Attack on the Nino Bixio

Today in history, 17 Aug.1942, 118 NZ prisoners of war died, when the Italian cargo ship MV Nino Bixio was torpedoed by a British submarine in the Mediterranean.

Their deaths, combined with 44 New Zealanders lost earlier aboard Jantzen in Dec.1941, amounted to nearly a third of NZ's POW fatalities during WWII...
Nino Bixio had left Benghazi in Libya for Brindisi, Italy, escorted by two destroyers and two torpedo boats. Crammed aboard were almost 3000 POWs captured in North Africa, including more than 160 Kiwis.
Two days out of Libya, the convoy was attacked by British submarine HMS Turbulent (N98). [This was one of the most successful Royal Navy submarines during its short career 1942-43. It sank a cruiser, a destroyer, a U-boat, 28 supply ships - some 100,000 tons in all - and destroyed three trains by gunfire. It was depth-charged on over 250 occasions by hunting forces.]

Nino Bixio was hit by two torpedoes from Turbulent: one exploded in the tightly-packed forward hold, killing 237 men and wounding another 60. In the ensuing panic and confusion, many men jumped overboard. Some drowned immediately; others reached makeshift rafts and drifted around the Mediterranean for weeks without food or water.
But, despite extensive damage, Nino Bixio did not sink. Survivors were pulled aboard, and the ship was towed by an escorting destroyer to Navarino in southern Greece, where 34 of the dead were buried (203 others are remembered on the memorial at El Alamein).
Nino Bixio was towed to the port of Pylos in Italian-occupied Greece, where it was beached. Later it was towed to Venice and sunk as a 'block ship' to protect the port.
In 1952 Nino Bixio was raised, re-fitted and returned to civilian service. In its peacetime career, it visited a number of NZ ports including Wellington where, on 25 Jan.1955, a wreath-laying ceremony was held aboard the foredeck. It continued in merchant service until 1970, and was scrapped at La Spezia in 1971.
Ironically its attacker did not fare so well. HMS Turbulent was lost with all hands off the coast of Sardinia in March 1943, after probably striking a mine...

Has Cook's Endeavour Been Found?

That plucky little collier Endeavour, sailed by Captain James Cook during his great voyage of exploration of 1768- 1771, may have been located.
Researchers in the US believe they may be a step closer to locating the ship. The Rhode Island Marine Archaeology Project (RIMAP) has known for some time the ship was scuttled in Newport Harbour, off the US coast, in 1778. But they now believe they have narrowed down the search to a cluster of five shipwrecks on the seafloor.

The researchers plan to investigate the ships and their artefacts further. They are also appealing for funds to build the right facilities for handling and storing items retrieved from the sea.
RIMAP: "All of the 13 ships lost in Newport during the (American) Revolution are important to US history, but it will be a national celebration in both NZ and Australia when RIMAP identifies Endeavour."
Capt Cook set sail on Endeavour - a British-built coal ship originally called Earl of Pembroke - in 1768 on a scientific voyage to map the Pacific Ocean. In 1769, he spent six months charting the NZ coastline,

and making the first European contacts with natives. (His visit is commemorated on the NZ 50c coin.) He reached Australia in 1770, claiming that for England too.
After returning to Britain, Endeavour was renamed Lord Sandwich and made a troop carrier. During the American War of Independence, it was scuttled by the British Navy in a blockade.
The wreckage has never been found, but RIMAP has been checking out 13 sunken ships, with the help of remote sensing equipment and historical documents. It says an analysis of data suggests there is "an 80-100% chance" that the Lord Sandwich wreckage is still in Newport Harbour, "and because the Lord Sandwich was Capt Cook's Endeavour, that means RIMAP has found her too."
The announcement coincides with the 240th anniversary of Rhode Island declaring independence from the UK. RIMAP says identifying "one of the most important shipwrecks in world history would be "an intriguing birthday gift for all of Rhode Island"...and an important historical link to NZ and Oz too.

