1 'NEIGHBOURHOOD' THEME Captions by Tom Pedlar. Edited by Virginia Philp. www.able.co.nz Captions were made possible with funding from NZ On Air. Copyright Able 2016 FUNKY MUSIC Chartwell and Rototuna, its newest neighbour, lie north-east of Hamilton. When my family moved here 20 years ago from South Africa, this is the area where we finally settled. But back then, most of Rototuna didn't even exist. Most of this, as far as the eye could see, was farmland. But today, Rototuna has become one of the fastest growing and most ethnically diverse communities in Hamilton. In fact, the local school roll, I think, has, like, 36 different countries represented. FUNKY MUSIC CONTINUES I have such strong memories of exploring the streets around here. In fact, I used to bike over this bridge to come visit a girl who lived right here, who I really liked. I had my first car accident right there on this road. Or we'd go and hang out at Chartwell Square on a Thursday night cos they shut really late. But, you know, every time I come back, it's so great to see that this community is still thriving and offering warmth to its residents. In this episode of Neighbourhood, we'll meet a Rototuna local who's spent decades supporting migrant women. New immigrants still need a lot of help. Like, now we've got students, for example. There's a lot of students, so they come to me so we can get them a job. A Canadian woman uses the skills she's learnt as a solo mum to help a refugee family. I know that I could get out of it easily, so I would just like to pass that on to them and see them succeed and be good examples for their daughters as well. We'll discover a sure-fire way to help kids connect with their culture. With the food, as you can see, they're all sitting down and talking and getting to know each other, and they're eating the food and they're eating the poke, that's the main thing, so my mother-in-law will be pretty proud of that. And a Swedish artist finds inspiration in her Viking heritage. So, these runes were also the alphabet that the Vikings used, and the Vikings were travellers, so I sort of see myself as a reference to my heritage, the Vikings. My name's Ido Drent and this is my neighbourhood. 'NEIGHBOURHOOD' THEME RELAXED MUSIC We sold up everything and came to NZ with literally all of our cash strapped to my dad's body. We didn't have much and it was a hard time for my family. Financially, but also because we wanted to fit in. We wanted to belong. It wasn't until later that I realised how much my parents actually sacrificed for us kids to grow up in a country where it's safe and politically stable. You know, they gave up everything they knew. Their jobs, their family, their friends, all for us to have a better life. And that is the story of so many generations of people who now call NZ home. For a better future, they had to venture on this great journey into the unknown. RELAXED MUSIC I would say I see myself as a traveller, but also through travelling and migration, can also be a mind thing. You do` You know, you visit places and explore new territories through your mind and I do that all the time. So even if I'm no travelling it's, you know` my mind is somewhere else. Yeah. (CHUCKLES) Since we came to NZ, I've picked up pottery. I signed up for a night class at the Waikato Potters' Society, and this was about two years ago now, and I was smitten. I was caught by the clay bug as soon as I walked through the doors. It's the feeling. I love the way it feels and smells. You know, it's just something primal. (LAUGHS) Mother Earth. I used to work as a finance manager for many years before we came here, but I've always pursued my art very seriously on the side, so all my spare time I've spent doing my art projects. I'm going to make a vessel, and, so, I'm doing the coils. So I'll do a technique which is called coiling. So, the basic techniques would be when you're learn` starting out, is coiling and pinching pots, and this is coiling. Compared to wheel throwing. So, everything you do on the wheel will turn out round, but here it's` you can do... you can do anything, really. It's just imagination that stops you. And` and that's the wonderful part of this. I've got a background in painting and sculpting, and this is a combination of all the previous` my previous experience, and I love` I've studied physics and I love chemistry, with the glazing, so it's a combination of everything. RELAXED MUSIC People tell me that they can see this Scandinavian touch in my work and, when it comes to my ceramic work, I can see, you know, looking back. The runes are the old alphabet, which was used in the Germanic countries before Christianity and the` and the Latin alphabet. So, um` And in Sweden you can find a lot of rune stones, which is` Um, you can call them artwork, I guess. So, these runes were also the alphabet that the Vikings used, and the Vikings were travellers so I sort of see myself as a reference to my heritage, the Vikings, and` Yeah, so the travelling part is that all my rune starts with I'm following the stars and the sky, they guide me on my journey. A runic inscription often starts with a name or a reference to the person who ordered` paid for it, I guess. So this one says that Sylvia did this rune to her loved ones and with thought of the father's country on the other side of the world. This one is also a reference. This is like a compass. So, like, the Vikings used to navigate by the