Hey All,
Its almost been a year since we arrived from the UK and a lot has happened. We lived in Te Kauwhata for 6 months (eek!!) then moved to Auckland 3 weeks before my partner gave birth to our first child. So heres a few things we have observed - some funny some not. Thanks all for the continuation of this forum.
- The midwifery system was a bad one for us. No one wanted to help us once we had moved to Auckland. Our Waikato midwife basically said its your problem your moving. There seems to be no communication between areas. Trouble was our baby was under developing and had we not been ignored by various midwives the problem might have been spotted. It was too late to prepare us for what happened and I won't go into details but our baby is lucky to be alive.
- The breast feeding culture over here is warped. As a result of all our drama it was best for mother and baby to be formula fed. We were made to feel like terrible parents and my partner was left in tears every day by the attitude in the hospital. Our baby is now thriving and is a happy, healthy child.
- Driving is really bad over here - lane discipline especially! Getting used to it though. Just need to be extra careful!
- my line of work (tv production) is all word of mouth which is hard when you don't know anyone! I sent CVs to every company several times until eventually a job came up - thank goodness! The job wasn't advertised on job websites and interviewees were people my boss knew (except me) - strange way of doing things maybe. Luckily it worked out for me.
- I love Shortland Street - not anywhere near as good as Corrie but NZ should be very proud of a soap thats lasted 20 years. It is entertaining enough for a 7pm soap!
- House Prices - ARGH!!! bone of contention. We are currently renting in Grey Lynn (because we needed somewhere ASAP and my partners friends all live nearby) and unless we win lotto cannot buy anywhere near here. Between we will earn around 110K and we have a good deposit. The problem is people paying way over the CV. I don't know how stupid people are - if interest rates go up then they are screwed. I guess a lot of these people don't care and as long as they get a house then it doesn't matter. Personally I hope the market bursts and we can actually pay what a house is actually worth. Yeah dreaming aren't we?!
- I hate that there are no ad breaks BETWEEN shows. They are usually somewhere stupid like after the opening credits. They also cut really hard out of programmes into ad breaks.
- The newsreaders have real trouble pronouncing their words. At least 3 times a night I yell "spit it out" at one of them!
- Phone calls at 7.30 am from various family members - I had heard about this and when it turned out to be be true it was a light bulb moment!
- Phone packages are awful - 40 mins a month!! Having a laugh over here ripping people off. My partner and I use vodafone best mate - really good value. We just don't bother calling anyone else.
- I miss IKEA
- Briscoes are always having a sale - it cracks me up!
- the lack of easy to eat non microwavable meals is a massive thing for us. God I could really murder some bloody M&S Chicken Cordon Bleus - half and hour in the oven with some Frites and some nice coleslaw. But no frozen, microwavable meals are all that exists over here. New World have just started doing fresh oven cooked meals but I would need to take out a personal loan to afford them every week.
- Why are there so many banks?!
- Kiwis impression of themselves as "green" cracks me up. Plastic bags galore at the supermarket not to mention EVERYONE drives EVERYWHERE. Public transport system in Auckland is so bad its laughable.
- Everyone thinks Spotify is a new thing.
- New Zealand Herald "Newspaper of the Year" - must be such a difficult award to win seeing as its the only national daily newspaper. Where is the political commentary, the bias of newspaper editors, debate amongst journalists. Doesn't exist. Its awful.
So thats all I can think of for now. I'll update again - maybe when we have finally managed to purchase a house. It seems like a dream for now.
Thanks for reading!