Thursday, June 14, 2012

New Zealand: It's not you, it's me. (It's you.)

I love New Zealand. I love that our national colour is black, both slimming and practical. I love that within an hours drive you can get to the beach, a forest, paddocks of masticating cows, a township consisting of a garage and a pub. I love our coffee and our cafes. I love watching tourists trying to find the tree on One Tree Hill. I don't care about rugby but I can name members of the All Blacks and get swept up when we win. I can eat roast lamb with the best of them.

But...I will never have the life that I aspire to if I remain here. The prospect of home ownership is out of my grasp, not if I want something that isn't a leaky damp box next to a railway line. I will never have a dishwasher. Sad violin music started up when I started typing that sentence and rain lashed the window. If that isn't tragic what is gentle reader, what is?

As much as I love this country if I stay I will end up remaining in dead end low paying jobs living in a rented mouldy cold home. However, if I move overseas I could end up in a dead end medium paying job in a mouldy cold home that I can call my own.

I'm a coward at heart and the idea of stepping out of my comfort zone and doing this is not something that I take lightly, or with clean pants. But New Zealand has rapidly become such a country of have and have nots,  where opportunities are few, where housing is crippling expensive, that there doesn't seem to be much of a choice in the matter.

I aspire to a dishwasher, I want that dishwasher, and to get that dishwasher I am going to have to leave this country behind and seek dishwasher opportunities elsewhere. I will cover it in fridge magnets of home and I will think of this place fondly.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

It makes me sad you do not have hundreds of people telling you that you are witty, intelligent and funny as hell. So take that and multiply by 100 and I will be less sad. Thanks! I feel better.

Also,
I wish you the best of luck in home ownership and moving and having an appliance that cleans dishes for you. I want to share though, that I do own a home (well I pay the bank for it) and I have a dishwasher, and it does not make me happy. I'm quite sure with the housing crash I own more on this house than it's worth and I'd prob need to put 15k into it to ever make enough repairs for it to sell. Also, I think it's sliding down the hill.

The dishwasher. It plagues me. I don't unload it after a cycle. The dishes pile up in the sink, and the clean ones mock me. You haven't used this bowl. You will have to put this bowl away before you put dirty dishes in here. There are also four clean forks. Haha. It gets so bad I realize I must do this. I must do the dishwasher clean/dirty switch. I pull the bowl out. There is food dirt crusted on it. I will have to scrub it with a sponge. I hardly use my sponge. It smells moldy.

I hope your dreams turn out better than mine. And hey! If you ever decide to move to America I have a nice house I'm thinking about putting on the market! comes with a dishwasher!

Dovil said...

Well, thank you, that was an incredibly kind comment. Not only what you said about me (cheque is in mail) but putting my dishwasher dreams in to some kind of perspective. Because yes, I have the feeling that within three months it would be hidden under a mound of dirty dishes and I'd be eating off paper plates, but a girls got to dream.

Though ugh, sorry to hear about the depreciation on the house - have you got insurance - you can probably pick up a can of gasoline and a pack of matches on the cheap. j/k!