Home//New Zealand Listener/Issue 17, 2023/In This Issue
New Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Cooler runningsAn electric vehicle recently burst into flames on the Auckland Harbour Bridge. On the same night, there was also a fire on a bus (presumably an internal combustion vehicle). The probability of a fire in your vehicle, irrespective of the type, is unusual but not new or exceptional. Simple owner precautions can minimise that risk. There are three types of electric vehicles: battery-electric vehicles (BEVs), plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) and hybrid electric vehicles (HEVs). All involve electric motors, but the two hybrid varieties include a petrol combustion motor as well. The liquid medium inside a lithium-ion battery is flammable at room temperature and the cathode of the battery is a source of oxygen, so that if internal parts of the battery or the terminals are damaged by shock or…3 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Tune in, drop outWe don’t trust the news like we used to. That much was evident in the recently published “Trust in News in Aotearoa New Zealand 2023”, the fourth such survey from the AUT Research Centre for Journalism, Media and Democracy. We’re not alone in this – it’s an international phenomenon – but the study’s authors noted that whereas trust in news media has fluctuated against a downward trend in many other countries, in New Zealand it’s been all downhill since their first report in 2020. The survey asked respondents to mark 17 local news brands on a simple 0-10 scale, “where 0 was not trustworthy at all and 10 completely trustworthy”. Since 2020, trust in every one of those brands has decreased, and in general, the most prominent names in news…3 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Underwater rescueChuuk Lagoon in Micronesia draws divers from around the world who, beneath warm, turquoise waters, marvel at the World War II shipwrecks scattered like ghosts across its floor. Dr Matt Carter, however, is drawn to the lagoon and its wrecks for other reasons; for the Kiwi maritime archaeologist, it’s ground zero for his work leading one of the world’s largest and most challenging marine archaeological and conservation projects. Melbourne-based Carter is research director of the Major Projects Foundation, a non-profit that’s tackling the threats posed to the environment and cultural heritage by oil-containing World War II wrecks as they slowly decay in the Pacific’s depths. The foundation was formed in 2018 by Newcastle-based couple Paul and Wilma Adams after they witnessed oil leaking from wrecks during a diving trip to…6 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Don’t try this at homeIt’s all over TikTok: people applying small pieces of surgical tape to their lips – literally taping their mouths closed – before going to sleep. The theory is that this will force breathing through the nose, and encourage a deeper, more restful (and less snory) sleep. The social media mouth tapers claim all manner of benefits, from clearer skin to improved facial contours. But breathing experts say there’s no evidence for these claims. What little research has been done on mouth taping has been in people with mild obstructive sleep apnoea and has shown some improvement in snoring. Though the benefits of nasal breathing are well established, mouth taping is not something breathing experts here recommend as a first fix for sleep. Breathing expert Tania Clifton-Smith says she’d always take…2 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023An all-inclusiveholiday?Our public holidays are an odd assortment. Four of them – the ones at Christmas and Easter – are Christian celebrations that were themselves adaptations of pagan festivals. One marks the birthday of an increasingly irrelevant monarch half a world away. Another celebrates the introduction of the 40-hour working week (younger readers, ask your parents). Then there is the set of provincial “anniversary days”, celebrating milestones of colonisation. Of those with a reasonable claim to being national days that tell us something about the identity of Aotearoa New Zealand, there are three. Anzac Day commemorates – some say celebrates, others say mourns – a disastrous World War I event. Waitangi Day commemorates an agreement between two peoples that was broken almost as soon as it was made. And Matariki, which…11 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023The enigma of the flying bootWhen Anzac Day comes around, my thoughts go immediately to my parents, both veterans of World War II. Both served in the Middle East – my mother as an Royal Air Force nurse and my father as a second lieutenant in the NZ Army. However, their service remains an utter mystery to me, as does a little silver brooch of a flying boot my mother always wore on her jacket, especially when attending Anzac Day ceremonies. I never heard my parents or their friends talk about it and it was only later, as an