"HMS Endeavour": John Charles Allcot (1888-1973)

Anzac Day Sacrosanct

While most kiwis and ozzies get it, one second-hand car dealer didn't.
Anzac Day is sacrosanct. It's a day to remember the fallen from all wars, the sacrifices made...it's not to be used for commercial exploitation.
2 Cheap Cars had to pull its TV ad for Anzac Day specials after the Returned Services Association (RSA) complained. The ad told people to "come down because their great-granddad would be proud".
The car company - which claims on its website to be "NZ's most popular car dealership" with "70,000+ Facebook likes" - crossed the 'respect' line with the RSA.
The RSA pointed out that the Ministry of Culture and Heritage guidelines prohibit the use of the word 'Anzac' in trade or business, unless approval has been given by the Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage and the Governor-General: "...the intention is to protect the term 'Anzac' from commercialisation and to ensure use is not offensive to public sentiment."
The company's marketing manager Jared Donkin said the ad was not meant to be offensive, and it's now been pulled. Great!
But now the question must be asked: WHY THE HELL IS IT RUNNING SUCH APPALLING ADS??!! They feature a young teenage girl talking so rapidly in such a high-pitched breathless almost-scream, that she's literally illegible! She sure puts me off EVER shopping there!
WHY MUST WE BE BOMBARDED WITH SUCH BANALITY??!!
Perhaps 2 Cheap Cars is too cheap to afford something better?
Wait, is she the boss's daughter or something?
Here's an example of its ads below...(spoiler alert: this is NAFF!!!)

WHAT did she say...?

Heritage Facade Demolished

The remains of Christchurch's old Excelsior Hotel were demolished last weekend.
The 1880s central city hotel was wrecked in Canterbury's earthquakes, and most of the building was demolished soon after, except the western facade.
The Christchurch Heritage Trust bought the building in 2011, with plans to dismantle the facade and reuse it in a new building. At the time, the trust described demolition as "unthinkable".
Since then, the facade has stood on Manchester St., forlornly propped up by a wall of shipping containers.
At the time of the earthquakes, the original Excelsior had a category one heritage listing and housed a restaurant, bar, and backpackers. But Christchurch Heritage Trust chairman Anna Crighton says there was not enough heritage left after the Feb.2011 EQ for the Excelsior Hotel to still be considered a "heritage building".
She says the demolition went through all the proper processes, with approval from both Heritage NZ and the Christchurch City Council.
Property development company Canterbury Property Investments (CPI) plan to rebuild the hotel with a replica facade. Crighton: "A lot of people remember that hotel with great affection, and it's better that a replica hotel is built rather than having a glass box there."
Initial estimates suggest the Excelsior project would cost $10 million.

Downstairs would be boutique retail and hospitality tenants. The upper levels would be used for accommodation.
Construction could start at the beginning of 2017, but a date has not yet been set for completion. 

No Go At Woods Mill

Lovely frontage, but...

A deal to restore the historic Woods Flour Mill building in Christchurch may have fallen over.
John Cameron, owner of the majority of the Wood Brothers Mill complex on Wise St, had been in talks for about two years, with a potential buyer who wanted to buy and restore the brick buildings. They’d hoped to sign a deal just before Christmas, but could not agree on a price.
The prospectives spent quite a bit of money doing due diligence, and sorting out engineering investigations on what is required to bring it up to 67% code.
So the property may be back on the market later this month.
The Riccarton Players own the Mill Theatre in the historic complex. The community theatre group hopes to restore/strengthen its part of the building and move back in. It would have to strengthen the building in partnership with any developer who took on the rest of the mill complex.
Chair of the theatre redevelopment group, Graeme Randle, says the theatre restoration would cost more than a million dollars.

...lots of work needed round the back.

Previous plans to restore the rest of the Woods Mill buildings have struggled to get off the ground: a $15 million plan to transform the buildings into a precinct of bars, restaurants and offices did not get beyond the planning stage.
Meanwhile, vandals and taggers are making a bloody mess...

UPDATE: 31 March 2016 - Back on the market again after another potential sale fell through...

Chch Heritage Building To Be Restored

Isaac House, which has stood on the Colombo/Armagh corner in Christchurch since 1926, and withstood the big earthquakes, will be saved from the wreckers.

