A free festival, Venezuela and a free kids drama workshop…

What an excellent line up for the Ihumātao Reclamation Festival tomorrow and the weather is looking great too.

Organised by Save Our Unique Landscape campaign – SOUL this promises to be a very pleasant way to spend the day while supporting their ongoing struggle to protect the historical, cultural, spiritual, and archaeologically significant landscape from Fletcher Building’s planned housing development there.

It’s a free, family friendly concert that will have fantastic musicians performing live on the main stage, whilst a range of onsite food, art and game stalls will feed your interests and puku.
More info here: Ihumātao Reclamation Festival

The aggressive policy against Venezuela repeats the ugly pattern of wars for regime change in the oil-rich countries of Iraq and Libya. National Security Advisor John Bolton is reading from the same script, declaring a “troika of tyranny” in Latin America (like the “axis of evil”) as a precursor for regime change first in Venezuela, and then Cuba and Nicaragua. Trump has always said that the “mistake” of the Middle East wars was that the U.S. didn’t “take the oil.”

The White House aims to overthrow the government of President Nicolás Maduro and replace him with Juan Guaidó. Guaidó is a U.S.-trained operative who was unknown to the vast majority of Venezuelans before he proclaimed himself president — at Vice President Mike Pence’s urging. Although Guaidó has the backing of US President Trump, the CIA, and the Republican and Democratic Party leaderships alike, huge numbers of Venezuelans have marched to reject this coup and defend their independence.

The New Zealand government should continue to resist pressure to support the coup attempts in Venezuela but also speak out against the economic and political warfare being waged against the people of Venezuela.

On March 16, the people of the world will come together to say:

• U.S. hands off Venezuela!
• NO to the coup — the U.S. does not have the right to select other country’s leaders!
• NO to the sanctions, oil embargo and economic war on Venezuela that aims to cause suffering for ordinary people in the country.
• NO to intervention and war from the U.S. and their proxies in the region

To add your name email mike

Hands Off Venezuela Aotearoa Facebook Page
https://www.facebook.com/Hands-Off-Venezuela-Aotearoa-295947577698168/

Saturday, March 30, 2019 10am – 4pm
Drama Studio, Faculty of Education
74 Epsom Ave, Epsom, Auckland 1023

Is your child between 10 and 13 years of age and interested in taking part in a one-day drama workshop?

As part of my doctorate at the University of Auckland’s Faculty of Education, I am offering young people a drama workshop. In the workshop, they will be invited to create and explore a fictional story through drama together.

The story will be based on John Marsden’s picture book Home & Away. In the story, an ordinary family hopes to find refuge and a new home overseas as they are forced to flee their own country. Together, the young people will take on different roles, and investigate many different perspectives, opinions, and behaviours. They will create dramatic scenes, drawings, poems, and other pieces of creative writing. After the workshop, I will facilitate a group discussion about the workshop with those participants who are interested.

The possible benefits of taking part in the research include the acquisition of drama skills and personal development in the form of

• personal competences (self-confidence, -observation & -reflection)

• social competences (ability to work in a team, empathy)

• methodical competences (presentation of ideas, team work, problem solving, self-motivation)

• emotional intelligence (ability to denote, analyse, and respond to one’s own and others’ emotions).

Encouraged to consider a variety of perspectives, your child may also benefit intellectually from engaging in genuine dialogue with others about different understandings of home, refuge, culture, and the impact of new media on their own and each other’s lives. The workshop may strengthen your child’s ability to think critically and creatively, and to generate, identify, express, analyse, and discuss their own and other’s ideas.

As part of my study, I will explore the same story with young people from Germany, so it will be an exciting project to be part of. If you wish, I will send you a research report accessible to you and your child as soon as the analysis phase of the research is finished. Participants will not be identified by name in any research report or publication.

If your child is interested in taking part, or if you have any questions about this research project, please contact:

Moema Gregorzewski
Doctoral Candidate
University of Auckland: Faculty of Education
Critical Studies in Education: Critical Research Unit in Applied Theatre
g.gregorzewski