Writing Portfolio - Joseph Hoye

1© Joseph Hoye. 2011

JosephHoye

Portfolio...

writer, editor, coffee fiend


The Chosen Ones

The Milk In Your Coffee 3 First appeared in NZ News UK

The Butler: a review 4 First appeared in NZ News UK

The Coffee Masters 5 First appeared in NZ News UK

Peta Mathias: a side dish 7 First appeared in NZ News UK

Villa Maria 9 First appeared in NZ News UK

Starting a Business 11 First appeared in NZ News UK

Christchurch Remembered 13 First appeared in NZ News UK

Step Up For Christchurch 15 First appeared in NZ News UK

Open House 16 First appeared in International Paper Board Industry

The View From... 17 First appeared in A&B: ACCA magazine

Camera Copy Rewrite 18 Sold to writing agency

Travel Copy Rewrite 19 Sold to writing agency

All copy and images © Joseph Hoye unless stated. This portfolio was created using InDesign 5.5

The pieces in this portfolio are a cross section of some of the work that I have created since 2009. All of the writing is my own, as are the photos unless otherwise stated.

A large part of this body can be found online from my time as editor of New Zealand News UK, a publication that’s been around since 1927.

But I have also contributed to magazines, rewritten SEO product reviews, ghostwritten a non-fiction manuscript and, as seen on the final page, edited a short story anthology.

Each piece shows off a different style or voice. So the first piece presents complex info in a simplified manner, Coffee Masters gives a general business profile, Christchurch Re-membered is an emotive first-person account while Step Up For Christchurch is straight reportage.

The View From... seems innocuous at first but pays testament to some creative editing. The piece required 200 words max but the sub-ject wrote 300 words per question.

The portfolio was created using InDesign - take note that I can drive it, along with MS Office and Photoshop (plus I easily adapt to new content management systems).

Finally, I make no apologies for slightly over-representing coffee in this portfolio. Coffee keeps my world revolving, not just the im-bibing but also the hunt to find or brew the perfect cup.

Use me when you need engaging copy for your website, business, magazine or book.

Contact: [email protected]

http://www.nznewsuk.co.uk


The Milk In Your CoffeeWhy does cow’s milk make coffee taste even better than it already does? Like love, it’s all about the chemistry!

A lot of it has to do with lactose, which is not good news for the lactose intolerant.

Lactose is a sugar, in this case a combination of galactose and glucose. For the science geeks out there, it’s C12 H22 O11.

Sugar is soluble - it dissolves in water. More so when it has been heated. Thus, heating milk is go-ing to make it taste sweeter.

• Milk – naturally sweet.

• Hot milk – naturally sweeter.

Milk also contains various levels of fat. And fat is a flavour carrier. It’s the troop transporter of the culinary world. If you are truly worried about calorie count-ing, stick to espresso or non-fat milk. If your coffee drinking is all about having the most pleasur-able experience possible, don’t quibble over full fat milk. At 4%, it won’t harm you if you’re eat-ing and exercising well.

Milk also lends itself to foam-ing – think of a cappuccino style coffee. This foaming is due to the protein in milk. Remember your mother/teacher telling you milk is a food? That’s due to the protein. Basically, when you steam the milk with an espresso wand, hot air is trapped inside coatings of protein. Bubbles, in other words.

Now, the protein and the fat have a tendency to slug things

out. Lower fat will give you easier foaming ability while higher fat will give you a raptur-ous taste experience.

• More fat – less foam – more taste

A good barista will be able to extract foam from just about any cow’s milk. Test your local café and see if the coffee maker can get decent foam from full strength milk.

Always make sure your barista is making your latte, flat white or cappuccino from scratch – with fresh, cold milk.

Why?

As milk is heated up, the pro-teins change shape. Remember, it was the proteins that allowed the foaming to take place. If the proteins have changed shape once through heating, they won’t change back by leaving the milk to cool. It’s a one-way, one-time process.

If you suspect your coffee professional is reusing warmed milk, ask for the fresh moo juice. It will taste much better and after all, you’re the one paying for it.

So milk is all about converting an already glorious espresso coffee into a sensual delight for your taste buds. Natural sweet-ness, flavour and tiny explosions of warm air are awaiting you in your next latte, flat white or cappuccino. And now you know why. Enjoy!


The

Butl

era

revi

ew

Take a 2 pound ball-peen ham-mer and ask a friend to smack you on the fore-head with it. That’s how stunned you’ll be after watching The Butler.

Penned by NZ columnist and writer, Joe Bennet, this is thea-tre on speed. Muscular, in your face and highly entertaining, The Butler tears away the fa-çade of pinot pretensions to reveal the grotesqueries of our social interactions in a way that leaves viewers both uncomfort-able and in awe of the visual spectacle.

Think of the opening scene of Kubrick’s 2001 and cross it with Jackson’s Meet the Feebles. Toss in a good measure of Cirque du Soleil and just the smallest hint of Play School. That’s the start-ing place for The Butler.

This is the tale of five dinner guests and the butler who serves and observes them. As the evening party progresses, two other guests arrive unbid-den. Much of the play revolves around how they fit into the party mix. Be warned - there is some nudity and simulated sex.

The cast are all members of the Loons Circus Theatre Company. Their athleticism is astound-ing, combining tumbling and circus skills with more conven-tional acting. To say they bring high energy to their roles is not hyperbole, it is an understate-ment.

