Looking for No.8 wire

Homeward bound

2006-12-31T12:16:00.000+13:00

Halfway down the departures board, I could see that Air New Zealand flight NZ39, bound for London via Hong Kong, was now open for check-in. The pit of my stomach was churning with unbidden feelings and the thought of twenty-four plus hours on a plane made me queasy. Not an hour previous, we'd all - friends and family - been sitting round the dinner table over steaming bowls of pasta and sauces, talking ten to the dozen about Christmas Eve barbecues on the beach, walks in the bush, surprise stockings on Christmas morning and how much wine we had drunk.

The easy friendship we had slipped out of focus, replaced by a stilted awkwardness and the quiet dread of parting that we had been carefully ignoring for days. The well-intentioned bonhomie of the greeting staff did nothing to lighten the mood. The baggage check-in was too quick to offer any delay of the inevitable moment. Tears, hugs, promises to write, more tears, make-sure-you-call-mes, hand-holding; the six of us taking turns, making sure we left no-one out. Then, moving quickly as if on an unspoken command, we walked away with pursed lips and lowered gazes, no-one daring to look around for that last glimpse.

Looking around, I checked the family were settled and made sure that, regardless of the tears, all had their belts fastened. Not one of us said a word, for there was really nothing to say; we knew that this situation could arise and now we faced it as best we could. Leaving good friends behind to head home was always going to be a factor but no amount of awareness prepared us for the heartache. With a deep breath, I looked over my shoulder one last time, pulled out into the traffic and headed home. In ten short days, we'd be back at the airport, standing in Arrivals, waiting to spot Granny and Grandad among the weary folks exiting the Customs Hall and starting the whole process all over again.

Job done - except for a door handle

2006-11-20T15:15:00.000+13:00

One of the reasons we chose the home we now live in was it's potential to expand to meet the needs of our growing family or, more accurately, the growing needs of our family. While the four bedrooms upstairs, the decks and the section around the house provide plenty of room to sleep and move around outdoors, the open plan area downstairs means that we all tends to end up on top of each other in the combined kitchen-diner-living-office area. Unsurprisingly, this lack of privacy and space can lead to frayed tempers, heated debates and the odd slammed door.

Before - utility room and office area

Most Kiwi homes seem to have, either by design, conversion or addition, a second living space variously called a family room, rumpus room, kid's den or sleep-out in the case of a separate unit. Half the ground floor of the house was taken up by a double garage with a utility area in one corner and, even during our first viewing, we were measuring and planning how we might covert it into another living space. In the months since we moved in, the garage was used as a storage and dumping area while we settled into the house. However, once I had built a new shed next to the house and moved the remaining boxes, bikes, bits and bobs in to that, the way was clear to convert.

After - office area and door to utility room

We called in a local builder, John, who replaced the automatic garage door with a window and ranch slider, rewired the space with halogen lights and lots of power outlets, built two stud walls and relined the ceiling. This neatly divided the space into a large sunny L-shaped room opening onto the front of the house and a smaller laundry/workshop with a door to the side passage. With the building work finished, SWMBO donned her 'Changing Rooms' hat and set about painting the rooms to her usual standard - those who saw how she transformed our London flat will know what she can do with a few cans of paint. With the decor sorted, John the builder returned to tile the utility room and last Friday, after I had smoothed and filled the holes in the concrete floor, we had underlay and carpet fitted in the larger room.

Before - the view from the homework/craft area

Not one to let the kettle go off the boil, SWMBO cracked the whip on Saturday to push the project to completion. As she headed off to a business seminar with her direct marketing colleagues in Auckland's CBD, I juggled the usual 'taxi' run to the sprog's dance classes with picking up a few last minute things to complete the conversion. Once back home, I relocated our home office furniture and family computer to the designated 'office' corner of the new space and installed and configured a new wifi network and broadband connection to serve the whole house.

After - the view from the homework/craft area

The last major job on the 'Honey, do!' list was to hook up our old UK television/video combo to a budget DVD player that sprog No.3 won in a school competition a couple of years back. Having warned that, as a UK unit, it'd only play region 2 DVDs, I and the kids were pleased to find that it happily plays DVDs from both regions 2 and 4 - a nice surprise in this day and age of locked-down formats and built-in obsolescence.

During - the not-quite-finished snug area, which will double as a guest room when fully furnished.

The next morning brought Sunday, the supposed day of rest, but any thoughts of kicking back and doing nothing were soon banished. In an up-to-date twist of the ancient practice of bartering, I agreed to trade a breakfast meeting spent business coaching friends through the planning needed to expand their business for a three-seater couch they no longer needed. After trailering it back to the house and installing it under several excited sprogs, we all sat down to a brunch brunch of bacon, eggs and homemade baps.

Before - garage door ready for removal

Soon after that, the guy who cuts our grass turned up to repair the damage his wife had visited upon our water tank connection with a brush-cutter two days previously. This is no small matter- like most of rural New Zealand, there is no mains water supply here and precious tank-stored rainwater is all there is to last us the summer, unless we order in extra deliveries by tanker lorry at some expense. No sooner was the repair done than a guy turned up to buy the garage door we'd removed and sold on Trade Me, the local equivalent of eBay. The bundle of lovely green dollars barely touched my skin before they passed to the clutches of SWMBO, who announced that she was off to look at beds for the guest area of the new room. After two days with barely time to draw breath, I was beginning to wane and as the afternoon wore on, the sore throat I'd been nursing all through a hectic week at work decided to undergo its own conversion into a head cold and a raging temperature.

After - ranch slider and window replace garage door

Having decided that a hot lemon and honey would ease my fevered brow, I was boiling the kettle when SWMBO rang the house. From the checkout at the bed store, she announced that they could deliver the bed she had just purchased but it would be an extra $60, so could I kindly hitch up the trailer and go and get it please? As I hooked up the trailer and start the Pajero, I found myself thinking that, should I ever undergo reincarnation, I would inevitably be reborn as a water buffalo - one destined for a life yolked to a plough in a paddy field with SWMBO as the whip-cracking rice farmer. That said, an scant hour later, I was back home with the new twin trundler bed unloaded, unwrapped and installed in the new room.

For all the hassles and the 'drama', as they say round these parts, the flexibility the new rooms offer us is more than worth the effort. We now have a separate utility room where the laundry gets done, the big freezer sits and I can colonise a small corner for a work bench and tool racks. The main room is now a place that offers a snug hidey-hole where the sprogs can hang out with their friends (and, no doubt, boyfriends in the years to come) and guests can sleep in comfort when they visit; an area from which SWMBO can build and command her growing skin care and supplement empire and a light and airy table for the inevitable homework, crafts and hobbies in the years to come.

I was going to close by saying that the only outstanding task on my list is to fit a door handle to the utility room door but, as is the way in this house, another job has just been added with SWMBO informing me that 'the new fangled wifi-server-thingy' is not working. If you are reading this, then you'll know I have fixed it and am back to just the door handle.

Kapa Haka

2006-11-05T12:55:00.000+13:00

Kapa Haka is the term used for the traditional Maori performing arts. The term kapa haka derives its meaning from two words: kapa (to stand in rows) and haka (Māori dance). Kapa haka requires the performers to sing, dance, have expression as well as movement and combine all these elements into each performed item. In this sense, kapa haka also acts as a sign language, as each action has a meaning that mirrors the spoken words.

Here, our youngest sprog is making the 'wiri' hand gesture. The wiri represents the world around us, from the shimmering of the waters of a bright sunny day, to the heat waves rising from the ground to the wind rustling the leaves of the trees.

The boys of the Taupaki School Kapa Haka group perform the 'Ra! Hupane, Ka -upane!' part of the Ka Mate haka, the original of the two haka used by the All Blacks before their rugby internationals.

The newer haka, "Kapa o Pango", features the controversial throat-slitting gesture which has received so much criticism - usually from the national press of the opposing team! For more information on the kapa haka and Maori culture, try http://www.maori.org.nz

Just like in the movies

2006-11-05T09:08:00.000+13:00

Click on image for larger versions

An unusual event interrupted my pottering about in the garden yesterday. I was in the middle of cat proofing my 'square foot gardening' vegetable patches, surrounded by chicken wire, tools and the odd sprog, when I heard a sound one normally only hears in films.

Buuuur-bup-bup-bup ... buuuur-bup-bup-bup ... phut-phut-bup...

I looked up and saw a small jump plane tracking low across the clouds and blue sky above the township and seemingly trailing smoke from one engine. It was making the kind of noise that came from Ginger's Spitfire shortly before he 'pranged his kite' in those 'how the RAF won the war' black and white movies of my childhood. A few seconds later, four skydivers exited the plane in close order, opening their canopies almost instantaneously while the plane lazily turned west. Shouting for the sprogs to come and see and grabbing the camera from the kitchen counter, I returned to snap a few shots, rationalising that I had obviously got it wrong and the smoke was simply vapour trail (unlikely at that low altitude in this warm weather) or a skydiver's cannister that had malfunctioned in the plane (very unlikely but still possible). As I clicked away, I was aware of the noise again.

Buuuur-bup-bup-bup ... phut-phut-bup...[silence]

Abrupt silence - never a good thing when flying I suspect, except in gliders maybe. As the skydivers slipped from view and into the paddock behind the local pub, I wondered whether I should dial 111. I didn't. Well, for one, I wasn't sure of what I had just seen - was it a plane in trouble or simply throttling back to reduce the prop wash for the skydivers? Did jump plane pilots have parachutes? There'd be a loud explosion if the plane had crashed, surely?

Later, at the school firework display, which the whole township attends, the jungle telegraph was in overdrive - the skydivers were rehearsing for a pre-display jump when the plane got into trouble. The pilot managed to walk away from a landing that left his plane upside down amongst the vines in a local vineyard. Not one to miss a trick, the head teacher raffled some of that vineyard's latest output as 'plane crash vintage, never to be tasted again as ten rows of the vines have been totalled by the plane!'

A write up and video report of TVNZ's version of what they're inevitably calling 'The Grape Escape' can be seen here.

Picture: TVNZ

Joy and pain

2006-10-30T20:00:00.000+13:00

Cruising on the Harbour Bridge

On the limit at the finish

Two hours, seventeen minutes & fifty-two seconds

2006-10-29T19:35:00.000+13:00

I ran over here today

The 21.09kms mix of rolling hills, flat dockside and Harbour Bridge of this morning's Auckland Half Marathon took me 2:17 to complete. To put this in context, my new personal best time for the half marathon is a full thirteen minutes slower that it took the Kenyan Paul Tergat to run twice that distance when setting the world marathon record in 2003.

Having risen for breakfast at 3 a.m. and previously only run 10k events, the extra 11kms were new territory for me and a challenge, despite twelve week's training. A solitary instep blister was the only 'injury' I experienced during training so I was surprised and annoyed when, at just the 8km mark, I picked up a nagging pain in my right knee. My post-race masseur offered the opinion that this might be associated with the iliotibial band, a common problem for runners.

After driving home gingerly, taking anti-inflammatories, soaking in a bath and icing my knee, I had a quick lunch and a long but fitful nap. Suitably refreshed and revived, I have just enjoyed one of SWMBO's superb roast chicken dinners and am now enjoying a chilled light beer.

picture: beautifulnewzealand.com

Our very own Swan*

2006-09-18T19:00:00.000+12:00

No.3 took part in her first ever soccer tournament last week in the annual competition between the primary schools of Huapai and Taupaki. The fact that we live in Huapai and stood amongst neighbours cheering for Taupaki school made for tense moments on the touch line. Coming off the bench in the first half, No.3 played a crucial pivotal role midfield, tackling the opposition and playing the ball forward, playing her part in the eventual 5 - 3 win that saw her team take home the trophy for another year. Quite what the dance examiner who invigilated No.3's ballet exam today will have made of the bruised and stud-marked legs I'm not sure but we're proud to have a kid who is equally happy on the pitch or in the dance studio.

*The Swanz are the New Zealand women's soccer team

View from the sofa on a wet Saturday

2006-09-09T16:47:00.000+12:00

The rich, warm, orchestral tones of Joni Mitchell plays while the day-long rain turns the water pooled on the deck effervescent and bubbling like a dull sparkling wine.

The mild regret of a day's chores hijacked by rain is balanced by the peace of mind that the rising water in our tank brings.

The damp of the day is kept at bay by the burnt ochre glow of the gas fire and the smell of freshly-baked chocolate chip cookies hanging in the air.

On the sofa, the sections of the weekend paper are jumbled up with remote controls and cushions. Those cushions not on the sofa are on the floor, where they support the dozing forms of a black cat and a mood-drained teenager.

Behind the music, differing rhythms are played out by the raindrops; the constant gravel-crunch on the flat roof above versus the bigger irregular splashes on the bay window in the kitchen.

As the rain eases for the first time since dawn, the strings of Barber's Adagio swell to mirror the sombre greyness of the sky, causing the teenager to stir and the cat to curl tighter.

Savouring the comfort and warmth of being submerged in the sofa is slowly giving way to the desire for tea and a cookie - but not just yet.

However, as soon as a hopeful thought of prolonging the moment occurs, the wail of the fire service siren calls the volunteers from their homes and the moment slowly dissolves. The teenager awakes and, inevitably, asks: are the cookies ready?

Father's Day

2006-09-03T16:42:00.000+12:00

It is Father's Day today and, as tradition demands, I was served breakfast in bed. Consuming cereal, toast and tea in a semi-horizontal position is not good preparation for exercise so, after several seconds indecision, I abandoned the idea of a staggering outside for a run and settled in for a lazy day.

I recently caught a re-run of an episode of Rick Stein's fabulous show, Food Heroes, where he visits a delightfully barking Irish hotelier who makes really good soda bread. Having the house to myself in the morning and knowing that we had buttermilk in the fridge, I thought I'd make some either for lunch or to go with the roast chicken dinner later this afternoon. As it requires no proving, soda bread is just the bread for those seeking near-instant home baked gratification. I whipped up a double batch of the moist, sticky dough and baked two gorgeous loaves of bread, one for us and another for our neighbour, who has been busy painting her cottage over the last few days.

Food is a central to Kiwi life with many cuisines from around the world represented in both the home and restaurant cooking here. From the national fixation with meat pies (the village pie vendor is called 'Hua-pie') and the baked goods of workplace morning teas to the ready availability of cheap sushi almost everywear, New Zealand is a nation that enjoys its food, a fact that is borne out in the worsening obesity statistics published each year.

Our local area, the fruit basket and vineyard of Auckland, is renowned for its fresh market garden produce and large number of eateries; indeed, the availability of take-way food in New Zealand must rival that of the USA. We can indulge in wood-fired Italian pizzas, charcoal-grilled Turkish kebabs, Kiwi roast dinners, Thai satays, Chinese noodles, English fish and chips to name just a few, washed down with numberless wines and beers, without ever touching the stove or the fridge and by walking no more than a few hundred metres.

That said, we enjoy cooking old favourites and new discoveries at home and sitting down to a meal with friends is always a great way to spend an evening. As a reward for those who still drop by and read this blog, here's a couple of recent recipes that I have come up - enjoy!

Huapai Open Sandwich

I had a hankering for a deli style open sandwich and came up with this combination. We are lucky enough to have Greg Flutey, a great Kiwi specialist baker, at the bottom of our road so we can get superb bread locally (even when I'm not in the mood for baking!). The taste and texture of the haloumi balances nicely with the peppery salad and the herby dressing and the chilis tickle the tastebuds, cutting through the flavoursome sausage slices. Perhaps it is just as well that I'm training for the Auckland half marathon, as this substantial lunch went down all too easily.

Serves one

Five grain sourdough bread
Mayonnaise
Mesclun leaf salad
Salad dressing (Cotterill & Rouse's Garden Fresh Herb Dressing is great)
Pickled piri-piri chilis
Haloumi
Left-over home-kill beef sausages

Heat slices of haloumi and sausages under a grill or on a ribbed skillet until heated through and browned at the edges. Meanwhile, toast two slices of the bread and then spread with mayonnaise. Pile with dressed mesclun or other small leaf salad and scatter with finely chopped pickled piri-piri. Slice the still-warm hamouli into chopstick-sized sticks and scatter with the sausage pieces over the salad. Salt and pepper to taste. Enjoy immediately.

Fridge d'Or Ravioli Sauce

After a twelve hour plus day at work, I'm rarely in a creative mood. However, a few nights ago, with the family elsewhere and a sparsely populated fridge staring me in the face, the desire for a quick tasty meal provided inspiration. I grabbed the contents of the fridge door and came up with a sauce that took 5 minutes to make and, thanks to the chili bean sauce, tasted more complex and sophisticated than my usual quick tomato sauce.

Serves two

½ large tomato
¼ onion
½ stick of celery
4 or 5 sun dried tomatoes
1 tbsp chili bean sauce (toban djan - paste of fermented broad beans and chili)
dried basil and thyme
Beef ravioli or pasta of choice

Chop tomato, onion and celery into small pieces. Place in lidded plastic container, vent and microwave on high for 1 minute. Shake and repeat. Add sun dried tomatoes and chili bean sauce to container and reduce to a chunky puree with a hand mixer or similar. Stir in a couple of pinches of the herbs, a little salt and black pepper. Spoon the sauce over the freshly cooked pasta on warm plates and serve with freshly grated pecorino or pasmesan.

Working From Home

2006-08-12T14:40:00.000+12:00

What is your definition of 'home'? Is it the place where you currently live? A country you left long ago? Can it really just be wherever your heart is at any given moment? Since saying to a colleague a few weeks back that I'd be working from home the following day, the phrase has stuck in my mind and has led me to thinking around the concept of 'home'. While I'm curious about this notion, I am also cautious about seeking to define something that has meant different things to me at different times in my life.

As a young child banished to his room for various and heinous crimes, 'home' was often my bed, where I'd lie for long periods, staring out of the window at the patterns cast by the branches of an oak tree against the sky. As an older youth, 'home' was either a destination reluctantly sought when I was having fun and more eagerly wished-for when I had over indulged.

The long list of bed-sits, house-shares, squats, theatrical boarding houses and spare room sofas I progressed through as a student and out-of-work actor were never 'home' but rather a place to sleep, shout, smoke, debate, sulk, rehearse lines and avoid landlord's agents.

Though the acting career faded and 'normal' jobs took over, I never quite made the transition to responsible tenant or respectable homeowner and, consequently, never really thought of anywhere as 'home'. This was due, in part, to never having enough money to buy a place of my own. However, I suspect the main reason was that I simply couldn't be bothered; certain that didn't want the seemingly onerous responsibilities that go with property ownership, I simple bumbled along from one rented room to the next.

Periodically, I would complicate matters by entering into yet another ill-fated liaison with a whacky theatre designer, uptight actress or manic runway model. Having a girlfriend only muddied the waters further. In the early stages of any of these relationships, I would invariably spend a disproportionate amount of time at her place, being a clingy pain in the arse who had no idea that 'space' can actually be a good thing and girls like to see their friends without 'him' in tow every now and then. As the seeds of doubt grew in her mind, I'd lay siege to her place, visiting more often and overstaying my welcome, all the time driving her further away and cursing myself for it. When the inevitable rejection came, the cold draughty room that awaited my vanquished pride just didn't feel like 'home' either.

When I met SWMBO, we both lived in other people's places before we moved into her previously rented bed-sit in commuter-land so 'home' remained a concept rather than actuality. The first one bedroom flat we bought together was great. We lived there in the year or so before and after our wedding, decorating and doing all the things not-quite-so-young couples do in their first place. When our first dog joined us, it seemed pretty much like 'home'. However, the combination of the arrival of daughter No.1, losing my own business to a greedy partner and looming debt, compounded by the negative equity mortgage scandal of the late '80s, saw us selling up.

The following years were not easy, with a few marital ups and downs played out in a number of rental properties and bed-sits for me when I went AWOL. Some of these were nicer than others but none were 'home'. Our last home in London was originally a council flat which we eventually bought. On the day we moved in, I christened it 'Chateau Sarajevo', as it looked not unlike the pockmarked, bullet-riddled apartments we saw on the nightly news. Though I swore I'd not raise my growing tribe in such a place, we stayed there and, with a little help from me and some others, SWMBO slowly turned it from a squatter's paradise into warm, comfy, habitable home for us and the kids. Although I never truly liked that flat, I have fond memories of reading and dozing on our bed on Sunday afternoons when the sun streamed a warm comforting glow through the cotton drapes. Thinking back, maybe it was a sense memory thing; a reminder of childhood moments spent gazing at dark twisted oak twigs against the conveyor-belt cloud above.

Last month, we moved from our large but impractical rented house to a lovely family house at the other end of the township. Although moving house is never fun, I actually enjoyed hauling twenty-seven trailer loads of boxes and belongings the length of the township to our new place and was impatient to be done with the rental house. It was more than wanted to be finished with the landlord hassles, endless water supply problems and the blind indifference of the letting agent. More than ever before and perhaps because we are so far from friends, family and all that is familiar, I wanted to be in my own home.

