Carla Green

Robyn Cameron tried to put a brave face on it at the Friends of the Dunedin Botanic Garden plant sale on Saturday.

Will Gillespie did not come to Dunedin to party. He came to study health science at the University of Otago, and that was what he did with most of his free time, he said.

Less than two hours before he was due to speak to 900 people about the aurora australis, Otago Museum director Ian Griffin was on Twitter.

An El Nino system is forecast to bring ''slightly cooler'' weather across the country this winter - not that southerners may notice.

A national television programme about Dunedin student drinking culture was criticised at a University of Otago council meeting yesterday.

Unseasonably warm weather this month has probably come to an end, with rain and some snow falling in Otago yesterday.

Ian Johnstone has been dancing for almost 60 years now, since he was a child.

Labour leader Andrew Little yesterday criticised a lack of ''desperately needed'' government transparency on funding to district health boards.

A report about the recent earthquake in Nepal has sparked Olivia Duffy (7) into action.

Photographing the night sky takes up much of Otago Museum director Ian Griffin's spare time, and since moving to Dunedin, Dr Griffin has become an aurora aficionado. Carla Green reports.

The University of Otago has appointed Prof Leigh Hale as the new dean of its School of Physiotherapy.

Working as a funeral director was not at the top of Callum Bisset's list of dream jobs.

For this year's International Day of the Midwife, celebrated today around the world, midwife Angel Temple is doing her best to keep the emphasis on the positive.

Organisers of a ''Cosy Home Expo'' at the Northeast Valley Community Rooms did their best to make it inviting, with a bouncy castle out front and promises of warm soup inside.

Reporter Carla Green speaks to the family of Nicola Weir, who was supported by the Otago Community Hospice before she died of cancer last year. The Weir family are now doing their bit to help the hospice.

A demonstration in the Octagon yesterday against the proposed forced closure of more than 100 Western Australian Aboriginal communities was part of a string of protests in eight different countries.