You don’t come to New Zealand for the money. You come for the lifestyle.

I wrote this blog a while back: http://brokenluggage.wordpress.com/2011/03/24/is-new-zealand-right-for-you/ but I feel like it missed the main point. So here’s my second attempt.

New Zealand has a high cost of living, partly due to the low exchange rate and partly due to the fact that so many products have to be imported. Also, since New Zealand is so small and isolated you don’t get as many of the cheap luxuries you get in a giant continental country with an extensive transportation network. Plus, New Zealand embraces the island mentality where business isn’t (usually) war. So businesses don’t stay open late, and the customer isn’t always right. This doesn’t necessarily mean that life is unafordable, cumbersome and inconvenient. New Zealand recieves thousands of immigrants every year from the South Pacific island, Malaysia, Korea and India where life is certainly harder, but if you compare New Zealand to the United States or Europe, you’ll definitely come to miss certain luxuries and conveniences. Bacon has become a delicacy for me that I savor on the few occasions I fork up the extra cash on special occasions for it.

Having said that, I wouldn’t move back to America for all the bacon and 24 hour convenience stores in the world. For all New Zealand’s petty flaws, I’ve fallen in love with the lifestyle. It’s not like in Tonga where nobody works. You’re going to work 40 hours per week (sometimes more), but the work culture is laid back. So you’re not as likely to hate going to work as much as in America. But you don’t move to New Zealand because you can show up to work in house slippers or have a beer with the boss at lunch. You move here for what goes on after work.

You move to New Zealand to go kayaking at Milford Sound, sunbathing at Whangerei Bay, tasting foods at the Pacifica Festival, skydiving in Taupo, relaxing in Rotorua, hiking at Waitekere, surfing in Raglan and the abundant fishing. You come to New Zealand because you can walk down the street without worrying about getting stabbed or shot. TYou come to New Zealand so your kids can attend a quality university for $5,000 per year. You come for the cheap vacation deals to Thailand, Australia, Samoa, Tonga and Indonesia. You come to New Zealand because you don’t have to feel guilty for paying taxes to support a predatory industrial war complex. You come here because all the different cultures embrace each other instead of fighting (for the most part).

Long story short, you put up with the little worries because you don’t have to put up with the major worries that plague the bigger, more volatile, more violent countries. Bottom line, New Zealand is an adventurer/hippie paradise. You don’t come to New Zealand to sit in your giant suburban home watching 5,000 TV channels shoving your face with big box processed foods. You come here to get outside and have fun. If you’re a die hard Republican and religious fanatic who can’t accept diversity, move to Texas. If you want to live and let live, come to New Zealand and bring your hiking boots with you. Just remember to clean all the dirt off of them first or they’ll get quarantined at the airport.

What did you see on your last vacation?

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