Already, for me, our new house feels more like home than any that has preceded it. While SWMBO and the sprogs have tapped into the school and church networks to make new friends quickly, with work and commuting I have had less chance to do so and find myself wanting for company outside circles of work and family. Even so, the house is a familiar magnet that I am happy to have pull at me most weekday evenings as I finish work. Why? I'm not sure I can say. It might be that it is a house that stands on its own section on the edge of the village, detached but not removed, behind gates that can be opened in welcome or closed in retreat. It might be the tentative but growing friendship with our reserved neighbour who keeps her own quiet counsel but tells us she secretly wished for a family to move into this house. It might be the knowledge that, in a week that has seen more fear and uncertainty creep into lives across the western world, we chose to make our new home in a country that rarely figures large in world events. Or maybe it is just that here, in a house on a small country road in a small country village on an island at the end of the earth, is where we are meant to be at this time in our lives.

Two pieces of paper

2006-05-17T21:04:00.000+12:00

The result of 3+ year's research, time, effort, worrying and more than a few tears.

Some people can tell you where they were when Kennedy was shot or how they stayed up late to watch Kennedy's pledge to put a man on the moon come true. Well, it may not be on the same world-rocking scale but I'll always remember where I was when I learned we had been granted indefinite residence in New Zealand. It was the rather mundane and unglamourous men's toilet of a conference venue because SWMBO has an unerring habit of calling me whenever I'm otherwise engaged.

Earlier today, exactly eight months to the day from the day we flew into Auckland as a family of emigres, I walked out of the Immigration New Zealand office into the crisp Kiwi winter sun, clutching passports with residence permits and returning resident's visas for 4 of the 6 of us. The last two permits and visas will be issued when the passports concerned are renewed in a month or so. I shall be using my newly enhanced passport next week when I travel to Melbourne and Perth on business but, for now, I'm just happy to relax and drink a glass of Pinot and be thankful for the outcome of our hopes and labours.

Easter heralds autumn

2006-04-29T18:01:00.000+12:00

As Easter approached, the sprogs were all busy with rehearsals for a dance display at one of the local village halls. For the first time in a good few years, all four are taking classes again and it was good to see all of them in a show together. With hair scraped back and makeup liberally applied, they all looked marvelous and danced their pieces beautifully.

The fifth birthday of No.4 was celebrated in style on a bright sunny day with fun & games on the tramp and an outdoor birthday tea. The guest list included just one brave lad who, undaunted by the 7 to 1 girl/boy ratio, held his own against the pink masses all afternoon.

It's pink, was made with heaps of chocolate and things, has heaps of chocolate buttons on top and had five candles on it. The look says it all - why on Earth would anyone in their right mind want to share this heavenly cake with their family, let alone friends.

Though the natives say that this year's Easter Show at Auckland Show Grounds was not as good as in previous years, we still had a fun day out. No.3 was adamant that, despite having eaten a large cone of chips just minutes before, the mini-bungee was a great idea.

SWMBO is a great lover of horses and has spoken of happy childhood evenings spent watching the Horse Of The Year Show on television, so she was keen to take in the eliminator final of 1.40 metre showjumping, which proved to be an exciting jump-off.

Sadly, the same couldn't be said of the Madagascar stage show we queued up to watch. With the usual tacky merchandising and actors in suits miming to a soundtrack of B-side pop songs, it didn't take long for the children in the audience to tire and vote with their feet.

The week after Easter, I took my first few day's leave from work. We loaded up the trailer and headed North to Waipu Cove where we camped for the first time as a family, just a few metres from the Pacific. It was a great place and we plan to return there next summer.

While friends in England are enjoying the flowers and warming weather, here we are slowly moving into autumn, leaving for work in darkness and arriving home at dusk. Our evenings are now spent in front of fires made with tea tree and pine, which we chopped and stacked in our garage before the autumn rains began.

More than seven months have passed since we flew into Auckland from the Cook Islands. With the routines of work and schools, our lives are moving from those of unsettled people in transit to people who live in and are part of a community. Our days are gradually taking on a comforting semblance of normality. We rarely stop to convert everyday prices, our accents are taking on the trademark Kiwi upward inflection and our terms of reference are slowly changing with the help of new friends and acquaintances. There are a good many things that we miss and friends we'd love to see but these feelings are balanced by the sense that the lives that we are building for ourselves are good and worth the efforts we're taking.

Twisted and bitter

2006-03-25T16:09:00.000+12:00

My bike was twisted and I am bitter - hence the following rant - bear with me, it will be short.

Removers crushed my bicycle when we moved to NZ.
The movers shrugged their shoulders and pointed to the insurers.
The insurers spent three months trying all avenues to avoid paying.
Stream of notated photos, techincal reference material from self eventually prompts cheque for two/thirds replacement value.
Took bike to posh bike shop on posh street for quote; they said they'd ring me with one.
Ten days later, called them for an update and was told 'The bike's ready'.
Arrived at shop to be ignored in favour of those spending $4k on shiny new road bikes.
When asked why job was done when I had asked for a quote first, no answer given.
Rashly paid without checking work as shop was busy and I was pissed off & wanted out.
Checked bike at home to find incomplete and ill-advised slap-dash repairs.
Turned air blue and cursed self for not listening to abdominal warning signs when first visiting posh bike shop on posh street.
Took bike to local mountain bike shop where nice couple treated me with respect, talked about what I used bike for, spoke confidently and honestly about sourcing spares and the time needed, discussed alternative bike scene and offered heaps of friendly advice.
Kicked myself black and blue for:

not going to local mountain bike shop in the first place as I had planned to do in December.
not insisting on fork replacement (as-new repairs are impossible and are potentially dangerous if stressed metal fails).
not kicking up a stink in the shop and embarrassing the smarmy buggers.

Resolved to purge poisonous feelings and shame my own stupidity/lack of balls by blogging the whole sorry episode.

Moral of the story: When it comes to bike shops, listen to your gut.

I'm off to a barbeque to chill out, have a beer and hopefully meet up with our UK-based Kiwi friends, currently back in NZ to visit family.

And relax.

One acronym begets another

2006-03-21T19:25:00.000+12:00

In the last five weeks, our previously mentioned EOI (Expression of Interest) has undergone a metamorphosis. Today, what left this house as bits and bytes - and a large credit card payment - returned in the form of a large courier package containing a large bundle of papers, forms and supporting material which makes up the New Zealand Immigration Service's ITA (Invitation To Apply) - along with a request for another, much larger credit card payment.

If we thought that we'd broken the back of the bureaucracy involved in securing residency, a quick review of the covering letter and checklist put us straight. As well as having to provide panel medical reports, X-rays and police check documentation within the next ten days (before their six month lifespan expires - we had them for a while), we now have to provide all the 'proof' documentation to support our claims in the EOI. This might sound fairly straightforward but I have discovered that one of the companies I worked for in the '90s has been swallowed up by another and getting proof of employment might be difficult.

To be honest, my heart sank upon realising that we're in for another extended bout of paperchasing and cajoling folks into providing evidenciary documents. Being in the middle of two very heavy weeks at work, I am finding it hard to work up the enthusiasm right now, even thought the ultimate goal is what we've spent over two years working towards. Recognising this, I have decided to stop beating myself up, stuff it all back into the courier pouch, grab a beer and take a night off, as has SWMBO. What that really means is that she's surfing real estate web sites for houses and I'm catching up on email and paperwork. I suspect I'll last all of 30 minutes before I give up and wander off to watch House, followed by the superb James Spader/William Shatner double act in Boston Legal.

From spring to autumn

2006-03-18T19:47:00.000+13:00

It was only when I was on my second St Patrick's Day Guinness that I realised why the date of the Paddy's Day posters looked familiar - March 17th was the expiry date on the original visitor's visa in my passport meant that we have been in New Zealand for exactly six months. I thought I'd ask the rest of the family to say what they have liked the most and least about the last six months and here's what they said.

SWMBO

MOST: Seeing the children exhilarated by outdoor activities; driving to school through rolling countryside rather than city streets.
LEAST: Not having old friends on hand to share great experiences; missing Radio 4 - and our old milkman.

No. 2

MOST: Lots more opportunities at school and home like softball, sailing, cheerleading; swimming with dolphins; lots of new friends.
LEAST: Being away from friends; the mosquitoes.

No.3

MOST: Swimming with dolphins; the great weather; the views; athletics and swimming
LEAST: Seeing lots of roadkill; the dangerous roads and drivers.

No.4

MOST: Watching sunsets; feeding roosters and cows; going to Kindy and friend's houses.
LEAST: "Nothing's bad about New Zealand".

MOST: Seeing the kids reveling in their new surroundings; more time doing fun family stuff outdoors; laid back attitudes; beautiful countryside.
LEAST: Lack of cycling buddies, old friends and trusted colleagues; no old stone buildings; favourite pubs and The Lahore restaurant.

However, the fact that No.1 is in her room, hates me and is generally exhibiting all the teenager symptoms of parent-itis proves that, regardless of what country we are in, some things don't change. That said, the last six months have seen our family grow and change in ways that means that we look forward to the next six with hope, excitement and expectation - and just the occasional look over our shoulders.

A midweek teatime picnic - one of our new family activities

There is another noteworthy event this weekend - SWMBO is launching her own blog. Whilst she is certainly not a Luddite, SWMBO is not an early adopter of most technology and has a pathological aversion to reading instruction manuals of any kind. This combination means that it has took the insertion of 12,000 miles between SWMBO and her friends to prompt her to embrace email as quick and effective way of closing that gap. A few weeks back, to support her first business venture, she put up a branded web presence and added a separate email address. This week, she has decided to put up a blog. Like me, she tried to keep friends and relatives up to date with family news and adventures with emails but has, I think, found it difficult to ensure that she gets the same news to everyone who wants to know and remember who has read what. I have just managed to sneak a quick preview and I can see that I am going to have to raise my game. So, if you have always wondered what SWMBO has to say for herself or why on Earth she puts up with me, head on over to A Word From Wendy to find out - and now you know what her name is!

Don't blink - it might disappear

2006-02-15T22:55:00.000+13:00

About 10 minutes ago, SWMBO idly surfed onto the New Zealand Immigration web site to login in and check whether status of our Expression Of Interest submission had altered from the 'received' it has been showing since we lodged.

We were certainly not prepared to see the following message.

Whilst hopeful and positive in outlook, I had quietly counselled myself for disappointment - at least the first time we applied - and had certainly expected to wait somewhere closer to the full 24 weeks our submission was valid before we heard anything. To be selected for vetting, and potentially an invitation to apply for residence, from a pool of around 800 well-qualified immigrants on the first draw after our submission is beyond any reasonable expectation we might have held.

All credit to SWMBO who collated all the papers we needed, highlighted the data I needed to provide and bullied me into filling in the labourious online application on evenings after work when I just wanted to grab a beer and relax. As it is too late for a beer, I'm off to bed with a mint tea and a book. Goodnight all.

Clearing more hurdles

2006-02-01T20:56:00.000+13:00

The Pinot Noir is flowing again. As related in Lining up the second hurdle, we have submitted our Expression Of Interest to the New Zealand Immigration Service and so have begun the long haul towards securing residency. In the meantime, we have continued to chase up various leads and applications and I am now happy to relate that, in the last 24 hours, we have been informed that:

Our EOI has been received and submitted to the pool for bi-weekly consideration over the next 6 months.
Our police check documents, fresh from the UK, state that we are not criminals.
SWMBO has been granted a work permit to run concurrent with mine.
Now we have paid handsomely for student visas, the sprogs can now [legally] attend school.

With that, I'm off to watch All Celebrity Kitchen Makeover with SWMBO and the rest of the Pinot.

Lunch with cicadas

2006-01-25T15:30:00.000+13:00

Today's LDL cholesterol-avoidance lunch

Following the sad and untimely death of an employee last year, my employer has recently taken a number of steps to support employees more in terms of lifestyle, health care and insurance provision. The onsite caterers provide a good variety of meal choices (though they still cater for those Kiwis who love their stodge and cakes), the company has introduced death/disablement in service cover and now are providing wellness clinic health checks. At 0800hrs last Monday and having fasted since 0400hrs (not including the obligatory morning cup of tea), I went before the 'company nurse'. After a chat to see if I was telling porkies in my health questionnaire, she measured and tested and prodded and drew blood.

The results are interesting and not unrelated to our emigration, hence baring my soul here. Whilst lugging 22 suitcases half way round the world might have stretched my arms and played havoc with my RSI, it didn't compact my vertebrae because I remain 184cms tall. Sadly, the same cannot be said of my weight which has crept up by 2kgs to 87kgs since we left the UK in September of last year. The lack of routine, the increase in take-away food and the generally unsettled life of living in temporary accomodation and travelling for interviews certainly took it's toll on my diet and the amount of exercise. These two measurements were used to calculate my Body Mass Index (BMI) by squaring my height then dividing my weight by the height squared or, for those that want the lowdown, 87 / 3.38 = 25.73. In general terms and ignoring the all-important family health history and lifestyle considerations that should always be taken into account, most folk's BMI should be between 20-25. By exercising less (laziness through lack of routine) and eating more (easy to do in New Zealand), I have let a two kilogram increase in my weight nudge my BMI from just inside (24.81) to a little too far (25.73) outside the healthy range.

My resting pulse rate, at 64 beats/min, is well within the ideal band for my age and indicates that running at lunchtimes and in the forest at weekends over the last month or so has helped me regain some aerobic fitness. Furthermore, I can use this information to better inform myself as to how hard to push myself when out training by calculating . Using my resting pulse rate, I have calculated my minimum and maximum training heart rates (i.e. 60-90% of my maximum heart rate) as 106 and 142 beats/min respectively, which will help me train more effectively. Likewise, my blood pressure is pretty good at 125/80mmHg against the quoted national ideal of 130/80mmHg though, with 1 in 5 Kiwis suffering some form of hypertension, I'm aiming for an optimal of 120/80mmHg.

With a low 'estimated heart event risk' score (a murmur-inducing phrase if ever there was one), my main target is getting my LDL cholesterol down. Like my Dad, I like a bit of cheese with brown bread and butter most days but I suspect that my main downfall has been a few too many take-aways and lack of portion control with my own home cooking. My alcohol consumption is pretty fair considering our home is amongst vineyards and wineries, not to mention the boutique brewery down the road. I think, all in all, I am very happy with my wellness check. Already being aware that I'm still getting back into my regular routine and that I have some way to go yet, the 'no worries but keep a watching brief' result from the nurse is as good as I could hope for I think. All the above is a very long-winded explanation for the low cholesterol lunch you see above, which I have been munching whilst writing and listening to the sound of the chirruping cicadas in the grass and trees beyond my window. These noisy creatures seem to be celebrating an all too brief gap in the rainclouds now sweeping in from the West after two days of stormy North Easterlies.

And they say it rains in England

2006-01-24T17:26:00.000+13:00

"HEAVY RAIN WARNING AUCKLAND:
Widespread heavy rain can be expected through to this evening [...] 50 to 80mm of rain is possible,especially about the hills north of the City [...] STRONG WIND WARNING AUCKLAND: Northeast winds are expected to rise to gale this morning, with possible severe gale gusts of 120 km/h in exposed places between 11am and 8pm today."

They are not wrong. Having bailed from work early die to ill-health brought on by budget forecasting, I was hoping to get home early. I hadn't factored in the four-car smash on the North Western motorway that required me to spend another hour stop-starting through Auckland in an effort to make my way home.

Lining up the second hurdle

2006-01-18T23:06:00.000+13:00

I can hardly believe it myself. About 30 minutes ago, I willingly and without menaces, voluntarily read out my credit card details to SWMBO, who was seated at the family PC. That said, this was not your common or garden run of the mill internet shopping session but more of your landmark fingers crossed and hope for the best moment.

We have just coughed up $300 dollars in order to submit our Expression Of Interest to the New Zealand Immigration Service. If you follow the link, you will see that this process is not for the faint-hearted, the poor or the ill-prepared. If you are not up for being honest, spending many hours doing research, even more collating documentation and then having every aspect of your very being scrutinised, then emigration is probably not for you. It will test the strength of your marriage just as much as your resolve, it will provide opportunity for self-doubt at every turn, it will rob you of the time to enjoy your new surroundings and it will cause you to question just why you wanted to embark upon the journey in the first place. What is more, this is just the process to signal your desire to remain resident. We now must wait to hear whether I am selected from a bi-weekly draw from the pool of applicants, with the likelihood of success inexorably linked to the number of points attributed to one's skills, qualifications and experience. If you have significant experience but no degree (like me) and you only just make the minimum number of points required to express interest, this could be the start of a long drawn out cycle of six-monthly submissions (with the attendant fee, of course) and bi-weekly draws. Whilst I am usually the half-full foil to the half-empty SWMBO, I am not holding my breath in this instance. New Zealand quite rightly attracts a lot of bright and highly qualified folks and I do not expect to have the same luck I had with the extraordinarily quick turnaround of my work permit application.

Having anaesthetised myself with half a bottle of our neighbours Pinot Noir, I am now off to bed. I will leave you with a mildly humourous but true work story. Next week, I shall be heading off to my first overnight business trip in my new position, on a two day management strategy and team building session with my peers. I scanned the email for the venue details, lobbed them into the NZ equivalent of Google Maps and, lo and behold, it is exactly 5.7kms from my home. I can't decide if this is good (short drive home afterwards) or bad (was hoping for Pacific island resort).

Easy like Sunday morning

2006-01-15T12:02:00.000+13:00

Our Sunday mornings are beginning to take on a semblance of normality, or at least what passed for normality before we decided to up stick and moved to the other side of the world. This means that SWMBO and the sprogs head off for church and I take the opportunity to try and get a couple of hours quiet writing under my belt. Sadly, the theory is great but, in actuality, what happens is that I invariably get diverted by email or checking out an interesting web site and before I know it, the family are back and baying for lunch. Another diversion has been my frankly pathetic attempts to settle back into running every other day, a simple enough programme but one which I have yet to accomplish. Compounded by a back strain earlier this week, my current sweat-drenched efforts are woefully inadequate considering that, in just four weeks time, I shall be taking part in an 18 hour, 160 kilometre relay race around Lake Taupo. All of which is my way of recording that I am finding it hard to get back into writing regularly and have found procrastination all too easy to embrace, even when I have house to myself and peace and quiet reign throughout. Not content with finding reasons and excuses for not being able to write here right now, I have also resumed my more geekish jottings over on my long-standing blog bignoseduglyguy, where I can get a shameless instant gratification fix by posting short and snappy comments rather than the longer, more considered pieces I have been posting here.

Teacher's Note: Must try harder.

An after dinner walk

2006-01-07T21:31:00.000+13:00

This picture, taken a few hours back, exemplifies why we came to New Zealand. Halfway through supper, we simply decided to go for a walk on the beach instead of doing chores or watching the television. Thirty minutes later, we were wandering barefoot on the black volcanic sand, watching the sun slide from the sky whilst the Tasman washed around our ankles.

Bliss.

Run, forest, run

2006-01-02T15:23:00.000+13:00

This track and the forest beyond has become a regular haunt for me over the last week or so.

Whilst I was running regularly back in London, I have lapsed severely since leaving the UK and have managed just one run each in Los Angeles, Rarotonga and Foxton. As we are now more settled and I'm no longer tearing around chasing interviews, I have started to get back into the groove. Thanks to the endless takeaways and a little too much beer and wine in this land of plenty, I guess that I am about about 5kg heavier than I was when I was in London. Add to this the usual Christmas and New Year festivities and you'll appreciate that it is proving to be something of a hard slog. However, I am now able to run amongst the tall firs of the local forests, swapping the pavements, car horns and fumes of London's East End for the birdsong, chirruping cicadas and pine scent of Riverhead. The difference is incredible, allowing me to enjoy the experience and focus on my running rather than watching traffic or teenage gangs out to hassle the unwary.

All this is just as well because, somehow in amongst all the frantic activity of starting my new job, I have managed to sign up for at least one leg of the Great Lake Relay 06. The thought of driving down country in six week's time with a bunch of colleagues to spend the night running 160kms round the country's biggest lake has had a certain sobering effect, I can tell you.

Jessie

2005-12-27T19:53:00.000+13:00

Earlier today we found our tortoiseshell cat Jessie, who had become another road toll statistic over Christmas. Sadly, we have been here before with Jasper. Always an independent, on her own terms cat, she would often join me on my late night online sessions by flaking out on top of my monitor. I don't think she ever forgave my for getting a LCD flat screen. After I set it up, she leapt on top, not realising their was no 'top' any more and plummeted down the back of the desk, emerging in one piece but distinctly unamused.

You'll be missed, Jess.

Here and there and elsewhere

2005-12-26T23:53:00.000+13:00

I suspended writing on my long-running bignoseduglyguy.com weblog a few months back in favour of concentrating on recording our emigration experiences here. Whilst I have never been the most consistent of bloggers, I now intend to resume blogging there as well as here and elsewhere. Now I am settling to my new life and work routine, I am feeling the desire to be looking around the web again and writing on other subjects. This being the case, I am pretty sure that I will now split my blogging across the two sites.

No.8 Wire was always intended to be a collection of impressions and recollections centered around our experience as migrants in New Zealand. This being the case, I hope to keep that focus as the core of my writing here whilst broadening it a little to include things of interest to friends and family around the globe.

bignoseduglyguy will resume where it left off - as a stream of geeky bits and bobs, comments and critiques, fun and philosophy - namely a common or garden blog.

