By Chris Pidgeon Reading time: 13 minutes Light pollution has removed a crucial element of our ancestry. For thousands of millennia, we watched the stars at night. Over time, we learnt to use these celestial beings as tools to help us navigate, tell time, or explore our...
By Philippa Hadlow Reading time: 13 minutes Creating a multi-faceted business to fund a mission to protect, restore, and enhance our natural environment is mission accomplished for North Taranaki Hapū, Otaraua, from the Waitara area. Nga Ringawera Otaraua (NRO) was established in 2013 as the Hapū’s commercial...
By Hayley White Reading time: 11 minutes When I was a young girl, my aunty lived in Shanghai, southern China. When she came home to New Zealand to visit, she brought me back a beautiful red dress called a cheongsam. It was and continues to be, the...
By Amokura Panoho Reading time: 9 minutes The ritual of a tangi (funeral) is steeped in tikanga (Māori tradition). With the advent of COVID restrictions on public gatherings, adhering to the requirements now in place for tangi have many Māori questioning how this will impact our tikanga....
By Jennifer Little Reading time: 16 minutes Tinsel-mania, the lure of the latest toys and gadgets, late December nights jostling with stressed fellow shoppers in crowded malls? Click and collect? Or make your own cakes, candles, or cushions? Whatever your usual approach or budget, this festive season will...
By Hayley White Reading time: 7 minutes No matter what country you live in, you’ll probably have heard of a ‘White Christmas’. But the idea of snow falling outside our windows and snuggling up to the fire with a warm cup of hot chocolate is lost on...
By Katie Stone Reading time: 13 minutes From ice-skating to card-playing, tamales to ugali, gingerbread houses to a share-bucket of KFC, Christmas celebrations around the world are quite a mixed bag. But no matter how it’s done or where the common thread linking every festive celebration is...
By Hayley White I was 11 years old when the illusion of Santa Claus was ruined for me forever. Like most kids my age, I was caught up in the excitement and magic of Christmas. My brother, my cousins, and I were put to bed,...
By Alina Suchanski Reading time: 12 minutes Christmas is the biggest annual celebration in Poland, as it is in most Christian countries. While in many western countries the reasons for celebrating Christmas have become diluted by the sea of commercialism, in Poland, they are still deeply rooted...
By Philippa Hadlow Reading time: 13 minutes Scrummaging in our lumber-room come Christmas time, I'm guaranteed to find a box of unused greeting cards. They’ve piled up as leftovers from years gone by, and I feel quite chuffed as I haul them out, ready for a spate...