Pioneer 51

Prospecting for yttrium in the Ploi Thua sector

For several years I couldn't play Elite Dangerous at all, what with my ISP being incompatible with the Frontier server requirements. A few months ago my street finally got fibre installed and I switched to a different provider, and could therefore play the game I've spent over a thousand hours in once more. As always, it's been a process of relearning the game mechanics, with an added dose of the traditional Elite Dangerous chore of resetting all the keybinds the game seems to wipe every so often, thereby bringing you back to square one. At first I reacquainted myself with the combat gameplay, and then taught myself the asteroid mining mechanics that were introduced a few years back. 

Then it was time to delve into another new gameplay area - the revamped exploration system. The old system involved a discovery scanner 'honk' on first emerging from witchspace into a new system to reveal the bodies orbiting the star, followed by approaching planetary bodies of interest close enough for a detailed scan. The updated exploration system is now more complex, but it's an interesting complexity. A commander entering a new system still triggers a powerful scanner burst on jumping adjacent to the main system star, which reveals all the system's stars plus the number of planetary bodies in the orbital plane. Then after travelling a short distance from the main star to gain a clearer sightline, the Full Spectrum System Scanner reveals the trace signals of all the different planetary bodies, and the commander can tune the scanner to identify each body, locking on to the correct frequency for each body and zooming in and out to complete the scan. It's a fiddly process but ultimately quite satisfying, and the FSS' ability to identify particular planetary types allows a commander in a hurry to just latch onto particular bodies, such as water worlds and Earth-likes, while ignoring the less lucrative icy bodies. 

Once I'd got the hang of this new skill I decided to head out of the civilised bubble for my first exploratory expedition in years. I rigged my Anaconda-class, Cahokia, with a compact power plant and distributor, lightweight engines and an enormous 28MCr fuel scoop, a minimal shield to protect from bumpy landings, and an SRV bay to explore planetary surfaces. All the Cahokia's weaponry was sent to storage to reduce weight, and ultimately this bare-bones approach boosted the ship's maximum jump range to a smidgen over 54 light-years, without the benefit of fancy Guardian jump booster technology.

Commander Totinges departed from Arrhenius Terminal in the Bard system, 150 lightyears from Sol and home of the Cosmic Caretakers Corporation, and headed rimwards through the Oochost and Hegeia sectors. The first major find of the journey was in the Hegeia sector, where the Cahokia came across a remarkable system (Hegeia ZS-U D2-48) with two water-worlds and a beautiful earth-like world. Further afield, Commander Totinges found a system with twin water-worlds (Gludgoi IH-D D12-50), and another with an earth-like and a water-world (Hypou Ain LY-2 D13-32). The furthest extent of the journey was at Hypou Ain JG-V C16-9, 5536 light-years rimward of Bard, and the point at which the Cahokia turned back towards civilised space so as to reach a settled system in time for Christmas! After 106 jumps the final destination on the trip was Hiyya Orbital in the Arjung system, which has long been a popular destination for Commander Totinges on his travels about the galaxy. 

The successful exploration mission took Totinges' exploration rank to Pioneer 51 (up 20 rank points), netted 40MCr for the bank balance, and set a new record for highest total system scan payout, at 7.8MCr. Next step will be to hop into Totinges' Krait Mk.2 and read up on how to unlock the Guardian frame shift drive booster to make the next exploration expedition even speedier.

See also:

Blog: Rares trader, 13 April 2020
Blog: 1000 hours of Elite Dangerous, 25 June 2017
Blog: Intrigue in Bastanien, 5 February 2017
Blog: Ranger 27, 13 April 2016

Cour des Miracles

The name of the rue de la Grande-Truanderie (Great Scam) refers to one of the Paris's 12 cours des Miracles, so called because when the most severely crippled beggars returned there at the end of each working day, they suddenly found themselves cured, lively, and nimble. Each had their specialty: the francs-mitoux pretended to faint at street corners, the piètres hauled themselves about on crutches, the coquillards claimed to be pilgrims in need, the sabouleux were phony paralytics or epileptics, the rifodés crawled on deformed limbs, the mercandiers affected to be war victims, and so on. They had laws, a language, and a leader called Le Ragot (today, slang for gossip), who was succeeded during the reign of François I by Le Grand Coësre. Every night, the beggars gave their chief a percentage of their gains and then spent the rest on a feast, since their law required them to keep nothing for the next day, but eat, drink, and be merry until all their money was gone. Towns within the town, the cours des Miracles had as many as 40,000 inhabitants in 1560. The Police Lieutenant La Reynie cleared them in 1667.

- Dominique Lesbros, Curiosities of Paris, New York, 2017, p.69

See also:

History: The siege-breaking balloons of Paris, 5 June 2020

History: Paris chose to be self-centred, 1 October 2016

Books: Hemingway starts his day, 30 April 2016

Testing the elephants' gangway

In days gone by Wirth’s Circus travelled regularly across the Tasman for their New Zealand tours, usually by passenger ship, and one remembers that, as the time for their voyaging approached, there was a general hue and cry to establish the whereabouts of the ‘elephant stage’, a massive gangway especially made for the embarkation and disembarkation of the circus elephants. It was said that the ‘leading hand’ elephant always tested the reliability of the contraption by a couple of resounding thumps of a forefoot before entrusting his weight to it, after which there was no hesitation on the part of his colleagues in following him over the brow.

