Valerie Vili has just won the gold medal in the shotput at the Beijing Olympics. She’s also won gold medals at the world championships in Valencia this year and in Osaka last year. But there are some other reasons apart from her great sporting achievements that make her a good role model.

The first is her height. She is 1.96m (6ft 4in) tall and, when it was first suggested to her as a teenager that she could be good at the shotput, she was initially reluctant because she was self-conscious about her height. She gave it a go anyway, and soon achieved success. I think there’s a lesson there about body image and how it inhibits women.

The second is what I heard her say on the radio tonight. She said she focussed on doing the job she was there to do, and didn’t allow all the other activity in the stadium to distract her. She achieved a personal best as well as a gold medal. And the lesson there is, focus on your dream and you may well achieve it.

about Winnie Laban’s battle with cancer here

would be most welcome at the next Wellington meetup, wouldn’t you agree?

^{They just need to start saving, get passports etc.}

Picasso’s Muse and I finally met this afternoon at a café, and then we went to the first Asian Night Market together. The queue to get in was long, so we had plenty of time to chat and get to know each other.

The Asian Night Market itself was a really good event to go to for the first 43T Wellington meetup. There was yummy food – we both had steamed pork buns, and I also had a Filipino banana fritter and a tapioca square – and entertainment.

We stayed for quite a while and watched cultural groups from various countries. After some initial concern when we thought the MC announced line dancing and thoughts of an Asian Billy Ray Cyrus flashed through our minds, we were relieved when it turned out to be the Chinese lion dance. Acts after that included both Singaporean and Malaysian Bollywood dancing, Thai dancing, Indonesian gamelan and Filipino singers.

Definitely a good evening, and we are going to meet again.

It’s really good news about the rain. Now keep it there and don’t send it on to us ;)

He certainly is!