In the Summertime

On the 11th of July 1970, I went to the record store in Castricum, near my home in Bakkum, where I lived with my grandparents. The scent of sunscreen already hung in the air, a whisper of freedom as days stretched longer and school tests were behind us. Most weeks I would go to the store to pick up a copy of the Radio Veronica Top 40.

It was ironic that while they were an illegal Pirate Radio Station on the North Sea, you could go to a record store and buy their merchandise. I don’t think I managed to keep any of those weekly sheets, although I do have some Songster booklets with the lyrics in them that I used to buy in the same shop.

On this particular week, the number one hit was a song called In the Summertime, by a band that had seemingly come out of nowhere, called Mungo Jerry. The song hit number one in 26 countries and sold more than 30 million copies.

The band played their first major gig under the name Mungo Jerry only the week before at the Hollywood Festival at Newcastle-under-Lyme, Staffordshire, in the west midlands of England. They were a real contrast to many of the other bands on the stage, which included the likes of Ozzy Osborne’s Black Sabbath, the Grateful Dead, and Ginger Baker’s Airforce, who I would get to know and love when staying at an Auckland urban commune called Foul Farm (for reasons you will learn in a future chapter) 6 years later.

In the Summertime was fresh, a feel-good song. If you are of my generation, you will remember it. Ray Dorset was the leader and wrote the song, which just seemed to resonate and stand out from some of the heavier music, which I also loved.

So switch forward two years and I am back living with my parents in the bush in Titirangi, a great village in the west Auckland rainforest. On the 25th of January 1972, I went to Western Springs to watch, you got it, Mungo Jerry. I was excited as I followed the big line going into the amphitheatre with some of my Kelston Boys High School friends. It was summer and the music of the day continued to be awesome.

1972, a year where bell bottoms danced to the rhythm of change. Rock legends like David Bowie and Elton John painted the airwaves with sonic rainbows, their voices soaring from stadium speakers to AM radios nestled under dashboards. Meanwhile, soul sisters like Roberta Flack and Aretha Franklin poured their hearts into every note, weaving tapestries of emotion that still shimmer today. It was a year where every melody felt like a shared secret, a whispered promise of a brighter future, all wrapped in the warm glow of analog fuzz. Those were the days, friend, a golden age etched in vinyl grooves and singalong choruses.

These were still conservative times, although that was changing. These were the days when one of my idols Stefanne Grapelli would say in a concert in Auckland’s Town Hall, that the only thing open in Auckland on a Sunday, were umbrellas, and he wasn’t that wrong. For many years, a strong Christian influence meant Sundays were largely observed as a day of rest, with most shops and businesses closed. This reflected a cultural value placed on religious observance and family time.

So switch back to Western Springs and Ray Dorset is chatting to us between the songs, saying the usual things of ‘You are the best audience we have played to.” and probably in his mind, adding this week. But he did appear to be enjoying the visit to New Zealand.

He then told a joke, which was mildly funny. I remember it to this day. I stood reasonably close to the stage, in front of the concrete steps where people usually sat to watch speedway motor racing. It was a longish joke, but the crux of it was that a boy was saying to a girl, “I’ve got something you haven’t got.” To which the girl replied, “My mommy told me that with what I’ve got, I can get what you’ve got, anytime I want.”

We laughed, it was funny and corny at the same time. But some people didn’t agree. I can’t find any record of the news story, but this happened folks. A week later we heard on the news that the band Mungo Jerry had been banned from performing in New Zealand, I think for 3 years as a consequence of this joke. I remember thinking that the band would think this was a bigger joke than theirs and that they probably wouldn’t have been coming back all this way anyway.

I really enjoyed the Western Springs concert, and many more great bands, on their way up and towards the dying embers of their careers. But this one was a bit special, because it took me back to my little room overlooking the cobbled Dr Jacobilaan street, in the house where I was born in Bakkum, North Holland, listening to a transistor radio loaned to me by my uncle Tom, whose bedroom on the first floor of our home backed on to mine. The radio would sit inside the drawer of my wooden desk. I had experimented many times and found a sweet spot where the music seemed to be amplified and got a lot more bass from the reverberation coming from the desk drawer.

I had desperately wanted to stay in Holland, and not return to New Zealand, where I had bad memories from the break-up of my parents. I had good friends in Holland, lots of big brothers and sisters, and a home where I felt safe and secure. But on this day in Auckland, I felt great and the rest of the world slipped away as it does when you are living in the moment at a concert.

Remember Mungo Jerry? Not exactly rock gods, mind you, but they were entertaining. Did you ever catch one of their concerts, all smiles and sunshine even when the rain poured down? “Lady Rose” still gets stuck in my head, and wouldn’t you know it, I think your old denim jacket might still have a bootleg cassette stashed in the pocket. Spill the beans, did we groove to them together? Let’s rewind to those hazy, happy days!

You Can Get Anything You Want

Arlo Guthrie’s Alice’s Restaurant came out in 1967 and being a student of Delta Blues, what appealed to me was the structure of the melody. I played it a lot at jam sessions, although I never got more than about 10 minutes into the song, although like many of the concept albums of the day, I knew most of the lyrics.

This was such a clever song and story, starting as you might remember “This song is called Alice’s Restaurant, and it’s about Alice, [pause] and the restaurant, but Alice’s Restaurant is not the name of the restaurant, that’s just the name of the song, and that’s why I called the song Alice’s Restaurant.” There was also a movie. The whole movie is here on YouTube. Here is the trailer.

I love a good story. Anyway, 1975 was the era when there were amazing concerts in Albert Park on a Sunday. I saw so many great bands and gigs there with my friends. The talent at the time was awesome, the sun was hot and the music was free.

Sometimes we would get there early and watch the ‘bible bangers’ and engage in some light banter with them. But that is the topic of another chapter, which includes a nasty beating (not me, but a close friend of mine) by a group of Head Hunters and how I became an unintended guru for a short period of time.

Here are a couple of my best friends from back in the day with one of the preachers, who could be seen on many a street corner in Auckland on Sundays from the Britomart bus station to the fountain in Albert Park, which was a speaker’s corner.

By the fountain in Albert Park

So back to Albert Park. Sundays involved catching the bus or often walking from home in Ponsonby. Being there early we would usually get pretty close to the front of the concrete area in front of the stage.

The bands included Blerta, who would arrive on their bus and play some awesome music, Dance All Around World would have to be a favorite.

Others of the day included Hello Sailor, The Dudes, Street Talk with Hammond Gamble, and Marc Hunter’s Dragon whose house our Richmond Rd house backed onto at one stage, and who sometimes used our school for practice sessions.

Anyway, one evening a few of us went to a house in Grey Lynn where an interesting assemblage of people was talking about making movies, drawing storyboards, and discussing storylines. There was a guy called Wally who played some nice blues, and we had a bit of a jam.

His style was a lot like Mississippi John Hurt, one of the artists whose style I had cut my teeth on when I was about 15, after a family friend Mike loaned me a TAB book of his songs. More on that later, when I went on a Blues Pilgrimage with Charmaine and visited his home in Avalon MS.

I made up a small series of videos about going to visit John Hurt’s home and in this video, which is also a little about my journey with prostate cancer. On it, I play one of the songs I learned back when I was 15 from the book of Delta Blues. I was amazed later when I bought his album Memories, I think from the World Record Club and he almost played it as well as me. OK sorry, that was a Dad joke. He was a legend.

Back to that house in Grey Lynn, a suburb on the outskirts of Auckland, which back then was an awesome community of mostly students and Pacific Islanders. The rents were pretty cheap back then. Today it is a very upmarket suburb.

There were a few musicians there, and the man who was leading the storyboard discussion was Bruno Lawrence, who should need no introduction to you, being the patriarch of Blerta, the family, and the band.

Another person who happened to be there was Tim Shadbolt. Tim was saying that he had a slot coming up at one of the Albert Park Sunday concerts, and he was wondering what he was going to talk about, not that he needed a topic, he was a master of adlib oratory. This will give you an idea.

We protested against the Vietnam War and other things that worried us as young people. I had friends who were facing the draft.

Many people thought of Tim and many of us, as the f***wit fringe, but he was, in fact, a skilled orator, witty, intelligent, and with a calling, which he followed through with, first railing against the system, then realizing that we are the system and going into politics, being elected as Mayor over the years of two New Zealand cities.

So back to Alice’s Restaurant. I just happened to be playing the theme on the guitar at this point in the discussion, and I suggested to him that he could weave a story around the tune. People there would recognize it and see the humor in his story woven around the theme tune. Tim agreed it would be a fun idea, and he asked if I would be keen to play the guitar while he did his oratory. Well, he didn’t have to ask me twice, I was in.

So I came to find myself playing this theme for probably about 20 minutes while Tim entertained the crowd with a story, which included many of my friends, lounging on the grass laughing and cheering as he preached his Bullshit and Jellybeans philosophy that we had grown up with.

Shout me a coffee?

I can’t remember who the band was that headlined that day, it might have been Blerta. I do remember it was a popular one as there was an above-average-sized audience of maybe a thousand people. At the end of our spot, Tim thanked me and I joined my friends in the audience to soak up the rest of the afternoon.

We weren’t friends, although I saw Tim often in those days, at Auckland University, at friends’ homes, and at protest marches, such as the battle to bring our soldiers home from Viet Nam.

Some years later when I was a Civil Defence Rescue Team Leader in Waitemata City Council, the first Auckland council to have one, Tim was Mayor of the city at the time. I was really impressed at how he had tried to change the system as a student and rebel, protestor, and subsequently became a leader in the system.

I don’t recall how it came about, but one day in the council building I happened to see his diary for the coming week and I was super impressed to see how busy he was. On an average day, he seemed to have 15-20 events to go to from meetings to opening buildings and speaking opportunities. I don’t think many people were aware of how hard he worked.

Today many people feel he is past his use-by date, but he has certainly served New Zealand in office for decades and has served New Zealand well IMHO.

In My Life

My Ongoing Autobiography tracks my adventures in life together with a Spotify Top 500 list of songs that accompany my journey.

Turn up your volume and click on the link to hear the songs I am sharing!

I’ve always wanted to have a book where you could actually listen to relevant music at the same time as you read. That’s why I’m starting this blog series, where I’ll be sharing songs that have been and are part of the fabric of my life and the stories behind them.

Take “Norwegian Wood” by The Beatles. This song is a masterpiece from the album Rubber Soul, and it’s one that has had a profound impact on my life.

When I was a kid, I didn’t really understand the lyrics to “Norwegian Wood.” But as I got older, I started to appreciate the song’s complex emotions and its beautiful melody.

“Norwegian Wood” is a song about loss and longing. It’s about the pain of being in love with someone who doesn’t love you back. But it’s also a song about hope. It’s about the belief that even though love can hurt, it’s still worth it.

I hope you’ll listen to “Norwegian Wood” and share your own thoughts and memories in the comments below. And if you like this post, be sure to subscribe to my blog so you don’t miss any future installments!

According to an interview in 1980, Lennon described it as his “first real major piece of work”. He said that it came about when English journalist Kenneth Allsop commented that he should write songs about his childhood. How serendipitous it was that it was the song that came to mind in coming up with the first song on my list.

He rewrote the song into the one we know and love today because he felt the original lyrics, about the places he went past when he caught the bus into Liverpool, were ridiculous. He called it “the most boring sort of What I did on My Holidays’ Bus trip song”. Sage words of advice for me to ponder as I embark on this journey.

