Posts by B Jones
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Stephen:
I wouldn't call it non-religious exactly. But not necessarily Christian A karakia could invoke Rangi raua ko Papa, the power of the southerly wind, or e te Matua, e te Tama, e te Wairua Tapu. A higher power as a concept, in any case.Freedom from religion isn't insisting that nobody mention religion in front of you. It's not compulsory to be welcoming and respectful of another culture, but it can really smooth things along. And if you (as a non-religious person) provide the space for the other culture to provide their own content, then the religion or otherwise of that content doesn't oblige you to participate or endorse it, the same way as you're not obliged to agree with what someone else says at a meeting.
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Can anyone recommend any good atheist or non-religious karakia? Seems to be the sort of thing it might be useful to know.
I was taught Whakataka te hau by a teacher who was keen on pre-colonial karakia.
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In a context where cultures meet, mine is squarely secular and non-Christian, and I'd like a compromise that reflects that.
Exactly how would you define contexts where cultures meet? Because I think tikanga pakeha infuses so much of standard business and community meetings that if you want to provide any recognition of tikanga Maori, giving people the opportunity to deliver a mihi or karakia if they think its appropriate is kind of the least you can do if you want a cross-cultural meeting to reflect both cultures.
I've been around plenty of prayers, graces, karakia, waiata, blessings, hymns, oratorios and so on, and they've not hurt my atheism one bit. But I've always seen them as applying to other people - I get to join in if they're fun and involve singing, or sit quietly and respect other's rights to their beliefs if they're not. Where I would draw the line is if I were expected to bring or perform the religion myself (thus failing John Roughan's test of great New Zealanderness, but so be it). I don't object to grace at other people's dinner tables, but I'd feel put upon if someone tried it at my own.
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I've spotted spanish red wine in Woolworths for $4 on occasion. It made perfectly good sangria.
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As I understand it, compulsory third party insurance is covered in Australia through the vehicle registration process, which means that if you're registered, you're insured. It could get a bit fiddly to administer if you started having to make decisions about which people could register which cars. One easy way to get around things is to register a car in your parents' name, if you're a teenager, which people already do for insurance purposes.
You could say that under 25s can't drive vehicles over a certain engine size (but what about all the little cars with medium engines but massive power/weight ratios that racers like?), but then would that mean a 20 year old couldn't drive dad's v8 home when dad's had a few too many whiskeys? It's fiddly, legally speaking.
That being said, I've also run the Kent/Cambridge Terrace pedestrian gauntlet late on a Saturday night, and it's not fun, especially after someone's died doing exactly that.
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I've apparently had early stage hypothermia, thanks to the Milford Track, the Sutherland Falls, and a bit of a fitness issue that led me to think that leaving my raincoat hood off was a sensible way to cool down after a painful ascent up Mackinnon Pass (I was not aware that the sweat-soaked cotton tshirt under my bush-shirt was already doing this very well).
The reason I say apparently is because as far as I was concerned, I didn't feel cold and was happily daydreaming about how nice a hot spa would be. The group leader noticed I'd slowed down a lot, fed me some calorie-packed scout bars, escorted me across the one person bridge, and picked up the pace until we got to the shelter and stopped for a cuppa soup.
I guess being in denial that you've got hypothermia is a classic symptom of having hypothermia. But of all the ways to go there must be plenty worse.
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Remember, two years ago the banks were returning 8% or more on investments; by comparison with that, 9% from an investment company wasn't high enough to set off any warnings.
Yeah, it could have been higher. 9% is just the first figure that popped into my head because I remember it being advertised on telly (don't get me started on the way that Geneva Finance used an English accented voice to pitch to investors and Jay Laga'ia to pitch to borrowers). But I don't remember getting up as far as 8% for my (long departed) savings, and I was always on the lookout for the best deal.
I remember stories in the major newspapers about several people who lost their life savings because they'd put it all in Bridgecorp, because their interest rate was higher than anyone else's. It was a classic case of it looking like a really really good basket to put all your eggs in.
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I'm on the losing side of that particular wager, with another 18 months to go, but that's the way the cookie crumbles. Likewise I couldn't muster vast amounts of sympathy for the people who thought they could get a 9% return by putting all their assets in one finance company and expect it to be as safe as if they'd had it in the bank at 6%.
That being said, perhaps this is my own fault, but although I was aware that there were break costs if you wanted to get out of a fixed rate, and that they could theoretically be higher than what you'd save in interest, exactly how that works isn't very transparent. I called the bank a few months back and was told that it would cost $8k to break my fixed term, and since I thought then it would only save $5k I didn't bother. I suspect that it would cost considerably more now.
You pay your money and you takes your chances, but I think the banks need to be a whole lot more explicit about what those chances are. Finance companies don't know what their chances of going belly-up are, but banks sure as hell know what they're going to sting you for if you want to move on. It's only fair that they tell you that up front.
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My girlfriend gets very excited when she dreams about receiving something (like dinner at a restaurant) but wakes up before she dreams about paying.
I get the opposite. I dream that I'm at work (usually when it's stressful) and feel ripped off that I'm not getting paid for the hours. You should get time and a half for that, especially when you're all awkward for being at work in your nightie and nothing makes sense.
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My mum got bitten by a spider that had been exploring the inside of her gardening glove, back in about 1981. It didn't occur to me until recently how uncommon that is.