As for writing elsewhere, I was involved in the London launch of the ever-growing Metroblogging franchise and still intend to post there occasionally as a 'foreign correspondent' though, now I have sorted shelter, food and warmth for the family, I might just have time to work on something else with Sean and the crew. Last but not least, I still hold out a small hope for making time to work on something with my good friends Chuck, Jason and Roger. Though we are all more than busy with our various lives, careers and families, I still fondly recall the fun we had writing for Chuck's most excellent but now-dormant happypalm.com.

Missing Mog

2005-12-26T15:43:00.000+13:00

One of the cats has been missing since Christmas Day morning. Whilst it is perhaps not too surprising as they have been uprooted and relocated twice in the last four months, it has brought a subdued mood to the house. Given that she is a town-raised cat in a rural setting, the possibilities are endless, for all the cats have gone into overdrive exploring their new and extensive territory. As well as the more usual getting stuck in a cupboard or locked in the shed, here we also have possibility of getting lost in the five acre maize field, being kicked by a bull or becoming trapped in the abattoir to factor in. Needless to say, no-one is wanting to even consider the State Highway at the bottom of the garden likelihood.

Christmas in Kumeu: a day in pictures

2005-12-25T23:35:00.000+13:00

One adult, two kids and just three hours to assemble

The Chef’s Salad and the salad chefs

No turkey here

The family and the neighbours lunching

Cap from Maryland, USA: US$40
Daughter's RipCurl shades: NZ$20
Shirt from Rarotonga, Cook Islands: NZ$35
Chef's apron from London, UK: £20
Feelings of happiness and contentment: Priceless

The cattle are lowing...

2005-12-24T12:57:00.000+13:00

Christmas Eve 2004, London, UK

A plastic tree, homemade paper chains and snowflakes, short days with biting winds, some nice neighbours and Chardonnay in the fridge.

Christmas Eve 2005, Kumeu, NZ

A real tree (same fairy on top), homemade paper chains and snowflakes, sunshine in the 20s, bulls for neighbours and Chardonnay on the vine in the distance.

Given the horrors and privations that some have endured in the last 365 days, we feel extraordinarily privileged to have been able to bring about change in our lives and be where we are today.

Bush telegraph

2005-12-23T19:30:00.000+13:00

In the last 36 hours, the combined technical clout of NZ's satellite TV company and national telecoms provider has converted our rural hideaway into a fully connected digital homestead. After nearly four months of expensive cellphone calls and 3G wireless data connections, we now have expensive digital satellite TV and ADSL!

This means is that, when I'm not glued to the European cinema channel eating turkey sandwiches or watching All American supermarket cart racing whilst grilling steak and prawns on the barbie, there's a good chance that I'll start writing here a little more regularly again.

[UPDATE] I have either just fried my AirPlus wifi router or it's power supply, so wifi access for my iBook will have to wait until tomorrow. All I have to do is work out which of the children's presents to return to the store for a refund to pay for a new router.

More to follow...

Hitting the road

2005-11-27T20:16:00.000+13:00

The last ten days have passed in a blur of activity and, by securing
a work permit and finding a house to rent whilst we find one to buy,
we have now cleared the last two major obstacles in the first phase
of our move to New Zealand. Just over a week ago, after four days
and 1500 kilometres of house hunting, we have found a great house to
rent in a rural township, 35 kilometres north west of Auckland.
After several days of viewing disappointing and nondescript suburban
properties, we knew that we would find it hard to live in a home that
was wedged in amongst others. Having spent too many years in a small
apartment listening to every neighbourly noise, such places were not
what we had envisaged when we decided to move halfway round the
world. Firm in our resolve to find a place where the kids would have
space to run amok, a community where we could enjoy life and make
friends and yet within commuting distance of my new job, we searched on.

Having been told that rural rentals are rarer than hen's teeth, we
continued north to a place called Kumeu[1] and popped into a real
estate agent to enquire anyway. It just so happened that one such
'hen's tooth' was back on the market that morning and the description
captured our interest. As the agent couldn't contact the outgoing
tenant, we drove out of the town and up the hill to view the property
from the road. Whilst the neighbouring Tuscan style villa, nestling
amongst the vineyards on the other side of the road had the edge in
terms of setting, the large house opposite, set back from the road
and with a large garden and patio to the rear was certainly in line
with what we were looking for.

Later that afternoon, we were able to have a look around the house
and it seemed to offer most of what we needed and wanted plus a few
other things like a sunken mosaic bath and a dressing room for the
lady of the house! Although it was a little over the budget we'd
set, we both knew that it was the best place we'd seen all week and
that the township was just the type of place we could see ourselves
settling in. Subsequent enquiries showed that the house was well
placed for access to good schools, local amenities, farm shop and a
reasonable 30 minutes from my office. We have since signed on the
dotted line, paid our bonds and deposits and will hopefully move in
at some point during the coming week.

With six humans, four cats, eighteen bags and cases, two bikes and
numerous boxes of stuff to move up country, not to mention my
upcoming daily commute, it was obvious that even our eight seat
family car would be woefully inadequate. Having driven a long 600
kilometres back to Foxton on Sunday and spent Monday running around
trying to work out what we needed to do first, we headed to
Palmerston North on Tuesday to look for the second car and trailer
we'd need to move north. During a quick lunch break, we got a call
to say that a package was awaiting collection at Palmerston North
Airport's Courier Post depot. When I drove over to collect it, I
found it contained a letter from NZ Immigration and my passport,
inside which I found my brand new two year work permit. I was
stunned; partly because it had been processed and returned to me in
under two days but also because, after a good few years' research and
planning and a large leap into the unknown without any guarantees, we
were now in New Zealand, with a home to move to, a job to start and
the permit that holds the key to our future.

I'll admit to being a little overcome for a moment or two as it all
sunk in and I felt a wave of relief pass over me. It was only then
that I realised just quite how much pressure I had put myself under
to keep focused on getting the job and permit we need to stay in New
Zealand, occasionally at the expense of my family's feelings, if the
truth be told. I think that it was then that I appreciated just what
we are in the process of accomplishing as a family: for all the
relocation programmes on television, comparatively cheap air travel
and desire for different lives, uprooting a family of six from an
established life in one country and moving them to another far away
is something that is hard to quantify and appreciate until you
experience it for yourself. After sharing the good news with SWMBO
and our dear friends Peter and Rae, we celebrated by buying a second
hand car and returning home to cook a family meal of chicken piri
piri. During this, SWMBO and I drank a toast proposed by our
daughters with a white wine charmingly called 'Cat Pee On A
Gooseberry Bush'. With a spooky twist of synchronicity, upon reading
the label, we discovered that the wine (which helps raise money for
the SPCA, in case you were wondering) is produced in the valley that
we shall be moving to. Be it fate, destiny, the prayers of friends
or sheer coincidence, it made us smile.

After many calls to shippers and Customs, it seems likely that next
week we will finally be reunited with the shipping container with all
our worldly goods in it next week after living out of 18 cases and
bags for three months. This being the case, we now have just two
days to get ourselves packed (of course, we have bought more stuff
since we arrived) and ready to leave at 0600hrs on Tuesday. It'll be
an eight to nine hour journey as a convoy to our new place, with
SWMBO driving one car with half the kids and her cats whilst I'll
take the remainder in mine, along with a load of boxes and bags in
our newly purchased trailer. Having bought the truck secondhand, we
splashed out on a trailer because every Kiwi family seems to own a
four wheel drive 'ute' and a galvanised trailer with which they haul
their sheep, cattle, white goods, hunting dogs, old mattresses,
building materials and mother-in-laws, depending on the task at
hand. As we drove back from the vehicle testing station, I turned to
SWMBO and asked her how it was that our lives had come to resemble a
Country & Western lyric - just a man, his gal, his truck 'n' his
trailer, driving into the setting sun. We thought it was funny but
you had to be there, I guess.

Joking aside, there's hardly a day goes by when we don't pinch
ourselves to check that it isn't all a dream. In just the last ten
weeks, we have abandoned the Northern autumn, snorkelled in the
Pacific, paddled the Tasman, made new friends, hiked the mountains,
been interviewed many times, swum with dolphins, joined schools,
attended clubs, seen Venus and Mars in the same night sky, drunk
lovely wines and fretted over papers and formalities. Whilst we have
had the odd blue moment and it is very early days yet, each day seems
to confirm the rightness of our decision - days where the girls can
cycle to school with minimal risk, days where one's word is still
enough to close a deal and days where the local pastor lets folk use
his open wifi connection for free because he's paid for it anyway.
Leaving the friendly folk of Foxton and Horowhenua in the week to
come, we can only hope that we find their like amongst our new
neighbours in Kumeu.

[1] http://www.kumeudistrict.co.nz/

Clearing the first hurdle

2005-11-13T11:48:00.000+13:00

Unforeseen issues and last minute hold ups notwithstanding, come the
5th of December, I will be taking on a newly-created operations and
strategy role with a regional utility company in based Auckland. It
is a smaller company than my last but the role manages and oversees
three departments: the call centre, the dispute and complaints team
and the network management centre. However, with 150,000 individual
commercial and residential customers, not to mention vendors and
third party field teams to manage, the initial challenge will be to
lead further improvements in customer service and deliver new
services for customers within the next 18 months. I am looking
forward to the novelty of working with a smaller team again in a
different industry. In the longer term, one of the attractive
aspects of the role is that I would assume a greater strategic role
in larger regional operations. I was shown around the operations
centre and met a few folks who seemed pleasant and happy in their
work. After what I understand have been a few tough years, they
seems to be a close knit team who are keen to develop and progress.

Elsewhere, whilst things are looking hopeful and we are confident of
making a go of things here, the uncertainty over permits and visas,
together with some unexpected hassles has all added to an certain
level of underlying stress. Though our visitor's visa are still OK
for another four months, I hope to have my work permit sorted within
the next two or three weeks which, in turn, will allow us to start
the long process of applying for residence visa for all the family.
The only major unforeseen problem that we have encountered thus far
concerns the shipping container that has all our worldly possessions
in it. After weeks at sea, it finally arrived at the port in
Wellington and was unloaded at the container base. The NZ shippers
contacted us regarding a few pieces of paper work and we thought that
all was going well. A week later, we were asked to provide a UK
prescription for just eight pain killer tablets that we declared had
been packed inadvertently by the shippers. Obviously, having used
the prescription to get the tablets, we were unable to comply. We
were then asked to get a private NZ doctor's letter and prescription
instead. This we did and, on all information and advice, hoped to
have our container released. However, to our annoyance, it turns out
that all this activity took us over a previously unmentioned time
limit that is applied to shipped items belonging to those with
visitor's visas. This, we were cheerfully informed, meant that we
are now liable for VAT on the shipment as Customs now deem our
belongings to be 'imported' goods rather than personal possessions.
The only upside to this is that clothes and personal effects
(jewellery, handbags etc) are not included in the calculation and
some element of depreciation will be deducted against the furniture,
books and kitchen stuff. If that is the only thing we missed in our
research, then we'll take it on the chin and move on. It seems
churlish to complain when some, like the folks affected by the
Pakistan earthquake, are homeless with just what they can carry in
their arms and no money to start again.

Now we know where I'll be working, we'll be off on a recce next week
to find rented accommodation we can move into before the Christmas
holidays, which is also the big summer break here. From there, we'll
be better able to search for schools and find a new home to buy.
With Christmas just six weeks away (where did the year go?), we'll
still be house hunting, living out of cases with most of our stuff
still packed in boxes in the garage or shed and our friends and
family will be thousands of miles away. However, the best present
this year will be the very real possibility that our new life in Te
Ika a Māui ā Aotearoa (the North Island of New Zealand) moves from
being a dream to a reality. We're convinced that "she'll be right"
as they say here. That said, we're not quite there yet and I need to
ensure that my work permit application is correctly completed and the
application filed next week if I am to start work on schedule, so I'm
off to start on that before catching the All Blacks v Ireland match a
little later.

Frequent flying

2005-11-07T21:51:00.000+13:00

A while back, one of our brood managed to lose a large set of keys to
our house and car. This must have, in some way, been working on the
subconscious of my beloved earlier this morning because, in the depth
of the night and half asleep herself, SWMBO shook me violently and,
in a rasping whisper not unlike Golum's, insisted that she 'could
hear Keith Chegwin outside!' Being woken at three in the morning to
be told that the moon-faced darling of 1970's BBC children's
television is creeping around our garden is not my preferred way to
prepare for a early morning interview. Incredulity turned to
comprehension when upon replaying the phrase in my head, my befuddled
brain realised that she had actually said that she 'could hear keys
jangling outside'. The need for sleep notwithstanding, paternal duty
and a certain amount of nervous male pride ensured that I spent the
next 5 minutes creeping from window to window, scanning the section
for intruders, famous or otherwise, whilst trying not to recall
details of brutal 'home invasions' from recent local news reports.
Having relayed that fact that the jangling was coming from the collar
bell of one of SWMBO's four cats, I returned to bed to prepare for my
interview with a few hours of restless tossing and turning, now
accompanied by persistent unbidden recollections of Keith Chegwin's
incessant nasal chirping.

It is two months exactly since we boarded an Air New Zealand Boeing
747 left the UK. In the morning, along with other bleary-eyed
business folk, I will climb aboard a much smaller aircraft for my
third day trip to Auckland in as many weeks. However, tomorrow's
flight will be different from my previous excursions up country in
that, this time, the cost of the flight will be covered by a
prospective employer, rather than our slowly diminishing family
budget. Whilst there is no business class champagne and caviar
breakfast option available on the thirty seat turboprop crop-duster
I'll be flying, I might just chance my arm and ask Kevin or Kerry,
the regular cabin crew on this route, for an extra packet of
Macadamia nut cookies to go with my stewed tea.

Whilst I am certainly no jet set executive, I have been lucky enough
to travel to a variety of places on business over the years.
Business travel can be an absolute grind, especially when the
itinerary is tight or the schedules mean long flights with bad
connections. With this in mind, I try to find something new to
offset the drawbacks and provide me with a new perspective to enjoy.
On the outbound flight of my last Auckland trip, I was seated in
front of an Un Min, the airline industry's contraction for an
unaccompanied minor. From the tone of the conversations he struck up
with both myself and another chap behind him, this small boy, no
older than ten, was already the veteran of many an internal flight
around New Zealand and Australia. From what I could gather, the lad
lived on a remote farm station and any journey to visit far-flung
family or distant friends involved, at the very least, a four wheel
drive and a small light aircraft and that was before he had left the
family property. Yet this seasoned flyer, whose trip home would
involve progressively smaller and smaller aircraft, was not too
seasoned to relish being given the job of handing round the sweets to
the other passengers, whom he proceeded to charm with a winning
combination of healthy outback complexion, cheeky smile and endless
barrage of questions.

With both my bicycles locked inside a bonded container somewhere in
the Port of Wellington, the majority of my terrestrial travel thus
far has been by car or train. Topography, geology and seismology
have all played a part in making road transport the main choice for
moving people and things up and down these long and varied islands,
with ships and boats fulfilling the crucial role of bridging the gap
in the middle and providing alternatives along the sides. I use the
all-encompassing phrase 'road transport' as we have seen all manner
of vehicles on the roads here and have become used to rounding a
corner to be confronted by some new form of wheeled vehicle the like
of which we have never seen. Even at the dinner table a week or so
back, I looked up and out of the window to see a London Route Master
double decker bus (No.18 route for those that want to know) driving
past the end of our road and down to the beach. This, we suspect,
was the 'English Rose', a bus used for tours and corporate events we
later saw plying it's trade in Wellington.

As someone who, at one time or another, has piloted bicycles,
minibuses, vans, minicabs and trucks around the busy streets of
London and around the UK, it has taken me a while to adapt to better
suit the more relaxed, though arguably more dangerous, style of
driving here. Although I would describe myself as an average driver,
my spouse has maintained for years that I am prone to certain traits
that are to be found in the sub genus Homo Automobilus. These, I am
reliably informed, include resetting the trip odometer to '0' before
each journey but never checking the final mileage, passing toilet
stops and rest areas to avoid being overtaken by those I have just
passed and demanding what other drivers are doing 'on my road'. It
goes without saying that I utterly refute such allegations but am
happy to repeat them here in the interests of balanced reporting.
That said, in the early weeks here, I did notice that I was
constantly passing people on the roads. Over the weeks, it has
dawned on me that this 'must pass' mentality was a hang over from
driving on British roads where every mile might be your last before
becoming trapped in a 20 mile Bank holiday tail-back. Of late, I am
more than happy, when the conditions allow, to edge up to just shy of
the prevailing speed limit, set the cruise control to keep me legal
and let the car take the strain, knowing that we'll get there soon
enough.

The vast majority of Kiwi drivers are perfectly sensible and
courteous but the tiny remainder fall into two distinct camps - the
dreamers and the boy racers. The former are those who make use of
the full width of the road, including the opposite lane and both
shoulders, as though driving was like one of those early video
driving games, which simply required one to steer down the black
ribbon between two sets of green pixelated markers. These folks mean
no harm but simply seem incapable of steering a vehicle within the
confines of a designated lane and clearly have less of a grasp
concerning New Zealand's particular 'give way to the right' rules
than I do. The latter, allowed to drive from the age of 15, feature
daily in the newspapers here, where graphic tales of speed freak
antics and lurid reports on road deaths share the same pages as
details of the latest safety campaigns and editorials exploring the
causal factors involved. Shock tactic television adverts feature
tearful actors as bereaved relatives or families in magically
suspended cars suddenly dropped to earth to simulate a head accident
but the thrill, kudos and machismo associated with customised cars,
ear-shattering sound-offs and street racing by New Zealand's youth
ensures the tolls continues to rise.

As with road deaths the world over, there are no easy answers and few
governments will risk their majority by taking on the road transport
lobby head to head. The inevitable corollary to this is that the
drive for such change invariably falls to volunteer campaigners and
pressure groups. Having been involved in a small way with the London
Cycle Campaign and Tower Hamlets Wheelers' Bike Buddy scheme, two
stories in Wellington's Dominion Post caught my attention this
morning which illustrate how the efforts of such groups can make all
the difference. The first concerned a novice cyclist who died whilst
out training for an upcoming charity ride. After carrying the bike
in a car, it seems that both the rider and their friend neglected to
reattach the quick-release brake cables after refitting the wheels.
Any but the shortest journey in Wellington will involve at least one
steep hill, so the consequence of this oversight was the cyclist
careered downhill, through a junction and into a pickup truck, with
fatal consequences. As "not a confident bike rider" who disliked
"riding in the city", perhaps this rider might have benefited from
having an experienced bike buddy who, as well as helping them ride
confidently along the safest route possible, might just have advised
them to check the reassembled bike before heading down a steep
slope. In the second story, prompted by a coroner's report,
Wellington City Council is considering lowering the speed limit in
the city centre from 50 to 30 kph in order to reduce deaths and
accidents involving vulnerable road users such as pedestrians and
cyclists. However, the union representing the bus and tram drivers
here claim that, because pedestrians stepping into the street leave
their members "nowhere to go", the pavements should be lined with
chains or railings except at designated crossing points. This is all
well and good unless, as has been found in London, you are a cyclist,
when these railings are potential killers that prevent riders falling
away from the traffic and leave them more vulnerable to being
crushed. Without a unified and comprehensive approach, the city runs
the risk of reducing casualty statistics in one user group only to
cause them to rise in another. Who knows, I may just add my voice to
the debate.

Talking of casualties, we had our first opportunity to experience New
Zealand's healthcare system when daughter two managed to over-extend
daughter three's ankle joint in a bout of playground rough and
tumble. Despite the lack of visible symptoms, an increase in the
pain after a few hours raised concerns enough to indicate a swift
drive to the emergency room forty kilometres away was in order.
Despite some concerns over the extent of the reciprocal healthcare
agreement between the UK and NZ, we were dealt with pleasantly and
efficiently in a clean and welcoming environment, a welcome change
from the madhouse atmosphere and cast of social outcasts that made up
London's busiest ER, which was nearest to our old UK home. After a
couple of hours waiting punctuated by a visit from a triage nurse and
a trip to x-ray, we were ushered into a consulting room to see the
doctor. Seemingly almost as young, blonde and smiley as her patient,
the lovely Dr Williams spoke with a soft lilting voice that could
only originate in the valleys of South Wales. The telltale signs of
junior doctor tiredness receded a little as she talked of home and
checked the ankle for damage. Having ascertained that the damage was
minimal, we said our goodbyes and left the good doctor to her work.
Whilst she professed to be enjoying her work experience and social
life abroad very much, I detected more than a hint of homesickness in
her tone and suspect that, on completion of her rotation, she'll be
heading back to the UK. Come tomorrow morning, I'm interviewing for
a job that may just mean that, when March rolls around, we can avoid
having to do the same.

Learning curves

2005-10-27T23:28:00.000+13:00

Standing at the dining room window, watching our two middle kids walk away from the house and off to school, it stuck me how adaptable and trusting all four offspring have been. Whilst one might reasonably expect a child to trust their parents, I am still impressed by how readily ours accepted and absorbed the fact that we were moving to the other side of the world. There were concerns about missing friends and family and the odd moment of 'I'm not going'-ness but, all things considered, they took to the idea very quickly and with hardly a moment's hesitation. Last week, the three eldest started at their respective schools and the youngest spent her first few days at the local kindergarten. Enrolling the kids in the schools and kindergarten here could not have been easier, with Kiwi pragmatism and 'can do' attitude sweeping away all our worries about visas, eligibility and paperwork. At each, we went along for an informal chat with the principle, discussed our situation and the perceived needs of the relevant child, passed across copies of previous reports and achievements and toured the schools. That was it. No drama, as they say here, no hassles, no bureaucracy, just common sense and a clear 'Put the child first' attitude.

