New Zealand Thoughts

Blogging in a forum titled “New Zealand Thoughts” and being a first-time blogger. I am going into this with no experience and no clue. On no less than both subjects, I’m afraid.

Being a child to Asian parents, and having had the pleasure of experiencing nausea on airplanes for 15 hours at a time, I had sort of sworn off places that would take over half a day of travel to get there. (I googled the flight duration from Germany to New Zealand. Sooooo much more than half a day!)

But anyway, I am not travelling physically, just mentally. How much more pleasant that journey will be…I’ll see.

So, “New Zealand Thoughts”. When I think of New Zealand, my initial thought is ‘too far away’, naturally. That it has been overshadowed by its much bigger, commonly more ‘popular’ neighbor to their west. (Would New Zealanders take offense when you speak of Australia in their presence? I shall find out!) The reason I think that way is because I imagine New Zealand to consist of a lot of vast land, wilderness, and exotic animals, especially the dangerous and poisonous kinds, foods and traditions. But in retrospect I ask myself if I’m really trying to imagine what New Zealand is like or just projecting what I know about Australia onto New Zealand, because they are geographically close to each other. In the end, I have to admit to myself that doing so would compare to saying Germany and Austria is the same, because they are situated next to each other (and people would hurt me for making such a statement), and that I really don’t know much about New Zealand at all, apart from the fact that Wellington is the capital and that there was a recent dispute about changing the national flag.

So why take a class that specifies on New Zealand? The answer is quite easy as it is silly. Because I got a glimpse of how beautiful it could look. In a music video. Is that shallow? Probably yes. But it sparked interest, curiosity and a motivation to learn about it.

Mai

P.S. The music video (for anybody who’s interested). https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4OrCA1OInoo