NEW ZEALANDERS ARE FRIENDLY

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXII, 31 January 1939, Page 2

NEW ZEALANDERS ARE FRIENDLY

IMPRESSIONS OF CANADIAN \ VISITOR “New Zealand people are wonderfully kind and so friendly" is the opinion cf I Miss Jennie Reid, of Kelowna, British '< Columbia, who is at present visiting Nelson in the course of a New Zealand tour. Miss Reid, who speaks with a soft Canadian accent less aggressive than its American counterpart, said she thinks New Zealand is a delightful country where real poverty, as it is • known in large cities overseas, seems ( to be non-existent. In Canada they '■ hear a good deal about the prosperity 1 of New Zealand, and of how plentiful 1 work is here, and before leaving VaqE * couver Miss Reid was told she would > find the cost of living 25 per cent. ( cheaper. 1 “It certainly is a little less." she went 1 on with a smile, “but not 25 per cent. * as far as I can see. I thought fruit was 1 very dear in Auckland, and when I took 1 an apartment with a girl friend, we 1 found it cheaper to dine out at restaurants than to cater for ourselves.” 1 One thing she particularly noted was 1 that New Zealand offices engaged 1 juniors fifteen or sixteen years old, f which was unheard of in Canada, where 1 a girl’s college education did not finish I until she was eighteen, after which she would take a year’s course in commer- 1

p cial work. The minimum wage there for a girl 21 years’ old or with a year's experience was 65 dollars a month, which in English coinage would be about £3 15s a week, so that our minimum wage of £3 5s for senior stenographers compares most unfavourably and, in Miss Reid’s opinion, would probably account for the fact that New Zealand girls are not as smart looking or as well groomed as their Canadian sisters. “Although” added the visitor. “New Zealand girls are very good-looking on the whole and have excellent complexions.” One of Miss Reid's chief interests in Nelson was to see our apple orchards, as she comes from the heart of British Columbia’s orchard district. She was surprised to see how small the apple trees in the Tasman orchards were, as they do not go in for such intensive pruning in British Columbia, where it is the custom to grow alfalfa in the orchards for winter feeding of stock. Our orchards are very small compared with the Canadian ones, and seem to be intermixed with dairy farms, whereas in British Columbia the fruit farms stretch for miles and miles, one after the other. Miss Reid is crossing over to Wellington by to-night’s boat, and although she has been warned fn advance of the wind to be expected in the Capital City, she is looking forward to seeing the beauty of the early-morning scene es the ship enters the harbour, which after all, is one of the finest views in the world.