Each is set out on a broad open campus, typical of many schools here, with expansive playing fields and sports facilities, sun-shaded outdoor picnic tables and benches for lunches and breaks surrounding single-storey classrooms filled with artwork and inspirational posters. The Kiwis place great emphasis on character development and good citizenry and it is common to find schools promoting 'virtues of the month', such as 'approaching each day with a smile' and helping maintain the cleanliness and fabric of the school'. From what we can glean, the younger two are perhaps having the easier time of settling in, whilst the older two are finding the delicate process of making new friends is taking a little longer. Early teenage years are never easy but, although we have no concerns at this time, it is still difficult to witness these quiet struggles without feeling a twinge of guilt and a modicum of helplessness.

For all those quiet parental concerns, the last week has seen several new friends coming over to visit after school and yesterday we hosted a birthday party for nine pre-teen girls, not including our own. This event was a risky venture for, over and above all the usual risks of children's birthday parties, we had unknowingly invited one or two who have been marginalised for various reasons. A number of mums mentioned this in passing but we chose to plough the UN peacekeeping furrow and carry on regardless. As firm believers in blank sheets, clean slates and speaking as we find, we felt that this was the only fair thing to do. After all, we have pitched up as outsiders in this small community and have been welcomed with warm smiles and kind gestures. As things turned out, a good time was had by all and, just maybe, a few fences were mended. The birthday girl had a marvellous time, not least because, for the very first time her birthday party was on a beautiful spring afternoon rather than a grey autumn one. In place of the previous cramped living rooms and fast food restaurants, she and her friends had the run of the beach sloping down to the rolling Tasman Sea, all framed by one hundred and eighty degrees of sky blue horizon. I hope that the day will remain with her as fond and cherished memory.

Elsewhere, the hunt for the job we need to secure our future goes on. The twice weekly ritual of scanning the papers and calling the recruiters that I have settled to has started paying dividends. As things stand, I have been shortlisted for two roles, one heading up the contact centre for a public utility who are on a mission to modernise their customer service department and the other as an operations manager of another centre in the capital. I applied for the former through a small firm of head-hunters who interviewed me and have 'pitched' me to their client in turn. From what I can ascertain, the centre is set in it's ways, the management jaded and it will take years to get anything changed. The latter role is better though, to date, having been through CV selection, an interview with a panel of senior managers, two sets of psychometric tests and another interview with a management psychologist used to check candidates' suitability, so I'm wondering what the heck it is all leading to. It would seem, from conversations with those in the know, the Kiwis are apparently very big on all this testing and it is widely used, so I had better get used to it.

I have also had some very interesting exploratory interviews with a large nationwide organisation and it's new subsidiary. From these initial meetings and a tour of their operation, I have hopes that something will develop so, having suddenly got superstitious, I'll say no more for now. Finally, we have seen a senior immigration officer this week and he was helpful in resolving some of our concerns and advising on turning a formal job offer and the requisite paperwork into a work permit. Once we have the permit and I am working, we can start the formal application for longer term residency. All in all, we're gradually settling into our various routines, balancing the starting of new friendships with maintaining the old, comparing new possibilities to the well-known, while all the while pinching ourselves.

Interlude

2005-10-27T20:48:00.000+13:00

A little earlier this week, whilst writing and listening to music, I had a quite unexpected moment. Looking up from the screen, my attention was drawn by the sunset and, walking to the window, I looked out on the most incredible rays of burnished golds and pinks, blazing through a Venetian blind of streaked clouds above dark blue and copper waves. As I listened to the beautiful 'Benedictus' from Karl Jenkins' The Armed Man: A Mass For Peace and gazed at this fleeting treasure, I felt a small, warm hand reach for mine and looked down at my youngest. I scooped her onto my hip and we stood there together without a word and watched the sun slip from our sky, perhaps I'd like to think to rise over other father and his daughter beyond the ocean.

Must try harder

2005-10-19T21:04:00.000+13:00

Today, I have tanked, ploughed, crashed and burned. As the weeks pass and the interview count increases, it was only a matter of time before I turned in an interview performance that was less than sparkling and today was that day. This morning, after an solid hour of wide ranging questions from a formal interview panel of three, I was asked to simply name the case management software deployed in my last operation. Almost before the question was even completed, I realised I'd blanked and what's more, as I looked from one patiently waiting face to another, I knew that nothing would bring it to mind.

In my career, I have given boardroom presentations, handled difficult negotiations and delivered training to hundreds of people. In these situations, I have faced unexpected questions, carefully considered challenges and requests for clarification and, by knowing my material backwards and being able to think on my feet, have crafted the appropriate response and replied accordingly. Knowing this, you might have some idea of how surprised I was to find my mind vacant and incapable of a coherent response. Whilst one half of my brain was still processing the novelty of the situation, the other was acutely aware that questions regarding resource management and budgeting were coming thick and fast and I was not doing a good job of answering them. I spent the second hour of the interview fighting a rearguard action to make up lost ground, trying to reclaim a little of my professional pride and salvage a few scraps of dignity along the way. The panel members were cordial and polite to a fault but I sensed that I'd had my chance and blown it.

I conspired to do all this during the first of two back-to-back interviews, so my earlier fumblings were fresh in my mind as I walked to the second. As this second meeting took the form of an informal 'get to know you' lunch in a bijou Wellington bistro with a key player from one of the national banks, how could anything go wrong? My cheeks, still burning from the disconcerting loss of memory and the subsequent scramble to re-establish credibility in the previous interview, flushed again as my lunch partner opened by saying how impressed he'd been by my CV. This had been forwarded by his colleague, whom I'd met with a week or so ago in Auckland and, after running a few checks with the recruiters, the chap decided that he'd like to meet to see if I'd 'fit' his organisation. We slipped into a very pleasant chat, he asking the questions and I, composure regained and confidence restored, providing the answers until our bijou food arrived.

Over quesadillas and braised kidneys, I was pleased to learn that we shared common opinions on a fair number of issues and, with my earlier troubles receding, I relaxed into the moment. Sadly, I relaxed a little too much and, whilst listening intently to my lunch companion, a momentary pause of my right hand changed the delicate balance of a kidney on my fork, sending the morsel into the rich sauce below. Ploop! Like blood spattering a condo wall in an episode of 'CSI Miami', the sauce rose to prescribe a perfect arc across my crisp white shirt. Idly noting that the spray had strangely missed my tie altogether, I pulled the kind of 'You wouldn't believe me if I told you' face that Stan Laurel used to give Oliver Hardy, dabbed myself with a napkin and commenced my second face-saving campaign of the day. To be fair, we both laughed and the conversation continued as before, with no further mention of the incident.

I walked back to the car, dreading the third interview of the day, namely the debrief with She Who Must Be Obeyed. After explaining that she might want to keep the champagne on ice a while longer, we fell into a deflated silence on the drive home. As we headed north, I found myself wondering how my respective interviewers would remember this day. Would the panel I met earlier always reflect on 'that nicely presented guy' who completely blanked when asked which software package his team used? Would the key player from the bank decline to pursue matters further but be quietly grateful for the 'I once interviewed this Pom...' story he can tell around the campfire at next year's team building weekend?

Only time will tell.

Turbulence

2005-10-09T21:57:00.000+13:00

"Oh...Dear...Lord..."

My neighbour, whose fingers were clamped deeply and firmly into the headrest in front of him, was clearly not enjoying the flight and spent a good deal of it in the 'brace' position recommended on the card in the pocket in front of him. To be fair, a small propeller-driven commuter aircraft flying up New Zealand's west coast is not necessarily where one would choose to be when springtime Westerlies are blowing in across the Tasman from Australia. Riveting though the in-flight magazine was, it was no match for the drama unfolding in the cabin during the one hour flight from Palmerston North to Auckland. After complimentary coffee and tea had decorated enough laps and the hostess had fallen over twice, the cabin crew gave up serving the in-flight breakfast snack and passed amongst the passengers with rosaries, lucky heather and next-of-kin forms. Massive air pockets sent the plane lurching earthwards, leaving me an inch above the seat straining against my belt, until our descent was arrested by vigourous updrafts that pushed me down into the padding like a large invisible hand. Combined with the gale howling the other side of the small Plexiglass window, these roller-coaster moments made for an interesting trip and the relief of being back on the ground was evident on the faces of my fellow passengers as we filed across the apron to the terminal building.

I had flown to Auckland for an interview with the deputy HR director of a large national organisation. The interview had come about as a result of a 'float' by one of the recruiters I am using. A float, I discovered, is recruiter jargon for pitching a candidate to a prospective employer without a particular role in mind. Whilst this might sound a bit hit and miss, New Zealand's present economic climate, low rate of unemployment - most employable people are gainfully employed - and static population mean that even the best of positions might only receive two or three applications. This being the case, employers are keen to meet with a promising candidate in the hope that they can match them to existing or upcoming roles in their organisations. In this case, the float was a good one, not only from from my point of view but that of the HR director and operations manager I interviewed with as well. The organisation seems to offer what I'm looking for and, I'm reliably informed, their feedback regarding me was unusually positive, with a specific commitment to try and find a role within the organisation that I could formally apply for.

Suitably cheered by the positive response, I returned from Auckland only to find that I shall have to fly back again next week, for a pre-interview with another recruiter concerning a position with a utility company. Should this gives the impression that job hunting in NZ is simply a matter of jetting about meeting people, then let me set the record straight. Far away from our old lives and networks, I have found it hard to establish an effective daily job hunting routine and securing two interviews in two weeks belies the routine slog that brought them about. Given that we have no landline telephone and therefore no fixed internet access at the beach house, establishing some sort of routine has become essential to making any progress in my job hunting. Usually, this routine involves checking the career sections in the New Zealand Herald and the Dominion Post (Mondays, Wednesdays and Saturdays), highlighting suitable roles and creating a tracking file for each role or recruiter. In these files, I record all the ad details, emails, phone conversations and meetings regarding each role. Given that, as of today, I am actively working with seven recruiters on six separate applications, not to mention other agencies I am registered with or jobs I'm applying for direct, I need to be comfortable with my system and confident I am on top of all that I need to do each day. As someone used to having at least 2Mb broadband access, fixed line telephone and a home office space to work with, trying to work without such things has been more of a challenge than I had bargained for.

My iBook and my new Nokia 6680 are both Bluetooth-capable and this means, in theory at least, that I can get online and work anywhere I can get a decent phone signal and faster 3G access in the major cities. In practise, things are a little more difficult and this has proven to be the most frustrating aspect of life here for me so far. GPRS, that is to say a fast data connection via my cellphone, is pretty costly here and means a pre-pay phone like the one SWMBO is using is out of the question, so I chose the 3G phone hoping to benefit from a faster service on a cheaper account tariff. Without an established credit history, signing up for a mobile account without a credit limit has been a trial and, whilst I have applied for an open account cleared by direct debit each month, I have yet to hear whether or not this has been approved. In the meantime, I have discovered that there is nothing more infuriating than preparing a bunch of emails and attachments, only to have the connection drop halfway through sending your mails because you have reached your credit limit. I have four other options available; using the internet terminals at the local township library 5 kms away or the main library 20 kms away or driving 40kms to Palmerston North to use an internet cafe or the pay-as-you-go wifi access at one of the coffee houses. Of these, the wifi option is preferable as I can access all my own documents on the iBook without the hassle of having to transferring them.

This uncertain state of affairs has driven me to distraction and, to my shame, have caused more than a few periods of turbulence and dark clouds around the house. Difficulties and frustrations are magnified by the fact that, as a family, we are removed from familiar surroundings, estranged from friends and colleagues and in each other's company twenty four hours a day. The kids have relished their time away from school and, in the absence of their usual TV programmes, have played together a lot more. The simple fact that they can now occupy three bedrooms, as opposed to the solitary room they shared in the UK, has helped to reduce sibling rivalries and tensions significantly but their noisy and boisterous games don't make for the conducive work-like atmosphere. Likewise, having a boring Dad who is always asking for quiet and moaning about the noise can cramp the style of four energetic youngsters. The lack of a desk or office space means that I must either perch on the end of the dining room table or retire to an easy chair in the corner of the living room to work, using my iPod to blot out the mayhem and chaos that goes on around me. Occasionally, I retreat to the bedroom downstairs to concentrate or make a call, in the fervent hope that the person I'm calling can't hear the fratricidal goings-on upstairs. Unused to spending so much time in each other's company, spousal relations have been strained too. Be it a disagreement about whether we should get a second car (without a car, you're pretty well stranded in rural NZ) or a misunderstanding about something that was said back in the UK, every conversation is a potential flash point. Without the routines and support structures we are used to, both of us are aware and afraid of getting into arguments that we can't resolve easily, fearful of long silences at the dinner table and, despite the very necessary electric blankets, cold shoulders at bedtime. After the storm has passed, tentative peace talks usually identify the causal factor of any dispute fairly quickly and, with both parties agreeing a mutually acceptable solution, hostilities dissolve and the house takes on a cordial atmosphere once again.

Storms of the meteorological kind have also played a significant part in our lives over the last two weeks. The view from our living room window is made up of just three elements; sand dunes, sky and sea. Like coast dwellers since time began, we often find ourselves transfixed by the view. Here, a world away from the crowded view of our London flat, we marvel at the cloud formations that announce the arrival of another weather front and crashing breakers that deposit the Tasman Sea at our back door. Just today, I found myself struck by the fact that, at an elemental level, there is no physical barrier between the cold angry water that foams over the dark volcanic sand here and the warm, reef-protected lagoon off Rarotonga where we snorkelled amongst pipe fish and coral just a few weeks back. That said, as Captains Cook and Tasman and the other pakeha who explored and mapped New Zealand discovered, the coastal water here are influenced by the winds and waves of the Pacific and Tasman, not to mention the frigid waters of the Antartic and, as such, are prone to impressive storms around each equinox.

Conscious that the preceding paragraphs read like the moans of a 'whinging Pom' (see joke below), let me reassure you that we love being here and are thoroughly enjoying ourselves. How can one complain about a country where one can buy five double-scoop ice cream cones for $5 (£1.97) or a five minute errand takes an hour and a half because every one wants to chat and find out why you're here? In our admittedly limited experience so far, we have found almost all Kiwis to be generous with both their time and resources. For instance, the local pastor, having learned of my lack of connectivity when the family attended church last weekend, immediately tracked me down and offered me the use of his Airport Extreme wireless broadband connection any time I needed it. This has meant that, in the last week, I have been able to work from his dining room table or, when I have just needed to send the odd mail, simply pull up outside his house, log onto his home network and hit the 'send' button in my mail application. We have received solid house buying advice from a waitress that tallied with similar advice from friends and a chance word in a $2 shop led to the loan of a cat basket when we needed to collect the cats from the cattery.

Despite our uncertain immigration status, the principals of both the local primary school and the local college have both been happy to enrol the three eldest girls, citing the need for them to get settled and make new friends as being more important than funding and paper work, at least for the time being. Both schools are made up of bright, airy single storey buildings laid out across large spacious campuses. Here, large playing fields with an abundance of climbing frames, play equipment and open air swimming pools with sun canopies are the norm even for the smallest schools. The classrooms are filled with artwork and project material that draws equally from both the Maori and Pakeha (European settler) cultures, alongside a multitude of All Blacks posters, which stand as testament to the strong national pride here as well as the fierce opposition the local teams dealt the British Lions in June. The general ethos in the schools seems to be one of work hard, play hard but have fun doing both. Come tomorrow morning, we will see if this is borne out as the eldest girls will start their New Zealand school careers, a little nervous of what to expect but excited too. Although the littlest has been attending an Early Years Unit at a London primary school since she was three, children here do not attend school until their fifth birthday so we're hoping to sign her up at the local kindergarten in the meantime, so she can make friends and SWMBO can have a few hours to herself each weekday.

The landscape here is simply wonderful and we are truly lucky to be able to view the vast expanse of the ocean from one side of the house and the low mountains of the Tararua State Forest Park from the other. Any car journey affords great views of the hills across the rolling farms, wide flood plains and thick swathes of fir. The wide views and distant horizons have enabled us to see the complete arc of the most vivid rainbows we have ever seen. At night, without the light pollution that blights so many places these days, the sky is crammed with stars and, just over a week ago, we saw a shooting star streak across the sky, mirrored in the ocean below. The southern spring is slowly giving way to summer and the fields are filled with young lambs, calves and foals, all grazing on the rich grass of riverine meadows of Horowhenua, the region where we currently live.

Our nearest large town is Levin and it looks like many others here, based as it is around a main street that sits astride a State Highway. On each side, the highway is bounded by covered walkways and canopies outside the shops and stores. Interspersed with these are entrance to small shopping malls that run perpendicular to the road and often lead to large parking lots at the rear. More often than not, these are surrounded by the larger chain stores and supermarkets. The fact that these large stores are away from the main street helps to preserve not only the feel of an older high street but means that the smaller independent store have more than a fighting chance in grabbing their share of passing trade. At either end of the main street, the shops gradually give way to the larger commercial premises of car dealerships, builders merchants and other service industry outlets. The town boasts a great adventure park where the kids went wild yesterday until rain stopped play, a small aquatic centre where we swam today and a thriving cinema that shows world cinema releases alongside blockbusters.

Closer to home, Foxton is a small town built around a Main Street that is one block back from but parallel to State Highway 1. As the first settlement of the Manawatu, Foxton had aspirations to become the regional hub but, unlike most towns in the region, was not founded on a farming community. Founded by a Presbyterian missionary in 1848, the town only began to thrive when a flax mill was opened twenty years later, processing flax harvested from the surrounding swamps. The town eventually grew to support fifty mills and a thriving river port but Foxton's growth was also it's undoing. A wooden tramway (later railway) was built to connect it to the new settlement of Palmerston North, which lay 40kms inland. However, a depressed economy and the diversion of the railways to serve business interests elsewhere sealed Foxton's fate, with it's gradual decline ironically balanced by Palmerston North's growth into a thriving university city. Today, a carpet factory, providing local jobs but itself under threat, is all that remains of this manufacturing heritage and the town is now reliant on tourism and crafts for it's main incomes.

To the seaward side of Foxton lies Foxton Beach, where we are living in a house kindly lent to us by friends. The township is comprised mostly of homes belonging to retirees and beach houses ('baches'), interwoven with the odd holiday motel and motor camp (caravan park). Intriguingly, I was told in conspiratorial tones by a local that a lot of single parents on low incomes move here, though quite what I was to make of that I am not sure. This little community sits in the mouth of the Manawatu estuary with a sailing club and slipway nestled alongside a bird sanctuary. Apart from the usual dairy (corner shop) and petrol station, commerce in the township also includes a second hand store that is never open, Mr Grumpy's fish and chip shop and a small bar and eatery called Simply Balmy. All this is overseen and protected by a volunteer fire service who are summoned by what sounds like a nuclear attack siren, an enormous lifeguard station on the beach and a police station that is smaller than our living room. Whilst it is highly unlikely that I will find work locally or that we will settle here long term, it is a delightful area full of wonderful little towns and lovely people. Our time here so far has proven to be a marvellous antidote of to our many years of city living and a superb introduction to the country we hope to make our home.

Kiwi joke: How can you tell if an aeroplane at the airport is carrying Poms? The whining carries on after the engines are turned off!

