SOLD: Beautiful Happyzine

“I have to snatch them.  I always do, just before I give a speech, I like to breath a bit, sort of a puff of oxygen into the brain.  I just like to prepare myself.”

“I was going out to Bastian Point in the weekend – that was probably the cross roads for race relations in New Zealand, a very difficult and complex issue. There seemed to be zones around the place that inspire you to just reflect and for me Okahu Bay (there was just nobody on it) was an empty beach and just the ultimate in quietness really.  You just get that sound affect of the very small waves fading up on the sand and I think that’s where you prepare yourself, by thinking about what you’re going to say and about what the day’s events are going to be like.”
And how important are these quiet moments to Tim?
 “I think when you live a very sort of out-there life, a very public life, those moments of contemplation just help settle you down, help prepare you and are probably very helpful for you too, just to take a little break now and again.”
“And I think that’s what the great kiwi holiday’s all about.  We’re always trying to run and scramble and trying to keep up and it’s good to just get away from it every now and again in our lives.”
“Earnest Hemmingway said he never missed a dawn in his life and he was a novelist so he might have been exaggerating, but I know what he means, there is that magical sort of hour of twilight and dusk, the beginning and end of the day where every thing can often go quiet, even in quite busy places and that gives you time to think.” 
“I’ve found here in the South, a lot of guys who are good Southern men, they go deer hunting and trout fishing and duck shooting, but when you talk to them about it, it’s often just the time away, and just being in the bush and even if they don’t actually stumble across any deer, or catch a fish, they still come back satisfied.”
“I think we need to be close to the elements, to water and the sky and just as part of a balance of life, especially living the kind of industrial, scientific age that we live in these days we need to get out into the bush and the mountains for part of our mental health”.
“Even having to rough it a little bit is good. Maybe we don’t have to live our whole lives walking on tar seal or concrete, there are just times when we get closer to the earth, in every sense of the word.  I think there’s always this desire to get to the coast, and it’s not just swimming or fishing or recreational, I think it’s often that sort of point in the world where the land meets the ocean that has always been very attractive to us.”
And finally, what’s Tim’s ideal time-out experience?
“For me, there would have to be no cell phone reception possible, or internet, no mail service of any sort, for me the greatest luxury would be to be completely cut off from the world.  The second one, being a southerner, I’d love it to be warm; I’d go to a Pacific Island in the middle of nowhere.”  Charlotte Squire                    

At twenty six, Nadia’s leading a new age of hairdressing in Aotearoa/New Zealand.  Gone are the carcinogenic colours and tints and bleaches, they’ve been replaced by natural or organic vegetable bases and clays. 

I asked Nadia why she chose organic?

“Well for one it’s how I live my life.  I’ve been organic myself for about five years.  I started working in an eco-salon in Queensland and just learnt about it really.  I wasn’t aware that it was available till then and I thought ‘God, what have I been doing?   There’s just no other way really.  It’s biodegradable, good on the planet and good for us”.

So what are the ‘organic’ parts of her salon?  

“Every thing you can think of – what we paint the walls with, your tea and coffee and biscuits are organic, everything is either eco-friendly or organic wherever possible.  There are no carcinogens in the shop and there are heaps of vegan products.  It’s nice to work in.  I love it.”

Nadia says that a year after she first bought it, many people are still discovering Amala, despite zero advertising. 

“It was a really run down salon, I de-cluttered and de-chemicalled the place.”

Location plays a role in the success of Nadia’s salon.  She set up across the road from Christchurch’s well established organic shop – ‘Piko’.  Also very close by are herbal outlets, a shop full of retro gear, and a crystal store.

I asked Nadia if she started out with a vision.

“Well it’s kind of created itself.  I’ve got an awesome team of staff.  They’ve learnt a bit about organics, one of them has taken her kids off preservatives.” 

And what about the future?

“I would love to open another one, to spread the word in New Zealand.  There are a couple around the country but they haven’t done as much homework as I’ve done.  There are companies out there who are trying to sell so-called organic colour, but they’re petroleum based.  I’d like to get out there and just let people know …”

“Women colour their hair every four to six weeks!  Your skin absorbs eighty percent of whatever you put on it and hair dyes are a grade one carcinogen.  If you’re doing that every four weeks it’s quite detrimental to your health.  I think once you know better you couldn’t inflict that on somebody, I’d never do it again, not knowing what I do now.”

I emerged from Amala feeling gorgeous and pampered.  It was the best haircut I’d had in years and just knowing the hair products were organic added to my pleasure.  My prediction: in ten years time, salons like Nadia’s are going to be more mainstream than leading edge – as she says – once you know the facts, there’s no going back.

  Charlotte Squire              

Charlotte Squire