Back to New Zealand Nature..

(not really indispensible in the wild, but funny nonetheless..found in K-Mart in Palmerston North, New Zealand. Can you think of a better way to be prepared for Mother Nature?)

SINGAPORE VS. NEW ZEALAND - PART 2

Not really part two, but a continuation. I have been to beautiful Wellington for a couple of days in the meantime and just got back to Palmerston North, to continue my stay with Amelie and Sascha for one last day before I take the overlander train back to Auckland tomorrow. Thanks a lot for all the hospitality, also to you Matt and your flatmates! I will try to make this visit to New Zealand a regular thing. Asia is not too far away, and that is where I am currently drawn to..

5) Supermarket: Surprisingly, New Zealand is more digitised here than Singapore. Price tags in many supermarkets are LEDs and customers can use a self-checkout by scanning the products in the trolley with a small battery-powered reader. How convenient for the store to outsource all the more parts of this value adding chain to the customers. Not suprisingly, New Zealand and Singapore seem to compete in the insanity of using as many plastic bags as possible to pack up the goods. At least in both countries the people have not forgotten how to be served, so there are always people who pack your purchase into dozens and dozens of bags. By the way, wine is a LOT cheaper here..

(New Zealand countryside; have a closer look at the picture...what can be perceived as little, bright maggots are acutally grazing, strolling sheep...this kind of mammal is one of its most important commodities)

6) Money: In the last couple of years, New Zealand seems to have turned into a cashless society. Fascinating. Everything, from the smallest breakfast roll is being paid via EFTPOS (like EC/Maestro). People with big piles of 'real' money are therefore sure to be mostly tourists. I also heard that the 5 Cent coin is supposed to be abolished soon, mainly to make payment even easier. Singapore is not chashless yet, but since the difference between rich and poor in Singapore is way more distinct, many people do not even have a bank account. Cash is more important here and a visible sign of wealth.

(The last weekend, Matt, Rob and me continued tradition by going for an overnight tramping trip in the Ruahines..a mountain range close to Palmerston North. Finally there was a reason to drag around my MUAC [Massey University Alpine Club] polypro-shirt in Singapore during the last 8 months. The rather short trip lead us along the riverbed of a small river, which we had to cross every couple of meters. It was fun and in the end not too cold to walk in completely soaked and dripping hiking boots. The best moment is the one when you have to get in your still wet boots the next freezing morning with hardly dried socks..yummy)

7) Sports: New Zealand is the only country I know where Skateboarding is still widely accepted as being a cool thing. The capital Wellington for example has many young teens and twens who use them as a means of transportation or simply to show off. This feels like a jump into the early 90s in Europe. Besides, Kiwis are naturally crazy for Rugby. No new information here. The belief in the performance of the allmighty ALL-BLACKS (the national team) has more or less a religious character. Singapore? When I think back now..I cannot really remember ANY specific sport that was present in the public and had wide support. I have to check on that again..there must be something..

(a real Kiwi meal: A Burger with Salami, Cheese and Potato Chips [makes it more crunchy]. This tasty appetiser was followed by genuine New Zealand sausages [no comment here...I have to say that these really belong to another world, in a negative sense] and Spaghetti Carbonara. All this with lots of chocolate and a crackling fire in the background turned it into a quiet cosy evening)

8) FOOD: Singapore has all sorts of funny dried fish (sweeted and salted), as well as dried seaweed that can be eaten like potato chips while watching a movie. Disgusting. Sorry. But true. Anyway, I think I do not need to mention that food is one of the many aces Singapore can draw. Its street hawkers alone provide a fantastic blend of Chinese, Malay, Indian and Western food. New Zealand on the other hand can score with fantastic dishes like Mince Pies (not Mint Pies..I had that mixed up in the beginning and therefore got something I did not quite expect) and Marmite (a yeast extract that they put on bread like Nutella...disgusting. Sorry. But true. Zero tolerance here from my side. You have to grow up with this to like it.)

(well..I'm not the big beer drinker. But, 'In Rome do like the Romans do', so there was no way of getting around the Kiwi's irrevocable duty of carrying beer and wine up to the hut and playing cards)

9) Clothing: What do they have in common? Singaporeans and Kiwis love to run around with shorts, flipflops and t-shirts. And, they both don't care about the weather. The difference? Singaporeans do not have to care about the weather, since it's always the same at this location only a few inches away from the equator. New Zealanders do have to face seasons, but they kindly ignore that fact. It is a quite common picture on the street to see a stocky Kiwi with only shorts and t-shirt, walking barefoot on his way to do some groceries, while the woman next to him looks like she's on to a trip to an Antartic glacier.

