> > Butt of a thousand jokes in Australia, let me tell you...
>
> At the Kiwi House, I encountered another rivalry joke, favoring NZ of course. There was a map of
> New Zealand, with a disproportionately small map of Australia next to it. It was labeled "West
> Island." That struck me as hilarious. "That joke doesn't go over so well over there," Puck
> told me.

There's a joke that gets told here, about the creation of the world. When God created the world, it is said, he made everything in balance. For example, he made North America rich, and South America poor. On the far side of the globe, he made a continent of white people in the north and a continent of black people in the south.
His masterpiece was New Zealand: he made the New Zealanders modest, intelligent, humourous, sociable, hard-working, and high-achieving, and gave them beautiful mountains, lakes, rivers, and streams, an exquisite coast-line and a superhuman, unbeatable rugby team.
And then, remembering about balance, he stuck them next door to the Australians.


Oddly enough, I've never heard anybody try to turn this joke around to favour Australia. Perhaps, deep down, we know it's essentially true.


> > > "What is this thing?" I asked Brunnen-G. "Beetroot." "What's beetroot? Same as a beet?"
> >
> > The plant it comes from is a beet, and the part of the plant it comes from is the root;
> > so it's beetroot.
> > Simple.
>
> Ok. Well, I also scraped off the onionroot, but the chips were made out of some
> really nice potatoroots.

Touché. :o)


Paul