The roll-on roll-off Interislander ferries that ply Cook Strait take passengers, cars and even trains across the 100-kilometre body of water, in almost any conditions. They carry a million passengers and nearly a quarter of the million vehicles every year. Here in Queen Charlotte Sound, Aratere and Arahura ferries pass between Allports Island and The Snout.
The steamer Waikare was wrecked on January 4, 1910, in Dusky Sound when on her annual excursion to the West Coast Sounds. There was no loss of life amongst the 141 passengers and 85 crew, nor did anybody get wet. She has rested there ever since, the province of butterfly perch with the distinctive spot that local fishos suggest is a “map of Australia”.
The radar tower affords a dramatic view as MV Flightless leaves the narrow entrance Pickersgill Harbour and makes for the Outer Islands of Dusky Sound. It was here board Cook’s second voyage in 1773 that Resolution stopped for repairs and recuperation, made the first beer out of rimu and manuka and fixed the exact position of New Zealand at Astronomer’s Point.
Peter Young has been crayfishing the Fiordland coast for decades, throwing those that are undersize or ‘in berry’ back, retaining the rest for export. But after a number of years of decline, he joined other fishers in pausing the harvest for a few seasons to allow the population to rebuild. Today Young and his son fish his quota in just 60 days; the example of what a sustainable, responsible fishery looks like.
When I started looking for stories about young people in New Zealand, I discovered that a lot has been written about them, but very little of it spoke to actual teenagers. This is what you might learn about teenagers from the media: Teens have higher rates of mental illness than ever before. They protest against climate change, but also, they’re not as wild as their parents were. Less sex, fewer drugs. They’re spending an awful lot of time on social media. They’re really pessimistic about the future. We hear from the people around them—their parents and teachers and counsellors. The people who watch them and worry about them. We don’t really hear their own worries, thoughts, concerns. Part of this is because it’s delicious to be outraged about what the youth are up to, sure. But part of this is also to do with good journalistic ethics—it’s not cool to put a kid on the spot for a quote. We’ve all said dumb things as teens and none of them are written down in the pages of a national magazine. And yet, as the pandemic went into its second year, I couldn’t help but wonder what it was like to be on the precipice of adulthood at this moment in time. An uncertain present and an uncertain future. The big OE temporarily out of the question. Family finances strained. A tough job market to enter. A second world, online, which never stops or sleeps—and which you can’t opt out of without losing friendships. We knew that if we wanted to produce a story about young people, it would require time. A lot of time. Enough to really get a sense of a person, a family, a circumstance. And it couldn’t be about just one person—there would have to be many. It was the kind of project that was too big and expensive to make. It went into the box of impossible stories. Then, in the wake of COVID-19, NZ On Air began offering grants to magazines like this one. Normally, NZ On Air only provides funding to broadcast journalism—television, video and radio—but during the pandemic, for a three-year period, it expanded its remit to include written journalism and photography. We received funding for a year-long project to document a group of young people who were broadly representative of the ages, locations, and ethnicities of teens in New Zealand today. We sought out teenagers. We met their parents. We mobilised a big group of writers and photographers. We bothered our teen participants as they studied for exams (Liam and Seilala), got ready for the ball (Vidi, Will, Ceejay), at their birthday parties (Hawaikii, Ceejay), at their prizegivings (Vidi). We photographed their bedrooms (Te Orahi, Ceejay) and their soft toys (Jaxon), their breakfasts and board games and sports tournaments (Mihi). It turned out to be a tough assignment. “I honestly think these might be my most challenging interview subjects yet,” one writer said. There were floods and COVID-19 outbreaks and a lot of unanswered messages, calls, chats, DMs. But it was also joyful. Documenting one of Seilala’s performances at Papatoetoe High took photographer Edith Amituanai back to her high-school Samoan group dancing days. Photographer Becki Moss sat in on a health class she wished she’d been able to take in school. And we all came to care for these teens and their families. We hope that comes through on the page.
Pandemic. Climate chaos. A cost-of-living crisis, houses laughably far out of reach, beaches too dirty to swim at—it’s exhausting being an adult in 2023. How do our teens manage?
Almost every year since 1973, tāne Māori of all ages have travelled to an uninhabited island in Lake Rotorua to train in the traditional art of taiaha. They learn how to hold an ahae, or defensive posture, how to perform a poua, or strike, and how to lay down a wero, or ceremonial challenge. But there’s something deeper in play: the wānanga connects modern people to old knowledge, and to each other, and that changes them. It’s become a place of second chances.
Fifteen years ago, a crisis loomed for search and rescue. Two-thirds of volunteers were men over 40, and as the years ticked by, they were going to struggle with the gnarly climbs, river crossings and long days so often required to find those who are lost. But would young people be altruistic enough to step up?