(Picture of me getting some new wood. It was indeed quite freezing outside..winter is looming around this time of the year. By the way, we were the only ones on the hut that night, but we had to share it with some mice...according to the familiar sound :-))

This was only a very short exploration of Kiwi lifestyle...a glimpse...the tip of the iceberg...an appetizer to make anyone hungry for both places. Get your bite!

Time for bed now...the next post will probably reach you from Germany then...

Good night!

Maik

Kiwis Everywhere

(this sounds like a good business plan. Anyway, according to what I heard, one of their drivers was caught completely drunk while driving. Risk of losing the license is therefore shifted, but not risk of losing a healthy bone structure…)

SINGAPORE VS. NEW ZEALAND

Hello everyone!

Unbelievable, but I am back in Middle Earth after almost 2.5 years…I was quite shaky when I set my foot back on New Zealand soil after such a long time again..
You want to know about the differences between Singapore and New Zealand? Ok, besides the fact that one basically enters another world in cultural and meteorological terms this is like comparing apples and oranges. Well, here are the most important points from my point of view ;-)

1) Starbucks Coffee sizes: Surprisingly, one has to order a ‘Venti’ not a ‘Grande’ to get the biggest size. Extremely disturbing.

(little Bach-concert in Verandahs-Backpackers in Auckland)

2) People: As soon as I left the shuttle bus in Auckland central (the biggest NZ city with about 1.2 million inhabitants in this 4 million people country), I felt that two essential things were different. First, the presence of people. I found myself looking over my shoulder several times when I stood virtually alone on pedestrian traffic lights. There’s hardly anyone here! I had to ask a waitress in a local (almost empty) bar, to realise that this is indeed normal on a late Monday afternoon in the cbd! No EXTREME QUEUING (THE National Sport in Singapore) anymore. Going from an overcrowded Asian city like Singapore to New Zealand therefore means to go from one extreme to another. In addition, I always expected to look in Asian faces. Being suddenly among mainly Caucasian and Maori and accepting to belong to the racial majority again took a few hours.

(I took the overlander on Tuesday from Auckland down to Palmerston North...including nice scenic views on the way. This pic is taken on a stop..)

3) Temperature: First time in 8 months (leaving aside the trip to Mt. Kinabalu) that there was constant need for long sleeve. AND, the unpleasant feeling of cold feet found its way back into my shoes. Great. I had only one cardigan with me, not even a pullover. No wonder that I felt like catching a cold for the whole first week here. The most positive thing though: Absolutely no need to sweat! T-Shirts can be worn for more than 1 day (Incredible! Absolutely revolutionises my washing rhythm!) and condensation now happens on the inside of building and car windows, not on the outside!

(One thing I do not understand: It is standard in New Zealand to have separated taps for hot and cold water, so it is virtually impossible to wash your hands with warm water..you either freeze or scald your hands. I must be too narrow-minded from my European point of view to understand this. Help?)

4) Asking for Chili Sauce in Burger King only returns a questioning look. Also, although there supposedly is Asian food available, this is more or less westernized like in Europe. Kiwis are best on their own food, like mince pies (yummy!)

More in the next post...

One last thing to clarify:

If you ask: ‘Wow…New Zealand, are there really many Kiwis there?’, you can answer self-confidently: ‘Heaps n heaps, there’re virtually EVERYWHERE!’ and go away. It’s one slight 'mistake' I made in my time here then and applies especially to Germans from my point of view. In our language ‘Kiwi’ mainly refers to the fruit, here in NZ it is a bit different:

- Kiwi fruit: the fruit of an East Asian climbing plant, with a thin hairy skin, green flesh, and black seeds.
- Kiwi bird: a flightless tailless New Zealand bird with hair-like feathers and a long downcurved bill.
- Kiwi: informal: a New Zealander (male / female)

You will definitely get a very questioning look when you ask a local how much a Kiwi is ..:-)

More later,

Maikinnz

(picture taken on the overlander train to Palmerston North)