If you thought multi-millionaire celebrities flew by chopper to Waiheke Island, or travelled by chauffeured town car to the lavish SkyCity Grand Hotel, you'd be right... typically. But in these recessionary times it seems even the stars have downsized their mode of transport: catching public ferries with the hoi polloi and flagging down their own budget cabs on busy Ponsonby Rd. And, surprisingly, they don't seem all that fussed about it.
Photos flooded my inbox yesterday of pint-sized Pussycat Doll
Nicole Scherzinger
- she of the skanky good looks with the squillionaire racing driver toyboy - who disembarked from a Fuller's Ferry on Sunday evening in downtown Auckland after enjoying the day at Stonyridge Vineyard with Auckland businessman
's girlfriend. She jetted out to Brisbane at 5am on Sunday complete with her signature bizarre hairpieces, fake lashes, giant sunnies and a slasher ensemble that defied description. Seems low maintenance isn't in her vocab.
Quite what Scherzinger made of her day sipping wine at Waiheke and travelling by public ferry is unclear, though we do know she had, only days previously, been enjoying the lifestyle of the rich and famous on a luxury liner moored off the coast of Portofino with her Formula One World Champion beau. The A-list couple was snapped soaking up the sites of the Italian Riviera and jet skiing in the harbour. The Auckland concert venue is next door to the unappealing Ports of Auckland and is a world away from the picturesque beauty of the Italian seaside.
Also enjoying the low-key sites of Auckland this week is British fashion guru
Gok Wan
who chatted to me at SPQR yesterday. He was with his agent and sipping a mojito and nibbling on buffalo mozzarella at the Ponsonby establishment. The tell-it-like-it-is TV presenter from the hugely popular series
The Gokster had only just flown in from Britain, he said, via Singapore. He was tired. He didn't know what time of day it was. Jet lag was to blame, he said. But he wasn't too exhausted to have a wee look at our local boutiques. One is never too tired for shopping, presumably. He loved Zambesi and thought the World boutique was "amazing", but he was disappointed at the amount of imported designer labels in our stores. He'd prefer to see more local fashion.
Then he chatted about his Chinese heritage and about growing up in a Chinese restaurant his family ran. He could cook a full dinner by the age of five and slept in a cardboard box at the back of the restaurant, he said. The conversation felt rehearsed like he'd prattled it off to many a journo in the past.
But to give him credit: pretentious he was not. The man with millions of British fans and a celebrity black book of besties was happy to swap stories about family life and fashion with his new Kiwi pals.
And then he was off. Bidding goodbye and walking out on to busy Ponsonby Rd to hail a cab. Yes. Hail. No chauffeured limousine to sweep him back to his lavish SkyCity Grand suite. The British star was waving furiously at any taxi flying by. One finally stopped, on the median strip, and with a flurry of chic black, Gok Wan and his agent trotted out to the middle of the road to get in. He waved at us as he sailed by. How's that for a low maintenance star?
