New Zealand

The Post Family, together in Tonga

On 22 Dec my parents, sister, and I touched down in New Zealand’s largest city, Auckland. Our AirNZ flight left Tonga at 4AM, the earliest flight I’ve ever had. But once I realized that the On-Demand TV on the seat in front of me was in fact a sticker with a promise of On-Demand TV by December 2008 (they’re cutting it close!), I quickly passed out.

My first impression of New Zealand was that it was strict. SUPER strict. I have never been through a more rigorous baggage examination process, and I once tried to enter the US with eight Arabic stamps in my passport (true story). In Tonga, the baggage screen was the door you walked through as you left the airport, but here everyone went through questions after lines after x-rays after inspections after questions.

I would later discover they had every right to be worried. Ignoring the damage of flora in New Zealand, the impact of invasive fauna introduced by Europeans was massive. When Captain Cook came by, he left behind cows and other livestock to feed future colonists. But these animals reproduced much too slowly for his tastes, and so he also introduced the rabbit. BOOM! Soon everyone is sick of rabbit meat, and to combat the rascaly rabbits they introduce the stoat. These animals were mentioned to us on a tour in a way that suggested they were well known, but I’d never heard of them before. What little demon animals they are! These vicious mammals live life on a faster plane of existence then most; they can attain 400 heart beats and 100 breaths a minute, requiring a constant flow of energy. They took a look at the rabbits, going mach 3 across the New Zealand countryside, and then they took a look at the Kiwi, a bird just one good (or even mediocre) predator away from extinction, and they feasted on Kiwi ever since. The rabbit plague was never cured, but in the meantime Europeans opened New Zealand to weasels, ferrets, and possums (speed bumps in New Zealand, while ironically a protected species in their native Australia). One governor even attempted to introduce zebra. In his defense, what place couldn’t use striped horses? Or monkeys... Only a few species introductions concluded happily, trout for instance.

My next impression of New Zealand, when we left the airport, was that it was cold. I’d hardly ever worn the hoodie I brought to Tonga eleven months ago, and in my effort to pack light I had left it behind (it’s a six week trip for me, I press on to Australia at the end of our New Zealand trip). Tonga had been low thirties the week before, but New Zealand was “just” mid-twenties. I maintain that that Canadian winter will kill me.

While we waited for a shuttle to pick us up and take us to the Apex car rental lot, I took in my new surroundings. McDonalds, KFC, AVIS, two dollar coins…I could believe I was in Canada again. But then a local would say something and Lisa and I would exchange confused looks – “keyn aw halp you?” And then wheelie bins, push chairs, tumblers, chilly bins!. “Coffee” meant nothing, you had to specify - short black, long black, flat white. This was definitely a foreign country.

Figuring out Auckland