New Zealand Herald

At Gallipoli - Remembrance Day - Singapore Takes Air NZ - Home Prices - Timor Student- Microsoft Down- Wintry Blast- Air Crash - Sacrifices Remembered - Varroa Mites - 36 Minutes Homework - Sumo Encounter - Zimbabwe Farmers - Rudman’s City

AT GALLIPOLI: Silence was the order of the day at Gallipoli yesterday. The spaces between the words of Prime Ministers, priests and soldiers were filled with silent tributes by thousands of ordinary New Zealanders and Australians.

REMEMBRANCE DAY: Even the storms that buffeted Auckland paused in honour of New Zealand's war veterans yesterday with rain over the Auckland Domain stopping during the dawn ceremony at the Cenotaph. Four thousand people, ranging from veterans in their 80s to toddlers wrapped in blankets, took part.

SINGAPORE TAKES AIR NZ: After one aborted takeoff, Singapore Airlines is about to add Air New Zealand to its global network. Singapore Airlines yesterday reached agreement with Brierley Investments to acquire 16.7 per cent of its stake in the New Zealand flag carrier for $285 million.

HOME PRICES: The median sale price for homes in the Auckland region was $240,000 during March and February - the same as it was a year ago. This signalled a stable market, said the national president of the Real Estate Institute, Max Oliver.

TIMOR STUDENT: Wellington - Indonesia is to pass legislation that will allow those who killed New Zealand student Kamal Bamadhaj in East Timor to be prosecuted. Foreign Affairs Minister Phil Goff was told of the move in a meeting yesterday with Indonesian Attorney-General Marzuki Darusman.

MICROSOFT DOWN: Microsoft chairman Bill Gates suffered a loss of nearly $NZ19 billion in his personal fortune yesterday and came dangerously close to losing his ranking as the richest man on Earth to another technology supremo. At the close of trade in New York, Microsoft stocks had dropped 15.6 per cent, their biggest fall since October 1987.

WINTRY BLAST: A wintry blast interrupted ferry sailings, delayed flights, caused road accidents and dumped snow on some North Island ranges yesterday. Late last night, nearly 2000 fast-ferry passengers remained stranded in Picton and 250 in Wellington because of high seas in Cook Strait.

AIR CRASH: Wellington teenager Timothy Anderson - one of six people killed in Monday's air crash in Central Otago - died having fulfilled his dream. "His ultimate dream was to go to Warbirds Over Wanaka ... he died doing what he loved," his mother Robyn said.

SACRIFICES REMEMBERED: They came from all ages and in all weather, with straight backs and medals on their chests, in Bananas in Pyjamas raincoats and gummies, some holding candles and some with tears in their eyes, to remember a nation's sacrifice. In the process, the country talked about the things usually drowned out by everyday bustle - honour and pain, duty and loss, life and death, a shared identity and an aching separation.

VARROA MITES: Eight more apiary sites infected with Varroa mites have been found, all in South Auckland, as the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry continues to sample sites near Auckland. These discoveries and two others recently near Helensville and in Orewa are all within the quarantine area imposed by MAF after the mites were first found nearly two weeks ago.

36 MINUTES HOMEWORK: Secondary school students spend an average of 36 minutes a day doing homework. The Government's Time Use Survey shows that those aged between 12 and 17 spend less time doing their homework than schools expect from them.

SUMO ENCOUNTER: It was a David and Goliath encounter at the Easter Show yesterday as 6-year-old Torrens Parsons stepped out of the audience to square off against sumo wrestler Emanuel Yarbrough. Luckily for Torrens he didn't have to toss the American giant off the mat: that would have been a feat beyond even David.

ZIMBABWE FARMERS: Svea Hurd fled strife-torn Zimbabwe so her young family could sleep at night. But their first night on New Zealand soil was disturbed by an early-morning phone call from Svea's husband, Adam, to say the farm they worked on had just been seized by veterans of Zimbabwe's independence war.

RUDMAN’S CITY: Of all the missed opportunities of the past summer, the failure to show off the newly renovated Civic Theatre must rank high on any list. I'd have loved to have shown visiting friends around during the America's Cup regatta and again over the Easter break. But all we could do was peer through the closed glass door into the gloomy interior. These days it's hard to even get to the door to squint through it.

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