YOUPOST 4

Beautiful New Zealand

A few weeks ago, a girl asked me to give her some advice in terms of travelling. She intends to go to New Zealand and knows that I was there, so I happily gave her some recommendations on what to visit and to do. Now I would like to share my experience with you.

First of all, you do not have to know anything before leaving. There is nothing you must not do, maybe except committing a crime. To correct myself, there is nothing you must not do, that you are not allowed to do in your home country either.
Next, stay as long as possible, because a) the flight is too expensive for a weekend trip and b) you will not be able to get to know the culture in a short time.
In my view, the best way to travel is on your own because you will meet many people on the way and to be honest, I could not spend half a year 24/7 with the same person, even if it was my best friend. I chose to do couchsurfing, I hitch-hiked and survived it. It is not a recommendation to sleep at strangers houses and go with them to the next town, but it is much more adventurous.

Some destinations worth going to: (all the pictures are of course taken by myself, that's why they are not that good)

Queenstown, the city of adventure in the Southwest of the South Island. Known for its beautiful landscape and the great variety of extremsports offered. It is probably best to not stay for too long because after one week you will have spent all your money on things like rafting, mountainbiking and skiing, depends on which time of the year you are going. Remember: Winter on the northern hemisphere means summer in the southern one. Why not spend a hot Christmas and New Year's Eve?

If you then travel on westerly, you will find a hiking trail that leads to Milford Sound, the best known fjord of New Zealand. The attraction is not just the fjord, but the National Park surrounding it is maybe even more beautiful. It is a very touristy place and sadly the only fjord a backpacker can afford to have a look at.

A very remote part of New Zealand is the West Coast of the South Island because it is confined by the Southern Alps in the East and the Tasman Sea in the West. Maybe owing to the fact that there are so few people, the nature is picturesque. To name one example: On the picture above, there is the Fox Glacier, which is a Glacier that runs into the rainforest and the rainforest runs on until it touches the sea.

Another thing you might want to try on the West Coast is Whitebait, a tiny little fish that you eat on the whole. It is a delicacy.

I worked for two and a half weeks on a farm in the Golden Bay, in the North-West of the South Island and I fell in love with that part of the country. Above, you see a photo of Pupu Springs, the clearest waters in the world. 

I recommend eating fresh cockles, pipis and other mussels as well as oysters, picked by yourself in the Bay.

Another remarkable part of New Zealand are the Marlborough Sounds in the Cook Strait. The best way to explore them is to go by kajak. I slept in a hut on one of the many islands and did a night kajak-trip where I saw penguins, dolphins and fish glowing in the moonlight. If you like adventure, go for it!

You might want to try Paua, too. It's a rare, eatable sea snail, but the best part of it is the amazing, colourful shell. The only problem is that they are hard to get, you have to dive for them.

 

One last stop on the South Island: Dunedin, an old Scottish city and the Otago Peninsula, where you can watch some penguins coming home if you are lucky.

 

What I liked best about the North Island, was the Far North. On the left, you see a picture of the northernmost point, Cape Reinga. It is surrounded by a lot of Bays, rainforest and waterfalls. If you like nature, you will definitely like that area.

 

As I said, there are a lot of bays in the Far North and the most famous of them is the Bay of Islands. I prefer other bays over that one because in the Bay of Islands, there are too many tourists. If you have the opportunity to go to one the remote bays of the North, do it.

Rainforest in New Zealand is nothing like the rainforest in other places. The Kauri Trees growing in them are the biggest and highest trees in the world and every rainforest you will walk through, will be full of large ferns. By the way: The silverfern is the national plant of New Zealand.

 

Last but not least, if you like hiking and volcanoes, do the about 18 kilometres long Tongariro Trek in the center of the North Island. There is not much to say about it because, in my opinion, you have to see it for yourself.

I could have shown you about one hundred pictures more, from other stunning, picturesque, amazing places in New Zealand. Indeed, I would be able to fill an entire book about this country. Anyway, at some point there has to be an end.

Some other recommendations:

1) Try Marmite, you probably will not like it, but try it.

2) Wellington is a beautiful city, but maybe try to avoid Christchurch. You will be disappointed because the earthquake destroyed almost everything. A lot of people moved away, so it is a very lonesome city.

3) If you like bubbling muddholes, this is the country for you. On the North Island there are many volcanoes, geysers and other forms of geothermical energy on the surface. Be prepared for the smell of addled eggs!

4) Enjoy the sweet New Zealand accent. :)

5) Go to the small, unknown villages, too. The people will be friendly and show you some places no tourist has ever seen before.

6) Avoid staying in hostels, they are not as international as you might think. You will not speak a word English because ninety per cent of the tourists sleeping in hostels are Germans. If you stay at hostels, maybe you could take one outside of the cities. I had much better experiences with them, because the people are much friendlier and of more disparate cultures.

