News of New Zealanders via Global Media

Responsible for the Rights of Children in Indonesia

Responsible for the Rights of Children in Indonesia

UNICEF representative in Indonesia, New Zealander Angela Kearney is responsible for leading a staff of 150 to carry out the duty of realizing the rights of every child in the country. Besides Jakarta, UNICEF also…

How Americans Perceive the Haka

How Americans Perceive the Haka

12 November 2013 – “Maori players screamed, made faces, pounded their chests and flexed their bulging muscles while chanting in unison,” writes Mike Still in a report for the Philadelphia Inquirer on the Maori…

Don’t Beat the Currency War Drums Yet

Don’t Beat the Currency War Drums Yet

The drums of war have been beating for two years now. With America, Britain and Japan printing money and the Euro zone considering unprecedented zero interest rates, the other tradable currencies – especially New…

Can Forward-Power Win it for England?

Can Forward-Power Win it for England?

The New Zealand forwards were outplayed by their French counterparts in Paris at the weekend and they will be given an even more searching examination by England, who easily dismantled the powerful Argentine forward…

Aucklander Brings Fresh Perspective to Sydney’s Art Month

Aucklander Brings Fresh Perspective to Sydney’s Art Month

New Zealand-born Scrap Wall has been named artistic director of Sydney’s largest annual celebration of art, Art Month. Wall is a well-established pioneer in the emerging art scene of his native Auckland. Wall…

Wickstead Nominated for UK Fashion Prize

Wickstead Nominated for UK Fashion Prize

New Zealand fashion designer and royal favourite, Emilia Wickstead was one of four nominated for the fourth annual Dorchester Collection Fashion Prize, established by the hotel group in 2010 to discover and support emerging…

Golden St Petersburg Captured with Help from Drone

Golden St Petersburg Captured with Help from Drone

11 November 2013 – Award-winning New Zealand-born photographer Amos Chapple recently sent a small drone helicopter up into the skies over an autumnal Saint Petersburg to take pictures and the Daily Mail has published…

Wanaka Aerobatics in a Vintage Tiger Moth

Wanaka Aerobatics in a Vintage Tiger Moth

Classic Flights takes San Gabriel Valley Tribune reporter Richard Irwin up in a vintage de Havilland Tiger Moth biplane for some shallow dives over Lake Wanaka. “The friendly pilots offer 20-minute scenic flights over beautiful…

Adventurer’s African Queen Back on the Nile

Adventurer’s African Queen Back on the Nile

The boat thought to be the original African Queen used in the film starring Humphrey Bogart and Katherine Hepburn has been restored by owner, New Zealander Cam McLeay. There’s no sign of the 2000 cigarettes…

Cop that – Adams Wins Biffo

Cop that – Adams Wins Biffo

Basketball prodigy Steven Adams is hitting all the right notes in his debut NBL season for the Oklahoma Thunder – including copping a deliberate elbow to the head. Dallas Maverick and eight-time NBL All…

Bringing Something Different to Every Party

Bringing Something Different to Every Party

Neil Finn, who is playing at Australia’s Falls Festival in December, has had a colourful career so far. Wild in Split Enz, he’s been a straightforward balladeer, the front man of a…

Sweet News for NZ Winemakers

Sweet News for NZ Winemakers

Global demand for wine is outstripping supply, meaning prices for New Zealand wine in export markets are likely to increase, according to a new report by US financial services firm, Morgan Stanley. Production of…

Kiwi Heroines Meet in New York City

Kiwi Heroines Meet in New York City

They’ve taken the music and book worlds by storm and now Lorde and Eleanor Catton are sharing some bedtime reading. Lorde, real name Ella Yelich-O’Connor, and fellow Kiwi Catton caught up in the Big Apple…

Life on Board Ship a Daily Adventure into the Wild

Life on Board Ship a Daily Adventure into the Wild

For the past 24 years, New Zealand mountain climber Greg Landreth and Canadian photographer Keri Pashuk have been living on a sailboat, travelling thousands of nautical miles into some of the coldest and most…

