P-cubed Newsletters

Contents HeadsUp Lately I’ve been pondering what it will be like to be back on campus. What will I most appreciate in being there in person? I’ve concluded its the opportunistic encounters I miss most. Life becomes a very choreographed performance by zoom. You need to...

Contents HeadsUp The final comment in an email from a workmate last week read: “I think I hit the motivational low point today”. Two aspects struck me. First, the candid admission itself, and second the implied fatigue. I’m not sure I would have encountered that sort...

Contents HeadsUp The world is full of surprises. Here on the motu, a resident was woken at 3am on the weekend to fine a kororā (little blue penguin) among the dishes on his kitchen bench.  Political surprises too. Who’d have thought of the audacity: a pekapeka (native...

Contents HeadsUp I was clearing out in the dusty, spider-colonised space under the old homestead on the weekend and came across a heavy box with large objects wrapped in newsprint. On close inspection the wrapping was sheets of 1989 copies of the NZ Herald. In the...

Contents HeadsUp So, we’ve descended a level. The main indicator as I walked the beach this evening was the smells of deep-fried food and fresh-roasted coffee from up at the shops. Last night, however, two parties raged across the valley with a crowd singing ‘happy...

Contents HeadsUp Kia ora koutou. It’s Te Wiki o te Reo Māori (Māori language week). Polling last December revealed that over 80% of New Zealanders see te reo as part of their national identity and something to be proud of. We have come a long way as a nation since the...

Contents HeadsUp It’s an old cliché that a week is a long time in politics. Perhaps a new one should be that a day is a long time in Covid. Within 24 hours we were gone from Symonds St. I sometimes think of that half-eaten apple I left on my desk in a distracted...

Contents HeadsUp Last week all New Zealanders were reminded of the ever-present possibility of a Delta-variant outbreak and the likely response: ‘short, sharp’ Level 4 lockdowns. ‘Be prepared’ is the imperative at all levels, Meanwhile I was having my own little...

Contents HeadsUp At least on Level 6, last week seemed consumed by conversations about a letter in that very unscientific but high-impact journal, The Listener. The best responses are invariably the most pithy. Rangi Mātāmua, a new Fellow of Te Apārangi / the Royal...

Contents HeadsUp I’m reminded of my islandnes here on Waiheke as I write these words while a storm rages outside and ferries are cancelled. It was 1624 that John Donne wrote the lines “No man is an island entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part...