My affections have shifted from Canada to New Zealand recently. If you in the northern hemisphere and don't realize it, it's summer down there right now. I have no idea why they don't change the date of Christmas down under. The celebration would lose a lot of its meaning and poignancy, in my opinion, if it wasn't accompanied by cold dark weather and short days. After all, it was originally a pagan celebration of the winter solstice.

Anyway... I want to share the gold mines I've found when it comes to New Zealand internet media.

First of all, let me share a new zealand tourism video with you. That island nation has its hopes wrapped up in tourism for a main industry. This really tugs on my heart strings, because until now, I've chosen to live in a tourist/ski/college town in the rocky mountains. Tourism is a great industry for a town or community, because it changes the zeitgeist. If people agree that something or other powers their economy, their attitudes will shift accordingly. One of the most repugnant places I've ever lived was in a town which had a paper mill as the main employer in town. People start dreaming up all kinds of ways to justify the pollution it puts into the air, and excusing the health problems that folks have who work in the timber industry for long periods of time. Tourism, on the other hand, is something that makes people realize that they need to smile at their neighbors. They need to develop a warmth about their character. It also makes them value and understand children more - because tourism is a form of adult play.

Radio new zealand is the public radio organization on that island nation. The audio streams work perfectly well, when listening from north america.

TV new zealand is a great source of video. Unfortunately most video streams are blocked for north american viewers. There are a handful, however, which are posted on youtube. And of course, if you get a show name, you can usually find that new zealanders have posted episodes of it onto youtube as well. It's important to have film to watch at first, because it can be difficult for north americans to understand the kiwi accent when they first hear it. The way I would describe their dialect would be to say that it's like a color photograph that's been desaturated. There is less richness in the vowel sounds, and everything seems to gravitate towards the long or a short i vowel sounds. Studying foreign anglophones make me appreciate the north american english dialect all the more. I think that we in the usa should be more proud of these things like our vowels - a e i o u, and less proud of things like our military, and our flag. There really are unique and wonderful things about the usa. But patriots rarely recognize what they are.