It is unfair to draw attention to particular cast members of The Butler because each occupies a unique role, with specific skill sets. The ‘Twisty Twinz’ Jola and Nele Siezen, are partner acrobatics specialists, twirling from high wires and bending in ways that the human body is probably not meant to. Pascal Ackerman is an accomplished musician amongst other things. However, two performances did stand out.

Tom Trevella brought an ex-tremely world-weary view to the title role. “And I, a butler in the night, have seen it all.” Per-haps he has but the audience probably has not. He brings to mind the melancholy Jaques from ‘As You Like It’, complete with glimpses of mischief when he can’t help but interact with his diners.

Sophie Ewert sings gospel A Capella. But not in this show. Here she is the attention seeker, using all the tricks possible to draw focus to herself. Her laugh would strip the Sistine Chapel and could possibly be mistaken for a character on its own.

While the play is a New Zealand production, it is not about New Zealand. Writer Joe Bennet said “Its subject matter, the stuff it addresses, is not especially NZ. Nor is it especially anywhere. It is, we hope, universal… the Butler is concerned with social rules, with the gulf between public and private behaviour.”

The Butler evolved through director Mike Friend. Tasked with showcasing Christchurch’ CircoArts school, an early The Butler was born. A revised show was staged at The Loons in Lyt-tleton and then just carried on gaining momentum to reach the Pleasance theatre in Lon-don.

The Butler is a powerful, rau-cous juggernaut of a produc-tion firmly aimed at adults. This is not a production suitable for children or the moral minor-ity. The script often leaves the audience howling with laughter while the action leaves them gasping for breath at the sheer power of the human body. It will make you uncomfortable as it pricks your illusions. It will make you reassess how you behave publicly. And it will undeniably entertain you. See it at the Pleasance before it closes on 31 July.

What:

The Butler

Where:

Pleasance Theatre, Isling-ton, London.

When:

July 9-31


The Coffee MastersBusiness Profile:The belief is that London already has good coffee in Starbucks, Costa and the other chains. It doesn’t and it’s up to us to edu-cate.

Richard Reed

London, once a world hub in coffee houses, with a coffee his-tory dating back to the eighteenth century and predating Paris’ coffee culture, is rising up from a long, dark age - an age in which greasy spoon diners were the only places available to grab a cup of coffee. Now, as London-ers are beginning to accept that there is an explo-sion of flavour waiting for them inside a cup of well made coffee, Kiwis are tak-ing up the challenge of provid-ing that high quality shot.

Drop into a packed café in London to order an espresso and chances are great that the establishment is owned and run by New Zealanders. The service will be excellent, the food fresh and driven by taste while the coffee itself will be outstanding

The Guardian is better in-formed, flying a reporter to Auckland to learn how to cre-ate the perfect flat white with Allpress Coffee. Four weeks delay would have saved them the price of an airfare, with Tony Papas about to open the All-press coffee roastery and café in Shoreditch.

But it is not just about the flat white. It is about the quality of coffee and the social scene surrounding it that London is latching on to. Tim Ridley and partners will be opening Coffee-smiths in the coming months, a joint Anglo/Kiwi venture, and have done the hard yards in market research. Tim points

out that there is a growing awareness in London of quality coffee and that the New Zealand style is seen as head and shoulders above the rest. He talks about people want-ing places to socialise that aren’t pubs or bars and that this is some-thing that New Zealanders al-ready do with

coffee shops.

Chris Ammerman and Miles Kirby, partners at Caravan in Exmouth Market, agree. “We’re just emulating what we did back in NZ… we believe in quality over quantity and would rather take a little longer mak-ing an excellent cup of coffee than rushing a customer out the door with something barely

acknowledges that the big chains needed something new to promote and the flat white fit the bill. Staff at the High Street chain EAT will tell customers that a flat white is just an Ameri-cano with hot milk. While any coffee connoisseur will cringe at that description, it’s an improve-ment. Two years ago, the same staff would have just stared blankly at any customer order-ing one.

- better than almost anywhere else in the UK. Why is London so open to Kiwi coffee culture at the moment?

Part of the current interest in New Zealand coffee knowledge and coffee in general lies with the humble flat white. Tubbs Wanigasekera of Sacred Café


adequate.” Their head barista, Daniel, calls a good espresso “love in a cup” and in tasting his ristretto, it becomes easy to understand why. The warmth of red stone-fruits lingers on the palate, long after the cup has been drained.

One of the factors that is surely contributing to the Kiwi con-nection is the willingness of New Zealanders to roast their own beans and in smaller batches, instead of relying on wholesalers who are only interested in volume sales. The coffee is fresh and the quality reaches the high standards and tastes set by each café. Sacred, Coffee Shop of the Year finalists in this year’s London Lifestyle Awards, will look at roasting next year, Allpress opens in the next couple of weeks and according to Tony Papas, their café is just a working billboard for the beans. Caravan have been roasting since February and Nude Espresso built a sepa-rate roastery a block away from their café near Old Spitalfields Market.

Richard Reed of Nude Espresso invokes the “can-do” attitude that New Zealanders pride themselves on - that knowl-edge that if something is bro-ken, we have to fix it ourselves. He sees New Zealand’s isolation as a key to the growth of a kiwi style of coffee. That if New Zea-landers wanted products that the rest of the world had, then we had to adapt the ideas and techniques to our marketplace. He also believes that the evolu-tion of coffee culture that took place in New Zealand during the Eighties is happening now in London, putting New Zea-land baristas and roasters in an enviable position.