7) Try some jolly cake.

YOUPOST 3

New York City

I asked myself the question, where I should go to for two weeks, if I had less to do for university. Many answers came to my head, but the most attractive one at the moment is going to New York City, a metropolis where as many people live as in my home country, Austria.

I am not very good at planning a journey, and if I plan it, I do something totally different when I am at my destination. Nonetheless, I try to plan every time I am about to go away again:
I will set off in the summer break next year, so I book a cheap flight to the LaGuardia Airport as soon as possible.
The reason why I want to travel to New York City is because I have never been to such a big city with so many different cultures living in it. America is a Melting Pot and New York was the entrance for the immigrants to the New World. I am curious about the lifestyle of the different ethnicities and so I do not want to stay in hotels or hostels, but do couchsurfing. Couchsurfing is a great opportunity to get to know the real citizens and not just fellow travellers. It is a social network where you can find accommodation, help and information about a place from Natives in the whole world, even in the Antarctica. It already worked out for me in Australia and New Zealand.

Of course I want to do some typical touristy sight-seeing, too. I am interested in the history of America, about which I recently learned in university. As a result, I plan on going to the New York Harbour to see Ellis Island, the Statue of Liberty and, when I am already there, the skyline of Manhattan. Going by yellow cab to the Downtown and the Central Park is definitely a must-do, as well as seeing Ground Zero, the Empire State Building and the Times Square.

I do not want to spend more than two thousand Euros and because the flight is very expensive, every activity I planned is free. I intend to spend most of the money on food. I want to eat in Turkish, Malaysian, Mexican, Italian, British, Chinese, Indian etc. restaurants, as many as I can afford.

One last thing I want to take a look at is the Columbia University, because it is one of the eight Ivy League Universities and I suppose the campus and the buildings are picturesque. Maybe I will even get the opportunity to enter them, walk around and explore.

I am looking forward to travelling to the Big Apple. I am sure it is going to be worth the long and uncomfortable flight, the strict security checks and the jetlag.

YOUPOST 2

The USA – is there actually another country in this world?

When you think of Americans, which stereotypes come to your mind? They are into guns, obesity is a big problem, they are as patriotic as one can be, do you see them as racists or even religious fanatics? Of course there are positive stereotypes, too. US citizens are often seen as optimists and hard-working people who are generous and like to volunteer.

In this blog post, however, I want to engross my mind in one of many typical stereotypes: Geography is not the strength of Americans, mostly because they never leave their own country. The thought of being the most important and powerful state in the world and behaving ignorant against every other culture goes hand in hand with the lack of topographical knowledge. This topic appeals to me because geography is an interesting subject per se and I want to see behind the curtains of a major prejudice which lets Americans look dumb, stupid and proud of it.

There is a great variety of images and videos available on the Internet that are meant to prove the lack of geographical knowledge. Introducing some of the pictures to you, in order to let you know what exactly this stereotype is about, I start with a very disturbing one. It illustrates both ignorance and arrogance against the rest of the world but also a lack of knowledge in terms of cultures and landscapes in their own country:

The following very popular drawing shows a small improvement to the previous one, although there are still some small mistakes, but see for yourself:

It cannot get any worse? No, it cannot indeed. Although I do not think the next one is much better. It demonstrates in an ironic way how the “Rest of the world” is thought to be seen by Americans. Especially the colors are noticeable:

Last but not least, a very detailed insight into the stereotype world around the USA. The key of this map tells us that Americans are proud of having killed Osama bin Laden as well as of the wars they conducted and won. Canadians are seen as morons, Greenland is the home of Santa Claus and Africa consists of sand, gold and diamonds. Saudi Arabia is the most essential part of the world because it offers the USA the opportunity to exploit it so as to keep their status as superpower:

After looking at these examples, a rational thinking world citizen has to ask themselves important questions: Where did this stereotype of ignorance, arrogance and lack of geographical knowledge derive from and is it true?

Americas embarrassing ranking in geography testings (Example one; Example two) is the easiest part to explain. Nobody learns something they are not interested in. Additionally, I found out that most schools in the US focus on subjects that either help pupils to receive a job later on or deal with American culture, history and literature. As a result, it is not surprising that children do not know anything about geography nowadays, having no one who encourages them to learn it.

The reason for this lack of interest in teaching geography lays in both American history and geography itself. In the first one hundred years after foundation, the Atlantic Ocean represented a large barrier that divided the USA from Europe, considering that the latter was the center of power back then. Furthermore, the United States were confined in the south by weak Spanish colonies and in the north by Canada which was occupied by Great Britain, so it initially posed a threat on the US. The years of the British-American War followed and the relationship between America and the United Kingdom improved rapidly after that. Consequently, Canada was not dangerous anymore.

