Toast Festival

I went to a festival called Toast on Saturday. It was a kiwi festival, celebrating everything kiwi!! I paid £5 for a NZ lamb and mint-sauce burger, that’s almost $15 for a burger, but I would do it again, I didn’t realize how much I missed NZ meat... by the way, all donations of meat from NZ greatly appreciated!! Just throw it in an envelope and send it this way!! :) For sale were t-shirts for Africa with Kiwi designs, Tim Tams, Minties, Grainwaves, not to mention the Monteiths and Speights, and kiwi wine. Appearances by Dan Carter and Zin Zan Brooke and Opshop and Supergroove played!! Scorpi-oprpi-orpio Girl!!! It was a fantastic day out, I say day as we started drinking around midday... :) Good times!

But the biggest thing I realised was how amazing it was to see the turnout and the pride and enthusiasm everyone had for everything from home. Practically everyone had a piece of ‘kiwiana’ on be it a ‘next Palmy mayor’ t-shirt to greenstone and bone carvings as far as the eye could see. Its an amazing culture here, there is no Pakeha, Maori or Polynesian, everyone is just ... Kiwi, and we proudly display New Zealand like walking billboards with our clothing, jewelry, bags, blow up kiwis, hats and yes even the tricky art of wearing flags. It is not so much where you come from as it is an identity that we all relate to, we are kiwis and we are proud of it. It makes you realise if all the expats went home the culture of New Zealand would be for the better.

We are all so far from home, its nice to be in a room with people whom you can relate... and mourn the loss of Snifters, Tangy Fruits and Sparkles together.