Or

Or, if you're really keen, you can read the whole damn first chapter of On Trying to Keep Still on my New Zealand wanderings here.  But that's it, definitely it, if you want any more you've got to buy the book.

Comments

[Ragini Werner]

When I was at school in NZ in the 1960s the longed-for and long-saved for trip to "where far away isn’t" was on the cards for everyone I knew. We all took for granted that after passing our school certificate (SC) and university entrance (UE) exams we'd have to get overseas experience (OE) to qualify for better jobs. Nothing enhanced your glamour more than being able to add an exotic OE to your credentials, whether you'd gained actual work experience or not. No matter, you'd still be held in high esteem just for having been there, done that.

[No one]

Curiously in London whenever I say I'm a NZer the response is always one of three things: either "oh, I went there X years ago. It was lovely", or "oh I've always wanted to go there: I hear it's lovely!" I have to suppress the urge to tell them to get knotted. I don't care if you've been or want to go there. When I meet a French person or an African or whoever I keep my travel preferences to myself. And this has just gotten worse with the whole LOTR rubbish.

Or they say, "didn't you feel isolated?" to which I want to say, "from what?" It's like asking a single child to imagine what it would be like to have siblings.