1 May

Hmm, maybe not much of interest to blogger friends. Dick spends time walking, and watching TV series and movies; and I am hard at work on my policy report and presentations I will be making over the next few months. So no new and beautiful photos.

Most presentations here begin with a mihi, or Maori opening that both welcomes the audience and situates the speaker. I really like them. Maori describe their affiliation with their mountains, rivers, oceans, and ancestors before they introduce themselves. I have an affiliation with a river (the Niagara) and ocean (Atlantic), but to my dismay, not a mountain. So I thought about the one I loved to ski and came up with Mansfield. So here is my mihi, that I am working on with a Maori speaker:

Tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou, tēnā koutou katoa. Nga Mihi Katoa nga Rangatira o tenei ra. Ko Mansfield te māunga. Ko Niagara te awa. Ko Atlantic te moana. Ko Marikena te iwi. Ko Jody ahau. E ki ana te whakatauki. He aha te mea nui o te Ao? He tangata, he tangata, he tangata.

[Translation: Welcome, welcome, three times welcome! Greeting to all leaders present today. My mountain is Mansfield. My river is Niagara. My sea is the Atlantic. My iwi (tribe/nationality) is American. I am Jody. The proverb says, What is so important in the world? The people, the people, the people.]

I have one more week in Wellington before going to Hamilton, then Auckland for a week. After that, I will only be conducting research in Wellington. I find it ironic that we typically go to the distant places before the ones right in front of our noses. Still, I will have two months to explore schools and refugee resources in my home base, so it should give me the chance for one in-depth place.

So far I have about 30 pages written about the new refugee resettlement policy and how it makes/does not make sense. It seems to me that the ministry has over-reacted to problematic statistics. Agreed, a stat indicating that only 29% of refugees are employed after five years of resettlement is problematic, no question. But I hate to see them take the US tactic of making a job, any job, the biggest priority, for so many reasons. A little more attention to English acquisition and they could go for living wage jobs. Poverty is associated with poor education, which simply perpetuates the model of poverty, poor wages and more kids under-schooled. I expect that in the US. But NZ has prided itself on being a social welfare state, and as a result, they should reconsider moving in the direction of the US model that does not help people rise above an impoverished state. I will recommend that employment is certainly of major importance, but that education comes before employment, so that refugees can rise to a point at which they not only support their children to become vital citizens, but they also contribute more to the national income and care about being Kiwis.

I will probably write again after time in Hamilton. Til then, kia ora!