Like all his compatriots, Rich-ard’s enthusiasm for coffee is infectious. “Coffee education begins as soon as a customer enters the premises.” He grins. “If they’re unlucky, I’ll talk to them about coffee for hours”. It’s this kind of “bad luck” that needs to befall London’s coffee drinkers more often, because talking about coffee with peo-ple like Richard inevitably leads to its consumption and Richard roasts and makes some of the most amazing espresso you

are ever likely to taste. With a texture like molten honey and a deep, almost chocolate taste, his ristretto will still conjure a smile weeks after tasting it.

And that’s what good coffee is. Not an acrid shot of pick-me-up caffeine but something that lingers, that brings back good memories and keeps us com-ing back for more. This is where New Zealanders excel with cof-fee. As Daniel said, it’s love in a cup.

Richard Reed

Miles, Chris and Daniel of Caravan


Peta Mathiasa side dishIn London to address the New Zealand Business Women’s Network about de-veloping relation-ships in business, New Zealand chef, author and television celebrity Peta Mathi-as made time avail-able to NZNewsUK for an interview. She shares some fascinat-ing insights into men and women, busi-ness, food and Face-book.I ask Peta about business – what makes someone successful and what it is that women in business do differently to men. She be-lieves networking is a dominant part of women’s lives, particularly in New Zealand.

“It’s a part of our pioneering heritage and also stems from being isolated geographically. I think we start doing it naturally when we’re about five. We start negotiating at kindergarten. If you watch little girls and boys, they play completely differently. Girls are already compromising and negotiating at that age. They say ‘if you give me that,

I’ll give you this’. For women, relationships are at the core of networking. Men are possibly more competitive in the way they work. Men’s relationships are built around doing things together, whereas women’s work relationships are built around talking things through together. Men tend to use a lot less words than women.

“Successful business people these days are using a lot more traditionally feminine qualities, like negotiation and artistic qualities. Masculine skills aren’t as valued as they once were. Men are needing to learn many more feminine skills in order to stay on top of business. When you sell a product, you no longer sell a product. You sell a story. Storytelling is such a feminine skill.”

We touch lightly on the New Zea-land way of business and wheth-er Kiwis have a different attitude to it than other nations.

“We’re almost naïve in the way we share and help other people in business,” and she says this with some pride. “The way New Zealanders relate to other New Zealanders in business is differ-ent from the way other people do it. Whenever I’m talking with Americans who have come over for business, they’re always amazed at how much informa-tion New Zealanders will give away about their business that Americans would keep to them-selves. Of course sometimes we make some mistakes with that openness. “ She grins wryly.

“Like telling the world how to produce great kiwifruit. That was a dumb idea.”

She has long conducted business in France and we moved on to the difference between setting up a business there and in New Zealand. Great food for thought for any Kiwi wanting to move into the French marketplace.

“It’s like night and day. I had a restaurant in Paris, which drove me insane trying to run it. The French love bureaucracy. It’s much easier and faster to open anything in New Zealand – a bank account, a business, a relationship. It’s all hugely complicated in France. It’s a much older way of thinking. The Dutch are much better at doing business. They’re very open, in sex and business. New Zealand-ers tend to be a bit the same. We just want everyone to do well. That said, I’m not really a business person. I’m an artist, so I let other people run my busi-ness now. I have producers and publishers to do all that. They do all my marketing and I just do the job.”

I mention watching her series Taste NZ while living in Singapore and ask how she feels about be-coming recognized internation-ally. And it’s now that I realise two things. The first is that there is a part of her that is intensely pri-vate. And the second is that Peta Mathias is becoming a Facebook junkie.

“I found Facebook incredibly helpful in terms of business. That’s why I joined. Not to tell people that I’d just made a cup of tea but to make professional contacts and to let people know what I was doing in terms of food, writing and filming.


“Facebook is a feminine tool – something that women have always done. Now men have picked up on it. I just don’t have the time for Twitter but I’m in love with Facebook. Who would have thought that someone like me who hid from contact with strangers is now addicted to it.

“Up until a few months ago, you couldn’t even contact me through my website because I was so overwhelmed by being a high profile person. I spent a lot of time keeping people away from me. Then my pub-lisher talked me into joining Facebook. Suddenly, all these fans who might have sent an email to TVNZ, who might have forwarded it on to me, found me and were able to say what they felt about Taste NZ. It was the first time I’d had contact with international viewers. It’s cute and wonderful because all sorts of people write to you on Facebook.”

No conversation with Peta Mathias can ever overlook food. It is the base on which so much of her public life is built on. I ask her if she believes there is a creature named New Zealand Cuisine.

“That’s the big question. I think there is. I long for New Zealand food when I’ve been away for a while.” She takes a moment to think. “I think what we do really well is middle of the road. Our produce is sparkling and relatively clean, although not as clean as we like to make out.

“I think once we realised that we weren’t English, that we were a South Pacific nation, our cuisine changed dramatically, although that was a world-wide thing. Australia, America: all these western cuisines suddenly got very good. Peter Gordon

is the obvious example of how we mix different flavours, tech-niques and cuisines from differ-ent parts of the world. In fact, a lot of the really good chefs in London are New Zealanders or Australians.”

Peta pauses again to think on my next question: whether New Zea-landers are innovators or adap-tors when it comes to food.

“… I think we have very adven-turous palates, so we’re a bit of both. We try anything and if it works then great. If it doesn’t we move on and try something else. New Zealand is very lucky with all the different immigrant communities because the first thing we do is start eating their food. Sometimes they can’t get a job in their chosen profession, simply because they’re over-qualified. So they open up a restaurant and we get to profit from that.”

