Biosecurity continues fly search
talking about home, belonging and displacement.’’
She cried after the first day of shooting.
‘‘It sticks to you. They tell you their journey and it’s not the journey you would hope for your children and it’s not the journey you would hope for their children going forward either.’’
She would like it to spark an ongoing conversation.
Take Moli. He lived in New Zealand and joined a gang. ‘‘We need to have some ownership or responsibility of the context that grew him.’’
HENRY has strong ties to Tonga through his wife; he is learning Tongan, enjoys mixing a bowl of kava and visits often. He reckons it helped earn the deportees’ trust – he wasn’t going to film and run – he’d be back. But he’s also got the sort of characteristics – open, inquisitive, culturally aware, kind – that make a person easy to talk too.
As a kid he liked animals, figuring things out, skateboarding and photography – intrigued by the ability to capture a moment that would never again exist. With no formal photographic training, he built his style over the years, influenced by studying anthropology at university, a fascination with subcultures and interest in the environment. He is currently doing his masters on how ‘‘last chance tourism’’ in places like Kiribati and Antarctica and is influenced by photographic representations of climate change.
One of the things Henry wanted to highlight in the documentary was how a lack of institutional support for the deportees affects Tonga as a whole. Many have a history of gang involvement, drugs and violence and, mixed with feelings of displacement, low employment and the availability of drugs in Tonga, deportation can lead to trouble, a sentiment reflected and reported in local media.
But Henry has also seen the redemptive possibilities of deportation. Talia’uli Prescott, who he met while making the documentary, moved him. He describes himself as a gangster at the start of the documentary. At the end, standing on a piece of land his brother is giving him, he says: ‘‘I don’t feel like a gangster over here because Mum and Dad grew up here… This is home. My feet are grounded.’’
Cultural connection and identity are important, says Henry.
‘‘It’s really powerful if you have that. He’s going to be OK because he has that.’’ A ‘‘large field operation’’ is under way on Auckland’s North Shore as biosecurity officers work to determine if there are any more fruit flies in the area.
It comes after a single Queensland fruit fly was trapped and identified in Devonport on Thursday. Biosecurity New Zealand has placed legal controls on the movement of fruit and vegetables in the suburb because the fruit fly could ‘‘seriously harm’’ crops.
Yesterday, Biosecurity said no further signs of fruit flies had yet been found. ‘‘The task at hand is to determine if the fly is a solitary find,’’ it said.
The immediate focus was to set more traps in Devonport
Biosecurity said a field crew was visiting local properties, checking for fruit trees, vegetable gardens and compost facilities that could provide a suitable habitat for fruit flies.
A mobile laboratory was being set up at the Devonport Naval Base where staff would inspect produce collected from the area.
Leaflets are still being distributed in the area and signs about the fruit fly are being put up on main roads and at the Devonport Ferry Terminal.
Bins will also be put in main areas so locals can safely dispose of locally grown fruit and vegetable waste.
Minister for Biosecurity, Damien O’Connor, was due to visit the Devonport field operations at 4pm today.