Dislocated

2005-09-27T10:58:00.000+12:00

Six people, twenty two pieces of luggage, three international flights over twelve thousand miles, seven hotel and resort rooms, four yellow cabs, one Hollywood premier and a swim in a waterfall - the last three weeks have been like no other in my life. Whilst I set out with the intention of posting my thoughts, impressions and feeling as we travelled, the simple practicalities of taking notes whilst in transit, finding time to write them up and securing decent internet access have conspired to extinguish the little incentive I had left at the end of each day. Moreover, I was conscious that I wanted my emigration experience to be a participative, family one, not that of a stand-alone observer watching from the outside, dutifully taking notes. So, rather than a day-by-day account of the ‘what I did on my holidays’ genre, which would undoubtedly turn out to be the written equivalent of viewing someone else’s holiday slides, what you have below is a collection of notes typed at various points along the way.
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Staring at my own reflection in the toilet of a Air New Zealand 747, thousands of feet high over Hudson Bay, it still hasnt sunk in. The redundancy has happened, our home and car are sold and our belongings together with our pets have been shipped to the other side of the world. The tearful goodbyes and leaving parties must surely count for something, as must the swapping of email addresses and promises to keep in touch, but I feel strangely hollow right now. The ever-increasing whirlwind that we have been through seems to have numbed me to a point where I cant quite put my finger on what I am meant to be feeling right now. I feel tired but that can be put down to the cumulative effects of recent weeks activities - the last days of commuting, the packing and re-packing, the phone calls and the visits, the arguments and the funny moments. I feel restless after too many nights when my mind wouldnt stop churning things which then gave way to last few nights of fitful rest on a friends floor until, with the arrival of this morning, there are, as the youngest would say, no more ‘sleeps’ to be slept. Most of all I feel impatient, no make that keen; keen for us to be done with all the planning, all the preparations and be on our way.
--
After two days in Los Angeles, we’re finally at gate 27 at LAX waiting to be called for our flight to Rarotonga in the Cook Islands. The blinkered and zenophobic attitudes that are now part and parcel of airport transits in the US are enough to leave a bad taste in the mouth of any ‘alien’. Such Homeland Security hoop-jumping would be enough on it’s own but the local check-in agent here was keen not to be outdone. Despite Air New Zeland allowing us to check 12 bags and a child’s car seat in London, ‘Hello, My name is Raoul, how can I screw up your day?’ had other ideas. He of the name badge, nylon blazer and Supa-Size attitude insisted that we may only check 12 with his airline, regardless of any previous arrangement in London, for ‘security reasons’. Quite how a Mothercare fabric and polystyrene car seat poses a threat to the Free World is unclear but Raoul was unmoved by our logic. Unmoved that is, until we removed the smallest case, reducing the pile to the required twelve pieces, stating that we’d take it as carry-on luggage instead. With his frozen smile changing to a death mask, Raoul insisted on measuring it in the hope that it will be too big or over-weight but eventually. We tried not to smile as he begrudgingly accepted the cases & car seat to tag and send on their way.
--
Or so we thought. With the grinding inevitability that follows all Pyhric victories, Raoul has the last laugh. We arrive in Rarotonga in the early hours of the morning to find that we are short one piece of luggage - the car seat. Of course, it turns up later, after a day or so, just long enough to make sure we know who is really in charge. I should have known better than to piss Raoul off. I knew a military logistics guy who, upon being abused by a condescending officer heading for UK from the Falkland Islands, redirected the officer’s personal effects to a camp in Canada where they were snowed in until the spring thaw the following year.
--
I like many things about America and have a good few friends across the US but, make no mistake, there has been a definite increase in their very special brand of self-assured, swaggering arrogance and cosy insularity since 9/11. In recent months, when mentioning to a US-based colleague that we were emigrating from the UK, they would invariably ask ‘Which state are you heading for?’, as if the United States was the only option worthy of consideration. Strangely, there are a fair number of superficial similarities between the US and New Zealand: the grid-based street layouts; the canopied shopping strips of the small towns along the State Highways; the dollar sign and old Chevrolet pickup trucks are all reminiscent of small town America. However, within minutes of our landing in New Zealand, our progress through the arrivals hall at Auckland airport only served to highlight the difference in attitude towards visitors and the cultural mindset in general. Where immigration at LAX offered one queue for non-US passport holders and 8 channels for returning citizens, Auckland offered an equal number of channels and, for those like us with young children, a separate fast-track channel. Even with six passports and visas to be reviewed, scanned, processed and stamped, we were politely dealt with and on our way inside 15 mins. In a world that is increasingly wary of those who seek to leave their birth nation to seek a new life in another country, it speaks volumes that the NZ immigration officer actually smiled and wished me good luck in finding the job I need to secure the longer-term visas we need to remain in New Zealand.
--
There have been surprisingly few tears and tantrums thus far. We have had the usual arguments and moods but, as yet, no major explosions of emotions over leaving the UK for the unknown of our present life in New Zealand. Climbing wearily onto the plane for the middle of the three legs, the youngest was heard to say that she wanted to ‘go home’. Having been awake for the 12 hours preceeding a 12 hour flight, it seemed that her idea of home was wherever she could lay down and sleep, which she promptly did for most of the flight.
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With the snickety-snick of the hire car’s handbrake, we finally stopped travelling five days ago. For now, our home is a friend’s beach house, set at the end of a road amongst the wind blown sand dunes of New Zealand’s Kapiti Coast. From the windows and the deck outside, we can watch large grey rolling waves, driven by the Westerlies crossing the Tasman Sea from Australia, break on the wide and wild expanse of sand that stretches for miles in each direction. The small township in which we are staying boasts a small bar, a smaller police hut, a fish and chip shop, a diary (corner shop), a service station, two schools, two churches, two bible camps, several hotels and camp sites, a sailing club and collections of small individual homes strung along quiet streets. Backtracking five kilometres back east brings us to the nearest small town which is pretty much the same but only larger by dint of the fact that it sits astride the State Highway, itself a simple two lane road with occasional passing places. Once the home to a thriving flax industry that is now reduced to one carpet factory, Foxton proclaims itself to be ‘Hometown, NZ’ on its sign and quite rightly, for it appears to be the quintessential small town with just enough of the necessary infrastructure intact to function and serve local folks immediate needs. Twenty kilometres south, Levin is a good example of the best of both worlds, the old fashioned canopied stores lining the main street and adjacent side streets interspersed with small malls and arcades of shops. Car lots and service industry outlets cluster at either end of the main street, just before the points where the speed limit signs allow the through traveller to accelerate back onto the rural highway. Tucked away behind the facades of the main street and down the side turnings, the chain supermarkets jostle with the small office buildings of the local professionals. This seems to be the pattern across a significant proportion of NZ with folks seemingly prize local services and streets fronted by family-owned stores, ahead of chain stores and out-of-town retail parks. Quite how long this state of affairs will last I’m not sure. With the weekend paper carrying a big feature story about the techniques supermarkets use to part shoppers from their cash, it would seem that the Kiwis may soon be subjected to the rampant all-conquering commercialism of the 24/7 megastore culture so prevalent in the Northern Hemisphere.
--
It has only taken a few days to drive home (pun intended) the fact that New Zealand is a car-driving, road transport-orientated country. We are covering distances that we’d rarely need to in the UK just to get to the places we need to be in order to get our new lives set up. The nearest internet access, for we have no phone line at the house, is 20kms away in a public library but limited to simple read/write activities. For the high speed, high bandwidth access I need for sending CVs, downloading tax documents and handling any volume of email, it’s a 2 hour, 100km trip to the nearest wifi hotspot (in a Starbucks coffee shop of course) in Palmerston North. Already our London-raised kids are becoming hardened to the fact that if you want anything more than the local store offers, it means at least a twenty minute car ride. Given that the location of our first proper home in NZ will be pretty much dictated by where I can secure employment, I suspect that there are a few prayers being said for Dad getting a job in the heart of one of the cities and a home in the suburbs. Having said that, none of us have really begun to adjust yet. That we are here for the foreseeable future and not heading home after a holiday is slowly becoming clear and I am sure that each of us will have moments when we might wish otherwise. I came close today when the umpteenth attempt to get a rudimentary dail-up connection via my cellphone at the beach house failed, the lack of my familiar broadband connection to the rest of the world only emphasising the enormity of the decision we made in coming here. A couple of hours and a few words of prayer by SWMBO later, I managed to get connected, albeit at an excrutiatingly slow speed and the dark moment passed. Tomorrow sees that beginning of another week and the continuing tasks of setting up home and getting employment, though if the first week is anything to go by, we’re in for more cultural adjustments and frustrations mixed with new acquaintances and humourous goings-on.

Because it is there

2005-08-21T00:26:00.000+12:00

'Because it is there' was George Mallory's now-famous response to the 'Why climb Everest?' questions that he endured before losing his life on his third attempt in 1924 - 29 years before it was finally accomplished by Aucklander Sir Edmund Hillary and Nepalese Sherpa Tenzing Norgay. We have a good friend, Elaine, who lives in the Netherlands and visited us recently. Elaine has unknowingly provided me with my equivalent answer for all those who ask us why we are moving to the other side of the world without having secured a job or even residency. In an email yesterday, she quoted Charlotte Bronte and I find the quotation apt for describing the mixture of excitement and uncertainity within us all as we approach this new phase in our family life:

"Better to try all things and find all empty, than to try nothing and leave your life a blank"

Charlotte Bronte: Shirley

Joy and numbness

2005-08-20T03:05:00.000+12:00

A day of mixed emotions. Earlier today, the last major obstacle to our move abroad disappeared when we received a call to say that our solicitors had finally exchanged contracts on the sale of our flat. This means that, barring unforeseen circumstances, the shippers will pack and ship our entire home contents on the 5th September and we'll move out on the 6th, the day before we leave the UK for the first leg of our trip to New Zealand. An hour later, the upbeat mood had evaporated as, oblivious to the traffic noise and rain, I hugged my father goodbye at Kings Cross mainline station. He was returning home to Yorkshire after a three day visit and, although we knew this moment was coming, I doubt that either of us were certain in the knowledge of exactly how we would feel when the time came. Speaking for myself, I feel numb and more than a little off-centre, as I keep hearing him saying 'have a good life' as he walked away from my without looking back. It was a simple statement without side but it resonates inside me still. His words drive home the fact that our decision to move abroad, fuelled by a desire to offer the kids a better family life than we can in the UK, also means the inevitable estrangement of our nearest and dearest. Whilst we have often discussed such partings and what the effect on those involved might be, I sense that it is only when faced with these moments of separation that we truly know what is in our hearts and how we might cope.

Not wanted on voyage

2005-08-19T03:43:00.000+12:00

The Sealand Michigan

Reading through the paperwork sent by our international movers this afternoon, I noticed that they have even specified which container vessel they will be shipping our worldly goods on. A swift search on Google produced a good few pictures showing the 75,000 tonne Sealand Michigan, like the one above. Seeing all those containers stacked that way reminds me of nothing so much as a giant game of topple blocks and this image doesn't sit well with the phrase 'total loss insurance' which features prominently in the shippers' contract.

Pulled in all directions

2005-08-07T23:55:00.000+12:00

This time next month, we will either be sleeping fitfully or watching cable TV in hotel rooms somewhere in Los Angeles, en route to the Cook Islands and ultimately our new life in New Zealand. Actually, as things stand at present, it is far from certain that we’ll have even got that far on our journey by then. Currently, we find ourselves in one of those Catch-22 situations where everything hinges on everything else and no-one involved seems particularly bothered about the outcome. Therein lies the naked truth of the matter: this is our family choice, not the removal company’s; this is our life-changing decision, not the immigration service’s; this is our leap-in-the-dark, not the estate agent’s. The place we find ourselves in is one of our own choosing and of our own making. We have wished all the chaos and confusion, all the bickering and spousal frustration, all the endless sibling disagreements on ourselves. As I type, we are awaiting news from our prospective buyer’s solicitor as to the date when we might reasonably expect to exchange contracts and move out. This is an improvement on last week, when we discovered that the same person had not only gone on holiday but had done so mistakenly believing that we had chosen not to go ahead with the sale of our flat. In turn, this has meant that we have had to delay the two-day pack and load session by the movers who will ship our belongings to New Zealand. As a consequence of this, there is a very good chance that our provisionally booked flights and connections will now have to be rescheduled, assuming that we can find six seats on the same flights and the same routes we had planned but later in the week.

Sitting in the sun-dappled garden of our friend’s house yesterday, I listened, as if to someone else, as we once again explained why we have chosen to leave all we know and love to move to the other side of the world without any guarantee that we will still want, let alone be able, to stay there. An outside observer might have caught an exchanged look between our friends or heard a slight hollowness in the oft-repeated phrases we trotted out yet, with redundancy just weeks away and a home far too small for a family of six, it still feels like exactly the right thing to do. As I cycled through London’s Hyde Park on the way to work one morning last week, a persistently vague thought began to crystallise and come into focus. As with almost everything in our lives, soon this journey will no longer be part of my daily routine and, although it will be replaced with journeys and activities as yet unknown, there are only a handful of such journeys in London left before me. In recent weeks, I have often find myself thinking “This’ll be the last time I do this” or “I wish I had time to do that before we go”, not so much with sadness as curiosity, as if I’d not expected to feel this way which, if I’m honest, is the truth. I had not expected to feel so attached to places, so bound to people, so linked to things around me.

Is this then an integral part of many an emigrant’s experience, a longing for things not yet lost, a mourning for an old life not yet finished? For me, it is not unlike the feelings I experienced when I knew a friend was losing his battle against cancer; bereft, disbelieving, empty and with so much to say yet unable to find the right words in the short time left. Now, almost a year after his death, I still keep his name and number on my mobile phone, as if I can still just call and talk to him. So, with the time for our departure coming up fast, perhaps I am seeking the emigrant’s equivalent of my friend’s telephone number, a talisman of my old life that I can carry into my new one. For me, with this thought comes a pleasing connection to a small act of kindness by a Kiwi friend a couple of years ago. She was travelling home to see her family before emigrating with her partner from the UK to Canada. Amongst her leaving gifts and good luck cards, I placed a small envelope which contained a small, faded yellow and green friendship bracelet which had recently worn through and finally snapped. This I had worn since the day my daughter made it and tied it around my wrist so, whilst I couldn’t bring myself to throw it away, I was unsure of what to do with it. My friend’s departure provided inspiration and so, in the accompanying note, I asked that she bury the bracelet somewhere in New Zealand to act as a ‘magnet’ which, if the attraction was strong enough, would draw us there. I’m not normally given to such gestures or talk of destiny and usually find such sentiment mawkish in others. However, there’s no denying that I find myself more than tempted to believe that that small tattered bracelet, made with a daughter’s love and worn with a father’s pride, beckons our family southwards and will do so until we answer the call. It seems that we simply have to take this step to continue our journey as a family, no matter where it takes us.

Closer to the dream

2005-07-10T01:37:00.000+12:00

Six or so weeks on from my last post, there now appears to be very little that stands in the way of us moving to New Zealand…other than the fact that I have not been able to secure a job that will allow us to secure right of residency visas there. Whilst this is often the single most important factor in any planned immigration, it is also the hardest to achieve remotely unless one’s professional skills are deemed to be in short supply and qualify for Skilled Migrant status.

After much consultation with friends, advisors and recruitment folks in New Zealand, we have decided to relocate regardless. The deciding factor in this is that I am to made redundant from my position in the UK at the end of August. Rather than focus on trying to secure a short-term position here whilst I continue to hunt for a position 12,000 miles away, we have decided to sell our flat and car, pack all our belongings into a 40ft container bound for the southern hemisphere, buy 6 return tickets and head for London’s Heathrow Airport. Although we have yet to book our flights, we are currently thinking of flying with Air New Zealand as they have generous baggage allowances for emigrees – essential for families that are 5/6ths female and fashion-conscious. Given we haven’t had a family break this year, we are also considering breaking up the journey with a couple of stopovers, perhaps a couple of days in California (Los Angeles is an Air NZ hub) followed by another four or five days in the Cook Islands. The additional costs appear to be small and I feel we’d benefit both physically and mentally from the break.

Once there, I’ll concentrate on getting a work-to-residency or skilled migrant position whilst the family find their feet. Rae and Peter, the parents of one of our Kiwi friends here in London, have kindly offered their bach (beach house) for us to use as our initial base. Located an hour or so north of Wellington, it will provide us with a ‘sponsored’ abode for our visitor and student visas as well as a base for house and job hunting. Furthermore, as I am not restricting my job hunting to just Wellington, the airport at Palmerston North 40 kms away may prove to be handy if I need to fly to Auckland, Christchurch or Dunedin.

Despite all this activity and planning, we are still in a state in bemused denial. Other people emigrate, we say, not us. It is always us seeing folks off on their travels, not the other way around. Yet, all being well, it will soon be us climbing on board a plane, ready to swap years of dreaming and planning for new beginnings in a new country.

Sixty days

2005-05-24T06:48:00.000+12:00

Sixty days is a significant period of time. Wars are won, fortunes lost, regimes toppled and new hope raised in less time. All of which is my way of acknowledging that a lot of water has passed under the bridge since I last wrote here. In the intervening time, my attention has been almost entirely taken up with the mundane and the humdrum, the ins and outs of everyday life. That said, thoughts of a new life and emigration have always been there, surfacing into conscious thought when time and space have allowed.

One of the key reasons behind the lack of updates was the fact that my blog became more widely known in my workplace than I was comfortable with. For this reason, I decided that discretion was the better part of valour and allowed things to cool off for fear of causing problems for myself. Whilst I am keen to resume regular blogging here, I am not quite ready for ‘no holds barred’ posting just yet. Suffice to say, we have been making steady progress with our plans, working away at the myriad tasks and to-dos that need to be attended to in order to even think about moving to the other side of the world.

More, more regularly, soon.

The supermodel in my bed

2005-03-21T01:03:00.000+12:00

In the week since I have returned home, I have woken in the night more than a few times, bidden by my bodyclock to be doing something other than sleep. The first few seconds of wakefulness have been typified by uncomprehending confusion for, no matter how familiar the surroundings of my bedroom might appear in the minutes that follow, my first thought is a conviction that I am in an airport hotel somewhere in New Zealand. My next thoughts are that I don’t know where the toilet is and, more worryingly, I’m in bed with a woman. In the agonising seconds that follow, one half of my befuddled brain tries to work out where the toilet is whilst the other half desperately ponders on how I am going to explain the woman in bed to SWMBO. After what can be no more than ten or more seconds, there comes the slow and blessed realisation that I am actually in my own bedroom and the sleeping form next to me is in fact the wife and not some Kiwi supermodel who would stop at nothing to prevent my return to the UK.

Having never travelled to the other side of the world and back before, I have no idea whether this sort of behaviour is normal after long haul flights or in fact I’m undergoing some sort of forty-something mental meltdown. After a week, I am seemingly back to normal and confident that the three-in-a-bed activities of the last week are behind me. That said, the disturbed sleep and disorientation has served to emphasise two things to me; just how far away New Zealand is and, somewhat surprisingly, how quickly my consciousness adapted to the solitary existence of such a road trip. Although the phrase is a little over-worn, ‘alone not lonely’ would be a fair way of describing my time in New Zealand for, whilst there were periods of lonliness in which I missed SWMBO and the kids, I was very fortunate to meet some wonderful people. These people ranged from bus drivers and waiters to the siblings and parents of folks I know and, without exception, each and everyone of them enhanced my trip. So, in the fervent hope that I will avoid gushing like a starlet at the Oscars, I would like to mention a few of those who helped make my visit the experience it was.

Linda, Gideon, Susie, David and Amy for their hospitality, friendship and good humour. There are not many busy families who will alter their plans in minutes to welcome a jetlagged semi-stranger so warmly - and then invite him back twice more. If ever there were a family who embody what we envisage for ourselves, we need look no further.

Rita and Steve for their generosity of time and advice. Steve gave up a whole day to give me a whirlwind tour of Auckland’s suburbs and amenities, introducing me to the culinary delights of pies and fresh Kiwi produce then fitting in a quick swim in the Pacific before joining Rita for a wonderful dinner and an evening of great conversation.

Di and Paul for taking me to my first English theme pub to watch my first Super 12 game…and then taking me to an Irish theme pub after Ireland beat England in the Six Nations.

Rae and Peter who made the diversion to Palmerston North so worthwhile, offering me the biggest lunch of the trip and a marvellous drive through the Manawatu-Wanganui countryside – not to mention Rae’s waist-expanding cream tea picnic!

Brenda (to whom I can now put a face after years of swapping emails on a mailing list), who knows a great place for organic coffee and muffins and kindly invited me for Friday afternoon drinks with the open source geeks at Catalyst, with whom I talked computing, politics and semantics whilst playing table tennis with a bat in one hand and a beer in the other before joining Brenda for a late supper with her partner Callum.

Tammy and Mike who took a few hours away from launching their Move2NZ migrant website to show me the delights of Christchurch, Governor’s Bay and Rapaki and provide me with a wealth of advice that only experienced migrants would know.

I spoke to a great many people who, in their professional capacities, provided me with advice concerning immigration, employment and relocation. Although it is my intention to write on the more practical aspects of our emigration experience elsewhere, I would like to especially mention Isobel, Gwenda and the team at SearchWorks who, being great folks to deal with, even lent me a desk and phone when Princes Charles’ visit threatened to make me homeless in Wellington. Honourable mentions are also due to Phil at Candle, Nathalie at Momentum, Shelley at OCG, Brenda at WestPac, Gillian at Drake, James at Comspek and Bruce, Sara, Tracey and Patrick at Duncan & Ryan.

In closing, I would like to point out that the supermodel featured at the beginning of this piece is, of course, an attention-grabbing literary device and nothing else. Really.

my lo-fi ears are listening to Broken Stones/Paul Weller

Vox pop

2005-03-15T22:58:00.000+13:00

Christchurch

Christchurch is often held to be the most English of New Zealand’s cities but I have to say that I really can’t see it. I’ll freely admit the River Avon, which runs a curling course through the city, has a certain Oxbridge flavour, but I’d venture that most folks wouldn’t make the the connection were it not for the punts that ply the river. Laid out on a rough grid, Christchurch has more than a little of the North American town feel about it, helped in no small measure by the wide streets, diagonal crosswalks and shopping malls crowded with teenagers. However, for me, the very centre of the city clustered around Cathedral Square and the people I met there said more about Christchurch than the suburbs that lay beyond. Looking at a plan of the city, one can see that Cathedral Square is actually more of a Cathedral diamond, with the perimeter road on three of it’s sides offset from the surrounding network of streets by 45 degrees. The eastern side of the diamond is taken up with the cathedral itself, the two-tone stone work of the bell tower and nave standing out against the hotch-potch of building styles around the square. Elsewhere, trees offer shade to those who pause to listen to the local cod philosopher who takes centre stage with his soap box, whilst police officers watch from their mirror-glassed turret. However, it was on the southwest side of the square, amongst the cafe tables and market stalls, that I found what for me was Christchurch’s trump card – open, friendly people.

