ROSEMARY ABBOTT | National
DEAD END
Leigh Hart’s ambitious campaign to give one chip to every kiwi has stumbled in the eerily empty corridors of Johnsonville Mall.
The Snackachangi frontman turned up to the ageing Wellington shopping centre shortly after midday with a lone chip packet, hoping to find a bustling public hub with everyday New Zealanders. What he instead found was more like a haunting post-apocalyptic echo chamber.
“I got chatting to someone straight away, had a great old conversation, but when I tried to give them their chip, I realised I’d been talking to a mannequin the whole time. It was quite a frightening experience,” said Hart, actively looking for the nearest exit of the mall.
Hart has been attempting to hand-deliver one SnackaChangi chip to each and every one of the country’s 5.31 million residents, and thought his work may be easier at a large shopping complex.
“I thought maybe there would be a school group around, or a pensioner doing a slow loop of the mall,” he said. “But no. Just closed shops, a broken escalator, and the distant sound of a wheezing air-con unit,” Hart explained, slowly realising he was the only human inside the mall and having more frightening encounters with mannequins.
“I then tried to give the chip to a bloke I saw outside Just Jeans. Giddaaay maaaate, I said. Had a good chat, real solid eye contact. But it was a mannequin. Again!” Hart recalled.
“At one point I thought I saw movement near the old Muffin Break. The ooooool Muffin Break,” he said. “Turned out it was just the automatic doors opening and closing for absolutely nobody.”
At press time, Hart was seen hurriedly leaving the mall and looking over his shoulder, holding the same singly-packaged chip he entered with.
More to come.
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