Signposts - a blog about Te Ara the Encyclopedia of New Zealand

Queen Elizabeth II opens New Zealand's 1974 session of Parliament

Today Te Ara commemorates the Diamond Jubilee of Queen Elizabeth II, the queen of New Zealand and the nation’s head of state, with two new entries, one on the Royal family and a second on Governors and governors general. Our sister site NZHistory also joins the party with an essay specifically focused on Queen Elizabeth’s Diamond Jubilee.

For those of us under the gold card age of 65, which of course includes a large majority of New Zealanders, Elizabeth II is the only sovereign we have known. She came to the throne in 1952 as a young married woman of 25, with two pre-schoolers. The following year she was crowned in a ceremony which many New Zealanders listened to on their crackling radios. And at the end of 1953 she stepped onto New Zealand soil, the first reigning monarch to do so. As the NZHistory feature on that tour shows, 1953 marked the highpoint of popular adoration for the royal family in New Zealand. About three quarters of the nation stood on apple boxes beside the road to see her and the duke of Edinburgh drive past. As a six year old, I confess to seeing her no fewer than 10 times, and if you look very closely at the clip of her rail journey through Hawke’s Bay you might even see a young boy on the Waipukurau station waving a Union Jack. I remember thinking that she was the most beautiful woman I had ever seen.

As our entry explains, sentiments about New Zealand’s relations with the royal family have undergone rockier fortunes since then. Royal tours do not quite attract the enthusiasm of 1953–54; and the royal family has had some knocks to its role as the ideal family. Two of our prime ministers have even declared themselves republicans; and as the entry on governors and governors general explains, we have repatriated that office. The governor general remains the queen’s representative, but those occupying the office are now locals, who are also representative of the New Zealand community with all its ethnic and social diversity.

Yet, just as in the last years of the 19th century Queen Victoria’s stock rose remarkably as she came to commemorate her diamond jubilee (statues of her began to appear around the empire), a similar upsurge seems to be happening to Queen Elizabeth II. Her calm dignity has won huge admiration and another spectacularly successful royal wedding has garnered another generation of adoring fans for the royals.

It is one of the strange accidents of history that Queen Elizabeth’s ascension to the throne came on Waitangi Day, 6 February 1952. This has a remarkable pertinence because the Treaty of Waitangi was signed by Lieutenant Governor Hobson on behalf of Queen Victoria, and there has always been a powerful relationship between the monarch and the Māori community. When Māori believed that the local Pākehā community was not honoring the treaty, they sent petitions or attempted to visit the sovereign. The film in the Te Ara entry of the young queen’s visit to Turangawaewae in 1953 is a testament to how important that relationship was.

So we hope that the entries launched today on both our sites help encourage reflection on a range of important issues – our relationship with the monarch, the role of the governor general, and the continuing meaning of the Treaty of Waitangi. Look and enjoy.

Ben Hana/Blanket Man

All cities (and some towns) have their share of people who live their lives, day and night, out on the streets, whether by circumstance or choice. Most remain nameless to those who pass them by, but some become well known enough to gain unofficial names, often based on their appearance. One of those people was Wellington’s Ben Hana – aka Blanket Man – who passed away on Sunday.

It’s probably fair to say that Hana surpassed the fame of those who came before him, such as Robert Jones (Bucket Man) who traversed the streets of Wellington with a bucket in hand for 20 years and was the inspiration for a character in Maurice Gee’s novel Blindsight. Hana is the subject of a Wikipedia entry, a Facebook page, a documentary (which can be viewed online) and an academic conference paper. He featured in Pip Desmond’s 2009 book Trust: a true story of women & gangs. One year a group of people dressed as Blanket Man for the Sevens rugby tournament in Wellington. There will be many more lesser-known instances of Hana’s cultural influence.

While not all supported Hana’s lifestyle, street presence and behaviour, there is little doubt that he was a true and striking character, recognised and known throughout Wellington and beyond. Aside from the periods in which he was carted off to prison or hospital, he was a fixture on the streets – someone we expected to see, either huddled in his blanket or sunbathing on top of it, sometimes abusive but usually smiling and swaying to music. He literally left his mark on the places he inhabited – his dreadlocks left a black smudge on the wall of the Courtenay Place building he sat in front of most recently. A shrine has been erected at this spot.

