Laurel

One of the downsides of coming here was leaving our dog Laurel. For those who know her you'll be glad to hear she has settled in great with our friends Linda and Joe (and fellow canine Ellie) in rural Massachusetts. Sounds like she is better behaved than she used to be and is not leaving little "gifts" on the rugs!

Wine

In an enthusiastic attempt to boost the local economy ( and because the beer is somewhat bland on the whole here) we find ourselves drinking much more wine here than in the US. Several plus points:

1. It is available in supermarkets unlike New York and often discounted there. A decent bottle ranges in price from maybe $US6 - 12 (3- 6 pounds) including tax, with cheap mass produced Aussie plonk cheaper still.

2. While some of the local wineries are owned by major companies a lot are still small to medium businesses.

3. While screw tops (adopted almost universally here) might not suit cellared wines and are vaguelly redolent of the delights of Lambrusco they are great for having a glass or two and saving. Many taste better after a day or two as well.

4. And best of all, a great range of good product.

A Kiwi View

I found these comments about the country on the website of a fellow Wanganui resident:

http://www.mistywindow.com/site/new-zealand-and-me.html

Interesting reading.

The Earth Moved For Us

We had our first earth tremor here that I've noticed, a couple of weeks back. They are not uncommon in the 3 range on the Richter scale, there's not been a destructive one in this area for 150 years though. It basically sounded like a very large truck trundling by but made our metal roof creak impressively.

Gangland

Our rather small and boring town (and to clarify I mean boring in the positive sense of pleasantly predictable and quiet before the natives lynch me in a pleasantly predictable way) has suddenly hit the news here:

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/location/story.cfm?l_id=131&objectid=10438111

so we are now getting cast as a hotbed of gangland activity. There is no doubt that a gang culture exists here both in the town and as one of the sides of the country the world does not hear about. But compared to other places we've lived it all seems pretty small scale. I've never lived anywhere quite as quiet downtown in the evening (both when we've been out and on my regular evening runs), even the drunks falling out of the pubs are few and far between.

In some ways New Zealand is a fairly violent place, at least in the sense that violence is tolerated among both Polynesian and Pakeha populations. Family violence is historically high and obviously the country excels at and glorys in the violent sport of rugby. The outcry here when a Green Party MP introduced an anti-smacking bill suggests that there are plenty of people who want to beat their kids, though even the conservative National Party agreed to support the legislation when opposition to it threatened to link them up with a "lunatic fringe"of religious and right wing groups.

However the country does well in most measures of crime and factors that predict crime. Quality of life for a large % of the population is high, violent crime is low by international standards and income distribution is good. Conservatives undid some of the reasonably effective social safety net in the 80s, and the same people who rail against criminals would dismantle it further (yeah, that works great in the rest of the world for detering crime!). But the New Zealand way which seems to me to comprise a combination of a reasonably strong state social system with a relatively socially conservative mindset and respect for individualism is not the worst way to balance different sides of the political spectrum.

Wanganui has been trying to up its profile and attract people, it'll be interesting to see how this plays out.

Random Update

Somehow with having to work for a living again I'm failing to keep up the blog. I'm sure my army, or possibly small gaggle of readers (now doubtless reduced by my choice of collective noun) are sorely disappointed. I often think of possible topics to address and just as quickly forget them, so you'll get what is on my mind right now. Wanganui has managed to get on the news of late here for all the wrong reasons which I'll address in the next post. In this one I'll look at the more universal issue of language.

New Zealand is a bilingual country with English and Maori, but not in the sense of Wales with it's dual road signs or Quebec with its uneasy relationship with the rest of Canada. Here most place names are in Maori (tough for the newcomer), at least in the North Island while Maori language is used in reference to Maori activities and concepts (whether it be meetings, cultural activities, relationships, values etc) especially where these are maintained in a separate and distinctive way. However pretty much all mainstream life is conducted in English. This means that my exposure to the spoken language is minimal, though I think Tracy encounters it more.

In some ways for me it's like the exposure an English speaking lowlander gets to Gaelic in Scotland (though the Maori culture remains more vibrant, distinct and widespread than that of Gaelic speakers now). It's all over the maps of much of the country, it's useful for describing history and culture and is heard in artistic presentations. But you are not going to pick up much by way of colloquial use. There's no denying that it's a beautiful and lyrical tongue though, even when rendered by Pakeha newsreaders.

The effort to remember popular NZ slang dredges up a few favorites:

crook - having some physical ailment in a usefully non-specific way: "I'm a bit crook" seems to cover everything from a mild cold to being about dead.

heaps - general word for "a lot"covering times the Brits might use lots, loads, tons etc.

And a couple of more specific favorites:

chilly-bin - cooler or cool box

judder-bar - sleeping policemen (always one of the stranger british phrases I always thought) or speed bump

Tracy adds "sweet as" meaning great and I'm sure a linguist could work on how the use of "eh" at the end of a sentence varies between NZ, Canada and the Dakotas.

I do have one question. If eskimos are supposed to have heaps of words for snow (is this true or a grand myth?) and Scots certainly describe rain in a multiplicity of ways, why do they not have more words for sheep inNZ?!

Newspaper Letter Writers

Now I'm working I'm exposed to the local newspaper which sits in the waiting room and gives me something to read on breaks. While it does an adequate job of covering local, national and world events the highlight has to be the letters page. While every paper must get its share of unhinged correspondence the Wanganui Chronicle actually prints most of it. Sadly they do not post letters on the website (that might not influence the world's view of our little town very positively methinks) but I might be forced to highlight a few on these pages.

Many of the letters continue a fairly personal slanging match about our local politics which can't avoid being personality driven when

a) The mayor is a well known talk radio host and political maverick
b) Most of the local politicians seem to fall into the "small town conservative" camp but manage to disagree on plenty

You feel you should check in every day as the same writers slag each other and their chosen political targets with the regularity of a soap opera plot. However these regular missives are only an apetizer to prepare the reader for the truly unhinged. Today's best contribution began by noting that crayfish had been found entombed in solidified mud after our recent lahar. This managed to prove via some spectacular leaps of pseudoscience that the earth's fossil record had been created in a short period of time by the biblical flood and therefore all the problems of the world were due to our failure to adhere to the bible. I look forward to the correspondent's next contibution and continuing to monitor the entire letters page!