Good Morning readers,

Thought I would take advantage of an enforced week inside by telling you some NZ stuff which I don't normally get time to as I am telling you about work & stuff.

NZ is a fantastic country & I am sure you are all bored of hearing how much I love it here.

However, it is not exactly the same as the image it likes to portray to the outside world.

I must stress that the following observations are based on only 5 months & seeing limited areas & I apologise to any Kiwis reading for any innacuracies.

Firstly. NZ is very eco-conscious & green & environmentally friendly isn't it ?

No.

The only people here I know who recycle are Brits. The Kiwis don't bother, claiming not to have the financial resources to make it viable. Most large places, ie farms, studs seem to have a particular area of a paddock which is 'the dump'.

It is here that the household rubbish ends up for subsequent burning. At Marfell Downs I cause hilarity by asking if the glass & metal also went on the fire ? 'Of course -where else would it go ?' was the reply.

Anything that doesn't burn eventually gets buried in the ground.

That doesn't pose a problem now at this point in time, but I imagine in a few hundred years when land starts to change hands & landowners start digging to develop, they may be surprised to find cars buried on their land. (Common practice here & something I witnessed at Marfell Downs, the illegality of it concerned them not a jot)

When I met up with all the other trainees at Kaiapoi earlier in the year they had similar stories to tell so the practice would appear wide-spread.

The same is true of pesticides, antibiotics fed to meat & a whole host of 'land-improvers' I suspect the reason farmers are able to get away with so much is the simple lack of people. This country is the size of the UK with less than a tenth of the population. Land is much cheaper than at home, hence farmers own comparitively vast tracts of land. The ability to do things unchecked & unobserved is endless.

This country guards its tourist industry very jealously & quite rightly too. Especially since the LotR phenomenon, tourism along with agriculture is the main money-spinner. I should imagine the government will clamp down very tightly on refuse & the like when tourists start to scratch beneath the surface & find the image less than perfect.

Please dont misunderstand. There is no litter blowing around the countryside & the beaches I have visited have been clean & lovely. However, the rubbish is there, buried on people's private land. The only difference between here & the UK I suppose is that we know there are landfill sites & choose to forget about them. Here, everyone's litter is buried in smaller amounts.

Speaking of the government, for anyone that doesn't know (I didn't before I arrived) there is a Labour government here, the leader of which is Helen Clark. She is widely referred to as 'Our glorious leader' & I haven't found a Kiwi, or a Brit for that matter, with a good word to say about her.

She was absolutely reviled at Marfell Downs for her anti-US stance before, during & after the war in Iraq. She made some very personal remarks about Bush & Blair & alienated the US in rather spectacular fashion. As you may remember the Redwood's major business was mussel production & their best buyers, pre-Iraq, were the Americans.

After Ms.Clarke's timely comments the Americans would not touch NZ produce & the bottom fell out of mussel demand.

Her ungracious & insincere apology to the US, when the country's entrepreneurs forced her to climb-down was embarrassing & she lost every shred of credibility she ever had.

Can you imagine Maggie apologising for something she believed in to appease the money-spinners ? I think not.

So - a Labour government, deeply unpopular with farmers, sounds familiar doesn't it ?

Another similarity is Tranz-rail, NZ's national rail-service. Customers complain of tardy trains, unreliable service & fare-hikes at a moments notice. Apparently the rail service used to run much better whan it was owned & run by the one company. It was then nationalised, sold off to separate buyers & has never been as good since.

Hmmm.

The roads here are a great deal better than I expected. I remember reading how a road which Q was travelling on, collapsed, & the car toppled into a , thankfully dry, river bed. I think I expected a road set-up similar to Africa after that.

It is not, & most roads here are metalled & fairly even. What does differ is the way they are made & repaired. I won't pretend to know anything about how roads are made in the UK but I know how thick the surface is & how, when you watch, you notice several different components to the surface. Here, it appears to be a fairly thin layer of macadam which splits & frays with little wear & tear.

The repair consists of the same thin layer being spread over the top. Cones aren't even placed over the 'repair' while it hardens, so the next large truck to cross, cracks the repair & back to square one, crack in the road.

The road from Cedar Lodge to my work-place is frequented by dozens of fully-laden quarry-trucks on a daily basis. The road has deteriorated badly in just the 3 weeks that I have been using it.

I imagine the rest of NZ's roads would disintegrate very quickly with the same usage & the only thing that keeps them together is the negligible traffic volume.

Speaking of which, I think that is the thing I like best about being here. The last traffic jam I encountered was Auckland & I can always park outside the shops I am visiting. Paying to park is an unusual encounter. My idea of a stressful drive to work now, is if I notice there is a car following me. I tend to pull in & let them pass as I don't like feeling crowded on my sight-seeing journey to work & back.

I am investigating a reputedly well-paid job with TFL (Transport for London) at the moment & wondering just how I would feel about seeing & being in that sort of traffic again ?

I have encountered complaints from Brits about the shops here. Michelle finds it difficult to get some items which she needs for cooking. I'm not talking about everyday things though but edible rice-paper & specialist stuff like that. Barring Toast-Toppers which I now have a lifetime's supply of (thanks L) I haven't had problems finding anything I like.

Bill's wife Linda says she struggles to clothe their kids, as the clothes market is either very expensive or cheap tat. The shop she misses most is Next. As someone who doesn't have to clothe kids I can't comment, but all the kids I see appear to be dressed nicely & no differently from UK kids. The exception being, they routinely wear poo-splattered overalls which I think is great. (This applies to the rural kids, didn't see any in Auckland dressed like that, maybe that's what I didn't like about it ?) Many kids also go barefoot & in most cases this isn't poverty-related. During school-hours they all take off their shoes & quite routinely come home without them.

They are hardy little buggers too, going barefot in all-weathers not just when it's sunny.

As a kid who could never be persuaded to put slippers on, I whole-heartedly condone going barefoot, I think it's great for your feet & have never had problems with mine.

I will leave you for now as I am going for a shower & Q has just rung,

Catch you over the weekend,

Cx