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#41 Kiwis Take On The World

#41 Kiwis Take On The World

Edge Message #41 from Brian Sweeney, producer NZEDGE.COM TO NZ EDGE GLOBAL GROOVERS This is a longish message please read it all, I promise it’s worth it. META MAILBOX Today we have the best mailbox ever, 72 messages, go right to …

Finn forum

Finn forum

Neil Finn at the Forum: “It was magic. It was intimate, it was funny. And above all, reverential”. Also, Finn in Sydney.

Big Dollar Boys

Big Dollar Boys

New Zealand energy family the Todds become the first New Zealanders to make the Forbes 500 list of the world’s wealthiest people, coming in at 490 with a net worth of US$1 billion.

Lucky Pig

Lucky Pig

New Zealand Kune Kune pig Grunty, former star of British programme Pig at the Ritz, currently resident at a farm in Wellington, southwest England, saved from slaughter after being declared free of foot and mouth.

Nests Bearing Fruit

Nests Bearing Fruit

Over half the world’s languages are under threat. Maori initiatives such as Kohanga reo (language nests), where elders teach children whose parents don’t speak the language, are seen as a model for other struggling cultures to follow.

Gone Fishing

Gone Fishing

Maori fishing rights seen as inspiration for other indigenous groups negotiating for sea rights.

Times Past

Times Past

It was fourteen years ago today that Captain Kirk got the boys to play, winning the inaugural Rugby World Cup at Eden Park.

Scholar honoured

Scholar honoured

New Zealand novelist, poet, critic and scholar Professor Karl Stead awarded an honorary doctorate  by Bristol University.

Big Cheese (and Milk)

Big Cheese (and Milk)

Taking on the world’s food ingredients multinationals, New Zealand farmers vote to merge NZ dairy Group and Kiwi Cooperative Dairies to form Global Dairy Co., a company that will be the ninth largest dairy company in the world generating 7% of New …

Milking Size

Milking Size

Global Dairy Co. New Zealand’s newly-formed giant dairy company looks to the Australian industry for further expansion. Also, we want to be fifth in the world, size-wise, says Global Dairy Company chairman John Roadley.  

Improv queen

Improv queen

Miss Wonder drags herself out to promote New Zealand comedy group the Improv Bandits at the Montreal Fringe Festival.

Difficulty in the holy land

Difficulty in the holy land

Dame Kiri in Israel “to do music”. “I love things that are difficult. I love looking for new arias and presenting them to the public,” said edge voice Dame Kiri.

Tri-series Netted

Tri-series Netted

New Zealand wins over it’s down under rivals to win tri-nations series.  

Ancient forest

Ancient forest

Arthur Conan Doyle’s Lost World filmed in New Zealand “where there are still forests that resemble those of the Cretaceous Period when the great dinosaurs walked the land”.

Camera Obscura

Camera Obscura

When is a pin-hole camera a pen-hole camera? When the person issuing the instructs has a strong New Zealand accent…

Seeds of Learning

Seeds of Learning

New Zealand plant expert Doctor Warwick Harris lectures in Seattle on the Christchurch Botanical gardens.

Top Travel…

Top Travel…

New Zealand scores as Guardian readers’ favorite long-haul travel destination.

Milford Enchants

Milford Enchants

Beautiful scenery and dare-devil flying over “a serene sea-loch towered over by glossy, beech-clad pyramidal peaks”.

Sister Joyce

Sister Joyce

James Joyce was the pre-eminent modernist prose stylist; his sister was a devout Catholic nun who spent her life praying for his soul and “witnessing at the ends of the earth” – New Zealand.

Compensation Won

Compensation Won

International interest raised by Waitangi Tribunal ruling on compensation for Moriori descendents of survivors of the 1835 Chathams massacre.  

He Makes Me Lie Down in Green Pastures

He Makes Me Lie Down in Green Pastures

“This New Zealand guy who came into my shop gave me the seeds. He was like the Jesus Christ of cannabis: long-haired, blue-eyed, a big healer. Fortunately, he told me the potential of the seeds. They cleared the candida. It’s like a scouring …

And Why…

And Why…

“There was a moment halfway up the Coromandel Peninsula, only a couple of hours out of Auckland, when I felt that this was as good as it gets. But there was plenty of competition for that accolade on a trip to New …

Talking Turkey

Talking Turkey

New Zealand farmer’s groups are a model of co-operation in preparing for the ups and downs of the agricultural sector.

Donuts to the World

Donuts to the World

Krispy Kreme donut king, Kiwi Don Henshall talks cautious expansion for the American icon.

Old Bones

Old Bones

Cache of moa bones and other fossils found under Canterbury vineyard.

Nipple Insulation

Nipple Insulation

Cold nipples – slip on some possum skin nipple warmers to ensure you don’t stand out from the crowd.  

Rock art

Rock art

New Zealander Chris Grosz designed tour posters for promoters Michael Coppel and Zev Isaac, producing pop art-influenced images. “I wanted the posters to stand up and be proud – bright and strong, in full color,” says Grosz.

Mussels and joints

Mussels and joints

Sore joints? Eat New Zealand green-lipped mussels, or take a pre-processed extract.

V. Good

V. Good

New Zealand energy drink V rates well for taste and kick.

Cutting Edge Commercials

Cutting Edge Commercials

Saatchi & Saatchi’s “Bugger” ad shows the creativity that will save TV advertising says Jim Aitchinson’s Cutting Edge Commercials.

