You were lucky! I guess you didn’t walk around K road on a Saturday night then.
Kiwis don’t leave the country as fast as possible because everyone is so pleasant to each other.
However, because the government confiscated all the handguns, people just bottle each other rather than shooting them, though the multitude of gangs have a penchant for big boots to the head.
More or less. “Haere Mai” is “Welcome” and “Haere Ra” is “Farewell.”
Other greetings include “Tena Koe” which means “Hello” to one person (it’s “Tena Koutou” for a crowd of people), or the more commonly heard “Kia Ora” which literally means “Be Healthy.”
“Aroha” which is similar to the Hawaiian “Aloha” is not a greeting, it means “Love.” I guess, after some etymological twists and turns, Hawaiians use it in an affectionate sense.
Besides the fact aircraft capable of flying between New Zealand and its nearest neighbour Australia weren’t around until the 1920s,
It’s highly likely Pearse managed to get a winged, powered craft airborne under a semblance of controlled flight around early 1903. However, Pearse himself realised the Wrights were far in advance of anything he was going to achieve and is understood to have decided to bow out of the public debate on the subject by simply letting the Wrights have the credit for first powered flight, rather than getting involved in an argument over technicalities.
Maybe this reflects some Japanese influence on the NZ native population.
Aeroplanes would have looked very different if they’d followed his lead. I think Pearse’s success was pure dumb luck, and didn’t really utilise the principles of flight very well at all. He was right to step back.
I would agree with that. Mr Pearse might have technically gotten a powered, heavier-than-air craft to fly first but he wasn’t in a position to do much with that achievement. He was a South Canterbury “Gentleman Farmer” and as you say, I think a fair bit of luck was involved in his success. I believe he was on the right track, though, but I also respect his decision vis-a-vis giving the Wrights the credit.
To be fair, modern aircraft don’t look much like the Wright Flyer either. It’s rare that the products of a well-developed technology closely resemble what was done in its early days.
Yeah, my iPhone looks nothing like the blanket and fire pit my great great grandfather used.
Actually, you’ll find that chauvinism is a French word.
Just can’t explain it. Dare I say it?
Yes, I know about the possibly apocryphal M. Chauvin. But wrapping yourself in the flag and singing that awful Lee Greenwood song seems to be a stereotype of us Yankees. And to be honest, not a completely unjustified one, either.
That reminds me of the time I had to translate for a Korean and a Fijian. Both were speaking English but neither could understand the other. However, I could understand both of them and both could understand me.
Yep you can say it - and I would happily dis-own him and send him on his way to join you if you like.
It’s been my experience that Americans struggle with non-American or British English accents for some reason. I’ve seen several US TV shows where someone educated from a foreign country (like France) is speaking perfectly understandable English and it’s subtitled. 
I’ve also seen people from Australia and New Zealand subtitled on American TV - and no, they weren’t speaking in weird slang or anything. It’s odd and also slightly offensive.
Yeah I saw that as well - that cyclist woman Philipa something? (she won an Olympics cycling gold I think) Was on some sort of extreme challenge and she was being subtitled in english while speaking english…:rolleyes:
Heh, that reminds me of something my parents told me - they used to live in a rural area, about 30 minutes drive out of Christchurch. They had a young European couple turn up at their house, lost. They were looking for a B&B where they had booked to stay for a week. Mum and Dad looked at their handwritten map, couldn’t understand it, so invited them to stay with them, and took them round the sights. 
I’ve seen the “Subtitled English Speakers thing” on more than one occasion in US, often in really incongruous places like in serious documentaries. “Jarring” doesn’t even begin to cover it.
Not just the US. I’ve seen BBC do it too.
A friend of mine from Christchurch carries around her own subtitles.
Admittedly I’ve seen the Beeb subtitle English speakers, but only in situations like “African warlord who speaks English as a third language (and not well)” or “Member of extremist group of a grainy video making demands” - I can’t say I’ve ever seen the BBC subtitle an English-speaking French doctor, South African history expert or an Eskimo national park ranger, for example.
