Tales of an Urban Indian is one of those extraordinary experiences that challenges every belief you might have that you know a thing or six about this theatre lark while, at the same time, affirming every belief you might have that the late Sir Peter Brook got it right all those years ago. Sir Peter defined […]
Puss
What is good about having a pet?
Black Dog Leadership ~ Roosevelt style circa 2023
Rāhui (Lockdown #1) Day (I need to check, I’ve lost count. Checked it’s Day 38 (40): a few good days, and a few crappy ones. It feels already like today will be one of the latter and the black dog is definitely sniffing at the door, it may already be in the room. As quite […]
Vision from Gaza
I met her On her road to Damascus So I thought Sun shone on the grit sand Glint owning shards of light Spreading them like a warm disease of the mind She wore her hair in unfashionable ringlets Screwtapes missing That was not all Something else was Not quite right She was pretty Hard though […]
Back in the Day
Mayday. So, always on the side of the workers, I set up the range. It’s chill bordering on cold. Quiet too. The young man is shooting 70m today. Alone, the park to himself. Except for me, of course. Keeping an eye on the time. And the sheep. An average first day back at school, he […]
‘Are We There Yet?’
I love this story. There was this exhibition called ‘Are We There Yet?’ that celebrated the 125th anniversary of women’s suffrage in Aotearoa and which asked ‘but how far has New Zealand really come since women gained the vote?’ I was asked if it was OK to include me and I said yes imagining it […]
Cem Erkal Beşe
On 26 May 2019 I met Cem Erkal Beşe at the finals of World Archery World Cup #3 in Analya, Türkiye. He was there with his family celebrating the success of the wonderful Turkish team, and, in particular that of a young superstar and soon to be Olympic gold medalist, Mete Gazoz. The entire New […]
Living in a ‘one size fits all’ world
This is so true, not just in healthcare but in damn near everything. It’s like coming out. The heteronormative understanding is that you come out and that it, done and dusted. The reality is most of us have to come out every bloody day, sometimes multiple times a day. It’s exhausting, frustrating, and debilitating, but […]
‘Tend to the people, and they will tend to the business.’
I wrote this during the first lockdown. When we were inventing, with great urgency, new ways to communicate online. That was then, this is now. On 01 February 2023. I was made redundant so there are no more babies. I’m pretty certain my removal was a revenge ‘firing’ by my Dean who had made it […]
A Tight-lipped Shudder of Cultural Inconvenience
Rāhui Day 30 (32): spent much of the day trying to find something to commemorate in lives sacrificed to the gods of money, nationalism, and ego. The ANZAC Days of my childhood were not the jingoistic memorialising of tidied up carnage that they are today, the knowing was still too raw and real. Some men […]