Take Diane. A Maori originally from the Wellington area, she moved to Christchurch and now makes a living selling pounamu or greenstone jewellery carved by Maori from raw materials collected from the West Coast. After I had browsed her stall for a while, she came over to tell me I was more than welcome to pick pieces up or try them on. From this inauspicious beginning, we struck up a half hour conversation that ranged from the relative merits of New Zealand cities to the politics of biculturalism. Needless to say, we parted with me a little poorer in the pocket department but a little wiser in knowledge and a lot happier in spirit. In need of a little refreshment, I wandered across to Steve’s Caffeine Machine coffee stand which, it turned out, is a micro-society all of it’s own. The eponymous owner, in a peaked cap and impenetrable shades, is a voluble, one-man marketing campaign for all things Kiwi and, seemingly, defender against what he sees as the gradual invasion of ‘American’ values and culture. Whilst holding forth on the need for continuing re-investment in the New Zealand economy, Steve doles out Seattle-style frappacinos and lattes without irony. He works amidst hand written signs ranging from innocuous observations like “Smiles – they cost nothing and are worth millions” to the more cryptic “Please ask questions – so we can help”. A constant flow of regulars engage him in conversation and it would seem that Steve takes care to retain and recall the little details in their lives in the same way a best friend would. In the space of an hour, I heard folks confess relationship problems to him, ask him for business advice and, in a scene that wouldn’t be out of place in a movie, a self-professed ex-bank robber complain about his bank – not the one he robbed, one presumes – retaining his cash card. Not wanting to miss out when I stopped by the next day but unable to conjure up a conversational gem, I lamely said “I really liked my coffee yesterday, so I came back”. “Great” says Steve with a dead pan expression “but did you tell 500 other people?”.

Feeling the need for sea air, I headed out to New Brighton on the eastern fringe of the city the following day. With summer fading, New Brighton gave off that end-of-season seaside town vibe and walking down the esplanade felt like arriving at a party that was just finishing. The surf school was shut and the air temperature on the cool side of just warm enough, so those restaurants that were open were getting by on a handful of late season punters like me. In an effort to justify a decent lunch, I donned my wind-proof jacket and marched along the town’s pier, which I had last seen on TV when Billy Connolly had used it as a vantage point from which to view an enormous sand drawing. At the very end, I came upon what turned out to be a group of Korean fishermen and, through the universal language of hand gestures and smiles, I managed to gather that they were line-fishing for crab though I could see no sign that pointed to any success in their endeavours. Pausing on my return to read a sign dictating allowable quotas for such fishermen, I fell into conversation with a couple who turned out to be natives not only of my home country but also my home county. Janet and John (no,really), originally from Barnet and Welwyn Garden City but now resident in Hamilton after many years away from England, had flown down to Christchurch to see Neil Diamond in concert and were taking a few days to unwind before heading back to the North Island. We dawdled back along the pier, chatting about places we had in common and what New Zealand had to offer for those raising a family, with Janet and John passing on the wisdom of those who had been there and done that. At the pier car park, we parted with a firm handshake and I went in search of lunch.

Although I spent less time in Christchurch than I did in Auckland and Wellington, I warmed to its charm and its people. From the horse riding waitress at the Olive Tree cafe to the delightfully ditzy Japanese server in the sushi bar, the sophisticated film buff selling cinema tickets to the monosyllabic Chinese chef, Christchurch seems to be populated with people who have a lust for life and a genuine interest in the company of others.

South into autumn

2005-03-09T15:02:00.000+13:00

Picton – Kaikoura – Christchurch

The Interislander Ferry advertising around Wellington asks potential passengers how they would prefer to cross the Cook Strait – ‘zip across or cruise across?’ I had originally intended to ‘cruise’ across in three hours on a traditional ship but I was informed that the crossing I wanted wasn’t sailing (though apparently it did after all). Keen to maximise the time time I had left in Wellington, I decided to book on the last afternoon crossing of The Lynx, a catamaran that provides a high speed service which ‘zips’ between the North and South Islands in two and a quarter hours. As it turned out, this proved to be a good move as my last meeting in Wellington proved to be an interesting one and lasted much longer than I had anticipated, leaving me just enough time to change out of my suit before heading off to hand the car back and board the boat.

The Lynx, with its gun metal grey superstructure and wide bridge, is an unusual looking boat in that it would not be out of place in a science fiction movie. This formidable-looking vessel sits high out of the water on its twin hulls and, once beyond the harbour, the two powerful diesel engines propel it at a impressive rate of knots, leaving two enormous ‘rooster tails’ of spray and foam in it’s three-striped wake. The mostly enclosed design of the boat means that deck areas open to passengers are limited to a rear-facing platform at the back and a small area forward, just behind the panoramic windows of the bridge. The former proved to be fine in harbour but once up to speed in the choppier waters of the Strait, the spray and diesel fumes drove most folks back inside. However, the spray combined with the day’s sun to create rainbows just off the stern of the craft which brought many back out briefly to photograph. Once into the stunning Tory Channel and Queen Charlotte Sound, the Lynx slowed considerably. This, I understand, is in an effort to minimise coastal erosion which many say is worsened by the ferry. The passage between the steep fir-clad slopes was jaw-droppingly beautiful and, as I drank it all in, I wondered just how on Earth I could convey the view without ending up knee deep in meaningless superlatives. After no small amount of thought, I’m not sure I can; suffice to say, the last hour of the crossing was spent passing secluded bays with a house or two at the water’s edge, each having a jetty or boathouse with the vessel moored alongside possibly the only means of visiting some, as the terrain is very steep and there was little evidence of tracks or roads.

Picton itself is a small town with a sheltered bay harbour that looks barely large enough to turn the larger ferries in. It sits at the foot of a valley that winds down between Mt Duncan and Mt McCormick and, driving away from the the town in my second hire car, I found myself (not for the last time) mumbling inanities as each corner in the road produced yet another gorgeous view. With summer almost at an end and autumn moving slowly over the land like the ever-present clouds above, the Alpine meadows, river plain grasslands, gorge scrub and crops have all taken on a variety of brownish or greenish hues. After a while, it occurred to me that I was looking at the sort of haphazard patchwork of colours that must have inspired the invention of camouflage material (or Disruptive Pattern Material in military-speak). Over laying this background were more vivid greens, smoky whites and silvers of the trees whilst the streams and rivers trickling under the road had a milky opalescence, like that of the ‘glacier milk in mountain-fed rivers of the Swiss uplands. Many of the rivers are mere summer shadows of their winter selves, small rivulets meandering through wide expansive gravel beds that show the true width of the river once the rain comes. Each of these is neatly signposted by the roadside with small yellow marked that bear names like Telegraph Gully, Caroline Stream and, most curiously, Jedi Culvert. More often the names are family names, probably of those who settled and cultivated the valleys and coastal plains hereabouts a hundred years ago. I say one hundred years ago for I passed more than one place that proudly proclaimed ‘Settlement Centennial – 2005’ next to it’s name sign with details of planned festivities.

With the bulk of the ‘business’ part of my trip over, I relaxed into a more reflective mood as I drove. The single lane highways here are deceptive and demand respect from local and visitor alike. Although I have seen little of the poor driving some Kiwis warned me of, the new government road safety campaigns on the roadside and the television each evening attest to a death and injury rate far too high for such a small population. With this in mind, lighter traffic than the North Island and with no pressing deadlines, I snaked through steep narrow passes and wafted along arrow straight sections, rarely exceeding the 100kph limit and happy to hold station between the truck up ahead in the distance and whoever was in my mirror. Although cooler than previous days, I kept the window open to allows the smell of the land and the sea, ever present somewhere to my right, to compliment the view. The early afternoon brought me to the towns and suburbs north of Christchurch, which is to be the last city I will visit. Although I had planned to drive further south, my planning from 12,000 miles away didn’t allow for much slippage in my schedule. With it becoming clear early in my journey that I needed to focus my efforts, initially at least, in Auckland and Wellington where the vast majority of opportunities in my field exist, something had to give. Needing at least three more days and a further 750 kilometres’ driving to get there and back to meet folks, it was Dunedin that had to be chopped from the itinerary and I am sad that I shall not be able to complete my trip as planned. Having said that, I deliberately built some flexibility into the trip and it may just be that my ability to stay on longer in Auckland and Wellington when required to do so makes all the difference to the desired outcome. I shall have to wait and see.

Trapped wind

2005-03-07T15:19:00.000+13:00

Wellington

Like most other things here, Wellington’s views are dependent upon the weather and it’s not for nothing that folks here refer to the city as Windy Wellington. A Kiwi explained to me that, given the predominantly hilly nature of New Zealand, the winds roaring between the Pacific Ocean and Tasman Sea seek the path of least resistance. As far as the North Island is concerned, other than the lowlands around Palmerston North between the Ruahine and Tatarua Ranges, the Cook Strait offers the perfect tunnel for such winds to follow and this means that most days here are at the least breezy. In just four days, I have experience blazing sun, tropical downpours, sultry & humid nights and 100kph plus winds. That said, I find the general climate very conducive and cannot say that the wind is obtrusive, though it is summer and so I have not felt the worst the winters here have to offer.

The wind is channelled by the surrounding hills so inevitably, if you move beyond the tight confines of downtown Wellington, sooner or later you have to go uphill. On the advice of a Kiwi colleague, I drove up to the summit of Mount Victoria, the hill that dominates the city’s eastern suburbs. From here, you can get a truly impressive 360 degree panorama of the city and the surrounding countryside. Using my digital camera to take a 45 second video clip of this panorama proved nigh impossible, for I was trying to do so in what I later read were winds gusting to 104kph. That said, it was well worth the effort, even if it took a good few minutes to wipe the dust from my eyes afterwards. For those who choose to eschew their cars in order to explore on foot but still wish to get into the hills, the venerable cable car makes easy work of the 1:5 gradient ascent from Lambton Quay in the heart of the CBD to the Botanic Gardens and observatory perched above the city. Once there, the various lookouts allow great views across the city and the harbour beyond. Despite buying a return ticket, I chose to walk back downtown via the Botanic Gardens and the Bolton Street Memorial Park. The former are a delight even for those who, like myself, cannot tell a hardy annual from a Hardy Boys Annual and there are sections that are dedicated to protecting indigenous species that are threatened in the wild here in New Zealand. As with Auckland, everywhere you find greenery, you’ll hear the high-pitched chirrup of cicadas. An expert, answering questions on the radio a few day’s back, explained that louder a male cicada is, the more likely he is to secure a female companion. If that is true, all I can say is there must be some out there who haven’t been getting any for a good while now, for they are loud little buggers.

Half way back, I stopped at the Begonia House Cafe for an ice cream, which is one of the delights that New Zealand has to offer foodies. Here in a large gazebo adjacent to the lovely rose gardens, tea and cakes were being served to whitehaired over 60s by dreadlocked under 20s whilst the cafe’s sound system pumped out a thumping garage/metal soundtrack. Incongruous though it sounds, everyone seemed to be more than happy with this arrangement as I settled down with my gin and tonic flavoured ice cream to take in the atmosphere and soak up the sun. Near a peace garden dedicated to the memory of those killed at Hiroshima and the eradication of nuclear weapons, I watched a cluster of small brown birds cheekily bob to and fro at my feet, awaiting the inevitable crumbs that ice cream cones provide. It was with surprise that I realised I was watching what appeared to be sparrows and it occurred to me just how infrequently we now see them in London, a place where their ubiquity once gave rise to the term ‘cockney sparrah’. Walking on, I passed the imposing statue of R.J. Seddon, a popular reforming Prime Minister who took New Zealand forward into the 20th century with the emancipation of women (despite his own reservations that this might ‘unsex’ them), and entered the Bolton Street Memorial Park. This once served as Wellington’s multi-denominational cemetery with sectarian areas set aside for Catholics and Jews alongside the larger Public area. The construction of Wellington’s Urban Motorway in the 1960s cleaved the Park in two and required the disinternment of the remains of 3,700 people, who were reinterned in a mass grave and their headstones distributed elsewhere in the cemetery. According to the register in the nearby chapel’s exhibition, two of these folks were sisters or mother and daughter who died two days apart almost exactly 119 years ago to the day of my visit have my surname, a small and nugget I shall pass to my father who is an avid genealogist.

Whilst these occasional wanderings and my writing might indicate otherwise, ‘downtime’ has been rare and I spent the majority of my time fully focused on chasing down relocation opportunities. The efforts of two and a half week’s worth of meetings, emails, property searches and telephone calls to recruiters and headhunters have culminated in two firm leads and my last two days in Wellington are dedicated to exploiting these, hopefully through to a positive result. Whilst this trip is definitely not a holiday and I had fully anticipated some low moments, the time and effort expended here has taken a certain toll on my usual positive and humourous outlook. Travelling on business is trying enough but at least then there is a solid focus to your day and the security of a certain structure to draw upon for support. Whilst exciting and notwithstanding the potential for the future, striking out into what is unknown territory for me, without the familiarity of family and colleagues, has been a challenge in some respects. Cultural differences, both of the business and societal kinds, mean that one can occasionally be caught off-guard no matter how much preparation you have done. Subtle differences in conventions and customs often leave you keeping one eye open for signals and signs to keep you on the right track. It goes without saying that, as a family man, I miss the ebb and flow of family life: the roast dinner on Sundays, the ‘what did you do at school today?’ conversations, the little daily rituals we all take for granted and, yes, as one man in a house with five women, even the queue for the bathroom. Such things are uppermost in my mind as I write for, should I secure a position and need to return to NZ ahead of the family, it is something I will have to deal with and quite possibly for a good deal longer. As things stand, I still have at least one more meeting to attend but I plan to spend the few remaining days enjoying things at a slightly less hectic pace as I cross to the South Island and head to Christchurch via Kiakoura and the coastal highway. That said, I will admit to counting down the days until I can see my wife and kids in the flesh, rather than having to make do with photos and voices on the other end of a telephone line.

Sitting on the dock of the bay

2005-03-06T11:48:00.000+13:00

Wellington Harbour

Wellington is a city that hangs between land and water. Whether looking out from a viewpoint on the steep hills surrounding the downtown area or sitting with your legs dangling over the blue water, one is always aware of the sea and the hills. As with many coastal cities around the globe, Wellington’s growth has necessitated expansion and, whilst some homes here are built on precariously steep slopes above the dowtown area, much of the growth has been out into the bay. On the pavement of Lambton Quay, a thriving shopping street a couple of blocks from the water, brass markers set in the ground mark the shoreline of the original quay during the nineteenth century and show just how much the city has grown. Similarly, Wellington has exploited it’s waterfront in order to provide a wonderful buffer zone where folks can escape the traffic and noise to take in the view and soak up the sun. On a walk along the harbour’s edge the day after I arrived, I was able to get a sense of Wellington, how the hills form a natural arena to the stage of the bay, how the sun always seems to find a way through the ever-present cloud cover and how the water is an every day part of the locals' life.

Take the school children of Wellington for instance. Whilst my eldest are braving the snow and sleet to battle their way home from school, the young uniformed boys alighting from the Dominion Post ferry sped from the gangplank on their silver scooters like a star burst of clockwork toys, little legs propelling them towards the freedom of the afternoon. Some joined their elder schoolmates on a pontoon where they dived from the stanchions and ‘bombed’ each other in a show of bravado that was half for the tourists but more so for the young girls of the local colleges hereabouts. Mind you, these delicate flowers of Kiwi womanhood were not here to gaze idly at these arrogant fellows for they had converged here on the watersports lagoon to practise for this weekend’s dragonboat racing. Marshalled by jovial but competitive coaches, they were sent on warm-up runs round the area or, in the case of late-comers from one school who had forgotten essential kit, made to jump into the water by way of a good-natured reprimand. Most had a sock tied around one knee like a bandage, presumably to prevent bruising against the boat though this gave the impression of each team being mostly comprised of walking wounded. Out on the water, the dragonboaters jostled for space with more serious-looking peers who had headed out from a neighbouring boatshed on single or double sculls. All of this activity was overseen by a number of safety boats carrying lifesavers and coaches with bull horns but there were others busy elsewhere in the harbour. Attracted by a large cluster of onlookers, I wandered over to find a team of New Zealand Navy divers tugging and hauling an inflatable salvage buoy towards the rocky harbour’s edge. It transpired that they were cleaning up the harbour – though it has been officially denied this was prompted by Prince Charles’ visit next week – and their catch comprised a rusting chassis complete with wheels, which was duly placed on a trailer for removal. This was then surrounded by men who all enjoyed a heated debate over exactly what model of vehicle the hulk was before entering the harbour. As this cleanup was taking place, helicopters from the small dockside heliport spiralled above us whilst transpacific jets slide along an invisible bannister into the city’s airport beyond the hills, the pilots making short work of Wellington’s famous ever-present wind.

The weekend’s local Dominion Post newspaper reports that Americans and Europeans working on kiwi Peter Jackson’s remake of King Kong are raving about Wellington and the surrounding countryside, just as Sir Ian McEllern and others working on Jackson’s Lord Of The Rings trilogy did before them. Sadly and almost inevitably, they compare it with California and Hawaii, though to my mind and many others, I think that to do so is to ignore the unique feel of ‘differentness’ there is about Wellington. With a strong showing of public art around the area and carved tablets of poetry dotted here and there, not to mention the Te Papa museum, events centre and the many bars and restaurants, it is easy to see how the city’s waterfront captures not only peoples’ imagination, but their hearts too.

In-A-State Highway

2005-03-03T19:58:00.000+13:00

Auckland to Wellington by road

To anyone used to the motorways of Britain, the Interstate Highways of the U.S. or the autobahn of Germany, New Zealand’s State Highway 1 might come as a bit of a surprise. In around 660 kilometres, it takes you from one thrusting urban streetscape to another, via bland suburbia, through rolling farmlands, river-worn valleys and even a stretch of tundra desert. However, whilst one is more than prepared for the landscape to change frequently on such a road trip, what is less common is for the road itself to change to a significant degree. Yet, in the space of eight hours, I and my fellow southbound motorists drove along everything from multi-lane expressways of smooth asphalt to dust and gravel.

Leaving Auckland on the Southern Motorway is pretty much like leaving any other city by road with traffic lights, filter lanes and fumes soon giving way to the synchronised lane surfing and whine of tyre noise of high speed trunk roads. This very recognisable system bore me as far as Mercer before the Southern Motorway metamorphosed into the State Highway 1 as I would know it until I reached Mana, 25 kilometres north of Wellington. For the vast majority of the journey SH1, as it is known, consists of one lane and a wide driveable shoulder in each direction, supplemented by slow vehicle and overtaking lane combinations every now and then. In my vast experience of exactly one southbound trip, this set up proved to be more than adequate, allowing me to make reasonable time without getting stuck behind too many roadtrains and slower cars. This is probably just as well given that, as of last weekend, the NZ Police can now endorse drivers’ licences with ‘demerit’ points for 32 offences, ranging from the usual speeding and traffic signal offences to the seemingly rather pedantic ‘driving too far out from the left hand kerb’ crime. I was periodically reminded to curb any such enthusiasms by passing those getting ‘nicked’ at the roadside, including a coach driver whose charges watched his admonishment from the comfort of their air-conditioned seat while he squirmed. Secondly, a good few Kiwi friends had warned of, how shall we put this, a certain relaxed attitude to car safety and sloppy driving and this was borne out in the Government’s blunt and often graphic road safety posters along the route.

Long stretches through gorgeous rolling farmland and pine plantations made for easy driving with lovely views across the fertile meadows to the hills and ranges beyond and reminded me of my travels through rural Virginia and Maryland in the U.S. In a landscape so pastoral, one is lulled into by the bucolic charm, so much so that the odd rare industrial structure like the Huntly Power Station and the geothermal works north of Taupo hit you like a slap in the face. Conversely, it is perhaps ironic that the grain silos and barn-like farm machinery dealerships dotted along the route only seem to reinforce the American analogy. If any further confirmation were needed, it is readily available in the form of the signs welcoming you to each town along the route. When town elders have gone to the trouble of ensuring that you know that you entering the ‘Peanut Capital of New Zealand’ or that their dot on the map is ‘Hometown, N.Z.’, it seems churlish to do anything but take them at their word. This I had to do as my tight time schedule left me no time to stop and take in the sights or explore the wonders promised by signs pointing away from the highway. Whilst I cursed my lack of time, I also knew that if I kept focused on the matters at hand and the prime reason for this trip, there’d be time enough for such things in the future.

