Melbourne has nothing on Greymouth
Storyteller Andy Wright has ditched big-city living for the South Island’s West Coast and hasn’t looked back, writes Joanna Davis.
As a professional storyteller, Andy Wright thought he needed to live in a big city and chose Melbourne and Perth, but as his international career took off, he realised he could live anywhere.
So he chose his dream place-to-be – Greymouth, on the South Island’s West Coast, population about 8300.
Wright, a librarian by training, says he developed his love of stories at the knee of his mother, who was blind and a prolific storyteller.
‘‘She loved to listen to stories, and she told stories. In my childhood, listening and telling was very, very important,’’ he says.
Storytelling started to take over his library work and 20 years ago, he went full time.
He moved to Melbourne to progress his career. ‘‘Like a lot of artists, I thought the way to make money is to be in big cities, with lots of gigs and opportunities for performers.’’
The Gisborne-raised performer was living in Melbourne when he was headhunted ‘‘out of the blue’’ by an Argentinabased organisation that runs storytelling programmes for Englishspeaking international schools throughout the world.
‘‘They asked me if I would do tours with them,’’ Wright says. ‘‘I went initially to Argentina and Uruguay, and in the last 15 years, I’ve been to more than 50 countries, mainly in South America, Asia and Europe. I stayed doing that and living in big cities, and over the years, the international work got more and more.’’
Eventually, he was travelling for seven to eight months a year. ‘‘So the need to live in a big city diminished as I was on the road so much.
‘‘I thought, if I was going to choose anywhere to live, where would it be? And I realised it was the West Coast of New Zealand. I’d been here a few times, and I really really loved it.’’
‘‘The green’’ is the main appeal for Wright. ‘‘Having lived in Australia for a number of years, there’s nothing more depressing than drought. It’s a soul-destroying natural disaster.
‘‘We have it all here; mountains, forests, rivers, lakes. I’ve always enjoyed tramping and when I was younger, I surfed.’’
Wright, 52, was initially concerned that his wife, Liz Burke, who grew up in Melbourne, might be too much of a ‘‘city girl’’.
‘‘She got here, and within six months, she said: ‘This is it. This is where I’ll stay until I die’.’’
Burke is working locally as a library manager. The couple were able to buy a 1937, four-bedroom villa, ‘‘so big you could drive a Mini down the central hallway’’, and Wright says housing is still affordable in Greymouth compared to other parts of New Zealand.
According to analysis from Infometrics, the West Coast region is more than twice as affordable as the country as a whole. Its 2022 housing affordability index number is 3.7 (ratio of the average current house value to average household income), compared to 8.6 for New Zealand.
Wright says he was initially concerned about the three-hour drive to the international airport at Christchurch. ‘‘But I figured I go for six to eight weeks – adding three hours at the start and end is not much of an issue.’’
During the worst of the Covid pandemic, when much of his work shifted online, he found the Greymouth tech infrastructure could keep up.
‘‘We have world-class internet here. I was able to do what I did – including providing performances online at 2am, telling stories to schools in Peru, Colombia – because I have fibre into my home. I didn’t ever have to cancel a performance.’’
Development West Coast chief executive Heath Milne says advances in digital technologies are opening new opportunities, enabling people like Wright to live where they want, and do business with the world.
‘‘The West Coast’s appeal as a digitally connected region is allowing people to run successful businesses remotely all while enjoying the superior West Coast lifestyle,’’ he says.
Wright has just signed a contract to perform in Colombia, Chile, Peru, Argentina, and Uruguay early next year.
There, he says he will naturally tell the stories of the West Coast as part of his repertoire, which generally includes personal stories, folk tales and true historical stories.
‘‘If you live in a place and you love it, it becomes part of your storytelling,’’ he says.
‘‘I was able to do what I did – including providing performances online at 2am, telling stories to schools in Peru, Colombia – because I have fibre into my home.’’