Mojo Magazine named this song as the best song of all time in the year 2000 and it has featured on many lists of top Beatles songs, and songs in general, including Rolling Stones 500 greatest songs of all time in 2004.

I’m sure you know the lyrics well yourself. We remember the places and people we have been to and known, but we can’t go back. Well we can, but they have changed, while the memories haven’t. Miranda Lambert captured this really well in another song on my list, The House That Built Me.

If music is the fabric of our lives, then the memories of what we were doing when we first heard them, map the timelines. Most of us can listen to a song that we love and evoke memories of what we were doing at the time, where we were living, and who the important people were in our lives; friends, lovers, and even people we didn’t like.

In My Life turned into a love song, as Lennon rewrote it to make it more commercial and less self-indulgent, as one of my lecturers at Berklee Music used to call the songwriters’ weakness.

In My Life, the perfect soundtrack for an autobiography

So I think back to 1965. Our family at the time was composed of myself, my parents and my little brother, aged 2. We were living in our first home of many, in Titirangi, a village in the west of Auckland City.

It was a great house, edging onto the bush, neighbouring Titirangi Primary School, which was an awesome school, with strong links to the Ministry of Education. Titirangi School was involved in experimenting with many aspects of education, supported by an office at Lopdell House in the Titirangi township, which is now home to an art gallery, the Titirangi Theatre, a restaurant, and up to 11 small local businesses.

I often visited there when it was part of the Education Department, going up and down the lift to the third or fourth floor, as in some ways I was part of the experiment. I might come back to that later in this book.

Our house at 1A View Rd had a gravel driveway and a large section. It was surrounded by fruit trees. We had oranges, apples, lemons, grapefruit, mandarins, and even a large fig tree.

To the back and side of the house, we had beautiful native bush which was part of my playground. In summer I would have many adventures in the bush, and once I discovered a track that led me to the school playing field, I would take that route to school in summer. In winter the track became muddy, and I walked along the road. The Waitakere Ranges which Titirangi edges is part of a rain forest that provides drinking water for the west of Auckland.

On the radio, in 1965 a new talent emerged in New Zealand. Ray Columbus and the Invaders won the inaugural Loxene Golden Disk Award with the song ‘Til We Kissed. He would become a star, particularly due to his head-shaking dance to a subsequent hit, called She’s a Mod.

In my later years, I would often see and talk to the diminutive man with a big legacy and heart, when I had a stall at the Takapuna Sunday Markets. I would get up at 4 am and set up a stall selling holographic novelties. I would often sit there playing the guitar while waiting for my next prospect.

The Lawson Quins were born in 1965. They were New Zealand’s first quintuplets to be born and survive. Later as a young adult, I would live on the same road as them in Massey and would see them from time to time.

Kiri Te Kanawa also became a household name that year, winning the Mobil Song Contest.

Back to me. I was in Standard 2, and if memory serves me well, my teacher was Mrs Tuoro. As the only Maori teacher in the school, she taught us action songs, stick dances, and Haka, which we boys particularly enjoyed.

We had a school pool and I proudly arrived home with certificates for doing things like swimming the mammoth distance of 25 feet. I remember the smell of the chlorine that got mixed by pulling a bucket with ropes extending to each side of the pool. Those ropes would be dragged up and down the length of the pool until the supervising teacher felt the chemicals had been appropriately mixed.

I enjoyed swimming and other sports, although my coordination wasn’t great where a bat was involved or in athletics. I was pretty handy in squares and played on a school soccer team. Safety rules were a lot more relaxed then, and Mr McLaren a great teacher and coach was able to fit an entire team in the back of his Morris van for away games.

The only negative, and maybe one of the reasons I used the bush track, was because there was a kid a few houses towards the school who was older and bigger than me, who bullied me from time to time.

For example, I took the initiative with all our lemon trees to make lemonade. I had a jug, cups, and ice and sold the refreshing drink to kind people walking along the road. I don’t recall how much for, probably a halfpenny. Yes, this was before the days of decimal currency. That makes me feel really old!

Anyway, I remember one day, this bully came along, slapped me around, and threw everything off my table at the top of my drive, smashing my glass jug full of refreshing juice. Such is youth. This person would later apologise, on orders of his parents, but took advantage of opportunities to let me know that he didn’t like me.

He was a rarity, though. I had plenty of friends and attending a school reunion decades later, caught up with people whose children were then going to the same school. Even though we were just little kids at the time, we remembered our friendships and the years seemed to melt away.

Life was simple then. Later in life, I was to hit some stormy weather, as I wrote in my song Life Is Simple When You’re Five.

Did this resonate with you? Please leave a comment and tell someone about this blog if you think it will be of interest to them.

A Few Hours of Bliss at Float Culture

I arrived in an addled state this morning at 11AM for my 10AM appointment for a float and massage at Float Culture. It was in my diary for 10AM, but somehow that’s when I had booked my taxi to pick me up. I only got a few hours sleep last night, that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it.

When I got there, they told me they had cancelled my appointment because I hadn’t turned up, even though I had confirmed this morning. I just tapped the button, not even reading it, or I would have realised and called for an earlier cab. How often do you do that with EFTPOS or paywave, just hit accept without looking at the price?

Anyway, after my heart dropped, it turned out I was in luck and despite messing everyone around, they were able to fit me in. They asked if a Pod was OK rather than one of the newer ‘rooms’. When I’m floating on Epsom Salts laden water in the quiet and dark it could be a farm water trough for all I care.

I keep a pain diary so that I can discuss my physio treatment, exercises etc for my back injury with the team of people assigned to restoring my health and getting me back to work. (3 bulging disks pushing against nerves which has kept me off work for 6 months) The injury has me at a pain level of 6-7/10 most of the time and that’s with some hard hitting pain medications. This morning I was up at 2AM (6/10) 3-4AM (7/10) and up again at 6AM with 6/10.