Bespoke Diamonds for the Jet Set Available at the House

Bespoke Diamonds for the Jet Set Available at the House

Rihanna, Madonna and Carine Roitfeld love New Zealand-born designer Jessica McCormack. But there’s only one way to buy her show-stopping jewels, the Telegraph explains, and that’s the old-fashioned way: visit her shop. Popstar Rihanna bought McCormack’s…

Aussies Envious at NZ’s Hot IPO Market

Aussies Envious at NZ’s Hot IPO Market

There are not many things in which New Zealand enjoys a marked superiority to Australia. Rugby and … It’s a short list. But for the last year, the trans-Tasman economic powerhouse has been casting…

Businessman Buys up Rights to Lennon’s Solo Recordings

Businessman Buys up Rights to Lennon’s Solo Recordings

New Zealand businessman Sir Douglas Myers has secured the rights to John Lennon’s music and some early Beatles records, he says in an exclusive interview with the Herald on Sunday. Meyers owns Downtown Music, a…

Adams on the Cusp of NBA Superstardom

Adams on the Cusp of NBA Superstardom

New Zealand basketball sensation, Steven Adams, is causing big waves in his debut NBA pre-season games for the Oklahoma City Thunder (OCT). Some are calling for the rookie to be elevated above the starting…

Beyonce: NZ Tourism Ambassador

Beyonce: NZ Tourism Ambassador

New Zealand got unparalleled international exposure from the recent tour by Beyonce, arguably the biggest music star on the planet at the moment. Whether posing for an Instagram with a Kiwi fan, promotion of…

Cambridge Cycle Path Has a Mind of Its Own

Cambridge Cycle Path Has a Mind of Its Own

Hamish Scott’s “glowing, seemingly self-aware bike path” is being tested in Christ’s Pieces park in Cambridge. The New Zealander’s “Starpath” is a type of solar-enhanced liquid and aggregate made by UK-based Pro-Teq Surfacing, which…

Plans Afoot for Animated Comedy Set in NASA Office

Plans Afoot for Animated Comedy Set in NASA Office

Academy Award winner Wellingtonian Bret McKenzie, 37, is creating an animated workplace comedy for Fox set in the world of NASA, according to TV Guide. McKenzie will executive produce the untitled show he came up…

Days of Grey Meat and Three Veg Are Behind Us

Days of Grey Meat and Three Veg Are Behind Us

Founder of Kent’s Moons Green Charcuterie, New Zealander John Doig, agrees with London delicatessen owner, the trend-setting Antonio Cardoso about promoting British farmers and too that charcuterie is a slow-pace, long-term income for them. Doig,…

We’ll Never be Royals – Clark

We’ll Never be Royals – Clark

Former Prime Minister Helen Clark appears to have taken teenage pop sensation Lorde’s lyrical sentiment – “We’ll never be royals” – to heart. In comments following a meeting at Clarence House in London with…

All Black Greatness to be Tested

All Black Greatness to be Tested

The mantle of greatness hangs easily around this year’s unbeaten All Blacks as they prepare for a tour of Japan, France, Britain and Ireland. Not that you would know it from the demeanour and…

Rare Chinese Carved Rhino Horns Sale Makes Auction Records

Rare Chinese Carved Rhino Horns Sale Makes Auction Records

A pair of very rare 19th century Chinese carved rhinoceros horns has sold for a record $797,300 Auckland-based auction house Webb’s – 454 per cent above the estimate of $125,000 – $150,000. The…

Every Hour on Holiday Another Gorgeous Spot

Every Hour on Holiday Another Gorgeous Spot

After a two-week winter holiday in New Zealand, Washington couple Nikki Magaziner Mills and her husband Keith Mills tell the Washington Post in a readers travel column that pictures cannot do the country justice….

Perth Breakfast Host Turns His Alarm Clock Off

Perth Breakfast Host Turns His Alarm Clock Off

After more than four decades hosting Perth’s mix94.5 breakfast show, New Zealand-born radio announcer Fred Botica, 66, will be able to have a sleep-in ahead of a new shift in the afternoon drive program. Botica…

Curating the Authentic at the Paris Art Fair

Curating the Authentic at the Paris Art Fair

With the International Contemporary Art Fair in Paris celebrating its 40th year, director of the Foire Internationale d’Art Contemporain (FIAC) New Zealander Jennifer Flay discusses the past, and the quality of art…

