The Weekend for Saturday 22 January 2022

 

08:12 Tense border situation in Ukraine 

Tensions have been rising in Ukraine over the last few weeks, and international discussions have been escalating as a result. Russia has gathered 100,000 troops near the Ukranian border but the Russian government denies planning an invasion of any Ukranian territory. 

It comes on the back of a series of demands that Russian President Vladimir Putin has made to western powers, including that Ukraine should never be allowed to join NATO and that the defensive alliance abandons military activity in eastern Europe. Dr. Lena Surzhko-Harned is an Assistant Teaching Professor of Political Science at Behrend College at Penn State University and a contributor to Harvard's Journal of Ukrainian Studies. 

8:35 Did getting a mortgage just get even harder? 

Changes to the Credit Contracts and Consumer Finance Act (CCCFA) regulations came into effect in December and the headlines this month have been dominated by anecdotal stories of issues they have created for consumers. The changes were put in place to protect borrowers from predatory lending practices, but critics warned even before they came into effect that they would lock people out of an already very difficult housing market. Associate professor Claire Matthews from the Massey University Business school has been keeping an eye on the situation and joins me now. 

9:05 Tom Pepinsky: what language do we think in? 

Does the language we speak affect the way we think? The way we act, the way we behave? Can it explain variations in subsets of people? This might seem like an odd question, but it's one with long-standing roots in something called Linguistic Relativity: the extent to which the structure of a language affects its speakers' worldview or cognition.

It's a controversial hypothesis, and one about which Tom Pepinsky has just written an article for Language, a journal of the Linguistic Society of America. Tom is a professor of political science at Cornell University in New York, as well as the director of the University's Southeast Asia programme. 

9:35 Performing on the fringe 

It's been a pretty tough time for the performing arts industry over the last two years, but the show must, Covid-19 settings allowing, go on. Actor, singer, performer and director Vanessa Stacey is the Director of the 2022 New Zealand Fringe Festival in Te Whanganui-a-Tara Wellington, and for her it marks a bit of return to the beginning.

10:05 Can you pick the All Black?!? 

There's a pub closing down in County Cork in Ireland and a very special photo has turned up in the process. It appears to be of an All Black visit to the pub in the 1970s.

Do you know who is in this photo? Please send us a text on 2101 or email us at theweekend@rnz.co.nz. 

To explain the story about the photo and establish what we DO know about it. Emile is joined by the Public Relations Officer for the Castlemagner (Catsle-Mayne) Gaelic Athletic Association Paul Gallagher. 

10:35 Lady and the Tramp: Routeburn 

Over the next summer months we've been taking a few trips  around the country with the former Prime Minister, head of the UN's development programme, and tramping enthusiast Helen Clark, who after many years of travelling around the world has put her time in Aotearoa to good use by walking some of the Great Walks around the country.

This week we're heading to the Routeburn Track!

10:45 Modern binge watching's debt to Shakespeare 

Now quick pop quiz. Who said this - Logan Roy from Succession or King Lear? 

"Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow!" 

Well yes, it's King Lear. But they were both played by the same actor. Brian Cox famously wrote a book about playing King Lear titled The Lear Diaries. He's now playing Logan Roy in the smash hit HBO show succession. Shakespeare aficionado Trevor Bell has been teaching drama on the North Shore of Auckland since the early 1980s and he's directing a new production of The Merchant of Venice for Shoreside Theatre's Shakespeare in the Park 2022. He joins Emile to talk about the modern impact of the bard. 

11.05 Who Lived There: Brain Watkins House 

We're going on a journey into Aotearoa's past now! We're continuing our series 'Who Lived There' this morning, it's based on a book of the same name which came out last year. Jane King took the photographs and Nic McCloy researched and wrote down the stories of dozens of significant buildings and places. Nic is taking us through these amazing buildings over the course of the month. This weekend we're looking at domestic lives, beginning in Tauranga with the Brain Watkins House. 

11:20 The Eady family: Shop to School 

In 1928 Lewis Eady started the first purpose built music store in Queen St, selling sheet music and pianos, and the rest really was history. It was the beginning of a musical dynasty in Auckland which stretches through to now. The shop itself stood for decades and the family business is now dedicated to teaching new generations of musicians with the Chiron music school. To discuss 100 years of musical wrangling in Tāmaki Makaurau Emile is joined by the 4th generation owner of the business John Eady.