Bayite’s Tale

My first expedition for a pre-op appointment and assesment was by road.

Leaving Napier at O-Dark-Hundred I cross the fabled Napier-Taupo road in a mixture of bright, full, moonlight for the most part and pea-soup fog in the middle section around Lochinvar Station.

It isn’t until I am deep into the Waikato region that the sun starts to make an appearance.

And what an appearance it is!

A pink and purple pastoral panorama unfolds around me as the early morning hues illuminate rolling dairy country. Patches of mist lie in valleys and green grass glistens in the gloaming.

It’s the sort of view giant dairy cooperatives pay advertising firms millions of dollars to try and replicate on clogged, polluted urban motorway billboards.

I somehow manage to drive non-stop to Hamilton, where stomach and lower portions dictate I need to take a break for breakfast, stretch and a rest-stop at around 8am.

New Zealand’s state highways and roads really are a story of thirds.

One third is perfectly fine, one third is roadworks and the final third is utter rubbish and SHOULD be roadworks.

I drive the fastest I have ever been legally allowed to drive on the Cambridge Expressway – 110km/h!

The only thing is with that section of road being several hundred meters across, with multiple lanes and (almost) everyone else doing the same speed, you might as well be doing 50km/h – there is no sense of the added “Oomph!” that 10km/h would otherwise bring.

You also still get passed by Audis and Hiluxes regardless of the speed limit, so very little changes, really.

You quickly reel in those who have overtaken you anyway, as further roadworks and rush-hour traffic grind everyone down to a crawl past Mystery Creek.

Having spent the last few hours driving so smoothly and freely, we are now packed together so tightly I can see the irony dripping from their exhaust pipes.

Aside from some stunning native bush views along the northern Waikato River trying to draw your attention away from the road and task at hand, the rather deafening sound of cicadas in river-side pine plantations along State Highway One is quite distracting.

Before you realise what the noise actually is you fear something is going wrong with your car.

Sadly something DID go wrong with my car on this trip once I arrived in Auckland.

The exertion and heat of the almost non-stop trip up made my transmission somewhat fiddly upon starting, so I limited my movements in the hope I would be able to get home in one automotive piece.

Close encounters of the Twitter kind! Paul Brislen and a Visitor From Hawke’s Bay.

Never the less I do manage to meet up with fellow Twitterer, technology commentator and pop culture fan Paul Brislen in person for coffee at a swanky Mount Eden Village cafe and pick up a present for my daughter from the equally Twitter renowned Time Out Bookstore.

The appointment with my doctor at the Greenlane Medical Centre goes much better and quicker than planned, and the picturesque view of Maungakiekie – “One Tree Hill” (right behind the hospital) out his office’s windows cheers me up, so I decide to go into town.

This is where the logistics of Auckland traffic come into play.

Greenlane is, in the grand Auckland scheme of things, very “central”. You are kind of in the middle of, well, everything!

This does, however, mean it can take a while to get everywhere.

With my car recuperating at my nearby motel, I decide to test out Auckland’s public transport system and catch a bus into the CBD, do some sightseeing and drop some copies of the magazine I write for, “Baybuzz”, to some of my big-city media friends.

The fare is reasonable and the ride is comfortable, but there is only one issue – the other bazillion vehicles on the road! (I did, unwisely it appears, choose to travel at 4pm in the afternoon..).

What “should” have been about a 15 minute commute takes over half an hour and I get into the CBD just as most of its workers are heading in the opposite direction.

While in Auckland I decide to sample some of the city’s haute cuisine that is unavailable in regional New Zealand – Namely Krispy Kreme Donuts and Wendy’s Burgers!

“No Regerts!!”

After taking in central Auckland for about an hour the day’s driving and events catch up with me and I find myself rather exhausted, sitting outside Britomart without the energy or will to traipse back to the bus stop I arrived from at The Civic Theatre.

I decide to take the train back to Greenlane (have I mentioned before that I think trains are awesome?!).

The train trip takes a mere ten minutes, if that, and another short bus ride delivers me to the door of my accomodation for the night and soon after I am enveloped by the arms of Morpheus.

“I’ll see you again
When the stars fall from the sky,
And the moon turns red,
Over One Tree Hill.”

H.G. Wells, Huka Falls and Home

I wake early the next morning keen to get home, or as far home as possible before any further issues can afflict my car.

At least I THINK I wake.

Merging onto the Southern Motorway in the early hours of the morning is like entering an 80s neon dream.

