Saturday Morning With Jack Tame

A few years ago, I asked my Grandad about his impressions from when he first set foot in New Zealand. It was the mid-1960s. He’d sailed from the U.K with his wife and two boys on an Italian liner, when they drew up and docked in Auckland. Together, the Tame family went for a look up Queen Street.  ‘It was horrible!’ said my Grandad. ‘Just awful. We couldn’t wait to get out of the place.’ His midlands accent added an additional level of disgust at the state of Queen Street, back then. And needless to say it was all he could do to get on a train and make his way to the South Island. Queen Street must have been really bad. He’s held onto a grudge for almost sixty years and as far as I know, he’s never been back since.But to be fair to my Grandad, when was the last time you heard someone gushing with compliments for Queen Street? When was the last time you heard someone say, ‘Queen Street’s amazing! It has all the buzz and intrigue of a street befitting the centre of our biggest city!’.The Herald is reporting thi