- Douglas F Gardner, The Union Steam Ship Company Steam Ships, Wellington, 1982, p.33

(Extract of Wirth Brothers advertisement from Wanganui Chronicle, 22 February 1916)

Up on the ridgeline

 

Palmerston North to New Plymouth railcar service

In light of various party policies endorsing the return of regional rail travel to New Zealand to improve public transport, reduce road congestion and reduce our dependency on fossil fuels, I decided to look at various routes that could be reopened across the country. The largest, involving regional rapid rail services between the centres of Auckland, Hamilton, Tauranga and Rotorua, is a great plan that is already well documented. But what about restoring rail transport to other regions, using the existing rails that have been neglected by passenger services for decades? 

A prime connection that could be rebuilt is the cross-country link from the North Island Main Trunk line at Palmerston North to New Plymouth, via Whanganui. For decades until the Main Trunk opened fully in 1908 this was the second leg of all rail journeys between Wellington and Auckland - passengers would journey from the capital to New Plymouth and then board a steamer for the remainder of the trip to Onehunga on the Manukau Harbour, and then travel the final few miles by train from Onehunga. The Marton to New Plymouth line was started in the 1870s and completed in 1885, but all passenger services ended in 1983.

I'm not pretending to be knowledgeable about rolling stock, but was envisaging self-contained electric railcars like the Japanese BEC819 series to save the expense of electrifying all the existing rail lines. This is of course emerging technology, and if speedy progress is required, perhaps diesel units might be procured, with the proviso that they should be convertible to full electric running.

A reopened service would be designed to replace public coach services and as much private transport as possible, so would need a good spread of stations for maximum population coverage. I've set out distances between stations and a potential schedule for a 0900 service departing Palmerston North for New Plymouth, based on an average speed of 75km/h (the BEC819 has a max speed of 120km/h) and a one-minute dwell time at stations, suggesting an end-to-end journey of three and a half hours. The key would be to establish multiple services per day to build a viable replacement for the now-dominant but environmentally damaging private transport.

Station	Distance	Time
Palmerston North	-	09:00
Milson	2.3	09:03
Bunnythorpe	6.3	09:09
Feilding	8.4	09:17
Halcombe	12.9	09:28
Marton Junction	14.3	09:40
Turakina	17.1	09:55
Whanganui East	24.8	10:16
Waverley Mill	46.7	10:54
Patea Riverside	14.3	11:06
Hawera	28.3	11:30
Normanby	5.0	11:35
Eltham	13.8	11:47
Stratford	9.4	11:56
Midhirst	6.6	12:02
Inglewood	15.8	12:16
Bell Block	18.4	12:32
Fitzroy	4.0	12:36
New Plymouth	2.7	12:39
Total	251.1	3hrs 39mins

See also:

Blog: NZ intercity rail, 19 April 2020
Blog: Public transport comes to Onehunga, 10 February 2015

Blog: Wellington tramlink, 14 January 2015
Blog: Avondale to Onehunga tramlink, 31 October 2010
Blog: A Cook Strait tunnel, 16 April 2008

A second term & building Labour as the new 'natural party of government'

With its crushing victory in the general election yesterday, Labour has an enormous mandate for its second term, and one that's largely unfettered by the conventional demands of MMP coalition politics. It's too soon to plough ahead with 100 percent certainty, given National lost two of their election-night seats in 2017 once the specials came in two weeks later. The same might happen to Labour, who knows? 

Either way, commentators are busy raising the stakes for the Ardern's second term, claiming the sweeping mandate to govern places the Government under the pump for the next three years. There's certainly some truth in this - the public will no longer wear excuses that NZ First has stymied progressive politics since 2017. But this stonking victory, unprecedented under MMP, illustrates the challenges of viewing politics through the media lens. For a long time many media old-hands have treated National as the 'natural party of government', assuming that their next term is just around the corner and that any Labour-led government is just a temporary aberration. This election puts the lie to that worldview. With this Parliamentary term Labour has now spent more time leading governments under MMP than National has. And with its policy of cautious centrism to bring moderate swing voters along for the ride, Labour has so far been highly successful in supplanting National in its former role as the home of the median voter.

Part of the challenge in filtering political discussion through the media is that the media now has relatively few practitioners who understand where Labour voters are coming from. With National in increasing disarray, the long-standing back-channel connections to former senior National front-benchers and grandees are increasingly useless as viable news sources. Newsrooms are populated with younger, poorly-paid journos who do much of the leg-work, and whose youth makes it more likely that they'll be left-leaning, but those journos are more likely to be Green or Maori Party-aligned than to the Labour movement that now governs. 

Witness the election night coverage on TVNZ, where surrogate after surrogate for the National Party, the Greens and the Maori Party popped up to laud their own party's efforts (or, if you're Nikki Kaye, excuse them). But unless you weirdly count Lovely Old John Campbell as some sort of raging Labourista, there was no-one on screen to give the perspectives of the party that absolutely dominated the election night in a historic wipeout of the political Right. TVNZ has always been famously leery of left-wing political ideas; perhaps it had better start thinking about broadening their narrowly conservative political diet in favour of a wider range of ideas.

Only a fool would deny this election was hugely influenced by Covid-19. But as Andre Alessi (from memory) has pointed out on Twitter, the last National Government had enormous crises of its own in the Christchurch earthquakes and the Pike River disaster. While I'm not claiming either policy response was a terrible botch, in neither case did National cover itself in any kind of glory as Jacinda Ardern has in responding to Covid. Voters have responded to the highly competent, carefully explained, straightforward positivity of Ardern and her core Ministers, and punished harshly those opponents who carped and bickered. Put plainly, voters believed the sacrifices endured by everyone to combat the disease were worth it, and they're optimistic about the future, however hard the medical and economic recovery will be. Any argument to the contrary, even if it has merit, was ultimately counter-productive. Yet Simon Bridges and Judith Collins, in particular, both persisted in the negative campaigning that ultimately led to their downfalls. 

