Congratulations to Rio on a spectacular and colourful opening ceremony for Olympics 2016.

The parade of contestants entering the stadium was equally colourful until the New Zealand team came into view. Happy faces but dressed in black from head to toe with the only thing absent being the coffin.

Is it any wonder that Kiwis suffer from what is known as the ‘black dog' form of depression when our clothing shops appear to only stock black or dark grey clothes , and even our houses which used to have red , green or orange roofs are now dark grey with even darker grey roofs.

Let's keep our black jerseys and singlets for the sports fields and use some of our sea, sky and pohutukawa flower colours for a ceremonial uniform.

Henry Ford must have had some Kiwi blood in him when he said: 'You can have any colour you like so long as it's black''.

G Sproull, Matua.