SECTIONS

a strictly local matter

DunedinAugust 1

Maintaining low profile, keeping a steady beat

SW3 is a modest building.
OpinionJuly 3

Miasmic hacking a plague on our city

Dunedin has been beleaguered by snivelling schoolchildren and bronchial babies as the flu season hits. David Loughrey follows the coughing to its illogical conclusion.
DunedinJune 14

Footy code shoots and scores

A Dunedin crowd used to lines of large men thundering into each other with ball in hand turned out to a football match this week, as Serbia took on Hungary in the Fifa Under-20 World Cup. David Loughrey hid among the spectators in row Z, taking notes on the ebb and flow of the game, and the madness of crowds.
OpinionMay 1

St Kilda wraps itself in mystery

Its name is of uncertain origin, it has been split into three by Statistics New Zealand, but St Kilda is a solid seaside suburb with neither airs nor affectations. David Loughrey travelled to the wide avenues and tight grids of the city's south to get a taste, and cast a sharp eye over the numbers.
OpinionMarch 6

Mysteries and ironies at home in the valley

Exactly 4614 people* live in Northeast Valley, one of a number of indisputable facts about this sometimes enigmatic suburb. But the facts only tell half the story. Armed with a sharp eye and a feel for humanity's strengths and weaknesses, David Loughrey ventured into the valley to find the whole truth.
OpinionFebruary 28

Chlorinated salt water baptism

In the pre-dawn darkness of a slumbering Dunedin, the spiritual arise to cleanse themselves from the sins of the night. David Loughrey followed them on their daily ritual, received a baptism of hot salt water, and came face to face with creation.
OpinionFebruary 7

Deep indignation in the deep South

Viewing penguins, touring heritage buildings, and taking photographs of the Dunedin Railway Station are all good things to do when you come to Dunedin. For long-term residents, though, a favourite activity is being angry. To help newcomers, David Loughrey has put together a guide to being angry in Dunedin.
OpinionJanuary 26

One for the too-hard basket

The shadowy and little-known existential infrastructure services unit at the Dunedin City Council was set up to deal with issues of existence, philosophy and the absurd. The unit was housed in crawl space behind the stone facades of the Municipal Chambers and its reception area was an intolerably low and stuffy room in the ceiling of the Skeggs Gallery.
One for the too-hard basket
One for the too-hard basket
OpinionDecember 19

For me, the horror lives on

For most of us, a trip to Pixie Town is a happy Christmas-time highlight. Not so for David Loughrey, who says the ''remorseless, jerking hysteria of the dreadful sharp-eared Christmas gang'' is settled deep within his subconscious. He braved near certain psychological damage to relive the traumas of his youth.
OpinionNovember 28

You've got to know when to hold 'em

David Loughrey recently did something he'd never done, despite a severe reluctance to exit his comfort zone. He represented the city's socially awkward and fearful citizens on a trip to the Dunedin Casino, and he learnt a sort of lesson.
You've got to know when to hold 'em
You've got to know when to hold 'em
OpinionOctober 24

Frilly display masks a deeper meaning

A certain flouncy flower was in bloom in Dunedin this week, and enthusiasts gathered to celebrate its sensuous delights. David Loughrey had been dimly aware of a blur of colour of late. He meditated on the whys and wherefores of the rhododendron, and found himself transported to the land of the Buddha.
OpinionOctober 18

What were they thinking?

A Dunedin city troubled by repressed childhood pain and a collective lack of self-esteem was invaded by 210 plain-clothes psychiatrists this week. Hiding the dark recesses of our psyche from their relentless gaze was essential. Fortunately, David Loughrey was keeping an eye on the visitors, and uncovered a weakness.
OpinionOctober 12

Going to the chapel of lingerie

They sat neatly on varnished wooden pews, 250 smartly dressed women wearing fashionable leather boots and holding elegantly curved wine glasses.
OpinionSeptember 27

Spammers wrestle with weary souls

Thousands upon thousands of spam emails land in the in-boxes of Dunedin workers every day of the week. But who thinks of the poor souls whose lonely job it is to send them? David Loughrey does. Today, with a little help from Google Maps, he imagines the empty lives of the emailers who spammed him recently.
DunedinSeptember 22

All eyes down and looking for a full house

Housie is thought to have begun in Italy in the 1500s, before migrating through Europe, played by the French aristocracy along the way. Not to be outdone, South Dunedin is a stronghold of the local housie hustle. David Loughrey travels to the flat to bear witness, and discovers a fast game is a good game.
DunedinSeptember 22

Exchanging the old for renewed

The low sun of a winter Wednesday fell on the Exchange and the warehouse precinct this week. David Loughrey visited an area struggling with the labour pains of rebirth and found decay, renewal and the failings of a city.
DunedinSeptember 22

Collector taps into love of retro Dunedin

A strangely popular Dunedin Facebook site is collecting the memories of a small southern city. David Loughrey meets the collector.
OpinionSeptember 12

Blank stares thrown into the bargain

Dunedin's $2 shops and bargain outlets dot the city's retail area, home to a bounty of often plastic forms moulded into objects weird, wonderful and sometimes insane. Some are all those things at once but all are cheap. David Loughrey took some coins and found a world of products that ranged from evil to incomprehensible.
DunedinJuly 25

In step with the march of winter

It was winter in Dunedin this week. It was cold. It rained. David Loughrey took the opportunity to walk the streets as the mercury dropped to 4degC, and ponder the effect on a city young and old.