Hard times are no doubt ahead of New Zealand, and the Government has limited its ability to address the fiscal implications by locking down the potential transformative tax solutions of a capital gains tax or a form of wealth tax. This leaves relatively little wiggle-room for a hyper-progressive reshaping of the New Zealand economy that dyed-in-the-wool leftists want. But it's the political centre that Labour wants to own, to advance its own version of a progressive legacy. By staking out Ardern's Labour as a moderate, consensus-building Government that leftists, centrists and the soft-conservatives can all cast their vote for, Labour under 40-year-old Ardern has the opportunity to build a hitherto unthinkable 12 or 15-year Government, as opposed to the one or two-term administrations that might otherwise have resulted. A couple of terms followed by a massive rightward correction under National is not enough to reverse environmental degradation, decarbonise the energy and transport sectors, clean up polluted waterways, reinvigorate the health and education sectors, pay for long-delayed infrastructure, reduce massive inequalities in social outcomes for disadvantaged groups, particularly Maori, and tackle enormous social evils like the housing crisis. The Ardern Government, if it proceeds cannily and doesn't alienate all its new voters, has the opportunity to radically reshape New Zealand's politics, the economy, the environment, and society in general. It won't succeed in this if its gets distracted into niche political crusades that don't appeal to the average voter.

The rare success of the Green Party bodes well for a progressive voice in Parliament to Labour's left. Even with a single-party majority, Labour would be wise to offer the Greens a confidence and supply agreement and a few key portfolios outside Cabinet. Unfortunately, it may be in the Greens' best interests to decline and to remain outside Government. The policy gains that might accrue could easily be more than countered by the cost of tying the party too closely to a more-centre-than-left Labour Government. James Shaw and Marama Davidson may consider 2023 presents a better opportunity for a true Labour-Green coalition. The risk of this approach is that until then, Labour has every opportunity to nick Green policies and claim the credit for implementing them.

Act has a wonderful opportunity to claim the spotlight for the next three years with its much-enlarged caucus. But as the 2002 term showed, tiny parties that receive a temporary boost of wandering National voters often struggle to retain them three years later. And Act will struggle to maintain a consistent voice, given its mix of libertarians, flat-taxers and gun rights advocates. Still, under a canny leader like David Seymour, Act could stake out its claim to the right of the political spectrum, leaving National to hold a smaller conservative and rural rump, with the aim of forming a symbiotic Australian Liberal-National-style partnership.

In 2020 NZ First fought and died by the sword. Always at its best in opposition, Winston Peters' party made the fateful call to trumpet its handbrake role in the three-party Government. In a conventional election this political inertia might have worked, but in this Covid election it proved to be a gruesome miscalculation. Crucial voters slipped over to Act or simply melted into the afterlife. Perhaps the New Year honours list will see a swansong gong for Rt Hon Sir Winston Raymond Peters, and most likely Hon Tracy Martin will find herself sought after for a senior Government appointment after three years being praised as 'virtually a Labour Minister'.  

The Maori Party appear to have snatched Waiariki from Tamati Coffey, which is an impressive surprise victory. But their vote-splitting gambit has masked the fact that as a political movement the party is increasingly tiny, with its party vote shrinking from 30,000 in 2017 to a mere 24,000 in 2020. Despite blanket and generally uncritically favourable media coverage - including one fanciful RNZ piece that claimed a candidate 12 points behind the Labour incumbent was still in the running - the Maori Party has never amounted to a political movement that attracts substantial support. Their best ever result was in 2008 when they scored a mere 2.39 percent of the party vote - i.e. not even one in 40 voters. While mainstream media almost always ignores it because it doesn't interest them, Labour is actually the political home of most Maori voters. [p.s. Apols for Blogger's lack of macrons]

And finally, the National Party naturally had a shocker, which was no less damaging despite the polls having predicted it weeks out. A rolling series of avoidable political scandals, serial leadership changes, multi-billion-dollar shadow budget botches and unforced errors from the eventual election leader Judith Collins all contributed to their worst result since 2002. But the overarching problem, despite Collins' assertion that the party put up a comprehensive suite of policies, was that many in the party couldn't shake the belief that they actually 'won' the 2017 election. This mindset led many of the party's senior brains to think that the 2008 policy platform that was so successful for the chilled-out-entertainer vibe of the highly-popular John Key would work in the vastly different political environment of 2020. 

While this shellacking is a golden opportunity for the party to re-imagine its elevator pitch to New Zealand voters, the initial signs aren't strong. Highly experienced potential replacement leaders like Amy Adams and Nikki Kaye saw the writing on the wall and resigned early. Grizzled old hands like Gerry Brownlee and Nick Smith have lost their seats. Many of the party's safest seats are in the hands of the religious right (nicknamed the Taliban by their secular caucus colleagues), who are way out of step with mainstream New Zealand values. And the party has lost nearly all of its non-Pakeha MPs in the winnowing of its party list. New star Christopher Luxon has no experience in Parliament and would be wise to learn the ropes before staking his claim to the top job.            

These myriad factors point to the next three years being a fascinating mix of political challenges for a highly popular re-elected Government. There are plenty of potential mistakes to be made, and further grave crises to tackle. Perhaps some of the Opposition sniping about Labour's limited talent pool are accurate. But the proof of last night's election result shows that Jacinda Ardern has the skills and the policies to build an enduring political legacy. Ardern is deliberately staking a claim as the (left-of-centre) heir to Angela Merkel's crown of global stateswoman. That means the next three years may not be as left-wing as 'proper lefties' want, but the long-term impact could ultimately be as significant or more so than the Michael Joseph Savage and Peter Fraser's era-defining first Labour Government of 1935-49.

