Jacinda Ardern, trailing wardens, security guards, police, media and fans, walked into the paddock with all the market stalls. On the stage up the top end, local singer Huia Shortland swung her way into Redemption Song. It was Bob Marley's birthday today, too.
Ardern was on walkabout at Waitangi. The
market was over the road from the formal Treaty grounds, and after the song the MC announced it was the first time any Prime Minister had visited the market on Waitangi Day.
It is an age of firsts, although Ardern is not the first Prime Minister to promise a new beginning on Waitangi Day, and she is not the first to attract enthusiastic fans wanting selfies. But she probably is the first where, everytime she stops for a selfie, there is a young girl, maybe waiting with her mum or dad, or there's a cluster of grinning girls, standing on the edge of the little crowd of fans. Some just wondering and admiring, others working up the courage to get in there and get a selfie themselves.
Many do. Many more let the moment pass, happy to have been close, or maybe kicking themselves. Note to everyone: just do that thing. She likes it.
Double takes of recognition, blushes, giggles, feet shuffling forward. The men do it too. The buzz goes round. The Prime Minister! Jacinda! Jacinta! Whatever they call her, they adore her.
