The Little Differences…

What’s Different between New Zealand and the USA?

1.  Here, they say “keen” for excited or pumped, “sweet as” for awesome or sweet, cookies are called biscuits, and no, they don’t have our thanksgiving biscuits.  A cooler is a “chilly bin”, Rice Krispy’s are called Rice Bubbles, and a BBQ does not have the typical hamburgers and hot dogs, but rather beef sausages on bread with onions and ketchup.

The New Zealand version of Rice Krispies

2.  The toilets:

• They call the bathroom the toilet.  They think that Americans are super polite by calling it a bathroom.
• The flushers are not little handles like at home; they are buttons, usually a big one for big things and a little one for little things.

3.  They don’t have fraternities or sororities.  I asked my flat-mate about it, and she had no idea that they were real things… she thought they were made up on television.

4.  Eggs are not refrigerated here.  It’s common practice to leave them on the shelves, even in grocery stores.

5.  They don’t have unlimited wifi.  Everything is sold by the amount of data.  You have to remember to turn the data on your phone off so you don’t use it up when you’re not paying attention.

6. The light switches

1. They can be turned on and off, which is awesome, until you forget to turn it on and your phone doesn’t charge overnight
2. They are in the opposite direction… down is on and up is off

7. Literally everywhere you go it is absolutely breathtaking.

The coast at Taylor’s Mistake beach

The botanical gardens

The view of Lyttlelton

Many things are similar, but there are also a ton of differences in our English.  Everyone here seems to be much more laid back and nice than what I’m used to in New York.  I enjoy the differences and it’s fun to learn new things about how Kiwis live.