“Binge” Drinking Culture in New Zealand

Every country has its own drinking culture. It helps them to interact with co-workers, seniors, juniors and friends. It allows them to forget their stress for a while and to have fun. In some countries, drinking culture is one of the way to increase business…

The history of Chinese people in New Zealand

Ni hao! There is one particular group we talked about rather often, but didnt go particularly into detail. The came from over the pacific sea, just like the first Maori settlers, but their travel is much more recent. I’m talking about Chinese New…

The importance of learning te reo Maori

In this week’s class we talked about the Maori language, also known as te reo Maori. It was the predominant language spoken in NZ at the beginning of the 19th century. But as more English settlers arrived there, the people spoke less and less Maori. Between…

New Zealand’s National Wizard

While searching for a topic for my next blog post, I came across this little fact: New Zealand has an officially appointed Wizard. And by officially appointed I mean, that the Prime Minister during that time signed a document which proclaims him to be “the first Wizard of New…

Kapa O Pango

“Kapa O Pango” simply means “team in black” in Maori.

Everyone who has read a little bit about NZ must have sooner or later crossed the sports section and therefor the New Zealanders favourite sport rugby. And everybody who knows about rugby has heard of the All Blacks, NZs…

Celebrating birthdays and wedding anniversary in New Zealand history

In past years, it was believed by Maori that birthdays are time of bad spirits and danger, so people were making good wishes and their friends were surrounding them to get rid of bad spirits. Nevertheless…

Being Trans in New Zealand

I’m going to publicly proclaim it now. Hi, I’m transgender. I changed my medium account name and will probably…

Let’s Cook Some Maori “Kai“

New Zealand’s indigenous people — the Maori — were traditionally gatherers, crop farmers and hunters, who got…

KIWI

The Bird, Fruit and People

Kiwi — that word alone can bring up a lot of confusion. Why? Well, it not only describes one, not two, but three things.

And all of them have exactly one thing in common: They can be found in New Zealand.