The site opposite Forsyth Barr Tower was originally earmarked for the city's new Convention Centre, but the Crown lifted the designation on the property this year.
Owner, the Isaac Conservation and Wildlife Trust, had planned to repair the four-storey brick building, but instead put the property on the market.
The new owners are Auckland-based Patrick Fontein and Paul Naylor, who previously restored the old Twisted Hop building on Lichfield St (which reopened as Dux Central).
Isaac House survived the EQs pretty well because of some previous strengthening, but it still needs a lot of work.
Paddy and Paul still have to decide between turning it into high-end apartments, a boutique hotel, or offices upstairs with hospitality outlets below, but promise it'll be returned to its "former glory". Work should start work in Feb.2016.
Isaac House has a Heritage NZ Cat.II listing (No.7383), and is one of Christchurch's best examples of the Georgian Revival style.

(In the background of the pic is the now-demolished Victoria Apartments tower.)

Timeball To Rise Again

As it was...

The Lyttelton Timeball will be restored in an epic $3.4 million effort.
The Timeball Station (c.1876) was "mechanical Victoriana in action", the high tech of its day. Overlooking Lyttelton Harbour, it told mariners the exact moment it was 1pm each day, and was one of only five working timeballs in the world.
It was also home to the Timeball Keepers who, like lighthouse keepers, lived in their station.
When radio technology made the timeball obsolete in the 1930s, the building carried on as a residence, eventually owned by Heritage New Zealand. It got the timeball working again, turfed out the tenants, installed a museum...and then the earthquakes struck. After the Feb.2011 quake, there was no way the Cat.1 heritage building could be repaired.

Devastated...

So here's what's happening now? The octagonal 15metre tower and the timeball on top will be reconstructed - forget the residence. This'll start in July 2016 and will take 12 months. The new tower must comply with the Building Code, so there will be plenty of concrete, steel and block, hidden behind the salvaged heritage stones. The timeball and associated mechanisms will be restored, which will almost certainly involve casting new iron parts, rather than buying new gearing.
The timeball will work, but probably won't fall every day: that'll be reserved for special occasions or perhaps some schedule yet to be decided.
Ferrymead Heritage Park is currently the storage site for the salvaged materials: tower stone, the timeball, its mechanism, plenty of timber, whatever survived of the museum...it's estimated that about 2000 salvaged stones will be used to skin the new tower.
Total cost: approx.$3.4 million, of which HeritageNZ already has $2.6m. Stand by for some public fundraising next year...

New Excelsior But Facade Goes

the old facade

Christchurch's old Excelsior Hotel is going to be rebuilt.
Unfortunately it'll be a modern building with a replica facade - not the old facade that's been propped up by shipping containers in the CBD for the past three years.
The 1880s hotel was wrecked in the earthquakes and only the western facade currently remains.
Property development company Canterbury Property Investments (CPI) is buying the site - it's going to smash down the original facade and rebuild the hotel.
Christchurch Heritage Trust, which bought the building to save it in 2011, says it's happy with both the buyers and the rebuild plan (originally it had hoped to dismantle the facade and reuse it in a new building, describing

Artist's impression of the new Excelsior Hotel

demolition as "unthinkable" when it purchased the property).
Trust vice chairman Stephen Collins says things had changed, and lightweight replicas were now a viable rebuild option: "Purists may say it's not heritage but the reality is, what we'll finish up with will look identical."
CPI has already built a St Asaph St restaurant in the style of the demolished Occidental Hotel, and a barbecue restaurant in the style of a historic San Francisco fire station. As well, it's planning two new hotels on the old Press site in Cathedral Square, one behind a replica of the old Press building.
This project will cost about $10 million.

Free Pub - A Dream?

