O is for OUTRAGE — An ABC
Satellites

Part three of a disorderly A to Z, to be continued throughout this magazine’s six-issue run.

N is for NAMES

‘When my great-grandfather arrived, Immigration mistakenly assumed his family name “Dong” to be his first name, and a new clan of “Chan Wais” came to be. This was a common mistake, which affects thousands of Chinese Kiwi descendants living here today.’

— Lynda Chanwai-Earle, ‘Poll tax descendants and their “wrong” Chinese surnames’, Asia Media Centre, 27 September 2018

‘Founded as Pretty Asian Theatre — a name reflective of a shaky sense of diaspora Asian identity — as we made work, connected with our community and realised the impact our stories could have, we staged our first original show in 2016, becoming Proudly Asian Theatre.’

— Proudly Asian Theatre, on their 2016 name change

‘“The list of the most common surnames for 2020 is yet another indication of Aotearoa New Zealand’s thriving diversity,” said the Executive Director of the Office of Ethnic Communities, Anusha Guler. … The most common family names registered in 2019 were Singh, Smith, Kaur, Wilson and Williams. Patel now makes it into the top five instead of Wilson.’

— Te Tari Taiwhenua Department of Internal Affairs, ‘Most common family names show diversity’, 18 February 2021

‘“The 2015 publication of what has become known as the ‘Chinese-sounding-names’ story on Auckland home ownership was,” says Harkanwal Singh, “a really pivotal moment for me, working in a New Zealand newsroom. Because that’s when I realised that things don’t have to be true to be published.”’

— Russell Brown, ‘What really happened with those Chinese-sounding-names’, Public Address, 24 November 2017

O is for OUTRAGE

‘I have come to consider artists’ trauma dumping, complaining or raging against me — a salaried arts worker — as an act of pure and unbridled generosity, a precious resource. The independent artist who raises hell when an organisation fails to attend to their needs is doing so for free, propping up our industry with hours of pro bono work. Those of us who are paid to be here should, at the very least, listen and honour their right to complaint. That is where care starts.’

— Nisha Madhan, ‘The cry of the birds’, Satellites, 11 June 2024

P is for POPULATION

‘The Asian ethnic group is the third largest in New Zealand and makes up 15.1 percent of the total population. Creative New Zealand receives a low proportion of applications from this ethnic group (an average of 2.9 percent), but once applications are received, they’re successful at favourable rates. The success rate for Asian applicants is 37.9 percent.’

— Creative New Zealand, Diversity Report 2019/20, September 2021. This finding led to the development of the Asian Artists’ Fund.

‘When that day comes, I’ll find myself back in standard two. Hay Park Primary in Roskill South was, in 1986, an ethnic microcosm of the projected population of New Zealand come 2051. Well, maybe with more Samoans. That year, Madonna released True Blue, the white population of my class photo slid under 50 percent, and a multicultural future was born. Two years later, my standard four class was perhaps New Zealand in the twenty-second century: Polynesian, Māori, Asian and White, split roughly four ways. And the Somalis hadn’t even arrived yet.’

— Tze Ming Mok, ‘Race you there’, first published in Landfall, vol. 208, 2004

‘Aotearoa New Zealand’s Māori, Asian, and Pacific populations are all growing, with Statistics New Zealand projecting that these groups are set to collectively make up 52% of the total population in 2038 (up from 35% in 2013). … As a conceptual frame, “Asia Pacific” is most often used as a tool for expansion and positioning within global economics and politics. This project, by contrast, points the phrase inwards, proposing that “Asia-Pacificness” might be a primary condition of Aotearoa New Zealand’s near future — one that requires us to rethink the dynamics of diversity and multiculturalism in relation to our unique bicultural foundations.’

— Exhibition room sheet, The Asia-Pacific Century: Part I, Enjoy Contemporary Art Space, 2016

Q is for QUARANTINE

‘Months of isolation could have driven me mad, confronting myself with only myself, admitting to what I fear, to my regrets, to what my life means. But even though I’m living on a rock in the middle of nowhere, I feel like my life has moved on in some way that it wouldn’t have otherwise …. I have learned that solitude provides a space in my mind where I do have some power. I can sit on this rock, look back at Wellington, and imagine it’s home.’

— Kim Lee, who was quarantined on Mokopuna Island after being suspected of having leprosy. Quoted in Mike Ting, Mokopuna Island Project, 2015

‘In March 2020, Bitter Melon苦瓜 released an international open call for Asian writers, artists and zinemakers to contribute to an e-zine called Stay Home Diary: “a free, online collective archive of diary entries recording our experiences from March to April 2020”. Centring on Asian diasporic experiences during the 2020 COVID-19 lockdowns, the e-zine posted a new “diary entry” each day as part of a Stay Home Diary online blog.’

— Bitter Melon苦瓜, in the Satellites archive

‘Cornall initially planned to move to the United States after graduating from Massey University with a Bachelor of Design with Honours in 2020, but had to pause these plans due to the COVID-19 pandemic. Instead, during the first lockdown in 2020, Cornall sewed a collection of 30 garments. After being approached by The Service Depot, a boutique in Pōneke Wellington that wanted to stock her work, Cornall established her label — which draws its name from her own first and middle names.’

— Emma Jing Cornall, in the Satellites archive

‘For years I’d come to work on three hours sleep; like most chefs, I’m a complete workaholic. Covid taught me that I wasn’t a better person for it; if you don’t stop sometimes, you never have time to consider how to reach your full potential. If you want to survive, you have to look after yourself.’

— Jessabel Granada, in the Satellites archive