We were proud to partner with Mabel’s Restaurant, our favourite Burmese Restaurant in the capital. Run by Marlar and Ian Boon, the restaurant’s namesake honours Marlar’s grandmother Mabel who, in 1977 opened New Zealand’s first Burmese restaurant, the Monsoon on Cuba Street. The Monsoon would become a hub for Wellington’s Southeast Asian community. Following in this tradition, Mabel’s also supports and promotes Burmese and Asian Tauiwi communities through their Community Hall market days, as well as serving fresh and delicious contemporary Burmese cuisine.

Brannavan Gnanalingam is a writer and practising lawyer who lives in Wellington. His 2020 book Sprigs, won the 2021 Best Novel prize at the Ngaio Marsh Awards, and was shortlisted for the 2021 Fiction award at the Ockham New Zealand Book Awards. The Guardian described Sprigs as "an incendiary novel" and "an important examination of racism, violence and toxic masculinity that everyone should read". He has also written for The Lumiere Reader, The Spinoff, The New Zealand Listener, The New Zealand Herald, and The Dominion Post, and is a contributing editor for Wellington-based Lawrence & Gibson publishing collective.

AAA2024 & Mabel’s Restaurant Presents
A South & South-East Asian Solar New Year Celebration

Mabel’s, 66 Tory St
Sun 14 April, 11am - 8pm

We collaborated with our friends Mabel’s Restaurant to launch our programme with a special South Asian & South East Asian Solar New Year Celebration. People were warmly welcomed to come and mark the change of seasons with us through a day of art, design, music, readings, food and performances.

Mabel’s designed a custom menu and there were special guest performances and readings by Brannavan Gnanalingham, Rose Lu, Lazarus Marama, Gia Espelita, DJsPrince Ferrari, and Maz Hermon, and the Burmese Karen Community traditional dance group.

A market offered design works for sale by Otsu, Chills, Tanuki&Co, Red Letter Distro, Sabado Studios, Gabebes, Jing Hé, romesh dissanayake, Jessica Miku, Sahana Rahman, Laurence Sabrine, and Mabel’s Super Store.

There were also family-friendly craft activities.

Free and all welcome!

Rose Lu is a writer based in Wellington, New Zealand. She gained her Masters of Creative Writing at the International Institute of Modern Letters in 2018 and was awarded the Modern Letters Prize for Creative Nonfiction. Her first essay collection  All Who Live on Islands was published to critical acclaim in 2019. She has also been published in The Guardian, Metro and Pantograph Punch. She was the Writer in Residence at Randall Cottage in 2022. Her undergraduate degree was in Mechatronics Engineering and she has worked as a software developer since 2012.