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[Music]
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Kiwis love a
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thirst. Like Finn, we're making
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[Music]
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[Applause]
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[Music]
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waves. Generate switch online
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[Music]
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today. Honey smiler. Honey Bill
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Williams, welcome to my podcast. A
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thanks so much for having me, Dom. Can't
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wait to get into it. This this is um a
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podcast first. Um in over 200 episodes,
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you're the first person that's come
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straight from the dentist.
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I know. I I feel like it's wearing off.
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So, if I'm sluring a bit, it's not cuz
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I've been on the juice. Although, um
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yeah, I've done so much research on you.
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It wouldn't be um out of character for
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you to be pissed before midday.
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There's a I'm so excited about this chat
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because I I feel like I know so much
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about you and um I've got so many uh
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cards here with notes on because there's
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things that I know I can ask you that
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are going to give us good answers like
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the time you had two bottles of port
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before
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midday or the time you stole your dad's
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tractor to do a booze run. Oh yeah. Um
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but then there's there's things that I
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don't know about you that I want to I'm
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curious to ask. But um yeah, it's just
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so amazing to have you here today. No, I
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really appreciate it. Okay. And and on
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the on the two bottles of port. So that
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was two bottles before lunch.
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Considering I started at 11:00, I think
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I finished those by 12 and then I think
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I polished off another three after that.
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So that's quite a bit of a record. Oh my
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god. Five bottles in a day. You had a
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very good reason though. This is when
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you you just found out you missed out on
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going to the Rio Olympics. Yep. Yep. So
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I took the took the phone call and Yeah.
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I just saw it's funny. I saw red. I
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don't even drink port. I don't know why
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that was my choice of uh poison that
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day, but it was maybe I was seeing red.
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I was going through so many emotions of
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not being selective for something that
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you tried so hard to to make. Um and
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with good reason, you know, now I
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suppose in hindsight when I look back
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like fair enough, you know, I I wasn't I
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wasn't 100% was carrying injury and I
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wasn't up to it, you know. Um, but yeah,
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five five reds a port will help you deal
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with that real quick because in the book
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you didn't talk about the three bottles
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after lunch.
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Thanks for that exclusive. So, um, who
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is Honey Hood Mey Smiler? Well, I've got
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some of your sporting achievements here.
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Um, you won the Rugby World Cup 7s in
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2013. uh one of our first professional
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women's rugby players, two World Sevens
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series titles, once won 44 consecutive
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matches with the Black Fern sevens, New
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Zealand women's rugby league player of
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the year three times, four rugby league
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world cups, winning twice, um NRL Ilawar
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Dragons in 2018, signed for the
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Warriors, but never played 2019. Captain
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of the Kiwi Ferns when they won the
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World uh the the Nines World Cup in
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2019. I mean, it's it's embarrassing the
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list. Like I could go on and on and on,
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but for for you uh what would your top
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five sporting achievements be you
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reckon? Oo, cuz there's not one thing I
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noticed um and and I I wonder if this
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pisses you off like there's not a huge
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amount of highlights of you online and I
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suppose that's just indicative of where
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women's sports was throughout most of
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your career. Yeah, absolutely. So if you
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think like you know um I think it's well
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documented like 18 years in black
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jersey, right? Well, I'd say 16, well,
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maybe not 16, maybe 15 of those. A big
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chunk where women's sport wasn't
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televised, barely any media coverage.
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Uh, you know, a lot of that was during
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my unprofessional era, right? So, we
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were paying to play in the back jersey.
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We were fundraising. I was selling hies.
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I was doing all of that kind of stuff to
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be able to uh go represent my country um
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in in all those different World Cups. So
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I mean I did you know have a big chunk
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of career where you know being part of
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that first lot to be a contracted rugby
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player. Um and that was awesome but yeah
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when you look back in in terms of my
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highlight whereas I always tell people
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oh they're in black and white as in a
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newspaper article there are no sort of
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video footage of a lot of those
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highlights. Um which is why I don't know
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when they put stuff on telly it's all
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the same old it's the same old highlight
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on repeat kind of thing. They just do
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different angles. Yeah. And you even
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make a joke about this in some of your
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public speaking engagements, but it's um
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it's actually no joke. Like who would
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your male um equal be throughout the
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sort of time that you were playing in
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either league or rugby? Oh yeah, I
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suppose I have to drop Sunny Bull's name
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real early anyway. And that because
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obviously um you know he he was you know
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flourishing in his career alongside and
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it was just weird how our careers were
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crossing over. you know, he was initial
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playing league. I was initial playing
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league. I went over to Sevens. He jumped
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on Sevens and All Blacks and and all of
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that kind of stuff. So, you know, we're
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crossing over, but yeah, but every like
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Cineville Williams is a is a household
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name. Everyone everyone knows him. Um
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Oh, yeah. He's he's a a boxer as well.
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And you're a boxer. If there's time,
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we'll get into that, but I feel like
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there's so much more of the Honey story
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to get into. Um but you are undefeated.
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Yeah. One hit wonder. One minute wonder.
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Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. So, um Yeah. So for
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you, sorry to put you on the spot, but
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your top five moments of this epically
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long career, what would it be? Yeah, I'd
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have to go with all my debuts for every
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single black jersey. Um, Hong Kong being
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one of those, and that was the Mai uh
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the Mai Woman Sevens team, my first
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debut over there. That was just unreal.
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Uh, we played our final in the in the
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packed Hong Kong stadium on a Friday
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night. Um, and being able to represent
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my culture first and foremost. So that
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was kind of my first experience um in a
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black jersey was for the Martis. Um and
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then obviously my Kiwi Fun's debuts
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right up there at the top of that. Um
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had a horror of a of a um first I
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suppose interaction when the ball uh got
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kicked off to me. But uh I think for me
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it was a realization of doing the anthem
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and doing the haka for the first ever
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time in that black jersey that I chased
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for so long. Uh yeah those those
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definitely top two. The third one which
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I always talk about that stands out to
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me was that 2013 World Cup where we lost
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uh first time losing the World Cup in
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the Kiwi Ferns and yeah that's just one
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of those ones that never never I I can
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never lose that memory you know because
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it was just it was a rough time. It was
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a rough time we lost. We should have
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won. We were the better team but we
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didn't. Um and then just yeah that that
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sevens that sevens world cup over in
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Russia of all places playing rugby in
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Russia in a world cup is super random
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but super cool to go out and win that
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world cup with with our seven sisters
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and then jump on the plane and shoot
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straight over to the league. So
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I Yeah, we can get into that in more
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detail later. This is a crazy story. So
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you played for two separate New Zealand
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teams and two separate codes in the
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space of a week. Yeah. Yeah. Um, and
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we're lucky to make both cuz there was
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an issue with the the flights, airports
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and flights and trying to cross Russia
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on my own. Yeah.
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Crazy.
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Um, what's one thing about you that
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people would be surprised to know?
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Oo, I've got a list of five here that I
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can I can I give I'll give you a few and
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you this will give you time to think.
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Um, you're you're um you're uh not a
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night owl. You're in bed by 8:30 most
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nights. 100%. Have you always been like
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a nanner? Yeah, I have been. I honestly
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have been. I don't know. I just I we
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wear myself out too quickly and like the
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moment I winter um I'm a 7:30 in bed
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because I hate the cold and um I just
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need to get in my bed. It's my happy
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place. Um but I'm not a good sleeper.
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So, I can get to sleep fine and I can do
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a decent night's sleep, but as soon as
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like there's one little bird that chs in
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the morning, I'm up. You know, I'm a I'm
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a morning person, so I can't stay asleep
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for long. But um yeah, that's probably
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just I don't know. It's always been in
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me. You're you're living life like a
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senior citizen.
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Well, you Relle, your wife, is she is
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she a night owl or is she We're the
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opposites. Yeah, she's a night owl and
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will love to sleep in. And she always
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pre-warns me like the daylight savings
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has just gone, right? She's like, "Just
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remember there's extra hours sleep. So
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just cuz you're going to wake up, don't
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wake me up. I'm going to take
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advantage." I was like, "Yeah, okay."
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Right. Sort of thing. Yeah. She hates
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it. She hates it. I'm an early riser.
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Um, another thing about you that most
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people probably won't know, you you once
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had a job making airline food. Yeah,
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like plane food. Yeah, that was super
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cool. Um, was it stacking trays? I used
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to make it of a little competition in my
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head how fast I could do a whole flight.
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So sometimes, you know, I'll do like a
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thousand thousand flight and just be
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stacking trays and I' I'd time myself
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and put the little the little cups and
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the you know the cutlery and all of that
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and then you got the your little bowl of
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salad and you shoved it in there and
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sent it off the hot pack and they chuck
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the hot pack on and then off the flight
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went. So, I I enjoyed that. It was It
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was a challenging time, but it
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definitely made me want to go back to
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school. Right. Yeah. This was um and
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we'll get into this shortly. This was in
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your your badgirl era when you shipped
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over to Australia. Um another fun fact
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that people might not know about you.
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Your your specialty dance move is the
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running man. Is that you used to bust
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out at Blue Light Discos? Yeah, I I was
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so good at it. And I used to like always
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be in the final two and then you'd see
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like the judges who were like my
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cousins. They were like, "Change, like
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do something. Do another move." I was
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like, "I don't have another move." Like
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that's it. I used to watch House Party
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and try and do that like little kick
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trick thing with my brother where you
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lift your leg up and jump over it. I was
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pretty good at that one, but no, I could
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never do it now. And your dog
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understands today Maldi. Yes. Yeah. Both
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my dogs now got another little pup on
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the way. So um we specifically got um
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both our pups and sort of made a really
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I suppose early decision that we would
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only um coded to them in Tel Mari to
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help us you know learn our own language
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and stuff and it's really cool because
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if I'm saying it wrong they don't creek
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me and they're really good. Yeah. Um and
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actually the day the doggy day that they
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go to said actually they're really good
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with um with learning multiple languages
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because uh you know they had to learn
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his name. his name is Donga and um they
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they when I go pick him up they're like
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ranga I was like his name is Donga like
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this and so they were like really cool
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with like you know trying to help me to
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teach him to do Mari. Yeah. What what
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have I overlooked? What is there that
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people may not know about honey? I was
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born with a club foot and technically um
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that was deemed a disability when I was
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um I was deemed a handicap baby
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apparently um because I had a club foot
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and it was severely it was severely um
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club and so they broke broke my ankle
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and straightened it with a with a uh
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cast and I wore cast for like the first
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eight weeks of my life. Um but I it
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never affected me for the rest of my
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life. My brother also so it's actually
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heritage in our family. My brother's
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also born with a club foot and um he
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also got the cast on the break but it
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didn't quite straighten him fully so he
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still sort of has a bit of a club foot
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and both of our sons were born with club
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feet as well. So yeah, super random.
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Wow. If you're born with a club foot
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does is it like different levels of
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severity? Yeah. Well, see I know they
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don't break ankles now. So like
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apparently they just broke our ankles
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back in the day and just chucked on a
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cast and straightened it up. They don't
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do that now. Like I know with my nephew,
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um they they they did cast them, but
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they have these like new little shoes
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now where they just wind and slowly turn
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your feet in cuz your bones are so soft
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as a baby. Um but yeah, it's super
00:11:18
weird. So you had your ankle broken as a
00:11:20
like a brand new but Damn, that is
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traumatic. That was your first first
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serious injury basically. Yeah, exactly.
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But I I didn't even discover that until
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I was like, you know, well into my teens
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and I found the little cast. Like it was
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just sitting in the back of this cabinet
00:11:35
at home and I was like, "What is this?"
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And it was literally that little. It was
00:11:39
just this little cast that had like, you
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know, been cut off my foot and my mom's
00:11:43
like, "Oh, you had a club foot." You
00:11:45
your parents never told you? No, I just
00:11:47
No, they had the souvenir. They had the
00:11:49
memorabilia in the back of some drawer
00:11:51
somewhere. Yeah. Well, I I suppose
00:11:54
there's probably no need to bring it up
00:11:55
if it's not impacting your day-to-day
00:11:56
life. Yeah, exactly. So, yeah, they just
00:11:59
I don't know, just decided never to
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mention it. It's a bit like my uh name.
00:12:02
They never really mentioned that. I was
00:12:04
under he What's your out of all the
00:12:07
things I've got, I didn't write this
00:12:08
down as a note because I thought, you
00:12:09
know, we've got limited time and there's
00:12:10
so much to talk about with you. This is
00:12:12
one of the probably one of the least
00:12:13
interesting things about your entire
00:12:15
story. Not to say it's not interesting,
00:12:16
but your real name is is Anita. Yeah.
00:12:18
So, Aneta uh Honey Hide is my legal
00:12:21
name, but I grew up as Honey Hunter at
00:12:23
school my whole life. And it wasn't
00:12:25
until I went to s my license that I
00:12:27
discovered. Um I knew my first name was
00:12:29
Anita and that I went by my middle name,
00:12:31
Honey. Um but I never knew that I was
00:12:34
under Hedime, which is my mom's surname.
00:12:36
And um yeah, I know I went through
00:12:38
school as Hunter. So yeah, all got How
00:12:40
when you found out, was it like a
00:12:41
bombshell sort of thing or just like a
00:12:43
No, it was it was just more annoying cuz
00:12:45
I was just trying to get my license and
00:12:46
then my dad was like, you know, they we
00:12:48
had to drive, we lived in Patard, you
00:12:50
had to drive all the way to Todd
00:12:51
Courthouse to change it. It was going to
00:12:52
cost 150 bucks and we were just like, we
00:12:55
have that money. So dad was just like,
00:12:56
don't worry about it. Just go to heed
00:12:59
me. So that's kind of how it all panned
00:13:02
out. So let's um talk about those early
00:13:04
years. So potato born and raised potato
00:13:07
known for probably pump water now. Yes.
00:13:10
Which I see you've got
00:13:13
hometown represent. Um and the big
00:13:15
corrugated iron sheep. Oh yeah that's
00:13:18
you know.
00:13:19
Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Um yeah. What
00:13:22
were those early years like? Oh they
00:13:23
were cool. E like when I look back now I
00:13:27
think you you take a lot for granted and
00:13:29
like I mean I only live an hour away. I
00:13:31
live in Hamilton and that's city enough
00:13:33
for me. But I I just loved my
00:13:35
upbringing. I think now I say that as an
00:13:37
adult. I think I couldn't wait to get
00:13:38
out of as a kid, you know, you just kind
00:13:40
of always you you yearned for the big
00:13:43
lights in the city and and all of that
00:13:45
kind of hype, but actually it wasn't I
00:13:47
got booted to Australia for being
00:13:48
naughty that I was like, "Oh, this is
00:13:50
too big for me. This is too much. It's
00:13:52
too fast. I needed to go home, you
00:13:54
know." And then I suppose throughout my
00:13:56
playing career, having traveled the
00:13:57
world, loved it. Absolutely. you know,
00:13:59
but always have been a homebody, I
00:14:01
think, and always wanted to go home. So,
00:14:03
when I reflect back on my childhood, I
00:14:05
love it. I love the fact that I got to
00:14:07
play in the street, you know, play on
00:14:09
the road my whole childhood until the
00:14:11
street lights come on. We knew that was
00:14:12
the time you had to get home, you know,
00:14:14
and that was that was the rules. And you
00:14:16
played with anyone. You rocked up to
00:14:18
anybody's house for a feed. And it's
00:14:20
just those real tight-knit communities,
00:14:21
right, that you just everybody was your
00:14:23
family, your friend, and you just felt
00:14:25
safe. It was a really tough safe
00:14:27
upbringing. Um I suppose in a sense, you
00:14:30
know, living in those small towns. Yeah.
