Wednesday, May 25, 2011

Can We Please Make Out Now?


I recently met up for pizza and booze with another transplanted Americano and a Kiwi who had lived abroad and visited the states annually for nearly 10 years. We chatted about polite subjects until the third beer, then The Question that all Americans are tremendously confused about came up, as it always does when I'm around newly minted expats: Why is there no dating culture in New Zealand?

The usual mating tactics of the native Kiwi largely consist of meeting someone they find attractive while out with their respective group of pals, gettin' crunk, and then half assedly making out in the toilets (or preferably in a bedroom if they're attending a house party). How uncouth! I mean, seriously? This is the Best you've come up with while Western civilization funds movie theatres, restaurants, mini golf, and bowling alleys with their mating habits? Generally six weeks after said drunken groping, someone mumbles or texts something along the lines of 'i like u. u r kewl & I wnt 2 b yr BF.' A very funny Kiwi I met last week said that it was more like 'i am l8 & yr a daddy.'

On the flip side I've heard horror stories of well meaning and vaguely honorable Yankee lads approaching Kiwi women with a smile and a drink offer only to be smirked at and given the cold shoulder. Quite frankly, if your friends and their friends aren't there to supervise then you're stuffed. I think Kiwis are used to a slower, less full on approach, and it's the slower approach that I've grown used to over the last 8 odd years- I totally find American dudes uncouth with their forwardness every time I visit.*

We may both enjoy Subway and Flight of the Conchords, but it doesn't mean that our cultures are so easily similar. In fact, I would say that the biggest difference between New Zealand and America is how personal relationships tend to develop. Kiwis are more guarded with their feelings, so a larger social setting suits them better and since NZ is a fairly petite place you have a wider berth of older friends around you that you grew up with to help instigate that. Americans are more keen to get to know someone faster and therefore prefer more one on one time before friends are brought in for introductions. A date is a period of time when you get to nervously hang out and try to find out as much as you can about this person who has given you solid proof that they think you're a hottie. It's greyer in NZ, and largely without as much structure. But all that said- both countries have a lot of married couples so both systems work, just very differently.

If only this post existed 8 years ago when I first moved here! Take note, if anyone you know is about to embark to and/or from NZ to the States please pass this along. Unless they're not single, then don't.

*For the record, I snagged my partner at a gig by yelling 'WANNA DATE?!' in his ear. He found this charming and has luckily kept me around for 4 years.

2 comments:

Carmen! said...

What would your Kiwi girlfriends think of some of my dating stories? Do you think there are as many Kiwis willing to settle as there are Yanks willing to settle?

Unknown said...

I think the whole 'settling' thing is more a people thing than a culture thing. I'd say that it also has a lot to do with your peers and family- if there's more pressure to get shacked up then I would assume that there's more of an incentive to BE shacked up.