Grand Theft Auto Five Developer Requests NZ Audio Input

Grand Theft Auto Five Developer Requests NZ Audio Input

New Zealand-based technology company Arvus Digital has confirmed that Grand Theft Auto Five (GTA5) developer RockStarNorth used its unique audio technology High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) to AES/EBU digital audio converter the HDMI-2A. Arvus…

Photojournalist Awarded Grant for Condemned

Photojournalist Awarded Grant for Condemned

01 November 2013 – New Zealand photojournalist Robin Hammond, 38, is the recipient of this year’s W. Eugene Smith Grant in Humanistic Photography, a US$30,000 prize in support of his…

Taking His Own Passions into New Sydney Role

Taking His Own Passions into New Sydney Role

Senior curator at the Christchurch Art Gallery Justin Paton has been named as the new head of international art at the Art Gallery of NSW and will take up the position in January. Paton has…

Young Soccer Player off to Flying Start in US

Young Soccer Player off to Flying Start in US

Aucklander Nicolai Berry, 19, is a freshman midfielder for the University of Buffalo (UB), and amid his transition to a new culture in the United States, Berry has excelled on the pitch, according to…

Coffee Revolutionaries Educate the Locals in Lyon

Coffee Revolutionaries Educate the Locals in Lyon

New Zealander Roz Morris James and her French partner Sadry Abidi, owners of Cafe Mokxa, are spearheading a slow but steady coffee revolution in France’s second biggest city, Lyon. Their 29 square metre…

Kiwi Making YouTube Waves with ‘Royals’ Cover

Kiwi Making YouTube Waves with ‘Royals’ Cover

As Lorde goes from strength to strength, covers of her number one song ‘Royals’ are sprouting like mushrooms on YouTube, and now a second Kiwi is finding fame with his take on the world…

Postal Service to Reduce Deliveries from 2015

Postal Service to Reduce Deliveries from 2015

With more people emailing their correspondence rather than popping it in the mailbox, New Zealand Post will deliver mail as infrequently as three days a week to most customers from June 2015. The…

Talented Generation of Welsh Stars Mean Coach Could Stay

Talented Generation of Welsh Stars Mean Coach Could Stay

Wales coach New Zealander Warren Gatland, 50, has hinted he may stay with the “golden generation of stars” beyond the 2015 Rugby World Cup, according to WalesOnline. Gatland’s current deal with the Welsh Rugby Union…

World-First Footpath Lights up the Way

World-First Footpath Lights up the Way

New Zealander Hamish Scott has had offers from all over the world for what could be the future in street lighting – glow-in-the-dark footpaths, which light up when the sun goes down. London-based Scott approached…

Sonny Bill Faces the Fear

Sonny Bill Faces the Fear

Vulnerability, fear and palpable humbleness are not qualities normally associated with sporting star, Sonny Bill Williams. But in an interview with The Guardian, the footballer and occasional boxer opens up about recent and historic…

New Zealand Features in Lonely Planet Best in Travel 2014 Lists

New Zealand Features in Lonely Planet Best in Travel 2014 Lists

Two New Zealand destinations have made their way into two Lonely Planet Top Ten list,s part of Lonely Planet’s Best in Travel 2014. Auckland features in the top ten cities in the world to…

BMX Canyon Leap Just Felt Right so He Sent It

BMX Canyon Leap Just Felt Right so He Sent It

Footage of New Zealand BMX sensation Kelly McGarry’s 20 metre leap, complete with backflip, across a Utah canyon gap has gone viral. The incredible stunt won Nelson-born McGarry, 31, the hearts and…

Hobbit Global Fan Celebration Event Planned

Hobbit Global Fan Celebration Event Planned

Director Peter Jackson has announced plans to preview footage from The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug at a “global fan celebration” on 4 November that will be simulcast in theatres and feature…

Letting Go of NZ Essential for Artists

Letting Go of NZ Essential for Artists

If artists get a chance to leave New Zealand, says Thom Powers, co-founder of The Naked and Famous (TNF), then they must seize the opportunity. Los Angeles-based Powers is in the US with TNF…

Tramp the Past with Milford Anniversary Heritage Walk

Tramp the Past with Milford Anniversary Heritage Walk

The Milford Track is celebrating its 125th anniversary with a Department of Conversation (DOC) guided commemorative heritage walk to be held between 31 October and 3 November so that participating trampers may have…