The dhobi technique

A dhobi - a more primitive but cheaper alternative to drycleaners - was set up by enterprising Egyptians on the edge of Maadi Camp, and soon attained landmark status with the New Zealanders, particularly after their uniforms arrived back beautifully pressed. It was probably just as well that initially the men did not know that the Egyptians achieved this by dampening the garments for pressing by squirting a mouthful of water over them.

- Alex Hedley, Fearnleaf Cairo, Auckland, 2009, p.31

Hodgman on hitchhiking

I have picked up hitchhikers twice in my life, both in Maine. The first time was a young couple who flagged us down as we were driving the loop road in Acadia National Park. They had gotten lost hiking and were looking for a ride back to the parking lot. 

When they got in the car they said, 'Are you John Hodgman?'

'Yes', I said.

'Oh, wow,' they said, 'we are huge fans of your podcast'.

I said, 'This must be very surprising for you'.

'It is!' they said.

'What makes it even stranger,' I said, 'is that usually it's the hitchhikers who end up murdering the driver. And not the other way around, like this time!'

It was just another example of the wit and wisdom of me at my finest. I didn't murder them. We met up later in Brooklyn, because of course that is where they live.

- John Hodgman, Vacationland: True Stories from Painful Beaches, New York, 2017, p.199-200.

The waning days of Republican privilege

America’s political institutions are currently biased – in many cases quite aggressively – in favor of conservatives. Restrictive voting laws make casting a ballot disproportionately difficult for lower-income, non-white and young Americans. Unprecedented gerrymandering gives Republicans a built-in advantage in the race for the House, and according to FiveThirtyEight’s Nate Silver, the Senate’s bias toward rural states makes the chamber about seven points redder than the nation as a whole. Thanks to the electoral college, two of the past five presidential elections have been won by Republicans who lost the popular vote – one reason why even before Justice Ginsburg’s death, 15 of the past 19 supreme court justices were appointed by GOP presidents.

The conservative movement, in other words, already had it pretty good. The average American disagrees with Republican orthodoxy on every major issue: healthcare, climate change, gun violence, immigration, taxes, Covid response. Yet thanks to the biases embedded in the American political process, Republicans have not just remained viable, but secured extraordinary amounts of power. We can’t know for certain who would benefit from upending the status quo that existed at the time of Justice Ginsburg’s passing – but we do know which party has the most to lose.

- David Litt, 'Republicans will replace RBG but Democrats hold the trump cards – no, really', Guardian, 23 September 2020

Olympus Mons

 Mt Taranaki at dusk from 17,000 feet, aboard NZ5823 from Hamilton to Wellington.

Silver linings in Westport?

Westport has been going through a difficult time lately, with the closure of the Holcim cement plant that for decades shipped its products to Onehunga Wharf in Auckland, the closure of the local Dunsford Ward rest home and hospital, and the downsizing of mining operations at nearby Stockton. But that didn't prepare me for the onslaught of for sale notices - locals are voting with their feet. Trouble is, with this many properties Westport must be a buyer's market. In two other similarly-sized towns of just under 4000 population, the number of houses for sale is a mere handful: Balclutha has nine, while Whangamata has 11. By comparison, Westport has 91 (see below from Homes).  

In a town this small that glut of properties could destabilise the regional economy. Tourism is unlikely to be the region's saviour in the short term. But the local council could take a proactive stance to encourage new blood to replace those wanting to leave. It would be a perfect destination for young families wishing to establish an online startup or mail order business, as long as the physical accessibility factor isn't an issue. It would be an ideal spot for a big city single-income family to get onto the property ladder. And if the Government is minded, new migrants fleeing the instability of the outside world could be encouraged to consider life on the Coast instead of the traditional big city.   

See also:

Blog: Finding Eva Morganti, 3 April 2020

Blog: South Is roadtrip, 19 November 2017
History: Gold has been all-in-all to us, 4 October 2011

Deciding the fate of the Wellington Library

Submissions are in on the public consultation and now Wellington City has to decide what to do with its library, its useful life curtailed by a radical engineering re-assessment of its earthquake safety rating. The stopgap mini-libraries that have popped up around town in Manners St, Brandon St and in the back of the National Library are a decent mitigation, but can't fulfil the full responsibilities of a large central library. 

The CBD is sorely lacking appropriately-sized public space for quiet study and intellectual pursuits. Christchurch's new central library offers a great example of how modern design can create innovative library spaces that draw people to the city and enhance the urban geography with creative and inspiring architecture. A new library for Wellington should focus strongly on being a library, rather than filling the gaps in many other services that people may wish to add to the mix. It should not deviate from its core mission to store and shelve as many books as is humanly possible, because a full library is a thing of beauty. But it can do this in creative ways, with flexible spaces. It should be designed to the highest environmental standards, and be better integrated into Civic Square than the current building.

While I know projected completion dates are highly speculative, there is little difference between Options C (high-level remediation) & Option D (new build on same site). Option D will produce a modern building that is fit for purpose at a cost tens of millions less than Option C. 

The current unusable library building was much-loved not for its architecture but because of the service and amenity it provided. People are fond of it, but it contains little of lasting architectural heritage. The palm motif is popular but is a curious choice to represent the fauna of the Wellington region. The undulating glass-front is a nice touch but is poorly integrated with the surrounding architecture. And the sweeping pathway around the building's north side looks nice but is seldom used and is therefore a waste of valuable space. A new building can start the design process anew and avoid the mistakes made in so many public buildings of the 80s and 90s - see also Te Papa, the lamentable design decisions for which were detailed compellingly in Gordon Campbell's 2011 investigation and interview with Ian Athfield, the library's designer. 