Once I was in the pod, for some reason I struggled to keep my mind quiet and even using breathing techniques, my brain would be off on some tangent before I could count 5 breathes in and out and the hour was over all too soon, BUT I could barely feel my back when I got out of the tank for a shower and I still had a massage to come.

Now I’m no biochemist and my understanding was that endorphins are what used to give me the bright colours and the grin that wouldn’t stop, back before I had radiation therapy, and enkephalins are the body’s natural painkillers, but it seems they both come from the same part part of your brain. I didn’t have the buzz, but I also didn’t have the pain!

Anyway I went straight from the tank to the massage room for an hour of total relaxation.

At the end Kim said to take as long as I needed. I could have quite happily gone to sleep at that point. Well when I did get up from there, I was pain free, I was able to stand up and with a bright red rosy face, I felt the way you probably take for granted. I was able to put my track pants and shoes on without grunting and groaning. I was even able to stand up, leaning on a counter to look out the window watching for the cab to arrive without any pain.

Now to be fair, after the taxi ride home I was up to 3/10 and now I’m now at 4/10 but that’s still a lot less than 6-7. It will go back to 6-7, but I can’t describe how good it felt to be pain free without the use of drugs. No other treatment other than morphine has been able to do that for me in the last 6 months.

If you have any sort of chronic pain injury, I strongly recommend not just having the float, but combining the two. If you think how relaxed you feel after a massage, imagine having the massage when you are already totally relaxed. I pay a membership subscription and occasionally I get given a voucher for someone to get a free float (does not include a massage).

If you live in Auckland, leave a comment and I’ll use some random method to let someone try it for FREE. Find out more about floating on their website. I’ll pick one person on 1 December. Think of it as an early Christmas present. That’s worth $100, but I’m sure you’ll agree the outcome is worth much more. Do remember it is sensory deprivation so if you get claustrophobic, this is not for you.

Meanwhile if you’re still here, I’m going to get into the Delorean and zip back to 4 October 1987 for my 3rd float. You can go back to my previous blog for the 2nd one.

Now just to set the scene, I was working for a company that was bleeding money for no obvious reason (yet). I was making sales for 6 figure sums of money, delivering cheques in some instances, but somehow even though they had been cashed, they never seemed to reach the company bank account. It got worse from there when not long later I arrived at work on my way to a sailing weekend on the family yacht, to find out why my pay hadn’t been deposited. I met the receivers who were in the processing of padlocking the office door. To make matters worse, a certain person (not me) had taken a first class family world trip on my company credit card (note, if you get one of those, you are jointly and severally liable for any debt) and the bank took me for the money. I ended up losing just under $40,000 and I was just an employee and had to refinance our home. Take it that I was a little stressed.

So, off to the Belleview Clinic in Mt Eden on 4 October. This is what I wrote:

“My third float. Nothing spectacular. I didn’t feel any more relaxed, or different. The float itself was unremarkable, anticlimactic. Yet as I sat down to relax afterward, I felt a vibration throughout my body and a general sense of well-being. Not euphoric, but content.

I concentrated some energy on relaxing my jaw, probably the last place where I still felt stress from clenching my teeth.

Driving home I felt rag-doll relaxed, although I still felt fragile in the face of pressure, real or imagined. (Note at this stage I wasn’t aware the company I worked for was being embezzled, I just knew something was seriously amiss), It is difficult going from a cocoon to a demanding environment. I felt like I didn’t want to let go of the comfort of zero responsibility that I enjoyed in the tank.

The current edition available from Amazon

My general bearing and outlook was positive and I could see many parallels to other relaxation methods like meditation. I felt as though I was taking a short cut. It was interesting that subsequently I read similar comments in ‘The Book of Floating‘. It has been compared to many ‘laboristic’ relaxation methods including Yoga and acupuncture. 

There is a notebook of floater’s comments, a visitors book in the lounge at the clinic. Every comment is positive. Most people are there to solve personal problems and seem to want to apply mystical meaning to the amazing results. That’s not surprising off course when their bloodstreams are getting a rush of natural brain produced opiates.

I found myself holding back from conclusions, but was keenly looking forward to moving beyond release of tension and balancing myself, to getting creative with the tank and finding new ways to benefit from sensory deprivation. 

I subsequently did that and had all sorts of experiences and experiments that you can read about in future blogs about these awesome tanks. Bookmark or subscribe to this blog to find out more. If it’s boring you to tears, sorry, this is my personal soapbox and like the woman who was offended by the 2 minute song, based on the doppler effect, that I performed in one of my sets at the Parnell Rose Festival many years ago, called What I Like About Reefton. She stood up and said ‘That’s not very nice” and left her seat in the audience. If you want other types of blogs feel free to visit one of my other blogs like The Future Diaries , Location Is Everywhere , First Home Buyers Training or SoLoMo Consulting.

 

On Homelessness, Being Trustworthy and the SuperBowl

Yesterday I had a day off between two holidays. I was going to go for a Fly Your Own Scenic Flight in a Cessna 162 at Ardmore, but the weather looked a bit dodgy and my car got trailered to an auto electrician in Pt Chevalier at lunchtime on Friday who said he was going to check the diagnostics and let me know why the engine lights kept coming up. Ardmore is an hour from here so a long drive with a high risk of rain.

I rang them 3 times after that and they said he was really busy and would call me back. I’ve been ringing ever since and I think he’s taken the long weekend off. It’s now Tuesday. We’ll come back to trustworthiness again later. This guy has been trustworthy before and was recommended by the man I bought my car off as an expert in Corvette’s. He didn’t let me down the other time I went to him. I suspect he is the sort of person that takes on more than he can handle and that frustrates his manager who in the end wouldn’t let me speak to him. So I’m not sure how I’m getting to work tomorrow or when I will see my car next. I think the thing about trustworthiness is it must be pervasive and consistent. It wasn’t.