00:14:33
You're you're probably how old are you
00:14:34
now? What are you? 40 plus. 40 plus. I'm
00:14:39
not 45. I'm 50. Yeah. So I'm 52. I'm
00:14:41
thinking you're probably close to being
00:14:42
one of the last generations to grow up
00:14:44
without the internet. Yeah. Well, I we
00:14:47
had the dialup, you know, so we we had
00:14:49
the little you plug it into the phone
00:14:51
port thing and it made that sort of
00:14:54
noise and then you connected. Um, so
00:14:56
yeah, I was and I used to um burn CDs.
00:15:00
That was kind of my thing. Like I loved
00:15:01
music growing up and so my dad and them,
00:15:04
you know, had rows of CDs. So then I was
00:15:06
the one that burnt off all the CDs for
00:15:08
them and made all these mix CDs. I love
00:15:11
that sort of stuff. But I I had um trays
00:15:13
and trays of tape decks as well. So
00:15:16
yeah. Oh, old school cassette tapes. I
00:15:18
love them. Damn. Oh yeah. Um the mix
00:15:20
CDs. Yeah. Didn't some some girl steal
00:15:23
steal your mix CDs and you broke into
00:15:24
it, smashed a car window and Yeah. Yeah.
00:15:26
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I was very protective
00:15:28
of my music. Don't touch my CDs. I spent
00:15:31
a lot of time on the computer illegally
00:15:33
burning those off. So, um yeah. Why why
00:15:36
why were you so angry? I was pretty
00:15:39
angry. I don't know. You you talk about
00:15:41
your upbringing a bit in the the in the
00:15:43
book. Um, but the picture that you've
00:15:45
just painted, it sounds kind of idyllic
00:15:46
in a way and kind of cool, but from
00:15:49
reading the book, it sounds like um, and
00:15:51
correct me if I've got this wrong, but
00:15:52
it sounds like Monday to Thursday,
00:15:54
awesome household, fairly standard, and
00:15:56
then Friday to Sunday, mom, dad
00:15:58
drinking. Um, and it was kind of
00:16:00
chaotic. Yeah, it was. It was to be
00:16:02
honest. There was a lot of domestic
00:16:03
violence. And I think that's possibly,
00:16:05
you know, it's it's a little bit I
00:16:06
suppose monkey see, monkey do. And
00:16:07
that's where I suppose the anger
00:16:09
developed, you know, quite deep-seated
00:16:11
inside me from a young age. and seeing
00:16:13
that seeing the domestic violence, you
00:16:16
know, getting we got beat a lot, you
00:16:17
know, and it was kind of normal back
00:16:19
then. I mean, I don't condone it, but,
00:16:21
you know, we it was normal for us like
00:16:23
we got strapped or we got um the wooden
00:16:26
spoon often. I mean, me and my cousins,
00:16:28
we laugh about it now, but it was just,
00:16:30
you know, really normal. Um and then,
00:16:32
yeah, and and alcohol was huge in our
00:16:34
house and and huge in our community. So
00:16:37
my parents, they drunk heavily in the
00:16:38
weekends and then, you know, the
00:16:40
fighting and and arguing and all of that
00:16:42
would come home, you know, would come
00:16:44
home to whoever was babysitting us or
00:16:45
whether we were there or not. Um and it
00:16:47
was rough, you know. So for me, I was
00:16:49
the eldest of my brothers and that and
00:16:52
um you know, we sort of just always in
00:16:54
that heightened state where we were
00:16:56
like, "Oh man, what's going to kick off
00:16:58
tonight?" you know, so there was that
00:16:59
fear that we grew up with and um you
00:17:02
know, it was normal, I suppose, for us
00:17:04
to wake up in a house that had been
00:17:05
smashed up, our TV had been broken again
00:17:07
and you know, it was just so much going
00:17:10
on in the middle of the night and we
00:17:11
often got picked up. So often whether it
00:17:14
would be myself or my younger brother
00:17:16
would run out and just call the cops up
00:17:18
and be like, "Come and get us, you know,
00:17:20
they're fighting again." And then they
00:17:22
just kind of got used to kind of
00:17:23
dropping us off either back at our
00:17:24
grandparents or um wherever else we kind
00:17:27
of our aunties and uncles or you know
00:17:29
just for a bit of saving time and then
00:17:32
kind of Sunday morning everyone sober up
00:17:34
and we're back home again. Yes. So so
00:17:37
Monday to Thursday it was always it was
00:17:39
always good and fairly peaceful. Yeah.
00:17:40
Like my my parents they work really hard
00:17:42
you know they both work full-time jobs.
00:17:44
We kind of you know we only lived around
00:17:46
this the corner from school. We got
00:17:47
ourselves off to school um on our own.
00:17:50
my brother and I and um yeah, it was it
00:17:52
was it was fairly normal upbringing. Um
00:17:55
but yeah, it was just it was just those
00:17:56
moments and and they were happy
00:17:58
drinkers, you know, and so it's kind of
00:18:00
what we knew and saw. So, it's funny how
00:18:03
you you think you think they would have
00:18:04
got their [ __ ] together cuz it sounds
00:18:05
like they um they they quite successful.
00:18:08
Like your dad has his own business, you
00:18:09
end up having like a beach house
00:18:10
somewhere as well. So, Monday to
00:18:12
Thursday, they were kicking ass. You'd
00:18:15
think at some point they'd go, "The
00:18:16
alcohol is not serving us well." Yeah.
00:18:18
And I think, you know, when I think back
00:18:20
then it was kind of normal, like you
00:18:21
know, my mom never hid the fact that she
00:18:23
drunk right throughout her pregnancies
00:18:25
with us and that was kind of normal and
00:18:26
she used to joke and say we were born in
00:18:28
a pool of alcohol kind of thing and we
00:18:30
just crack up thinking that was funny.
00:18:32
Um yeah, but yeah, I mean they
00:18:34
definitely got their [ __ ] together. They
00:18:36
were young parents too, you know, and um
00:18:38
I think mom was 23 when she had me and
00:18:41
um you know, then my brother and my
00:18:43
other brother straight not long after.
00:18:45
Um yeah, I think once we sort of hit
00:18:47
those teenage years, um you know, they
00:18:49
sort of, you know, things kind of uh
00:18:51
settled a lot at home and I suppose, you
00:18:54
know, there was a lot of growth and a
00:18:55
lot of learning done by us as as a whole
00:18:57
family unit, you know, but there was
00:18:59
definitely some ugly times that were
00:19:00
that were rough to deal with. Sounds
00:19:03
like your your dad's like a completely
00:19:04
your mom unfortunately is not here
00:19:06
anymore. Um and we'll get into that, but
00:19:08
it sounds like your dad's like a
00:19:09
completely different person now. With
00:19:10
with that in mind, um yeah, how how is
00:19:13
he about the book? Yeah, he was good.
00:19:15
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like we had not
00:19:18
necessarily embarrassed, but you know,
00:19:19
there was a lot of honest conversations
00:19:21
that dad and I had and um and it
00:19:24
actually probably took the book for us
00:19:25
to actually have those discussions. Um
00:19:28
when when we were going through the
00:19:29
draft page uh pages and that I sent him,
00:19:31
you know, a couple of those pretty
00:19:33
pretty tough chapters and that and um
00:19:35
you know, we met up and had, you know, a
00:19:37
pretty big conversation and and a few
00:19:39
tears and we'd never discussed it. So it
00:19:41
was like it took for the book for us to
00:19:43
actually have those conversations and I
00:19:45
only tell my my truth and how I remember
00:19:47
it but actually hearing uh dad's point
00:19:50
of view actually gave me a different
00:19:52
take on it. So there was lots of things
00:19:53
I actually decided actually you know I'm
00:19:55
going to I'm going to take that out of
00:19:56
the book because I think how I
00:19:58
interpreted it as as a young kid wasn't
00:20:01
necessarily um how maybe things panned
00:20:04
out from hearing my dad's version. But
00:20:06
yeah, back then we just you know and we
00:20:07
were probably that family. We didn't
00:20:08
talk about our feelings. you know, we
00:20:10
were just kind of that just shut up and
00:20:12
do what you're told kind of thing. So,
00:20:15
yeah. Yeah. It Yeah. It just wasn't um
00:20:17
wasn't done at the time. Like I had a
00:20:19
very normal middle class pucky
00:20:22
upbringing, but there's still there's
00:20:23
still parallels like the heavy drinking
00:20:24
in the weekends, spanking. Feels like I
00:20:26
was getting smacked all the
00:20:29
time's belt. And I'd always say, "This
00:20:31
is going to hurt me more than what it's
00:20:32
going to hurt you." And it's like, "No,
00:20:33
no, it isn't. It's hurting me a lot."
00:20:36
Yeah. It's pretty sore. Yeah. Um,
00:20:40
yeah. You you said there were there were
00:20:41
tears when you ran through the the book
00:20:43
with your dad. Like tears from you and
00:20:45
him or just you or Yeah, I think from
00:20:47
both of us, you know. Had you seen him
00:20:48
cry before? I had and probably um
00:20:52
actually only just when my mom got sick
00:20:54
actually. Oh, and and I suppose as a
00:20:56
younger younger I'd seen him, you know,
00:20:59
a little bit upset. But yeah, that was
00:21:01
that was a real um a real healing
00:21:04
process, I think, going through the book
00:21:06
and and having those conversations with
00:21:08
my dad were really cool and and my
00:21:09
brother as well because I I initially
00:21:11
sent the chapter to my brother and said,
00:21:13
"Hey, look, have a read of this. Like,
00:21:14
is this how you remember it?" Cuz it was
00:21:16
really interesting, right? Because as I
00:21:18
was having these conversations with
00:21:20
Suzanne, they were bringing up stuff
00:21:22
that I'd never spoken about for years.
00:21:24
And so the first draft was harsh. It was
00:21:27
harsh. like I didn't realize how angry I
00:21:30
was about all of that stuff. So when I
00:21:32
had to read it physically on paper like
00:21:34
whoa like this is this is actually
00:21:36
hurting me which is why initially I sent
00:21:38
to my brother and then to my dad cuz
00:21:40
it's like look the intention of the book
00:21:41
is not to hurt anybody. It's to tell my
00:21:43
truth but you know this is coming across
00:21:45
pretty harsh. Um, and so we did we pul
00:21:48
we pulled some stuff back um out of
00:21:50
respect for for my family but also for
00:21:53
myself cuz I thought actually I probably
00:21:55
needed to go through that for it to
00:21:56
actually be said out loud and to read it
00:21:58
on paper but it it helped heal in a way.
00:22:01
Yeah, you're you're a better child than
00:22:03
me. I I put um I put a book out called
00:22:06
Childhood of an Idiot which is just like
00:22:07
some just some stories and reflections
00:22:09
about my childhood. Um and I didn't I
00:22:11
didn't let anyone read it. I didn't you
00:22:13
know I just wrote it and got it out
00:22:14
there. And dad called me goes, "Oh, it's
00:22:15
a great book, but it's um I saw it in
00:22:17
Paper Plus in the biography section,"
00:22:18
and he goes, "I put it over in fiction."
00:22:21
[Music]
00:22:23
Okay.
00:22:25
That's a nice way of putting it. It's a
00:22:28
fabulous work of fiction, son. Um and
00:22:31
the it seems like the big incident, like
00:22:33
the pivotal moment in your family, the
00:22:35
turning point was um when you were 16
00:22:38
and you had this fight with your dad.
00:22:40
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that was that was a
00:22:41
huge point, you know, and um and you
00:22:43
know, dad went away and did a little bit
00:22:45
of time um after that incident and you
00:22:48
know, that was that was hard for us, you
00:22:49
know, after that. I I pretty much sort
00:22:51
of I wouldn't say I permanently moved
00:22:53
out, but you know, I was I was in and
00:22:55
out of my grandparents house quite a bit
00:22:56
anyway, but yeah, that kind of
00:22:57
solidified me, you know, kind of moving
00:23:00
on and and that really sent me on
00:23:02
another pathway. That's when I really
00:23:03
dug in dug my heels in and just started
00:23:06
rebelling big time. Um, I turned to
00:23:08
alcohol. I turned to drugs. I turned to
00:23:10
anything, you know, just to kind of numb
00:23:12
that because I was hurting, you know,
00:23:14
like I I loved my family. They were my
00:23:16
absolute rock. And it was really funny.
00:23:18
I used to get real pissed off, right?
00:23:20
Cuz people would go, "Oh, you're just
00:23:21
like your dad." You know, and I'd be
00:23:23
like, "Fuck, no, I'm not." Sort of
00:23:24
thing. But then I'd, you know, reflect
00:23:26
and look at myself like, "Yeah, you are,
00:23:28
man." Like, "You're so angry." And I
00:23:30
just didn't know how to cope with that
00:23:32
and deal with it. So, um, alcohol, you
00:23:34
know, it was again just another case of,
00:23:37
oh well, Falco was going to help. And I
00:23:39
was going out and I was I was hitting
00:23:40
people. I was looking for fights. I
00:23:43
wanted to be this uh this big- time
00:23:46
macho. I wanted to prove I I wanted to
00:23:48
prove that I was strong, that I was
00:23:50
better than that, and I wasn't going to
00:23:52
um get beat, you know?
00:23:55
Yeah. you when you reflect on that
00:23:57
16-year-old version of yourself now like
00:24:00
I know like is is it with compassion or
00:24:03
sadness or like she couldn't it was
00:24:04
unprocessed emotions e yeah I I think I
00:24:07
look on it with a bit of shame with with
00:24:09
yeah with some shame um shame but
00:24:13
understanding you know like I sometimes
00:24:15
I go home and I just kind of have to
00:24:17
hold my breath when I um see people you
00:24:20
know that maybe I've done done wrong by
00:24:22
or you know um and I just kind of think
00:24:26
Oh, far out. Like, I hope that you know
00:24:28
that they've they've got some
00:24:29
forgiveness in their heart for what I
00:24:31
did back years. And most people are
00:24:32
like, "N, you know, it's so good to see
00:24:34
you." Like, they've forgotten it.
