Student quarter cleanup
It should have been a normal Sunday morning on the notorious student enclave of Castle St, but it was anything but typical.
Students, joined by university staff and the wider Dunedin public, were urged to ‘‘turn our grief into action’’ by University of Otago vice-chancellor Professor Harlene Hayne.
By noon yesterday they had turned up in their thousands to honour the wishes of the Wellington-based family of Sophia Crestani, 19, who died at a student flat party on October 5.
The crowd included university staff member Claire Gallop, who said the tertiary institution was a ‘‘tightknit community and this has been a horrible tragedy’’.
It was important to acknowledge the wishes of the Crestani family and ‘‘just do our bit’’, she said.
The large response showed students cared.
‘‘These are good smart kids and they want to do the right thing,’’ Gallop said.
One of those was Emmanuel Osigwe, a student from Nigeria, who said he wanted to show his support for the Crestani family.
While students in his home country often lived in untidy areas, they were ‘‘not this bad’’, he said as he gestured from the corner of Castle and Dundas streets.
Within hours though most of the debris synonymous with the student quarter was gone, thrown in skips supplied by Dunedin City Council.
The rubbish included bags of glass, old bikes, mattresses and the items the area is infamous for – couches.
It was a sobering start to his new role for mayor-elect Aaron Hawkins, who noted the university was at the heart of Dunedin both ‘‘physically and culturally’’.
It meant the city celebrated the university’s successes, but also ‘‘we share in its moments of grief, of which this is certainly one of them’’.
He praised council staff who volunteered for the ‘‘fantastic cause’’.
Otago University Students’ Association president James Heath said yesterday’s cleanup offered a chance for students, still dealing with grief and shock, to ‘‘come together’’.
About 2500 people were involved in the cleanup in total, with numbers climbing as the afternoon progressed, he said.
‘‘We filled at least 12 skips, each with 1200 to 1500kg of rubbish in them . . . The cleanup ended earlier than expected, due to the incredible volume of people helping, which is a fantastic result.’’
Bede Crestani and Elspeth McMillan issued a statement last week through the university, asking for privacy to mourn their daughter.
‘‘It is a very difficult time for us. We are grieving the loss of our beautiful daughter and so is the community which Sophia knew and cared for,’’ the couple said.
The family is holding a private funeral for their daughter, who had a twin sister.
In lieu of flowers, the family requested donations be made to a University of Otago scholarship fund.
‘‘I think it is an outstanding way to actually mark how much Sophia loved it here,’’ Hayne said.