Blast from the Past

Blast from the Past

Edge inventor Paul Williams’ gasification technology leads the way in turning waste into energy.

Golden Shooter’s Last Shot

Golden Shooter’s Last Shot

Malcolm Cooper started his small-bore rifle career in New Zealander and went on to shoot double Olympic gold for Britain, but lost the battle with cancer. Malcolm Cooper: 20 December 1947 – 9 June 2001

Docu Prize

Docu Prize

New Zealand co-production Wild Asia: Creatures of the Thaw wins Canada’s Banff Television Festival President’s Prize, worth C$25 000 .

Hairy Summer

Hairy Summer

On the track of the elusive ape-drape, found among “isolated sporting tribes such as New Zealand rugby league players, Czech speedway riders and the pantomime grizzlies of the Worldwide Wrestling Foundation”.

Bat to Beat All

Bat to Beat All

Best place to pick up a custom made stick to make sixes? New Zealand maker James Laver “just the sort of man one would want to make one’s bat”.

Riding High

Riding High

New Zealand riders let their legs do the talking for the Pittsburgh Cycling Club.  

Tough Fight

Tough Fight

New Zealand Maori “arguably the most committed and technically sound rugby race on the planet” threaten world champions Australia on their home turf. Also, NZ Maori match a focus for Sydney’s Maori community.  

Edge Composer

Edge Composer

Douglas Lilburn “gave the music of New Zealand its own distinctive voice”. His fine work brought him international recognition as a significant composer. Douglas Lilburn: 2 November 1915 – 6 June 2001

The loved one

The loved one

Yale University based NZ playwright Julie Mckee’s one-act play about death and two maidens, Invitation to a Funeral, well reviewed in NYT: “a wonderfully wry trip to the funeral parlor” about two women who come together over an open-coffin viewing …

The Mouse Who Roared

The Mouse Who Roared

New biography on New Zealand-born WWII hero Nancy Wake (the White Mouse), who “although the most feminine of women, fought like five men”.  

Founder Found

Founder Found

The lost grave of Denis Hoben, founder of the New Zealand Rugby Football Union, uncovered in Sydney.  

And to Wash it Down…

And to Wash it Down…

Serving salad? Drink New Zealand Sauvignon, also just the ticket with artichokes and asparagus. National Post features refreshing Fairhill Downs Sauvignon and classy Palliser Estate Pinot.

Screw Up

Screw Up

Marlborough winemakers ditch traditional cork in favour of screw tops for better quality.  

Lost at Sea

Lost at Sea

June 8 is the anniversary of the death by drowning of Richard Seddon, Prime Minister of New Zealand 1893-1906.

Pregnant pause

Pregnant pause

Hold the show, my wife’s having a baby cried Jeff Knight of Christchurch’s Court Theatre.

Thought for Today

Thought for Today

“I do believe one ought to face facts. If you don’t they get behind you and may become terrors, nightmares, giants, horrors. As long as one faces them one is top dog.” – Katherine Mansfield, New Zealander author (1888-1923).

Dawn Ceremony

Dawn Ceremony

Maori dancers performed a traditional dawn ceremony opened by a conch shell in St Mark’s Square, Venice, to celebrate New Zealand’s participation in the Art Biennale.

If You Can’t Beat ’em, Eat ’em

If You Can’t Beat ’em, Eat ’em

“We need to take millions of possums out of circulation, not just nibble at it,” said Tauranga farmer Bryan Bassett-Smith promoting Possyum, the possum meat dog food he hopes will solve New Zealand’s marsupial woes.

Win at Cardiff

Win at Cardiff

New Zealand brings home the Welsh title and overall series crown.  

Boyish Blair

Boyish Blair

Ex-Labourite, New Zealander Bryan Gould comments on the man who runs Britain: “When I see him on television now, he still seems very young to me – just as he was in 1983, refreshingly boyish, wet behind the ears. It’s a puzzle …

All that is golden…

All that is golden…

The Lord of the Rings (the book) – boyish fantasy or “true myth” that is a modern masterpiece?

Architectural Taste

Architectural Taste

Te Mata Estate’s Buck House included in a review of good winery architecture – buildings that, like the wine, reflect and are inspired by the region. Designed by Ian Athfield, the “series of honest, non-fussy buildings” fuses modernism with traditional New Zealand forms, …

Jumped

Jumped

A.J. Hackett – the edge entrepreneur and adrenalin junkie who took bungee from a bridge in Queenstown to the world – profiled as pioneering legend of ‘American'(!) adventure sport in this month’s Vanity Fair. 

Foxing the censors

Foxing the censors

“Marvel at the ever-brilliant Kerry Fox” in style bible i-D mag’s guide to the ‘future of cinema’. Fox’s raw performance in Intimacy won her best actress at the Berlin Film; i-D suggests that the explicit scenes mean “notoriety of a …

Intimacy and anguish

Intimacy and anguish

New Zealand actress Kerry Fox’s award-winning work in Intimacy continues to generate curiosity, awe and pursed lips: Getting Intimate in the Sunday Times; Truely, madly, explicitly in The Observer and Hanif Kureishi talks about the book that inspired the movie …

Don’t Bank on British Security

Don’t Bank on British Security

NZ is light years ahead of Britain for banking security. “I don’t want to sound like a homesick Antipodean”, writes Charlotte Denny, “but ever since I arrived here 10 years ago, the true awfulness of the British banking system has always puzzled me.”