I didn’t ever really know Hana, but I did come to understand that there was more to him than a printed blanket and a loin cloth when he turned up to a community garden working bee in Te Aro in 2001. The ground was stony and difficult to work, but he wielded his pick-axe with strength and dexterity, blanket flying, throughout the day. The garden was an act of protest against the inner-city bypass road, and Hana also attended marches and meetings about this – I remember seeing a large blanket hanging off the gallery at the town hall during one such meeting, which signalled that he and his comrades were in attendance. You can learn more about his political beliefs and ideas by checking out that documentary mentioned above.

In those days I used to wear a red coat and he always called me Red Riding Hood. Over time the red coat went by the wayside, but we continued to exchange nods. I passed the legend of Blanket Man down to my son, who dressed up as him one day without prompting.

Amos as Blanket Man

Farewell Ben Hana/Blanket Man. You earned your place as a true man of the streets and a Wellington icon. I wonder how the city will recognise your life and contribution to its street culture?

Watches on the wrists of Te Ara old fogies

I was sitting at our staff meeting yesterday and looked at my watch to see the time. I then looked around the room and noticed that quite a number of my colleagues were not wearing wristwatches. There appeared to be a generational divide to this pattern, with those in their 30s and under more likely to have naked wrists than their elders. Was I witnessing the end of the wristwatch?

If so, it paralleled the pattern at home. When my son Fred turned 11 we said he could get a watch for his birthday and that we’d go into town and he could choose it. The expedition mirrored one I’d taken with my parents in the 1970s when I was his age. Getting a watch was big deal then – almost a rite of passage. I can still recall the event vividly. It was late shopping night in the middle of winter. It was cold and raining, but the bleakness was punctured by the blaze of street lights, flashing neon signs, and animated shoppers, including us. We ventured into a Lambton Quay jeweller (long gone) which had cases of childrens’ watches beneath the spotless glass counters. My parents made small talk with the jeweller while I scanned the dazzling collection. The first Japanese digital watches were just coming out and I thought about getting one of those, but the jeweller pointed me in the direction of the Swiss watches. ‘You can’t beat Swiss precision,’ he said to my parents. My eye finally rested on a piece with a gleaming stainless-steel casing, luminous hands and numbers, and a date function. That night I wore the watch to bed, diving under the covers to see its luminous face come to life: awesome! (I found the watch a few weeks back in a battered tin of other childhood mementos. I turned the winding knob, but the timepiece failed to tick, or tock - so much for Swiss precision.)

Fred’s trip to Pascoe’s jeweller lacked the same romance. The children’s watches were confined to a single case. Almost all were digital and featured a multitude of “modern” functions: a stopwatch, calendar, two alarms, and other things I failed to fathom. The one he wanted was larger than his wrist, but he eventually settled for a smaller one. Fred seemed less taken with his first watch than I had been with mine. He regularly forgot to wear it, so our hope that he’d become more punctual never happened.  Within a few months he lost it ‘somewhere’. We eventually got him another one, but that was ‘lost’ too. By this time he had a cellphone and was using it as his timepiece. None of his friends wore wristwatches and he did not see the need for one either. As he explained, if he forgets his phone he can get the time off his iPod. For his generation the wristwatch had lost the social status it had claimed a century before.

So like the roadmap - whose demise I’ve previously blogged about - it seems the wristwatch is fast becoming obsolete. However, I won’t be flaunting a naked right-hand wrist (I’m left-handed) any time soon. I like my watch and take pleasure in its simple design. Sometimes I watch its second hand move around the dial for the sheer pleasure watching the passage of time - it can get quite existential. At other times, I’ve glanced at it and been amazed at how quickly time has passed, or vice versa. I’d feel naked without it. What about you?

During the REAL New Zealand Festival, which runs alongside Rugby World Cup 2011, our Jock is roaming the country and blogging about it for the REAL New Zealand Festival Insider blog…

Revellers

Almost everyone was dressed up - French supporters with tricolour wigs, rooster hats, and red, white and blue drapes; Kiwis almost all in black, with silver hats, fern antlers, and enveloped in New Zealand flags. The black T-shirt, with the slogan ‘Keep calm/Piri’s on’, was everywhere. There was a team of people offering elaborate face painting; guitarists playing on every corner; and a juggler was performing high up on top of an elevated bicycle and surrounded by a circle of gawking admirers. People were laughing, ribbing their mates, doing impromptu hakas, and taking endless photos. Queen’s Wharf had already closed; but no-one seemed to mind. There were other places to go and watch the game on the big screen. Aucklanders were partying - and this was before that nail-biting finish gave them something real to celebrate.