00:24:35
Whereas I still kind of have held on to
00:24:37
it like, "Oh man, I remember." And
00:24:39
that's where the shame comes up for me.
00:24:42
Um, so I remember the first time like
00:24:44
not long after I um had made the
00:24:47
Blackburns and the Potato Rugby Club
00:24:49
asked me to come back and be the guest
00:24:51
speaker for their prize giving and I was
00:24:52
like, "Oh man, I don't know about that."
00:24:54
that like you know I've done some bad
00:24:56
[ __ ] and I hadn't been home for a little
00:24:57
while and I was like and so I said yes
00:25:01
cuz it's like you know they're they're
00:25:02
good people and and so how I started my
00:25:05
speech was by apologizing I was just
00:25:07
like you know what before I start saying
00:25:10
anything about my rugby career and what
00:25:11
I've done I mean you guys have all
00:25:12
followed my career you know I started
00:25:14
here I just want to apologize I want to
00:25:16
apologize to everybody in this room that
00:25:18
I've done wrong by you know and that's
00:25:20
whether I'd robbed them whether I'd
00:25:22
pinch their car or you know gone to a
00:25:24
party and I don't know kick something
00:25:26
over at the house or whatever I'd done
00:25:27
cuz you know I was I was just so loose
00:25:30
back then and I was rebelling and I just
00:25:33
had this huge chip on my shoulder and I
00:25:35
just didn't care. I was just lacking a
00:25:37
whole lot of respect for my hometown and
00:25:40
I just thought um you know that I kind
00:25:45
of I didn't give a [ __ ] Yeah. I was I
00:25:48
was that kind of teenager. I just my ego
00:25:50
was so big and I just thought I was
00:25:52
bulletproof and I owed nothing to the
00:25:55
anybody. So yeah, that was a big apology
00:25:58
and and it was received really well. I
00:26:00
mean, they laughed about it and I was
00:26:01
just like, "Okay, okay, cool." Then why
00:26:04
why why was your ego so big?
00:26:07
Um, you know what? I think I was just
00:26:10
struggling a little bit with um with
00:26:12
everything with with life and what I was
00:26:14
doing with my life. Um, and trying to
00:26:16
figure that out. like man, you know,
00:26:18
when you hit puberty and you're trying
00:26:19
to figure out where you're going in life
00:26:21
and you know I my happy place was always
00:26:24
on the footy field, but I knew that well
00:26:26
I thought at the time that was never
00:26:28
going to be a career for me and so I
00:26:31
just was lost and I knew I always wanted
00:26:34
um to be something great. I just didn't
00:26:36
know how to get there because there was
00:26:37
never a pathway for me that I knew of.
00:26:40
Um and so it made me angry made me angry
00:26:43
at the world. Um yeah. So you um Yeah.
00:26:47
You describe yourself not just as the
00:26:49
school bully, but the town bully. Yeah.
00:26:50
The town bully. Yeah. Um so you got
00:26:53
suspended from school twice. Uh and how
00:26:56
many times did you end up in court? Uh
00:26:59
twice. Yeah. Twice. So was one of them
00:27:01
before you got shipped to Australia and
00:27:03
one of them afterwards? Yeah. Yeah.
00:27:04
Yeah. I think I had like a uh what is
00:27:06
it? One of those
00:27:08
um like when you you drink on the
00:27:10
street. I had one of those first. Oh,
00:27:13
like like breaching an alcohol ban.
00:27:15
Yeah. Yeah. And so I had to go into
00:27:17
court for that and then that just kind
00:27:18
of like a slip on the wrist. See you
00:27:20
later. But then I mean the big one was
00:27:21
you know obviously going in there for
00:27:23
for assaulting another female who was 5
00:27:26
years my senior. Um and I assaulted her
00:27:28
really badly. Um you know to be to be
00:27:31
honest that night's a blank to me. I
00:27:33
don't really remember it. Um back then
00:27:35
we didn't have videos so people didn't
00:27:37
video stuff. We didn't have the phones.
00:27:39
Um but you know the injuries that I
00:27:41
inflicted on on that lady was um were
00:27:43
quite significant um and enough for for
00:27:46
me to be charged and um yeah to have to
00:27:48
go to court for it and it was just yeah
00:27:50
that that was me hitting rock bottom
00:27:52
when I knew you know I think I remember
00:27:54
waking up the next day and not recalling
00:27:56
anything but I just had blood everywhere
00:27:59
all over me and it wasn't mine like cuz
00:28:01
I looked at myself and I was like well
00:28:04
I'm good you know sort of thing and I
00:28:06
was like oh my gosh you know and then
00:28:08
you know my My mates told me what had
00:28:10
what had gone on and and I was just
00:28:12
like, "Oh." And in all honesty, I was
00:28:15
like, "Oh, mean." You know, like, "Man,
00:28:18
I gave her a good hiding kind of thing."
00:28:20
And then the seriousness of it started
00:28:21
to sink in and I thought, "Oh, man. I'm
00:28:23
going to be in [ __ ] for this." So, yeah,
00:28:26
it was kind of crap. Yeah. So, you had
00:28:29
to What? You get Did you get diversion
00:28:31
and you had to pay you pay for her
00:28:33
dental work? Yeah, I got diversion. So
00:28:36
um you know effectively you know I kind
00:28:38
of got off um fairly lightly I'd say and
00:28:42
yeah had to play some dental work for
00:28:43
her and um do what what do they call it
00:28:45
like family group conference and
00:28:47
apologize um you know and her and her
00:28:50
and her mom came in um and my mom you
00:28:53
know came along with me where to
00:28:55
apologize and things like that. Um,
00:28:57
yeah, I sort of haven't really, um, I
00:29:01
suppose I'm not sure where that where
00:29:02
that lady is now or or what. I've never
00:29:05
sort of been in contact again.
00:29:10
Um, I mean, you could have easily kept
00:29:12
on going on on that path thinking
00:29:15
thinking, you know, you're you're I
00:29:16
don't know, the man or whatever, you
00:29:18
know, and everyone everyone's
00:29:19
intimidated by you, but instead like,
00:29:21
um, you went like a full 180, right? I
00:29:23
did. I did. Was that the moment? Yeah,
00:29:25
that was the moment for me. And
00:29:27
obviously it wasn't long after that that
00:29:28
I got shipped off uh went to I know I'd
00:29:32
already been shipped off to Aussie. I'd
00:29:33
come back um and then realized like that
00:29:36
was it, you know, like I I'd gone to I'd
00:29:38
already been shipped off to Aussie cuz I
00:29:40
was already going down a bad track. Um
00:29:42
my first night back, you know, that
00:29:43
incident had happened and I knew I was
00:29:45
like way off track then. And um I think
00:29:48
the most the the worst part was is that
00:29:52
I you know really really like
00:29:54
disappointed my grandparents, my parents
00:29:56
and that and they were just like oh you
00:29:58
know we're done with you and um I think
00:30:00
when you get a sense of you know you're
00:30:01
losing your family your absolute
00:30:03
backbone. Yeah. That kind of was like I
00:30:05
I can't do this anymore. You know and I
00:30:07
and I was yeah you like I said I was
00:30:09
embarrassed and I just you know when
00:30:11
people kind of like are ignoring you and
00:30:13
you know it and I I got that sense. It
00:30:15
was like it didn't matter where I go,
00:30:17
people knew like and I just could feel
00:30:19
those you know that the cold shoulder
00:30:21
that I was getting from people who I
00:30:23
thought um you know were like my mates
00:30:26
and stuff and and you know they were
00:30:28
like they that had enough people had had
00:30:30
enough of that that version of me. So
00:30:32
yeah. Yeah. You talk about that in the
00:30:33
book. It got to the point where people
00:30:34
are like um you know we're having a
00:30:36
party but don't invite Honey because
00:30:38
she's going to stir [ __ ] Yeah. Yeah.
00:30:39
She's going to wreck my house. She's
00:30:40
going to she's going to beat somebody up
00:30:42
and all of that kind of stuff. So yeah.
00:30:45
But I mean it would have been easy for
00:30:46
you just to like double down and go
00:30:48
further into that sort of direction that
00:30:50
you're heading in. Like the the hard
00:30:51
thing to do is actually do what what you
00:30:54
did. Like you ended up becoming head
00:30:55
girl at your school. How did you
00:30:57
honestly seriously like how how does the
00:31:01
girl that get suspended twice end up
00:31:03
becoming head girl? What the actual
00:31:05
crazy e Yeah. Um well so obviously when
00:31:08
I came back from from Australia I asked
00:31:10
my MI teacher look could I come? They
00:31:12
were going on a kapaka trip. I really
00:31:13
wanted I had massive FOMO. I really
00:31:15
wanted to go on it. asked my, you know,
00:31:17
I asked my teachers, could I come back
00:31:18
to school? I'd do second year, seventh.
00:31:20
And they were like hesitant, you know,
00:31:22
like come on, honey. Like, you've put us
00:31:24
through enough [ __ ] for the last four
00:31:25
years. We thought we we got rid of you.
00:31:27
But they let me back, you know. I was
00:31:29
like, and I I just remember this one
00:31:31
teacher. I remember like it was only
00:31:32
like the second day I was back and you
00:31:34
know I was never an academic and so I
00:31:36
was I was kind of just doing subjects to
00:31:38
get me by and that and I remember one
00:31:40
teacher um I think it was like the
00:31:42
social services uh social studies teach
00:31:44
or something like that and he was just
00:31:45
like man like don't come back here and
00:31:48
like you know you've asked to come back
00:31:50
so make the most of it. I was like yeah
00:31:52
I am. He's like, "No, but really really
00:31:54
honey, like you've got so much
00:31:55
potential. Like genuinely make a good
00:31:58
effort." And I was like, "I am, you
00:32:00
know." And I felt like when I said that
00:32:02
out loud, I was like, "Right, I'm I'm
00:32:04
going to prove that to you." Like I was
00:32:05
always one to like wanting to try and
00:32:07
prove myself. I said if I said I was
00:32:09
going to do something, I was always in.
00:32:10
Like I was never a half pie person. So I
00:32:13
think once I made that, I suppose mental
00:32:15
mental shift and decided like this is
00:32:18
this is what I want to do now. like I've
00:32:20
got a point to prove and I just I just
00:32:22
went full circle kind of thing. Um and
00:32:25
yeah, I just I it it helped that I got
00:32:28
picked up obviously with the sevens. I'd
00:32:30
had a good year with my league that
00:32:32
year. I got picked I was my first it was
00:32:34
the first time I got picked in the mai
00:32:35
league tournament and so I had things to
00:32:37
to work towards kind of thing. I knew
00:32:40
that I like computers and I'd started
00:32:42
like sort of dabbling in that. Um, and I
00:32:45
just had a bit more of a pathway and I
00:32:46
was a lot more settled then. I'd matured
00:32:48
a lot from, you know, getting shipped
00:32:50
over to Aussie and getting stuck in
00:32:51
this, you know, this catering job where
00:32:53
I'm stacking trays. I was just like, is
00:32:55
this my life? This is not what I want.
00:32:57
Was throughout these these uh teenage
00:32:59
years, was sport always a backdrop? Big
00:33:01
time. Yeah. Were you just Were you
00:33:03
naturally good or did you have to work
00:33:04
hard? I think I was naturally good.
00:33:06
Yeah. I knew I was naturally good. Um,
00:33:09
and so I I knew that from a really young
00:33:12
age, you know. I knew as a 10-year-old
00:33:14
that I could, you know, keep up with the
00:33:16
boys, if not do better. You know, I knew
00:33:18
I was I was standing out in those boys
00:33:20
teams because I've played with the boys
00:33:21
for like 14 years and till I was sort of
00:33:23
14, 15. So, I I knew um but I also knew
00:33:28
uh I suppose my weaknesses like I I
00:33:31
don't I I mean I trained I went to all
00:33:33
trainings and stuff, but I wouldn't say
00:33:35
I dug deep in terms of like that that
00:33:37
real um I suppose those effort plays and
00:33:40
things like that. That wasn't me. I was
00:33:42
I was your fancy guy out on the wing
00:33:44
waiting for that wonder ball and I'm
00:33:46
just going to go run in all these tries,
00:33:48
you know, I was I was kind of that
00:33:49
player. Um and but you know, tell me to
00:33:52
go on the work and go in the middle of
00:33:53
the field and do some work. I'm like,
00:33:56
it's not not really my strength. Yeah.
00:34:00
Yeah. And your um Yeah. Your fend as
00:34:02
well. Your Yeah. Your fend the amount of
00:34:04
footage I've said of your fend. It's
00:34:06
like I would I wouldn't want that hand
00:34:07
on my neck. It's intimidating. Was that
00:34:11
you was being good at contact sport, was
00:34:13
that a helpful sort of outlet for any
00:34:15
aggression you had? Yeah, it was. You
00:34:17
know, like I kind of, you know, when I
00:34:19
talk about I suppose, you know, my
00:34:20
fighting years and my bullying years and
00:34:22
things like that and then I look at my
00:34:23
fe cuz I was throwing throwing a few
00:34:26
punches around here and there. Um, and I
00:34:30
just, you know, I kind of got to, I
00:34:32
mean, I was fairly, I suppose, you know,
00:34:36
tall, kind of skinnish, you know,
00:34:38
growing up. But I think when I kind of
00:34:40
hit like my teenage years, then I kind
00:34:42
of I got bigger, you know, and I just
00:34:44
sort of fooled out. And people say, "Oh,
00:34:45
you're a swimmer." I was like, "Well,
00:34:46
no, but actually I can swim." Um and and
00:34:50
I just used that strength, you know, I
00:34:52
kind of got quite big and I was, you
00:34:54
know, probably a bit stronger than um
00:34:57
the other girls and stuff. So I just use
00:34:59
that to my advantage. I knew how to I
00:35:01
knew how to use my strengths on the
00:35:03
field and those what I focused on. Yeah.
00:35:05
Can you remember the very first time you
00:35:07
got to represent the country? Yeah, I
00:35:09
can. Yeah. What sport was that for? That
00:35:11
was for rugby league. Yeah, that was for
00:35:13
rugby league. So how old? Uh 22. was 22
00:35:18
when I first put on the Kiwi F shoes.
00:35:20
Yes. Okay. Oh, I thought it was younger
00:35:22
for some reason. Your your career was so
00:35:24
long, eh? Yeah. So, it was Well, I was
00:35:25
18 when I first got selected for New
00:35:27
Zealand Maldis and then I think 19 and
00:35:30
20 I was playing New Zealand Miy 7s, you
00:35:32
know, cuz those were kind of the only
00:35:33
pathways back then. Um, and sort of I
00:35:36
mean, Black Ferns were around. Um, but
00:35:39
again, still amateur and then I wasn't
00:35:41
aware of kind of the Kiwi Ferns cuz I
00:35:43
sort of, you know, just didn't know
00:35:45
about them. you know, they were they
00:35:46
were there or thereabouts, but you
00:35:48
didn't sort of read about them or were
00:35:50
aware of them. Yeah. Did did you have
00:35:51
any like female sporting role models? I
00:35:54
did, but you know, they were they were
00:35:56
local women back home who I'd sort of
00:35:58
grown up and who had they taken me under
00:35:59
my under their wing and you know helped
00:36:01
me along and they were playing uh you
00:36:03
know there's they were playing mis and
00:36:06
things like that with me. So I kind of
00:36:07
gone under there but I never saw any fe
00:36:09
for female role models on TV you know.
