Ava Reid, 20, won this year’s Landfall Young Writers’ Essay Competition for an essay she wrote after wondering about objects people left behind at a cafe where she worked.
Miss Reid said did not expect to win the competition and was "very surprised".
She said her flatmate, who was also a writer, had encouraged her to give it a go.
Her winning essay, Two and a Half Mealworms was a collection of reflections and observations from people-watching.
"My essay explores the material traces left behind as we move through the world, and the tension at the boundary of public and private looking practices.
"I found that time can warp what is deemed ‘acceptable’ to look at."
As an anthropology major at the University of Otago, Ms Reid wanted to understand the difference between the really old objects that were dug up in the field and the random things that were left behind at a cafe.
She said someone once left behind two and a-half mealworms on a high chair she was cleaning and she immediately had questions about why they were there.
"I feel someone had intentionally bought them in to feed their child."
Rather than drawing conclusions about what the objects said about the culture, she was interested in what stories may come about them in the future.
She said there was probably no way of knowing what those objects said about society, but people loved to tell stories.
"We can’t really influence what people are going to think of us."
Her essay-writing skills were one of the biggest takeaways for her from her studies.
"That’s an unintended benefit of that course," she said.
"I’m also really into poetry writing, but I think that my degree has helped me a lot more with formal writing."
