Has an email ever changed your life?

Maybe it's this one?

and

Oct 17, 2023

Hi angels!!! I’ve just had my first rainy day in Lisbon which makes me regret wishing away all those hot days - grass is always greener right??? Anyway, I’m hitting you with that NZ timezone energy, a classic Bel Chime, and a Squish edish today - damn you’re in for a treat!!

ALSO I’M FINALLY UP TO SEASON FOUR OF SEX EDUCATION and thank you to everyone who reached out to tell me that yes I should continue watching it and no I won’t be disappointed. This show has weirdly become a comfort show for me as I’ve been navigating quite a bit of hate online at the moment. I wasn’t going to talk about it because I like to keep this a cute space for us all, but I did just want to drop a little reminder that I’m a person, you’re a person, and we’re all just doing what we can to try and get things right.

Love you all, hope you can feel it! xxxx

Where to get trusted information on Israel-Palestine & how we can help
Bel Chimes In: What email changed your life?
A Squish Edish: The NZ Election roundup you were promised
And finally, something a lil lighter, because you deserve it xx

Where to get trusted information on Israel-Palestine:

As usual, pointing you to the journalists out there who are covering this in depth!

(If you have other sources you’d like to see covered here, I’m only an email away!)

How we can help!

Social media is currently awash with misinformation so I wanted to make sure that any info I passed on to you about places we could donate were safe, legitimate and effective.

This a list that has been compiled by CharityWatch, who’ve listed “legitimate, efficient, and accountable charities involved in efforts to aid and assist the people of Israel – Palestine during active conflict in the region.”
This is another list from Charity Navigator which includes only “organizations that are at least three years old, show a three-or four-star rating and have a track record of positive results in their region, among other requirements.”

And a personal note from me to thank you for being so kind to me (and to each other) while everyone is figuring out what feels right to say and do. I really appreciate you all.

Bel Chimes In: What email changed your life?

This section is written by my crush, the refreshing-as-a-house-chardonnay-on-a-steamy-day, Bel Hawkins. She also writes our Sunday newsletter ‘No News is Good News’ which all our paying supporters receive. Upgrade your plan to get her newsy here!

Hi crushes,

Woof. What a week in global politics. Each time I sit down to write these Chimes, I try and bring you a kind of resonant joy that either feels like it comes gushing in or speaks to something that's hard to put our hands on. But now? It's hard to know what to say, how to write about what's going on and what to do in these times. I'll leave that to the experts.

~ hard to do a graceful pivot ~ but in the interest of Chiming in with something kinda funny, or thoughtful, I saw Amelia Dimoldenberg's (Chicken Shop Date’s) feature in The Design Museum's exhibition over the weekend about emails that have changed people's lives. It got me thinking about my own. Mostly because, as a freelancer, I live by the feeling that, at any given moment, your life could be completely changed by an email. Isn't that... the greatest (and sometimes most anxiety-inducing) feeling? That something could change irrevocably in one swoosh of someone hitting 'send'?

I couldn't go back far enough in the archives of my life to find my own, so I drew it for you here. A rejection email from an art school I'd set my heart on, believed was the Answer To All My Problems, and received days before Christmas. It was one of the biggest devastations of my nineteen-year-old life. I remember driving to the beach and sitting in the sand dunes til the sun went down, probably listening to some emo back catalogue of Death Cab For Cutie and feeling like my entire life was over.

I went on to study journalism and picked up my quill. Over 10 years later, here I am, talking to you here. An email will change your life, no?! Would j'adore to know what yours is.

Love u, see you this weekend where I'm gonna write something light and funny for you.
Bel x

A Squish Edish: The NZ Election roundup you were promised

This section was written by my brother Squish (who you all know better as co-host of The Shit Show!! Squish loves space, cycling, wine, and F1 💘💘)

Well team, it seems I totally forgot to write the segment I promised you in last week’s episode of The Shit Show! In my defence, it was a big day on Saturday and an early start on Sunday for the All Blacks game. In case you missed it, we won a hard-fought game against the Irish - but the All Blacks weren’t the only team celebrating an exhausting victory on Sunday morning. Chris Luxon and the National Party woke up as the “winners” of the 2023 New Zealand General Election too.

The game on Sunday morning drew more similarities to the election than just exhaustion. Ireland were the world number one’s coming into the match, but were still seen as the “plucky underdogs” - kinda like the NZ Labour party (who were the incumbent government but definitely came into the campaign on the back foot.) As it often goes though, the bookies’ favourite came out on top. A key difference, however, was the winning margin. While the All Blacks beat Ireland by just 4 points, National’s gap over their own 'competitors’ was… a bit higher.

Winny P

If you don’t mind, I’m gonna jump away from rugby for just a second to cover some of the other interesting results. First off, the dark night is back. You could almost hear Winston Peters belting out the 1992 Chumbawamba hit “Tubthumping” from his election night party at the Duke of Marlborough Hotel in Russell. Much to the National Party’s dismay, It’s been proven over and over again that you never ain’t never gonna keep Winston Peters down! On current results, it seems as if the National Party will get away with a coalition government with just the ACT party, although with 500,000 special votes yet to be counted, Peters seems confident that he will be needed as kingmaker once again.

ACT

Speaking of the ACT party, they’ll be disappointed with NZ First coming in to cut their lunch by taking a good share of their vote! The ACT party were polling as high as 14% in the lead-up to the election, but ended up at 9%, so they are the 4th largest party in parliament. In addition to their 9%, they got two Auckland electorates, and it looks like they will be getting into cabinet for the first time in their party history. I’m sure they’ll be stoked with that!

The Green Party

Despite it all, we did see great results for the Green Party. They’re bringing a record 14 MP’s into parliament, and they won 3 electorates for the first time in their history with all wahine (female) candidates. We’ve got Chloe Swarbrick in Auckland Central, Tamatha Paul in Welly Central and Julie Anne Genter in Rongotai. While this is a result to be pumped about, they won't end up in Government, so they will be fighting for Green values from the sidelines.

Te Pāti Māori

Finally, I have to give a shout-out to Te Pāti Māori, who secured four of the seven Māori electorates and will return to Parliament with at least twice as many MPs as they had before Saturday’s amazing result. The party claimed victory with Rawiri Waititi in Waiāriki, Debbie Ngarewa-Packer in Te Tai Hauāuru, Hana-Rawhiti Maipi-Clarke (New Zealand’s youngest MP ever at 21) and Takuta Ferris in Te Tai Tonga. This is before the special votes come in which could bring in a 5th MP as the results are pretty close, so watch this space.

Basically, all of these results mean that it will be a Chris Luxon-led government, with support from the ACT party. It remains to be seen if they will need Winston Peters to back them up, with the special votes and final results coming in at the start of November.

And bringing it back to rugby, at least this is good news for the All Blacks chances in the upcoming World Cup finals! John Key had two World Cup wins under his Prime Ministership for National, so, if history is anything to go by, then at least we could be onto a winner there.

Squish xx