Submitted by Andrew Lenherr on the 2017 winter session program in New Zealand and Fiji sponsored by the Alfred Lerner College of Business and Economics…
This first week has been absolutely incredible so far. As someone who had never left the country and had only flown to Florida once, I never imagined myself taking a combined 27 hours of flights across the globe to New Zealand for a month. Our group has gotten to know each other a lot over the course of the week and everyone has been extremely friendly and interesting. We have covered such a wide range of activities this week, much of which I never thought I would be able to do in my life.
It has shocked me so far how different so many of the people and much of the culture is different from what I’m used to in the United States. People here are extremely friendly and always willing to smile, talk and share their stories. Businesses operate much more differently and relaxed than in the States. As someone who comes from a family and an area that goes insane over football all of the time, something in particular that stood out to me was the complete indifference of the people of Auckland to the sport. We were unable to even find one restaurant that was showing the first round of the NFL playoffs as we were searching for somewhere to sit down for lunch which I thought was very odd.
The flights into New Zealand were also an interesting experience, as I had not really ever flown like that in my life. They weren’t necessarily bad, but it was a challenge to sit in one spot for such a long time, especially since I was unable to sleep for both flights! Overall, my first week has been better than I ever could have imagined, and I absolutely cannot wait to see what the rest of this program has in store for me!