Meetings with Powerful People...

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I woke up this morning and put on my new Chinese tailored suit and tie from the BJ silk market. I was lacking a pair of black shoes so had to wear my timberlands, hoping no one would notice! I headed off to Petone on the north side of the Wellington harbour bay for my first meeting with William Tonkin at SSS Ltd. This was set up by Stuart after our dinner in HK. Bill had then set up my later meeting at the NZ Electricity Authority (get my title now....).

Bill and I had a chat about the work his company did, the current state of the electricity market in NZ and then about his family history. My great aunt Nannette married a Tonkin and she is very interested in geneaology. Therefore I got as much information as possible so Nan could see if they were related, by marriage of course. He was very helpful and we even had a conference call with his mother to get more info!

I then headed next door to the Maccers (McDonalds) to try the new Serious Lamb burger, something that I heard advertised many times on the radio. Apparently it has taken 2 years to perfect and you can tell as it is the first McDonalds meat burger I have actually enjoyed! I then went for a drive around Lower Hutt, where my first NZ cousins settled in the 1860s, to try and find the Anglican church where John Heayns was buried (after his drunkern swim in the river). However there are more than a handful in Lower Hutt and none I visited had a graveyard so in the end I had to head back into the city for my second meeting.

This was in the CBD at the New Zealand Electricity Authority, the entity responsible for the effcient operation of the NZ electricity market, which I thought would be a great opportunity seeing as I was interested in that area. I met with Greg who was involved in making sure the authority, which only started 2 years ago, was running correctly. He was a font of knowledge and gave me a great insight into the market. Something I was very suprised about was the amount of the market that was made up by renewables compared to the UK. Around 55% is hydro and another approx 15% is made up from other sources! Obviously the population here is only 4-5 million so they dont need as much as us in the UK.

I obviously made a great impression with Greg as he set me up with a tour of the Haywards distribution station up the road that was having a massive upgrade. So I would drop by on the way up out of the city the next morning. I then headed down town to meet Jordan Kuiti, another one of the guys I had played rugby against in 2008. We grabbed a coffee and caught up before he had to head off to training for his cup final, good luck mate!

I then drove back to Megan's and chilled out for a bit before Catherine, her flat mate, kindly dropped me in town to have dinner with another cousin Alan Heayns. We went to The Bangalore Polo club which is themed like a colonial polo club. It was very different with peanut shells allowed to drop on the floor. We both had the pork which was amazing! Then I had a creme brulee for dessert which was delightful. Alan talked about his side of the family from Levin and his love/obsession with taking cruises around the world! It was great to meet another relative and was even better when Alan paid for dinner, what a nice guy!

Megan was at work at Subway....but when she finished her and Catherine met me at the restaurant and we went to have a drink. We went to the Apartment Bar that had rooms which were based around an apartment, with a bedroom, dinning room etc. It was very interesting and to repay them for their hospitality I bought the ladies a drink....it was rather expensive! We had a lovely evening and was a great end to my stay in Wellington!

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