Music also plays a large role in Peta’s life.

“It stems from studying it at school, under Sister Mary Leo (a link she shares with Dames Malvina Major and Kiri Te Kanawa). Most of my books are about food and travel but I al-ways include a lot about music. And now that I have started up my own production company – Redhead Media – there’s always a segment on music. We just finished filming a show on the south of France, due for release early next year in New Zealand.”

There’s time for one more ques-tion and I want to learn a touch more about what makes Peta Mathias tick. So I ask her what it is that makes her get up each morning. She laughs.

“I have to pay the mortgage.

“I just have so much to do. Otherwise I’d stay in bed all day. I love being in bed and it’s getting harder to get out the older I get. Sometimes I just decide not to get out. I’ll get my newspapers and my computer and then spend all morning still in bed if I don’t want to get out. The great thing about working freelance is that you’re free - and it provides inbuilt motiva-tion, because you don’t have a regular pay check every month to cover your life.

“Sometimes, when the sero-tonin levels are low at 5 am, I ask ‘What have I contributed, really, to anyone or anything? Am I a waste of space or is all of this worth it?’ That’s my Irish side, which is very dramatic. Then my feet hit the ground. I have something to eat and the serotonin levels are back up and life is fantastic. I think most art-ists and freelancers spend a lot of time asking themselves “Am I on the right track? Can I do it a better way’.” She shrugs and then says, “maybe it’s the same for people with normal jobs.

“When you freelance, people let you know pretty quickly if you’re doing your job properly. There’s no safety at all. Some people find that very distress-ful but I find it very stimulating. Sure, the freedom is great but you don’t have the financial security that other people have. But I think you do have a much more rewarding life.”

She finishes with a comment that frames her life.

“Success? Success is determined by what you think success means. It’s achieving what you want to achieve.”


Villa Maria

For many people, Bernard Budel has the greatest job in the world. He flies around Europe market-ing one of New Zealand’s best wine brands while also promoting New Zealand itself. His presenta-tions showcase the wine but also extend to the land that produces that wine – Aotearoa. Every good wine de-serves a story. Anyone who thinks wine is just about a liquid should think again. The land and the story surround-ing the wine are almost as im-portant as the wine itself.

Mr

Budel points at Holland as a great place to market New Zea-land wine. Little wine is produced there and the Dutch are not so taken with the French or Spanish styles. Their drinking culture is sophisticated, they have money to spend and are very open-minded. Russia is also a market with huge potential. They love the Western style of living, and wine drinking is seen as something very westernized. They also love anything high-end, and New Zealand wine can be pricey. There are still some legislation problems that mean it is not simple to take wines into Russia but those problems will be smoothed out long term. Russia is in many ways still a young market.

The 2008 vintage caused some problems for New Zealand. An above average harvest that season plus the recession saw the price of NZ wine drop remarkably. For a brief while, New Zealand wine became a mere commodity to be traded, rather than seen as something to be coveted. People with little interest in the New Zealand wine industry were buying up vast tanks of NZ wine and churning it out under pop-up labels with little thought for Brand New Zealand. Holland is an excellent example. Un-storied Kiwi wines that were rushed into the market and were fetching 10 Euros a bottle quickly tumbled to 5 Euros.

2009 was a good vintage, with New Zealand’s usual high quality on offer. However, 2010 is something else.

It was that once in a lifetime season, where the ripening time was extended by an extra month

due to an unexpected drop in temperatures at the crucial time. Mr Budel said “It’s

just blown my mind. It’s wine on steroids. Even old wine hands like

(2007’s NZ Winemaker of the Year) Gordon Russell have

been stunned by the 2010 harvest. Our

Cellar Selection, which is

one step

down from our

premier Re-serve range, is

exceptional.”

The problem that New Zealand wineries

have had this year, and it’s a nice problem to have, is that the 2009 bottles in Europe sold out, with a month’s extra wait for the 2010 bottles.

“It’s not until you come to Europe that you re-

Over a cup of Kiwi-style coffee in Shepherd’s Bush, New Zealand wine marketer Bernard Budel chats about New Zealand wines in Europe and conduct-ing business as a Kiwi there.

photo supplied


alise how good New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc is. Back home we just call it Sav, but here, it’s just so different from anything coming out of the Loire Valley or Chile, South Africa or Tasmania, that you begin to realise that New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc is THE Sauvignon Blanc. Our red wines are good, too. They sit between the big juicy Austral-ian reds and the more earthy French wines – so we offer the best of both worlds. Europe, with its cold winters, needs big red wines. It’s a comfort factor, I think,” said Mr Budel.

Mr Budel moved on to address some of the ad-verse publicity from environmental impacting. “I think we have got through the silly carbon-foot-print backlash. There has been some good work done showing rightfully that one large container

ship from New Zealand filled with wine is going to leave far less of a footprint than a number of lorries trundling through the back lanes of France to the UK and other markets, each only carrying a hundred cases.”

Marketing New Zealand wine is as much about marketing New Zealand as it is about the wine. Mr Budel speaks about European wine tasters being captivated as much by the images of the land that the wine comes from as they are by the wines.

But he has also identified a few key differences in the way New Zealanders and Europeans conduct business, differences that other New Zealand-ers wanting to do business in Europe should

be aware of. He believes that the Europeans are a lot more focused than their Kiwi counterparts, able to plough through work very rapidly. They know how to plan something with great efficiency, then just do it with limited per-sonnel. He also admits that the Europeans have great established networks, sometimes centuries old, that New Zealanders just don’t have the history to tap into. Having existing relationships to call upon helps speed up the busi-ness process. Contrasting with that, Mr Budel points out that European business people really appreciate the openness with which New Zealanders conduct business.

