The land of sheep and chocolate

Friday, September 29, 2006

Ten things we miss about England

Here's a list of 10 things we miss about home.

Public transport
Channel 4
Decafeinated Tea
Match of the Day
Tomato puree in squeezy tubes
The Guardian
Next petite clothing
Ikea
Car boot sales
Pubs

Monday, September 25, 2006

Shed Mania

There's so much more space here and we absolutely love it. But it's worth asking the question: What does a man do with 500 square metres of garden? If you're a Kiwi bloke, the answer is to cover it in sheds.

It is shed-tastic in this country and it is pretty obvious from the moment you start house hunting. Most places here have a double garage and workshop and more often than not they come with a sleep-out, a kind of impromptu shed based bedroom in the garden. I looked at average sized houses with quad-garages, the same size as the house, with a tiny garden squeezed in between. For God's sake, what do they do in these buildings?

To find out, the place to look is The Shed, a magazine devoted to shed based activities. And it's a man's world in the Kiwi shed. They don't potter around collecting nails in jars; they have circular saws and they operate powertools. On a Sunday morning, the sound of hammering and sawing echoes around the suburbs.

What do the women think of his? My research hasn't got that far yet but I can reveal that the divorce rate here is 50%. Whilst I'm not saying that the national shed-obsession is the cause of the divorce epidemic, whose to say that whilst the men are hiding out in their sheds, their wives aren't smuggling the handyman into the bedroom?

That won't happen here. I did my best to buy a house with minimal outbuilding coverage on my section. Even so, I have a garage/workshop with attached sleepout and storage area as well as a separate shed. I am going to have the shed removed at the first opportunity; it's not worth putting my marriage at risk.

Besides, I want my garden available for growing vegetables. I spent the weekend putting up a fence around the veggie patch prior to the arrival of the dogs at the weekend. I can't be doing with them rolling around in the compost heap and digging up my potatoes. Jo is horrified about the amount of space I have taken up (or stolen as she puts it) and the pressure is on for me to grow something worth eating. The early signs are not good. My plastic greenhouse blew over in the wind last week and my pumpkins, tomatoes and peppers have had it.

Saturday, September 16, 2006

We're Levin It!

Its three weeks since I last wrote anything and in that time Jo and Lily have arrived and we have settled in to our new house. There's far more to say than I can possibly begin to write in the time available so lets just say that I am pleased to see them and leave it at that.

The task of furnishing the house has begun in earnest and for the last couple of weekends we have shuttled between various department stores but mostly we have trawled around Levin's branch of The Warehouse, which seems to be some kind of national institution in much the same way that Tesco's is at home. It is a bit like a downmarket version of Ikea crossed with Poundstretcher. Every town seems to have one and it sells absolutely everything. You might say its killing the high street, but when it comes to sorting your house out, it gives the Kiwi consumer what they want.

What this does mean is that we haven't really explored what the district has to offer. The 30-mile long (windswept) beach remains unexperienced and we haven't ventured into the bush reserve or up the mountain path. We have been down the coast to Paraparaumu (you pronounce it like it is spelt), but only to go to the shops. We did venture down to the beach and the locally famous Marine Parade. Here, shops and cafe's face the sea, behind a short stretch of sand-dunes. The water was turquoise, the waves were gentle and the views across the strait to Kapiti island were stunning. However, the wind was up and when the wind blows around here it really goes for it. It wasn't a day for taking in the sea air and besides, the clock was ticking; shops here close at 4 on Saturday and I had a fence to buy.

Jo is settling into life here and has made positive noises about the house, much to my relief. We both really like the town. It has lots of parks including two huge play areas for Lily, and wide open streets without too much traffic. Jo has been to the play group and we have been invited over to tea at one of the other Mum's place. So, the early progress is good and we are are liking it.