adult, that I understood its significance. During my childhood, my parents never spoke of that part of their lives to me or my three siblings, and we children were too self-absorbed to ask. Every evening, they’d…6 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Calories that countQuestion: I’ve read that it’s advisable to regularly put on a little weight as we move into older age. I’ve been about 54-55kg for many years but have slipped to 53kg this year. Increasing the size of all my meals has made no difference. I’m 67, fit and active, with no health concerns, and pescatarian (with low fat, sugar and salt). Answer: ot all weight loss is desirable or intentional – a fact often overlooked in a society that praises the pursuit of thinness. Indeed, weight loss can be the result of a personal crisis or illness. Among those aged over 60, unintentional weight loss can be an early sign of health issues such as cancer, according to a study in the British Journal of General Practice. Among those over…4 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Seeing the lightSome wine lovers are “complicit in an escalating climate emergency”, says Rupert Joy, a former UK diplomat, now wine writer and consultant with a special interest in sustainability. Joy’s article, “Wine bottles: A heavy price”, published last year in Decanter, highlighted the environmental problems caused by many producers’ selection of heavy, thick glass bottles purely for marketing reasons. Most empty wine bottles weigh 300-900g, averaging 500g. “Bodybuilder” bottles are chosen by winegrowers because they think consumers associate heavy glass with luxury wine – and they are right. Who doesn’t assume that chocolate sold in a heavy carton, with several layers of packaging, is superior in quality to chocolate marketed in lighter packaging? A study conducted more than a decade ago in a wine shop in Oxford, England, found that heavy…2 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Critical thinkerANAXIMANDER AND THE NATURE OF SCIENCE, by Carlo Rovelli (Allen Lane, $40) Most scientists know what science is until someone asks them to define it, and then they don’t. It’s something to do with precision and accuracy, so you’d think there was a precise and accurate definition, but there isn’t. We know it’s related to truth and reality, two big, solid-seeming concepts that blur and dissolve when we examine them too closely. Conservative historians of science believe it’s a formal system of knowledgeseeking invented by a clique of British gentlemen-philosophers in the 17th century. More expansive thinkers argue that the use of inductive logic and empirical reasoning date back to our earliest prehistory – that humans are an innately scientific species. The Italian theoretical physicist and bestselling science writer Carlo…4 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Paris matchDRIVING MADELEINE Directed by Christian Carion Rather like Before Sunset but without the romance, Driving Madeleine is a talky, simple film in which two endearing strangers share life stories as they spend the day traversing Paris. Madeleine Keller (singer Line Renaud) calls a taxi to take her to her new abode in a nursing home across the other side of town. Gruff, taciturn Charles (Dany Boon, his broken face aptly wearing the weight of his character’s financial travails) picks up the moneyed, upright 92-year-old, and over the course of an allday trip down memory lane, this odd couple develops an enduring bond. So that it’s not just two people chatting in a cab, writer-director Christian Carion (Joyeux Noël) illustrates plucky Madeleine’s surprisingly chequered past through a series of dramatisations. The…1 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Coming home to roostWild Isles returns that ancient and much beloved creature, the Sir David Attenborough, to his natural element. While the many shows he’s made in recent years have mainly kept him studio-bound or caged in the voice-over booth, the new series has the man who won’t be put out to pasture back in the field. He hasn’t been out in the wild much of late. After all, he’s 96. The last time he was out in the field, that field was probably still a forest. One full of species that are now on the endangered list. But Wild Isles takes him, gently, backtowherehis fascination with nature started – the English countryside outside Leicester he first explored as a boy on a bike in the 1930s. “Back then, it was easy to…4 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023TELEVISIONSATURDAY APRIL 22 THE GHOST OF RICHARD HARRIS A hellraiser’s life Screening: Sky Arts, 8.30pm Who was the famously hellraising Irish actor, really? Richard Harris’s three sons – Bafta award-winning actor Jared Harris (Chernobyl, The Crown), actor Jamie Harris (Carnival Row, West Side Story), and director Damian Harris (Brave the Dark, The Wilde Wedding) – never got to find out. And, as this biographical documentary makes clear, they still aren’t really sure. That uncertainty seems to have been shared by director Adrian Sibley, whose background is in made-for-TV music biographies. When the first cut of the film screened at the Venice Film Festival last year, The Guardian’s Peter Bradshaw professed discomfort with its “lenient” approach to Harris’s boozing and drug-taking, and its impact on those around him. Six weeks later,…4 min
New Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Let’s get metaphysicalCongratulations, Mark Broatch, on “Senses of Wonder” (April 8). It showed so well the wondrous world we live in ‒ its beauty and mysteries. Professor Ashley Ward’s tantalising remark that “none of these things, in the strictest sense, exists” leaves the door open for a metaphysical challenge. Our perceptions are undeniably real – we know that the colour red exists, that “sweet” exists, our feelings of joy, yet all this apparently happens in our brain – so what is really going on? Our Western mainstream philosophy is that of materalism; that reality is entirely made of matter, not of dreams or mental stuff of any sort, yet this does not address how our physical brain gives us our subjective, qualitative experience, and it makes assumptions and leaves explanatory gaps. This…8 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 202310 Quick Questions1. Who wrote the story commonly known as Metamorphosis? ❑ Franz Kafka❑ Thomas Mann❑ James Joyce❑ Gabriel García Márquez 2. The Cretaceous period followed the Jurassic in geological history. ❑ True❑ False 3. What is a Monobloc? ❑ Chocolate❑ Type of chair❑ Musical instrument❑ Building material 4. Who lived at 742 Evergreen Terrace, Springfield, USA? ❑ The Griffins of Family Guy❑ The Simpsons❑ Hank of King of the Hill❑ The Cartmans of South Park 5. Dick Fosbury, who recently died, was famous in which field? ❑ Athletics❑ Pharmaceuticals❑ Racing❑ Veterinary science 6. What is Ozempic? ❑ Diabetes drug❑ Gym franchise❑ Social media platform❑ Video game 7. Where would you find a newel? ❑ In the ocean❑ Genome❑ Kitchen❑ Stairwell 8. Who was the musician McKinley Morganfield better known as? ❑…1 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Waxing and waningPolitical attack jobs being in the news just now, it’s worth noting that some of the best ones are inadvertent. A long-ago American politician once reported a rival for threatening him with torture. The threat turned out to be, “I’ll hold your feet to the fire.” As English was the politician’s second language, the expression was unfamiliar and therefore understandably alarming. Depending on one’s pain threshold, a more evilly discomforting threat has recently, if not quite rocked, then greatly bemused the Scottish public. One of its MPs complained that malicious enemies had spitefully booked her in for a bikini wax. What possible message could these foes be trying to transmit? Various MPs have campaigned for better hygiene and safety standards in beauty salons, but not Karen Adam, the Scottish National…3 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Learning to breatheIf social media and the wellness press are to be believed, most of us are walking around performing one of our most fundamental bodily functions incorrectly. “You’re probably breathing wrong”, go the headlines and YouTube descriptions. It’s enticing clickbait. How could I be breathing wrong? Isn’t it involuntary? Is this another thing I need to worry about perfecting? And yet it’s believable enough: on any given day, you could find a fair chunk of the people around you complaining of fatigue, brain fog, poor digestion or aching muscles – all things that are attributed to breathing incorrectly. It’s a thing that sounds, in the words of comedian Stephen Colbert, truthy enough. Physiotherapist Tania Clifton-Smith is an Aucklandbased breathing educator and the author of How to Take a Breath. She says…12 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Force for goodThese days, “resilience” has become a somewhat hackneyed word. But not for Inge Woolf. The Holocaust survivor, who found love, prosperity, acceptance and influence as an émigré to New Zealand, once declared that resilience was “the hope to see there is light besides all the darkness”. It is apt yet bittersweet, therefore, that the posthumous publication of her memoir is entitled Resilience: A story of persecution, escape, survival and triumph. In the wake of current global tensions, Woolf’s call to “respect people no matter how different they are from us” requires the resilience to never give up the fight, and to heed her warning to “be careful who you elect”. She never forgot that Adolf Hitler was the legitimately elected leader of Germany. Born in Vienna in 1934 to parents…9 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Unity DayIn Napier, they’ve been running a Unity Day as a complement to Anzac Day for many years. The culmination of a week of events, it was the brainchild of Pat Magill, long-time resident and inspirational social campaigner. Magill is 96 and was in