Someone will be like, ‘Where are you from?’
I’ll be like, ‘Kurdistan’. They’re like, ‘Where’s that?’
I’m like. ‘It’s the Middle East’. They’re like, ‘Kazakhstan?’
I’m like. ‘Nah nah nah, Kurdistan’.
They’re like, ‘Oh, so you’re like Borat’.
I’m like, man, f*** this.
My full name is Dera Meelan.
I'm a producer and musician.
My family is from Kurdistan
which is in the Middle East
We’re from an area called Kirkuk.
You know, it all began from necessity
so migrating because of war and stuff
and you know my family couldn't be in that environment,
so they began migrating.
They went to Iran and then the country over, and the country over
Eventually that led to China
and then they end up in Pakistan
and that's where they awaited migration for about 10 years
I think in 99 they were like, cool. you can come over to NZ
Yeah, that's where my life starts.
From what I was told
there was about 500 families
when we came here.
I was fully immersed in it,
so I learned how to speak Kurdish
just off the back of speaking with my family at home
and simultaneously learning English through school
and being here, and YouTube and all that.
They taught me through music, family books
the Kurdish community were quite prevalent
when we first came here.
They were in a refugee camp for a short while
and then from there, they’d say hey, you can live here
I have plenty of memories of the house
we were at before this,
which is the house that they got moved to.
It was on a road called Freidlanders,
which isn't too far from here.
The house was in shambles.
The floor was warped.
You know, there's mould and algae
there's cockroaches everywhere.
We actually refer to the house as ‘xanu sisark’
which basically translates to cockroach house.
I just remember, it was like eight of us crammed in
it was a three or two bedroom house
and you know everything was just
dark and gloomy, but that’s very much
the kind of circumstances
and environments that breeds love.
We've always lived out South,
so we lived first in Manurewa
I think for a few years,
and then we came out here to Clendon
and we've been here ever since.
My cultural experiences
didn't shape my kind of view of the world
until I'd say the past few years.
You know, growing up,
I wanted to actually hide
from being Kurd, from being Middle Eastern
You know I grew up, people would mock me
and call me terrorist and this and that.
Even explaining what a Kurd was in Intermediate.
Someone would be like, ’Where you from?’
I’d be like, ‘Kurdistan’, they’re like, ‘Where’s that?’
I’m like, it’s the Middle East,
they’re like ‘Kazakhstan?’, I’m like, ‘Nah, nah, Kurdistan.’
They’re like, ‘Oh, so you’re like Borat?’
I’m like man, f*** this.
Alright, I’m Russian.
Just anything to kind of escape that, that torment
you’d get for being Middle Eastern.
You know South Auckland, is one of the most multicultural places
probably in New Zealand.
So seeing all of that
seeing, you know, the Samoans
be proud of their culture
the Indians proud of theirs
you know, the Asians proud of theirs
and the Māori proud of theirs
you know, made me go, OK, yeah this is just as important to me.
It's just you know becoming an adult
becoming independent.
I'm like, OK who am I, like really?
And the music actually helped a lot.
I was able to see people
flaunting their shit in their cultures
people wearing their culture proudly
you know, right in front of them, and embracing it.
So I’m like, OK cool, I’ma do me, let me re-embrace this.
I remember seeing Daft Punk tracks and the music video
they had attached to them were insane,
I’m like, I’ve never seen anything like this
so I go on YouTube
I just engrossed myself in all of that.
You know we had hand-me-down laptops
and stuff for the family computer.
I’d try figure out demo softwares and stuff
that I could get to learn how to make music.
I met Church & AP
it was this blog event for Nah Zone in 2018.
At the time, no music out.
No one knew me.
I didn't know anyone, so I'm like, cool
let me get a foot into the community
and there was this group
around these two guys.
I’m like, cool, I guess these are the guys you know.
These must be the guys.
So I approached Church
they were like, talking about music
and he's like yeah we have this acapella that we want a beat for.
So I’m like, cool, yeah, I have a beat for you.
And he just looked at me like, man I don’t know you, but whatever.
Later that night I ended up meeting AP.
We exchanged emails and then we kind of started from there.
My biggest achievements,
I'd probably say the Pacific Music Award.
That was a pretty big achievement.
I wasn't even expecting to win anything.
To win that was pretty incredible.
Everyone that streamed album, shared it. showed love
I'm just grateful to be doing this stuff for a living now.
Hitting like a million streams
and then two-million streams
those little kind of milestones, they’re really important
cos you know, kind of, foreshadowing what's to come.
But I think the biggest achievement of all is just the fact
that people like my music.
Honestly, it's like it's a trip every day
that you know people actually even listen.
So that's the coolest thing to me.
So the way I got involved with DeadForest
we actually go way back.
He lived like three houses across.
So I was a little kid
and our brothers were best friends
and I remember he did music.
He was the cool guy.
I'm like, man I wanna be like this guy
and we disconnected again and we ended up
reconnecting in 2018, which is what sparked everything up again
and we've been making music ever since.
I feel like if it's organic, it’s the best, you know.
Especially as artists just working online isn’t really my thing.
You know, I could send you ten beats through email,
but it's just not the same
as kind of playing them for you
and seeing how you kind of gauge
if you like the beat or not.
Or you know, I think that stuff to me
is more important.
My mum is a stay at home mum.
My dad's an interpreter at the moment.
He knows like seven languages, might be butchering that but
he interprets for people, so hospital, court cases
if someone comes into the country
and they can't speak English he will help out with that.
My family is religious, they’re Muslim, and so I’m Muslim as well.
My parents raised me very much on the ideology
of you believe what you want and you kind of figure out
what works for you, and you go from there.
The shooting in Christchurch definitely had a huge impact
on my family. I remember, I think I was at work
when I found out it happened,
so I called up my mum and dad and I went home
and everyone was just crying.
It’s the first time I had seen my dad cry in years.
It was a big moment in terms of, it was the first time
they felt scared again.
You know, they came to a place
where everything felt safe
and you're running away from that.
It was kind of the first moment they went, ‘Oh man,
that's really coming here.’
So yeah, it definitely affected us
but it was incredible to see New Zealand’s reaction to that.
My family loves it here.
Any time they've gone travelling,
my mum always comes back and says,
’Wasn’t as good as New Zealand.’
I'm like, yeah, I know.