How interesting to find a photocopy of a letter my Dad wrote to the Department of Social Welfare in 1986, to apply for National Superannuation on behalf of his parents.
We had been here less than a decade, but, frankly, Dadâs correspondence was always like this. The whole idea of immigrants coming to Aotearoa with limited English always smacked of racism and intolerance to me, and this letter illustrates that it might actually be our linguistic superiority in mastering another tongue that has racists and xenophobes worried.
There are some minor errors here, and he could have used a few commas instead of full stops, but itâs on a par with period correspondence from native Anglophones.
I still have this Underwood typewriter.
Posts tagged ‘1986’
Forget the stereotypes: how immigrants write with English as their second language
12.09.2020Tags: 1980s, 1986, Aotearoa, correspondence, family, government, immigration, New Zealand, Wellington, Whanganui-a-Tara
Posted in New Zealand, Wellington | 2 Comments »
Wellington’s most dangerous intersection (in fiction)
13.11.2010While chatting about the movie Shaker Run with one of our Lucire team (who was not born when the film was made), I noticed that the intersection at Courtenay PlaceâTaranaki StreetâDixon Street was rather treacherous in 1980sâ fiction (start at 1’56”):
Fast forward to 1986 and the Hong Kong film æäœłææȘćéæć·źć© (marketed as Aces Go Places IV). Watch from 28″ on:
When I still had a blog on Vox, I noted that the car chase in this film played extreme liberties with New Zealand geography: you turn from the Auckland Harbour Bridge on to Willis Street, Wellington; and fly in a Holden Torana from a Viaduct rooftop, leaving the Lombard car park in Wellington, and landing in a Ford Cortina on a soundstage in Hong Kong.
Tags: 1980s, 1985, 1986, Aotearoa, film, Hong Kong, humour, Jack Yan, New Zealand, retro, Wellington, Whanganui-a-Tara
Posted in cars, culture, humour, interests, New Zealand, Wellington | 3 Comments »