hospital at the time of writing. “In 1971, Pat organised a walk from Taupō to Napier which took a week,” says Napier Pilot City Trust chair Alwyn Corban. “It was a whole lot of diverse people and over the week they got to know each other and became friends. That transformed into Unity Week. Pat’s got this ability to bring diverse things – people, concepts, whatever – together.” In this case, the elements were a hikoi, a lecture by a guest speaker, awards and a dinner. “And…2 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Error messageFor a long time, irritable bowel syndrome (IBS) was poorly understood. Diagnosing it is mostly about tests to eliminate other potential causes for the symptoms, which include abdominal cramps, bloating, constipation and diarrhoea. Treatments are still limited. Part of the problem has always been that, on the face of it, there appear to be no medical reasons for the gastrointestinal problems that IBS sufferers experience. “There are a variety of gut conditions where you can see inflammation when tests are done but with irritable bowel syndrome the intestine looks normal,” explains Professor Stuart Brierley, an expert in gastrointestinal neuroscience at the South Australian Health and Medical Research Institute. “So, the question is, what is causing the chronic pain and other symptoms?” Researchers believe IBS may be triggered initially by some…3 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023NUTRITION BITESBUILT-IN POWER SOURCE Many type 1 diabetes patients use battery-powered insulin pumps to regulate their bloodsugar levels. German researchers have developed an implantable fuel cell that could be used to power such medical devices using excess blood sugar from tissue to generate electrical energy. And the technology, tested on mice, could one day be teamed with implanted artificial beta cells to produce and secrete insulin and treat diabetes, says Martin Fussenegger of ETH Zurich University. TOWN VS COUNTRY An analysis of BMI data of 71 million children and adolescents in 200 countries over 30 years challenges “commonly held perceptions about the negative aspects of living in cities around nutrition and health”, researchers say. The international study by more than 1500 researchers looked at height and weight data from 1990-2020. It…1 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Word gamesImagine that your phone rings, so you pick it up. What do you say? My money is on some version of “hello” (maybe with a “so-and-so speaking”). I reply, “Hello, it’s Marc.” What do you say next? When I ask about this in large groups, I typically get a majority who say, “Oh hello”, a second time. But why? If the overt purpose of “hello” is to signal a greeting, you’ve already done that when you picked up the call. How about those minimal interactions as you’re walking towards a colleague at work – “How you going?” you say, and they reply, “Good, thanks”, and you continue on your way. But you may have had that experience where they pause briefly and then say something other than “Good, thanks”. Awkward.…3 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023DIVERSIONSPRIVACY NOTICE This issue of NZ Listener is published by Are Media Limited (Are Media). Are Media may use and disclose your information in accordance with our Privacy Policy, including to provide you with your requested products or services and to keep you informed of other Are Media publications, products, services and events. Our Privacy Policy is located at aremedia.co.nz/privacy. It also sets out how you can access or correct your personal information and lodge a complaint. Are Media may disclose your personal information to its service providers and agents around the world, including in Australia, the US, the Philippines and the European Union. In addition, this issue may contain Reader Offers, being offers, competitions or surveys, which may require you to provide personal information to enter or to take…7 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Frozen stiffSHACKLETON: THE GREATEST STORY OF SURVIVAL Directed by: Bobbi Hansel and Caspar Mazzotti This documentary marries the now familiar story and images of Ernest Shackleton’s 1915 Antarctic expedition, dramatic recreations from a 2001 IMAX doco, and celebrated Australian adventurer-environmentalist Tim Jarvis’ own 2013 real-life replications of the rescue mission that saved all of the crew of the Endurance from an 18-month frozen ordeal as castaways. There’s new footage of Jarvis retracing his own and Shackleton’s steps, mostly from the deck of a ship. Throughout, his voice is the only one to be heard, other than readings from Shackleton’s diary by an actor faithfully channelling a man with a frozen-stiff upper lip. Although it’s easy to be impressed by Jarvis’ earlier achievements in sailing a replica of an Endurance lifeboat from…1 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Razzas on paradeTĀMATI’S RSA ROADIE, TVNZ 1, Anzac Day, 10am With its cheerful name