It’s about time I wrote about how we’re getting on, finding our feet on the other side of the world.
It has, generally, been great – fairly easy to ‘fit in’, with Rach’s large extended family making sure there’s always something happening (good or bad). And being so close to beaches, on both the wild Tasman side and the much gentler Hauraki Gulf side has, over the summer, been absolutely great. It’s not been difficult to fit a trip to the beach into Leo’s daily routine, not difficult at all. He’s grown up a lot since we arrived, and Rach seems more relaxed here, despite being heavily pregnant and having to wrangle a toddler.
There have been moments of uncertainty – reticence at a softball clubhouse bar on my first night playing for a new team, with different rules, unfamiliar money in my hand looking to buy an unfamiliar bottle of beer, surrounded by unfamiliar faces; and at work, memorably on my second day, walking into a howling wet November wind on an exposed walk to a draughty bus station, watching the newly-applied $10 creases in my suit trousers drain away.
There have been moments of satisfaction – the virtual lack of queues, and the bright-eyed efficiency; the generally quiet roads, meaning driving around town is not something to dread; the allocation of a midwife to Rach for her whole pregnancy - someone who deals with the hospitals for her, and arranges stuff for her, and checks up on her, and remembers her first name.
And there have been lots of mundane moments: living out of bags for 2 months and then unpacking our cargo as it arrived just before Christmas, to discover a fair amount of mould and mildew in clothes, bedding, toys, shoes and baby stuff which were obviously slightly damp when packed; working longer hours than I did in London; learning lots of new terminology for familiar things and working to a slightly different keyboard layout; commuting on the bus, walking up and down and to and fro round Auckland’s many hills; buying a car and starting to learn to drive; looking for a place to live; and, overwhelmingly, walking to the beat of Leo’s daily routine.
In truth, I’ve waited for the fact that ‘I’ve emigrated’ to hit me, but in reality it doesn’t fell all that odd. It feels good to be here.
In the first four (and a bit) months, here are ten things I’ve noticed about New Zealand and its people:
1. There’s no one here. The beaches are beautiful and almost empty. Heaven. It’s bigger than the UK with less people than Scotland. So, whilst this means it feels, economically, a bit vulnerable, it means you can work in the Big Smoke yet be at the beach within 15 minutes. And the beach you end up at will be gorgeous and sandy and peaceful and virtually free of people. The lack of crowds was particularly apparent on Election Night. In the UK the polls are open for about fourteen hours and there have been scuffles outside as people have been locked out whilst queuing. And the votes take ages to count. Here, people loaf out to vote on a Saturday morning and it’s all over by early evening. ‘Your vote can make a difference´ – particularly when you could fit the rest of the voters in your constituency into a small shed.
2. It’s a bit parochial. The news outlets hardly bother with world events – they’re the equivalent of the local news in the UK, and more than that, the local news from Nowhere. Right now, Syria is a bloody catastrophe, Iran is champing at the nuclear bit, and Greece is in meltdown. But because these stories don’t have a Kiwi character: a protagonist, a location, or a philosophy, they’re virtually ignored. The same came be said of the multiple/identical TV channels. Despite being a well-travelled and educated nation, the media is extremely narrow minded.
3. People are nice here. They say thank you to the driver when they get off the bus. Almost without exception. I do it myself now. The other day a bus driver saw me walking in the rain, stopped by the side of the road and gave me a free ride to the bus station, where I caught another bus to work. There are no stab shields protecting the drivers, either. There’s a connection. This extends to all parts of life; I play softball with a guy who works in a bank who knows a mortgage guy who knows a builder who knows someone in the council etc. etc. Connections are important and there is little of the same anonymity you experience in London.
4. The houses can be a bit rubbish. A lot of houses are built of wood, like big sheds. The place was thickly forested when it was first settled by Europeans, and timber continued to be used in construction for decades after it started becoming scarce. As a result New Zealand has an unfortunate problem with respiratory disorders caused by cold, damp houses that are hard to heat. We’re trying to buy brick.
5. Maori can be difficult to pronounce. When I got here I knew where the cities were (all five of them) but was clueless when it came to the positioning and, worse, pronunciation of suburbs and districts. I’ve got better but my fluency with Maori hasn’t improved. Each time I say ‘Aotearoa’ it sounds quite different, and probably offensive. I try and learn a bit more each morning by listening to Nicola Wright read the news on NZ National (like Radio 4), she has the most amazing voice. Maori has that same tendency as German, to tack words together to form a new and much longer one. I had a guy tell me on the phone that I should ‘aww, just flick it to Ngapotiki Street, Paraparaumu.’ Uh?
6. People are proud to be New Zealanders. Being a Kiwi is important. Pride takes many forms – in the All Blacks, in the Oscar winners, in the writers, in the beauty. It also sometimes has the faint whiff of protectionism (which is probably a noble thing, but unusual for someone from a country that largely gave up owning its own industries in the Eighties). Companies are extremely proud to say they’re Kiwi owned and operated; many companies use ‘Kiwi’ or ‘NZ’ in their names or corporate identities.
7. They don’t do chilli. Spicy does not mean spicy here. Spicy means ‘having flavour’. I reckon Hell Pizza have carved out a niche for themselves not only on their devilish branding, which is fantastic (especially in a country where Jesus Heals Cancer), but also because their chill sauce is genuinely hot. The chilliheads flock to it and take their butter-chicken-loving mates along for the ride.
8. You can get used to almost anything. I work 40 hours a week, not by any means a lot I realise, but 5 hours more than I did in the UK, and I get a short half-hour lunch break each day. At first I thought this was the worst thing in the world. Now it just feels normal. And it’s completely accepted that, to make things happen, sometimes you have to work out of hours and on weekends. We had a Westpac rep come round the day after Boxing Day to discuss mortgages. This, at the time when most of the country is sitting on the beach. We’ve had estate agents call us in the early morning and late at night. My charity has a volunteer Board who have to finish paid work before they can get together, so meetings often go on past 9pm. (That’s another thing about NZ – they don’t seem to ever, ever use the 24-hour clock.)
9. The weather is worth talking about. This weekend we’re about to experience a ‘weather bomb’. Suck on that! A gale-force wind gets classed as ‘fresh’ or ‘brisk’. Being understated is another classic Kiwi characteristic.
10. And is it like living in the Eighties? A little bit. Shoulder pads and mullets can be seen. New dads don’t get much time off work (in fact nor do mums). People drive to the local beach for their summer holiday, just like we used to drive down to Bexhill or Eastbourne or Hastings for our week away when I was little. Flags are flown proudly. Jif has not yet turned into Cif. Where sold, ready meals inhabit just a tiny little corner of the supermarket. People don’t recycle all that much. You get a paper ticket on the bus. There’s not much choice in the shops. Casual racism is tolerated just that little bit more than it would be in the UK. Whole streets remain closed on Sundays. There is a strong temperance movement. People still go to church. And the conservative party are in charge.