Anyway, the weather improved a bit and I borrowed a car off my daughter and went into town to visit my friend and your Giapo for a chat.

I parked at Sky City, because it was free courtesy of a couple of poker matches and walked down Queen Street, where in almost every doorway sat someone with a hat out, not making eye contact, mostly no note and a vacant drug stare in their eyes, not the “I can feel it coming in the night” rush I saw on Louis Theroux’s Dark State – Heroin Town on TV recently, this was more like everyone was isolated in the same bad trip.

I had about $18 in coins in my pocket, planning to give some to buskers if they were making an effort, given that I had done some busking in my teens and I respect people who are prepared to make some sort of a trade for value.

Then I walked past this white guy, (his term) in a tidy shirt, clear drugless blue eyes and a hat in front of him with a lonely silver coin looking up at me from it. I turned around and walked back. I asked him if we could chat and if I could ask him a few questions. He looked me straight in the eye, blue eyes to blue eyes and said “Sure, I’m not going anywhere. What do you want to ask me?”

I said “I don’t want to offend you, but how did it come to this?”

He told me that a couple of years earlier he had been working as a labourer, had an accident which left him unconscious in hospital with severe injuries, to the point that he could no longer work when he got out after a couple of months. He couldn’t earn money (still can’t because of tremors and the scars looked pretty real where his hand appeared to have been pulverised). He and his wife lost their State House and then he lost his wife and kids.

With nowhere to go he now lives in a street doorway in downtown Auckland, except when he can find the $10 to get into an Internet Cafe where they don’t mind if you sleep in the night.

I asked what he could do and he said he didn’t know. His body didn’t give him much of a chance to get work and therefore a room and the only work he had been offered was with the gangs and he said “You know where that would end up. Back in jail and I aint ever going back there.” I didn’t ask what he had been inside for but he said it was about 24 years ago. He told me how he had survived by studying on behalf of inmates who were trying to get qualifications and explained how they would arrange it so that at exam time, the guards would let him go in and sit the tests on behalf of inmates that would have failed. He was very bright. He helped them and got to use his mind and they left him alone and safe.

It was clear that he couldn’t do physical labour, but he is 51 by his reckoning and the only way off the street is to work. Without a street address, he couldn’t get a benefit or his first hand on the rung to get out. He told me a lot of stories and he did have a good head on him so I asked if he had done any public speaking. He said he had been a member of Toastmasters while he was in jail. He found public speaking pretty easy and I thought of people I know who tread the circuit and thought he could probably hold an audience with his experiences. I said to him that the chances I could help him were pretty close to zero and not to get his hopes up, but I would ask some questions and I shall.

I dropped the change I was planning on giving to buskers into his hat and with a big grin he said “I’ll be staying in the Internet Cafe tonight.” He went on to say that he had to stash the money because if street kids saw any money in the hat they would run past and snatch it. He said he had been through 7 hats already that they had stolen.

I shook his hand and went on to visit my friend Giapo in his awesome new gelato shop.

This was my first visit to the new store (I know it has been there a while) and there was one thing that never changes. There is always a queue of people waiting for their Giapo gelato experience.

If you haven’t been to his new store in Gore Street, Auckland City, you owe yourself a treat.

This is no ordinary store where they wet an aluminium  scoop in a container of water and drag some ice cream into a cone from the cardboard tub of your preference.

You are purchasing a culinary experience the equal of what you would get from the kitchen of a master chef. You will be taken on a journey of testing and trying flavours, even while you are standing in the queue Eventually a unique visual and sensual experience will be delighting you and your friends, while you are looking at and consuming it, followed by the sensation that you are sated and satisfied and looking forward to recommending it, the experience, to your friends. This is no drive to Pokeno for an ice cream, this is theatre for the eyes and taste buds.

Giapo and I have wonderful conversations and it was also great to finally meet his amazing and beautiful wife in person. I loved that she gave me a firm handshake and looked me in the eye, I don’t like limp handshakes from anyone. I know these last years have been a big journey for her also. Behind every consummate dreamer is their best friend and partner and without her the stumbling blocks are that much higher. We deep thinkers need a leveler and someone to sometimes ask how and why and finally, “how can I help?”

Giapo is an economist, a mad scientist, a gastronome, a master chef, a 3D printer, a social media maven from way back, a purveyor of experience, an artist and a man who speaks with absolute passion and Italian gestures, from a big heart, who wants to leave a legacy of experiences bound by trustworthiness for himself and his business; and a secure income for staff who want to use his business as a stepping stone for his own career.

We have many experiences in common, including both being deep thinkers and the visit left me with lots of thoughts and questions about what a trustworthy business looks like. The simple answer is that he was going to take many years to build it and would find out as it developed. But I can say that trustworthiness for Giapo includes:

• Consistently delivering a quality experience that is like going to theatre for the eyes and taste buds. I have never seen anyone leave disappointed;
• Passion for delivering something of quality including his relationships with staff and the products.
• Passion for his staff and helping them make what they will from the work experience and wishing he could do more with and for them.
• Helping his staff develop ideas, for example he runs Chef’s Table gelato degustation evenings and VIP evenings (they were set up for one when I was there) which includes matching music to the course, something one of his students is studying.
• Having a genuine passion and compassion for his customers (and friends) that never wavers, Giapo is who and what he is, not someone living a persona.
• Making sure that he looks after himself, his health and fitness so that he can be well in order to run his business to deliver the trustworthiness he aspires to.
• Recognising the importance of family, that includes those of his customers (friends like me and my family) and of course his own, those here and those back home in Italy.

