Watching the Kiwis

Ok, time to report some of my findings on New Zealanders:-

Observations:
1. The accent - Well NZ accent is very subtle in general, I don't have much problem understanding them, and neither do they have much trouble understanding me (big contrast with my last Sydney/Gold Coast trip in Australia). The one funny thing bout the accent is the way they pronouce 'e' the way we pronouce 'i'. Therefore, 'head & neck' sounds like 'hiad & nick', 'desk' becomes 'disk', 'tension' -> 'tinsion', and 'medicine', 'midcine'.

Example: (for bist effict, rid this aloud)
sex - one liss than sivven

It was kinda amusing (and sometime hilarious) when I first hear them, but I'm getting used to them now. Oh they also love to use 'aye' a lot by the way, not unlike the 'la' we Malaysians have the habit to use at the end of our sentences. Well in general, I'm surprised by how gentle the accent sounds, since I was expecting something harsher, like the Australian accent. But they do have the habit to mumble once in awhile though, which is when I can hardly understand anything lol.

2. The opening hours - Yes I DID expect shops to close down early in the Australasia region, but imagine this: Most shopping malls are closed around 4.30-5pm on a Sunday!!! I mean, what the hell?! How am I supposed to spend my weekend nights then? The only things you can do to entertain yourself at night is drinking here really. Which brings me to my next point... (Before that, I juz wanna confess that I REALLY miss Malaysian night life...) <=(

3. The drinking orgy - Alright I've overexaggerated there. But it's true to a certain extent: people here engage in binge drinking more often than not. It's as if their sole purpose of visiting a bar or having a drinking party is to get drunk. Then you'll see the most well-behaved people saying all kinds of incomprehensible rubbish, while some of us even received some racist remarks and all (someone thrown an egg at one of us while we were walking back along a road at night). And god when they drink, the stink of beer stays at the place for hours. And they get pretty rowdy when they're high too, which is rather annoying for someone who enjoys the quiet and peaceful enviroment of NZ.

4. The diet - Strange enough, the diet here in Auckland (read: Auckland, not NZ. I have no idea how things are outside Auckland) is filled with all sorts of Asian delights. Rice is a common staple food, Japanese/Chinese/Korean restaurants can be found everywhere, they have a nice selection of indian dhal, and best of all, the satay here actually taste better than the ones in Malaysia! The lamb here is delicious, but the pork here juz turns me off. It has the weird, unpleasent aroma with it. Quite a pity actually, since it's refreshing to see pork everywhere here compared with Malaysia.

Oh and they have really light lunches here. The people here often have sandwich for lunch. Which is REALLY bad for me, since lunch is usually my heaviest meal of the day back home. And of cuz, supper is almost non-existent here. Thank god they do have a wide selection of instant noodles here, again, due to the high Asian influence in their diet. Indomee, maggi mee, hokkien mee, singapore fried noodle, vietnamese nice noodle, korean kimchi noodle, japanese udon... All these you can get easily in the instant noodle section of the supermarkets/asian grocery shops here.

5. The multiracial community - One of the reason I feel quite at home in Auckland is due to the fact that there's quite a multiracial community here. There are more than 15% of Asians here (18.9% according to the 2006 census), 25% are Maoris or Polynesians while the rest are causcasians. Even the caucasians are from all over the world: UK, Europe, North America, South Africa (quite a number of them. funny accent)... A very colourful community indeed. I've been with chinese, middle-eastern, maori, and american doctors in my hospital attachments so far, and it's been quite an interesting experience learning from them. It's a relief that I'm not a minor minority here really lol.

Well that's all I can think of for now. Well update more if I recall any further observations! ;)

Random Pics

Auckland City Central, as seen from a ferry. Well it does look pretty, doesn't it? The tall tower over there is Sky Tower, tallest tower in the south hemisphere... Still much shorter than KL Tower though, not to mention the Petronas Twin Towers.

Auckland Domain at dusk. This picture don't do any justice to the beauty of the domain, as I took it with my lousy handphone VGA camera. It looks like some sort of sacred ground really. And man it's HUGE!

Everybody getting ready for the start of the Starlight Symphony, an annual event of live classical music performances and fireworks!

I've bought a bottle of dessert wine just to enjoy it along with the show! Hehe...

Keat caught in the act! Haha...

Cheers to Khang Hee's soon-to-be-born baby!

Fireworks coordinated with Tchaikovsky's 1812 Overture (remember the song from V For Vendetta when the whole parliament building went kaboom?) It's one helluva impressive display! There's even canon shots and all in the domain!

Lion dance at Sky City (The atrium of Sky Tower). Reminds me of CNY celebrations back home...

One Tree Hill, the highest peak in Auckland. Used to have a lone tree sitting on top of the hill, but have since been chopped off. There's a long and amusing history behind this hill, you can check it out in Wikipedia if you're interested.

The obelisk on top of One Tree Hill. The figure over there is a statue of a Maori warrior.

Pride of Auckland sailing tour. The uni sponsored half of the ticket costs for us, which is why most of us can't resist giving it a try.

All of us have a chance to steer the sail for the Pride of Auckland tour! And don't let the jacket fooled you: it's hot as hell then! Lol. The weather here can be very unpredictable.

Downtown Britomart, the central bus station of Auckland.

Flowers!!! Colourful!!! Hehe...

The Auckland Wartime Museum at Auckland Domain. Beautiful architecture, but very singular though. You won't find many such classical buildings in Auckland.

The marae visit. A marae is a place of meeting for the Maori people, which is held to be a sacred ground by them since... forever. We have 2 days of lectures here inside the building, and spent a night sleeping inside the building.

The interior of the marae. Yes I know, the place looks bigger from the inside doesn't it? The chairs are all aligned for the (exceptionally boring) lectures.

Laying the mattresses down to sleep for the night in the marae! I looked quite stoned there don't I? Lol.

Dusk at the fields close to the marae. The variety of colours in the pics reminded me of the paintings of my favourite artist, Van Gogh. Rangitoto Island, a volcanic island that emerged from the sea about 5 decades ago, rests in a dormant state mysteriously at the background of the pic.

Brilliant Phony Trailers

Sorry guys with the lack of updates. I'm definitely gonna upload some pictures this weekend. Been busy with my anaesthetic postings and all this past 2 weeks.

In the mean time, check out these phony movie trailers! I have never posted youtube movies on my blog before, but these are just so impressive I just can't resist sharing with you guys!

Alritey! 1st off, we have Brokeback to the Future, which is probably the best-known of all the 3 that I'm posting here. It's hilarious and brilliant and the same time, with all the clever manipulation of scenes and dialogues that are originally from the Back to the Future trilogy.

Next we have some old classics with a modern spin! Gosh that's a gross understatement. Just imagine how the story of Moses and the exodus would be like with an R&B soundtrack! Lol. The 'principal firebush' scene at the end is just freaking hilarious! Thank God for Quentin Tarantino and Samuel L Jackson!

And finally, who would have thought that Mary Poppins could be a figure of such disturbing horror?! Whatever trace of the sweet nanny who sing such happy tunes like "Just A Spoonful of Sugar Makes the Medicine Go Down" is totally lost in the demonic rendition of Scary Mary... This clip never ceased to give me goosebumps everytime I watched it alone at night! By far my favourite among the 3.