What on earth would drive these people to look elsewhere for happiness? Was it the same thing that made early American settlers heave heavy pianos into Conestoga wagons and set off for the Wild West? Didn’t America have everything they needed…and more?  Weren’t there more opportunities in America…the chance to get more cars, more houses, more furniture, more televisions, more shoes and more psychiatric help for their dogs…and yes, even more money? Wasn’t that enough? After all, who could want anything more than was available at the local Wal-Mart?

Sound familiar? I have to believe it happens hundreds or maybe thousands of times a day. I’ve had very close friends tell me that it’s happened to them! I know it sounds fantastic, but daydreaming at work seems to be a very popular past time for more than a few people. I’m told it’s mostly about things like a shiny new car or getting all of the tax deductions possible this year or if dog psychiatrists actually make very good money…things like that.

So what does that have to do with moving to New Zealand? Hold on, I’m getting there.

The next thing I did in my daytrip, and I’m told the wisest, was to ask my wife what she thought I should write about. “What about what it’s like during a typical day here? I think people have a hard time imagining what it must be like to live someplace very far away", she told me. Sandy is a very wise person and now you have some idea of why I married her!

I gave both ideas some thought and decided that since my wife is usually right, I could kill two birds by writing a bit about what happens during a “normal” day here in Godzone (God’s Own), Aotearoa or Land of the Long White Cloud as the native Maori call it…New Zealand to the rest of us…and make my wife happy. And we all know that when momma’s happy, we’re ALL happy!

So if you’re sitting at work thinking about what it might be like to live on the other side of the planet, you’ll have an idea of what to expect…at least from our narrow prospective as Americans in a foreign land anyway. And somewhere along the way you may get an picture of why we are here.

Our weekday mornings start off like that of many people, but it’s a different experience for us because we used to live in the desert of the South Western U.S. Now we live along the eastern coast of the North Island of New Zealand. Sometimes we wake up early enough to see the sun rise over the bay. Often it can be very spectacular and worth the initial yawn or two. The light not only dances off of the azure water, but highlights the clouds passing by with shimmering gold and bright yellow. The only competition for these Kodak Moments is the New Zealand Sunsets over the Kai Mai Mountains on the other side of our house.

After staring at the sun a little too long we get up, get dressed and, like many Americans, head out on our long commute…down our hallway to our respective offices. They used to be bedrooms but are now filled with all kinds of office stuff and electrical things with extension cords running every which way. Mine still has a bed but it’s disassembled and leaning on a wall waiting for our next overseas guests to visit at which time I’ll put it back together and take my office/laptop out to the dinning room table. Our two cats (who also immigrated to New Zealand with us) greet us by jumping up on our desks, rubbing up against our faces and walking across our computer keyboards, making up their own words and taking a few half-hearted swipes at the cursor as it jumps across the screen. They switch places and do it all over again just to remind us who actually owns the house.

After answering a few e-mails and making some semblance of appearing to actually work we both take a break and go downstairs to walk and sometimes jog down the hill to the ocean’s edge, admire the view, think about how blessed we are and then drag ourselves back up to the house again. On the way we’ll encounter all sorts of wildlife, mostly the kind with wings. 

There’s a large covey of quail that regularly prowls the neighbourhood. Their calls are distinct through the still of the early morning air. There are also some larger, chicken-like creatures called Pukekos (pronounced poo-kek-oh). They screech more than sing. They are slightly smaller than a normal chicken and we’re told only slightly smarter as evidenced by frequent road-kill scenes. They can fly, but it doesn’t appear that they like to.  Local joke; why did the Pukeko cross the road? He didn’t. Kiwi humour, har. Some of the locals call them “swamp hens” as that’s where they can often be found. To support their weight in the wetlands God was thoughtful enough to give them enormous feet. When we see them walking around in our back yard we always laugh at how much “understanding” they have…their extended limbs look as if they were stolen from Big Bird. We have a feijoa tree (pronounced f?-jó-ah) tree in our back yard. We’d never heard of feijoa’s until we’d moved here. The tree has delightful blooms and in the autumn produces a wonderful fruit. It’s something like a cross between a small peach and a pear, looking a bit like a tomato inside, but tasting more like a very juicy pear/mango/orange sort of thing. They come in all sizes. Most would fit in the palm of your hand, but we’ve had some that were the size of navel oranges which our friends think is quite extraordinary. We like them so much that Sandy’s even learned to “put them up” as preserves, a first in this land of many firsts for us. When our tree is heavy with fruit (called feijoas coincidently), the “pooks” have a field day pecking at the ripe morsels that have fallen onto the lawn.  Because we enjoy this new-found delicacy too, we try to gather them up each day, but they beat us to it now and then. 

