Summer Weekends for Sunday 26 January 2025

 

9.00 Farewell Guangdong director Lynda Chanwai-Earle

In 1939, the New Zealand government granted approval for 256 wives and a similar number of children from China to take temporary refuge here.

The women, who were fleeing war, had left their villages in Guangdong and then sought to be reunited with their husbands here.

This week, a new web series launches - Farewell Guangdong - which tells the deeply moving and sometimes unsettling stories of seven of the women who made New Zealand home.

Lynda Chanwai-Earle is the director of Farewell Guangdong and joins Susana from the RNZ Wellington studio.

 

9.35 Jazz musician Jack Claridge on turning 100

Jack Claridge is a multi-instrumentalist jazz musician who has been making must for more than 85 years.

As well as featuring in some of the earliest musical recordings in New Zealand, Jack opened and ran Claridge's Cabaret in Lower Hutt.

Jack, who is nonagenarian for just one more week because he's turning 100 next weekend, joins Susana to talk about his career.

 

10.00 John Innes on saving the Kōkako

Twenty-five years ago there were 458 known pairs of Kōkako, now their numbers have increased five-fold.

Manaaki Whenua - Landcare Research senior scientist John Innes has been part of the drive to turn those numbers around.

He's devoted the last 44 years to protecting native birds and retires this week.

John joins Susana to talk about the pivotal discoveries that saved the Kōkako from extinction.

 

10.35 Apirana Taylor on his services to poetry and the arts in Aotearoa

Apirana Taylor (Ngāti Porou, Te Whanau-a-Apanui, Ngāti Ruanui, Pākeha) is a prolific poet and artist.

He has just been awarded the Prime Minister's Literary Award for Poetry, though he is also recognised as a prominent theatre-maker, musician and artist.

Apirana joins Susana on Summer Weekends.

 

11.00 Summerfruit with Simon Webb

It's the thick of the summerfruit season with nectarines, peaches, plums and apricots available across the country.

Susan's joined by fourth-generation Central Otago grower Simon Webb to hear how the season's unfolded, and what he considers to be the pick of the crop.

 

11.20 The Hamilton company giving our beloved pets suitable farewells 

For seventeen years, Gavin and Lyn Shepherd have owned Pet Farewells, which offers animal and pet cremation services.

During that time, they've seen approaches to pet bereavement closure change - from backyard burials to more caring ways to say goodbye.

Gavin and Lyn Shepherd join Susana to talk about their growing business. 

 

11.40 Red Books in Greymouth 

Wendy Barrow from Red Books in Greymouth joins us for the final part in our summer series New Zealand’s secondhand-bookshop owners.

 

 

Music played in this show

• Bill Sevesi Team — Bamboo Swing (intro music)
• Bic Runga — Haere Mai Rā' / 'Sway
• Jazz-a-plenty — That's A Plenty (Jack Claridge on acoustic bass)
• Jazz-a-plenty — I'm Gonna Sit Right Down and Write Myself A Letter (Jack Claridge on acoustic bass)
• Jazz-a-plenty — Midnight in Moscow (Jack Claridge on acoustic bass)
• Claridge’s Cabaret — Undecided (Jack Claridge on vibraphone)
• Claridge’s Cabaret — The Continental
• Neil Diamond — Sky Bird 
• Hirini Melbourne — Tihore
• Mark de Clive-Lowe — Day by Day 
• Icehouse — Touch the Fire 
• Cowboy Junkies — Sweet Jane 
• Lucinda Williams - Blessed
• Nadia Reid — Holy Low 
• Paul Kelly — You Can Put Your Shoes Under My Bed