New Zealand wine is still very much a niche market in Europe, competing against wine produc-ers from France, Spain and Italy. In fact, just .005 per cent of the world’s wine production comes from New Zealand. That said, New Zealand wines are known for the fantastic quality they offer and are highly sought-after and much anticipated. With that in mind, if you see any of the 2010 vintage then snap it up quick and prepare to have your mind blown.

Bernard Budel: photo supplied.


So you’re a Kiwi and you have a great idea for a business in the UK. Great. But before you take the plunge, make sure you take some advice from those who have gone before you.

1. Do as much research as you can before you arrive in the UK

2. Make sure you are legal and stay legal.

These are the top two tips from business presentation skills guru Maggie Eyre.

Maggie Eyre: photo supplied

Maggie arrived in the UK from a successful PR career in New Zealand as well as a stellar career in New Zealand theatre. This former artistic director of the New Zealand Performing Arts Centre arrived in the UK and spent her first six months learning the lay of the land – valuable time that could have been spent on the business

itself if she had done the back-ground work while still in New Zealand.

She also fell into some difficul-ties when the time came to renew her UK visa. After a lot of problems, she contacted the New Zealand business group KEA in the UK who quickly put her in touch with a great UK based lawyer who only works with New Zealanders. Problems sorted.

Maggie’s other tip is to get into your own place as soon as possible rather than relying on friends to give you accommoda-tion. Having to pay the rent or mortgage on your own place is a great business catalyst.

“Kiwis speak the same lan-guage. We say how it is,” ac-cording to business coach Paul-ine Wright. “For me, the biggest thing would be to talk to the people that you want to sell to. Are Britons just as passionate about your idea or product as you are?” Just because it was a good idea in New Zealand does not mean it will translate across to the other side of the world. “And get a business coach.”

It’s the kind of advice you’d expect from a business coach, especially in dim economic times but Pauline is not some-one to ignore her own advice. Every week she calls up her New Zealand mentor to talk business and it’s an appointment she wouldn’t dream of cancelling.

Her work with the police and in the navy has taught Pauline a lot about how vital commu-nication is in business, which is why she is now moving into the use of Neuro-Linguistic Programming as a means of self-inspiration for business leaders.

She also has two further pieces of advice.

1. Outsource the work that you hate doing. It has to be done but can be soul-destroy-ing if you hate it.

2. Get connected.

This second piece of advice is something that both Mag-gie and Pauline agree on. In fact, Maggie’s next book will be on networking. And while there are plenty of networks for Kiwis around London – Kea, NZ Society, New Zealand Busi-ness Women’s Network - Pauline would be interested in starting a business network for the Kiwis who live further north. Based in Carlisle, she is in a perfect posi-tion to reach down into Leeds and Manchester or up into Scotland.

Coming up with the ideas does not seem to be a problem for

Starting a Business


New Zealanders. London has seen Allpress Coffee begin roasting coffee beans this year. So too are Nude Espresso. And this year Caravan became the first restaurant in London to roast coffee. The Sacred coffee shops are going from strength to strength while the Coffee-Smith’s Collective are about to open their first coffee shop on Leather Lane – the Depart-ment of Coffee. One would then assume London is well catered for coffee by Kiwi businesses. But sometimes it’s finding the quirky ideas to fill a particular niche in an over-crowded mar-ket.

Sandra Ledger and business partner Chris Nathan have turned to wine, with a twist to their wine label Pukeko Bend.

Pukeko Bend: photo supplied

Rather than attempting to fit into an overcrowded market, they have seen how highly New Zealand wine is thought of in the UK then looked for the gap in the market.

That gap is in the single serve PET bottles ideal for sporting and cultural events and fully recyclable – without the po-tential injury that glass carries. Their aim is to take on the High Street with a great, eco-friendly product. The bottle looks and

feels like glass and should be a winner with event management companies.

Sandra points out that product launches in the UK cost a lot of money if you’re going to do it properly but also agrees that the connections you make can greatly alleviate that. “Who you know in the UK is important,” says Sandra.

The problem with choosing a Kiwi seasonal product like wine is in guaranteeing supply throughout the year. Pukeko Bend have a Central Otago Pinot Noir and a Gibbston Val-ley Sauvignon Blanc bottled for them but waiting on containers to arrive can be frustrating.

Business can be a tricky… busi-ness. More so when setting up in a new country. Key advice amongst those who have gone before: network, network, net-work.

Some people will always shy away from the so-called Kiwi Mafia, that group of New Zea-landers who are happy to re-main staunchly Kiwi-connected while overseas. The problem with staying away from them and “making a go of it on your own” is that these Kiwis are often very well connected in a diverse range of industries.

Britons retain ties to Old Boys networks, Working Men’s Clubs, Conservative Clubs and any number of other associations that allow them to network. New Zealanders aren’t often given the opportunity to en-gage in these groups, at least not until success is proven.

Ignoring fellow Kiwis and the advantages they can bring is to put your business well and truly

on the back foot.

So, network like crazy, do your research before coming over (or before giving up your cur-rent UK job), and remain legal. Three basic tips to get a new business underway. If you have further tips, NZNewsUK would love you to share them with our readers.


ChristchurchIt’s a big church, the Roman Catholic Cathedral of West-minster. Big and imposing. The ground level is brightly lit while the ceiling is dark, as if night and day are both present. Up above, the gloom barely hints at the Byzantine-styled art.