Walker and De Mey Are the Fashion Business

Walker and De Mey Are the Fashion Business

New Zealander Karen Walker has been named as one of the world’s most influential designers by leading industry website The Business of Fashion. Walker was one of 118 designers included on the site’s annual Bo500…

Introspective New Album for LA-Based Singer

Introspective New Album for LA-Based Singer

New Zealand-born singer and songwriter, Los Angeles-based Ted Brown has released his second album, An Unwide Ride; “an elegantly spare and tenderly introspective record”, recorded at Roundhead Studios in Auckland. In 1993, Brown…

Oscar Foreign-Language Submission a Battle of Wills

Oscar Foreign-Language Submission a Battle of Wills

Based on the novella Medicine Woman by Witi Ihimaera, New Zealand’s 2014 foreign-language Oscar submission, White Lies (Tuakiri Huna) is a period drama about three women drawn together in conflict. David Rooney, reviewer for the…

Kiwis: Half a Century of Points Not Good Enough

Kiwis: Half a Century of Points Not Good Enough

Much sterner tests lie ahead but the New Zealand Rugby League team delivered an encouraging start to its defence of the World Cup with a 50-0 romp over the Cook Islands. The one-sided win…

On the Trail of Colour in Hokitika

On the Trail of Colour in Hokitika

For those “following the trail of the world created” in Man Booker Prize winner Eleanor Catton’s The Luminaries, the Telegraph suggests ten great things to do in Hokitika. Included in the list is a cycle…

McKenzie Stars in Austenland Though More a Brontë Man

McKenzie Stars in Austenland Though More a Brontë Man

Bret McKenzie, 37, one half of the comedy duo Flight of the Conchords, stars opposite Jane Seymour in the new romantic-comedy Austenland, which opened in the UK in September. “I’m not a crazy Jane Austen…

Repatriation of Lost Ancestral Remains

Repatriation of Lost Ancestral Remains

A tattooed preserved Maori head, or toi moko, and skeletal remains, koiwi tangata, discovered in the anatomy department at the University of Birmingham, are being returned to New Zealand. University staff said the ancestral items…

Aotearoa Casts Its Shadow on the Clouds

Aotearoa Casts Its Shadow on the Clouds

“There is a playful antagonism between the inhabitants of New Zealand’s two islands, North and South,” Man Booker Prize winner Eleanor Catton writes for the Guardian in a story about growing up in New…

Move to the Sunshine Has Rejuvenated Golfer

Move to the Sunshine Has Rejuvenated Golfer

Queensland Sunshine Tour Order of Merit winner Hamilton-born Jim Cusdin, 28, credits a move to Maroochydore on the Sunshine Coast for revitalising his golf career. It was somewhat of a risk he says, but…

Nearly Naked Aussies Almost Pull One Over Nude Blacks

Nearly Naked Aussies Almost Pull One Over Nude Blacks

New Zealand blushes were spared in Dunedin, as the Nude Blacks narrowly edged an invitational Australian side in the annual naked rugby contest in the country’s southern-most city. To coincide with the Bledisloe test…

Lydia Ko Goes Pro: Teen Golf Sensation Makes Announcement With Help From Israel Dagg

Lydia Ko Goes Pro: Teen Golf Sensation Makes Announcement With Help From Israel Dagg

Kiwi golf prodigy Lydia Ko has finally announced she has turned professional – but to mix things up a bit she has done so through a YouTube video and Twitter. A two-time winner…

Taxpayers Put Wind in Team NZ Sails

Taxpayers Put Wind in Team NZ Sails

Taxpayers have thrown Emirates Team New Zealand a lifeline, courtesy of the Government’s “bridging investment” of NZ$5 million, to fund another bid to win the America’s Cup. The syndicate had sought NZ$6.1m but Economic…

Musket Room Cellar Tips for Future NZ Classics

Musket Room Cellar Tips for Future NZ Classics

23 October 2013 – The sommelier at New York’s first restaurant showcasing haute New Zealand cuisine, The Musket Room suggests we start cellaring future New Zealand classics before the rest of the world catches on. Erin…