Mils Muliaina

Have you ever wondered how popular your favourite rugby player was? Last Thursday night I found out…

When it comes to watching rugby games I always get excited and I make sure everyone in the room shares my excitement or they at least know of it. That is of course until the team I was cheering for loses the game. The All Blacks are not my favourite rugby team but Mils Muliaina is my favourite rugby player. He is a successful, well known player both on and off the field. I met him late last year at the Auckland Airport with a few other players for a quick photograph and a chat before checking in through customs. I also went along to meet him again at Chartwell on Thursday as he was autographing his new biography titled “Living the Dream”. A perfect Fathers Day gift! There were fans lining up to not only meet him but to get their books personally autographed and a photograph. Mils seemed quite popular as I found out.

With more than 50 test matches at fullback under his belt, Mils Muliaina is the most capped All Blacks No.15 of all time. Muliaina combines pace and a dangerous counterattacking ability with dependability and strong positional play at the back for New Zealand. He also has the speed and rugby nous to play at the highest level at either wing or centre.

He has scored 21 test tries for the All Blacks, which places him amongst the top 10 all-time test tryscorers for New Zealand. Mils Muliaina's biography plots a highly unusual path to the pinnacle of New Zealand rugby.

Born in Samoa, Muliaina's family moved to Invercargill when he was a young boy. He played through the age grades in Southland before moving north to Auckland and boarding at Kelston Boys' High. A veteran of two World Cup campaigns with the All Blacks, Muliaina casts a critical eye across the state of the game in New Zealand and what the All Blacks have to do to win the 2011 Cup. His is a story of adversity and a living demonstration that dreams can come true.
http://www.mightyape.co.nz/product/Mils-Muliaina-Living-the-Dream/3071021/

I can't talk right now...

http://www.autoinsurance.net/wp-content/uploads/2008/05/800px-cell_phone_use_while_driving.jpg

“I can’t talk right now…I’m driving” – The common trick to get out of talking to someone just became true. Yes from November 1st 2009 there is a new law taking effect which means you are no longer able to use a mobile phone while you’re driving.

So far, there has been a mixed reaction toward this topic. A majority of people believe that using a mobile phone while driving is no more dangerous to smoking or eating while driving. I agree with this, I thought that changing a compact disc or searching for your lipstick in your handbag was far more of a distraction. But not according to our Transport Minister.

Transport Minister Steven Joyce says that driver distraction - particularly through the use of cellphones - is a real issue on our roads.

"There are a lot of other distractions while driving but handheld mobile phone use has grown to become a significant problem. The reality is we need to send a strong signal to all road users that it's not on," says Joyce. http://tvnz.co.nz/politics-news/s-official-no-driving-and-dialling-2913600

If you get caught breaking the law you will instantly lose 20 demerit points and have to pay a fine of $80.00. So if you get caught using your mobile phone while driving just five times within two years, you can wave your licence goodbye for a few months.

Some drivers say this is not enough!

Waikato University’s psychology department associate professor, Samuel Charlton, who has studied the safety of using phones while driving, said the law change did not go far enough.

"I think it's a really great start and a step in the right direction, but still allowing hands-free devices sends the mistaken impression that they are safe, when they are clearly not," Dr Charlton said. http://www.stuff.co.nz/waikato-times/news/2752111/Phone-ban-not-tough-enough/

Just like the abusers over the smacking law and the drink drivers, you can’t stop people from using their mobile phones behind the wheel of a car. Besides, haven’t the police got better things to do than pulling people up for sending a text message? I believe they need to put more of an effort into targeting drivers that are speeding and that are drink driving – this is far more serious. On the other hand, using a mobile phone behind the wheel would only become serious if an accident occurred, and according to these statistics, they are.

Between 2003 and 2008 there were 482 crashes causing injury and 25 fatal crashes resulting from someone using a mobile phone or other telecommunications device. http://tvnz.co.nz/politics-news/s-official-no-driving-and-dialling-2913600

Would you still use your mobile phone while driving?

Reflection

When it comes to using the internet, I will admit that I am not a fan of it. In fact, I never have been and I didn’t realise how internet orientated our lives and chosen career paths are becoming until I was introduced to the web media paper. At first, I was unsure about this paper until I learnt that journalists can specialise in writing for the web. On the TVNZ website you can follow television journalists blogs. I particularly find the one written by Corin, a TV 1 business reporter very interesting. http://tvnz.co.nz/business-news/unemployment-rate-sours-green-shoots-show-2890870

Journalism, where to start; as we all know there isn’t just writing articles for newspapers or magazines these days, but there are always websites that complement newspaper sites or magazines. This is because a majority of people rely on the internet as a major source of information.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Internet

The internet is a whole new media, full of endless opportunities. It creates a whole different meaning to the ‘writing world’ because as a writer you can create your own digital identity. My digital identity if you like is called Fisherchick09, because I simply love fishing and everyone knows my work under that identity.