There is something I deeply admire in people like Giapo. There is a sincerity and depth of purpose that he strives for every day, rain or shine, winter (not the best time for gelato) or summer, year on year.

It is a desire to be the best and continue to push the boundaries of what that means, each and every day and he has now done that for years past the use by date at which 80% of businesses go broke. He has proven that it is sustainable.

I’m not saying it has been easy. It’s tough when you are creating a unique business with a unique set of values and direction. Where ultimately you want your business to conform to a set of ideals. Where, if you consistently over-deliver on your promise of a wonderful experience and people trust you that if they tell their friends how great it was, they will confidently wish that same experience for their friends.

Like fractals, (something Giapo used to tell me about years ago, that branch out like pretty ice crystal flowers) customers all over the world would say “If you go to Auckland, New Zealand, you really have to go to Giapo in Gore Street. It will be a highlight of your trip.”

Anyway, enough of that, it’s a beautiful day, go and visit Giapo and let him know I sent you.

On the way back to Sky City to pick up the car I borrowed, I walked past a noisy bar with an American flag outside. It sounded like there was a show on, so I walked a bit closer to see what was happening. Yep, you got it, Super Bowl 2018. I’m not sure whether the audience was that worried about whether the Eagles one. Heck, I’ve only ever changed planes at the airport there on my way to or from Ithaca NY, but we love our sport in Auckland and despite the showers, it was a great day for sitting in a bar watching sport on TV.

Off I went home to do my thing, working on recording my second track for The Cancer Diaries, my charity music EP and Music Videos for cancer patients and their supporters, a bit of writing on the two books I am working on and pondering with my wife on the nature of trustworthiness as a pillar foundation for a business.

I have 2 questions for you:

What does trustworthiness mean to you in business? ; and

Have you been to Giapo yet. Looks like a great day for it today.

 

Auckland Kindle Buyers at Dick Smith Beware if You Want to Read Library Books

I have a Kindle, the latest model WiFi 4GB which I bought from Amazon, cheaper than I could buy it locally, which sort of goes to the story I posted this morning about retailers who struggle to cope with change in the way people buy products, i.e. competing with online sales. My wife and I both have iPads, but for reading on long trips or after a day on the computer, I really like the Paperwhite because it isn’t back-lit, so doesn’t cause eye strain.

I am also a happy customer of Auckland Libraries, mostly downloading audio books which I listen to while driving or doing chores like mowing the lawn.

My wife decided after seeing myself and one of our children getting great value from our Kindles, that she would like one too. With the Auckland libraries also having an excellent collection of digital eBooks, I thought this would be a great opportunity for us to get real value, so I went to Dick Smith Electronics in downtown Auckland to see if it was worth buying locally.

Just inside the door is a Point of Sale unit with a Kindle Paperwhite, same model I own and an old model original Kindle Fire (which I understand was superseded quite a long time ago). I looked at the feature display sheet and it says that Kindles including the Paperwhite will allow you to read public library books. Now that isn’t strictly wrong because I know someone who reads them, but they are from Australian libraries. I wanted to confirm whether I could download eBooks from the Auckland libraries onto a Paperwhite. The salesman couldn’t tell me, he was going to check for me, but couldn’t confirm anything and ended up with another client while I went on my iPad to look it up. I asked him to check it out for me. Obviously it was confusing because their POS clearly said I could read library books. When he couldn’t give me an answer, I asked who could. He said that the merchandisers were the people who dealt with the POS so I asked if I could talk to them. That wasn’t possible, so I asked who the distributor was that they worked for. He said they are actually Dick Smith Electronics staff!

Here’s what I found on the Auckland Libraries website. So, given that I wanted to buy a Kindle for my wife, I asked the sales person, when he eventually returned to me to let me see a Kindle Fire to find out whether it would be better on the eye that the iPad, because I didn’t want to buy the Paperwhite at $179 if it couldn’t download the library eBooks.

The sales person said he was sorry, but he couldn’t show me a Kindle Fire because they didn’t have one out of the box; and he couldn’t open a new one because then it wouldn’t be new. I told him in that case he had lost a sale because I wasn’t going to buy one if I couldn’t try it out and see if it was fit for purpose. It’s hard to be a customer at Dick Smith Electronics. I left the store without a purchase. I tweeted that they had lost a sale.

In hindsight I could have bought one because under the Sale of Goods Act, if it wasn’t fit for the purpose I had described to the sales person, I could have brought it back for a full refund. He could have even suggested that, but he didn’t. I also live about 12km from the store and it would be a real hassle if I had to take it back. I hate to think what the customer service level would be for a return after that experience. So my wife still doesn’t have a Kindle.

I subsequently got a Twitter message from Dick Smith Customer Service saying that someone would give me a ring within 2 working days. As you can see, that was just over 2 weeks ago. I haven’t had a call or a message (in case I missed one) since.

So I’m probably going to buy another Paper-white Kindle from Amazon for US119 rather than NZ$179 or $199 depending on where you look, locally from Dick Smith and accept that we can’t download library books. We can buy books on one Kindle and share them with the other and Amazon also have subscription services which are pretty cool. I guess ultimately Dick Smith isn’t local anyway, they are Australian owned, I think, well listed anyway.

My real concern is, if you live in Auckland and you bought a Kindle Paperwhite because you read the POS which says you can read library books, you will find yourself disappointed. I have pointed it out to Dick Smith via Twitter, and the photo above saying you can, was taken in their store in downtown Auckland yesterday, so their in-store marketing hasn’t changed since I first brought it too their attention more than 2 weeks ago.

I did eventually talk to a librarian who confirmed that you cannot download and read library books from any Auckland libraries on a Kindle Paperwhite. It appears the reason you can ‘on some Kindle Fire’s’ is in fact because they are Android Tablets.