The congregation buzz and hum before the service, then silence descends ten minutes before the vigil starts. It is not an easy silence.

It is not a congregation at ease.

Forgive me if I do not report the facts. Instead, allow me to tell you a story - a true story.

It is 2am as I write. Like many of London’s Kiwis, it feels as if I have not slept for days, staring non-stop at Twitter feeds, news websites, Facebook and a long string of emails, trying to come to grips with the Christchurch earthquake.

I know. Better staring at a com-puter than broken buildings and bodies.

Very few of tonight’s congrega-tion are Catholic - possibly not even Christian. It is a congrega-tion of New Zealanders, gather-ing publicly for the first time to contemplate the Christchurch earthquake. Our grief is still raw.

The earthquake tore apart a city on the other side of the world to us but it also tore apart something inside of us. People we know are dead or still miss-

ing. People we know, family and friends, are homeless. The grief on our faces tonight can only hint at the horrors that Christchurch went through. But they are our horrors too. We are still in shock. You can see it in people’s eyes and hear it in our responses. We are hurt. We cry. We mourn. We are not yet ready to sing or laugh.

There is a season for everything, a time for every occupation un-der heaven:

A time for giving birth, a time for dying; a time for planting, a time for uprooting what has been planted.

A time for killing, a time for heal-ing; a time for knocking down, a time for building.

A time for tears, a time for laughter; a time for mourning, a time for dancing.

Brigadier Phil Gibbons will read these lines from the Book of Ec-clesiastes to us later in the ser-vice. For now, we sit in silence.

At 7pm, a bell sounds and peo-ple stand as Canon Christopher Tuckwell proceeds to the front of the cathedral before wel-coming us. Ngati Ranana, all in black, lead us in Whakaaria Mai/ How Great Thou Art, a song that brings to my mind an image of

the late Sir Howard Morrison. We listen, but few of us sing.

The Brigadier reads Ecclesiastes to us: Chapter Three, verses 1-14. I do not know if the words are a comfort to anyone. They just seem to reflect what is - a time for tears - and what is to come - a time for healing.

Our Prime Minister has sent a message, expressing his

condolences and sympathy and thanking us for gathering together. He promises Christch-urch will be rebuilt... best wishes, John Key.

The message is read out by Derek Leask, New Zealand’s High Commissioner to the United Kingdom. He follows with words of his own, urg-ing us to stand strong. He too thanks us for gathering tonight. He praises the New Zealand community for our energy and spontaneity in banding togeth-er to raise money and organise events like tonight’s so quickly. He singles out this event’s

Remembered


organisers for special mention - Nick Mitchell, Josh Stent and Bronwen Horton.

Before the vigil, I asked Nick and Josh about the service and why they felt compelled to organise it. Nick answered with typical Kiwi straightforwardness. “It’s kind of obvious why we organ-ised it.” Fair play. He continued. “If we hadn’t, someone else would have done it. We just wanted to do something.” And that is how we feel, thousands of miles from New Zealand. We just want to do something.

Nick came up with the idea and ran it by his old uni mate, Josh. They sent an email out to friends and contacts and within three hours the feedback was phenomenal, including inter-est from the High Commission. Then Bronwen Horton put her hand up to help and the service snow-balled to an estimated 5000 people in attendance.

Back to the service.

Ngati Ranana sing again. It’s in Maori but the tune is familiar. I

hum along for a minute before everything clicks. It’s Leonard Cohen’s Alleluia.

Then silence again. This time for two minutes as we call to mind all those who have perished in the quake. Two minute silences usually drag on but not this one.

Paddy Austin, a former Christch-urch City councillor, reads from the accounts of some of the survivors. She manages a wry smile as she fights off the tears. She is not the only one. “Who-ever thought we’d be living in tents and queuing for water,” she reads.

We sing again, this time with Hayley Westenra leading our national anthem. Even now, most people listen or just murmur the words. It is not until Hayley returns to her seat to cry that I remember she’s a Christchurch girl.

There are prayers of remem-brance to follow. The Catholics in the congregation give the correct responses while every-

one else looks despondent. Part of the night’s subdued nature may have been the unfamiliar Catholic words but tonight was the first time that many of us had come face to face with our own grief. We were never going to clap along.

After, Canon Tuckwell farewells us at the door. We are quiet. We greet friends, tentatively shak-ing hands as if something might break and tumble to the floor.

These are still early days for the New Zealand expat commu-nity. Over the next few nights, we will gather in taverns and theatres, cinemas and cafes to raise money and probably to raise glasses; to share a tear and a smile or two, but tonight we have acknowledged our grief as a community away from its home.

Tonight was a turning point for our community of Kiwis in London. We have seen and ac-knowledged the shock and dev-astation in each other. We will still grieve; we will still weep. And some time in the near future we will come together again and officially remember the dead. But right now we will start to rebuild.

To Nick, Josh and Bronwen: thank you.

To Christchurch: we are thinking of you, praying for you and do-ing all in our power to help.

Kia kaha, Christchurch.


Step Up For Christchurch

1037 steps. One grey step after the other. That is the number of stairs it takes to climb London’s Gherkin.

On Sunday, 22 May, 1000 en-trants raced up the Gherkin to help raise funds for Christch-urch.

Major sponsors of the race and Gherkin co-owners Evans Randall hosted a day of racing, music and Kiwi food and wine in an effort to raise £250,000.

