boats, bards & beaches

UPDATE - WEEK 1

So, I have officially been in this beautiful country for a week and it is almost impossible to believe how much I have managed to pack in!

The first highlight of the week has to be the five hour boat trip to Waiheke Island.

​I was lucky enough to be invited on board by singer/sailer Andrew Fagan, a national celebrity known for his music, poetry and record breaking boating career. 

It was a beautiful way to see the city coastline and I absolutely loved sailing and sipping cider whilst observing the beauty of the ocean, the volcanic islands and Auckland in the distance. 

We arrived and had a lovely swim in the sunshine before catching the ferry back, just in time for dinner - dumplings on the famous Dominion Road. 

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The next morning was just as exciting and a chance to meet another nationally recognised poet. After some emailing, Ben managed to set up an informal meeting for us at the Poet Laureate's house! C K Stead is 84 years old, incredibly well renowned and extremely well read and we had the honour of chatting to him about his knowledge of the ever growing Kiwi spoken word scene and slam poetry. He was not really very aware of either, although he had heard rumblings of the spoken word scene, but was very receptive and engaged in a delightful conversation with us over coffee, during which I spoke of the British scene, the importance of Slam, particularly with reference to my work with young people and the similarities between what he considered true performance and the work we do. (He even gave us a little rendition of a piece of Shakespeare which tripped off his tongue).

Ben Fagan, C K Stead and myself at his Auckland home.

​It was a real pleasure to meet with him, learn a little of the academic approach to poetry and feel that we had been able to plant the seeds of spoken word in the laureate world. He commented at the end that he had certainly learnt a lot from our visit, a real compliment I'm sure you will agree. 

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We then went straight to a 3 hour planning session for the NYDS poetry in performance course we will be teaching at the end of April before starting our roadtrip and heading down to Te Henga Studios for my next gig; The studios are set against a bush backdrop and the scenery we drove through coming out of Auckland completely took my breath awaty. Te Henga is an artist retreat and on arrival we were shown round the grounds of the quirky building and then offered a cup of mint tea before heading to the yurt, the setting for my workshop/performance. The workshop was really lovely, the group were very keen and seemed to take a lot from my prompts and wrote some beautiful pieces on the theme of identity. I even read them a student's poem from back in the UK which was from the same writing prompt and they really loved that. 

The performance went well too.. It was a really intimate setting, with ten or so people sat around a yurt to the sound of insects outside and it gave the evening a real sense of community. The writers attending also offered some poems up for the circle and the atmosphere was really warm and supportive. It was unlike any performance experience I have ever had in the UK and will stay with me for sure. I then had the honour of spending the night in the yurt, which was really special before enjoying a shower in the luxury of the main building the next morning. 

Left: performance and workshop shots in the yurt at Te Henga Studios.
Above: A group shot with workshop participants.

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Finally, to round off the week, we drove for another four hours through beautiful bush and via stunning beaches (as pictured below) until we reached Whakatane.. On arrival I was stunned to see the amazingly lovely apartment we were being put up in by our host and couldn't resist a quick dip in the rooftop infinity pool!!!!

We then rushed over to Stage Door - an after school drama club for young people in the area - to run a workshop with a musical theatre class where they were responding to a piece of music by writing poetry. I led them through a series of exercises to get them writing in response to the music and they seemed to really engage with the work and produced some lovely writing. 

Workshop in Whakatane

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Then, after sampling some of the local fish and chips (hard to beat!) I performed a 45 minute set for the local Whakatane audience with support from Ben who had performed there last July and got a great response to some of his new poems about London life. 

This is a really small town in New Zealand and so spoken word is not a common occurance and so I was really happy to see smiling faces in the audience.

By the end of the gig it truly hit me how much we had packed into a week! It was time for a bit of relaxation in the form of hot springs and a massage which was one of the most amazing experiences I have ever had!

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This brings me to the end of this epic update! It has been a very busy week of touring but I can honestly say I am having the time of my life! Next time I hope to have some poetry to share as well as more photos and reports. Do keep in touch on the hashtag #WhatAWayToTour @sarsbars89. 

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