Parker Posey on working with Christopher Guest

Before we enter into a scene, on any of the movies, the main direction from Chris is, "This isn't too far from the truth. People are really like this". The irony is that he inspired an ironic or postmodernist position in comedies today, but he couldn't be further away from irony. The other irony is that for such funny movies there's disappointment for the actors when they see the final product, since so much of everyone's performance gets cut. After the premiere of Best in Show in Toronto, the actors weren't laughing as much as calculating or comparing what was shot to what was sacrificed to move the plot. The ratio of material produced to the bit that's kept feels out of proportion. There's no clause with the Writers Guild of America for improvising being seen as writing but maybe one day there will be. As in the case on Woody Allen's films, no one gets paid anything, so you do it for the sake of the art. Chris doesn't do the awards circuits, so great performances worthy of them are left to legacy. I'm thinking of Catherine [O'Hara] in For Your Consideration, who was so funny and painful, just genius. Life imitated art for her that year because like in the film, there was talk in the biz of her receiving an Oscar nomination. He gives us our very own medals, though, made especially for the production, with the title of the movie written on a round medallion that hangs by a red, white, or blue ribbon. I have four of those medals and a few Oscars of my own. They're the souvenir-sized ones from LAX, but still, it's something.

- Parker Posey, You're on an Airplane, New York, 2018, p.255-6. 

See also:
Movies: Now God said to Moses I don't want no sinnin', 19 March 2014
Movies: I'm a hypocrite, but not an idiot, 4 March 2011
Movies: Oh Superman, 8 November 2010

The first single, maybe

The first [45rpm 7-inch vinyl single] issued ... was 'Texarkana Baby' by Eddy Arnold. He might not be mentioned much now, but he was a big name in the Fifties when his TV show took over Perry Como's slot. His songs spent a total of 145 weeks at number one on the US Country charts and sold over 85 million records. Signed to RCA, he was managed by Colonel Tom Parker, but would later find himself pushed down the roster when the 'Colonel' hooked up with some punk from Tupelo. Like Elvis, Eddy came from an impoverished background. Born in Henderson, Tennessee, in 1918, his father was a sharecropper and eager for his son to earn a few dollars by working the land himself. Accordingly, despite having forged a musical reputation that took him to the Grand Ole Opry, his record was released under the billing of 'Eddy Arnold, the Tennessee PlowBoy and his guitar'. The record was released on 31 March 1949, making it the first single ever released, if we ignore the [RCA spoken-word] demonstration record, which I think we have to. You can cop a listen to it online of course. It's pretty good, and though his guitar is certainly in evidence there are dandy bits of fiddle and lap steel too. It sounds a lot like Hank Williams, only cheerful. 

- Mark Radcliffe, Crossroads: In search of moments that changed music, Edinburgh, 2019, p.132-3. 

See also:

Music: Rich pickings at the Boston Tea Party, 14 February 2019
Music: A Chickasaw County child, 5 February 2018
Music: Mr Iturbi will see you now, 29 December 2013

The old route to Karori

Karori Road has been used since the 1840s to describe part or all of the route from the city to Karori. The earliest settlers made their way up Orangi Kaupapa Road and Military Track, crossing over Northland, down to the Kaiwharawhara Stream and then past Seaforth Terrace and Rosehaugh Avenue to reach Karori Road. Signs mark part of the way. Soon, however, the regular route was up The Rigi, over the hill (later pierced by the Karori Tunnel), down to the Kaiwharawhara Stream, across the Devil's Bridge and up Old Karori Road, then through a deep cutting to Karori Road. A plaque erected by the Wellington City Council in 1989 near the former Karori Garden Centre in Old Karori Road commemorates this route. Karori Road remains the main way through the suburb down to South Karori Road which, with various bridges, gave access to many small dairy farms in the early days.

As part of the Wellington City Council's renaming of many Wellington streets in 1925, it was proposed that the road from the Botanic Garden to the foot of Makara Hill be renamed as follows: 

Botanic Garden to Tunnel - Glenmore Street

Tunnel to Cemetery - Karori Road

Cemetery to Makara Hill - Chaytor Street

The argument was that any road to Karori should be known as Karori Road. However, John Burns, a Wellington city councillor, (ex-Karori borough councillor) and Karori resident, was instrumental in switching the proposed Karori Road and Chaytor Street named sections before final approval. The numbering of Karori Road property today follows sequentially from the Old Karori Road numbering. Thus, Karori Road numbering commences at 77, following on from 75A Old Karori Road.

- Will Chapman & Kitty Wood (updated by Judith Burch), Karori Streets 1841-2019, Wellington, 2019, p.59-60.

See also:

History: Rich pickings at the Regal Cinema, 10 February 2020 
History: How to take a bus, 28 November 2018
History: Wright's Hill Fortress, 29 October 2013

Film festival 2020 roundup

So it's been a funny old year for the New Zealand International Film Festival, full of disruption and rebirth. I hope the new leadership gets to put on its preferred full lineup next year so it can be judged against the wonderful legacy Bill Gosden left over the past 40 years. But in the meantime we're very lucky in New Zealand to have been able to experience at least some of this year's festival titles in the cinema, and the online streaming option has worked well, for me at least.

Instead of the usual 20 films I've only managed nine this year: six in person at the Roxy in Miramar and three online. Here they are in rough order of personal preference:

The Kingmaker (dir. Lauren Greenfield, US/Denmark, 2019, trailer)

An object lesson in a documentarian's restraint, as Imelda Marcos displays all of the messianic pretensions that were the hallmark of the dictatorial regime she was at the head of with her equally ruthless husband Ferdinand Marcos, and seeks to perpetuate through her children, who still hold sway despite their legacy of vast corruption and thousands of extrajudicial killings during the eight years of martial law decree. Lauren Greenfield's documentary might well be the defining record of the end of three decades of Philippine democracy and the return to ruthless, kleptocratic autocracy. One can take at least a little hope from the director Lauren Greenfield's observation that there has been considerable interest in the film since it opened in the Philippines last week.