Running in the first wave, Ru-pert Sanford-Scutt set the time to beat of 5:02 minutes. The newly qualified teacher had re-cently returned from Auckland and was delighted to head the leader board.

In the penultimate wave of pre-

dominantly walkers, late entrant Danny Bent broke through the five minute barrier. His 4:56 mark was the best of the day. Mr Bent adds the StepUp4 crown to his three World Champion titles in Bog Snorkeling Triathlons.

A charity adventurer, he has also recently completed a 15,000 km bike ride from England to India. His book chronicling the trek, You’ve Gone Too Far This Time, Sir, is just short of best-seller status. He plans to cycle to the North Pole in 2013.

First woman to the top, in an im-pressive 5:46, was Gillian Banks.

Kent Gardner of Evans Randall addressed the crowd, thank-ing them for their support. “We wanted to show Christchurch

what we could do,” he said. “Today, you’ve shown them.” When Mr Gardner spoke, the total charity funds raised had exceeded £275,000 and was ex-pected to go beyond £300,000.

For those disinclined to exer-tion, there was also an option to pay to take the lift to the top floor.

Back on the ground, performers kept a party-like atmosphere going. Opera trio Elysium 3 wowed the crowd throughout the day. Maori performance group Manaia coaxed volun-teers on stage and led them in the haka Ka Mate. Troubadors Laura Tapp and Matt Mitchin-son also produced sterling sets filled with some classic Kiwi songs.

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A fter a couple of tough years, SCAPackaging in Lucca, Italy have plenty tocelebrate and did so in style during their

recent open house. Customers, suppliers and specialguests were invited to the event in Lucca, Italy’straditional heart of paper-making, for presentations,interactive modules and an exclusive walk-throughof the paper mill.

The event acknowledged the completerefurbishment of SCA’s PM2 and celebrated thereturn of their mill to full productivity after the roofcaved in one year ago. The introduction of two newproducts to roll off the paper machines was alsogreeted with enthusiasm by customers.

Participants gathered at the stylish Villa Rossi justoutside the city of Lucca. Introductions andcongratulations were held over a light lunch before arange of speakers addressed the participants. After ageneral welcome by the Managing Director, ClaudioRomiti, the audience listened to two of Lucca’sleading public servants. Signore Alberto Baccini,mayor of the Porcari municipality of Lucca, thanked

32

SCA for making its home in Lucca. He stated thatbusinesses like SCA played a great part in alleviatingthe effects of poverty felt in the region by thedownturn of the economy.

Signore Stefano Bacelli, President of Luccaprovince, related how he had been present at the millwhen its roof had collapsed in 2009. He mentionedthat he was both amazed and impressed by how thestaff of SCA Lucca managed to turn the disasteraround, returning to peak productivity in just fourmonths. He too thanked SCA for its continuedpresence and economic input into the area.

The open day was was also attended by MichaelCronin, President of SCA Packaging. Mr Croninopened with the concept of sustainability and what itmeans to SCA. At heart, sustainability came down tothree factors: environment, cultures and profitability.“Without these three significant ingredients, we don’thave a successful business for the future,” he said.

He went on to say that SCA is fully committed tominimising its environmental footprint by leavingthe least footprint behind and maximising the scarce

Italian Open House32

CELEBRATING ONE MILESTONE MAKES FOR A GOOD EVENT,CELEBRATING SEVERAL MILESTONES MAKES THAT EVENT SPECIAL.

A report byJoseph Hoye

OPENHOUSE INLUCCAFORSCA

Open House


The View From


Camera Copy SuppliedOriginal text supplied by writing agency.

Keyword: Casio Exilim Pro EX-P700

The $599 Casio Exilim Pro EX-P700 has much to offer users who want lots of features and relatively good ease of use. And despite its poky performance and inconveniently scattered analog buttons, there’s a lot under the hood to appeal to serious amateurs and point-and-shooters alike.

The all-metal, dark grey and nickel-trimmed EX-P700 is light, slim, and generally well built; despite its lack of an effective non-slip grip or surface and a flimsy plastic door concealing its ports, it’s easy to hold and operate, even one-handed. The optical viewfinder is more accurate than those on many comparable cameras, but it lacks a focusable diop-ter, essential for eyeglasses wearers. On the other hand, its 2-inch LCD is bright, and the text menus are highly readable and well organized. The select dial can be easily rotated by thumb, but many of the analog buttons require both hands to access. Oddly, several of the buttons are on the side, rather than the back of the camera, forcing the user to tilt the camera to read the abbreviations. While the camera has a PC connector for attaching an external strobe with bracket, it doesn’t have a more convenient hot shoe.

Like its predecessor, the 6MP EX-P600, the EX-P700 has a Canon f/2.8 to f/4 4X optical zoom lens, which has slightly wider angle coverage 7.1 to 28.4 mm (equivalent to 33 to 132 mm in 35-mm) than most comparable cameras. It has virtually the same feature set as the EX-P600, including aperture and shutter priority, manual exposure mode, Best Shot Selector, and visual help cues that pop up when you press the Set button, as well as exposure, white bal-ance, and focus bracketing. One feature we found disappointing is the camera’s video mode: It can only shoot 320-by-240 video, though it can shoot until memory is full.

It does, however, have some nifty (but less critical) features, such as a world alarm clock with voice message capability, a self-timer that shoots three consecutive images and lets you select the best, and a month calendar that displays a thumbnail of the first shot taken on each date. On the LCD, users can select a variety of views, including grid lines and...