There was enough room for the Americans to expand their territory and they also experienced an industrial boom in the late 19^th century. They were busy with trading and expanding as well as looking for new sources in their own, larger and larger growing country. Being that isolated and busy with the execution of all these plans, it is no surprise that citizens were more interested in setting up their state than learning about others.

On the other hand, America had a lot of contact to foreign countries throughout the last century. Beginning with World War One, followed by World War Two and the Cold War, the USA are deeply involved in a war against terrorism today. It would be logical that American citizens have grown interest in geography in all these years of international affairs, but they did not. It seems plausible that the average American does not want to be bothered with war, international business and politics because they are satisfied with their status as a member of a superpower. They have everything they need in their own country, including advanced technology and food resources as well as great environmental variety. The country is almost as big as the whole European continent. That means if an American wants to go on a skiing vacation, they can do it in the USA, if they want to relax on the beach, they can also do it in the USA. Neither a weekend trip to one of the biggest cities in the world, nor a camel ride through a desert are impossible within one state border.

As always, stereotypes are chained to the entirety of a culture, but there are many adventurers among Americans who travel the world. Those who do not go away, in contrast, can definitely refer convincing reasons for their decision.

In conclusion, there is to say that most part of this stereotype is true, but understandable if you do some research on the background of the topic. Yet, it sometimes seems as if Americans try to live in their safe bubble and as long as nothing affects themselves personally, the outside world does not matter. One might think that for instance 9/11, obvious terrorism on American soil, must have woken up the citizens, but as this survey shows, nine out of ten Americans were unable to find Afghanistan on an Asia map after that terrible incident. Maybe because the world out there is so scary, depressing and far away for them.

Sources: http://hubpages.com/hub/American-Ignorance-of-Global-Geography
http://ancientheart2013.wordpress.com/2013/02/22/the-problem-of-geographical-ignorance-in-america/ 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stereotypes_of_Americans

Pictures: http://discoveringdifferent.wordpress.com/tag/geography/

http://9gag.com/gag/2471854

YOUPOST 1

A spooky Halloween to all of you !

The estimates for this years Halloween per capita expenditure on costumes, decorations and candy lie at about 90$. That amounts to nearly seven billion dollars spent all in all, keeping in mind that this statistic only covers the United States. Beforehand mentioned numbers raise Halloween to the second largest feast, right after Christmas.

This typical American tradition evolved... – wait, is it actually American? Almost everyone of my friends in former times as well as myself were told by family that this tradition from overseas should not have been shipped to Europe because we already have our own customs. We do not need to walk from door to door begging for sweets. Pumpkins are not European, so Halloween cannot be either. We already have got Carnival, why should we dress up twice a year?

Thinking about the topic for more than just one minute, probably lets you discover that there could possibly be a relation between All Saints´ Day and Halloween. If so, you are totally right.

2000 years ago, the tradition was born in the form of a festival called Samhain which meant Summers´ end in the Celtic language. It was celebrated on the first of November, whereas the 31^st of October was believed to be the day on which the dead reasserted their presence. Nobody wanted to face the spirit of a deceased person, thus citizens disguised before walking out of their houses, in the hope to confuse the ghosts or be mistaken for a fellow one. They left food and wine on their doorsteps and lit bonfires in order to soothe the restless souls. Priests even tried to foretell if a village was able to get through the last night of October or not.

In the 8^th century, Catholic church weakened the ancient tradition by imposing the first of November as either All Saints´ Day or All Hallows. The relation to Halloween is obvious.

Nevertheless, the Irish kept on doing what they were used to and when they immigrated to America, they introduced and mixed up their customs with those of other cultures, hence the festival as we know it, with trick-or-treating, Jack O´Lanterns, decorated yards, dressed up children and adults, arose.

Some creative, modern Jack O`Lanterns

By the way: Jack O´Lanterns refer to the carved pumpkins with a candle in them. They are named after Stingy Jack, a man who tricked the devil. God did not want to welcome such an underhand person in heaven and of course the Devil prohibited him entry to hell, so Jack had to wander around on earth. The only thing the Devil gave him, was a burning coal that Jack put into a turnip to be able to light his way.

When this myth was finally brought to America, the pumpkin substituted the turnip. In England, for instance, they used large beets.

There is actually quite a big difference between the various versions of Halloween, depending on the culture. The Dia de los Muertos, an example that surprised me in some way, is held from the 31^st of October to the 2^nd of November in many Spanish speaking countries. The bereaved family and friends construct an altar in honor of the dead and celebrate “together with the spirits of the deceased”. On the last day they assemble at the graveside to picnic, reminiscent and simply have fun thinking about the good old times.

To each his own.

After my intense research on the origins, myths and legends around the 31^st of October, my opinion on the subject has definitely changed. Although the commercial part dampens my enthusiasm, I like the former ghoulish, now rather funny basic idea of the tradition.

Now go and spread the word: Halloween is not American!