The Truth (La Vérité) (dir. Hirokazu Kore-eda, France/Japan, 2019, trailer)

Kore-eda's first venture outside Japan is a delicate mother-daughter fencing-match, with the great central pairing of Catherine Deneuve and Juliette Binoche reliving old grudges and debating the legacy of a fractured childhood dominated by an alpha mum for whom acting was everything, and examining the way family memories are subjective and fluid as they calcify with age. There's a top supporting cast, with Ethan Hawke immensely likeable as Hank, the American husband, and Clementine Grenier as the charming young daughter. The film also makes good use of a film-within-a-film as a narrative device to further explore the positive and negative nature of maternal bonds.


Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson & The Band (dir. Daniel Roher, Canada, 2019, trailer)

I'm a sucker for a great music doco and Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson & The Band was a top example, helped by the fact that I love their music. It takes talent, luck, endless practice and a whole lot of living to polish a group as marvelous as these five - four Canadians and an Arkansas drummer, from teenagers supporting Ronnie Hawkins, to the hot R&B group accompanying Dylan-gone-electric and reverberating around the world to a chorus of boos from uptight folk audiences, to an incredible yet defiantly unpretentious group in their own right that had eight magical years at the top of the rock scene, inventing a whole new style of music along the way. The doco is generous and inclusive but is clearly a Robertson-led story - his eloquent, elegant wife Dominique appears to add interview context - to act as a counterbalance the embittered and not-long-for-the-world Levon Helm's 2010 doco Ain't In It For My Health, made at a time when Helm was lashing out at his former bandmate. Once Were Brothers is a fine, positive antidote to that. And where better to end than with The Band's last ever performance in 1976, The Last Waltz, captured so brilliantly by Martin Scorsese.

Driveways (dir. Andrew Ahn, US, 2019, trailer)

A big-hearted drama with gentle touches of comedy and an engaging depiction of a burgeoning friendship between a solo mum and her 8-going-on-9 year-old son venturing to upstate New York to clear out a deceased relative's house and a lonely octogenarian widower who lives next door (Brian Dennehy, in one of his final roles before his death in April at the age of 81 ). File alongside Tom McCarthy's The Station Agent as a film that enjoys dwelling on the simple pleasures of companionship, with the added charm of the surrogate grandfather relationship of Pixar's Up.

Kubrick by Kubrick (dir. Gregory Monro, France, 2020)

A valuable contribution to the canon of Kubrick film obsession, with Michel Ciment's audio interviews conducted over several years helping the film play the same role as Scorsese's Bob Dylan documentary No Direction Home: a safe space for a notorious recluse who has little time for the fripperies of media interviews to put their real philosophy on record with a trusted interlocutor. The usual actors contribute via contemporary interviews, but ultimately it's the strange sensation of hearing the director's own voice that is deceptively powerful. The Leon Vitali documentary Filmworker was a great second-hand view of the director; Kubrick by Kubrick is one step closer.

Dinner in America (dir. Adam Rehmeier, US, 2020, not a trailer)

A rousing tale of suburban misfits bolstered by an absolute star turn by the delightful Emily Skeggs, of Broadway and The Miseducation of Cameron Post fame, as the downtrodden Patty, ably assisted by Kyle Gallner as sociopathic Simon, who shakes up Patty's dead end existence with a dose of anarchic punk energy.

The County (Héraðið) (dir. Grímur Hákonarson, Iceland, 2019) 

A strong central performance from Arndís Hrönn Egilsdóttir anchors this north Iceland rural drama replete with traditional Scandinavian stubbornness. New Zealand dairy farmers making their livelihoods with Fonterra will be well aware of the role of a powerful co-operative, but in Skagafjördur the co-op not only buys everything, it also controls most of the retail, and as newly-widowed Inga (Egilsdóttir) discovers, when you ask awkward questions and rock the boat, the co-op will fight back. It's telling that director Grímur Hákonarson was originally planning to make a documentary in the farming fjord but quickly learned no-one would go on the record to discuss the real co-op, so the film became a fictionalised tale filmed in a different fjord entirely. While there are perhaps too few surprises in The County, it's still a treat to witness a well-told narrative set in an island that always seems as if it's actively trying to kill its inhabitants.

The Last Wave (dir. Peter Weir, Australia, 1977)

A visually stylish metaphysical thriller with an added dash of cultural appropriation that remains effective if over-long. Richard Chamberlain and David Gulpilil work well within the constraints of the material, and the increasingly apocalyptic visions of a haywire climate are convincing and well-staged. Lots of mucking about in Sydney's sewers, so you have to sympathise with the actors and the crew.

True History of the Kelly Gang (dir. Justin Kurzel, Australia, 2019)

Impressive cinematography boosts this young filmmaker's revisionist 19th-century outing, which features memorably energetic set-pieces and commendable central performances. And before people get up in arms, even if the Kelly Gang didn't do it, men dressing up in women's garb for criminal hi-jinks was actually a thing in the 19th centuries - look up the Rebecca Riots. But the over-reliance on repeated revolver-to-the-head standoffs, strobe lighting and drone shots become slightly wearying, as does an overlong prologue in which we learn the superhero childhood backstory of our 'hero' Ned but take an hour to do so, which is an unusual narrative choice. As for the NZ contingent, Thomasin McKenzie doesn't get much to do but is reliably watchable, while Marlon Williams should possibly stick to his excellent singing voice as opposed to his at times ropey American accent.

