The Bay of Plenty Times welcomes letters and comments from readers. Here you can read the letters we have published in your newspaper today.
Pipe bands find perfect place to play
On behalf of the Organising Committee of the New Zealand Pipe Band Championships I express sincere thanks to the public of Tauranga and the wider Bay for their magnificent support of what was a wonderful spectacle on Friday and Saturday.
Everyone from the management board of the Royal New Zealand Pipe Bands Association to the members of participating bands and particularly the Australian ones were fulsome in their praise of Tauranga, its people and the facilities at the Domain which were ideal for this event.
To the local sponsors and the great bunch of volunteers without whose assistance this event would not have happened we also express our thanks.
And thanks also to staff of various departments of the city council whose usual "can do" attitude provided assistance and advise over the last three years to help ensure that the event proceeded smoothly.
The result of all this is a financial spin-off to the city estimated at upwards of one and a half million dollars.
Kevin Nally, Chairman of Organising Committee, Tauranga
Bag pipers thrill
Last Friday my 7-year-old daughter and I were heading up the Minden in Te Puna for a look see from the look out up there.
As we passed the turn off she heard a sound she hadn't heard and asked me to stop.
The sound became clearer and when she climbed up on the bonnet to have a look over the fence to the motel where the sound was coming from there was a huge smile of joy over her face.
There, on the other side, were a bunch of bag piping boys practising for a local competition.
We stayed and enjoyed the sweet sounds for a good while and the word that keep coming from her was: "Cool eh Dad?"
It was indeed a cool sight and sound that we could have watched from the bonnet of my car for ages. That's if the noise police or ngati whingers didn't shut them down at 8.30
Kia ora bag piping boys'n girls who gave my daughter a tumeke time - and a snapshot into your culture.
Tommy Kapai, Te Puna
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