An historic pub deep in the boonies of East Otago could be yours... for nix!
Stanley's Hotel, in the town of Macraes Flat, is available for free lease to the right person, after failing to attract a lessee over the past

year.
People have until this coming Monday (19 Oct.) to register an expression of interest in leasing the property.
The property is owned by the Macraes Community Trust, and has been attracting interest from all over NZ and as far afield as Oz.
Stanley's Hotel was built in 1882. Tom Stanley, Kentish-born son of a sea captain, took over a ramshackle hotel at Macraes Flat, and decided to rebuild. He quarried stone from the hill behind the Catholic church, and engaged a Hyde stone-mason called Budge, to "build me an inn that will last." Budge, noted for his craftsmanship... and his huge capacity for beer, erected an inn fit for a king. It took him five years - on some days he did not face a stone, succumbing to an invitation to "come and have one" before he put foot on the ladder. His payment was wholly in beer and, when the building was finished, it was estimated he'd consumed 72 hogsheads' worth (a hogshead being 54 gallons/250L)!!!
The single-storey schist hotel remained in the Stanley family until 1960. Nearby Oceana gold mine bought it in 1997, and gave it to the community. It's been an institution for many years and locals are very keen for that to continue, beyond the looming closure of the goldmine in 5-10yrs.
The hotel is one of the few illustrations of the type of C19th hotel that used to be common in goldfields Otago. It is the only surviving hotel from that period in Macraes, and is the most substantial building in Macraes Flat. It now has a Heritage NZ Cat.1 listing.
Mind you, although it's a mainstay of the local community and travellers, some backpackers found the previous host less than endearing, so whoever takes over the lease should consider the quality of service for what could be a valuable tourist opportunity.

Unt Zen Zere Were Five!

The 'Red Peak' flag will be added as a fifth possible choice in the NZ flag referendum.
Prime Munster John Key says "I'm not wanting to stand in the way of people having some choice."
Bless him - how considerate!
This remarkable mid-week turn-around came after growing support for the design seemed to be ignored, following a petty wee stand-off between the govt and Labour opposition on how it could be added to the designs already selected.
Johnno Key repeatedly said he'd only add Red Peak as a 5th option if Labour supported the process rather than criticising it. Then the Green Party came up with a work-around...which featured them not siding with Labour - at least according to the PM.
However, Greens co-leader James Shaw said the whole process had been deeply flawed from the start, and it was "absurd" that they had to come up with a solution.
Labour leader Andrew Little has accused Key of trying to put the blame on Labour for blocking Red Peak.

Currently, the 1st referendum (in November) will ask kiwis to rank the now-five alternatives. The winner will then run-off against the current flag next year.
New Zealand First has opposed Red Peak being added, in line with its strong opposition to any flag change - in fact it says the design resembles markings on WWII Nazi sentry boxes!
The fact remains that if voters don't want our current flag to change, then in November they should vote for the weakest of the options, to then fight off against the existing flag.
Just don't mention ze vor!

UPDATE: 25 Sept.2015 - Gareth Morgan calls the entire issue a "$26-million dollar folly" that's completely lost the public's buy-in.

Saint Peter And Saint Fran?

Thanks sooo much, you two!

They've done it again!
Sir Peter Jackson and Fran Walsh have saved an historic Seatoun (Wellington) church.
Jackson and his wife have bought St Christopher's Church (c.1932) in Seatoun for $1.06 million, saving the earthquake-risk church and neighbouring hall from demolition.
Now, the Miramar Peninsula Community Trust has been established to run the buildings for the community, and will lease the buildings back from the Oscar-winning couple.
The deconsecrated church has been closed since 2012, but will be available for weddings, recitals and christenings once strengthening work is done.
The couple made their latest purchase to ensure the buildings would not be lost from the peninsula.
It's the second time these angels have saved a Seatoun church: they bought the quake-threatened Our Lady Star of the Sea in 2007, saving it from development.
They also bought the site of Bats Theatre in 2011, securing its future. And together with Weta Workshop founder Richard Taylor and others, Sir Peter helped restore Miramar's now-stunning 1928 Capitol Theatre.

A great save!

Flag 'Em All!

