Random thoughts

This post is all of the random thoughts/observations about NZ so far.

Things that no longer exist in the US but are here:
 While walking around the octagon (downtown area) one of the things that sticks out is how many travel agents there are. Off the top of my head, right now sitting in bed, I can think of the location of at least 4 different ones. I don't know if people actually go to travel agencies here or if they just have not gone out of business yet. According to one of the readings for my Foreign Policy class, NZ has one of the highest computer ownership rates in the world.

 Another thing is video stores. On my way to Uni. I walk by two; only separated by McDonald's. And I always see people returning movies so I know people are renting movies. One reason for this is that Netflix does not work here and there are no Kiwi equivalents.

The New Zealand "penny"
 There is no one cent piece in NZ. The coin values are 10, 20, and 50 cent and 1 and 2 dollars. So when you make a purchase they will round the bill to make it a value that you can pay and get change for. I have not paid to much attention to the price of things but most of things already end with a coin amount that does not need to be rounded. So because of the fact that there is no 1 cent piece, there needs to be a coin that fulfills the role as the most annoying coin to have. Me and my friend decided it is the $2 coin. They are much larger that the rest and because it is a coin we are less likely to pull it out and pay exact change with it than giving the cashier a bill and dealing with the coins. The only thing $2 coins are good for is to get ice cream from Rob Roy Dairy. This is an ice cream shop on the other side of Uni from where I live so I only go there about once a week. But for a $2 you can get a small cone of ice cream that is equivalent to a medium or large cone back home. I will get a picture of me with a cone soon so you can see how large it is. Right now it is still cold so the ice cream doesn't melt as I take forever to eat it. My friends comment every time we get ice cream how long it takes me to eat it. I think when it gets warmer I will need to bring my own bowl and spoon to eat my cone with so I don't make a large mess (They charge you extra for a bowl and spoon).

University user name:
 So the university gives everyone a user name that they use to log onto computers, into their online services to get a class timetable, onto blackboard to access stuff for class, etc. It's pretty much your identity in the university. Well that and your student ID number. The algorithm Otago uses is the first 3 letters of you last name followed by the first 2 numbers of your first name and then 3 numbers. So my user name is Tensa315. When I have to show my student ID card to university staff they usually comment on how cool/unusual it is for my user name to be my last name. It makes it a lot easier to remember and type except I find myself trying to use my OSU user name to log in because it is just my last name.

This is all I can think of right now...  I will have more of these later.