stars so that's also, like, the same inscription. And then a symbol which I often use in this. Yeah. I think it's about, sort of, eternity or, you know, faith, and that it's all connected somehow, so... UPBEAT MUSIC So, I'm currently in an exhibition at the Calder & Lawson Gallery at Waikato University and it's called Birdbrain, Dislocation Is A Place. The Birdbrain is a word that is widely used. I mean, we use it at home if someone does something stupid, and it's widely used, and it's not only in English. It's in German as well. I'm not quite sure about Swedish. Would you use birdbrain? Yes, you do. Sort of a relation to bird. If someone` > Cuckoo, like, 'You're a cuckoo.' Yeah, yeah. I know that one. (LAUGHS) I think what did bring us together, as well, if you choose to make another country your home. Paul Bowles actually put that quite nicely in his novel The Sheltering Sky, 'Travellers are people that not to intend to return to their point of origin as tourists do.' So that makes us travellers as opposing to tourists. So, this one behind here, it's called Inside and Outside. My idea was that I place my cylinders, nicely white cylinders, outside the box, and I'll puncture them to let the inside seep outside and then the passion and the potential rises like fire through chimneys. I'm fascinated with people and their stories, and when you talk to people, it's often obvious that we do share the same soft inside. We all bleed red, no matter shape, colour or, you know, where on the planet we are. I love being in transit. There's nothing like new beginnings and adventures ahead. I love to do things and experimenting with ideas and that is on my mind, so I think that's maybe even a more powerful tool than exploring new territories, so to say. Yeah. When we first arrived here from South Africa, it was a major culture shock. People would invite us over for 'tea' and we would go over expecting a cup of tea, not dinner. And when we approached the front door, we'd see people taking off their shoes and that was so bizarre to us. In South Africa you would never do that. They'd get stolen. We just simply couldn't get used to the low level of serious crime in this country. I remember us send a picture of the front page of the Waikato Times back to South Africa about someone having stolen laundry off a clothes line. I mean, back in South Africa, people would get murdered and it wouldn't even make the news. This house here is where I spent most of my childhood. This is where I got into all my trouble. And these neighbours here, they were this lovely elderly couple who became like grandparents to us, became like family. Because, as a migrant, it often makes a world of difference just having someone to look out for you. Someone to just ask, 'How are you today?' Or even just say, 'Good morning.' RELAXED MUSIC I arrived here in, uh, 1959. I got married, then I arrived here. I was expecting my son. So, I came. It was a good challenge, to come to a different country and see the different part of the world and cultural difference too. The only thing I felt that was hard ` there was no social life now. There was no social life with the people and, of course, I was used to a very good social life in India. When I cam here, I thought I lost my identity 85%. Especially over in India, everybody knew who we were. Over here, nobody knew who we were, you see? So I had to learn` to learn from the start to live with every person, and` which was a challenge. That's my dad. He was a politician. He was the opposition leader. In the parliament, he was, before, a speaker of the house. So he a had a lot of roling, and he was an Oxford (SPEAKS INDISTINCTLY) and he had a title of MBE. There was only four or five people had this title in India, at the independence, so he had one of them. We were a very close family. We were seven. We all sit in the evening together and, with my father, we used to go out a lot, and he used to go to the parliament session. So we enjoyed the life, and I think we had a great life in India. All my life I've been involved in community. That's my thing. I really like to work in community, because other reason was, that I felt, when I come from India, I had nobody. Nobody to tell me what to expect at the hospital or anything, so I was very lost. I think, uh, new immigrants still need a lot of help. Like, now we've got students, for example. There's a lot of students, so they come to me so we can get them a job with some company that we might know or something like that, so we are still trying to help the community. I became a JP in '96. So, I try to look after everybody who's sitting home waiting to be deported. So, they had just had their last chance, you know, so I put the appeals` I used to write appeals for them. Because, you see, I thought if there's my links could help somebody, why not? MELLOW MUSIC Well, we are at SHAMA Hamilton, and that's for ethnic women. It's not only for Indian; it's for every woman from any country. So, we try to look after people for domestic violence and for teaching them English and trying to start their life in this country. I'm always supporting SHAMA because we have been supporting SHAMA for a long time, ever since it started. How many years, Gladys, that we have been here? Oh. 11? 