Ok, what actually is your ~ truth ~ ?
➕ WE SAW HARRY STYLES LAST NIGHT🕺
Today is International Woman’s Day so hope we’re pouring one out for all the women out there today!!! Hate to be making a day for women all about a man, but… I went to Harry Styles last night and it’s kinda all I can think about rn.
First of all, for everyone wanting to know about the FIT???? I’m gonna put that in my Friday Diary edish so you’ll see more of that there if you’re a paying supporter 😎 Second of all Harry?? Cannot BELIEVE he was actually there in the flesh!! Rubes, Liv and I were in the front GA area, and so the fact that we could see him so clearly (except for at the beginning when Ruby’s view was hilariously blocked by the dude that plays Chris Warner on Shortland Street) was almost unfathomable???
Harry came out on stage singing Tūtira Mai Ngā Iwi (a classic waiata) which was cute as hell:
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He made a joke about the doing the census (and says he did it):
And he made a joke about accidentally uploading that photo of him wearing the One Direction shirt to his Instagram story:
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His voice sounded amazing, his presence up there was polished & charming, & seeing everyone rock up in their sparkles and cowboy hats was truly incred!! I will say I do have some notes 👀 but I’m gonna save them for this weeks Culture Vulture to discuss. Stay tuned for that!!
🔔 Bel Chimes In: Ok, what actually is your ~ truth ~ ?
🗺Around the world🗺
103 unaccompanied minors abandoned in a truck in Mexico, and South Korea to compensate victims of Japan's wartime forced labour
All the words we can’t pronounce
Today’s mundane poll: Do you think the correct word for paying someone is renumeration or remuneration?
🔔 Bel Chimes In: Ok, what actually is your ~ truth ~ ?
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!
Mōrena besties! March! Pisces season! This one's all about balancing emotions, honing in on your dreams and making plans to turn your quests into living realities. Got an unfinished storyline going on in your life atm? Mmm now's the time to snip, resolve or evolve it.
Witch shit over, I wanted to lol with you about a TikTok trend about five of my friends have sent me over the last week, where besties ask each other ‘what’s your truth rn’ and send unfiltered content to each other of the truth of their lives at that very moment (I guess in a way like BeReal? It's all a whirlpool of content I guess). Obviously, I love this, and naturally, most of us are already doing it, but it did leave me to wonder: why are we so obsessed with honesty as a concept right now?
I always smile inside a little when I find myself in a meetings, and the people I’m talking to are all about 'authenticity' in marketing as though it's a revelation. As though connecting with others through your own humanness/realness/a shared experience (um, hi, the entire founding vibe of SYSCA, gorge to have you here) is a new insight into how we feel an affinity with someone or something. It reminded me of these illustrations by Sally Nixon that Vice ran in a piece years ago, called 'What Women Do When No One's Watching':
But I wonder if this 'what's your truth' vibe works if done with the right (read: safe, close, reciprocal) people and not in a performative way. Sometimes the back-and-forth relay of sharing content and keeping in touch can add this buzzy layer of pressure to have something to say and a story to tell, and well, some days, honestly? Nothing much interesting happens, and I eat a Lad Bible-style dinner, and I'm done with it.
My current truth? 6.39pm in the office, I'm whirring on the keys (lol, laptop keyboard), cute outfit having expired by about 1pm and thin hair definitely waning, mentally catapulting through the next two hours til I'm on my couch reading 2 pages of my book before getting tired eyes and sending memes to the chat thread I have with my besties. Too real? Too dramatic? Not enough going on? I feel like the gift of all of this is that none of that is wrong, and none of that is right.
As always, bloody can't wait to chat to all the ~ paying subscribers ~ this weekend in No News Is Good News where I will tell you more inner workings of my life and unpack more pressing, cute, useful and tragic experiences of being alive. Ily! xox
🗺Around the world🗺
Mexico
103 unaccompanied minors abandoned in a truck in Mexico (BBC)
Officials have found more than 340 people (including 103 minors) in an abandoned truck trailer in Veracruz, in one of the biggest recent discoveries of migrant children travelling through Mexico. For context - many undocumented migrants who are looking to flee violence and poverty in Central America end up paying huge fees to ‘people smugglers’ to get them across the US border.
The migrants from Guatemala, Honduras, El Salvador and Ecuador all appeared unharmed “and the trailer had fans and ventilation ports,” officials said.
Asia
South Korea to compensate victims of Japan's wartime forced labour (BBC)
In a controversial move, South Korea has “agreed to pay compensation to its own citizens who were forced to work in Japanese factories during World War Two.”
For context: Between 1910 and 1945, about 150,000 Koreans were forced to work in factories and mines in Japan during the war, due to Japan's colonisation of the Korean peninsula.
The proposal aims to resolve a long-standing grievance between Japan and South Korea, and while officials on both sides have hailed the proposal as a “breakthrough” victims and opponents in South Korea have criticised it, saying “it does not hold Japan accountable.”
All the words we can’t pronounce
Yesterday's mundane question was ‘what words have you never been able to pronounce’ and it turns out… there are a LOT.
Mine is awry (anyone who listens to our podcasts already knows this) but you all have some GREAT ones that I wanted to share:
Lois: “For years I thought gargantuan was said like orangutan like the primate but with a G on the front. Also can’t wait for the full diary entry of your Harry experience!!!!”
Sinead’s is the word ‘misled’ - she see’s it as “mizled”
Mars: “i cannot for the life of me get açaí down”
Iona: “Censored. I read and said it ken-saw-d until I was about 17”
Heather: “I thought spatial was pronounced spat-i-al. I'm honestly still mad it's not.”
Sophie: “I have a vivid memory of being 11 and going up the elevator in Farmers with my mother, seeing the bra section, and saying "Why would they put the linger-y section at the top of the stairs??". My mother laughed very hard at me. Turns out lingerie is said "laundjeray"...”
Jenny: “I've always struggled with RURAL. Those back-to-back Rs really wreak havoc!”
Eilish: “Ok I have never been able to pronounce 'specifically'. Like my mouth just doesn't wrap around it, and if I do say it then its in small individual bits hahah.”
And some from Instagram:
“Yosemite. I know what it is but every time I see it I say it phonetically knowing it’s wrong 😂”
“When I was young I called it Massatwoshits. I still always say chew not 2 before I say Massachusetts.”
“Dachshund—I always want to say “dash hound” because that’s how tiny me pronounced it the first time I read it in a book.”
“I'm a nurse and I can never say "Rapid tranq".. it always comes out as "wapid twank"“
“EPITOME”
Today’s mundane poll:
To get my Friday diary entry, a whole bunch of links and recommendations, and Bel’s Sunday morning newsy ‘No News Is Good News’ become a paying supporter 💌
Saying he "sung" Tūtira Mai Ngā Iwi is a generous way to describe singing the first line, then leaving the rest up to the crowd and talking over the best line 😭
But renumeration would make so much more sense. Sadly, English does not care about making logical sense.