Other birds keep us company on our walks here like one of our favourites, the native Tui with its unique pan flute like call along with a few thrush, lots of yellow finches and the delightful fantails. Fantails love to swoop and fly about, sometimes swooping right between your legs as they chase down tiny bugs which are stirred up when jogging through the grass.

Now and then we see a small hedge hog crossing the road…cute and kind of lumbering along, oblivious to us as we pass. Granny from the Beverly Hillbillies would have loved it here because there are also lots and lots of possum. The poor little creatures are despised here due to their over populations and are regularly rounded up and made into pelts. Outside of a type of native bat there were no mammals here once upon a time. Everything has been introduced by humans…mostly European explorers. And the possum population has apparently gotten completely out of hand. The local hardware stores and garden shops all sell possum traps. It’s ironic that they are a protected species neighbouring Australia.

Down by the sea there are plenty more feathered friends and fowl including Canadian geese, ducks, heron, and often other migrating birds of one type or another. And as if you need to be reminded, all you have to do is wash your car to know that seagulls abound. There are literally hundreds of other species here too. A black bird family took up residence in one of our camellia trees last spring, even allowing us close enough to snap a few pictures of the babies when they were just a few days old. They now feast on the worms that inhabit Sandy’s garden.  New Zealand is a bird watcher’s paradise. You can hear a recording of the Tui as well as a number of other native New Zealand birds at this website:

• http://www.accommodationinnewzealand.co.nz/soundbytes/birds.htm

Once we’ve stretched our legs we’ll each have a shower which we’ve come to really enjoy here. I say that not because we we’re shower-challenged in the U.S., but because we don’t have one of those “water saving” showerheads that you have to dance under to get damp. Ours is a full-blown fire hose of a shower! With a respectable amount of rain here, water is generally not in short supply. Our house doesn’t even have a water meter. We pay a flat fee with our “rates” every six months so we can shower to our heart’s content. Most towns do have metered water now, but again, the cost is minimal. 

After a quick breakfast it’s time for the mail to arrive. We know it’s coming when we hear the high-pitched whirring sound of the tiny motor on the scooter that our lady mail carrier rides. Daily mail delivery (except Sundays) is handled by government employees affectionately known as “Posties”. (Kiwis love to add “ies” to the end of words.) 

Our old neighbourhood had one of those “communal” mail box clusters at the end of the block. It was a big ugly grey thing with a couple of dozen little anonymous locked doors. We rarely saw the mailman or woman, not sure which. Individual mailboxes are still the norm here. Some may be clustered at the end of a road in rural areas, but most are perched on a post, often surrounded by a bed of colourful flowers, at the end of driveways. Our mailbox is the typical, U.S. regulation white metal style with the little red flag and such…no flowers. (We have plenty of those in the garden for my wife to deal with!) But there are no governmental regulations as far as what style mailbox you have to have in New Zealand. So mailboxes here can be very creative. Some resemble charming bird houses; others look like something straight out of Hobbiton with the requisite moss covering. Still others are built of some space-age plastic design that resembles the futuristic house they sit in front of.  And shocking as it may sound, without all of that government regulation…the mail is still delivered and no one gets hurt! And for the most part, if you mail something on a Tuesday, it will arrive at its destination on Wednesday…anywhere in the entire country!
 

Most Posties ride cute little scooters or red bicycles. Like most Kiwis they are very friendly types willing to stop for a moment and find out how your day is going. If you put a little sign on your mailbox that says something like “No Junk Mail”, they’ll pretty much obey your wishes too. I saw one mailbox with a sign that said “No Junk Mail” and under it the owner had written “Except Mitre 10” - the local version of Home Depot. They must have a very understanding Postie. But that’s really what it’s like here. People tend to go out of their way to make other people happy. We like looking at all of the junk mail. It gives us a good feel for the place plus when we moved here, we actually needed a lot of what they were advertising. 