After dropping down into Taupo and skirting it’s eastern shore whilst taking in the view, I passed through Turangi and the road started to climb again, taking me into the Tongariro National Park. Those who have seen Peter Jackson’s Lord Of The Rings trilogy would be more than familiar with the view west as you take the Desert Road south from Rangipo. Mount Ngauruho, with it’s snow filled gulleys and cloud-obscured peak is instantly recognisable as Mount Doom and the land on it’s northern slopes as the Plains Of Gogoroth. As I followed a lumbering logging truck up the the switchbacks and onto the plateau, I passed men working on rebuilding the washed-out road over the aptly named, pampas-covered Black Swamp. As I crested the rise, it became clear why the Desert Road is so named. Having passed large gates and a road open/closed/diversion information board back near Rangipo, I was puzzled until I saw the Rangipo Desert. This desert is not of the sand dune Arabian type so beloved by Lawrence but more akin to the vast steppes of Russia or windblown tundra of Iceland. Although this fifty kilometre stretch was without habitation, it was far from deserted as I found out when, driving cautious through a dust cloud, I almost ran over a young lad sitting in a patio chair in the road. The dust made the ‘stop/go’ lollipop in his hand pretty redundant and he waved me on without so much as a glance in the direction I assumed his opposite number was located. Proceeding with some care, I drove on past more guys fixing the road and continued on my way south through the bleak but beguiling landscape. Further on, I spotted the more usual fast moving and camouflaged inhabitants of the desert, namely the armoured divisions of the New Zealand Army, who were about their business far beyond the ‘Do not stray more than 20m form the highway’ signs that keeps Joe Public on the straight and narrow. The army also makes up the majority of the population of Waiouru, the first town settlement south of the desert. Pulling into the gas station to fill up the car, pick the flies from my teeth and answer nature’s call, I felt like a character in a road movie and all that was missing was the tumbleweed. Waiting in line for the fuel pump, I cleaned the windscreen with the squeegee provided and looked down the road towards the Army Museum. Turning back, I was approached by a woman whose reddened face testified that she’d known many hot, windy days and cold desert nights. After filling the tank, she preceded to clean the windscreen and I joked that maybe she thought this Pom hadn’t done a good job first time. She smiled, flushed an even deeper red and we shared a good laugh and a few words before I paid and moved on.

From here on, SH1 is slowly but surely drawn south west towards the coast across flat wide lands which were under grain, crops or pasture. After a dogleg through the wonderfully named Bulls and turning south again at Sanson, a Brit could be mistaken for thinking that the Romans had been here, as the road runs in an almost straight line down to Levin. Foxton, some two-thirds of the way down this stretch, is the home town of Kiwi friends back in the UK and, whilst I was unable to swing east to see their family in Palmerston North, I did stop at the most fine and supremely clean public toilets there by way of homage. Another Kiwi colleague had issued a very clear warning about the heat haze and mirage that occurs on these undulating straight roads. Driving towards the sun, it was easy to see how folks could pull out into the opposite lane to overtake only to have a vehicle suddenly spring from a shimmering patch of silver straight into a head-on collision. Content to take my place in a small convoy of cars, I continued towards the capital, trying to ignore the tempting signs indicating that warm beaches and inviting water lay just a few kilometres to my west. That said, nothing prepared me for the sudden arrival of the Tasman Sea’s vast expanse on my right hand side as I passed the last buildings of Paekakariki at the top end of Pukerua Bay. From here, it was just 20 kilometres until the Johnsonville Porirua Motorway that would draw me, past the superbly-named Colonial Knob, through the suburbs that nestle in the valleys north of Wellington. This changed into the Wellington Urban Motorway without my noticing and, within minutes, my exit ramp spat me down into the narrow streets of the district of Thorndon. Here, I pulled slowly to a halt at the kerb to rub my tired eyes and reach for the city map whilst, outside the car, the famous Wellington wind lifted the skirt of a passing pedestrian in a saucy salute of welcome.

Local knowledge

2005-02-28T13:32:00.000+13:00

Auckland

Sunday morning arrived promising a hot day and, after spending the previous evening at the Lantern Festival with thousands of Chinese, Europeans, Maori and tourists, I was ready for a quieter day with a few less folks for company. Having called ahead the previous day, I had arranged to spend the day in the company of Steve and Rita, parents of a friend and colleague with whom I work in London.

After Steve collected me from the motel, we took a drive out through the east of the city to the lovely new home they had only just moved into a few days prior. There, whilst taking in the view from their dining room window, we chatted about work and employment prospects before moving onto the more important matters of rugby and beer. Looking out across the trees and rooftops of the neighbourhood and the blue waters of Okahu Bay, we could see the North Shore and the tip of the Sky Tower above the CBD. Having discussed the relative merits of the Northern and Southern hemisphere style of play and painfully agreed that England were far from showing anything like their world championship form, we commenced a tour of Auckland’s suburbs, circling the city in a slow clockwise fashion. When you’re new in town and needing to get up to speed quickly, it is hard to beat local knowledge and Steve, as a local resident and businessman, knew his stuff. From the respective merits and earthquake resistance of the varying building methods to local schools and shopping areas, all were covered in detail, giving me a solid grounding in what each area has to offer. However, the afternoon wasn’t all hard facts and data, with Steve pointing out some of the more swanky multi-million dollar homes around the city, throwing in nuggets of local history and folklore for good measure. During our drive, I notched up a notable ‘first’ when I was introduced to that pinnacle of Kiwi cuisine, the pie. Long held as a surefire hangover cure and staple of the hardworking Kiwi, the steak pie I chose proved to be as tasty and satisfying as any I’ve had – and perhaps, just maybe, a bit more besides. Towards the end of our circular tour, we took a run north, out to the fruit and vegetable farms beyond Greenhithe and North Harbour. Steve, with a fervour bordering on the evangelical, was keen for me to experience the taste of the freshly picked local produce and pulling into a roadside farm shops, he questioned farmers closely about the provenance of the produce on sale. At one stop, hearing what I first thought to be a South African twang in the farmer’s voice, I asked where he was from. “I’m a Kiwi, mate” he said, adding after a well timed pause “but I came here from Croatia 30 years ago.” He went on to explain that, by skipping school to go out to work instead, he never had his original accent schooled out of him and had managed to retain a fair degree of the old country in his voice. After discussing the intricacies of an eggplant recipe passed to him by a Turkish migrant worker and the marlin poaching exploits of a Croatian friend of mine, we departed with fresh eggplant, tomatoes and corn on the cob with which to make a Sunday supper.

Back at the house, I met Steve’s wife, Rita, who had just returned home from work. After a couple of cold beers to take the edge off our thirst and unable to convince Rita to join us, we ambled down the hill passed a packed bowls tournament and an equally well-attended touch rugby competition to Okahu Bay for my first swim in the Pacific. Warning Steve that exposing my pale European flesh had been known to cause children and women to scream in horror, we piled our shirts and towels on our shoes and waded out through the gloriously warm shallows until we were able to dive in and swim amongst the moored yachts and families kayaking back and forth. Most of the bays here cater well for those seeking respite and relaxation in the evenings and weekends, with tree-shaded grass, clean showers and toilets and picnic tables for those choosing to dine al fresco. Watching families having their evening meals and few ‘cold ones’ whilst watching local biathletes compete nearby, it is hard not to be seduced by it all and imagine that life here is always like this. That said, the Kiwis seem far more geared up for such things and although New Zealand has very low unemployment at this time and an increasingly energetic economy, one senses that here, the ‘work to live, don’t live to work’ ethos is well and truly engrained in the national psyche.

After a slow uphill tramp during which we both puffed and panted in an effort to convince ourselves that we had exercised extensively and deserved more beer, we rejoined Rita to settle on the deck in the warm afternoon sun. The talk ranged from work to families to why we’re considering emigration and back again, taking in a small modicum of politics and religion for good measure along the way. Showing off pictures of the family I have left back home made me feel a little sad that I wasn’t able to share this with them but also served as a reminder that this trip wasn’t about sightseeing and I should cherish the weekends because weekdays were all about finding employment opportunities to pursue. We ate a lovely roast chicken supper in the dining room with the view I had admired earlier. As we talked and laughed, the sun slowly set, gradually turning the scudding white clouds numberless shades of red and pink before disappearing to leave the lights across the bay twinkling and the tip of the Sky Tower peeking between the trees on the crest of the next ridge. After supper, we settled down in the living room to watch Billy Connolly’s World Tour Of New Zealand on television. I have to admit there is something slightly off-balance about watching a humourous travelogue about a country you are currently travelling in, having seen it previously whilst planning the very same trip. It was good to find that Connolly’s risque observations of the Kiwis and their islands seemed equally funny to the ‘natives’ as to us Poms and was a fine way to round off a great day and relaxing evening.

On the way back to my modest motel, we drove along Paritai Drive which seems to be the Auckland equivalent of Bel Air with some truly opulent houses, complete with security gates, illuminated steps and walkways though, it has to be said, mostly dark uninhabited windows gazing unblinkingly over the bay. Having taken in every conceivable type of house and home on our round-city tour, I settled down for the night wondering whether there was a nice, affordable, well-located home somewhere that had our name on it. If there was, it would mean relocating a family of six and all their worldly goods halfway round the world and, in order for that to happen, the hunt for a job and a visa needed to resume first thing in the morning.

Gone bush, mate

2005-02-27T09:32:00.000+13:00

Waitakere Ranges and Helensville

Considering I didn’t arrive until Tuesday, I have had a pretty busy week and managed to stave off the worst of the jet lag to accomplish a fair amount in three days before folks closed for the weekend. This being the case and with little I could practicably do on the job front, I decided to indulge in some rest and recuperation.

After sorting out my laundry, which consisted of collecting it from the Chinese laundry across the road, I packed my bags, checked out of my room and drove out of the city, heading west. Actually, I drove out of the city heading north because I missed the turning for SH16 and had to follow SH1 over the harbour bridge before I could find an exit that would allow me to backtrack. However, this little navigational error afforded me the great view one gets heading south into Auckland over the bridge. Taking in the harbour with seemingly thousands of yacht masts pointing skyward, set against a background of towers and buildings beyond, there’s no doubt as to why Auckland calls itself the City Of Sails. Heading in the right direction, I headed towards the Waitakere Regional Park which stretches from the western fringe of Auckland all the way to the West Coast. Free of the strip developments and suburbs, I took snaking roads up into these low hills, snatching great views through the foliage here until I pulled into the Arataki Visitor Centre. Here was a very well thought out centre, whose entrance walkway on stilts curled through the bush plants to suddenly reveal a superb vista overlooking the bush falling away down to the blue waters of Manukau Harbour. Inside, informative displays explained not only the facts concerning the local flora and fauna but the settlement and land use by Maori and Europeans over the years. I moved on over the Waitakere Ranges to Piha, a small settlement of houses and baches (summer homes, often on or near beaches) that plays host to families and surfers escaping the city. The dark-coloured beaches sparkle here and, judging from the look of things, are made up of something like iron ore sand.

From Piha, which is the end of the road, I backtracked to the scenic drive route and drove down into the rolling farmlands to the north of the park. These reminded me somewhat of Virginia in the US, which small farms nestling under wooded bluffs and long straight stretches of road drawing one onto the next crest. I stopped in Kumeu for lunch at a cafe in a garden centre. In the UK, this would usually mean pretty meager fare but at The Carriages (part of the dining area is comprised of two railway carriages) served up what was the best meal I have had so far on this trip. Eating seared scallops with parma ham on grilled ciabatta with cucumber salad and chopped tomatoes with a small glass of wine on a warm sunny terrace, I tried imagine the whole family here with me and found that the image came easily – it may be wishful thinking but who knows? After lunch, I headed to Helensville for no other reason that it would make a good turning point to head back east and then south later in the afternoon. Upon arriving, I found that I had turned up on the day of the town’s Agricultural and Pastoral show, an affair similar to English county shows. I wandered around this, taking in the usual sights like lovingly restored farm machinery, country dancing displays, sheep dog trials and show jumping, as well as the less familiar like a pen full of alpaca, junior bungee jumping and a truly wonderful open air unisex hairdressing salon.

After the drive back to the motel, I spent time uploading pictures to Flikr before heading out to a heaving downtown where AO5, the Auckland City Festival and the Lantern Festival celebrating the new Chinese Lunar Year were both in full swing. Having finally found a parking space, I wandered around Albert Park eating satay and rice whilst watching acrobats and dancers and browsing the stalls. I walked back to the car via the square by the City Hall where open air performances where in full swing but by then I was running on empty. Watching opera singers dangling from cranes and balconies seemed a little too surreal for my knackered mind to cope with so I headed back for a cold beer, a chat with the family and sleep.

Downtown

2005-02-25T16:34:00.000+13:00

Auckland CBD

If the truth be told, my real first impression of Auckland was how loud the noise of the local cicadas was outside my room … and in the domain where I run … and Albert Park where the local Chinese population are preparing a latern festival to celebrate their New Year tonight. High pitched and annoying at first, this sound has gradually become the background music of my time here and I have grown to like the constancy it provides me whilst away from familiar surroundings.

For those used to London’s extensive public transport system, Auckland’s mass transit system is fairly rudimentary considering that a quarter of the country’s population is based in and around the city. However, as is often the way with these things, what is lacking in quantity is more than made up for by the quality. Take the bus service I have been using. Called ‘The Link’, it is the Auckland street equivalent to London’s Circle tube line, encircling all the major parts of the Central Business District and it’s surrounding neighbourhoods with buses that run both clockwise and anti-clockwise at 10 minute intervals. The drivers are friendly and seem to be real characters, flirting with the staff who get on at the City Hospital and keeping a stern yet fatherly eye on the grammar school kids who use the bus. I’m sure that the fact that the drivers are not encased in the armoured glass that is sadly necessary in London is partly the reason folks seem to go out of their way to smile and thank the driver when the leave the bus. Yesterday, when I jumped aboard his bus for the third time that day to head back into the CBD after a dash back to the motel for papers, the walrus-moustached Maori driver looked over his mirror shades at me, raised an eyebrow and said ‘Forget something, mate?’ before cracking a wide smile.

Apart from taking the odd bus and running each day, I have walked pretty much everywhere and it has been an excellent way to really get a feel for the layout and make up of the city. At first glance, the individual lapboard houses and the wide smooth asphalt streets lined with trees are reminiscent of small town America but the tall palms and pohutukawa trees, the voices of the locals and the cars driving on the left are all indicators that make it clear that New Zealand is very different and very not-anywhere-else. The hot and humid weather with brief tropical showers is very pleasant when not wearing a suit and tie and the sun is deceptively strong, as my pink forehead proves. It would seem that, other than a few backpacking Brits I saw yesterday, I am the only person in this city who doesn’t have a tan and perspires as soon as I step outside the door; that said, it’s better than being in the snow back home right now. The weather seems to engender the easygoing relaxed demeanour that I have found in almost every person I have met. This attitude and behaviour is all the more beguiling because it seems more mellow/less brash than the ‘no worries, mate’ directness of the neighbouring Aussies. Observing folks on the streets, in stores and in bars and restaurants, I notice that society here seems to be a little more balanced than elsewhere, with young and old, European settler and Maori mixing without the class-ridden self-consciousness of the Brits or the status symbol awareness of the Americans. Office workers happily sit alongside street cleaners on a shady bench to eat their lunch snacks and exchange a few words before returning to their respective labours.

Meanwhile, back on the emigration front, I have spent much of the last two days meeting with recruiters, filling out forms and talking over my employment prospects here in NZ. Apart from the friendliness of the folks, the process is much the same as back home and has meant a couple of hours on the computer and phone each day following up meetings and planning next moves. Luckily, I seem to have weathered the worst of the jet lag and have managed to present a bright and relatively sparky ‘me’ to the folks I have seen. In between these meetings, I visited a lovely person called Brenda at the WestPac Bank in Queen Street. Brenda had called SWMBO some months back after getting our contact details when we visited an NZ expo in the UK last year and has proved to be a very helpful contact to have. Unlike the UK, where one needs their grandmother’s birth certificate, a gas bill and the cat’s inside leg measurement, opening a bank account in NZ is simplicity itself – so much so that I somehow managed to acquire one whilst chatting to Brenda about immigration and money matters.

Whilst nothing concrete has emerged yet, a couple of leads have cropped up and, for this reason, I have decided to stay in Auckland over the weekend and for a few days next week in order to follow these up. As I am only booked into my current room until tomorrow, I have taken the opportunity to book a room in a motel just up the road for the next few days. The room I have is fine if a little basic but the 14k Internet connection is absolutely awful and I have been unable reliably connect to my mail, my FTP or blog servers let alone upload my pictures to Flickr. If SWMBO is reading, the fact that the motel has a bar and seafood restaurant had nothing to do with my booking a room there so if these turn up on my bill, it’ll be an admin error. Honest.

Note: The Wallabies fans out there might like to know that the spellchecker of Blogjet (the app I use to post these articles) offers the word ‘Pussies’ as an alternative for ‘Aussies’. I pass this on without comment for information only.

I'm here but my bodyclock's not

2005-02-24T17:55:00.000+13:00

Auckland

Having settled into my room at the lodge (motel), the first thing I did was go for a run. This is probably the last thing on most folks mind when they hit town having flown halfway round the world but it seemed as good to banish the stiff legs and check out the local neighbourhood at the same time. The local neighbourhood turned out to be like a lot of Auckland – hilly. No matter which way I turned, I seemed to be running uphill so after half an hour, I called it quits and headed back to shower. After doing so and grabbing a cool drink, I picked up my contacts book to make a few calls. One of the things I did in preparation for this trip was harvest as many Kiwi contacts as possible from friends and colleagues so I can meet local folks and get a feel for normal family life in NZ. Linda and Gideon are just such folks. When I rang to introduce myself, Linda immediately asked if I was up for company and promptly invited me to dinner when I said ‘yes’, saying that she’d be by to pick me up in an hour. At the duly appointed time, I was standing on the corner outside my lodge when I heard my name called across the street and turned to see someone waving, smiling and beckoning me to join them. Proferring hastily-purchased flowers and chocolates, I crossed over the road and was whisked away on a brief tour of the delights of Tamaki Drive and Mission Bay whilst Linda remotely organised the family preparing the evening meal back home via her cell phone. Given that I am a previously never mentioned husband-of-a-friend-of-a-sister, Linda and Gideon, along with their children Sarah, David and Amy, were gracious in their hospitality and I very much enjoyed their company over a pleasant dinner. As they had sagely prophesied earlier, the minute the meal hit my system and I sat back in the living room with a cup of tea – having wisely eschewed alcohol since London – my eyes grew heavy and I started to lose the thread of the conversation. As the minutes passed, my mind seemed to be undergoing a gradual shutdown and the harder I tried to concentrate, the more elusive clear thought became. Spotting my declining mental and physical state, my kind and understanding hosts simply guided me to the car and drove me back to my lodge. Once there, it took all my will power to stay awake long enough to make a slurred ‘good morning’ call to SWMBO and the sprogs before hitting the bed like a redwood toppled by a lumberjack’s axe. So, on my first day in a country that I have long planned to visit, my first impression was the dent I left in the mattress.

In Transit

2005-02-23T19:26:00.000+13:00

London Heathrow

After heart-wrenchingly tearful goodbyes with the family at home, I was not in the brightest of moods or thinking clearly when I arrived at the Emirates check-in desk. The agent looked weary after a long day but was pleasant and helpful, advising me that that I needed to transfer some of the weightier items in my gargantuan carry-on bag into my suitcase for, despite my concerns regarding paying for excess baggage, it was the carry-on that was the concern. After more than a little soul searching, I wrapped my laptop and my two folders of paperwork in clothes, zipped up the case and consigned the case to the care of the handlers and loaders. It was as it had irretrievably disappeared down the conveyer that I put my hand in my pocket – to find that the padlock for the case was still attached to the key on my key chain. With grim thoughts of luggage larceny and sobbing sprogs, I wandered off to kill the time before I boarded. After another lump-in-the-throat call to SWMBO, I was surprised by how low I felt and wondered why. After all, I was heading off to the other side of the world with great intentions to help provide those I was leaving behind with a better life. A beep from my belt signalled a text from SWMBO which almost reduced me to tears but said exactly what I needed to hear and set me up for the weeks ahead.

London to Dubai

The nose wheel camera view on my seat back screen was great but it was hard to focus on the image as the guy in the seat in front was constantly bouncing up and down. This performance was accompanied by the incessant kicking of my seat back by a willful child behind who was deaf to both my requests to cease and her mother’s. The unholy trinity of annoying neighbours was completed by the guy next to me. It appeared that he had grabbed a copy of each of the many free newspapers as he boarded and was trying to speed-read each page before moving onto the next paper.

These distractions aside, the first leg of the flight was a breeze. I passed the time either reading Annie Proulx’s ‘That Old Ace In The Hole’, which I’m enjoying, or watching on-demand movies on Emirates’ ICE system (Information; Communication; Entertainment – in-flight info; phone, email & SMS; movies, music and TV). I found the humorous mid-life meanderings of ‘Sideways’ to be just what I needed to raise my mood but found the Robin Williams vehicle ‘The Final Cut’ to be over-wrought second rate sci-fi nonsense. The choice of food was surprisingly good for economy and the Middle Eastern lamb dish I plumped for was notable for it’s taste as much as the large and succulent chunks of meat – top marks.

After eating and acting on my colleague’s advice, I stayed awake through the night and the rest of the leg deliberately, in order to hopefully induce sleep on the longest leg.

Dubai UAE

I am not sure whether I can actually claim to have visited the United Arab Emirates, for my sojourn in Dubai was brief – just under 45 minutes plane to plane – and hectic due to frantic passengers being repeatedly required to walk through incredibly sensitive arch detectors. I took every piece of metal from my person and the blasted thing still beeped. Having narrowed the possibilities to my trouser zip, fillings in my teeth or surgical steel pins in my leg, I was allowed to dash for my next plane.