See also:
Blog: Film festival roundup 2019, 2018, 2017, 2016 part 1 / part 2, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, 2009

On the naming of Inglewood

A party of gentlemen — members of the Provincial Council — were invited by the Executive to partake of lunch at the new township, in the Moa block, in order to see the district, and bestow a suitable name on the town. The party consisted of Messrs. Standish, Kelly, Upjohn, Andrews, Callaghan, Syme, Peacock, Elliot, McGuire, and Hately. In consequence of the arrival of the Avalanche, his Honor the Superintendent could not join the party as was intended. After luncheon had been partaken of, Mr. Kelly, in the absence of the Superintendent, addressed the company, and stated the object of the meeting. 

He said that he regretted the necessity there existed to change the name of the township from Milton to Inglewood, but, in doing so, he did not consider the name either ignoble or inappropriate. A writer in the News questioned the meaning which he had given to the word, and, though it could not be disputed that the writer was right in stating that "ingle" was derived from the Gaelic, and meant fire, yet that did not in any way prove that the old Saxon name Inglewood meant firewood; on the contrary "Ing" in Saxon means a pasture, a meadow, or a level plain; and as applied in the word Inglewood was more likely to mean an open plain, or meadow in a wood, and, therefore, appropriate to the name of the township. There was no doubt that the site was a plain in a wood, though not at present a meadow or pasture. In few places could 150 acres be obtained so level as the site of the township, and it was an indication of the level character of the country. He would call on Mr. Standish, as Secretary for Waste Lands, to perform the ceremony of christening the township.

A lordly pine stood in the vicinity of the party, and Mr. Standish dashed on its rugged trunk a bottle of sparkling champagne, and declared the name of the township to be Inglewood. Three cheers was given for the new township, and Mr. Upjohn, as the oldest member of the Council present, responded, and addressed the meeting in a speech of some length, in which he described the vicissitudes of the Province, but now believed in its prosperity. Mr. Andrews proposed [a toast to] "the Executive," and spoke with approval of their action. Mr. Kelly responded, and stated that the Government felt grateful for the support and assistance which they had received from the Council. Mr. Standish proposed "The Council," and spoke in terms of praise at the energy they shown in getting through the business. Mr. Syme responded. "The Patea Members" was also given, which was responded to by Mr. Peacock, who said the members returned satisfied that the Province intended to deal fairly with Patea, and the ill feeling and jealousy which existed at the first was now being rapidly removed. Mr. Kelly proposed "The success of the District," and called on the oldest inhabitant, Mr. Stevens, to respond. Mr. Stevens responded, and thanked them for the compliment paid him in coupling his name with the toast, and expressed his belief that though the inhabitants were now few that in a few years Inglewood would be a thriving district. 

At this period the party broke up, having spent a very pleasant day together. The Patea members went on, on foot, to Patea, while the New Plymouth party returned to town, where they arrived about eight o'clock.

- Taranaki Herald, 27 January 1875

See also:

History: Writing to the New Plymouth colony, 28 November 2015

Blog: 'Psychics' 'helped' search, 3 April 2014

History: Old New Plymouth, 9 February 2014 

 

Does Cambridge burn brightly into the day?

They say the sky is the same everywhere. Travellers, the shipwrecked, exiles, and the dying draw comfort from the thought, and no doubt if you are of a mystical tendency, consolation, and even explanation, shower down from the unbroken surface. But above Cambridge – anyhow above the roof of King’s College Chapel – there is a difference. Out at sea a great city will cast a brightness into the sky. Is it fanciful to suppose the sky, washed into the crevices of King’s College Chapel, lighter, thinner, more sparkling than the sky elsewhere? Does Cambridge burn not only into the night, but into the day?

- Virginia Woolf, Jacob’s Room, 1922

Warmest greetings to the Bishop of Los Angeles

'Fred Astaire is a pixie ... with a Lefty Flynn-type penchant for schoolboy jokes - so when one day a voice on the telephone said, "Good morning, I am the Bishop of Los Angeles," I replied knowingly, "And I am the Mother Superior - how's your cock?"

A quick intake of breath followed by a longish pause alerted me to the fact that it was not Fred. When the Bishop had recovered from this unaccustomed greeting, he told me what was on his mind.

"We have a Convention of several thousand Anglican clergy coming to Los Angeles from all over the world, we are holding a service in the Hollywood Bowl and we would be very happy if you would read the Second Lesson"'

- David Niven, The Moon's A Balloon, 1971, p.291. 

Use all your well-learned politesse or I'll lay your soul to waste

A few days ago I rewatched the Rolling Stones Rock 'n Roll Circus - the TV special recorded in a circus big-top on 11-12 December 1968 featuring the Stones in their last performance with Brian Jones and joined by plenty of their rockstar pals: John Lennon, Eric Clapton, The Who, Marianne Faithfull, Taj Mahal, and Jethro Tull. 

It wasn't released though for nearly 30 years, in part because Jones died around the time the film was going through final edits, but it's also often rumoured that Mick was (justifiably) dissatisfied with the Stones' performance in comparison with the limelight-stealing king hit of The Who's offering, the swaggering, bravura mini-rock-opera A Quick One, While He's Away, which was the prototype for the following year's record-smashing Tommy. 

And it's not often you get to see Lennon perform with Clapton, Richards and Mitch Mitchell from the Jimi Hendrix Experience on drums, in the impromptu supergroup The Dirty Mac. But the less said about Yoko the better; suffice to say, Yer Blues is fine because she just sits in a black bag on the stage, but on Whole Lotta Yoko she shrieks into the mic for four minutes while the band plays and it's obviously god-awful.