A young All Black fan

World Cup 2011 and the REAL New Zealand Festival is now over. I can return to my humdrum life. After six weeks on the road, it is time for a few overall impressions.

One big party: The image which will stick in the mind is of Kiwis learning to party in public. The tradition of public carnivals is not deep in our culture. It used to be said that at the weekend the streets of our cities were so empty that you could fire a cannon down the main street and not hit a soul. On occasions when we did celebrate, such as VE and VJ days at the end of World War 2, people did not know how to behave or hold their drink; and once the kissing of strangers was over there was drunken hooliganism and breaking of windows. But the world cup has taught us how to have fun on the streets. True, the one real crisis of the cup came about at Queen’s Wharf on opening night; but this was simply a reflection of how keen we were to party. Once that crisis was worked through, the organising of the national party - at fanzones and other public places throughout the country was superb. There was plenty of alcohol drunk, but there was little aggro or wanton violence against property. We sang and laughed and danced and cheered. Huge street parties was not how I had imagined the cup; but it is the enduring impression. And this was despite that fact that early spring in New Zealand is never the most pleasant time to be outside at night - five of the first games I attended were in the rain. But it did not stop the music playing.

Good hosts: It may be simply our national insecurity - our desire to be liked. But there is no doubt that New Zealanders went out of their way to help our guests. The ‘Kia ora’s as you entered an exhibition, or the ‘How can I help you?’ which flowed from those wonderful volunteers in their blue uniforms were really appreciated. I spoke to at least 100 overseas fans, and their comments on the ‘warmth’ of the welcome became almost tedious.

Nationalism: If you landed in New Zealand on Sunday and saw the ‘Go All Blacks’ signs on farm gates and suburban fences, and the black flags with silver ferns on cars, you might have worried that a dangerous nationalism had taken hold. ‘Patriotism is’, after all, ‘the last refuge of a scoundrel‘. However, colour aside, this was not the black-shirts nationalism of the fascist state. There were a few ugly asides, such as the petty anti-Australianism, but in general it was a light-hearted nationalism, no more than a pride in the country’s footie team and a deep desire to express our best. Impressively, a love of New Zealand flowered alongside a real effort to learn about other countries. I will not forget the large window display in a New Plymouth store providing a map of Namibia and an interesting caption about its economy and way of life; or the way Napier divided its central city into quarters representing the countries that played there; or Palmerston North’s relabelling of Main St as Romania St and George St as Georgia street and their encouragement to everyone to wear red or yellow buckets.

Dunedin campervans

Campervanners: I had expected that most of the overseas fans would be relatively affluent people, eating in posh restaurants and staying in motels or hotels. From the moment that I checked in at the St Kilda motor camp and saw the huge army of campervans spread out over two football fields I began to realise that most were young, doing it on the cheap and heading for hamburger joints. This was confirmed when I saw vacancy signs at motels on match days at every place I visited, and when I was the recipient of an avalanche of moans from taxi-drivers about their lack of patronage. The profile of the visitors undoubtedly affected their response to the festival. I nearly always discovered a few non-New Zealanders at the exhibitions, concerts and plays I attended. The rugby widows undoubtedly enjoyed the cultural offerings. But the numbers of overseas visitors at such events were not great. Most, quite frankly, were more interested in enjoying fun in the bars with their countrymen. The audience who loved the festival were the locals. So, the achievement of the festival was to give us a richer sense of ourselves.

An outpouring of talent: I never ceased to be amazed at the outpouring of creativity which the cup released and which the REAL New Zealand festival pulled together so brilliantly. Each day when I looked at the festival programme, I was faced by tough mouth-watering choices. The number and range of offerings was deeply impressive. At times this meant that the audience was spread too thin; at times it meant that not everything was done to the same high standard. I would sometimes turn up to see a dance group and find it had been cancelled; or go to an exhibition and find the labels were incorrect or wrongly positioned. But the energy and ingenuity of the offerings, whether it was street theatre or a showcase event, was a constant. An awful lot of New Zealanders had their creative juices flowing over the last year. And as for the food - well, you could not take part in this festival without enjoying some truly delicious tastes.

