<i>Tangiwai:</i> a tale of love, tragedy and cricket
Jacqueline Smith, writing in the New Zealand Herald , says Tangiwai , a movie named after the country's biggest rail disaster, is as much the tale of how cricketer Bob Blair braved the news of his fiancee Nerissa Love's death to bat for his team
Nikita Bastian
25-Feb-2013
Jacqueline Smith, writing in the New Zealand Herald, says Tangiwai, a movie named after the country's biggest rail disaster, is as much the tale of how cricketer Bob Blair braved the news of his fiancee Nerissa Love's death to bat for his team in a Test against South Africa.
He eventually got her letter, posted from Taihape - the final chapter in their tragic love story. She would meet him off the boat and they would be married, she wrote. But first, he needed to concentrate on hitting a six for his country ...
It was Christmas Eve, 1953. With 151 dead, many more injured, and a lump in the back of the throat of the nation that would last for generations, the site was renamed Tangiwai, or river of tears.
Nikita Bastian is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo