Language Subtleties

You may have noticed that the blog entries have slowed considerably since we settled in Wellington. With three months now under our belts, we’ve sort of settled into more of a “living here” routine, and less of the big adventure traveling the world.

Now moving from America to New Zealand was not a huge culture shock as you might
expect. Both countries being English speaking, Western democracies, it
was difficult to even believe we we're on the opposite side of the
planet. And being predominately of European decent here, we don't even look
like foreigners. There have been times walking along a crowded street of Wellington when we realized, oh yeah, if we're not speaking out loud with our North American
accents, they don't know we're not Kiwis!

However, there are lots of little things everyday that remind us that we are indeed in a foreign land. Take the simple task of buying a cooler:

Chilly Bin
Early in our trip as we we’re going to be living out or our car and traveler’s lodging, we knew we’d want to keep some foods cold between stays. So we went looking for a cooler, thinking a gas station or grocery store would likely have one. We’ll that week, English felt like a second language.  When I asked where I could buy a cooler, I received only blank stares in return. After several attempts, of playing charades with the clerks… “O.K. I’m off to a “Barbie,” I’ve got my lamb shanks and food, and I have my (Blank), which I have put ice in to keep my beer cold…” That was all it took, his eyes lit up and the fill in the blank was a "Chilly Bin!" So we are the proud owners of a chilly bin.

Here’s a few other phrases we’ve noticed.

• There's the easy ones like “g'day” and “Cheers” and “Mate” and “Bloke.” Though we still feel like posers tossing those around.
• A much more subtle difference is that Kiwis use “how ya going?” not "how ya doing?”
• There’s a dairy just down the street from our flat. Any guesses? That’s
  right, the “Dairy” is the corner market or convenience store near our flat(apartment).
• My favorite is “Heaps” to describe a large quantity. Oh, I’ve got heaps more…
• Another favorite is “Sweet As.” There’s never a conclusion that comes after this phrase. I always feel an innate need to finish the thought, but the beauty of “Sweet as” is it’s just left wide open to any positive conclusion (Kevin: “Hey, I went bungee jumping yesterday”. Brad: “Ah, sweet as…”). So you can see how it works. But before we really got the accent down, we thought “sweet as” was a comment that our butts were getting in good shape from all that walking.
• And of course, “Tea.” Tea can have a much broader definition that we'd ever thought. “Come on over for tea” can indeed mean a cup of tea. Or a cup of coffee. Or a glass of wine, or a beer. Or dinner! This one we have far from mastered. We still can't understand how people can respond to an invitation of “tea” as they may have no idea what the invitation might entail.
  

Well it's tea time, got to go...