If you’re expecting a parcel that’s too large for the Postie to carry on his or her two-wheel vehicle, Courier Post will deliver it to your door in a bright red van. Usually if you get the package to them by 11:00 A.M., they’ll have it at its destination by that afternoon. Cost? I can send a decent-sized package from our home to Hamilton which is about an hour-and-a-half away, for less than NZ$4.00. There are other private delivery services but no FedEx or UPS trucks can be found. All of their packages are handled by Courier Express who also have red vans but with yellow lettering.

We’re amazed at how our mail finds us sometimes. Of course our U.S. mail was forwarded for a while and it always caught up with us. We’ve moved once since coming to New Zealand and everything was forwarded without a hitch. But most surprising of all is that we often see hand-written envelopes (usually with no return address) in our box. No bar codes or high-tech machines could have dealt with them. They had to be hand-sorted, and again, they arrived the day after they were sent! Our experience is that it takes about five to seven days for a normal letter get to us from U.S. It costs NZ$2.00 to mail a letter to the States. If we send or receive a package New Zealand Customs get involved, but the delay is usually only a day or so.

So overall, we’re very pleased with delivery service here in New Zealand. I know it’s a small thing, but it’s something that happens everyday (except Sunday!) and based on what we’ve seen, it works pretty darn well…particularly for a government agency.

After sorting through the odd bill and flyer, we go back to work and like everyone look forward to…lunch! We often have lunch on our deck. The view of the ocean is dazzling even after almost a year of looking at it. We could have never have afforded such a vista back in the U.S. so we try to relish it as often as possible. While dinning we can watch all sorts of plant, animal and insect life thriving right under our noses…literally sometimes.  Depending on the time of year the air can be filled with butterflies flitting about the flowers often in competition with the bees, both regular and of the bumble variety. There are no “killer bees” here so we don’t mind them and they don’t seem to pay too much attention to us. 

When I’m not watching the ocean I can admire Sandy’s garden. Gardens are very, very important here in New Zealand. Likely a carry-over from the English that settled here a while back, Kiwis take their gardening seriously.  And when I say garden, I mean anything and everything that grows, edible or not. Mostly they tend to cultivate beautiful flowers, shrubs and trees. The people that built our house did a great job of planting some incredible flowers and other vegetation. We thought it looked nice when we first thought about buying it, but never realized how much work we (mostly my lovely wife) were in for. (I mow the lawn, she handles the hard parts.) We have something blooming almost year-round. Everything grows and grows fast here. It’s a full time job just keeping up with everything. 

We once had a beautiful bush growing in the front yard. It had very bright yellow flowers and seemed very healthy. Sandy kept it clipped and attractive along with the rest of her dahlias, roses, cineraria, fuchsia, hibiscus, carnations and more. People would often drive by, slow and point at her (and God’s) wonderful work. One day one of our neighbours was visiting and asked us if we knew what that particular bush was called. No, no we didn’t…what was it called…we think it’s pretty. In a calm voice he told us that it was a “ragwort”, a common weed found in paddocks throughout the country…pretty much a bane to gardens everywhere. After our initial embarrassment Sandy went to work and had it out in no time. People don’t slow and point as much anymore.

Besides gardening we’ve learned a number of new-to-us things here. If you’re a country type, you’ll probably laugh, but for us semi-city folk, we weren’t really prepared for some of the things we’ve come to embrace. For instance, when we first moved here we live in a rented “holiday home” in Rotorua for about three months.(See some of my early stories below.) It was a wonderful home, almost new and we felt very fortunate to have found it. It had all of the modern conveniences we were used to save one; a clothes dryer. 

Clothes dryers are still not very big in New Zealand…and I mean that in two ways. They are not terribly popular and the ones that are for sale are not very large. We had a behemoth washer and dryer set in the U.S. You know the kind that could be mistaken for a commercial laundry if you had several? Over here many things are much smaller in scale and that goes for appliances. That’s probably because houses are generally smaller so space is at a bit of a premium. So the house we were living in had a washing machine, but no dryer. Like a majority of New Zealand houses, there was a clothes line outside. Imagine! 

