This week are we celebrating Te Wiki o te Reo Māori. Radio New Zealand shared a great story about Te reo Māori growth being boosted by apps. It talks about how more people are learning and using Te Reo Māori thanks to social media, websites and apps. Such a great thing, why rely on traditional lessons?
This article has a great list of useful apps including:
Karakia are Māori prayer and a way in how we connect with our Atua, used for spiritual connection or guidance.
How do I do a karakia?
Before you start your karakia, you need to think about what you want to pray about.
Some prefer to close their eyes, bow their heads to the Atua above or stare at a spot and focus in on the spiritual connection and what you are asking for.
When should I do a karakia?
Anytime, anywhere, any way that you feel is comfortable.
This could be anything, from guidance when travelling afar, starting your workday/hui, before you eat, going to bed at night or finishing for the day.
Why do we do karakia?
The reasons why we do karakia and what karakia is are the same. We seek connection with our Atua for spiritual guidance or to give thanks for what we have received.
Here is a short karakia that can be used before you start your day at work or at the beginning of a hui, or the start of something special to you.
We were closed for the first day of Delta Level 2, Wednesday 8th September, but that didn’t mean we had the day off. We were kept busy with so many items being returned and over 600 items on our request list. We found almost all of them – only 45 left on the list at the end of the day!😁
The Square book-drop, one of the many times it needed to be emptied.Some of the holds we have found.The Hold shelf – we needed to add some extra shelves!
Did you know that during lockdown you can access Ancestry from home? So, why don’t you spend some time growing your family tree. Just log into the City Library website with your library number and find the ancestry link at https://citylibrary.pncc.govt.nz/explore/heritage.
This is a special service offered by Ancestry for limited period of time.
I love looking through recipe books and the food magazines. In our library I can not seem to walk past the trolley of food books without stopping to have a ‘quick’ look through. Who doesn’t like food? Sadly with our library closed at the moment I don’t have access to the great book selection on our food shelves. One solution is looking at the great selection of magazines on Pressreader.
Another idea is to dig out my well used recipe books. Check out my Edmonds cookbook. I can proudly say all pages are there and are in order, they just don’t look very pretty anymore. Though it makes it easy to find what recipes are good: they are the dirty pages!
Local writers come together for the “Versions” project. A single prompt and a wide array of versions from that.
As part of the Palmerston North City Library’s focus on Kupu, and aligned with the submissions call for writers and other creatives for the library’s upcoming publication Versions Tuarua, we’re running online sessions with a focus on the writing craft.
Setting: how setting can make your writing rich and immersive. An interactive session with time for questions and answers.
Email sean.monaghan@pncc.govt.nz for the Zoom meeting link. You’ll be able to use the app, or just go through a web browser.
After the Tampa by Abbas Nazari is an inspiring story about Afghanistan and how the author managed to escape from the Taliban and arrive in New Zealand.
Check out the listings for this book on our catalogue here:
Its lockdown again and we are all experiencing life a little bit differently. Manawatū Heritage is looking for content that you have created showing life as it is in your bubble in 2021. Go to https://manawatuheritage.pncc.govt.nz/ and you can upload your movies, photos, audio, etc, yourself, or send it to the Heritage team with a few details and we can upload it for you heritage@pncc.govt.nz Come on, lets make history together!
I wish I’d had a moment to race around the library, in those moments before lockdown, and scoop dozens of books from the shelves. I would have been like one of those people who win the supermarket or hardware store “Ten Minute Trolley Grab” or whatever they call those things. Manic and desperate.
Fortunately, I do have a “to-read” shelf of books here at home, so I have some reading material. There are too many books on that shelf.
As a side note, two or three years back, I made a conscious decision to read through those books. Years of having thirty or so books waiting to be read seems like something therapists might consider worthy of long conversations about my missing pieces.
Despite that intention (to read through them) the number of books on the shelf has not shrunk. As I’ve read the books and put them aside, new volumes have taken their place.
I suppose the therapist might call this “magpie behaviour”. I have a friend who lumps it in with the “Ooooh, shiny!” category (which I guess amount to the same thing).
I am told that is something many people share.
Lockdown, however, is keeping me from purchasing replacement shelf-filler, and having me read some of these books.
One that sat for a while was John Grisham’s Camino Island. This came out in 2017, though I’m pretty sure I only bought it last year. Maybe the year before.
Grisham is known for his legal thrillers. You know the kind of thing, a junior lawyer finds herself confronted by the borderline policies of the firm and takes on a case that challenges plenty of moral scruples and she ends up going in to bat for the underdog.
Camino Island is something different. It’s about rare books and theft and double-crossing and a fabulous island, with barely a lawyer, courtroom or judge in sight.
On the back it has the text; “Just when you think you know Grisham, he surprises you”. I guess that’s meant as a warning for those expecting a legal thriller.
The writing is pacey, the story engaging and the characters lively, complex and likeable. Likeable for the most part.
The City Library does have copies, in regular print, in large print and as an audiobook.
There’s a sequel too, Camino Winds, set in the same location, with some of the same characters. The library also has copies of that.
There are numerous other Grisham books which steer away from the legal thriller too, Skipping Christmas, Playing for Pizza, Bleachers, and available through the library (those last two as ebooks, so, assuming they’re not out on loan, they’re available during lockdown).
‘Scrublands’ by Chris Hammer is the book for the next Together We Read book club. This book will be added to Libby as an eBook and eAudiobook for you to borrow by the end of the day on August 31st. It will be available for all who want it so no need to place a hold on it. If you want to join in the discussion for this book check out AUNZ – OverDrive’s Together We Read. This will be available from September 1st-15th.
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