Over the past few weeks in my web media class I have been introduced to a lot of new areas that exist both within the internet and journalism.

One of our web media tutors, Steven Harlow taught us about the history of the internet and how to use research to assist us with our information about our given event and date. This was interesting as we were all given either a name or event that impacted the web in some way; which got us into pairs. We both researched our event and date using the appropriate keywords, search engines and other web tools. We were then asked to place our research into the form of a slideshow, collaborated by our class members onto a web browser. This was a useful skill to learn because it can be applied to our blogs by using links to back up our information.

Setting up a delicious.com account was straightforward as it was similar to setting up a bebo or a facebook page. I learnt how to bookmark certain pages and articles I found interesting using the delicious bookmarking tool and also tagging my articles with webmedia09 so I could share these with other class members. Until this lesson, I had no idea what delicious.com was or how to tag articles and share them with other people.

Julie Starr expanded our knowledge on the topic of search engines. A search engine is a tool designed to search for information on the internet. Keywords play an important role in this process as they are a key component not only for the researching but also for the results the engine returns. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Web_search_engine

She also introduced us to another device called Wolfram Alpha. We got into groups of three or more and we all had to research this device and write instructions about how this device worked. I found this exercise very helpful because I could apply this knowledge to my assignment about creating a how to wiki page.

Wolfram Alpha is a brand new way of accessing information on the internet. It isn’t a search engine because it uses its own data, instead of searching outside sites for answers, which google does. Wolfram Alpha collects objective data (facts that can be proven by science) and stores it using key words.

The computational knowledge engine sorts through its own database and presents the intrigued with relevant data.

Wolfram Alpha is a free source of proven information, it is very interesting as it presents the information to the viewer in the form of an in depth analysis. I looked up my birthday (26/04/1990) this returned precise results about the day, famous people who were also born and it gave other information which was relevant to that particular date. http://www.wolframalpha.com/

Julie also talked to us about twitter. I’ve had a twitter account for awhile now, but I had never really taken much notice of it. The impact that twitter has on the world is simply incredible, you can even follow Ashton Kutcher! I just hope it’s really him.

Much to my surprise the internet was not a difficult tool to get my head around. I am starting to explore the web more and I am also a twitter addict!

I also feel more comfortable with applying some of these topics that I have learnt about to my other papers.

John Pule

John Pule was born in Liku, Niue in 1962; a small pacific island nation. He arrived in New Zealand at the age of 2 in 1964. After reading the work of Hone Tuwahre, John Pule began writing poetry at the age of 17 because he liked to project his feelings and emotions. Pule has published poetry including Sonnets to Van Gogh and Providence (1982), Flowers after the Sun (1984) and Bond of Time (1985). http://www.papergraphica.co.nz/artist_detail.asp?id=20

He has always loved drawing and is a fan of the bible because of its terrifying, provocative literature. He started painting at the age of 25 with the encouragement of artist Tony Fomison. His first paintings were influenced by the Nuiean tapa cloth, where he would paint pictures that would both reflect and relate to the religion of his own culture. In 2002 he created a series titled ‘Cloud Series’, where he would incorporate stepping stones into his work to not only portray another level of life but to show the struggles and pain people go through to achieve their goals in life. This is where the clouds came into effect as they were used as a means of transportation as well as a place of rest. Throughout his illustrations I found it different that he likes to create his own plants and mythological creatures, in reference to the dangers of life.

I enjoyed listening to some of the poems John read out today, I particularly liked the illustrations that were drawn in ink. He doesn’t rely on a computer like most of us do these days; instead he handwrites all his poetry. He is inspired by the ocean as this is his concrete theme for his latest exhibition titled “Nothing must remain”, an exhibition about the ocean and how it is there to connect us, not to separate us.

John Pule considers New Zealand as his first home as it is rich in history and exchange, Niue is his second home. John prefers writing to painting. Influential memories, thoughts, emotions, personal history, current affairs, war and religion all assist him in the creation of his paintings and his poetry. Penguin have published two of his novels titled The Shark That Ate the Sun and Burn my Head.

Pule has held residencies at the Cultural Museum in Rarotonga in 2003, and at Galerie Romerapotheke in Zurich, Germany in 2005. His work has also been represented in two Asia – Pacific Triennials at the Queensland Art Gallery. In 2004 he exhibited as part of Paradise Now! At the Asia Society in New York – the largest exhibition of New Zealand art held since Te Maori in 1984. In 2004 he was honoured with the prestigious Laureate Award from the Arts Foundation of New Zealand. http://www.spark.net.nz/?p=115


I enjoyed this seminar because it showed how someone’s past can influence their paintings and poetry.