The costly and wasteful process to choose what could be New Zealand's new flag has been trimmed down to 40 options.
The Flag Consideration Panel has released a "long list", chosen from more than 10,000 public submissions.
Chairman John Burrows: "A potential new flag should unmistakably be from NZ and celebrate us as a progressive, inclusive nation that's connected to its environment, and has a sense of its past and vision for its future."
The chosen 40 will now be subject to further scrutiny, including whether any breach intellectual property law. [Oh yes, mustn't forget that some maori think they have rights over a koru, and the NZ Rugby Union reckons it can claim the silver fern!]
Mid-next month, the panel will announce four of them, to be put to a national referendum. The winner will then go head-to-head with the current flag in another referendum in March 2016.
Prime Munster Johnno Key is trying to permanently stamp his legacy on this country by changing the flag, claiming ours is often mistaken for Australia's. But the cost of merely deciding whether to change the flag - up to $26m! - has come under heavy fire.
The Top 40 List is dominated by designs featuring koru, stars and ferns. Spokesman for the 'Silver Fern Flag' group Kyle Lockwood: "Like the maple leaf to Canada, the silver fern screams 'New Zealand', and it's not just a sports symbol. It's on our army and navy logos, our firefighters', police and sportsmen's uniforms, our money, passports,

national airline, and soon it'll be on NZ rockets sending satellites into space...it's our national symbol and it's time we put it on our flag." Hmmm, as you can tell, Kyle is quite OTT about the fern!
As for me, there's not ONE on the "long list" that smokes my tyres. I say: flag 'em all and keep what we've got!

History Saved For A Buck

Shand's Emporium stood in Hereford St, Christchurch, since 1860.
It was one of the oldest wooden commercial buildings left in the CBD, and now a simple gold coin has saved it.
Christchurch Heritage has paid property developer Antony Gough just a dollar for the Shand's Emporium building. It is typical of buildings from the early colonisation years and has a Heritage NZ Cat.1 listing.
Gough, whose family has owned the building for more than 75 years, said they could easily have pulled it down but were determined to save it.
The building, which Gough spent $70,000 weather-proofing and straightening post-EQs, will move to Manchester St.in 2-3 weeks, where it'll sit alongside the old Trinity Church, being restored by Christchurch Heritage.
The late-night shift will be fairly straight-forward, apart from the Colombo/High/Hereford Sts.intersection, where there were live tram lines. A 200-tonne crane will lift the building off the transporter and over the tram lines (as the temporary dismantling of the lines would be too costly and time-consuming).
Once at its new site, the building will be put on new foundations and

repaired so that it meets new building standards: the building is in a fairly sad condition currently.
It's the second time Shand's has dodged the axe. In the late 1970s, NZ Post Office planned a new telephone exchange right on top of it. After several thousand signed a petition, the building was saved.
But a big question niggling away at me is: what happened to the Elvis Costello album cover, that sat so iconically in Shand's front window for years?
Has Elvis left the building?

UPDATE: 28 June 2015 - Shands touches down in its new home.

Catholic Cathedral Construction Plans

It's been several speculative post-EQ years in the making...
But today, major plans for Christchurch's historic Catholic cathedral will be announced.
For those not familiar with the city, we're not talking the Anglican cathedral in the Square - this is the spectacular white Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament on Barbadoes Street.
Catholic leaders have decided to deconstruct the most quake-damaged parts of the cathedral but keep other sections. The deconstructed parts will then be rebuilt in stages but would not replicate the original cathedral.
The plan will cost about $14 million (including the deconstruction), compared to $120-$170m to restore the whole building. Previous estimates have put the cost of a modern cathedral at about $40m.
The Cathedral of the Blessed Sacrament is a Heritage NZ Cat.1 building, completed in 1905. It's considered one of the finest examples of Renaissance-style architecture in NZ and was innovative for its use of a concrete structure with Oamaru stone cladding.
The front facade of the cathedral partially collapsed in the Feb.2011 EQ. The back of the building has since been partially deconstructed, with removed masonry, copper detailing and windows stored off-site.
Heritage expert Ian Lochhead: "The building is the grandest of all the Roman Catholic cathedrals constructed in NZ in the 19th and early 20th centuries."
More details will be announced at a press conference at 11am today.

Update: The details, as released today...

Anzac Day 2015

This is not glorification of war.
Not salacious lapping at spilt blood.
Not false-sounding honorifics on monument walls.
This is unmeasurable gratitude, respect and thanks...a nation-wide desire to advance and be all we can be, as some way of making the sacrifices worthwhile.

As we live and breathe, you will never be forgotten...