00:36:12
Yeah. I suppose it would just be like
00:36:13
what you see at the Olympics or the comm
00:36:14
games. It was it was those kind of
00:36:16
Beatress Farina was kind of I think if I
00:36:19
recall Beatress Farina was the first
00:36:20
female athlete I saw on TV ever. I was
00:36:23
like oh shocking really. Yeah, it was
00:36:24
crazy, you know, and so that's kind of,
00:36:28
you know, who my my role models were all
00:36:31
males, you know, and that's I think why
00:36:33
I grew up so frustrated because, you
00:36:35
know, I always knew that I'm going to I
00:36:37
loved I loved sport. Um, but I knew
00:36:40
there was always going to be like this
00:36:42
handbreak because, you know, I only ever
00:36:45
saw male male role models. So, I was
00:36:46
pissed off. I was pissed off. I was a
00:36:48
girl.
00:36:50
So, um, yeah, paint a picture of like
00:36:53
women's sport at that time. Like, is
00:36:54
were you being paid at all? No, no, no.
00:36:57
We weren't being paid. We were
00:36:59
fundraising. We were, um, you know, we
00:37:02
we'd go to teams and we'd get like, oh,
00:37:05
I was just constantly running around
00:37:06
with these big ass jerseys and, you
00:37:09
know, you you just they were always told
00:37:11
you bring your own bring your own shorts
00:37:13
cuz they never had shorts for the woman.
00:37:15
Um, and all of that kind of stuff. But I
00:37:17
didn't care, you know, cuz we didn't
00:37:19
know. I didn't know any better, you
00:37:20
know. It was like we were just grateful
00:37:21
to be there and just just wanted to
00:37:23
play. So I didn't give a crap that my
00:37:24
jersey was two times too big or hadn't
00:37:27
been washed from the men's have played
00:37:28
it on a Saturday and we're playing it on
00:37:30
a Sunday and no one had washed it. It
00:37:32
was like, "Oh, gross. That's terrible."
00:37:34
It's like, "Ah, stop it. Let's just go
00:37:35
play anyway." Your um now commentator
00:37:38
buddy, Kendra Coxy, I've had her on the
00:37:40
podcast and yeah, she talked about that
00:37:42
like having hand-me-down hand-me-down
00:37:44
jerseys for the men's. Yeah, it was just
00:37:45
normal. So, but this is this is recent.
00:37:48
Yeah. On the like in the big scheme of
00:37:50
things, eh, like this is this isn't
00:37:52
Yeah. We're not talking 50 years ago or
00:37:53
anything. This is like recent. Yeah.
00:37:55
Exactly. Seems crazy. Yeah. But So, did
00:37:57
you have like perdms or anything? Like
00:37:59
when you went away on trips, did you get
00:38:01
like a No, no, none of that. I mean,
00:38:03
that was, you know, I I think, you know,
00:38:05
we didn't I I was probably in my third,
00:38:07
very early 30s before we started kind of
00:38:09
getting any kind of like player payments
00:38:11
and whether it was like an overnight or
00:38:13
day allowance or, you know, that kind of
00:38:16
stuff. We'd get like $10 for lunch
00:38:18
allowance or something like that and $20
00:38:20
for dinner. Um, yeah. So, it was like,
00:38:23
well, that that's going to buy me a pie
00:38:24
and a Coke and dinner's going to be
00:38:26
Mackers, you know. But, but they were
00:38:27
they were flying your business class to
00:38:29
all the tournaments. No way.
00:38:32
I wish. Once once we got B business
00:38:35
class and that was on the way home from
00:38:36
Dubai because we won the tournament.
00:38:38
That was me. We're in the bar. Wow. We
00:38:40
lit that up. Were
00:38:41
you I mean yeah women's sports come come
00:38:44
such a long way in like the past like 20
00:38:46
years or so. But were you like were you
00:38:47
guys were you and your teammates like
00:38:49
pissed off at the time like seeing the
00:38:50
men and how they were treated in
00:38:51
comparison? Yeah. Not yes I suppose yes
00:38:56
and no. um like we didn't we yeah again
00:39:00
I just feel like we were just grateful
00:39:02
for whatever we got you know we were all
00:39:04
about like let's just we we did whatever
00:39:07
we had to do to be able to play you know
00:39:09
it took we did whatever it took to get
00:39:10
out on that field and we sort of didn't
00:39:12
really I I know me personally I don't
00:39:14
really bother to get tied up with the um
00:39:17
worrying about what we didn't have cuz I
00:39:19
was just like I'm here you know I didn't
00:39:20
care to play um and I'm going to make
00:39:23
that happen and it and it didn't sort of
00:39:25
phase me I think there were times though
00:39:28
where like you know we might travel with
00:39:30
the men's team and you know they're all
00:39:31
going the front of the plane and we're
00:39:32
way down the back or um we're in camp
00:39:35
together and you know we're on bunk beds
00:39:37
and they're in you know the novatel or
00:39:40
something like that you know so there
00:39:41
was those kind of moments where just
00:39:42
like this is crap but again you just I
00:39:45
always just I was always focused on the
00:39:47
goal and that was just to play. I was
00:39:49
happy to play. Yeah. M we just before
00:39:52
the podcast started we um talked about
00:39:54
uh briefly about an an old mate of
00:39:56
yoursy Baker who you used to play with
00:39:58
who um I've had on the podcast um and
00:40:01
she talked about some of the trouble she
00:40:03
got on on tour. What was the Did you
00:40:04
ever get in trouble on tour? What was
00:40:06
the this was in your good girl era by
00:40:09
the time you were playing for the Kiwis.
00:40:10
But is there anything there you prepared
00:40:12
to share? Yeah, I was probably I was
00:40:14
probably like the first one to do the
00:40:15
old um I learned this this saying really
00:40:18
quickly. what happens on tour stays on
00:40:20
tour. And so I was always the first one
00:40:22
to double check that that you know that
00:40:24
those rules applied before we like got
00:40:26
on our planes to come home cuz it's like
00:40:27
yeah no I mean I I played a big chunk of
00:40:30
my career where you know we played and
00:40:32
we we were out the next day you know it
00:40:34
wasn't about recovery recovery was
00:40:36
coming home kind of thing. So there was
00:40:38
a big chunk of our career where we were,
00:40:40
you know, doing the bus trips and, you
00:40:42
know, stopping at the alcohol store and
00:40:44
pulling up on the side of the road to
00:40:45
take a pee at the back of the bus, you
00:40:47
know, and that's that's what I loved
00:40:48
about it, you know, that's kind of what
00:40:50
drew me in. It was those kind of vibes.
00:40:52
And then kind of when we turned
00:40:53
professional, you know, that kind of all
00:40:54
went out the window. So pros and cons,
00:40:57
e, with professionalism. Yeah.
00:41:00
Um yeah, I suppose that it's a
00:41:01
double-edged sword e because um you know
00:41:03
with without having the cameras or the
00:41:05
public visibility um you don't have all
00:41:07
these all this amazing footage of your
00:41:09
achievements, but then the stuff that
00:41:11
you you know you wouldn't want people to
00:41:13
see that's not there either. Yeah. I I
00:41:14
tell you what, I love going back like
00:41:16
through my old photo albums cuz I always
00:41:17
used to have those like little um you
00:41:19
know those little portable camera
00:41:21
thingies and I go back through all my
00:41:23
albums. I've got some great photos of us
00:41:25
like in Hong Kong and Rome and all over
00:41:28
the world. Um, but I only have the
00:41:30
photos to prove it, you know, and I'm
00:41:32
just like, man, those those were the
00:41:33
days. Like, we just had so much fun and
00:41:36
it was just, you know, just when I think
00:41:39
about it, I just think, well, those are
00:41:40
where I had my best days. And I feel
00:41:42
like it wasn't
00:41:44
um, we were serious, you know, we played
00:41:46
so well. We we definitely we did the
00:41:48
job. We were there to do the job and we
00:41:50
were on field. We were professional as
00:41:52
can be, but the moment that was done, we
00:41:54
were like, man, we were there to have
00:41:55
fun and enjoy ourselves. And that was,
00:41:57
you know, that's what drove us to be
00:41:59
there. So, well, and and so you should
00:42:01
cuz it was kind of a hobby really,
00:42:02
wasn't it? Like we were paying. Yeah.
00:42:04
Yeah. 100%. It was like a Yeah. It's
00:42:06
like a like a budget sort of holiday in
00:42:08
a way because all this is done in the
00:42:10
backdrop of like full-time work. Like
00:42:11
you, Meanwhile, you're you know, you're
00:42:13
working with um you know, uh youth
00:42:15
justice um and you're working with um
00:42:18
kids with disabilities. Yeah. Exactly.
00:42:20
So, you know, a lot of what we we went
00:42:23
out and did we were paying for
00:42:24
ourselves, right? or we were we had
00:42:26
fundraised and and whatever. So, you
00:42:28
know, if we were going to go over there,
00:42:29
we were going to make sure that we got
00:42:30
the job done first and foremost and
00:42:32
we're going to enjoy ourselves because
00:42:33
we all had day jobs to come back to. The
00:42:34
moment we landed back in New Zealand, we
00:42:36
knew we're straight back to our
00:42:37
families, straight back to being mom,
00:42:39
straight back to going to work
00:42:40
full-time. Um cuz that was just how it
00:42:43
was. you was it was that stressful like
00:42:45
dealing with employee employers and
00:42:47
having to get time off work and just
00:42:49
juggling the expectations of you know
00:42:51
keeping your household running and I I
00:42:53
think the hard part was that we never
00:42:55
really knew what we had coming up you
00:42:57
know like now nowadays you know the
00:42:58
athletes say you know they get the full
00:43:00
year plan like okay we've got these
00:43:01
tournaments coming up kind of thing and
00:43:03
so you could plan ahead where is weird
00:43:05
you know maybe find out a two months out
00:43:08
okay hey look we're going to go to this
00:43:10
and then you know you didn't get
00:43:11
selected till you know very last minute
00:43:13
kind of thing. So, it was just about,
00:43:16
you know, trying to give your employee
00:43:17
the heads up. I mean, I worked for
00:43:18
Timong for years and um they were great,
00:43:21
especially early in my career. They, you
00:43:23
know, really um they sponsored me and
00:43:25
they were like, "Yeah, whatever." You
00:43:26
know, they were just wrapped to see me
00:43:28
representing uh our country. So, I was I
00:43:31
was pretty lucky. The Winger and, you
00:43:33
know, a few of those jobs that I had
00:43:34
back then, they all supported me big
00:43:36
time. So, that was cool. You know, it
00:43:37
was really important. Yeah. Did you have
00:43:40
a a pregame routine for you? How many
00:43:43
different sports did you represent? New
00:43:44
Zealand in three. So sevens uh well
00:43:47
sevens rugby and rugby league and rugby
00:43:50
sevens. Um nines was that national and
00:43:53
nines. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So four
00:43:54
different sports. Yeah. Uh I don't know.
00:43:57
I I was I was a little bit um I think in
00:44:00
my earlier days I just kind of went with
00:44:02
the flow. I was I didn't really um
00:44:05
overthink things, you know. I was I I
00:44:09
think I just naturally was a a fairly
00:44:10
relaxed person and nerves were always
00:44:13
good for me. You know, I never really
00:44:14
got myself in a twist over that cuz I
00:44:16
thought nerves for me was excitement and
00:44:18
I knew how to utilize that and and cope
00:44:20
really well. Um but music was always a
00:44:22
big thing for me. Music was a, you know,
00:44:24
big thing for me as a kid and I always
00:44:26
had a set playlist. So when I'm on a bus
00:44:28
and we're heading to a stadium or
00:44:30
whatever, I had a set playlist and was
00:44:31
my game day playlist and I knew and as
00:44:34
we'd get closer I had like you know the
00:44:36
one song and that was um all I do is
00:44:38
win. Yeah. I always make sure that that
00:44:41
was the last song that I listened to
00:44:42
before we arrived to a stadium. So I'd
00:44:44
always map you know like I'm sitting in
00:44:45
the bus. I'd map I'd like to sit at the
00:44:47
front of the bus as well so I could see
00:44:49
where we're going and then I'd say okay
00:44:51
look I'm four minutes out from we're
00:44:52
four minutes out from the stadium. Boom.
00:44:54
And that would be odd. That was always
00:44:55
my last song that I wanted to hear in my
00:44:58
ear on the bus as we got there. Who's
00:45:00
that? Is that Tain? Uh, no, not T. When
00:45:03
DJ Oh, DJ Khaled. K. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah,
00:45:07
that's it. And they stay there.
00:45:09
I love that. Just it just pump it just
00:45:11
pumped me. I mean, I was there, you
00:45:13
know. I I never took the field not to
00:45:14
win. So, and I I didn't I I don't know.
00:45:17
I didn't shy away from that, you know. I
00:45:19
was I was all about winning. So Oh,
00:45:21
that's so cool. What else on the
00:45:22
playlist? just sort of like a hip-hop.
00:45:25
Oh, old school. Old school. Yeah. Like I
00:45:27
love Temptations. I love Whitney
00:45:29
Houston. I love Nolan Sisters. Like real
00:45:32
old school. R&B. Old school. Jackson 5.
00:45:36
Um Yeah. All of that mostly. Yeah. Oh,
00:45:39
that's rap. I like rap too. Bit of two.
00:45:42
Where where did the love of old school
00:45:43
come from? Is that what your parents
00:45:45
listen to around the house or? Yeah. I
00:45:47
mean I think Yeah. My parents, my dad
00:45:49
was right into music and, you know,
00:45:52
Smoky Robinson, all of that kind of
00:45:54
stuff. Robert Gray, so I I still listen
00:45:56
to it now. I don't really get into kind
00:45:58
of new music. I mean, I do, but yeah,
00:46:02
you'll always catch me playing all the
00:46:03
old school and I and I'll go deep to the
00:46:05
70s. I love um yeah, just all that old
00:46:08
school kind of dance stuff. I I used to
00:46:10
really like the um movies like the dance
00:46:12
movies and all of that. So yeah, I love
00:46:15
some of that stuff like Glattus Night in
00:46:17
the Pips, Midnight Train to Georgia. One
00:46:19
of my favorite songs of all time. 100%.
00:46:22
Who's the funniest teammate you've ever
00:46:24
had in all the sports?