So what do you think. Does it help clarify why I sometimes buy things offshore instead of in local stores? Sometimes it’s actually easier.

Who Can You Trust? Who Do You Trust (Read Time 1:41)

Who do you trust? Who can you trust? With happenings in Auckland, New Zealand mayoral politics recently, the NSA spying, and other revelations, we find ourselves in interesting times. With the invasive growth of social media we live in a world of increasing transparency. Corporates and Governments which have thrived on sharing only what they think people need to know are losing that battle.

I’ve been reading article in The Futurist by Rolf Jensen, Chief Imagination Officer (I like that title!) of Dream Company in Denmark who compares today’s society to the first Renaissance. Gutenberg’s Press accelerated the spread of new ideas, and the golden age sprung out of the middle ages where much of the world was controlled by a religious hierarchy.

We have a similar break-up to political hierarchy’s now, particularly in but not limited to the Middle East and Europe, and like the Gutenberg Press, Social Media is now making important information available to the masses, most significantly in real time. This means that it isn’t possible for governments and corporations to use smoke and mirrors quite so much. With trending information, we can see right past the kaleidoscopic obfuscation to what is really going on.

Here are some interesting statistics that Rolf shared in his article in The Futurist:

• From Pew Research: In the 1960’s 75% of the US public trusted their Government. In 2010 the result was 25%!
• The European barometer polled UK voters in 2005 and found a trust level of only 34%. In 2012 that was down to 21%.
• CEO’s of large corporations are trusted by 45% of the US population (almost double the number that trust their politicians, that’s positive isn’t it?)
• Gallop says that teachers are trusted by 84%. That’s great news isn’t it. What a shame they get one of the smallest parts of the budget!

Back to social media though, what we are doing is finding groups of people that we do trust and building a new society. We’re sharing knowledge and information in countless ways that have immediacy.

As an example, in my new eBook, Buying a House – Using Real Estate Apps, Maps and Location Based Services, I speak a lot about using social media to research where to live. I cover questions like where to find people who are like you, or people who can tell you about a suburb or area, who have nothing to gain by sharing that information. Who can you trust to give you honest information?

I feel very grateful to live in such exciting times where the power is gong back to the people. Of course ‘the people’ do have to take the power and whilst everyone subsequently had an opinion on Mayor Len Brown’s indiscretions, only 33% turned up to vote in the Auckland local Government elections. I do like the saying ‘You get the Government you deserve’.

So who do you trust? Who do you go to for advice? How are you going to use the information now available to you, to help build the world you want for yourself and your children? How will you contribute?

Comments welcomed.

Petrol Tax Increase and Solar Power Feed-in Tariffs

It’s election year next year and the National Government has announced petrol tax increases to start in July this year. Now I don’t have a problem in principle with user pays, although after the report by the Ministry of Transport earlier this year, it doesn’t look like things are going to improve, in fact we are likely to see mid day traffic congestion (don’t we already have that?) in Auckland, as well as the morning and evening commutes.

There doesn’t seem to be a lot of encouragement for people to work from home although that would ease the pressure on congestion. Auckland Council seems dead set on high rise housing in the Auckland Unitary Plan, but at the same time they are building new homes in areas like Long Bay as quickly as they can, with no sign of increased road capacity for the 2500+ homes to be built. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not against high rise as long as it is done smartly, without taking sun away from existing properties and it is part of an environment which includes amenities that encourage people to work, live and play in a safe healthy environment.

Wouldn’t it be great if those homes all had solar panels on their roofs and were able to sell excess power back to the power companies. Even better if they could get interest free loans to cover the cost. This last long hot summer would have been able to generate massive amounts of power for water heating etc. It’s funny that when I built a minor dwelling next to my last home, I had to install an ugly water tank to capture rainwater and allow it to trickle into the stormwater system from the roof, which I could of course also use for the garden, but there were no options with regard to using renewable energy.

I was listening to the Peggy Smedley Show podcasts as I do each week and she recently interviewed Nick Bitterswyk CEO of Urban Green Energy, who mentioned that great things were happening in areas like solar power in Australia and New Zealand. He was right about Australia, which is going gangbusters with finance and feed-in tariffs, but clean and green New Zealand is not. We do not walk the talk when it comes to renewable energy as you can see on the web site at EECA.

At a recent home show I visited every exhibit where they were selling domestic solar power solutions and asked about the ability to sell surplus power back to power companies. They said that it was not happening, that the utility companies were not supportive or interested. They said that they and the Government have their own agendas when it comes to power generation.

Now we have a large reliance on hydro and geothermal power. Much of our power in the North Island comes from geothermal power sources in the Taupo region, such as Wairakei. I wonder what would happen if we had a major eruption and this source of power dried up. What would our back up plan be? What if we had another drought similar to the one we had this summer and the lakes were too low to provide sufficient energy. You can’t suddenly roll out a solar energy plan at the last minute.

I urge Kiwis to consider solar power and feed-in tariffs when thinking of who to vote for next year in our national elections. This is not a new topic, I have blogged about it several times. If a disaster happens, will the Government say they could not have foreseen this situation? I don’t think so, it is a choice. I’m hoping that at least the Green Party will think about this as part of their election manifesto. Actually where are the Greens? They do appear to have a policy on feed-in tariffs, but its pretty hard to find.

So if you were able to get an interest free loan to put solar panels on your home and the ability to use that power when you needed to and were able to sell power back to the grid for a rebate at fair market pricing, would you take advantage of it? I welcome your comments.

Michael Q Todd is a Social Media Expert

The world is full of self proclaimed social media experts, many of them legends in their own minds. Every once in a while you come across someone who not only really does understand how it all works, but one that practices what they preach. 