12? Yeah, 12 years to 15 years. And our aim is to educate the women a little bit, you know? And then people can come here, volunteer. So, then we are sort of giving them a chance to work, to find them a job here, which is quite good for them too. Um, I've come to you with a very personal request, that I would need a sponsorship recommendation letter from yourself because I have to put up my application for residency. OK. I can do that, and, anything else? I would like to thank you for the support that you have given me since the time I have been here. I think` I'm 73, I think I'm still going and, actually, telling the truth, I'm more active now than I ever was. You see, because now children is all grow up. My` All four children, they're grown up. They've got their life. And now I feel that I've got enough time to do things so I can give more time to my community. I couldn't speak any English when we first arrived. It wasn't easy. My mum actually sat in the back of the classroom for the first couple of weeks, just to make sure I was OK. But in Afrikaans we've got the saying "'N boer maak 'n plan", which essentially means 'we make a plan.' So, whenever things got tough, my parents encouraged us to find a way around it, to make a plan. I remember taking a little rugby ball to school. It became a way of communicating, just playing rugby with the other kids. See, that's how we connected. That's how I made friends. Things were still lonely at times, yeah, sure, but it got better. Like I said, sometimes you just need to make a plan. RELAXED MUSIC I love teaching kids the skills that they need to be able to make their own choices in their artwork, to be able to express themselves and some really individual works of art that they can be proud of. So, do you think that you might able to put in a bit of that down here in some of those lines? So that it's not just white. My name is Kim Garside, and I was born on St Joseph Island in Ontario, Canada. I came to NZ in 1996, so nearly 20 years ago, and I came for my first teaching job. Thought you could take some` some kowhai drawings and some pohutukawas and some korus and make a design that has NZ flowers. When my kids were 2 and 5, I worked part-time and I sold a lot of my art at that time, and I was living on a benefit when I came into Hamilton, before I got my foot in the door at some schools. I decided the best thing to do would be to build up my little, tiny business that I had doing one or two after school classes and turn it into five after school classes. That, so far, has been the best decision I've made. I got a business coach, and I joined a` a support group for women in business and things like that. I decided to volunteer for the Red Cross refugee support group, because I saw an ad in my son's school newsletter and then I got into a group. Ruth and her family are from Colombia, but they've lived in Ecuador for the past six years or so, getting work and going back to Colombia to visit their family. Oh, ice cream. Ice cream. Ice Cream. Yes, ice cream. Pharmacy. Pharm-a-cy. Yes. Red Cross refugee support volunteers do a lot more than they thought they were going to do at the start. (CHUCKLES) They have to organise everything you could need in your household besides, um, beds, sofas and table and chairs. It also includes showing them how to use the bank and bus and Work and Income and showing them around their neighbourhood. OK, you can make things like this. Eh? Mm-hm. Yes. This is a good example. Because I've been on a benefit myself and I see that that's what's happening for them, they're on a benefit, and their goals for the future, I think, don't go very far beyond that, maybe because of the opportunities that they've had before. Um, I know that I could get out of it easily, so I would just like to pass that on to them and see them succeed and be good examples for their daughters as well. RELAXED MUSIC Ruth and Cielo first came to my house right at the start. They saw that I'm doing lots of art, and they told me that Cielo loves to do art and she would like to learn, um, and I discovered that they're seamstresses. We went into some crafty shops and we looked at some handmade items in gift stores, and we talked about how they could be making things like that and selling them as well. and they said, 'Yes, yes!' They already have lots of really good plans. (SPEAKS SPANISH) TRANSLATOR: I was thinking about what I could give to the volunteers as a gift that would be really personal, that was my work. So I thought about these paintings. My sister does the painting and I do the gluing. We use mainly recycled clothes. So, we would like to expand our business with a lot more content. The limiting factor is really the language. We have a real need to make context and to communicate. INDISTINCT CHATTER Kim has been an angel. She's helped me a lot, especially with my daughter when she gets sick, contacting the school and taking her to the medical centre. She's an angel. The caring and the love is also translated. The smiling and the hugs, that's also really important. (SPEAKS SPANISH) When we first moved here, we were very homesick. Definitely for the people and place, but often for little things, like food. So, we tried to make our own snacks, biltong and drowoers. It's a dried, cured meat. But we weren't used to humidity, and the house was damp, so we tried to dry the meat in front of the gas heater. Well, it ended up mouldy and half cooked. (SPEAKS AFRIKAANS) (SPEAKS AFRIKAANS) How are you? Quite good. Yourself, Ids? Good, good. So, a few years later my best friend came to visit, and he went