Associate Professor Tino Mercado of the Faculty of Dentistry is one of six category winners in this year’s University of Otago creative writing competition – Writer 2026.
A periodontist – and now award-winning writer. Associate Professor Tino Mercado of the Department of Oral Sciences in Otago’s Faculty of Dentistry says he was “excited, joyful proud – and humbled, all at once” to learn he had won the staff fiction category of Writer 2026 for his story Longganisa – a story of small things.
“Four emotions is a crowded room; they all arrived together,” he says of his reaction.
Tino is one of six winners across the competition’s six categories, as selected by Dunedin author Paddy Richardson:
Student poetry: Annie Hall for Begonia Boyfriends
Student fiction: Anindita Chatterjee for The Second Kettle
Staff poetry: Nat Christensen for The Only Copy
Staff fiction: Tino Mercado for Longganisa – a story of small things
Alumni poetry: Sarah Gallagher for Small
Alumni fiction: Nicki Macklin for Dear Josie
Read the full winning entries here.
Paddy says this year’s prompt ‘Small things – overlooked details and ordinary moments’ provided an array of fascinating pieces of creative prose and poetry and made choosing winners difficult.
“There was humour, sadness, loss and joy, stories and poems from the heart, which made me wince a little or smile but did not make the task of choosing one over the other an easy one.”
She says she loved Tino’s story, which speaks of the importance of small things within our lives, such as with the line:
“We think of history as the large things; treaties, invasions, liberations. But the large things only touch us through the small ones – the war is a wheeze behind bamboo, a thumb on a wrist, a bar of soap on a bathroom floor.”
Tino says he was inspired by fragments of his own family’s history, combined with the story of the Philippines itself.
“A country colonised in turn by three nations, Spain, America and Japan, each behaving as though it were dealing with a child incapable of looking after itself, and therefore in need of foster parents.”
For him, entering this year’s Writer competition was a “why not” decision of the best kind.
“I had a story to tell, and a story kept to yourself is only half told. The competition supplied the other half: a deadline, and an audience.”
Though he is a dental specialist and scientist, Tino is not new to writing.
“In primary and high school, I loved feature writing, edited our high school paper, and won a few competitions along the way. Lately my writing has been scientific: research papers, manuscripts, literature reviews. Since moving to New Zealand nearly two years ago, after 26 years in Australia, I have found the time again to write the stories I have been researching.”
The other winning writers used the prompt to tell very different stories, but each shared a common thread of care and kindness.
Student fiction winner Anindita Chatterjee, who is in the process of completing her Master of Teaching and Learning in Primary Education at the College of Education, says her story, The Second Kettle, was inspired by her own experience of moving to Dunedin from Delhi to study – and the homesickness and loneliness that came along with the excitement.
“Sometimes, it is the smallest gestures from strangers that make an unfamiliar place feel a little more like home. Making someone a cup of tea, offering a little company, or simply noticing that someone might be struggling can make a world of difference.”
Similarly, the alumni fiction winner Nicki Macklin, who completed a Master’s in Public Health at the University’s Wellington campus in 2018, focused on the kindness of a café worker during a family’s health journey in her story Dear Josie.
“The theme – small things – grabbed my attention as immediately relating to kindness, and the subject of my story was the first person I thought of as I wondered how I would express the theme. I truly thought I was sending a love letter off into the great void, almost as an indulgence to my busy mind.”
The winning poems also examined small details and moments of love.
Commerce student Annie Hall, who won the student poetry section with Begonia Boyfriends was inspired by her partner and his newfound obsession with plants.
“I wanted to capture the humour and beauty of ordinary domestic life, and how the smallest details can make it meaningful.”
Alumni poetry winner Sarah Gallagher, Tumuaki Wharepukapuka o Ōtepoti Director Library Services, was moved by her daughter stepping in to look after an injured thrush.
“That moment reminded me of so many other beautiful, small moments we had together when she was little and I was at home with her. They all speak of our connection and her huge heart and empathy for animals and the world around her.”
Staff poetry winner, the Senior Strategy Advisor in the University’s Division of External Engagement, Nat Christensen’s poem examines AI – and considers the ways that it can mimic the human experience, but can never truly know it.
“As I tried to convey in the poem, there are many things where AI (however we choose to interact with it) can't replace our real lived experiences. It feels like there's a lot of nervousness, confusion and sometimes outright hostility towards this technology right now – a lot of it justified, and I think one response is for us to really understand what small things are actually important and why.”
Each of the winners agrees that the competition has helped to validate them as writers and has encouraged them to keep putting words together.
As Annie says:
“Winning feels like a stepping stone towards finding the confidence to share more of my writing with others.”
A sentiment shared by Sarah:
“I feel touched and very grateful; it’s a real honour and very validating.”
Tino agrees. He says the Writer competition offers a platform for people to share their stories and passion for writing.
“Platforms for staff writing are rarer than they should be. Please keep this one.”
The competition was established in 2019 as part of the University’s 150th celebrations and is now in its seventh year. It is organised by University Publications Editor Lisa Dick and English and Linguistics Programme Senior Teaching Fellow Nicola Cummins and supported by the University Book Shop, Otago University Press, Dunedin City of Literature, Otago Access Radio, the Dunedin Athenaeum and the Otago Daily Times.
And – it isn’t planning on going anywhere.
English and Linguistics
Studying English helps you read more deeply, in fiction, poetry and critical prose, and take in the sounds and signs of language in the world around you.
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