New Zealand Participants

[Nats]

Go on Cytrix, "tell us about yourself." That is indeed a rubbish question. "On weekends I like to sellotape crayons to my fingers to make art, and then sell it on trade me for $1 each."

Wow Ja9, seems you got all the trufax questions! The closest thing I got asked was how I would teach about a national holiday and ended up talking about Waitangi Day. Looking back, my sugggestion would have been a snooze-worthy class. Should have picked Easter: now class, stuff your faces with oddly shaped, low quality chocolate!

[Cytrix]

They didn't ask me anything about NZ or to give an impromptu lesson! Lameeee.

Guys...$2 stores are your friends. I have been amazed at the amount of random kiwi souvenirs in these stores. Today I picked up the following for $16 all up

4 NZ pencils with cute rubbers attached (a sheep, a kiwi, a silver fern, and a tiki)
6 different NZ key rings
ABC flashcards
Pegs with tiki and maori dolls on them
A tik-tak-toe with kiwi and tuatara statues
An NZ flag

[bigbennynz]

Gosh here I am thinking I would get an email when people replied again in this topic... Obviously I did something wrong because I received nothing and yet there has been tons of replies on here!!!

So awesome to see a few more Kiwi's coming out from hiding!

I've only got a couple of things for prizes at the moment, might go on a bit of a trip sometime next week to try hunt down a whole lot more! Thanks Cytrix about the $2 store info! I was wondering about whether or not they do little cheap NZ stuff, and obviously they do! Yay!!!

I'm trying to think what I should get for the more "important" people. Like the principal and what not.

In regards to the questions I got nothing like any of you guys! I think I got it way to easy! haha all I got was the whole "Why JET? What can you bring to JET?" Blah blah blah routine!

Looking forward to hearing about placements!

[Cytrix]

The $2 stores are literal goldmines for souvenirs. Sure 99% of them are from China, but the range of stuff is amazing. You need to shop around though...I went to one that only had a few stickers, and then the one next door had two aisles full of magnets, key rings, tea towels, cups, caps, t-shirts etc.

[nzpete]

Yep I got the treaty of waitangi question too. The NZ Head of state is the queen. Total trick question and I got owned. The old professor guy said, it's on the back of the coins... I had another mind blank, and then he said "come here". He got me to walk over to the desk so he could take a 50c piece out of his pocket and show me the queens face. I said uh huh and slowly walked back to my chair [sulking].

My heart was racing sooooo much considering it was my first question and I was 100% certain I would never be accepted. Little did I know that they didn't care at all about what I said, they just wanted to see me react in an unknown situation - looking back I must have had my facade up looking cool and smooth LOL

[Ja9]

nice one nzpete!

i hear a lot how they always try to put you under a lot of pressure in the interviews just to see how you cope in a stressful situation and it definitely felt like a trial during my interview.

thanks for the tips on getting nz souvenirs i'm also trying to think of gifts for the "important" people as well, coz i don't really want to bring chocolate (it'd probably melt all over the place in the hot summer weather) so maybe a nice tin of biscuits?

by the way, has anyone thought about how they're bringing everything over? e.g. shipping their extra/winter stuff via surface mail or buying everything over there etc...

i'm considering surface mail, does anyone know the price of sending ~20kg to japan?

[hanamiko]

Hi guys,
I'm a first year JET in Japan from NZ. When I came over last year, I shipped a 15kg box (mostly my winter clothing) from UPS (near Auckland airport) and from memory it cost around $150.
I has trouble finding anything cheaper than this. It arrived after about 2 weeks I think.
Looking forward to seeing some of you new Kiwi JETs in Japan! I'll be a TOA at Orientation B so hopefully see some of you then

[Nats]

Thanks Hanamiko, I've been wondering about shipping. Look forward to seeing you in Tokyo! I did find out a little about unaccompanied lugagge, but I don't think there'd be any way of picking it up from the airport. Unless there's a way of getting it sent straight through to your placement...

Yeah, good stuff nzpete, bet you were all p-p-p-poker face. Ahem.

Nice tips with the $2 store Cytrix, definitely going to check them out. I'm planning on waiting til I hear from my pred about omiyage for the important people. Plus I have no clue what to get yet!

[Ja9]

thanks hanamiko! how's your first year in JET going so far? did you get your preferred placement and what not?

[rosec20]

If anyone is interested in showing NZ landscape/scenery to their students, there's an amazing movie shot in Fiordland called Ata Whenua. Lots of dramatic scenery, mostly shot from helicopters so it shows places you couldn't normally get to. I think it's about a 40min movie. Also, Cytrix your post on ITIL about getting stuff on the Rugby World Cup is a good idea too.

[nzpete]

ah Ata Whenua is a good idea, does anyone have it?

[hanamiko]

Hi guys,

I think that they advise against sending unaccompanied baggage to collect at the airport...when you arrive at Narita and get out of customs/immigration, you will pretty much be rushed onto a bus right away. If you have sent a box in advance to your BOE/school/new apartment (as I had) you have to fill out a form (from memory it's yellow) but it's easy and in English, and then they give you a copy of it to show when the parcel arrives to you. If I had to do it over I would have had someone else send the box for me and just give them the money for it, because then you get the skip the above steps, and the parcel will just arrive to you.

And on the other question- yes I did get my preferred placement. I was one of the lucky few! I think it helped that I am in a prefecture that's not heavily requested...so they may have been like 'Wow, she wants to go there, ok!'.
Last year we found out our placement on May 14th so around this time, so I guess you guys will be getting them soon. No matter where you go, I'm sure you'll love it! When you get your placements you'll be able to start joing Facebook groups from these prefectures, and getting to know other new and current JETs through that. All the current JETs in my area are really excited to find out who is coming here and welcome them.

Something I did for omiyage that worked well was (I have one Junior high and six elementaries) is just to bring a bag of NZ candy for each school (I think things like fruit bursts, minties, etc - things where each lolly was individually wrapped anyway) and put it in a bowl in the staffroom. Cheap and easy! I also gave the elementary school principals NZ themed cards where I wrote a message introducing myself etc, and my Junior High principal a card and a pictorial book about NZ in Japanese (found at Whitcoulls).

Just over 2 months to go for you guys! Exciting!

[Cytrix]

Well one more thing added to the pile of things to take over. Just found some New Zealand Breakfast tea at T2, so bought a box of that.

[bigbennynz]

Man cytrix how are you actually gona get all this stuff over?! hahaha doesn't sound like your going to have room for your own clothes at this rate!

[Cytrix]

Yeah I need to take a break for a bit I think...otherwise I'll be going over wearing about 50 layers of clothes, just to leave space in my luggage for all my purchases