I was a more cultured person when I lived in Wellington.

You can’t really help but be, what with all the theatre, exhibitions and general creative atmosphere around the place. 

Luckily for me, I have a great group of friends up here that take up a fair portion of my socialising time, so I haven’t felt like I’ve been missing out too much – in fact, there have been a few shows that I’ve been meaning to go to that I haven’t quite got around to – my fault, slap on the wrist etc.

My point (I think I have one) is that I was stoked to find out last week that the World Press Photo Exhibition is coming to Auckland – and in fact opened on Friday. This is an exhibition that I made sure I went to whenever it came to Wellington and was something I was going to miss about the old home city.

Me and the great group of friends headed along to the sobering exhibition on Sunday, and my advice first off is to go on a weekday – it was mega crowded and uber stuffy.  It took us about an hour to get around the whole exhibit and we didn’t stay to watch the video presentation playing in the background.

Some of the photos are quite horrific (I’m thinking the photos from war torn countries and of people being stoned to death), some were incredibly fascinating and some a wee bit weird (naked man doing press-ups in places of topical importance?).

The exhibition definitely gets you thinking about the world and can make you feel a little mopey. Plan for something fun afterwards!

Now that I’ve got a bit of culture back into me I’m keen to keep it going – anyone know of any must see plays or other fabulous things coming up?