Appreciating the mechanisms of what actually happens – light enters a water droplet and bends (or refracts) and reflects off the droplet’s back surface, then bends again as it exits – makes this everyday magic even more amazing. The rainbow phenomenon, called dispersion, is when longer wavelengths of light (like red) bend less than shorter ones (like blue). That’s why red appears at the top of the rainbow, while blue sits at the bottom in a more compact curve. It doesn’t matter where you see that rainbow ‒ in a rainy sky or a crystal hanging in a window ‒ these colours will always be in the same order.

Unless of course you get a cool double rainbow, which forms when light undergoes two reflections within one raindrop. As a result, you observe two distinct reflections, each arriving from different angles. This results in the secondary rainbow having its colours in the reverse order!

This principle of exploring the unseen is what’s behind the school holiday science workshops we run at Te Ara Whānui ki te Rangi Space Place. We take an everyday something and explore the science behind it to show that understanding more, makes the mundane amazing.

A series of fun activities and demonstrations exploring the forces involved in air and space flight and what it takes to get humans into the air is the theme for this month’s Flight Club. We grapple with the concepts of air and atmosphere by expanding shaving foam inside a vacuum chamber, and fighting the drag of a bowling ball; we look at lift using a roll of toilet paper and a leaf blower to understand the forces involved in lifting an airplane off the ground and we examine thrust by launching rockets.

By the end of the day our young audience will have a better understanding of what air is made of, how airplanes, balloons, and rockets fly, and a basic understanding of the wider scientific principles and concepts.

Last year in Science Bites! An Edible Science Workshop we used edible demonstrations to explain the science behind everyday items and the scientific principles of light and colour, what happens inside a chemical reaction, and even how clouds form in the atmosphere.

Simple can be amazing. I used glow-in-the-dark jelly to discuss fluorescence and phosphorescence, then asked the kids to sort packets of Skittles into colours, what seems like a simple task. When I turned on only red lights and set the kids to their challenge, every group was supremely confident they had sorted them correctly, only to be flabbergasted when the lights came up and they found all their Skittles mixed together. Their excitement and confusion set us up to explore how the colours we see depend on the wavelength makeup of the light shining upon it.

This is a unique collaboration between Wellington Museum, Toi Māori Aotearoa and 19 contemporary artists and artist collectives working in Māori creative hubs throughout Te Upoko o te Ika (the Wellington region). The artists were invited to manaaki the taonga collected by the community minded, Martinborough-based businessman George Pain (1846-1937) throughout his life. His widow Mary donated these taonga to Wellington City Council in 1946, and they came into Wellington Museum’s collection in 2004.

‘Tis the season to be ticking off Christmas gift lists for most people, but like many on the other side of the counter we’ve been planning for months and have a very clear intention behind our gift store approach. It’s important to us because Experience Wellington is Wellington Museums Trust, a registered charity and our retail revenue, venue hire and donations help us to continue to bring remarkable experiences to people in the city.

We want our gift shops to be an extension of our visitors’ experience, rather than just an add on, ‘do you want fries with that?’ We deliberately offer keepsakes that mirror the stories we tell within our walls, with three quarters of our products celebrating Pōneke by promoting local creatives and Māori makers. We are a creative capital, with creativity spilling into our cracks and alleyways, independent pop-up shops and markets. I feel really lucky we have the bricks and mortar to champion our city’s makers’ skills in our spaces. Showing creativity is still an essential part of our capital city’s DNA.

We drive revenue back into our creative communities by featuring plenty of quality local brands including books from Huia Publishers, Apostle hot sauces, chocolate from Wellington Chocolate Factory and Wonderland, National Candles and timo and toki made by Paku. We’re equally proud of the products designed by our in-house team. We found our Wellington travel poster was a big hit during the Covid-19 pandemic and our exclusive ranges have blossomed from there.

“Mum said she loved driving the cable car. That was one of the best times in her life,” Faulkner-Ruka says, as sit at a table with her and her wife, Chucky, looking at Lorrayne’s old CV.

I am borrowing these irreplaceable items – the photos, the coaster, and the beautiful cloth – so I can feature Lorrayne’s story in a display I’m working on for the Cable Car Museum.

I ask them what the monetary value of the items is for my paperwork, and they laugh. “The wrath of hell!” Chucky says, so I write that down for the registrar.

The Kelburn Cable Car first started running in 1902 and the bright red cable cars have long been a symbol of the city. At the top of Kelburn hill, just next to the terminal, is the Cable Car Museum. We house two original cars, ‘Grip Car One” and Grip Car three’ plus the historic winding gear. The museum tells the story of the cable car’s technological innovation and evolution but, over the last few months, I’ve also been gathering personal stories and memories to bring this history to life.

“Being a woman trying to get into what was called then a man’s job it was more difficult for her— but she stood her ground. I was proud to be her daughter,” Faulkner-Ruka says.

In October 1979 Lorrayne and her brother Henry Ruka both worked for Wellington City Transport driving buses, but when the opportunity arose to apply for a job on the new ‘Swiss-made’ cable cars that replaced the old ‘red rattlers’, Lorrayne put her hat in the ring.

She went for the job and got it, much to the consternation of male colleagues. But Lorrayne took their resistance in her stride.

Chucky says: “The staff asked her to wear a skirt, but she said, ‘No, they all get to wear a suit and tie. I’m wearing a suit and tie’ so in the photos you can see she’s got a tie and her pants on. She did not want to be stereotyped by her gender.”

Cable Car drivers are ambassadors for the city and Lorrayne had a gift for customer service. She also loved music and on the Kelburn Cable Car she used to play music to her passengers. Her favourite bands included The Hi Marks, a Māori showband who put out two bestselling albums. Her brother jokes they owed their success to Lorrayne playing them on the Cable Car. The Hi Marks were whānau featuring Lorrayne’s uncles, Butch, Hayward, and George Ruka (alongside their nephew John.)

“She took her guitar everywhere,” Faulkner-Ruka says.

In 1981 Lorrayne left the Kelburn Cable Car for an overseas adventure. The New Zealand Herald and the New Zealand Woman’s Weekly both covered stories on Lorrayne as the first cable car driver. (I am still chasing those stories down!) Lorrayne continued to operate cable cars in the United Kingdom, Hong Kong, San Franciso, and Switzerland. She died in 2015.

Over the phone, Lorrayne’s older sister Mere Nakare, based in Blenheim, tells me, “I always knew my sister was a part of history.”

Lorrayne’s story will be featured in newly refreshed displays at the Cable Car Museum.

If you have any memories of Lorrayne, recognise any of the staff in this photo or have other memories of the Kelburn Cable Car you’d like to share, please get in touch. I’d love to hear from you.