00:46:27
There's probably two that stand out to
00:46:28
me. Uh Monkey, who's my tour fetica, she
00:46:32
played Kiwi friends for us for a long
00:46:34
time. sour girl. She just she just
00:46:38
walked in a room and you know the just
00:46:40
the what one the volume went up so you
00:46:42
hear you you'd hear her before you see
00:46:44
her and she just was this happy buzz
00:46:46
person. You just kind of she just you
00:46:48
wanted to be around her. Um but she was
00:46:51
really easy to like egg on and and do
00:46:53
dumb [ __ ] and so you just kind of like
00:46:55
took the piss and and she was just
00:46:57
funny. She's just like she could be a
00:46:59
comed a standout comedian for sure. And
00:47:01
the other one was Victoria Zeritzky
00:47:02
Nafatali. Um and she was our first five
00:47:04
for the Black Burns for quite a few
00:47:06
years and and again very similar um
00:47:08
personalities but they just they just
00:47:10
were just larger than life. They just
00:47:13
constantly positive just bought this
00:47:14
massive aura about them and I love that
00:47:16
and they were so confident they spoke
00:47:18
their mind and I just that about and
00:47:21
they just you know you're sitting in a
00:47:23
team meeting and it's serious and you
00:47:24
get in the growling for whatever and you
00:47:25
you're thinking [ __ ] and they you you
00:47:28
just could guarantee they would say the
00:47:29
[ __ ] that everybody's thinking but won't
00:47:31
say it. They just blurt it out and it's
00:47:33
just like a [ __ ] here they go kind of
00:47:35
thing and I I love that. It's like they
00:47:37
they kind of Yeah, I I love their
00:47:39
personalities. Um Yeah. Do you miss
00:47:43
that? You retired like 5 years ago. I
00:47:45
do. I big time miss the team
00:47:46
environments, right? So like you know
00:47:48
and it's all of that kind of stuff like
00:47:50
playing pranks like Renee Wickcliffe.
00:47:52
Woodman Wickliffe. She was like the big
00:47:54
prankster in our team. Always kind of
00:47:55
pulling pranks on people and just just
00:47:58
those connections like when you're on
00:47:59
when you're in camp. um you know and
00:48:02
you've got that downtime and you're just
00:48:03
hanging out in each other's rooms and
00:48:04
it's just that camaraderie that that you
00:48:06
miss and so you kind of and I and I love
00:48:09
seeing it in teams you know and they
00:48:11
talk about culture within teams and it's
00:48:12
so like that's probably the biggest
00:48:15
thing that I miss like not being in a in
00:48:17
team environments and so you kind of
00:48:19
chase that you know in life after sport
00:48:21
you chase that whether it's in your day
00:48:23
job or you know now I'm you know I chase
00:48:25
that with my sky crew when we're
00:48:26
commentating you know like you I walk
00:48:28
into makeup yesterday doing the warriors
00:48:30
And I see Laura, I'm like, "Hey, my
00:48:32
teammate." You know, and you're always
00:48:34
looking for that whatever work
00:48:35
environment. I'm at school at the
00:48:36
moment. I'm studying and I'm like, "Hi,
00:48:38
my class friends." You know, like
00:48:39
they're they're my new team. And so,
00:48:41
you're looking for that constantly, you
00:48:43
know? So, I love that about um teams.
00:48:46
That's probably the the biggest thing
00:48:47
that I loved. Now, who are the um the
00:48:50
best and worst people to share a room
00:48:51
with? Cuz when you were captain, you got
00:48:54
your own room, but a lot of your career
00:48:57
in these different sports was not as
00:48:59
captain.
00:49:00
Oh, best and worst. Best was probably
00:49:03
Celica Winiata shorty cuz she just slept
00:49:06
all the time. Super tidy. I'm I'm a bit
00:49:08
of a tidy freak too. So love that about
00:49:10
her. Um and she was just always
00:49:12
sleeping. So sometimes I got a bit bored
00:49:14
though cuz I like I want to talk, you
00:49:16
know? She just like she just slept all
00:49:19
the time. I was like I just could I
00:49:21
don't know how she did it. Um the worst
00:49:23
and she's going to hate me for saying
00:49:24
this but is Stacy Walker. So when Stace
00:49:27
first come on the um seven scene, you
00:49:29
know, it was kind of like that big
00:49:31
sister little sister vibe and we got
00:49:33
room together in a couple of tournaments
00:49:34
and I was just like she was just like
00:49:36
messy
00:49:38
and she was the opposite of Shorty.
00:49:40
She's just bubbly and like jumping on
00:49:42
beds and just like this little kid on
00:49:45
the heat. I was just like would you just
00:49:46
settle down like shut the hell up and
00:49:48
she's you know night hours she'd be up
00:49:50
and I'll be like get the hell to sleep
00:49:52
kind of thing. I was she quite a bit
00:49:54
younger than you or Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
00:49:55
Oh, she makes and she makes sure
00:49:57
everyone knows that she's way younger
00:49:58
than me and she's like she's like Yeah.
00:50:01
She's just out the gate. So, um, so the
00:50:05
Moscow story, let's talk about that. So,
00:50:07
so you're in Moscow for the Rugby Sevens
00:50:10
and then over to Leeds to play the Rugby
00:50:13
League World Cup and this so you played
00:50:15
like two two different codes, two
00:50:17
different sports for New Zealand in the
00:50:18
same week. Yeah. Surely this has never
00:50:20
been done before by anyone? No, not that
00:50:23
I know of. Um and and what had happened
00:50:27
was I was able to negotiate with New
00:50:29
Zealand Rugby because their event was
00:50:32
first. If it was the other way around, I
00:50:34
would have got a flat out no, you know,
00:50:35
sort of thing. And so I was I was stoked
00:50:37
about that. So the moment, you know, I
00:50:39
knew that that Sevens World Cup was
00:50:40
done, they were happy to release me to
00:50:42
go and do this League World Cup and I
00:50:44
was the captain. Um but there was just
00:50:46
this massive stuff up. So New Zealand
00:50:48
Rugby League had booked my flights at
00:50:49
the wrong airport and um you know I had
00:50:53
to travel across Russia like 3 four
00:50:55
hours across Russia to get to this other
00:50:57
airport on my own and you know my
00:50:59
manager at the time was not for the
00:51:01
Sevens cuz I went to the airport with
00:51:03
the Sevens girls. We had won the World
00:51:04
Cup the next day everyone was flying
00:51:06
out. They're going back to New Zealand.
00:51:07
I was going over to Leeds and um yeah I
00:51:10
was on I was at the wrong airport. Um
00:51:12
and it was
00:51:14
like it
00:51:16
just honestly I don't know what came
00:51:19
over me but there was no way I was going
00:51:21
back to New Zealand. There was no way I
00:51:23
was going to miss this World Cup because
00:51:24
I had that responsibility. I' I'd been
00:51:26
selected as a captain and I was going
00:51:28
there, you know, I'd committed to it and
00:51:30
so there was no one no nothing that was
00:51:32
going to stop me from getting there. Um,
00:51:35
and so yeah, I just grabbed my bags and
00:51:37
took off and just started making my way
00:51:39
on my own carrying two big bags across
00:51:42
the country to figure it out. And I had
00:51:44
to like do a couple of trains and a tram
00:51:47
and an underground and you know, no one
00:51:49
spoke English and it was just it was
00:51:51
unreal. When I look back now, I'd never
00:51:53
do that. But I just I don't know what
00:51:55
came over me. I mean, I bled my eyes out
00:51:57
for half the trip. Um, but I still it
00:52:00
wasn't it still wasn't enough to turn me
00:52:02
around to go back to the airport and be
00:52:03
like, "Okay, I'll just go to New
00:52:04
Zealand." Um, and then maybe fly back,
00:52:06
but no, I was So, how old were you at
00:52:08
the time?
00:52:10
[Music]
00:52:12
2013, I don't know. 12 years. I would
00:52:14
have been in my 30s. Oh, yeah. Okay.
00:52:15
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Um, yeah. It's a
00:52:18
remarkable achievement. Hey,
00:52:21
really? Do you look back and think, how
00:52:23
did I do that? Not just not just the
00:52:25
navigating your way around Moscow, but
00:52:27
like just you playing two different
00:52:28
sports in two different countries in the
00:52:31
same week. It's incredible. Well, I
00:52:33
think I always remember that year like I
00:52:35
remember that year in February and I
00:52:37
knew that they were going to clash and I
00:52:39
was just waiting to find out what months
00:52:41
were on each. So, I'd made a decision
00:52:43
early in that year. I was doing both and
00:52:45
I was going to figure out a way on how
00:52:46
to do both. So to be able to actually I
00:52:49
don't really think I took the time to
00:52:50
reflect on it um for for quite some time
00:52:53
afterwards because I'd made the decision
00:52:56
early. I knew that's what I was going to
00:52:57
do and I didn't think it was hard. I
00:53:00
just I just thought no I love I love
00:53:02
both these sports. I love both these
00:53:03
teams and this is what I want to do. And
00:53:05
I didn't think it was like a big
00:53:07
mountain to climb. I just I had set my
00:53:09
mind to it. So I knew that's what I was
00:53:11
going to do. Um I think what really put
00:53:14
a downer on it though was was we lost.
00:53:16
We lost that World Cup like obviously we
00:53:18
won the sevens and I was you know you
00:53:20
know totally stoked and then to go over
00:53:22
and I just thought you know losing that
00:53:25
World Cup just put a hold down on
00:53:27
everything like everything was about
00:53:29
losing you know and I I hated it. I
00:53:32
hated that year after that. When did you
00:53:33
lose? We lost the League World Cup uh
00:53:36
the final to Australia. Um and no shame
00:53:39
in losing in a final is there? Yeah but
00:53:41
it was the first time it was the first
00:53:42
time uh that we had lost the World Cup.
00:53:44
We had won three before that and and I
00:53:47
was a captain and I and I talk about it,
00:53:49
you know, pretty regularly, but the
00:53:51
first question I got asked the the
00:53:53
moment that final whistle blew and I
00:53:55
knew we'd lost from the reporter from
00:53:58
the um from the reporter was, "How does
00:54:00
it feel to be the first captain of new
00:54:02
the Kiwi Ferns to lose the World Cup?"
00:54:05
You know, and I was like, and that just
00:54:06
stuck with me. It's like the one
00:54:08
question that stuck with me that whole
00:54:10
World Cup. So, I traveled home like just
00:54:13
miserable. I went home the very next
00:54:14
day. A lot of the girls, you know,
00:54:15
stayed on, but I never got over that
00:54:17
loss.
00:54:20
When you reflect on that question being
00:54:22
asked and in particular being framed
00:54:23
that way, does does that [ __ ] you off?
00:54:25
Yeah. Big time. It's really It's It's
00:54:27
savage. Yeah, it's savage. It's Who was
00:54:29
it? What country were they from? Was it
00:54:31
Australia? It was over in England. Who
00:54:33
knows? Yeah. It wasn't a Kiwi.
00:54:36
No. Lacks all empathy. Just I know.
00:54:39
Crazy. Well, you know, puts me on high
00:54:42
alert to make sure never to ask a
00:54:43
question like that in the role that I'm
00:54:44
doing now. That's for sure. Well, I
00:54:46
think with the empathy of being a former
00:54:48
player yourself, you just you just
00:54:49
wouldn't, you know. Yeah, for sure. Um,
00:54:52
I'm Buckingham Palace. You got to go to
00:54:53
Buckingham Palace. What What happened
00:54:55
with you and Prince Harry? Did you Did
00:54:57
you kiss him on the nose? I almost I
00:54:59
almost kissed him on the nose, right?
00:55:00
So, they brief you before he comes and
00:55:02
they briefed us. So I went over as a a
00:55:04
rugby league World Cup ambassador for
00:55:06
New Zealand and um they had a
00:55:09
representative from each country and and
00:55:11
we had this certain attire that we had
00:55:13
to wear and so you go into Buckingham
00:55:15
Palace, you got to put all your phones
00:55:17
away and then um they brief you and they
00:55:20
what they did is they they said, "Oh,
00:55:21
Harry's going to come through the store
00:55:23
and there's going to be, you know, four
00:55:24
pods and and I was in the first pod and
00:55:27
I was the first person in the first
00:55:29
pod." And I mean things were um that was
00:55:32
when Harry had just him and they had
00:55:34
just announced that you know he was
00:55:35
going to step out of the Royal Family
00:55:37
duties and all of that. So media was
00:55:39
like packed over there and um and he was
00:55:43
the ambassador for the Rugby League
00:55:45
World Cup. We're doing the draw. So
00:55:47
anyway, he comes walking in this big
00:55:49
amazing room in the Buckingham Palace
00:55:51
and walks up to me and they told us
00:55:53
specifically we'll we'll guide him.
00:55:56
We'll tell him your name and your
00:55:57
country, shake hands, and he'll go to
00:55:59
the next person. So, you know, we're
00:56:01
kind of like, okay, that's what we
00:56:02
prepped for. So, they say to him, "This
00:56:05
is Honey, and she's from New Zealand."
00:56:06
And he goes, "Oh, cod." And he goes to
00:56:09
put his hand out. So, I was like, "Okay,
00:56:10
here's the shake." And then he goes to
00:56:11
lean in and I'm like, "Oh my gosh, they
00:56:14
didn't, you know, I thought like
00:56:15
kissing's off thing." So, I was like, so
00:56:18
I stick my lips out and then he kind of
00:56:20
tilted his head a bit and I was like,
00:56:22
"What's he doing? What's he doing? He's
00:56:23
hunging me." say, "Oh, honestly, the
00:56:27
moldy instincts kicked in the very last
00:56:29
minute and I was like, "Do not kiss his
00:56:30
nice honey." And he gave me a hungie. I
00:56:33
was like, "Wow, that was so cool." And
00:56:35
everyone else in my pool was like, "What
00:56:36
was that?" Like kind of thing. I was
00:56:38
like, "Oh, that's how we greet each
00:56:39
other in our culture by pressing noses."
