The morning after his big social snub, Labour Party benefactor Owen Glenn is relaxed. "A problem? Oh, no, no, no," says Glenn, who is convinced that Helen Clark was obeying Maori protocol. "Well no one rushed across from our side of the room to rub noses either. Howard
[Morrison] explained to me that it's two different iwi, and all that stuff."
Behind closed doors, however, it was a different story. "I had a very, very pleasant 45 minutes with her, and we parted on very good [terms]. She said, 'that's just New Zealand and the way things happen and we made a mistake and whatever'."
In other words, Prime Minister Helen Clark is quite happy to be buddies with Mr Glenn in private, but will go to amazing lengths to avoid him in public.
The decision not to hongi him was an interesting one, possibly driven more by the prospect of a photo alongside the one she is tormenting John Key with: when he hongied Tama Iti at Waitangi. Either way, Glenn is mildly happy with his relationship with her - even if he has no firm plans to return.
Although he will be back in Australia and Fiji around October, he will not come here until the Business School invites him back to give a paper on entrepreneurship which is planned over the next few years. "It's a lot of fun and I found it very challenging."
As for his now-unlikely Monaco appointment: "All I'm trying to do is help and people are trying to make something out of it. Richard Worth [the Wellington-based consul-general] was resigning from the job and I just mentioned it loosely in a conversation I had with Mike Williams, 'Heck I'm going to be living there and I wouldn't require any payments or anything'.
"It's just a storm in a teacup."
Glenn plans to leave for Los Angeles tonight after visiting Eden Garden where his parents' ashes are scattered.
And yes, despite his recent health scares, he has sailed through the stress. "I love all this stuff," he laughs. "Squabbles in school yards."
