Chch Birds Eye View Seminar at FGS South Island
On the 19th of April, Minister of Customs and Christchurch City central MP Hon. Nicky Wagner hosted the Birds Eye View seminar, this year held at Fo Guang Shan South Island. Some of the notable invited speakers include Minister of Justice Hon. Amy Adams, and Christchurch and Canterbury Tourism Convention Bureau Manager Caroline Blanchfield. Around 60 people from various government agencies and private sector businesses attended the talks. Also invited that day were Fo Guang Shan (FGS) New Zealand Venerable Abbess Manshin and several Buddha’s Light International Association (BLIA) members.
Minister of Customs Hon. Nicky Wagner first thanked Venerable Abbess Manshin for providing such a calm and elegant venue for the talks, and invited her to give the first speech. BLIA member Lihson Ding also gave a quick introduction to the South Island temple’s history, some facts about Fo Guang Shan founder Master Hsing Yun’s Humanistic Buddhism philosophy, and an overview of some of the services and activities BLIA members have done within the local community.
The first main speaker, Caroline Blanchfield, gave the audience a recount of how Christchurch’s tourism sector fell hard and never quite recovered after the big earthquake. To add salt to the wound, the negative media news reports have cast the impression that Christchurch is a dead city with nothing to see. Caroline wants us to put all of that behind because the earthquake has now long past, and change our view to a more positive note. She has collaborated with several Canterbury tourism departments to make a cheerful tourism drive, asking reporters to come over and see how well the reconstruction work is going. By using various emerging media styles, such as the example of having short interviews with locals on why they stayed in Christchurch, Caroline hopes that potential tourists will come to see Christchurch as a revitalized city with a fresh face to offer.
Minister of Justice Hon. Amy Adams talked about the reasons domestic violence cases arise, and how to guard against it, amongst other noteworthy topics. As a politician with five different ministerial positions, she gave an interesting statistic in that the government spends $61 billion each year on the New Zealand Police, Ministry of Social Development, Justice Department and other social and crime related issues, and yet this does not fully stop incidents from happening in the first place. Instead of spending more tax dollars, she believes that it is essential to start looking at alternative ways, for example, through education or big data analytics, to better tackle these problems. At the same time, if we can encourage more community events that are good for the mind and body, make our community safer, increase standards of living and act to give more counselling services, this will make our big New Zealand family all the more harmonious, instil more positivity into the country, and really get at the root of the problems we have.
Quite a few people from the audience asked Hon. Amy Adams on whether the Justice system was working in New Zealand, and some wanted the government to listen more to people’s thoughts on justice. Some people from the audience actually shared their stories on their experience with the justice system, and praised the department’s thoroughness.
Hon. Nicky Wagner thanked everyone for the incredibly positive and constructive responses, and invited Venerable Abbess Manshin up to the podium again to wrap up the seminar. Venerable Abbess Manshin told the crowd on how the BLIA members didn’t flee from Christchurch after the earthquake, they actually immediately embarked on emergency relief work, providing free hot food and basic material items to earthquake victims for two weeks, and also spiritually comforted the victim’s nerves. As a Humanistic Buddhism practitioner, Venerable Abbess also feels that she must have the ability to be a counsellor for the human heart and soul, avidly propagating Venerable Master Hsing Yun’s “Three Good Deeds, Four Gives and Five Pentagon of Harmonious”, going from an individual’s level, to family, society, and finally peace and happiness across the whole world.
Once again, Hon. Nicky Wagner expressed her gratitude to Venerable Abbess for offering this special temple venue so that the seminar can come to a close in such a smooth and comfortable manner. On her count, about 90% of the guests that night said that it was their first time visiting the art gallery-like temple. During registration, more than half of the participants actually registered because they saw that it was held at the temple, and the total count this time was more than double that of previous years. Many of the guests were also full of praise of the temple’s serenity, and said they will definitely pay a visit again in the future to have a closer look at some of the art exhibition displays.
Minister of Customs Hon. Nicky Wagner has been acquainted with the temple for over ten years, This Birds Eye View seminar has been her brainchild idea, to be held in Christchurch on a regular basis, with participants made up of various government, private and non-profit sector people, and distinguished speakers from around Christchurch. It was no mistake to host this seminar here, given the high quality and excellent effect the temple grounds has created to inspire the interesting conversations that night, and Nicky felt very happy and touched to have had it all come together so nicely.