00:56:42
They're like, "Oh, wow." And yeah, so I
00:56:45
was just like, "Oh, that would have been
00:56:46
the worst." And it was all caught on
00:56:48
camera. So I was like, "I'm so glad that
00:56:50
I did not kiss his nose." Oh my god. So,
00:56:52
is there footage of that on on YouTube
00:56:54
somewhere? So, someone caught sort of
00:56:57
the footage, but yeah, you can kind of
00:56:59
see me sort of starting to pucker and
00:57:01
then I
00:57:02
did catch it cuz who who were you there
00:57:05
with? What what I just went over as as
00:57:07
the representative for New Zealand Rugby
00:57:09
League um as ambassador. Yeah. So, on my
00:57:11
own again. Yeah. And apart from that,
00:57:14
the whole experience of going to
00:57:16
Buckingham Palace. Unreal. Yeah. I was
00:57:18
there with Connie Harel and oh he was he
00:57:21
was so funny. I mean yeah it was it was
00:57:24
good. There was there was um it's just
00:57:27
unreal being in a place like that. I was
00:57:29
just you're pretty blown away. Very felt
00:57:31
very special. Most Kiwis that have been
00:57:33
to London have probably like gone to
00:57:35
Buckingham Palace and you know there's
00:57:36
the roundabout and the gates and you
00:57:38
have your photo taken but not many of us
00:57:40
get on the other side of the gates. Yeah
00:57:41
absolutely. feel like I'd played in the
00:57:42
London Sebs, you know, a few years
00:57:44
earlier that and obviously we'd all go
00:57:46
there and stand outside the gates and
00:57:47
take our photos. I' I'd been there a few
00:57:50
times before as a as a um as a tourist,
00:57:53
but yeah, to actually go in the gates
00:57:55
and and go inside, that was cool. Yeah,
00:57:58
man. I've got so much um to ask you
00:58:00
about your sporting career, but we're on
00:58:02
on a limited um time schedule this
00:58:04
morning, so I might have to just fast
00:58:05
track some of this, but um so we've
00:58:07
talked about some of the
00:58:09
highlights. Biggest um adversities or or
00:58:13
negatives with 2016 that would be would
00:58:15
that be top of the list? Not making the
00:58:17
Rio Olympics. Yeah, definitely. Yeah,
00:58:20
that that was rough as well. Um not
00:58:22
making that.
00:58:25
Um yeah, it was it was that you know we
00:58:28
were part of that first group that that
00:58:29
go for gold and so it was sort of you
00:58:31
know a big four-year journey and we'd
00:58:33
been through some [ __ ] in that team like
00:58:35
you know the the it was really it was it
00:58:38
was a hard time but but the best kind of
00:58:42
thing you know sometimes you go through
00:58:44
those things and when you look back on
00:58:45
it now I was like man that never put the
00:58:47
athletes through what some of the stuff
00:58:48
that we went through but because we were
00:58:50
new you know we didn't have a blueprint
00:58:52
to what we were doing so a lot of stuff.
00:58:54
Obviously, we were trying we're sort of
00:58:55
mimicking the men's the all black sevens
00:58:57
and that was during hard times in terms
00:58:59
of training. Yeah, the training and the
00:59:02
camps and and things like that. So, we
00:59:04
were mimicking a lot of what Titch was
00:59:05
already doing with the boys. Um and and
00:59:07
that was hard um physically, you know,
00:59:10
that we had the Wu camp where they made
00:59:12
us dig holes in the ground like graves
00:59:14
and sleep in them overnight and the
00:59:17
freezing freezing cold. Um there was
00:59:19
just all these like horrific things they
00:59:21
had us doing to try and make us mentally
00:59:22
strong and physically strong and all of
00:59:24
those kind of things. And um we were all
00:59:26
learning on the go. So um we'd have
00:59:28
these honey badges sessions out on the
00:59:30
you know the hottest part of the day on
00:59:32
the mount um on the mount beach. We were
00:59:35
just get we're just getting grilled into
00:59:36
the ground out on the sand doing fitness
00:59:39
you know and our feet are all blistered
00:59:40
and burnt from the sand being so hot and
00:59:42
they were like stay out there. Stay out
00:59:44
there. Your feet are getting burnt. We
00:59:46
don't care kind of thing. And it was
00:59:47
just what we went through sort of thing.
00:59:49
But you know in hindsight I'd take them
00:59:52
back those days any day. Would you love
00:59:54
it? Yeah. I I think you know they they
00:59:56
definitely matured you and you can see
00:59:58
how much growth that I had during those
01:00:00
times of sevens. I'm super grateful for.
01:00:02
So So how how big was the squad and I
01:00:05
think they we contracted 22 and and they
01:00:08
took away 12. Um yeah. Oh. So so 10
01:00:11
people got the phone call saying sorry.
01:00:14
Yeah. Yeah. There was a chunk chunk of
01:00:16
us. So there was a couple of injuries
01:00:17
and that and then a fair chunk um yeah
01:00:20
that that got us very similar phone
01:00:22
calls and it's heartbreaking. It is. It
01:00:25
is. And uh and it wasn't my first
01:00:28
experience with non- selection. You know
01:00:30
we had the uh the 15's World Cup not
01:00:33
long after that. I'd been to the 2014
01:00:35
one and then didn't get selected for the
01:00:36
2017 one again. I another injury that
01:00:39
kept me out and yeah, you just kind of
01:00:42
end up you know dealing dealing with
01:00:44
those. I think when it came to my
01:00:46
retirement though is I didn't want to
01:00:48
get another one of those phone calls,
01:00:50
you know, so I wanted to make sure that
01:00:51
I called time on myself, you know, cuz I
01:00:53
I you know, I I think what annoys me the
01:00:57
most was that a lot of my professional
01:01:00
career, you know, I'm 33 plus, you know,
01:01:02
I played till I was 39, you know, so and
01:01:05
I had multiple demons in my head saying,
01:01:08
"Stop playing, honey. Stop playing. Stop
01:01:10
playing." But I, you know, I feel like I
01:01:12
was peing at 33, 34, 35, but definitely
01:01:15
felt the decline in those last few
01:01:17
years. And then once sort of co hit, I
01:01:20
just knew that that was one extra rugby
01:01:22
league that was just a year too far away
01:01:24
from me. So I knew I was done. Yeah. I
01:01:26
want to talk about that in just a second
01:01:27
because it's like you you announced your
01:01:29
retirement like a couple of days before
01:01:30
your last game. Yeah. Um but yeah, first
01:01:33
of all, so the the Rio stuff. So, did
01:01:36
did you consider going over and watching
01:01:38
the team or was that just going to be
01:01:40
too hard or I I did consider because my
01:01:43
dad was my dad had booked flights and
01:01:45
had this whole package. So, he was
01:01:47
coming over to support and all of that
01:01:48
and then when I didn't make the team, he
01:01:50
was like, "Do you want to take the trip,
01:01:52
you know, like you can go over and and
01:01:54
I'll swap the names over and stuff like
01:01:55
that." So, I considered it, but yeah, it
01:01:57
was it was a bit of a rough time for me.
01:01:59
I think traveling on my own. I'd never
01:02:00
I'd never traveled on my own. So, I was
01:02:03
pretty nervous about doing that and I I
01:02:06
wasn't in a place where I could go
01:02:07
wholeheartedly to support my team. I
01:02:10
needed that time to sort of deal with
01:02:11
what I was going through. Um so, I chose
01:02:13
not to go and my my dad got a small
01:02:15
refund, but not really um on on his
01:02:18
package. Um but I I think by the time
01:02:20
the girls uh started playing in that
01:02:22
Olympics because you know they went over
01:02:23
quite early a month early and um you
01:02:26
know by then I'd sort of um one I'd
01:02:29
gotten the call from the Blackburns 15's
01:02:30
coach to come and join that team. So you
01:02:32
know I sort of had something else to
01:02:33
look forward to but also I I suppose I
01:02:35
dealt with it. So by the time they
01:02:37
started playing the Olympics I knew
01:02:38
wholeheartedly I could I could uh cheer
01:02:40
and support my sisters that were out
01:02:42
there. Yeah. Yeah. It must have been
01:02:45
unimaginably hard though like the FOMO
01:02:47
factor. Oh, big time. You know, like I I
01:02:49
I'll be honest after I took that phone
01:02:51
call, I didn't want to talk to anybody,
01:02:52
you know, for two weeks. And and
01:02:54
especially not the girls that were
01:02:55
selected, you know, because to me, I was
01:02:56
like, well, that's that's my spot, you
01:02:58
know, and they were my they were my good
01:03:00
friends. And as as happy as I was for
01:03:02
them, I was pissed. I was pissed I
01:03:04
wasn't there sort of thing. So, I knew I
01:03:06
needed to take myself away from that to,
01:03:08
you know, be in a be in a better place
01:03:09
where I could wholeheartedly support
01:03:11
them. Yeah. When And what happened at
01:03:13
Rio? They won silver. They won silver.
01:03:16
Were you secretly happy? I wasn't to be
01:03:18
honest. I was broken, you know, like
01:03:20
when they had those the footage of them
01:03:22
just sitting on that field and, you
01:03:25
know, tears and all. Oh, I those tears
01:03:29
were so deep-seated in me. And that's
01:03:31
when I knew whole wholeheartedly I was
01:03:33
broken for them. I was just like, that's
01:03:35
not fair. You know, they Yeah, that that
01:03:37
was rough. You've come a long way
01:03:40
because that's um that speaks of how
01:03:42
little ego you had, I think. Yeah. I I I
01:03:44
knew that I had a lot of um you know I
01:03:47
I' I'd had so much growth through that
01:03:49
throughout that time you know and I I
01:03:51
was you know one of the mature leaders
01:03:53
and I think you know I'd started to just
01:03:56
you know I I'd started just to do a lot
01:03:58
of inner work I think which I'd blocked
01:04:01
out for a long time. Um but yeah, just
01:04:03
that that understanding of myself and
01:04:05
and I started to do a lot of work with
01:04:06
David Galbra and DG. Yeah, DG. He was
01:04:10
our he's our team um team uh mental
01:04:13
skills uh doc and he was he was great.
01:04:15
So he had helped me through a lot of
01:04:17
that pro you know as we were working
01:04:18
towards the Olympics. So I sort of I I
01:04:21
reached into a lot of that work that I
01:04:23
did with him um to kind of get me
01:04:24
through some of those those uh rough
01:04:27
times. Did did you get anything from him
01:04:29
that you can still like implement in
01:04:31
day-to-day life now? Uh yeah,
01:04:33
definitely. So like we he always gave me
01:04:36
this like little uh model if you like or
01:04:39
scenario was all about jumping off a
01:04:40
cliff cuz I think I always held myself
01:04:42
back, you know, through fear of failure.
01:04:45
That was always my biggest thing. Fear
01:04:46
of failure, you know. I never wanted to
01:04:47
be a failure and I was so competitive. I
01:04:50
wanted to win everything. I was the
01:04:51
worst sore loser. Um but sometimes that
01:04:54
fear of losing would would hold me back.
01:04:58
So he we had this thing around jumping
01:05:00
off the cliff and he was like look
01:05:01
you've got to decide like once you cross
01:05:03
that white line and once you know you're
01:05:06
getting into your red zone whereas you
01:05:08
know whether it's say I'm just
01:05:09
absolutely at my breaking point of
01:05:11
exhaustion or whatever that's the moment
01:05:13
that I've got to jump off the cliff.
01:05:14
I've got to be all in. I've got to throw
01:05:16
that last pass. I've got to make that
01:05:17
last last bit of effort that 1% left in
01:05:21
me to make that last tack or whatever
01:05:23
that, you know, whatever that was at
01:05:25
that moment. He just helped me to
01:05:27
recognize those moments that I was going
01:05:29
through in my head so that I wouldn't
01:05:31
feed the other, I suppose, demons in my
01:05:34
head that were saying just quit honey,
01:05:35
just just stop, you know, sort of thing.
01:05:37
Cuz there I had a lot of that sort of
01:05:39
thing. Once I was able to um I suppose
01:05:42
implement that as a player on the field,
01:05:44
I was all in. I was all in. I also
01:05:46
learned I suppose how to transfer that
01:05:48
into everyday life in in terms of that
01:05:50
jumping off the cliff and not fearing
01:05:53
failure and and it took me um it would
01:05:57
just take me back to going through the
01:05:59
same processes you know when I'm under
01:06:00
pressure. I mean, I get it now like as a
01:06:02
commentator for work, you know, I still
01:06:04
get the sweats. I still get nervous and
01:06:06
that and I'm like, right, just, you
01:06:07
know, and there's something might be
01:06:09
happening on screen and I'm like, should
01:06:10
I say it? Should I say it? Just do it,
01:06:12
honey. Jump off the cliff. Say it. If
01:06:13
that's what you think, if that's your
01:06:15
opinion, it's what you're being paid
01:06:16
for. Tell the people, tell the people at
01:06:18
home, this is how you're breaking down a
01:06:20
game or whatever it might be, you know?
01:06:21
And it's even things as a mom, you know,
01:06:24
when like my boys are pushing me or my
01:06:25
son's like really pushing me, I'm like,
01:06:27
oh my god, like, you know, kind of
01:06:29
thing. And it's it's again it's that you
01:06:31
know just jumping off a cliff. So I've I
01:06:33
think I'll carry that with me for the
01:06:35
rest of my life and it's being able to
01:06:36
just push past push past those um the
01:06:40
the voices in your head that kind of
01:06:42
want to pull you back a bit or or hold
01:06:44
you down or you know make those
01:06:46
decisions of [ __ ] it and you know. Yeah.
01:06:50
I love that. Thanks for sharing. Yeah.
01:06:52
So, so your retirement um so you just
01:06:55
decided one day that was that you were
01:06:57
done cuz I feel like um and you sort of
01:06:59
alluded to this before there's two ways
01:07:00
you go. Either you make the the decision
01:07:02
for yourself like a Richie Mccor or the
01:07:04
decision gets made for you and you get
01:07:06
unceremoniously dumped but you yeah you
01:07:09
you sort of decided the week off. The
01:07:11
week of yeah I did decide the week off.
01:07:13
So I I went into the camp feeling really
01:07:15
good and that and um you know and we'd
01:07:18
come through co so we'd been hanging out
01:07:20
to play and we got the test match
01:07:21
against Sam Eden Park uh not Eden Park
01:07:24
Mount Smart there and I went into camp
01:07:26
feeling good and you know I was excited
01:07:28
we had nine debutons you know I was part
01:07:30
of the leadership group and I knew all
01:07:31
of this um and as that week kind of
01:07:35
panned out you know I was I was carrying
01:07:37
a couple of injuries but I was I was
01:07:38
okay but I there was just little things
01:07:40
that were happening throughout that week
01:07:42
and it was like little things like you
01:07:43
know we had all these new debutons
01:07:45
coming these 18 19 year olds Caitlyn
01:07:46
Baha Kulo and and the like they were all
01:07:49
coming in right and um you know they
01:07:51
just had this energy about them and you
01:07:53
know and I and I didn't feel like I had
01:07:56
that same energy I was like I'm kind of
01:07:58
bit tired here and and I was just
01:08:00
starting to slow down a bit and then I
01:08:03
remember during training just feeling
01:08:05
like I couldn't quite hit the you know
01:08:07
hit some of the milestones or things
01:08:09
like that that I was used to hitting and
01:08:12
I couldn't quite make the pass or I
01:08:13
wasn't seeing the pictures that I
01:08:15
generally see under pressure. And so
01:08:18
just little things were happening
01:08:19
throughout that week and and I made a
01:08:21
phone call home to my wife and I was
01:08:23
like, "Hi, you know, it's it's cool."