Simpson And His Donkey - The REAL One

A classic painting of a famous Gallipoli character went under the hammer this week.

"Simpson and his Donkey" was painted by Horace Millichamp Moore-Jones in 1918. It depicts a medic evacuating a wounded soldier during the ill-fated Gallipoli campaign of WWI.
Moore-Jones had thought the Anzac medic was John Simpson Kirkpatrick, an Englishman who (as John Simpson) enlisted with the Australian Imperial Forces when war broke out. And as time went on, most of Australia thought so too...
However, the medic was actually a New Zealander, Richard (Dick) Henderson, a Waihi-born man who was a teacher in Auckland when he enlisted in 1914.

Moore-Jones' most widely-recognised art work was not painted at the battlefront, but from a photo taken by Dunedin medic, James Jackson, who identified the subject as Richard Henderson.
Moore-Jones' depiction of the soldier and his donkey was done when the artist was touring his watercolours in Dunedin in 1918, three years after the Gallipoli landings. He altered the composition of the photo to make for a more dramatic painting.
This week, the art was bought by a private buyer and will remain in New Zealand. It's value was estimated at $150-200K but sold for $257,950.
The artist Moore-Jones died in a Hamilton fire in 1922, still believing he had painted Simpson.
While not wishing to denigrate John Simpson's work at Gallipoli, it should be recognised that his heroic exploits have been seriously inflated over the years.
The "Simpson" legend stemmed from an account in a 1916 book Glorious Deeds of Australasians in the Great War. This was a wartime propaganda effort, and its stories of Simpson, supposedly rescuing 300 men and making dashes into No Man's Land to carry wounded out on his back, are demonstrably untrue.
In fact, transporting that many men down to the beach in the three weeks that he was at Gallipoli would have been an impossibility, given the time the journey took. However, the stories in the book were widely accepted by many, including the authors of subsequent books on Simpson.
The few contemporary accounts of Simpson at Gallipoli do speak of his bravery in bringing wounded down from the heights above Anzac Cove through Shrapnel and Monash Gullies. However, his donkey service spared him the even more dangerous and arduous work of hauling seriously wounded men back from the front lines on a stretcher.
Simpson landed at Gallipoli on 25 April 1915 and was killed by machinegun fire on 19 May 1915.
There've been movies based on the Simpson legend, statues erected, and even calls for a posthumous Victoria Cross.

But the real man in the picture, NZ stretcher-bearer Richard (Dick) Henderson, served in Gallipoli and later on the Western Front. He was awarded a Military Medal for repeatedly rescuing wounded from the battlefield while under heavy fire at the Battle of the Somme. Seriously gassed at Passchendaele in Oct.1917, he spent several months convalescing in England before repatriation to NZ in Feb.1918.
Henderson did not recover from the effects of the gas. He went back to teaching, but became blind in 1934 and was obliged to stop working. He remained in poor health for the rest of his life, and died in Greenlane Hospital, Auckland, on 14 November 1958.
The real 'medic with donkey' rests in Akld's Waikumete Cemetery, Soldiers' Burial Row 11, Plot 111.
Perhaps the painting should hang as acknowledgement of all medics, stretcher-bearers, nurses and doctors in fields of conflict...

Richard III: Re-Writing Royal History?

Last weekend, England farewelled her king – or at least the skeletal remains of Richard III.
Here in NZ, the spectacle only garnered a few moments of tv curiosity time, but it was Billy Big Time there. However not everyone appreciated the pomp and ceremony.
Michael Thornton, writing in Britain's Daily Mail, watched with …mounting stupefaction, the grotesque televised travesty involving the remains of one of the most evil, detestable tyrants ever to walk this earth.

Richard III: R3, to his friends.