The Māori response: I had not set out to look for Māori culture in the festival, but time and again this is what I found. I saw a wonderful Māori dance, Te Houhi: The people and the land; a powerful Māori play, I, George Nepia; an ambitious but largely successful opera with kapa haka, Arohanui; several exhibitions on Māori rugby and influential Māori rugby players; and I just loved the way Māori presented their culture in a living way. Whether it was at the Haka exhibition at Hamilton or in the tents at the entrance to Waka Māori, visitors saw tattooing, weaving, carving and kapa haka in action. They were encouraged to eat hangi foods, sing waiata, do a haka. As a Pākehā, I sometimes felt that Pākehā culture, not Māori, was a museum relic!

Best rugby exhibition: I saw too many rugby exhibitions for my own good on this tour, and too many consisted of lengthy texts extolling past heroes along with a collection of tired objects such as old programmes or boots. Because the presentation was always lively and original, and it made a real effort to present rugby as a culture involving many people in the society not just the heroes, the best was ‘Red, Yellow and Black’ at the Waikato Museum.

Best non-rugby exhibition: I loved renewing acquaintance with Len Lye in New Plymouth’s Govett-Brewster and Ralph Hotere in Dunedin; but the biggest challenge to my view of the world was in Nelson with George Shaw’s brilliant exhibition on street art, ‘Oi You.’

Best music: The single most affecting musical moment was Kiri Te Kanawa singing alone ‘Pokarekareana’ as a third encoure at her gala concert. It had us all in tears. But for sustained music I loved Annie Crummer’s energetic singing in The Cloud.

Best theatrical experience: This is a tough one, since I saw some brilliant theatre on my tour. I, George Nepia was fascinating and highly relevant; Finding Murdoch was engrossing; and The Earthquake in Chile, which was pitched so perfectly to its Christchurch audience, was one of the most emotionally intense evenings I have spent in my life. But I will never forget the emotional power of Te Houhi. It brilliantly evoked the human tragedy which colonisation brought to parts of this land.

Best match day: Perhaps because they were smaller and the event was more unusual, match day in the provincial centres was something special. New Plymouth was brilliantly organised and the compact entertainment on the waterfront was superb; Napier’s adoption of the Canadian and French teams was done with real charm; the walk to the new stadium at Dunedin was one long drawn-out entertainment; and the pre-match programme in Palmerston North’s Square was most enjoyable; but the match day in Rotorua will live longest in my memory because I was there for an Irish match, and the Irish fans simply have to be seen, and even more heard, to be believed.

Most upsetting moment: This was not when I heard that Dan Carter had hurt his groin, or when the French scored their try in the final. It came when I reached Christchurch’s Bridge of Remembrance, looked through to see the empty macadam where buildings long known to me had once stood and read the sad inscriptions on the wreathes laid against the wire barrier.

It was a moment such as this that put the cup into perspective. It’s great that we have learnt to party in public. The REAL New Zealand Festival was a brilliant showcase of this country’s talent and creativity. It made us all proud to be Kiwis. I feel as if we have been on holiday for six weeks; and have come back home refreshed. But when the party is over…….

I look forward to joining you next time!

During the REAL New Zealand Festival, which runs alongside Rugby World Cup 2011, our Jock is roaming the country and blogging about it for the REAL New Zealand Festival Insider blog…

Dame Kiri Te Kanawa

It’s midday on the day of THE BIG GAME. The countdown really began at Kiri Te Kanawa’s concert last night when the great soprano welcomed everyone to a ‘celebration’; and then explained that ‘hadn’t our boys done well getting to the final?’ Well, yes, perhaps. Certainly for the next two hours Kiri and her accompaniments, a wonderfully smooth New Zealand Symphony Orchestra, a strong bass-baritone Teddy Tahu Rhodes, and a charismatic theatrical baritone Kawiti Waetford gave us every reason for feeling proud of the country, win or not - but winning the final is what the people want.

To soak up the mood, and since I was on Granddad duty, I decided to head to St Luke’s Westfield Mall and ask ‘real New Zealand’ how it was feeling about the game. Here are a few answers.

My first conversation was with a late-middle-aged Pākehā woman: I am not really a rugby fan, but everyone says I have to watch it. I will; and it has been exciting hasn’t it? They say that if we win there will be a baby boom in nine months time! A good thing that we won last week or it would have been an Aussie-French final. That would have been funny, wouldn’t it?

The waiter at the coffee bar was from China. He had been in New Zealand ten years. ‘I didn’t know the rules before the World Cup. China is not a rugby place - but I will definitely watch it tonight - at home. Rugby’s quite a nice game isn’t it?

Read more on the Real NZ Festival blog…