01:08:24
She's like, "How's camp?" And I'm like,
01:08:25
"Oh, it's good." She's like, "Oh, you
01:08:28
don't sound so, you know, hyped." And I
01:08:30
was like, "Yeah, I don't know. I just
01:08:32
it's something about it. I just I feel
01:08:34
like I it's I'm, you know, coming to
01:08:37
coming to the end kind of thing." And
01:08:40
I decided I I had a big conversation
01:08:43
with my wife on the phone and then I
01:08:45
sort of thought, okay, look, I think I'm
01:08:48
done, you know, kind of thing. And then
01:08:50
I sent a text to my family and once I
01:08:52
sent that text, then I knew, okay, now
01:08:55
you got to follow through cuz you've
01:08:56
said this, you've got to follow through.
01:08:58
So first I spoke to the coach Ricky
01:08:59
Henry at the time and I said to him,
01:09:01
look, we've got jersey presentation
01:09:03
tonight and I want to let you know this
01:09:05
is going to be my last. just, you know,
01:09:08
I said, but I don't want to tell anyone.
01:09:09
I says, I don't want anyone to know cuz
01:09:11
this is a big moment for these debutons.
01:09:13
I remember my debut. Um, and it's got to
01:09:16
be it's got to be be about these young
01:09:17
players. And so, he agreed. He agreed
01:09:20
not to tell anyone. I says, "We'll wait
01:09:21
till after the game and we'll let people
01:09:24
know kind of thing." And I'm really glad
01:09:25
that it happened. There was also a
01:09:27
moment during that game where I knew I
01:09:30
was like, "Yeah, you're totally done."
01:09:32
cuz I could feel myself just mentally
01:09:34
like I knew when I crossed that white
01:09:35
line every moment I was out playing in a
01:09:37
black jersey I was all in and I could
01:09:40
just almost feel myself out there
01:09:42
floating like floating like oh this is
01:09:44
nice you know kind of thing. I didn't
01:09:45
have that fire burning like right I'm in
01:09:48
there. I'm in there. I'm in there. I'm
01:09:49
competing. I'm competing. I just was
01:09:50
like I'm just going to kick back a
01:09:52
little bit. So I knew I knew I was done.
01:09:54
But it must have been a strange feeling
01:09:56
for you like having this big secret but
01:09:57
knowing that every time you do think
01:09:59
it's the last every time you walk
01:10:00
through the tunnel, every time you're in
01:10:02
a team huddle or every if if there's a
01:10:04
hacker or an anthem or whatever, just
01:10:06
knowing it's the it's you know it's the
01:10:08
last but no one else does. Yeah, that
01:10:10
was so and and I kept those m obviously
01:10:12
the all those moments to myself. So
01:10:14
yeah, that ride in on the the van ride
01:10:16
in, we were on, you know, minivans and
01:10:18
coming out and Simon Manoring was part
01:10:20
of our coaching crew and he was driving.
01:10:22
I was sitting in the front and I just
01:10:23
remember thinking it's my last ride into
01:10:24
the stadium team van, you know. So I was
01:10:27
going through all of those um emotions
01:10:30
and that and it was my last game prep,
01:10:32
my last game meal, all of those kind of
01:10:35
things kind of things. So that was I I
01:10:37
really enjoyed that. I and I I think I
01:10:38
really took the time to be consciously
01:10:40
aware what was going on. Um, and at the
01:10:43
time it was a 25 year Kiwi Ferns
01:10:44
celebration. So they had um all the p
01:10:48
past uh Kiwi Ferns make a tunnel as we
01:10:50
ran out and I thought this is definitely
01:10:53
this is special you know cuz I'd played
01:10:55
with a lot a big chunk of those women
01:10:57
that had really paved the way. So I just
01:10:59
thought oh man I've I've picked the best
01:11:01
moment cuz I wasn't aware that that was
01:11:03
going to happen either and they didn't
01:11:04
know I was retiring. Um so that was so
01:11:07
cool. Yeah I was I was so wrapped that I
01:11:10
chose that moment. And then what was it
01:11:11
like after? Was it like a morg
01:11:12
afterwards? Like did you really bring
01:11:14
the party down with the news? Yeah.
01:11:16
Well, so um so then they literally
01:11:20
announced it the moment like the final
01:11:21
whistle went and I got interviewed
01:11:23
straight away. My family cuz I told my
01:11:25
family they did a hucker in the stadium.
01:11:27
That was awesome. And my team was
01:11:29
wondering what the hell was going on cuz
01:11:31
the players still didn't know. And so we
01:11:33
went into the change rooms afterwards
01:11:35
and the CEO had come in, Greg Greg
01:11:38
Peters at the time and he's like, "Oh, I
01:11:39
just want to acknowledge honey for, you
01:11:41
know, announcing her retirement." The
01:11:43
players were like, "You know what?" And
01:11:45
then it was like a morg. It was like
01:11:46
tears and I was like, and they got up
01:11:48
and did a huck and I was like, "Don't do
01:11:49
that cuz I don't want to cry." And it
01:11:51
was, you know, it was huge. And then I
01:11:53
feel like that was that moment that sunk
01:11:55
in for me like, "Oh crap, this is
01:11:57
actually really happening." But I didn't
01:11:59
have any regrets. It was just like, "Oh,
01:12:01
far out." Yeah. So it was cool. Yeah.
01:12:04
You mentioned your wife and the role she
01:12:07
had in these discussions. Had your mom
01:12:09
passed by by this stage? Yeah, she had.
01:12:12
Yeah. And I think a chunk of, you know,
01:12:14
a chunk of me had, you know, kind of I
01:12:17
think after her passing and that whole
01:12:19
journey and not being able to play for
01:12:20
the Warriors, you know, so I I feel
01:12:22
like, you know, things were slipping
01:12:23
from me and and that fire, you know, I
01:12:25
always talked about the fire in my
01:12:26
belly. I felt like it was just slowly
01:12:28
dimming and that was a significant part
01:12:30
of it, too. Yeah. Um, cancer uh impacts
01:12:33
so many New Zealanders. I think the
01:12:34
stats are like one in three New
01:12:36
Zealanders are impacted by cancer. But
01:12:37
[ __ ] you've had it rough, haven't you?
01:12:39
Yeah, sure have. Yeah. So, your wife
01:12:40
Relle, she's um she was diagnosed in
01:12:44
December 2020. Yeah. 3 years ago. Yeah.
01:12:46
Yeah. With and and the prognosis was not
01:12:48
not good. She was given she was actually
01:12:51
given six months in that. So, she was
01:12:53
diagnosed with quite a rare cancer
01:12:55
colangio carcinoma which is cancer of
01:12:57
the bile duct. Um and she had
01:13:00
significant metastases, you know,
01:13:01
throughout uh throughout her. So she was
01:13:04
given six months without treatment and
01:13:06
12 months with treatment. And we're now
01:13:08
coming up three years and she's still uh
01:13:10
you know, chugging along pretty well at
01:13:12
the moment. Um but still obviously a
01:13:15
stage 4 uh patient and um on palative
01:13:19
chemotherapy. So, uh, yeah, we just
01:13:22
continue to, that's probably been our
01:13:24
biggest, uh, challenge the last three
01:13:26
years and and dealing with that and the
01:13:28
roller coaster and up and downs that
01:13:30
come with, you know, stage 4, uh, cancer
01:13:32
diagnosis. What What does it look like
01:13:35
from a day-to-day perspective living
01:13:37
with stage four cancer? Yeah. Um, at the
01:13:40
moment, it's uh, we we're in our scan
01:13:43
anxiety phase. So that means uh she's
01:13:46
got a scan tomorrow uh PET scan cuz
01:13:48
she's hasn't um she's actually been off
01:13:50
treatment for four or five months now
01:13:52
which we we chase um something called a
01:13:56
stable. Stable is the best we know that
01:13:58
we're going to get with her. And so we
01:14:00
got stable at the beginning of this year
01:14:01
and we were really really stoked with
01:14:03
that. Um and yeah, she's recently just
01:14:06
had some routine bloods which have shown
01:14:08
her tumor markers have shot up and I
01:14:11
think this uh time round it's highly
01:14:13
likely she'll return uh back onto pallet
01:14:16
of chemo again very soon. Um and this
01:14:18
will now be the fifth I think full cycle
01:14:22
and a cycle kind of means uh once a week
01:14:26
um going in for six hours of infusions
01:14:29
of chemotherapy. Um, and we're probably
01:14:32
looking at a bit in the next 6 months of
01:14:34
her being back on treatment again. So,
01:14:36
it's it's rough. Um, and it gets harder,
01:14:40
I think, each round, uh, for her. And,
01:14:43
um, you know, from a from a physical,
01:14:45
emotional, mentally as well. But, um,
01:14:48
yeah, this this time round is is a I
01:14:51
think, you know, we we're prepared for
01:14:53
it because we've been here four times
01:14:55
before. Um, but it doesn't make it any
01:14:57
easier. How do you stay so strong?
01:15:01
uh uh you know I have to you know I have
01:15:04
to be the stronger one into us because
01:15:07
I'm like well physically this is
01:15:09
happening to her so I've got to be the
01:15:10
one to stay mentally and emotionally
01:15:12
strong um and and focused on the end
01:15:15
goal and that's just to you know survive
01:15:17
and keep surviving and keep fighting um
01:15:20
you know like we
01:15:22
we didn't have um a good obviously a
01:15:25
good uh long journey when it was my
01:15:28
mom's uh cancer diagnosis In fact, we
01:15:30
got nine weeks from day of diagnosis
01:15:33
through to when she passed. And so that
01:15:36
always played in the back of my mind
01:15:37
that we were going to make sure that we
01:15:38
put up a really good fight this time
01:15:40
around. Um, it was only a year later, I
01:15:42
suppose, when Rafelle got diagnosed. So,
01:15:44
um, yeah, I took it upon myself to learn
01:15:47
anything and everything that I could
01:15:48
about this cancer, all cancers,
01:15:51
everything. And I, you know, I'm a real
01:15:54
advocate for it because I just I hate
01:15:57
it. If there's one thing I hate in the
01:15:58
world, I hate cancer. Um it's affected
01:16:00
too many people in my life and um yeah,
01:16:03
I just I'll do anything and everything
01:16:05
to keep my my wife around for as long as
01:16:07
possible. Yeah. Actually, there's um a
01:16:10
bit in the book. This is um this this
01:16:12
broke my broke my [ __ ] heart,
01:16:14
actually. So, page
01:16:17
195. You think you love someone as much
01:16:19
as as it's humanly possible. But as I
01:16:22
watch my wife go through this, I keep
01:16:24
falling in love with her deeper and
01:16:26
stronger. I'm amazed by her fight, her
01:16:28
resilience, her humor. In the toughest
01:16:30
times, she keeps me strong and I keep
01:16:32
her strong. Then there are days uh where
01:16:35
we lean on each other. As we celebrate
01:16:37
each milestone, I still can't shake one
01:16:40
dread. Not waking waking up next to her
01:16:42
is my biggest fear.
01:16:45
Yep.
01:16:48
Yeah.
01:16:50
I think it's a fear that kind of, you
01:16:52
know, you live with and um that I wake
01:16:55
up with every day, you know, and I'm
01:16:56
lucky enough that I do wake up every day
01:16:59
uh next to her and looking and think
01:17:00
there's another day, here's another day.
01:17:02
And that's kind of where I allow only
01:17:04
allow my mind to think we get another
01:17:05
day, we get another day. Um and it's
01:17:08
really rough waking up on the days where
01:17:10
she's where she's crook or when we're
01:17:12
back in the hospital again and something
01:17:14
else has gone wrong. Um and we've had
01:17:16
plenty of those moments. Um, but it just
01:17:19
makes me so much more grateful for the
01:17:20
good mornings that we get to wake up.
01:17:22
Um, and and she's she's going to have a
01:17:24
good day. I mean, she's gone back home
01:17:26
today to set up a Easter egg hunt for
01:17:28
our granddaughter. So, you know, it's
01:17:29
it's all of those like little small ones
01:17:31
that we choose to focus on because, you
01:17:34
know, I know that, you know, the the
01:17:36
stats um they don't speak, you know,
01:17:39
very well. And when when you know, they
01:17:42
tell you don't Google it from get. So,
01:17:44
they say, "Right, you got stage four
01:17:46
cancer. It's rare. Don't Google it. What
01:17:48
do you do? You walk straight out of the
01:17:49
room. You Google it. And um the first
01:17:51
thing that came up for us for stage four
01:17:53
colangia carinoma is 5% of people make
01:17:55
it past five years. We're coming up
01:17:57
three. And I remember very early on we
01:18:00
made the decision she's going to be part
01:18:02
of that 5% that makes 5 years and we're
01:18:04
coming up three years and so we're like
01:18:06
we're good, you know, we're getting
01:18:07
there. We're we're we're over halfway.
01:18:10
And we celebrate every single milestone
01:18:11
that we we're able to achieve. So yeah.
01:18:14
Do you um because in your book you talk
01:18:17
about not wanting to cry in front of
01:18:18
your mom and in her brief battle with
01:18:20
cancer. Do you do you allow yourself to
01:18:23
cry in front of Relle? Yeah. Yeah. 100%.
01:18:26
Now like I just you can't hold it back
01:18:28
because we've we've been through such a
01:18:31
a [ __ ] journey with this you know and
01:18:34
you know even just as raw as you know
01:18:36
this morning she gets the phone call
01:18:38
when we're sitting in the hotel lobby to
01:18:40
say look your PET scans tomorrow and we
01:18:42
know we know what comes. It's because
01:18:44
we've been through it. So, you know,
01:18:45
just hearing that, oh, okay, it's a
01:18:47
reality of we know we've got bad bloods.
01:18:49
We know now it's a PET scan. We know
01:18:50
we're back in the oncologist end of this
01:18:53
week or or early next week and we know
01:18:55
what's to come sort of thing. And
01:18:56
straight away as soon as she said, "Oh,
01:18:58
yeah, this is Relle. Oh, yeah. I'll come
01:19:00
for the scan." You know, and straight
01:19:01
away your eyes just
01:19:07
swinging strong for each other, too, but
01:19:09
allowing us to grieve those moments
01:19:12
because you have to grieve it. You start
01:19:13
grieving from the moment you hear the
01:19:15
cancer diagnosis without a doubt, you
01:19:18
know, but you don't stay there. That's
01:19:19
my thing is you can't stay there because
01:19:21
if you stay there, then you lose hope.
01:19:23
And we've hope is the only thing that's
01:19:25
got us to the three years, you know, and
01:19:28
hope will get us past the five years and
01:19:30
and beyond. You know, we we always make
01:19:33
um you know, we always every year or
01:19:35
actually every mater we we set our goals
01:19:38
and we always say, "Okay, what's our 20
01:19:40
year goal? it, you know, and we don't
01:19:41
just say it just to say it. We say it
01:19:43
because that's what we believe, you
01:19:44
know, but we are very realistic in the
01:19:47
fact that, you know, we've always had
01:19:49
this 5-year goal from day of diagnosis.