I take the liberty of reprinting his piece (abridged) as a strong counter-balance to the Royalist hype...
2½ years after his bones were unearthed under a Leicester car park, and at the outrageous cost of more than £2.5 million, Richard was prepared for reburial with a 21-gun salute, medieval re-enactors in shiny armour and plumed helmets, children in paper crowns, onlookers tossing white Yorkist roses.
An aura of heroism has been conferred on R3 for being the last English king to die in battle. But he was only in battle because his usurpation of the throne - and his abduction/murder of his nephew Edward V - had provoked a popular rising/invasion led by Henry Tudor, Earl of Richmond.
R3 need not have died at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485. If he'd retreated, the throne he'd stolen would've been lost, and his future would have been as an exiled fugitive. He died attempting to hack his way through to Henry Tudor, knowing that if he killed him, then the throne was his.
Was this heroism? No. Like everything else he did, it reveals the mind of a murderous pragmatist.
In this light, much of what took place last Sunday raised serious doubt about the sanity of some of the key figures involved.

Flag It Away, John!

NZ's Prime Minister has been pushing his "new flag" hobbyhorse again, using the devisive Waitangi Day commemorations as a platform.
In a speech to business and maori leaders, John Key spoke of his vision for NZ in 25 years' time when, in 2040, we celebrate 200 years of nationhood: "(By then) I'd like to see a new New Zealand flag raised at the Waitangi Day dawn service. That's my personal preference...I think the (current) flag captures a colonial and post-colonial era whose time has passed."
And Johnno promised that maori would be fully consulted and have a say in the design choice. Like...hello!!! As maori make up only 10% of our population, they should only get 10% of the consultation. We ALL have a choice in this flag - IF it happens - not just one race. Cut out the political tokenism, PM!

"All my own work" - John Key

Johnno still wants the silver fern on the flag: "It's the symbol of NZ, it's internationally recognisable." But many point out that splashing said fern on a black background (a la the precious bloody All Blacks *yawn*) would create an image too similar to the ISIS terror group.
JK's always quick to add that, other than changing the flag, he remains a constitutional monarchist and does not want to see NZ become a republic.

PM's preference...and to hell with you!

John Key says he's softened on his preference for a silver fern on a black flag, instead liking this Kyle Lockwood design.
But do you agree that the colour scheme too closely resembles the maori protest flag, and thus reeks of the arse-licking tokenism that JK spewed forth at Waitangi this year?
A referendum on the flag will be held over this parliamentary term, in a two-step process. Voters will be able to choose between an alternative flag, and then whether that flag should replace the current one.

The Price Of Saving History

Six months after the Feb.2011 EQ: courtesy PhilBee NZ

Restoring one of Christchurch's most prominent historic landmarks will cost at least $50 million.
The Canterbury Provincial Council buildings (cnr.Armagh/Durham Sts.), are widely acknowledged as NZ's most outstanding example of high Victorian gothic revival architecture.
They were severely damaged in the Feb.2011 earthquake: the stone chamber (c.1865), collapsed and the stone towers at both Armagh and Durham streets had to be deconstructed.
The Chch City Council, determined to see the buildings restored, has revealed the restoration work is likely to cost at least $50m, maybe as much as $70m, well over the council's expected $30m total insurance payout.
Deputy Mayor Vicki Buck is questioning where the extra money will come from and where the restoration of the buildings fits on the council's list of spending priorities. She says the council needs to start looking at the bigger picture and weighing where it's best to spend its money: "If there's limited capital we need to start looking at which are the most important assets."
Hmmmm, I'd have expected council to have been doing that from Day One, not starting now - three years after the EQs!
The council has secured some funding for the restoration. The Chch Earthquake Appeal Trust and the Ministry for Culture and Heritage were giving $2.5m towards repairing the complex's two stone towers. (The trust received about $100m in donations to help repair damaged properties across the city.)
Rebuilding the Canterbury Provincial Council buildings is due to start later this year.

Art Deco Demo

Demolition work on Christchurch's distinctive art deco former civic building is well underway.
The gutting of the building's interior began some time ago, and the main task of actually ripping down the skeleton is expected to be completed by the end of the month.
The Cat.II heritage building opened in 1939 as the Miller's department store. It featured the South Island's first escalator, which was the biggest in NZ at the time. The 5-storey building was refurbished and reopened as the Christchurch City Council chambers in 1980.
After the council moved out in 2010, the building stood empty, with no plans for its future. But the Feb.2011 earthquake damaged staircases and cracked some floor plates.
Now the site is earmarked for a $53m bus interchange, as part of the rebuild blueprint - that's due to open mid-2015.