A river of white, yellow and halogen blue lights stream towards you, as those bound for work in the city make their way in. While ahead, red tail and brake lights form a long, rippling rouge ribbon to the south.

It’s not too disimilar to the “Light Cycle Battle” in the movie Tron (and quite possibly why residents of the next major city in this direction, Hamilton, use the movie’s name as their city’s nickname).

As the motorway heads towards the Bombay Hills the pink and purple tinges of dawn are growing over the horizon.

But also coming over the hills is a scene from “War of the Worlds” – Row upon row of giant power pylons stretch towards the city and motorway.

Not unlike Wells’ giant aliens, these steel quadrapeds actually provide power to the metropolis’ populance, but in the misty glow of dawn they look other-worldly, straddling the red and white streams of light.

Traffic flows freely and smoothly, despite the sheer volume of vehicles that are simultaneously using this small strip of road. The only issue I have is trying to rejoin the flow after pulling over to take the obligitary picture of the Waikato River and Huntly Power Station beyond.

I bypass Hamilton to top up with fuel and grab breakfast to go in Cambridge.

I carry on, eventually stopping at Huka Falls for a walk, where my car decides to play its “lets not start of a while” trick again and in Taupo to take a look at the lake (transiting Taupo so early in the morning on the way up, I had bypassed the town).

The trip back over the Napier-Taupo is far less foggy and dark than the day before and I arrive home in time for a late lunch.

It was a roadtrip I had wanted to do for some time, but now having done it twice in 24 hours with car issues, I think I would prefer to fly next time.

Fortunately they fly you up for operations, which would come around quite quickly.

To Be Continued!

Fortunate Son

Posted on June 28, 2019 by Andrew Frame

How do New Zealand’s talkback “shock-jock” wannabes and their enablers honestly think this divisive “us” verses “them” / “the left” Trumpian, Fox News cant could hold any credibility in New Zealand?

Our nation’s “tyranny of distance” used to be a nice, safe vantage point from where we could see this mindless crap coming!

But not any more.

Words start and stop wars.

Books have stopped bullets.

So to weaponize words, to turn terminology toxic is a very dangerous and stupid thing to do.

In the wrong hands Aware/astute becomes “Woke“.

Polite and caring becomes “PC gone mad!”

And only “Snowflakes” show Empathy.

To say “(“The Left”) want to tell you what is right and what isn’t” is rich coming from someone whose high-paying job is to tell people across a nation via multimedia platforms how their opinion is superior to anyone elses, or how the likes of:

Cyclists,

The unemployed,

Public transport proponents,

And even members of parliament,

Are all wrong!

I consider myself on “the left” politically, but I don’t think I’m superior to, or know more than anyone else.

Mainly because I’ve been told so, or that feeling has been reinforced for decades upon me by the likes of this opinionist – Richer, whiter, more entitled people than I could ever be.

I don’t think I’m better than anyone. But I’m more fortunate than many.

I’m fortunate that I have a home and loving family.

I’m fortunate to be able to provide for that family.

I’m fortunate to have communication skills and access to platforms like Twitter and this site to share my views & opinions.

And I’m fortunate to realise mine is not the only opinion.

Others have different views to mine and they are allowed to express them.

I may not be as highly paid or widely broadcast as many of these malefic media mouthpieces, but I am more fortunate than they are.

Problematic Pacific Plastic

Posted on June 23, 2019 by Andrew Frame

I entered the following in a Sea Week poetry competition last month.
I never heard anything back, so obviously didn’t get anywhere (which is a bit odd..) but thought it was worth sharing nonetheless:

Problematic Pacific Plastic

Our oceans are dying!
That’s not iconoclastic.
You would be too,
If you were that clogged up with plastic!

We’ve got lagoons of balloons,
Whale swimming speed’s off the throttles,
‘Cause it had to get ocean motion,
When you’re chock-full of fizz bottles!

Sea turtles are choking,
When they spy their favourite dish.
Because turtles can’t define
Between plastic bags and jelly fish!

There’s so much plastic pollution
Floating around the Pacific,
They’ve named it “The Great Garbage Patch”!
Y’know, just to be specific!

We need to do something!
All this ocean pollution must end!
For the sake of our existence,
And for our planet to mend!

It’s too much a problem
For us just to park it –
Start by taking canvas bags
To your supermarket!

Reduce, reuse,
Recycle the lot!
Sea levels are rising,
But our future ain’t looking too hot!

