Cultural Differences

Andy, 28 February 2008

Kiwis don’t rinse the soap suds off their dishes before placing them in the rack to dry, and I’m ready to hypothesize that some sort of related glycerin buildup in the brain is what’s causing so many people down under to hallucinate that mullets are fashionable. Maybe it’s the Eurotrash influence, too. I’d rant about the crocs, but that particular epidemic is scorching the States as well.

As did Troy in Amsterdam, I heard Mambo #5 on a ‘modern hits’ radio station while on the freeway in Auckland. Tangentially, it seems kids my age have yet to get past the house techno that the Bay Area so thoroughly wore out in the 90s. I tried to name-drop Justice or SebastiAn, but if it doesn’t have a Roland 505 with the Cliché knob set to MAX, I guess some people just can’t be bothered. To be fair, I saw hordes of Keffiyeh-wearing hipsters in Wellington, but I was too shy to throw myself at them and ask about the latest Iron & Wine album like a lost, dehydrated waif begging for water at the edge of a desert oasis.

Meanwhile, I’m more tan than I’ve been in years, and am running, so to speak—trying to stay ahead of the throbbing, ominous thunderhead of existential crisis gathering on the horizon. (A very common theme for young adults, really, and I invoke it mostly in jest. Mostly.) I never thought living out of a suitcase for weeks on end could come so easily to an anal-retentive bore like me.

Categories: Rants, Leisure, Travel
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