Filched in the Antipodes.

It’s a long shot that anything will come of this but as they say, nothing ventured nothing gained. I’ll try and make it as short as possible.

Late last year we had a series telephone and e mail exchanges with a friend [lets call him NN] down in the states. NN was to attend a series of social and cultural conferences down in New Zealand’s North Island, mainly within the Maori Community.
At the Maori gatherings it is customary to exchange gifts, so NN asked for some input as to availability and appropriateness of gifts. NN learnt that for the gifts to have real meaning they would not be ones that are purchased at places like the airport duty free shop or the like. It was more appropriate if the gifts came from the creator of these gifts, or as close as possible.
So we came up with several small crafts that Fran had made, and one larger craft that had been in our possession for many years, but thought it to be an ideal item for this occasion. This was a soap stone oil lamp [Kullik] made by john Terriak. It was to be from Fran, an Inuit of Labrador to the Maori of NZ.

Due to the short time span that NN had given us it was a frantic time to get the items to him in time for his departure to NZ. Frantic really does not do it justice, but won’t go into that. Suffice to say the gifts made it into NN hands before departure.

So the conference up in the Northern Island Mountains goes swimmingly and the smaller gifts get into the correct hands. Then it’s down to the city and some more meetings/conferences, this is where it goes awry.

Part way through the city do-dad there was supposed to have been an exchange of gifts. The Kullik was in NN hands when some one decides that time is short, so lets put all the gifts on a table in a room, leave it unattended while we all go into another room and give all sorts of speeches.

Mean time [the story is foggy here] the Kullik and other gifts were to have been collected by some one and taken to some ones office or some such safe place.
After the do-dad NN inquired as to what happened to the Kullik, surprise surprise, no one any bloody place who should have known did know.

NN has inquired several times of the people in NZ in the time hence of any sign of the missing Kullik. No sign.

To say I’m pissed is to put a diplomatic spin on how I feel, as I’m sure NN is pissed too.

So if anyone down NZ way, or anyone passing through and sees something like this on someones coffee table, then tell them they have it bloody illegally.