Waiata

I spent yesterday down at the Pa practicing waiata. Translation: I went down to the meeting house my family belongs to outside Normanby in Sth Taranaki to practice songs. They are making a CD and have been running practice sessions for the last few weeks. The songs are a mix of traditional and modern, all with a link to the history and people of the place. It's helping my pronunciation no end also I can now greet people properly, and ask how they are and answer when they ask me - those classes are definitely working!


By the time I left in the afternoon the weather had closed in so it was a good thing I took these shots of the mountain early.

It's been a huge week

and I have the t-shirts to prove it!

We have entered the second phase of advertising for the Wars exhibition and buttons and t-shirts are now doing the rounds. They were handed out at the Museums Aotearoa conference that we hosted this week and it was great to see them around town.

I was honorary conference staff for a day so got the shirt for that too with a cool logo incorporating the mountain (on the left) and the sugarloaves (on the right).

I must however confess to ditching the gym in favour of three glasses of wine and some stuffed mushrooms at the opening function. I feel slightly better about this as I had spent the whole day chaperoning delegates to and from sessions all over our building which seemed to involve an enormous amount of going up and down stairs. I now know that this is an area of fitness need and will be off the treadmill and on the stairmaster when I get back to the gym next week!

What did you do for Easter?

Did serious damage to the local hot cross bun population, a lot of reading and a little gardening.

And moved half our non-fiction collection around. Because you can but also because it was a bit confusing and I finally decided we just had to fix it.

So, first take all the books off the shelves - we covered both cafe areas, the newspaper area and half our display space...


then you take apart some of the shelves to make them easier to move and put them in their new spot...

then put everything back, that's the trolley train full of books waiting to go into their new spots.

Lastly, open the doors to the public and wait to see what happens.

It took us a day and a half but we have had nothing but good comments. Such a relief.

How to throw a 40th birthday party

The Govett Brewster Art Gallery has just turned 40 and decided to throw a party, as you do. So because there was a street party when they opened they decided to do it again and do what you do for a party...

Invite all your friends

Have a cake (and streamers)

Have a band (that's the Trons a robot garage band in the truest sense of the word - check out http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c2JChnwv2Ws) and some dressing up (as robots in honour of the band)

and of course masses of fairy lights.

plus food, drink and because it's a gallery the opening of two new exhibitions.

Result? Good time had by all!!!

I passed!

When I finished my library degree I declared that if I ever studied again it would be cake decorating or flower arranging. Well I did do pottery and cooking classes but I have learnt again that you should never say never.

I have enrolled for Te Reo Maori classes and it's the full deal, classes every Tuesday and study to do. We had our first assessment last night and I passed! Yay! We got our book packs too; workbook, dictionary, diary, cd, dvd and colouring pencils. They will come into use this weekend when I do my homework or as it is called by our teacher, homeplay. That's really a much better word for crosswords, puzzles, movies and colouring in. Makes study a lot less stressful.

War has commenced

Last Wednesday, the 17th was the 150th anniversary of the first shots fired in what became the First Taranaki Land War. It was a huge day - here is my schedule:

Tuesday

• 10am - blessing of the new carving on our ceremonial doors and the exhibition
• 11am - cuppa tea
• 4pm - powhiri at Kairo Marae. This is the closest meeting house to that actual spot and they held an evening of talks and discussion

Wednesday

• 5am - all my alarms go off
• 6am - meet at work to go in convoy out to Te Kohia, the site of the first shots
• 6.45amish - prayers, songs and speeches to remember those who died
• 8amish - back to work to help set up for...
• 9.15am - moving the opening from the landing to the foyer because it was tipping down rain then...
• 9.30am - the arrival of the first guests who helped set up chairs and gave valuable feedback on the sound checks and kept squeezing and squeezing so we fitted everyone in, followed at
• 10.15am - by the arrival of the Prime Minister, assorted ministers and other significant people (I held the umbrellas!)
• 11am - PM offically opens the exhibition and puts the first comment card on our wall
• 11.15am - cuppa tea
• 4pm - start setup for evening reception for the Govenor General
• 5pm - first guest arrives (plenty early having had to wrestle for a seat in the morning)
• 6pm - everyone seated and looking posh
• 6.15pm - arrival of the GG and his entourage
• 6.30pm - speeches, all fabulous
• 7.30pm - posh cuppa tea (wine and canapes)
• 10pm - door locked, go home

It was a huge day and there was lots of other stuff going on as well, like two treaty negotiation signings (big deal, trust me). Everyone was completely exhausted at the end of it but very, very happy that it had all gone without a hitch - as it should have given the number of meeting hours that were devoted to it.

Check out http://www.pukeariki.com/ to have a look at the Wars info on our web site.

Womad survival kit

Yes, it's Womad weekend again and with one eye on last year's experience and the other on the weather I have put my stuff together very carefully. It includes sunscreen, hat, sunnies, water and singlet top for if it gets hot; pashmina, jumper (Icebreaker!) and socks for when it turns cold; rain coat (already used last night), emergency munchies, money, phone, The Programme and most excitingly this year a VIP pass. And of course I am wearing sensible festival going shoes.