Dubai to Auckland

Notebook entry written at gate: Feel tired but OK though I imagine that I will grow to hate my [next] seat after 12hr+ to Sydney and the last leg to Auckland.

Whilst Dubai security was preoccupied with my dangerous trousers and teeth and I was jotting notes, Saint Christopher was busy having a change of heart for, boarding for the long slog across the Indian Ocean, I was ushered to a lovely aisle seat, just behind the business class bulkhead. My neighbour, a thrusting young entrepreneur from Pakistan who is building a sports goods empire in Sydney, and I grinned like lottery winners as we stretched out our legs and settled in for the (very literally) long haul.

I passed the long hours with a series of cat naps punctuated by half-watched movies, the odd meal, regular offers of chilled water and a few attempts at getting my eyes to focus on my book. Somewhere over the Indian Ocean, beyond the Equator and south east of Jakarta, I glanced at the screen to see BBC Worldwide News announce the death by apparent suicide of Hunter S Thompson. This seemed strangely apt as the long hours with little rest had induced in me a weird drug-like stupor worthy of one of Thompson’s gonzo characters. Equally fitting of a place in an HST novel was the incredibly rude Englishwoman who, along with her bloated husband, took great pleasure in moaning about everything and making sniping remarks to the crew. She seemed totally unaware of quite how infantile and self-centred she sounded when, after being asked to pull her seat upright to allow meals to be served behind, she snapped back with “I’ve been sitting down for 12 hours, you know” oblivious to the fact that so had the rest of us whilst the crew had been on their feet looking after us. Elsewhere, I fell into sporadic conversation with the woman who, despite a full-blown Kiwi accent, emigrated from the West Midlands of the UK just five years before. Those who have heard the West Midlands accent will know that replacing it with another is no mean feat! This woman must be a saint because she made the whole trip with her charming one year old son (who was remarkably well behaved for the circumstances) on her lap without once raising her voice or losing her cool. During the early morning descent into Sydney, I suddenly became aware of the sound of a dawn chorus of twittering bird. After establishing that it wasn’t my iPod playing up, I realised that it was being broadcast softly over the PA system, presumably to signal the break of day to bodyclocks addled by lack of sleep. Sadly, this calming interlude was shattered by twin Arab boys, who screamed blue murder all the way down to the terra firma in Sydney.

After disembarking into a hot and humid Sydney terminal to allow fuelling and cleaning, I called the family and enjoyed the sound of happy sprogs who excitedly announced that it had snowed since I left. After catching up on news, I re-boarded for the comparatively short hop over the Tasman Sea to Auckland. The clouds over the North Island shone brilliantly in the sun and, seeing them stretch out southwards in great narrow wisps, it was not hard to understand how the Maori had come to name the island (see title of January 22nd’s post). The long flight had taken its toll and I felt a little subdued as I navigated Customs, Biosecurity (to prevent importation of biologically threatening organic materials) and Immigration. However, as I exited the terminal and headed into a cloudy but warm Auckland afternoon, I couldn’t help smiling: I was about to begin a trip that I had been planning for a good long while, one that could change our family life dramatically. Wondering if I could pull it off and whether the outcome could be as good as we have hoped, I pulled into the traffic on highway 20A and headed north to Auckland.

Locked and loaded

2005-02-21T03:51:00.000+13:00

I had to adopt a ruthless approach to packing in order to bring some order and reduce the weight of this morning’s first attempt (left) to this afternoon’s more acceptable result (right). As well as jettisoning a pair of shoes, a travel guide and a few other bits, I bit the bullet and transferred the lovingly pressed suits and shirts to the main case so I could shed the suiter. I’m now praying for a forgiving check-in agent as I’m still a shade over my limit.

Well, with the bags packed and a friend offering a lift to the station later, I’m off for to loaf on the couch watching a DVD and enjoy a roast dinner with the loved ones I’m leaving behind for the duration. The Man Upstairs and weather gods permitting, the next post will be from Auckland.

Doors to manual.

my lo-fi ears are listening to Adia/Sarah McLachlan

In Kupe's wake

2005-02-20T04:44:00.000+13:00

“New Zealand was the last place in the world to be settled by humans and its isolation and freedom from human interference came it a unique natural environment. The first settlers in New Zealand were the Maori who came from Polynesia. Their arrival from their homeland of Hawaiki is celebrated in myths and legends carried down by word of mouth through successive generations. The Polynesians were master navigators, using the stars, the direction of sea birds in flight, cloud patterns and the colour of the water as guides to make journeys throughout the Pacific Ocean.

The great navigator, Kupe was the probably the first man to sight New Zealand around 950 AD and then returned home to tell of his findings. He named the country he discover the Aotearoa, the Land of the Long White Cloud. A few centuries later, around 1350 AD, a great migration of people from Kupe's homeland of Hawaiki, following his navigational instructions, set sail for New Zealand. They came in seven great migratory canoes, Waka, built to withstand heavy seas and able to carry many people and their possessions over great distances. Present-day tribes still trace their origins to the various canoes and their descendants will still take you to the very spot described by tradition as the first landfall.”

With a day to go before leaving, I woke up with a strange sense of anti-climax. Sitting down at the PC this morning to do my usual weekly round up of NZ-related mails and paperwork, it suddenly occurred to me that, with the weekend half over down-under, there is really nothing more to be done online before I arrive in Auckland on Tuesday. With this realisation, years of talking, months of research and weeks of preparations have finally brought me to a point we wasn’t even sure we’d get to. Somewhere along the way, between the first inkling that we might find a better life elsewhere and this, the eve of the trip, we have crossed an indefinable line; the line between dreaming and doing. Given that it is all unknown territory from here on in, I am feeling fairly relaxed and have few worries about the weeks to come, although the thought of being away from the family for three weeks is nagging at me, despite the fact that they are the reason for this whole venture. I’ll admit to a small concern for SWMBO (She Who Must Be Obeyed) having to cope with the four sprogs on her own, as previous trips have been peppered with pleas for long-distance telephone discipline for them and soothing words for her. I once ducked out of a seminar in Atlanta to receive a ten-minute lecture on how leaving a Fun Lovin’ Criminals CD with ‘Parental Advisory’ lyrics lying about whilst packing had led to a sprog asking SWMBO what ‘fucked up’ meant in front of company.

I’m interested to see how I cope with spending 24 hours on a plane without going nuts through boredom. However, the real concern I have is being seated next to the passenger from hell with no spare seats to escape. A few years back, on a fully booked flight back from Washington DC, I was seated next to a very pleasant but absolutely enormous lady who ‘overflowed’ into my seat, having neglected to book the requisite extra seat stipulated by the airline. This oversight necessitated me spending the whole eight hours perched on my right buttock, occasionally waking her to ask if she could lift her midriff so that I could get to the seat arm controls. Elsewhere, a Kiwi friend has advised on me on a sleep strategy that will minimise the jet lag. So, after setting my watch to local time as I always do, my aim is to stay awake until we transit Dubai, then try and sleep through the transpacific leg between Dubai and Sydney, hopefully leaving me ready for the last hop to Auckland. As for occupying my time, I’m still pondering the book choices because there’s nothing worse than getting 40 pages into a book only to find it’s no good and you’ve nothing else to read. The iPod is loaded with 1600 songs and I’m sincerely hoping there’ll be something other than a Jennifer Aniston rom-com to watch on my head rest screen.

With such ephemera sorted, it is a pity that the same cannot be said about the more tangible stuff like packing. I am pretty laid back when it comes to packing and rarely get worked up about it – which seems to drive SWMBO mad. That said, I am lucky in that SWMBO usually has a marathon laundry session the week before I leave, ensuring that if I get run over by a taxi in a foreign land, I’ll at least have clean underwear. After more than a few business trips, I have a good idea of what needs to be packed. To avoid leaving essentials behind, I use a number of packing lists as aides memoire; one for my suitcase, one for my garment bag and another for my laptop/briefcase. Even so, the bedroom looks like an explosion in a garment factory and yet, here I am, I’m sitting at the PC recovering from the inevitable ironing that needed to be done before stuff gets packed. On occasion, I have tried unsuccessfully to convince myself that there is no point in ironing clothes that are going to be crammed into suitcases on the flimsy premise that they will undoubtedly need ironing again at the destination. This is just as well because had I not ironed my dress shirts I wouldn’t have discovered that one of our cats had decorated two of them with muddy footprints. When all is said and done, if something needs sorting out or packing then I’m confident I’ll get round to it at some point before I head for the airport – after I have finished blogging and downloading tracks to my iPod, of course.

my lo-fi ears are listening to Low Down/Boz Scaggs

Putting in the hours

2005-02-17T09:42:00.000+13:00

Since the last post, I have been leading what, to all intents and purposes, constitutes a double life. By day, I have been holding down my usual job and, for the last two weeks, standing in for my boss as well. This has kept me pretty busy, meaning that my eyes are often closing by the end of each evening’s tube journey. Consequently, I arrive home ready to crash out on the sofa and do very little. Sadly, this is rarely what happens. Instead, after a brief hello to the family and the odd chore, I retire to the spare room to pick up the threads of my other life – that of a potential émigré and job seeker. Whilst I will admit to a ‘belt and braces’ tendency to over-plan, it has been a long month; one typified by long evenings at the PC reading web sites, sending emails and, of late, making calls and confirming bookings. As from Sunday, my existence will one of a peripatetic serial interviewee and even I had underestimated the level of activity I have had to maintain in order to maximise my time in-country and ensure that I give myself the best chance of success.

Working with recruiters after such a long spell with one employer is an education. It seems that if they are not generating supreme positivity and enthusing and one’s CV, they are out of the office, or on a call or somehow otherwise indisposed. As a hiring manager myself, I understand the mechanisms of the recruitment process and am fully aware that a good recruitment consultant can make all the difference. Like estate agents, each wants you to commit to them and them alone, issuing dire warnings of conflict of interest and ‘client overlap’ if you even hint that you may be talking to another. However, if one is travelling 11682 miles to seek a new life, it would be foolish to leave things to just one or two people. That said, I think of myself as an honest person with some integrity and so have tried to ensure that any overlap, in terms of geography or market, has been kept to a minimum. As the trip draws closer, I have started whittling the list down, favouring those who keep in touch and who are showing an active interest. So far, all the strongest leads are, not surprisingly, centred around Auckland and Wellington, with a number of solid prospects that bear further investigation. We shall see what transpires soon enough.

It hasn’t all been hard sell and powerbroking though. Much fun and games have been had trying to find the best car hire deal. Having called pretty much anyone who rent cars in New Zealand, it soon became clear that the big name firms were looking most likely to offer a decent deal on my three week north-runs-south one-way rental.

click to enlarge

As shown in the map above, my intended route – which alters daily – means that I need to need to cross the Cook Strait between the North and South Islands. To avoid the hassle of shipping one-way rentals back across the Strait, hire firms require renters like me to leave the car at their Wellington port office, cross as a foot passenger and pick up another at the Picton office on the South island. One spin-off benefit that springs to mind is that the long-suffering D&C staff (those who clean, valet, delivery and collect hire cars) are not faced with endless vehicles decorated with the hirer’s lunch after rough crossings. Having chosen a firm to hire from, I thought that the haggling for a decent price would have been over but it just became all the more interesting because their local branch, national booking office and international call centre each quoted wildly differing prices. All this is academic because the price I ended up with is still pretty good value when compared to hire charges in the UK and US.

Choosing accommodation has been just as entertaining. No road trip in NZ would be complete without a stay in a motel. When I say motel, the variety of accommodation available under that title is pretty wide, ranging from basic backpackers’ hostels to swanky hotels. Putting thoughts of the UK’s Travel Lodges and the Crossroads soap from my mind, I have used my obligatory Lonely Planet guide and a motel directory to search out some choice places to overnight during my road trip. Some kind friends have offered up their poor unsuspecting relatives as possible hosts, pressing scraps of paper into my hands whilst promising to call them before I arrive on their doorstep. I just know that they’ll forget and that I’ll up doing a Hugh Grant-style embarrassed Englishman thing, trying to explain why I’m standing on some poor sod’s doorstep at dusk, surrounded by luggage and clutching petrol station flowers. No matter, I have the first week sorted with a lodge near the Auckland Domain – the city’s oldest park, which will be handy for my early morning runs – before moving onto the evocatively named Bureta Park Motor Inn (“Welcome to your place”) near Tauranga to start my second week. I chose the latter motel for two reasons. Firstly, the very pleasant reservations clerk offered me a nice room at a rate that was half that quoted by a grumpy and greedy competitor a mile away (“Well, it does have a sea view”!?). Secondly, who could resist the lure of a motor inn that boasts the ‘Rose 'n Fern Bar’ which, according to the web site, is not only ‘comfortably casual’ but also promises a tired, lonesome English gentleman far away from home, ‘an air of olde England’. So, secure in the knowledge that I shall quaff fine ale and rest well that night, I’ll leave you for now.

my lo-fi ears are listening to Mr. Loverman/Shabba Ranks Feat. Chevelle Franklin

Doing the homework

2005-01-24T06:03:00.000+13:00

As I have already mentioned, what the relocation TV shows don’t show you is the sheer grind of getting to grips with the bureaucracy involved. Of all the tasks so far, finding a discernible path through the labyrinthine convolutions of the immigration regulations must rank as the most frustrating. In this topsy-turvy world, rules change can and do to accommodate governmental policy changes and shifts in employment demographics, often leaving the émigré back at square one. This is a world where skilled manual trades-people and key workers rule, their tertiary qualifications and experience making them valuable assets to be encouraged and assisted. Likewise, applicants in certain high-tech professions and artistic high flyers are also keenly sought. Middle of the road folk like me, who have good solid business experience but no degree, have to plough their furrow through slightly tougher ground.

The main obstacle to migrating to any desirable destination is gaining enough points to submit an Expression Of Interest to an immigration authority’s pool. From this pool, a selection are chosen for qualification to apply for a work permit and/or permanent residence. Like their US and Canadian counterparts, the New Zealand Immigration Service is fairly strict and selective about whom they wish to welcome – too much say some, who point to the recently tightened language requirements as proof of bias. Those with family ties can apply through the Family Stream, others with significant assets can apply in the Investor Category but many seek to make the move as a Skilled Migrant, gaining entry with provable skills and experience that are in short supply in key areas. However, establishing whether one falls into any of the numerous Skilled Migrant categories requires one to navigate through a complex net of web pages and regulations. The Standard Classification of Occupations, Occupational Registration, Registration Authorities, Immediate Skill Shortage List, Long Term Skill Shortage List, Panel Doctors and the all-important Points Indicator and Expression Of Interest are just some of the documents the potential émigré must become familiar with.

Last year, after repeated calculations and rechecking of facts, we were pretty much convinced that we didn’t have enough points to qualify for the Expression Of Interest, let alone residency and came close to giving up on the idea. It was in this frame of mind that we visited a New Zealand expo in London with the intention of simply confirming that we didn’t have a chance of qualifying. My memory of that day is hazy but I recall that it seemed like a never-ending parade of glossy stands and scripted pitches. Many stands were aimed squarely at attracting the doctors, teachers, scientists and accountants most regions needed to maintain the social infrastructure. Another handful promoted particular regional development areas, drawing the crowds with enticing promotion videos and it’s-oh-so-easy seminars.

Mixed in amongst these were the battle-hardened recruitment agencies, some specialising in particular professions or business areas, others casting a broad net to find candidates for specific positions. One such recruiter took a keen interest in me and asked a great number of questions, jotting down my details and answers. Another gave me a card with a generic email and said to send my details for consideration. A third said he couldn’t help but gave me a name of a colleague in Auckland who might be interested. By the end of the day, I had handed out scores of CVs, completed many application forms and smiled at everyone I’d talked to. Tired, hungry and drained, we left the function and dragged ourselves into a TexMex restaurant nearby. Over chicken wings, fajitas and beers, we tried to make sense of the day and work out what, if anything, we had achieved – we were none the wiser we we headed home to pick up the kids. However, and to cut a long story short, from these inauspicious introductions I have now made good contacts with some leading recruiters in the major cities. With these good folks, I have been through telephone interviews to establish suitability, discussed career history to provide candidate credibility and kept regular contact to keep interest high and options open. In return, they have provided honest feedback, helpful advice and, in one case where recruiter is a recent migrant themselves, photos of their own emigration.

The general consensus is good; each is confident that they can place me in a middle management role in New Zealand. With operations management experience, documented successes in productivity improvements, not to mention training qualifications & experience, I apparently stand a good chance against local candidates. Furthermore, having experience of working in the US market as well as the European markets is apparently also in my favour. However, best of all, the recruiters have been able to allay some of my concerns over qualifying for permits and residency. It would seem that the most likely route to achieving our aims would be for me to secure a sponsored position with a large employer, enabling me to work initially under a shorter term work permit, with a view to applying for permanent residency for me and the family at a later date.

With Christmas out of the way and the southern hemisphere holiday season winding down, these recruiters fully expect to be able to generate some interest in the coming weeks and months. So the ball is now in my court, for it is highly unlikely that I’ll generate any interest, let alone secure a position, unless I show commitment and interest myself. Which is why, in exactly 28 days, I shall be enjoying a Sunday lunch with my family before heading off to Heathrow to catch that Emirates 747.

The Lure Of The Land Of The Long White Cloud

2005-01-23T10:54:00.000+13:00

In four week’s time, all being well, I’ll step blinking from the air-conditioned cocoon of an Emirates 747 into the warm afternoon sunlight of Auckland. Ahead of me will lie a three week road trip across New Zealand, from Auckland in the north to Dunedin in the south – a trip in search of future opportunities for myself and my family. Eighteen months ago, after years of idle wondering and speculative talk, we decided that we would take a serious look at the possibility of quitting England to build a new life elsewhere. Though a variety of destinations including Australia and Canada have been considered over time, New Zealand remains the favoured destination.

Some of the motivations behind this decision are complex, individual and will not be explored here but, in general, I suspect that our reasons are not so very different from many would-be émigrés. Despite it being our lifelong home, we have become increasingly disillusioned with life in the UK and the grind of living in Central London. Property and property prices are one key factor. Over nine years, we have transformed a near-derelict council flat into a warm comfortable (if small) family home. Somewhere along the way and in an effort to recoup the considerable sums we had spent to make the place first habitable and then comfortable, we waived our political consciences and bought the flat. The local housing market is fairly buoyant thanks to the proximity of Canary Wharf. However, this and the fact that a new 21 storey luxury development 500m to the south will rob a fair amount of our south-facing daylight means that we are caught between Scylla and Charybdis – too cramped to stay but too expensive to go. In order to afford a decent-sized family home, we would need to move to move to areas that, whilst they might desirable or suitable, do not have the requisite employment opportunities to fund a family of six. No matter how hard we work, it would seem that we can't build and maintain the kind family life we want here unless or even if both of us hold down full time jobs. And therein lies the rub. Dedicating every waking hour away from the kids working is self-defeating if the purpose of the exercise is to spend more time with them and provide them with an improved quality of life and better opportunities.

Phrases like ‘improved quality of life’ and ‘better opportunities’ are all well and good but what do they really mean in our case? Our hopes for our family’s future are not grand, expensive or fanciful, rather they tend to be simple ones defined by values we hold to be worthwhile. Our overarching desire is to provide our children with a safer, happier, more secure daily life than we can offer them living in a small flat in London’s East End. In real terms, this means that we are looking to raise them in a community that is less threatening and where they can be lead more independent lives; to live in a cleaner, more cared-for local environment that has more offer in the way of pastimes and pursuits; to explore and enjoy the outstanding natural beauty that a country like New Zealand has to offer and to experience life from a new perspective that will challenge as well as confirm our values and beliefs. Beyond these fundamentals, there are less tangible elements that cannot be denied as contributing factors: the expectancy and thrill of undertaking a leap into the unknown, the making of a deliberate move from the familiar and a change in circumstance that many would shy away from or simply not entertain.

Over the months, we have talked through the myriads aspects of emigration, first as a couple late at night when the kids were in bed and later, as a family, across the dinner table or in the car. During these conversations and after, we have given much consideration to exactly how such a move would affect each of us, balancing pros against cons, benefits over drawbacks and assessing the impact on our lives and those of our extended families. I believe that we have approached this task from a different angle than most do, in that we looked into the more difficult emotional issues before moving even considering the more practical aspects of moving half way round the world. The logistics of packing up a home and transporting it some 13,000 miles is nothing when compared to discussing the impact of such things on the 80 year old grandparents of our children. As for the more mundane tasks, it is strange but no sooner had we made the decision than a rash of ‘reality’ shows about families relocating suddenly appeared on British TV. There is no denying that these shows have a great entertainment value, such the woman who moved to Oz only to remark ‘It’s too hot here…and the money’s all funny’, but they are more akin to holiday shows, tending towards the rosier post-relocation aspects of emigration rather than the whole process. In my experience, they could never prepare one for the sheer amount of research and information gathering that is required when one doesn’t have TV researchers and professional relocation specialists on hand. But that’s another post.

For those wondering about No.8 wire, a brief explanation can be found on New Zealand Tourism Online’s Kiwiana page.