Final thoughts on New Zealand

Spending two months of your life in a foreign country leaves you with some strong opinions of the land you visited, both positive and negative.  Before I go any further, let me say that New Zealand is a wonderful place.  The people are the heart of this wonderfulness, always accommodating and friendly on whichever island we were on.  With that said, I feel it necessary to mention some of the shortcomings.

It didn't take long for Anne and I to discover Watties, the huge food manufacturer that is found in every supermarket.  Watties is synonymous with the American food giant, Purina or Alpo.   Nothing is more god awful than the products that Watties  produces and nothing will make you feel more ill.  I wish them catastrophic business failure and hope their employees never make it back to the food manufacturing industry.  Another shortcoming is their lunch meat.  I've never seen a thicker cut of processed, congealed crap than I saw at the New Zealand supermarkets.  If only they made pieces of bread to accommodate the football-sized pieces of animal remains.  This leads me to my third food complaint.  There is no Miracle Whip. I'm not sure how a modern civilization does not end up in total anarchy without the tasty zing of Miracle Whip.  My final food complaint lies with the fast food industry and their rationing of Ketchup.  They hand it out as if it was a precious metal. 

Now to the positive.  I've never seen such profound fauna of all variations living in harmony.  Deciduous trees, multiple types of coniferous trees,  palm trees and every type of fern imaginable are found in New Zealand.  I'm not sure how everything stays green as it always rains and there is never any sunshine.  I'm pretty sure that photosynthesis incorporates sunshine of which New Zealand is clearly lacking.  Along the rolling green hills you will find 40 million sheep, and I believe we saw every one of them.  All to often, Goldie would honk her horn and send them scampering to the hills.  She was given the name "Wooly Bully" for this reason.  If there are 40 million sheep, there must have been 80 million speed bumps, of which we hit every one.

As I commented on an earlier article, there are multiple forms of birds that we have never seen before as we entered the Southern Hemisphere.  Our favorite, the Pukeko, is a pheasant-sized bird that is nearly all royal blue, has a red beak, and has white fluffy feathers on its butt.  Chasing this bird was a real treat as it would run away, versus fly away, and stick its white tail feathers in the air and run like it were a large ostrich.

To conclude, there was some food that I did like.  Toffee Pop cookies were a real bargain at 2 dollars a package.  We also enjoyed Mrs Higgins Chocolate Chew cookies, not similarly bargained at 1.30/cookie.  The cheese is profoundly better than American brands, and will surly be missed.  Here's Anne's take on our two month stint.

Ditto on everything Brian said.  NZ is a fantastic country, despite all the bitching I did about the cold and nearly constant rain.  HOWEVER, I have one major complaint.  There is no Mexican food in NZ.  I think in the 2 months we were there, we saw 2 Mexican restaurants.  We ate at one of those 2, and the next day I was quite sick.  Right about now I would kill for Taco Bell.  I finally asked a NZ resident what the deal was and after much thought she said "Mexican food?  That was a fad in the 80's".  WHAT?  A fad in the 80's?  Are you kidding me?  Legwarmers and Smurfs were a fad in the 80's.  Mexican food is my life!

Another strange thing about NZ is that when you check into a hotel, they always give you a carton of milk.  It's the strangest thing - must be for all the tea they drink.  I can only imagine that when NZ residents vacation in the US, they look desperately all over their hotel room for a carton on milk  which is nowhere to be found.

One last thought I'll leave you with is how seasons are flip-flopped here.  A few weeks ago we went in a large store (a Target/Shopko/Kmart sort of place) and noticed that they were getting ready for both Christmas and summer at the same time!  Imagine Target with all the holiday stuff next to a department filled with patio furniture, BBQ grills, and gardening tools.  Then across the aisle you'll find shorts, tank tops and jandals.  It's weird.

Anne PS - I'd like to thank everyone who's been reading the website.  I hope you have been enjoying it.