Presenting at his Auckland Seminar

One such person is Michael Q Todd. I had the pleasure last week of meeting him in person in Auckland and attending one of his seminars which was a pre-launch of his upcoming book The 7 Pillars of Your Online Success. Michael is an ex-pat Kiwi who lives in Japan with his lovely wife Dr Yoriko Todd.

The mix of attendees ranged from total beginners to very experienced people including Sean Mitchell of Techday, Jason Kemp of Dialog Ventures, Mark Thomas of 2Review and Roger Bennett, one of New Zealand’s serial networkers and connectors, all people who are very passionate about what they do. You have to be, to go to a 3 hour seminar on a weekday evening. There was a quality of debate, illustrating that one size doesn’t fit all and Michael managed the proceedings like the pro that he is.

I’m not going to tell you about everything he covered, it was an introduction to the new book and one that I am very much looking to receive an advanced copy on. I’ve read a couple of pre-released chapters and they are winners. You may be very good with one application or aspects of an application, but be missing out on others. Another is that this is a changing environment. Social media sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn and Twitter are constantly adding and modifying features, you need to keep abreast of these. New services like Vine, Empire Ave (one of my current favorites, you’ll find my account here)  and Posse  are popping up all the time. Some of these will be valuable to you. Never assume you are up to date, because you will be wrong. If you don’t keep up to date, you could end up like this moth (not for the squeemish) I captured on my second Vine attempt, being devoured by a praying mantis.

This is one of the reasons I really like

Following are a 3 key takeouts for me:

1. It’s about selling. Anything you do is social media has to have a purpose, an end game. It is usually to sell something. It could be the products or services you provide to customers, it could be selling your consultancy, or perhaps promoting your sporting activity, music or hobbies. Start with the end game in mind.

2. Three things that brand you. People get confused when you tell them you do lots of different things. Define the 3 most important things, based  on (1) above. Give this some serious thought. If you have too much going on, narrow your focus or you will confuse people and won’t sell much of anything. For me, I am

• an entrepreneur, late founding member of Imersia, involved in location based services and Augmented Reality
• a Futurist consultant, blogger and public speaker, owner of SoLoMo Consulting
• a Songwriter, although I haven’t been able to dedicate a lot of time to that lately

3. Plug the gaps. One for me is Lists. I used to have a very successful newsletter many years ago which I sold as part of my consultancy and training school, the New Zealand Smartphone and PDA Academy. It had a large following and I really enjoyed the feedback from readers. Lately I thought that social media had replaced email newsletters, but now realize that they add another dimension. What are your gaps?

Once in a rare while you meet someone who will make a profound and positive difference in your life if you let them. I have had a few of those over my years and I believe that Michael Q Todd is going to be one of those. Whatever business you are in, or want to be in, whatever role you currently play in life, you are a brand and Michael can help teach you how to focus and market that brand and to reach the results you desire. You can find out more about him on his website.

I’ll leave the last word to Michael from one of his many YouTube Videos

You Have Cancer

At the closing ceremony of Relay For Life on Sunday at the Millennium Institute in Mairangi Bay, Auckland, New Zealand, we were told these are the worst 3 words you can hear in your life. As part of Team Hope Fighters, I was one of a group of awesome people who raised funds through a variety of activities culminating in an 18 hour walking relay. Our group walked the equivalent of Auckland to Blenheim and the full compliment walked the equivalent of Auckland to New York via Los Angeles, collecting over $120,000 for cancer research along the way.

Team Hope Fighters

I lost my first friend, my best childhood mate to cancer at the age of 9. Since then, like most people I have lost lots more. My grandmother, my father-in-law (who was a past President of the Lost Chord Club) and many more. I have relatives who are survivors and one who has only recently found out they have cancer and who didn’t want to tell me.

Relay For Life is a poignant event, which starts of with a Survivors Lap, lead by people who are in remission or still battling this horrendous condition. Many of these people marched for much of the 18 hours of this event which was very inspiring.

We walked through the night and I was pleased to survive sans blisters and managed just over a marathon

Walking through the night

distance, which was a real achievement for me considering I hadn’t trained. One monster in our team was in training for a super marathon in 3 weeks time. I’m not sure exactly how far he ran, but it was in excess of 140km which was amazing.

Blues in the night

During the night there were various activities including games, bands, the lighting of the HOPE lights, food stalls

HOPE

including bacon butties (something my stomach couldn’t handle the thought of at 3 in the morning, despite the pervasive aroma which I would normally relish) but I did see a number of Police enjoying them after a brief team run in full kit, very brief I might say, but it was great to see them there. It would be really cool to see an official team from them next year:)

Candle Tribute Bags

People created candle bags (LED Candles for safety) and left messages for loved ones which twinkled during the night, adding to the spectacle. Reminding people why we were there.

I made an interesting discovery at about 4 in the morning which was that it was pretty much just as painful getting back up and moving after sitting down for a while as it was being back on the track, so back I went.

Looking out from our tent site

Ultimately this was an awesome event, which despite having said after walking through the mud in Kumeu last year, that I wouldn’t do it again, I will most likely do it again next year, although I might train for it next time. After all I can’t be satisfied with only 44km in 2014:)

Don’t judge me

In closing many thanks to my personal sponsors, to all sponsors, huge thanks to the many volunteers and kudos to the cancer survivors. Cancer doesn’t respect age, gender, ethnicity or anything else and I doubt there is anyone who hasn’t been touched by it themselves or through a friend, family member or colleague.

One footnote. I’m seeing ads on TV for cycling for cancer and other events, which appear to be commercially funded. I didn’t see any news media at this event at all, despite the number of people all giving their time for free other than a TV crew who appeared to be recording a documentary. Where was the NZ Herald? Where were the radio stations? Where was TV One and TV 3? Where was the North Shore Times?