01:19:52
Why Why was it important for you not to
01:19:54
cry in front of your mom when she was
01:19:56
unwell? I don't know. No, I think it
01:19:58
would have broken her heart to see you
01:20:00
upset or Yeah, because my mom was um so
01:20:03
strong in herself and I think for when
01:20:07
it when it came to mom, I
01:20:10
um I took on the the nursing role kind
01:20:14
of thing and I was so focused on that
01:20:17
that I I I think deep down I believed
01:20:22
she was going to get better and I hadn't
01:20:25
um accepted the fact that she wasn't
01:20:27
going to get better right right to the
01:20:28
days you know where she's like l like
01:20:30
pretty much in her last days of life in
01:20:32
a coma I still had that small amount of
01:20:35
hope that she would come back to us um
01:20:38
and so I didn't allow myself to cry
01:20:42
because that would be me accepting the
01:20:44
fact that she was was going to die and I
01:20:47
didn't allow that I didn't allow that
01:20:49
till almost the night before my mom
01:20:51
passed away when I finally said in my
01:20:54
mom's ear as she lay you know in a in a
01:20:56
coma date. You can go now, Mom. And
01:20:59
those are probably the hardest words.
01:21:06
Thanks for sharing that. Yeah, but uh
01:21:09
can you um Yeah, she she must have been
01:21:11
so proud of you because um uh yeah, you
01:21:14
you you were just you were there for
01:21:16
her. Like you really you really stepped
01:21:17
up, right? Um I've se seen clips online
01:21:20
of you training at the hospital like
01:21:22
running up and down the stairs and just
01:21:24
sleeping on the floor there. like you
01:21:25
you really you really fronted up in a
01:21:28
big way and um she must have been so
01:21:30
proud. Can you can you remember your
01:21:31
your last conversation with her when she
01:21:33
was lucid? Yeah, that is probably what
01:21:36
disappoints me the most is cuz like when
01:21:38
you're caring for someone that's so sick
01:21:40
and you're entrusted with giving the
01:21:42
medication, right? So, I'm I'm giving
01:21:44
her all of her, you know, all her
01:21:47
medication, the morphine, the pain
01:21:48
medication, the anti-anxiety medication,
01:21:51
pretty much the medication that's
01:21:53
keeping her at peace, but also a lot of
01:21:55
it was, you know, allowing her to rest
01:21:57
so that her body could go through the
01:21:59
dying process. Um, and I and I didn't
01:22:02
understand that at the time. And I had
01:22:06
massive cira fatigue, you know, and I
01:22:08
was tired and I was getting frustrated
01:22:10
with mom cuz she was so act she was um
01:22:13
so much out of character, you know. She
01:22:15
was getting frustrated. She was worn
01:22:17
down. She was tired. She was in pain and
01:22:19
she was suffering, you know, and I
01:22:21
didn't want to think that she was
01:22:22
suffering cuz I'm like, well, I'm your
01:22:23
nurse. I'm not a nurse, but you know, I
01:22:27
am here to help you. Um I don't think
01:22:30
what I registered was actually what I
01:22:32
was there to do was to help her to die.
01:22:35
I still had held on to the hope that um
01:22:37
I was going to make her better. Um and
01:22:40
so it was actually I think you go
01:22:43
through a whole lot of spiritual
01:22:44
distress and that's where that's where I
01:22:46
was at and that's where mom was at. And
01:22:48
so my last conversation with mom was mom
01:22:50
was really pissed off with me because
01:22:52
she was she wanted to go and I didn't
01:22:56
want her to go. Um, and I was frustrated
01:22:58
with her. You know, we were we weren't
01:23:00
sleeping. You know, she was having
01:23:01
really rough nights and things like
01:23:03
that. And we were all at the family
01:23:05
homestead. There was, you know, 34 30 of
01:23:08
us all all sort of there for mom during
01:23:11
those last days of life. And um, it was
01:23:14
actually my papa that said to me, you
01:23:17
have to let her go. You know, she's
01:23:19
hanging. She's holding on because you
01:23:21
won't let her go. And so that's when I
01:23:24
had to say those words was me actually
01:23:26
cuz I'd say, "Oh, I've let her go." You
01:23:28
know, I know I know what's happening. I
01:23:30
But I hadn't actually said those words
01:23:32
out loud because I think deep down I
01:23:34
hadn't I knew I hadn't convinced myself
01:23:37
that I was actually letting her go. So
01:23:40
yeah, it's um it's a it's an unreal
01:23:43
journey, you know, when you get to care
01:23:44
for someone in their last days of life.
01:23:46
I think it was a huge privilege, you
01:23:48
know, and I don't regret a moment of
01:23:49
those days that um you know that I got
01:23:53
um for mom. I think it's it's one of the
01:23:55
things that I'm most proud of how I
01:23:56
cared for mom. Yeah. Yeah. You should be
01:23:59
and I'm sure she was as well cuz you
01:24:01
really stood up. Eh yeah. Um even even
01:24:04
like another little thing like bringing
01:24:06
your wedding to Relle Ford so you guys
01:24:08
could get married in the chapel at Wat
01:24:10
Hospital just so your mom could be
01:24:11
present cuz you weren't sure.
01:24:13
Um you when do you miss her most? Um I
01:24:18
think I miss her most
01:24:20
uh obviously on her anniversary. Um I
01:24:24
miss her most when we go back to family
01:24:25
things. So mom's mom's one of 11
01:24:27
siblings and I miss her most when I'm
01:24:30
around my family because um up until a
01:24:34
few months ago she was the only sibling
01:24:35
that had passed. Um her brother not long
01:24:38
passed another brother not long passed a
01:24:40
few months ago. But I think when I go
01:24:42
around her sisters because they're so
01:24:44
much like her and they remind me so much
01:24:46
of mom. Um and then it's also those
01:24:49
moments where um people look back at me
01:24:52
and they go I thought you were your
01:24:53
mother just then. And I'm like oh. And
01:24:55
I've I've that really warms my heart to
01:24:58
to for people to think, oh either I look
01:25:00
like my mom or I sound like my mom. I'm
01:25:02
like oh cool. You know like I don't
01:25:04
think as a kid I ever aspired to be like
01:25:07
my mom. But now when I hear people cuz
01:25:09
mom had such a beautiful heart and she
01:25:11
was so caring. I love it when people say
01:25:13
that. Um but yeah, definitely when I'm
01:25:15
around family, I I miss mom the most.
01:25:17
And when I see, you know, our kids, our
01:25:21
my
01:25:22
grandkids and you know, my ne nephews
01:25:24
and nieces, they don't get to
01:25:26
experience. Mom's just great great
01:25:28
grandmother. I mean, had her faults as a
01:25:30
mom, but the best grandmother ever. So,
01:25:32
yeah, I I miss her the most times. that
01:25:36
um the 16-year-old town bully like [ __ ]
01:25:39
she would have been so proud of the
01:25:41
woman the woman that you've grown up to
01:25:42
be like what the hell like you've really
01:25:45
you've really come good yeah for sure um
01:25:49
you know are you proud of yourself I am
01:25:52
yeah I am I know you know I I know I'm a
01:25:55
good person deep down and you know I
01:25:57
think it took a while to dig through all
01:25:59
the bad [ __ ] um to get to where I am
01:26:01
today but I know like I've got a good
01:26:03
heart and I see so much of my mom and my
01:26:05
dad reflected in in how I've been and I
01:26:08
give so much credit back to my family,
01:26:10
you know, like they've always been my
01:26:12
absolute foundation and everything. I'm
01:26:14
so grateful that I had great
01:26:16
grandparents um you know on both sides.
01:26:19
Um I've only got one one nan left. She's
01:26:21
95 and she's still chugging along and
01:26:24
she tells me my longevity is due to her
01:26:26
and you know she's she's proofs in the
01:26:27
pudding. which is 9 to5 and you know
01:26:30
still going good and um yeah I just I
01:26:34
credit everything back to my family and
01:26:35
my upbringing cuz although it had its
01:26:37
rough parts you know there was still
01:26:39
those real um deep set I think um you
01:26:43
know things that come through um as part
01:26:46
of our family traits and that's in and
01:26:49
around humility. I mean, my mother, my
01:26:50
grandmother was actually Jehovah Witness
01:26:52
and and um you know that we kind of grew
01:26:55
up with that religion. Um didn't
01:26:58
necessarily follow it, but in the in the
01:27:00
times that I lived with my grandparents,
01:27:02
I had to go to church, you know, it was
01:27:03
part of it. And I think that gave me
01:27:05
some grounding, too. Um but my parents
01:27:07
were very hardworking. My parents were
01:27:09
very hardworking. They were very humble.
01:27:12
Um and so I just I'm grateful that those
01:27:14
traits come through. Yeah. Yeah. I think
01:27:17
you have to show some grace. like they
01:27:18
did the best they could with the
01:27:20
resources they had at this at the time.
01:27:22
My god. Um, we've got there's another
01:27:25
studio booking, so we're going to have
01:27:26
to get out of here soon. We haven't
01:27:28
talked about the New Zealand Order of
01:27:29
Merit. We haven't talked about your
01:27:31
boxing. Um, we haven't talked about God,
01:27:35
the commentary stuff at all. Yeah. Um,
01:27:37
[ __ ] there's so much um so many strands
01:27:41
to your story, right? Yeah. I I always
01:27:44
um I I always reflect my life as a bit
01:27:47
of a roller coaster, you know, like I've
01:27:49
had tons of bad [ __ ] you know, happen,
01:27:51
but I've also had so much cool stuff as
01:27:53
well. And I I always think um my life
01:27:57
just there's always something different
01:27:59
around the corner. And I'm glad like
01:28:01
especially, you know, I feel like, you
01:28:03
know, as I've finished up playing as an
01:28:06
athlete that I've taken opportunities,
01:28:07
you know, like I had no vision
01:28:10
whatsoever that I was going to be
01:28:11
working for Sky Sport and doing this
01:28:13
commentary and the broadcasting side of
01:28:15
things and then, you know, the
01:28:17
opportunity um presented itself and I
01:28:20
think, you know, the 20-year-old honey
01:28:22
would have been no straight away. But,
01:28:24
you know, I think the 30-year-old honey
01:28:26
is like give it a crack. Just give it a
01:28:27
crack. And that's kind of how what I've
01:28:29
lived by is like just give it a crack,
01:28:30
see where it takes you. And so I just
01:28:32
try to live my life like that now.
01:28:34
That's a funny story all on its own.
01:28:36
Turning up to the sky boardroom and your
01:28:38
hoodie and track and being handed an
01:28:41
envelope and Exactly. Oh yeah. The the
01:28:44
trolling has the trolling sort of died
01:28:45
down like you talk about this in in the
01:28:47
book and there's um there's a couple of
01:28:49
messages that you bring up including
01:28:50
token brown face, token female. They've
01:28:53
ticked three boxes. the brown face box,
01:28:56
the girl box, and the rainbow box. Shot
01:28:58
sky. And that's really offensive and
01:29:00
aggressive stuff, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah.
01:29:02
It took a little while for me to um to
01:29:06
uh I suppose learn to cope with that
01:29:08
kind of stuff. And and that's what
01:29:09
happens, right? You put yourself out
01:29:11
there and um and you got to expect that
01:29:14
people are going to have their opinions.
01:29:16
That's what I'm paid to do is give my
01:29:17
opinion and so people are going to have
01:29:19
their opinions. And it was vice versa
01:29:21
with the book. you know, is obviously
01:29:22
putting myself out there again. Um, and
01:29:26
you know, and you're going to get uh
01:29:27
feedback and you got to just be open to
01:29:29
it. But I think what I've learned now is
01:29:31
just to take on, you know, what's
01:29:34
actually useful for me, you know, and
01:29:36
sometimes I read those comments and I
01:29:37
thought, far out, you know, that is that
01:29:39
is actually true, you know, like I got
01:29:40
to lift my game. I got to stop repeating
01:29:42
myself or I've got to stop bandwagoning
01:29:44
or I've got to stop saying absolutely a
01:29:47
million times in in one take kind of
01:29:48
thing, you know, all of those kind of
01:29:50
things. So I
01:29:51
I I know that I take, you know, um
01:29:55
constructive criticism really well
01:29:56
because I want to always be better. So,
01:29:59
but you know, the [ __ ] where you're just
01:30:00
getting pumped for, you know, whatever.
01:30:03
I'm just like I' I've leared to just be
01:30:05
like, "Oh, I can't do anything with
01:30:07
that. I can't change the way I look. If
01:30:08
you don't like my top that I'm wearing
01:30:09
or you don't like how my hair's done or
01:30:12
whatever, I can't change that." Yeah,
01:30:14
exactly. Pretty much my words, not
01:30:16
yours. Um and last one, where do you
01:30:18
goals for the future? like where do you
01:30:19
see yourself at 50? Well, I'm I'm
01:30:22
studying this year. So, I'm doing the
01:30:25
full-time uh a full immersion tel mi at
01:30:28
Wakato University. So, I just got
01:30:30
through my first term. when I'm on
01:30:31
school holidays and and I it it already
01:30:35
feels like, you know, I've done my first
01:30:37
term and it already feels like um it's
01:30:40
just changing my whole perspective on
01:30:42
the world, you know, having really
01:30:44
diving deep into my uh mi tonga into um
01:30:49
just having um just being real
01:30:52
vulnerable to uh learning relearning my
01:30:56
language, you know, and um and putting
01:30:58
myself out there. Um, and I'm excited
01:31:02
for it and I I haven't thought too far
01:31:04
past that because it's been something
01:31:06
that I've been wanting to do for, you
01:31:08
know, two, three years now. And this is
01:31:10
what I've solely committed to for this
01:31:11
year. It's my number one priority is to
01:31:14
um is to start my learning journey, you
01:31:16
know, and um and see where it takes me
01:31:18
from there. How good. So you and your
01:31:20
dogs can have full conversations. Yeah,
01:31:22
for sure. Um and hopefully many many
01:31:25
many many more um happy years with
01:31:27
Relle. Oh, 100%. Yeah, honey smiler.
01:31:31
This has been awesome. We're gonna have
01:31:33
to do a part two some other time. Yeah,
01:31:34
for sure, Dom. Um, this has been really,
01:31:36
really good. How's it been for you? Oh,
01:31:38
I love it. Lovely. Yeah, really enjoyed
01:31:40
it. You know, it's so cool to sit and
01:31:42
chat with you. Um, such a fan of the
01:31:45
conversation that that you've had with
01:31:47
so many and I was just I felt really
01:31:49
privileged to be able to come here
01:31:51
today. Yeah. Do you enjoy reflecting?
01:31:52
Yeah, I do. Yeah. It makes me um think,
01:31:54
"Oh, yeah. This is what you've done some
01:31:56
shit." Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You have.
01:31:58
You really have. Hey, this has been
01:32:00
amazing. Thank you so much. Cheers.
01:32:02
Thanks.