To be fair, due to lengthy sequence setup times the Stones didn't get to perform their set until 4am (!) and therefore it's not surprising that Charlie, Bill and Brian look absolutely catatonic. Brian in particular was according to Pete Townshend a complete mess earlier in the day due to his drug addiction. But Mick gives a legitimately amazing lead performance in the Stones set, particularly on the climactic Sympathy for the Devil. And overall despite the somnolent Stones, this is still by far a superior performance to that given by the band in its other contemporary concert film, The Stones in the Park from July 1969, in which the band, recently bereaved of their former bandmate Jones and sporting brand-new new guitarist Mick Taylor, is remarkably loose and ill-rehearsed.  

Anyway, for those without the DVD, you can construct a fairly decent summary of proceedings via Youtube. So here's the best two-thirds of the film, if you can tolerate the ads:

Film Festival 2020 lineup

Emily Skeggs & Kyle Gallner in Dinner in America

Well it's definitely going to be an odd Film Festival this year, and we should be grateful we have any titles in cinema at all, unlike much of the rest of the cinema-going world. Instead of my traditional 20 films, mostly seen in the wonderful 450-seat Embassy Grand, I've booked a mere five films from the small selection on offer at the Roxy Cinema in Miramar.

This is the first year following the retirement of the great Bill Gosden as NZIFF director, and no doubt new director Marten Rabarts wants to stamp his own mark on the festival, and in the circumstances of a global pandemic that has interrupted the supply of quality and popular films alike, that was always going to be challenge. It's great to see that the initial announcement of an online-only NZIFF20 has been superseded by a hybrid format with some cinema screenings, but it's anyone's guess how successful the online aspect of the programme will be. 

For one thing, the quality and range of films available to the programmers must have been severely limited by the disruption to studio and indie production chains. In addition, it's unclear how the festival-loving public will respond to being asked to pay full ticket price for an online viewing experience. The whole point of a cinema experience is savouring the impact of a splendid screen and the best sound equipment theatres have to offer. Watching at home, no matter how high-quality the screens involved, is an implicitly inferior cinematic experience.

There's also the challenge that may arise from the early inklings of Rabarts' programming preferences. While it may be a factor of the limited palette of titles available this year, it's apparent that he wishes to promote niche cinema to a greater extent than Gosden. The festival circuit is by its very nature a broad church, but over the years Gosden developed a finely-pitched balance of populist, obscure and strange programming that helped NZIFF to thrive and grow for decades. He knew the New Zealand cinema-going market back to front. While 2020 may well be an outlier, Rabarts, who until recently hadn't lived in New Zealand for decades, will need to programme to the tastes of this admittedly culturally isolated market, rather than those of other countries. Perhaps I'm wrong though, and there's a great pent-up demand for niche genre films out there.

Here's the films I'm catching in NZIFF20, plus five more titles I'm likely to try to catch online:

In the cinema

The Truth (La Vérité) (dir. Hirokazu Kore-eda, France/Japan, 2019)

One of my favourite directors continues his masterful examination of the complex dynamics of the family environment, stretching himself with his first non-Japanese-based production. Set in France, The Truth features a splendid cast (Deneuve, Binoche, Hawke) and will undoubtedly be a festival highlight.

True History of the Kelly Gang (dir. Justin Kurzel, Australia, 2019)

From the Peter Carey novel of the same name, this revisionist history of the famed Australian bushranger features not one but two New Zealand connections, with Thomasin McKenzie and singer Marlon Williams both featuring.

The Last Wave (dir. Peter Weir, Australia, 1977)

A second Australian outing, this time from Weir's 1970s creative peak (although I'll always admire the hell out of 2003's Master & Commander: The Far Side of the World), this nightmarish vision of gothic Outback mysticism sounds intriguing and just a little bit bonkers. 

Once Were Brothers: Robbie Robertson & The Band (dir. Daniel Roher, Canada, 2019)

While I haven't seen the Levon Helm-centred Ain't In it For My Health, this documentary will be a wonderful counterpart to the astonishing musical experience of Scorsese's The Last Waltz (1978), giving the marvelously talented Robbie Robertson his perspective on this fractious, beautiful legacy of the groundbreaking and hugely influential (mostly) Canadian legends, The Band. 

The County (Héraðið) (dir. Grímur Hákonarson, Iceland, 2019) 

You can never have too much Icelandic cinema, and this woman-against-the-world tale from the icy countryside sounds like the perfect counterpart to the director's brotherly feuding saga, Rams (2015).     

Online

The Kingmaker (dir. Lauren Greenfield, US/Denmark, 2019)

Illustrating the irredeemable arrogance and unquestioning egocentrism of the now-80-something Imelda Marcos as she discusses her joint reign as the Philippines' First Lady for 21 years, unrepentant and still determined to control 'her' nation through advancing the political career of her son Bongbong.

The Unknown Saint (dir. Alaa Eddine Aljem, France/Morocco, 2019)

In what sounds like a perfect set-up, a Moroccan petty criminal returns after a jail sentence to dig up a stash of wealth, only to discover a massive shrine erected atop his hastily-dug treasure trove.

A Year Full of Drama (Aasta täis draamat) (dir. Marta Pulk, Estonia, 2019)

A documentary crew follows a young Estonian competition-winner as she takes up the challenge of a year of theatre-reviewing, having never before seen a play.

Kubrick by Kubrick (dir. Gregory Monro, France, 2020)

Taking advantage of unprecedented access to tapes of the director in conversation with French writer Michel Ciment to fill in the many gaps in our understanding of the much-analysed genius director. A fine addition to my Kubrick completism, having loved Filmworker and amazing Kubrick exhibitions in New York and London. 

Dinner in America (dir. Adam Rehmeier, US, 2020)

A crowd-pleasing 1990s-set suburban outsider girl-meets-boy epic with supporting cast work from Lea Thompson and Mary Lynn Rajskub sounds right up my alley.