They're a Happy Lot

New Zealanders are indeed a happy lot…they are as friendly and pleasant a people as any to be found on this earth. They remind me of the old song by Mother Maybelle Carter, the matriarch of the Carter Family Singers in the early to mid 20th century American folk traditions..my favorite of their songs seems to apply perfectly to New Zealanders: “Well there's a dark and a troubled side of life. There's a bright and a sunny side too. But if you meet with the darkness and strife, The sunny side we also may view. Keep on the sunny side, always on the sunny side, Keep on the sunny side of life. It will help us every day, it will brighten all the way, If we keep on the sunny side of life.” If you want to listen to her singing with her daughters, one of whom married Johnnie Cash, you can see/hear it at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3qEhj-rQSAU Another melodic sound to New Zealander is: Ca-ching, ca-ching ca-ching. That’s the sound of the cash registers here as I find things more expensive than anticipated. The $75 p/p price of Hobbiton was typical of things to come. You’ll need $11 for your pita sandwich and you can wash it down with your small coke at $4 and a packaged ice cream bar for dessert will be another $4. Dinner will set you back $30+ per person and gasoline/petrol is $7 per gallon or $2,20 per liter. Want a beer? That’s $7, please and thank you. When I moaned “politely” about the high prices, New Zealanders give me a quizzical look and just say: “You reckon?” These prices are offset for locals by the bustling economy where the minimum wage is about $15 per hour. There seems to be a lot of disposable income here and people don’t seem to be hunkering down and letting prices prevent them from enjoying the good life that NZ offers. Speaking of money….it’s not paper, it’s plastic….literally. Apparently it is harder to counterfeit. Bills of $5, 10, 20, 50, and 100 are all different colors and slightly different sizes…each has a clear window in the plastic through which you can see. They did away with pennies and nickels, so the coins are 10, 20, 50 cents and $1 and $2 dollars. The plastic has a definitely different feel to it, and doesn’t wrinkle, so all the bills look new. There has been a lot of land speculation in the cities, particularly Auckland, where fat cat Chinese have entered the real estate markets and driven up the prices of houses in desirable areas. Schools are strictly regulated by districts and so the noveau riche Chinese are not hesitant to pay any price to get their children into the best schools, squeezing out locals. One school in particular, Auckland Boys School, I understand, is considered the best in NZ and is now heavily populated by the Chinese boys whose parents pay the freight. We encountered similar situations when we moved to Washington when the fat cat Californians moved from the high real estate market to the low market, and to be honest, we benefited greatly from this very situation. I’ve been very surprised at the size, breadth, and scope of the forestry industry here. NZ is heavily forested and tree farms abound. Old growth forests are dwindling and the mess that is left by the clear cutting rivals that of the early 20th century in the American great forests…the land is stripped and the trash is left to decompose in the newly barren areas…This may be good in the long run, but it creates an incredibly ugly visual effect. The lumber trucks rumble up and down the highways transporting the trees to ports where enormous stacks of cut trees are continuously loaded onto ships to be sent to Asian ports, particularly Japan. It just seems incongruous in a land where conservation is of prime importance..it seems that the land has been ravaged and left behind. We worked our way to the bottom of the North Island to Wellington, the capital of the country, but certainly not the largest city…sort of like California’s Sacramento/Los Angeles. It seemed rather a stuffy place at first, but the boppy young lady with magenta hair and tattoo leading who knows where from under her overly short skirt told us that this was the “dull” part of town…all business and government types…she told us to walk the waterfront and head for Cuba Street which was a very counter culture sort of place where dreadlocks and tattoos were the prominent displays…it’s a pedestrian thoroughfare, sans cars, and was a lot of fun to sit and people watch… still lots of friendly smiles and happy faces all along the inaptly named street in terms of the personal freedom on display.

Along the waterfront, They’ve done a lovely job of incorporating the history of Wellington with upbeat coffee houses and street artists of all genre to liven up the route. Placards abound showing the history of the Wellington port…733 Polish children brought at the height of the armed resistance in the Warsaw ghetto to a safe haven in NZ….a ship that sank with all hands lost just outside the harbor….a plaque from the US Marines thanking the people of NZ for their hospitality during their training in Wellington….to Paddy the Wanderer, a dog who took to the waterfront after his owner died in 1928. He became a fixture of Wellington, took trips to Australia, and when he died, the fleet of Wellington taxis led the funeral cortege and his death was a front page story in the Wellington Newspaper. The three-hour ferry crossing put Carol, Stan and me on the South Island where everybody says the real New Zealand adventures begin. We’re about to find out. Sign of the day: Horse Poo….