So as my poem ends,
I’m begging you, Please!
“Tiakina o Tātou Mōana”
“Care for our Seas”!

Shine a Light

Posted on June 17, 2019 by Andrew Frame

As you may know I’m BIG supporter of my home & region, Hawke’s Bay.

And, as you may also know, I’ve been pretty vocal about how little media exposure (other than disasters & crime) regional New Zealand has gotten over the past two decades in favour of an Auckland-centric focus.

In the last 5 years we saw the rise of smaller news websites like Spinoff & Newsroom, intended to take on the likes of TVNZ, Mediaworks & Herald/NZME.

I had high hopes for these new sites, given how little the main players cared about places like Hawke’s Bay.

I was disappointed.

Early on it seemed Spinoff had more articles about NZME’s Jane Hastings than the actual city of Hastings.

To them apparently one media person > City of 80600+

And if not for the wonderful, award-winning autobiographical writing of the late Peter Wells, Napier would have hardly featured at all.

Hardly inspiring for this regional reader and writer.

Not to be out done, Newsroom’s Mark Jennings essentially declared NZ’s regions don’t matter:

“Viewers in Invercargill don’t give a toss about Whanganui’s sewage problems.

There are simply not enough stories of national significance in Nelson or Queenstown or Tauranga to justify a full-time TV reporter in those areas.”

That understandably pissed me off.

The new wunderkind websites had the same mentality as the old media dinosaurs they were meant to be superior to.

It felt like they were blowing the biggest opportunity New Zealand media had had in years – Wherever there was internet access they could have had reporters!

Within the last month the New Zealand government recognized the country has a serious lack of local-body news coverage – particularly in regional NZ and announced a scheme to put several specially focused, government-funded reporters in established newsrooms around the country.

Then last week a story with major public reaction & national implications broke about state carers taking newborn babies from their parents.

The story wasn’t broken by a mainstream media outlet.

It was broken by Newsroom.

And the story wasn’t based in Auckland. It came from Hawke’s Bay.

My region.

So I’ve been right all along?!

NZ regional news DOES matter!?

This should feel like vindication for me, but it doesn’t.

How many issues have been missed because they were “regional/provincial” and “didn’t matter”?

How many wrongdoings could have been stopped?

Jennings’ hypothetical Whanganui sewerage problems?

Homelessness?

Inequality?

This is just the tip of an iceberg New Zealand media SHOULD have started melting years ago!

Heck, in the 80s we had regional news in print and on national TV every weeknight that stopped these bergs from forming in the first place, let alone making it out into the shipping lanes and causing casualties.

We have regional stories that deserve coverage, as many have national implications; A specialized regional local government reporter program in the works, and a Provincial Growth Fund to assist NZ’s growing regions.

Isn’t it time NZ’s commerical media refocused back on the regions, too?

There’s a saying goes:

“Sunlight is the best disinfectant”.

Regional New Zealand has a whole lot of growth going on. Not all of that growth is going to be good.

It’s going to need a lot more solar energy from traditional & digital NZ national media to keep regional growth rot-free!

Regional Rugby’s Lament

Posted on June 7, 2019 by Andrew Frame

Listening to the talk of NZRU CEO, Steve Tew’s, resignation annocement on Radio New Zealand’s Morning Report the other morning I was irked by how much his / NZRU’s focus was on the international game & stage under his tenure, while it’s felt, like with so many other big New Zealand corporate organisations, regional / grassroots rugby has been ignored under his tenure.

How many Super Rugby, or even All Blacks games (Napier has hosted only two in 20yrs!) could have been played in sold-out, 15,000-20,000 capacity regional stadiums like McLean Park, rather than the regularly 1/2 – 3/4 empty Eden Parks, or (Wellington’s Westpac Trust Stadium) “Caketins”?

Main centre Super Rugby fixture crowds have been pitiful and/or declining for some time, and the whining about low attendances from rugby bosses has only gotten louder, yet do they change tack and spread the games around?

Hell no!

HOW MUCH??!!

Hawke’s Bay and their NPC team, The Magpies have been fortunate to have the local support, income and success over recent seasons to weather the storms Tew bemoaned.

Hawke’s Bay, its team and its fans have been regularly providing the talent, the turnout and the income for Tew’s organisation for years, so why haven’t NZRU returned the favor?

Or, under Mr Tew’s reign, has rugby in New Zealand become more about the money than the mana?

Napier In Frame

Tag Archives: Media