New Zealand Geographic journalists and photographers followed the trials and tribulations of nine teens for almost a year to create a picture of a generation we sometimes deride, often misunderstand, and almost never listen to. These are their stories.
What would lockdown have been like when you were a teen? In trying to fathom the gap between today’s adolescents and all who have gone before, it’s a useful thought experiment. For me, a Hawke’s Bay teen in the late 90s, I suspect a lockdown would have been extremely chill. Lots of books and baking and runs around the orchard with our dog. I guess there would have been homework? Posted-out worksheets or something? But no smartphone, no TikTok or Instagram or chaotic class Zooms, or streamed TV to hand 24/7. My brothers and I would have fought over the landline, made eel traps and played cricket on the lawn. I’d have spent a lot of afternoons up trees. Also: COVID would have been pretty much the only hard thing we had to deal with. I don’t think lockdown circa 2020/2021 felt like that for our kids, or for many teens in New Zealand. Our young people are now part of the pressure cooker. They exist in this busy, uncertain world with us—but they’re also online, and in that world the sun never sets. Lockdown at our place, in Auckland with two working parents and two young kids, meant that every moment from 5am was parcelled out, consumed by either childcare or work. My husband and I were both working in digital journalism so even when we weren’t technically on shift we were still responding to Slack messages and tweets. There was no way around it and no way to hide it from the kids. By necessity, they had their own screens: the TV in the lounge, streaming endless Bluey and Octonauts while I tapped away on the laptop beside them. The iPad stuffed with e-books and primary-school maths programs. We got outside when we could. Hunted for fungi, walked endlessly around the block, planted silverbeet. But on the whole it sucked, for everyone. I still worry about what those months did to our kids—and the fact that their future will likely be full of similar, extraordinarily anxious times. What will the world be like in 10 years, 15, 20? My three-year-old is obsessed with babies. She chatters with happy certainty about having a real one of her own. She will teach her baby to make kawakawa tea, to swim at the beach, turn over stones to look for pinchy crabs. It has recently become an act of self-preservation to smile and slam a door on the thoughts that bloom when she talks like this. Our parents can’t help us parent in this moment. Nothing they faced compares. Their experience of thinking about their kids’ futures is so far removed from our own that sometimes when I broach the topic, I come away feeling slightly unhinged. But then another news story drops into my feed: an Antarctic ice shelf sets melt records. Millions of dead fish clog an Australian river. This morning, economists updated their predictions of recession—it will be twice as deep as first thought. In grappling with all this, I think it’s helpful to acknowledge that the gap between teens and adults today is more like a gulf, a parallel universe—in a world in flux every adolescence, from now on, will be profoundly out of whack with our own. It already is. Yet we never hear from teenagers—they exist on different platforms, they don’t get to vote, they’re often ignored in data collection, and too often what they say in public is misunderstood or disregarded. So this edition of New Zealand Geographic is a special one. With funding from NZ On Air, we’ve spent nearly a year documenting nine teenagers from all around Aotearoa. We want to know what the world looks like from their perspective. What it feels like. How they cope. This project is not about chronicling the quirks of youth or the evils of screens, or how to be a better parent. There is no tutting or throwing-up of hands. It is simply an exercise in listening. If you’re a teen reading this magazine, we hope you see something of yourself in it.
In her last years of high school, Cadence Chung wrote a book of poems, a musical, and a high-profile complaint to the New Zealand Qualifications Authority. Two years on, she’s also told the backstory.
Nō hea koe? Where are you from? In te ao Māori, it’s the first and most important question to ask—because your place, and the place of your people, shapes who you are.
The world according to Jaxon Brian Storm Czepanski, 14.
They stopped him doing the girls’ pūkana when he was little. But nothing will stop Te Orahi Akuhata living his best life now.
Cameron Gumbley and Henry Wilson feed meal into the pens at High Country Salmon on an arm of Lake Ruataniwha. The family-owned operation sells directly into the local market, rather than exporting.
Legendary Kiwi mountain climber Lydia Bradey swaps notes with fellow climber Ruari MacFarlane in the iconic Plateau Hut, something of a ‘base camp’ for attempts on the summit of Aoraki/Mt Cook. There are dozens of routes up the peak to choose from, all of them challenging, but some more challenging than others.
Alan and Pam Gilmour have been researching near-Earth asteroids since 1973, monitoring 20 to 30 targets in any one night from University of Canterbury Mt John Observatory in Tekapo.
Te Rawhitiroa Bosch documents the traditional harvest of a sperm whale stranded in the Coromandel.
Becki Moss photographs the drama and intimacy of two vogue balls.
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