Camera Copy RewriteTitle: Casio Exilim Pro EX-P700

Subtitle: Room for growth

Summary: A solid effort by Casio that has some-thing for everyone.

Keywords: Casio Exilim Pro EX-P700

The Casio Exilim Pro EX-P700 is not the greatest performing 7MP around but it gets the job done.

Press the power button and the Casio Exilim Pro EX-P700 boots up in 3.1 seconds, which isn’t too bad but recycling click to click with flash and LCD enabled drops the performance to a poor 4.6 seconds. That’s a long time to wait before tak-ing another photo. Thankfully shutter lag is just 1/10th of a second.

The lens is a Canon f/2.8 to f/4, 33mm-132 mm equivalent and will take additional auxiliary Canon lenses if an adapter is fitted. The Casio Exilim Pro EX-P700 is capable of 4x optical zoom-ing plus 4x digital zooming but I’d rather not use the digital, preferring to crop on my PC at a later stage. With 7MP to play with and an average resolution of 1475 lines, cropping is definitely the better choice.

Daylight images are good, though they can be a fraction underexposed. Indoor flash images are excellent up to 12 feet but beyond that, the Casio Exilim Pro EX-P700 will struggle. The Casio Exilim Pro EX-P700 also struggles a little in low-light conditions, providing some decidedly grainy images. Generally, I couldn’t wish for sharper im-ages in standard conditions. The colours are also very good with surprisingly realistic flesh tones in indoor flash portraits.

Unfortunately, there is no RAW format available in the Casio Exilim Pro EX-P700 but the JPEG and TIFF formats are more than adequate. The aver-age file size is about 4.5 MB large so it’s really important to purchase a large SD card.

The lack of a diopter adjustment makes the opti-cal viewfinder difficult for people with glasses but while the LCD screen does chew through power, it is thankfully both bright and crystal clear...


Title: Los Abrigados Resort

Subtitle: A place to recharge and revive.

Summary: This family and pet friendly resort goes out of its way to provide every facility you could hope for.

Keyword: Los Abrigados Resort & Spa

The Los Abrigados Resort & Spa is set in the stun-ning red rocks of Sedona, Arizona. This is a great place to bring the family AND get some much needed pampering. The spa part of the resort offers massages, hot stone treatments, exercise regimes and full body skin treatments.

Surrounded by 22 acres of land, the Los Abriga-dos Resort & Spa caters for all but the most snobbish of holidaymakers. The buildings are in a Spanish style, reflecting some of Arizona’s heritage. Each unit comes with at least two large screen TVs, a balcony, mini-kitchen and a wet bar plus space to comfortably accommodate four people. The larger units contain full kitchens, dining rooms and in some cases a Jacuzzi. But the Los Abrigados Resort & Spa isn’t just for self-catering holidays, with several on-site restaurants available.

Children will have an amazing time here at the Los Abrigados Resort & Spa. There is a fantastic kids club available to dispel even the slightest hint of boredom as well as giving the adults the opportunity to make the most of the spa ameni-ties. The club generally meets poolside most days.

For the really energetic guest, the Los Abriga-dos Resort & Spa provides basketball and ten-nis courts, Bocce courts, a well-stocked weights room and many other activities.

But staying at the Los Abrigados Resort & Spa isn’t just about frenetic activity or even treating yourself to some pampering. There are plenty of quiet secluded spaces to just get away from everything.

The Los Abrigados Resort & Spa is part of the Tlaquepaque community, full of great...

Travel Copy Rewrite

Travel Copy SuppliedKeyword: Los Abrigados Resort & Spa

I have noticed that a lot of members write reviews on Travel and Hotels and I have ruminated, it must be fun to able to travel so extensively. I'm afraid working in the building trades doesn't allow our family to get away for vacations. Therefore I decid-ed to write reviews on some of the popular aspects of Arizona, not as a visitor but as a resident. I will start with my very favorite part of Arizona, Sedona.

Los Abrigados, more than any other Sedona hotel, epitomizes what Sedona has to offer. Los Abrigados in located right in the center of Sedona on twenty-eight prime acres, partially located on state route 179, partially on Oak Creek and strategically ad-jacent to Tlaquepaque, a wonderful collection of boutiques, art galleries and restaurants set within a cluster of architecturally innovative, classically designed buildings. Tlaquepaque, which started out as a artist colony in the seventies, has transmogri-fied over the years into a quaint, aged, old world appearing, commercial dynamo, which, settled among ancient sycamore trees and other indig-enous vegetation, the babbling of Oak Creek and towering red cliffs, itself, has become the destina-tion of many artists and the subject of numerous paintings. Fascinated by this intriguing, faux aged relic, I myself, have dabbled in painting Tlaque-paque. I admit to a certain amount of awe, when visiting Tlaquepaque, maybe even envy, that I, a designer/builder, have never created anything this clever and wonderful. But I digress. Back, to Los Abrigados. Los Abrigados and Tlaquepaque seem to be enjoying, a very successful symbiotic relation-ship. Tlaquepaque provides the atmosphere and shopping while Los Abrigados has the lodging and restaurants. While I have not tried all the restau-rants in the fast growing community of Sedona, I have tried several and have come to the conclusion that restaurants are not one of the towns strong points. However, Los Abrigados features three fine restaurants, a classy sports bar, an Italian restau-rant and a steak house. I gravitate to the sports bar. I have stayed at Los Abrigados only once, in the win-ter, in a standard room with two queen size beds. The room rate was above average (about $185) and that was several years ago. Remember, tourist season in Arizona, is fall through spring....


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