Growing up I vaguely remember my mother doing the laundry and hanging it out to dry so I was familiar with the concept, but our family acquired a dryer early on so the clothes line eventually disappeared. (Soon after some friends and I used it to pretend we were crossing a deep gorge, hand-over-hand…until Jeff fell to his death…or actually sprained his ankle as I recall.) In any case, we had never had the “opportunity” to hang out wet clothing. Our hosts were watching me struggle while helping with a load of laundry one day. I tried to appear to act like I knew what I was doing but things weren’t going well. After the laughter died down Adele came over to show me how to properly shake, smooth out and clip my shirts to the line so they didn’t end up looking like I’d slept in them. 

We have a clothes dryer now, the biggest one we could find…about half the size of our old one, but it works fine. However I still like to hang things out now and then. I feel like I’m contributing to the conservation of resources and such. Plus we get that “spring fresh” smell! The only downside is that we have seagulls flying overhead now and then…if you get my drift.

After lunch we settle back into our routine, which is hardly a routine at all as one day can differ from the other a great deal. Sometimes, many times, we’re stuck in front of our computers, hard at work. But we’re both able to look up and gaze out at the bay, the islands and graceful sail boats as they drift by. It’s hard to get our work done some days. 

Other days we head into town, about a 15 minute drive through picturesque countryside, to meet with clients or do some shopping. We’ve even been known to play hooky now and then and catch a new movie. Tauranga reminds me a lot of San Diego where I used to live, but much less crowded and where it’s much easier to find a parking space. There are plenty of quaint and cool seaside cafes with great food and service. Oh, did I mention it’s very rare to hear “cars that go boom” drive by as your enjoying lunch? Woo hoo! Now don’t get me wrong…I grew up on music that goes “boom”, “bang” (as in “head-bang”) and the like…I was a musician myself for a while. But I really don’t miss having to hear what someone thinks is a great song…six blocks away! 

When dinnertime rolls around we generally enjoy some New Zealand beef, pork or lamb along with fresh, organically grown vegetables and a glass of Kiwi wine when we’re in the mood. They don’t sell bologna here, but other than that, you can pretty much find any American food to your liking in New Zealand, plus some tasty international fare.

So our days here are not that different from what we experienced “back home”. It’s just that our lifestyle is much more to our liking; laid back and comfortable. Kiwis don’t generally work under the pressure cooker atmosphere that most Americans have gotten used to. They get their work done and they do it well. The economy is about the best it’s ever been for that matter. But they seem to do what needs to be done in a sane timeframe.

We don’t miss the daily freeway insanity, the crowded malls, or the discontent that seemed to be growing all around us before we moved here a year ago. We don’t make as much money, but the trade-off is worth it to us. A calm, friendly place with incredible vistas, pretty nice weather year-round and the ability to truly relax is in fact priceless. We always say, it’s not perfect here and we know a lot of Americans that wouldn’t like living here at all. But for us, it’s a slice of paradise.

So as you sit in your office and wonder what it might be like to live somewhere else…it’s a bit like that. We never thought we’d be where we are today, but we’re glad we’re here. Maybe you’d like it too, who knows? When you get the chance, come and visit New Zealand. It’s a wonderful place to “holiday” as they say here, both for old and young alike. There’s “heaps” to do and lots of fun to be had…participating in some extreme sports, hiking on a glacier or just relaxing on the beach. You can’t go wrong that way, and maybe you’ll like it enough to trade your current office for a bedroom…um…office…with a view! 

The following are Rick's previous articles for the magazine:

• Chapter 9 ~ Getting Ready For The Big Move 
• Living in New Zealand - Chapter 8
• Chapter 7 - New Zealand ~ So What's The Big Deal
• New Zealand ~ Some Not-So Important Answers To Some Important Questions!
• Life In New Zealand ~ Six Months Later
• We Did It! ~ Escaping To New Zealand
• We Did It! - Part Deux ~ Moving To New Zealand 
• We Did It! - Chapter Three ~ The Magic Of New Zealand
• Life In New Zealand...So Far ~ Cars And Fish

• http://www.immigration.govt.nz/migrant/
• http://www.emigratenz.org/
• http://benz1.com/forum/index.php?s=2b5a621987b160a0bac291321e62297d

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