and the affable Tāmati Rimene-Sproat as its presenter, this reconnoitre of the country’s RSAs might seem like a feel-good manoeuvre or an extended Anzac Day Good Sorts. But the tiki tour of half a dozen clubs between Hokianga and South Canterbury does ponder some questions about the state of the veterans’ organisation and its history – and gets some occasionally surprising answers. The most startling comes in an interview with Sir Robert “Bom” Gillies, the 98-year-old last surviving member of the Māori Battalion. On their return home to Rotorua after fighting in North Africa and Italy, including the Battle of Monte Cassino, he and his former comrades weren’t welcomed by the organisation supposedly founded to support veterans. “When…2 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023TV Films bySATURDAY APRIL 22 ESCAPE FROM PLANET EARTH Unhappy landings Three, 7.00pm Derivative animated sci-fi comedy about alien astronauts from the planet Baab sending a mission to Earth where one of them, Scorch, a Buzz Lightyear clone voiced by Brendan Fraser, is captured, forcing his brother on a rescue mission. Despite having a starry voice line-up, including William Shatner as villainous Area 51 boss “General William T Shanker" and Ricky Gervais as a sarcastic mission-control computer, it’s just not very funny. (2013) BIRDS LIKE US Balkan avian animation Whakaata Māori, 7.00pm Finally, the Bosnian-Turkish cartoon feature of the 12th-century Persian poem Conference of The Birds by Farid ud-Din Attar we’ve all been waiting for. There may be English voices by Jeremy Irons, Jim Broadbent and Alicia Vikander but it doesn’t help…5 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Crystal clearOne of my favourite moments in all music is the partial bar that opens Mozart’s 40th Symphony. It lasts only a second, but for three beats the pulsing lower strings are exposed before the famous theme kicks in. The bar is marked piano – quiet – and unless you listen hard, you’ve probably never noticed it. For me that simple, subtle figure, which underpins the symphony’s first movement, exemplifies why Mozart was a genius and the rest of us are not. If you listen to the symphony on the main streaming services, technical limitations mean you’ll struggle to hear those three life-affirming beats, even if you’re trying. The reason I mention this is that Apple has a new dedicated online streaming service, Apple Music Classical, and there are some nice…2 min
New Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Caption competitionWINNING CAPTION Edith Macklin, Hastings FINALISTS Co-star: “Sam, tell them I don’t want to discuss gender issues.” – Hans Zindel, Palmerston North Casting is complete for the remake of The Odd Couple. – Rex McGregor, Auckland Sam Neill: “Marama Davidson told me that the Green Party was a bit different over here.” – Peter Davidson, Christchurch 2070 Academy Awards – Sam Neill meets hologram of younger self. – Pete Snelling, Havelock North Neill: “You look a lot younger on your Tinder profile.” – Deborah East, Wellington Opening of the Sydney Doppelganger Convention. – Conal Atkins, Nelson Caption Competition {listenercaption@aremedia.co.nz} TO ENTER Send your captions for the photo at right to listenercaption@aremedia.co.nz, with “Caption Competition No 508” in the subject line. Alternatively, entries can be posted to “Caption Competition No 508”,…1 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Welcome to the fatherlandIt might be nice for a beer-guzzling, lederhosen-clad holiday, but nobody wants to come to Germany to work. At least, that’s what recent research published by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development appears to indicate. The OECD research looks at how attractive its 38 membercountries are for skilled workers, academics, students and entrepreneurs. Over the past four years, Germany has slipped from 12th to 15th place. You may know this already, given Kiwis’ penchant for over-enthusiastically celebrating even the tiniest international success, but New Zealand did far better. It was right at the top of the OECD list in almost all categories. People want to work in New Zealand. All this is bad news for the Germans. Employment researchers estimate that in just over a decade, Germany will be…3 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023The royal waveOnce upon a time, the kingdom known poetically as the Land of the Long White Cloud was ruled by a kindly princess. She was empathetic and smart. She cared for all of us, for the team of five million. She wanted to save us from the hellfire and watery torrents of climate change. From the dragon’s breath of a virus called Covid. She had the requisite princessy flowing locks and air of optimism. She was lauded, mostly, throughout her land, but mostly in other lands. She appeared in prestigious publications and on American talk shows. In 2020, Sam Neill, probably our other most famous New Zealander, told Time magazine that wherever he went, “People