back to South Africa and convinced his dad to come, move out here and they set up their own biltong shop, so problem was solved, cos the taste of home goes a long way in remembering where you're from. Good. (CHUCKLES) My childhood was pretty strict, I would say. Gotta` Gotta be kept in line somehow. Well, you see, you know, you've got a bit of 'off the lines'. The cool island things I did as a kid was mainly dancing. Um, pretty much danced most of my childhood. And, yeah, wish I could dance now, but I'm a bit too heavyset these days. Bit older, but I always try and encourage my kids to do it, and my daughter does it now, eh. With the` With the dancing, it was school events. Um, also what we call Uapou Fellowship, which is a Cook Island gathering of all the churches around NZ, the Presbyterian churches. Um, mainly it's just traditionally Cook Island dancing. I actually met my wife through a culture group, (CHUCKLES) believe it or not. Um, when I left Tokoroa, came up to Hamilton to study, um, ended up in a Cook Island culture group and, yeah, met my wife through there, and the rest is history, I think. OK, so what we're doing now is that we are cooking, uh what we call our 'poke'. So, this is a banana dish. It's a side dish, um, for Cook Islands. Um, so, at the back of me you've got a hive of activity. So, you've got all my family all in there. And this is my mother-in-law Tupou who is going to assist me with making the poke. Um, you know, she's been doing it for many years, so we'll see how we go. OK, so, we've got some ripe bananas. It's always good to use ripe bananas. Yeah. > See? Told you. I know what I'm doing. So, it's really easy. Just got to peel the bananas. Chop them up into small bits. Yeah. > So, we're going to make some food to take to our culture practice. Um, so we're making, um, chop suey, which is, you know` All pacific islanders can claim that they do chop suey. Um, some raw fish or 'ika mata'. We're doing a bit of that and, um, 'minus' which is also what we do in the Cook Islands, which is a potato salad, um, mixed with egg yolk and beetroot and all that sort of stuff, so, yeah, be a good feast. Definitely. To be honest, it'll be my wife. She's the main cook. Before I met her, I was quite a slim guy, but she cooks well and, yeah, I think my kids prefer her cooking than mine. Our Cook Island culture, food is very very important. It's one of the first experiences you have as a child growing up and you` and when you teach that to your children, you hope that they'll be able to share that with theirs and keep the tradition going. Especially with the foods with, um` that are shared by your parents and grandparents and great-grandparents. Especially, um, my dad's island, Penrhyn, in the Cook Islands. It's one of the northern islands in the Cook Islands, and, um, there's a lot of fish, a lot of shark, so you pretty much eat fish. Fish and crab. (CHUCKLES) OK, so now we've, um, cooked the banana, and we've had to wait for it to cool down before we can do anything else. Is that right? OK. So, now we're going to put in arrowroot powder. In the islands you always mix it to make sure the arrowroot is mixed through the banana. So they use their hands. So we use the hands. It just here in NZ we just use spoons. Food safety. (CHUCKLES) You know how it is these days. Yeah. Do I need any more? Um, just mix it. Try and get the arrowroot through. OK. So, as you can see, with our elders, they don't have any sort of measuring, sort of, way. They just go by look. We'll put it straight in the oven because arrowroot, it sinks down. If you put it now, the oven is hot and if you put in there, the arrowroot will still be on top. What she says. Told you. You all have something in common. Um, and with Cook Islanders, there's actually 15 islands in the Cook Islands and, you know, sometimes you have that little bit of banter between, um, islands, and if you're on the same island, there's always a bit of a banter with your villagers and all that sort of stuff. And, you know, we're loud. We get together, we laugh loud, we enjoy ourselves. Um, you know, we enjoy each others' company and just, you know, sharing stories and stuff like that. COOK ISLAND MUSIC PLAYS And a little bit of that. So, yeah, with the food, as you can see, they're all sitting down and talking and getting to know each other, and they're eating the food and they're eating the poke, that's the main thing, so my mother-in-law will be pretty proud of that. So, we'll see how that goes. Yeah, with the amount of people turning up pretty much every week, it's quite a common thing, so it is` it is encouraging, to say that we are keeping the culture alive. and hopefully that our kids will also carry on that standard and keep it sustained so that, you know, for my grandkids ` when I do have grandkids ` they'll also be learning the culture. MELLOW MUSIC In my experience, migrants want to fit in and belong, but they also want to be accepted for who they are. They want their stories to be heard and engaged with. And that requires us all to be more vulnerable, a little more open and a little less defensive. But I think that's the way it should be. So next time you meet a migrant, maybe just ask them how they're doing. It might be the first time that they feel that they can call NZ home. Captions by Tom Pedlar. Edited by Virginia Philp. www.able.co.nz Captions were made possible with funding from NZ On Air. Copyright Able 2016