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who are you talking to here? You’re ranting against what you assume will be American complainers, but there are none. You must be one angry person to randomly rant against an imaginary post.

I live in Texas of all places, and my city allows women to be topless in public. There’s even a popular nude beach at the nearby lake. Granted, it’s not the French Riviera…

Funny, I hear from Europeans that the US is too prude and religious (we do have Pat Robertson after all), then I hear from my Asian friends (not the Japanese ones of course) that we’re too promiscuous, and the Iranian ones say we’re too immoral and godless. (Yes I have friends from all these areas; I’m in engineering grad school.) The truth is we have elements of all of these so whichever element your culture is lacking is going to be the thing we get insulted for. That’s fine. These people can rest assured we have many people from wherever they’re from, contributing to our culture.

@77: And downtown Wellington (the capital city) is built on landfill on a part of the harbour floor raised from an earthquake on the fault line the runs through the city… Also, apparently until quite recently there was no rule stopping people from building structures (e.g. buildings) straddling a fault line…

@ All: An old Aussie (Australian) nickname for New Zealand is “the shaky islands”.

Excellent summary!

Additionally, a quarter of the NZ population live in a city that is situated around 49 volcanoes. And what’s more:

“The monogenetic nature of Auckland’s volcanoes has particular implications for volcanic hazards because in the event of an eruption, rather than one of the existing volcanoes becoming active, a new volcano will form. Because of this situation, a hazard map based on any one location cannot be drawn and the entire field has to be considered as under a threat of a future volcanic eruption.”

and

“there is every reason to expect eruptions in the future.”
From http://www.gns.cri.nz/what/earthact/volcanoes/nzvolcanoes/aucklandprint.htm

Two words: Ruh roh.

If it’s geologically stable but EVERY SINGLE plant and animal is poisonous and trying to kill you – You are in Australia

If every plant and animal is harmless but the geography ITSELF is trying to kill you – You’re probably in New Zealand

Active volcanoes….where else do you put skifields?

“New Zealand is not on the same continental shelf and so is not part of the continent of Australia “…

so we’re continent-less!

Disc: NZ-er

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=836740

***
Excerpt :

“…the cheeky campaign has left many Kiwis unimpressed, according to reports in the Sunday Star-Times newspaper.“The last thing I want to see when I fly is some fat Air NZ flight attendant’s rear end,” one disgruntled customer posted online.“I will be booking with Jetstar and Pacific Blue for all of my future domestic flying.” Another said: “Enough is enough, this is our national airline, not a strip joint! I for one won’t bother booking with you again.” One person even laid an official complaint with New Zealand’s advertising watchdog that children would find the ads “disturbing”.

****

Sheesh. The natural human body “disturbing”, as if we don’t all have one .. really, what’s wrong with these prudes?

Sigh. I loved it though it took me a while to get it too! THX BA. You beat our e-news by days.

The Air NZ chief has been “seen getting his hands dirty” by “doing the jobs his crew would do” as well as appearing in the body paint campaign. However, I very much doubt he’s getting paid what his crew gets paid, or would even agree he could subsist on such pay.

New Zealand’s advertising watchdog, the Advertising Standards Authority, has received a complaint about the advertisement from a viewer concerned that it was airing on TV at a time when children were watching with their parents.

“All genital areas were hidden but they left nothing to the imagination and [it] conjured pictures that none of us needed,” the complainant said.

In considering the complaint about the “Nothing to Hide” advertisement, the Advertising Standards Authority said while painted bottoms were shown, the use of nudity was not gratuitous and had been employed in a “tasteful manner”.

It ruled there had been no breach of the advertising codes as the advert was unlikely to cause widespread offence in the light of generally prevailing community standards

England is a part of Europe, just as Japan is a part of Asia. New Zealand is geographically part of the Australian continent.

http://www.worldatlas.com/aatlas/imaged.htm

what you meant was Britain (or possibly the British Isles) rather than England!

What, you thought those were correct, too? Shame.