say, ‘You think we could have Jacinda this week? Could we just borrow her for a…5 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Crushing fatigueSilver Ferns and Northern Mystics netballer Sulu Fitzpatrick thought she was okay after picking up Covid-19 on the national team’s UK tour in early 2022. But in the weeks and months afterwards, she realised the effect the virus was still having on her as an athlete. “If I was doing everyday things, I was fine. It’s the impact it had on me being able to do my job as an athlete that I really noticed. The breathlessness, my heart rate and my ability to recover.” Physiotherapist and academic Scott Peirce describes what Fitzpatrick was going through as “the biggest, nastiest symptom” for most people who struggle post-Covid, a symptom known as postexertional malaise. “It’s not just, ‘I’m tired.’ It’s more, ‘I went to exercise and I am crushed’, for the…2 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023The unfortunate consequenceHere is a taste of reality that could be from any New Zealand hospital (this is based on one I know of from 2016) to give you a small understanding of the conditions which can never be reproduced, explained or appreciated later in a courtroom. The doctor working in the emergency department is called to an emergency. Urgent attention is required. In real life, this doctor is already stretched to breaking. They worked very late the day before, didn’t get much sleep because of a sick child at home, worked extra shifts all month and hasn’t had time to deal with the emotional fallout from the death of a patient days before. They need to pee, haven’t had a drink in five hours and nothing to eat for seven. They…10 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Lockdown DayAnational day should have at its centre a unifying national myth, says Nick Agar, professor of ethics in Te Kura Aronui – School of Social Sciences at the University of Waikato. Hence his proposal of a Lockdown Day, in a piece published on newsroom.co.nz: “I see in New Zealand’s response to Covid-19 the makings of a potent and unifying national myth … The great thing about a national myth of the Kiwi lockdown is it wouldn’t follow the familiar pattern of glorifying war.” What was he thinking? In part, he says, three years after the original piece appeared and still of that view, he was thinking of all the people who are left out of Anzac Day. He would like, for instance, to see the bit players of history celebrated.…2 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023HEALTH BRIEFSCANCER-CAUSING AIR Exposure to fine-particulate air pollution over as short a time frame as three years could increase your risk of developing lung cancer, according to research published in Nature. The team looked at the relationship between exposure to PM2.5 air pollution and lung cancer in groups of people across England, Taiwan, South Korea and Canada. They say higher levels were associated with a higher frequency of EGFR-mutant lung cancer, triggered by the mutation of the EGFR gene. The researchers add this suggests lung tumours may develop in a two-step process; first, a gene mutates, then other factors allow these mutated cells to grow and expand into cancer. STATINS AND EXERCISE Cholesterol-lowering statin drugs do not exacerbate muscle injury, pain or fatigue for people doing moderate exercise, say researchers from…1 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Going retroThis nursery-sweet British classic based on the flavours of toffee and banana really is astonishingly simple to make. The toffee in my banoffee omits the traditional, dangerous (and, at times, literally explosive) practice of boiling a can of condensed milk for most of a day. So, you can breathe a sigh of relief that, aside from the calorie count, this recipe is entirely risk free. Use a standard-size or six mini loose-base tart tins. BANOFFEE PIE 140g butter250g digestive biscuits1 x 400g can condensed milk75g dark muscovado sugar2 tsp pure vanilla extract3 bananas300ml double cream25g dark chocolate, grated Preheat the oven to 180°C / Gas 4. Melt 65g of the butter. Blitz the biscuits in a food processor until completely crushed, add the melted butter and pulse until fully combined.…7 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Watch this spaceAround 15 years ago, I was handed a satellite phone and told I could call anyone, anywhere in the world. I was standing on an isolated farm in North Auckland with an executive from the satellite company Inmarsat. The chunky phone in my hand had a thick, cigar-shaped antenna connected to it. I ended up calling my mother, who was at home just 50km away. At the time, making a phone call via satellite cost $15 a minute, so I cut the call short. Sat phones have long been the device of choice for those who spend their time well beyond the reach of mobile networks – oil-rig workers, deep-sea sailors, search-and-rescue specialists. But early this month, two of our mobile network providers, One (formerly Vodafone) and 2degrees, said they…3 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Survival tacticsKIND, by Stephanie Johnson (PRHNZ Vintage, $37) A Kiwi pandemic novel with elements of a pacy thriller, Stephanie Johnson’s Kind is also a wry and clear-eyed commentary on New Zealand, where we are and where we’re headed. There are many plot strands – each richly peopled and filled with nail-biting jeopardy – and multiple perspectives. This satisfying complexity means the novel is way more than an exploration of lockdown-related claustrophobia and navel-gazing. There is a bit of that – but just enough. It’s the second week of Level 4 lockdown and newly separated Lyall Hull, a National MP for Christchurch, has “had enough of looking at walls and Netflix [and] memes about … being kind”. So he leaves his soulless apartment and takes off for the Southern Alps in his…3 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Breaking the silenceRED MEMORY: Living, remembering and forgetting China’s Cultural Revolution, by Tania Branigan (Faber, $36.99) What would people do if all the norms of society were broken? And how would you live with what you had done? It’s these questions that make China’s Cultural Revolution so fascinating to outsiders, and also lie at the heart of a new book that’s an early contender for book of the year on China. It was an era, roughly 1966 to 1975, when an erratic Mao ordered people to smash the “old China”, then stood back as Red Guards and the populace created egalitarian chaos, beating and torturing people in his name. Families and friends denounced one another for being insufficiently Maoist and millions were killed. Song Binbin was a Red Guard. She may also…3 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023Bearing upRight now, Stefania LaVie Owen is talking from a van somewhere beneath Mt Ruapehu, not far from the Ohakune carrot. Last year, the location might have been because the Wellington-based actress was shooting the second season of Sweet Tooth, the acclaimed Netflix fantasy series in which she plays Bear, a sort of a post-apocalyptic, heavily armed Greta Thunberg. “I don’t want to just do thing after thing and burn myself out just to get to a certain place.” But she’s been enjoying her own company, writing songs on her guitar, and contemplating her future while camping in her VW Kombi named Gwendoline. It’s all part of a need, she tells the Listener, to unwind after filming. Sweet Tooth season two, she says, was much harder than the stop-start first season…5 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023GRAHAM REID Home truthsIDEAL HOME NOISE, by Vera Ellen Vera Ellen emerged from the folk and indie pop scene in Pōneke, Wellington, recorded and toured with her high school band Maple Syrup and has established herself in the Los Angeles feminist collective Girl Friday. Her 2021 album It’s Your Birthday appropriated and adapted snatches of Velvet Underground reductivism, Bangles-like pop, lo-fi Flying Nun, acoustic folk and Iggy Pop (for the shouty chorus of I Want 2 B Boy), astutely winding them into an intelligent, personal song cycle. It saw her pick up Best Alternative Artist at last year’s Aotearoa Music Awards and a Taite Music Prize nomination. High expectation then for Ideal Home Noise – an ambiguous title depending on the emphasis – which addresses her health problems and depression (the unsparingly honest…2 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023In it for the long haulMOVING HOUSES, TVNZ 1, Anzac Day, 7pm The key to Moving Houses, which begins a second season this week, is that it’s about drama that was already there. People were putting old homes on the backs of trucks and taking them places for a long time before anyone pointed a camera at it. It’s never not a dramatic thing to do. A good example is the new season’s opening episode, which sees a grand-looking house cut into several pieces and driven from Auckland to Ahipara, at the southern end of Ninety Mile Beach. It’s a journey some of us might find a bit daunting just in a car. The producers of factual TV series often contrive deadlines to generate tension but in this case, the deadlines are quite real –…3 minNew Zealand Listener|Issue 17, 2023The road less travelledTo my amazement, and no doubt to the amazement of anyone who has ever known me, I have taken up exercising. Let’s not get carried away. I have taken up walking. For an hour, most days. Greg, ever encouraging, says that I am barely even walking, more like wafting. It is certainly true that I don’t stride along Fitbitting, whatever that is. I most certainly don’t do that arm-pumping stuff. I already look like a dick in my raggedy shorts, and socks that look as though they came from the secondhand shop where retired circus clowns send their old costumes to die. I don’t wear serious power-walker gear such as those tight, bicyclinglength, Lycra legging things. I don’t want to look like a complete dick. Also, I wouldn’t want to…3 min
