My grandfather, bless him, used to answer any mystery telling us "the Chinaman did it".

"Who?" we'd ask. "Yes that's him" he'd reply.

Rather more recently, I interviewed Benji Marshall a couple of seasons back, after a leg injury sustained playing the Dragons.
I was suggesting it was…

nobody, but nobody, says "Boomer!" anymore

I've heard boomer used in a sort of slang portmanteau: 'boomer, bonza, box of birds!'

Boomer!

I've heard this relatively frequently in Auckland. Not everyday useage, but relatively frequently.

If the UK hadn't engaged in war crimes of that type they'd have lost the war*

Not worth getting dragged into this debate, unless you enjoy pointless death spirals.....

If the UK hadn't engaged in war crimes of that type they'd have lost the war*

(*Or made it continue until either the Red Army reached the Seine, or Oppy's boys and girls finished their work and Berlin got turned into vapour).

Uninvited racism from taxi drivers is always quite a highlight.

Best one I can recall, re. Pacific Islanders: "These people don't mind being hit on the head, but the one thing they can't stand is being bitten by a dog."

Poppa used to work at the University, and as an alcoholic, spent a bit of time hanging out in pubs with Colin McCahon, apparently often causing McCahon to miss his lectures. I wonder if McCahon ever uttered that phrase...

That would be the (now long gone) Kiwi. Dad too was…

"I'm hiring you to provide transport, not to subject me to your warped view of the world"

I've never had trouble with taxi drivers talking politics or talkback unless asked. This may come as no surprise..

Is there some sort of alumni office, or do you just have to live in a place with a fairly small community from the country you're from?

the embassy monthly drinks were open to anyone (of any nationality) who could be bothered getting themselves up the hill from Shibuya. it's…

stand-by topic of discussion in a taxi. Stops me being grievously but silently offended when some driver who obviously spends all day flicking between Laws and Leighton starts telling me what's wrong with New Zealand these days...

I reckon there should be some way of demanding a discount for the…

do you just have to live in a place with a fairly small community from the country you're from?

I've had some lovely freebies from the Brazilian embassy: food, drink and music. Cause they care about culture. It has occurred to me that keeping my ear to the ground about…

I even think I imply that all Wellington music is the same as Fat Freddy's Drop

I thought we had that whole downbeat thing beaten down for a while, but it seems to be making a frigging comeback. I blame Kerry.

I've never even *been* to an embassy of either of the states I'm a citizen of. But Americans living here do seem to get US Embassy invites on occasion.

Is there some sort of alumni…

Yep. You know who used to turn up in droves to the free monthly drinkies at the NZ Embassy in Tokyo?

New Zealanders. Shameless.

the drinks weren't free. they sold drink tickets for 200 yen each (redeemed for a glass of nz wine or can of nz beer).

that regular…

But luckily, I can fix that.

Hi Damian thanks for slagging off us Wellingtonians. Appreciate that.

If you liked that, you'll LOVE the article I wrote for Metro called "Capital Punishment" in July 07. Based on my time in the Capital, it caused quite a stir at the time. Full of half-arsed humourless generalisations and observations.…

PJ O'Rourke does this shit funny.

Used to. His more recent stuff is getting very weak – increasingly, he's sounding like a bevvied-up uncle at a family gathering, cracking the odd joke while bemoaning the youth of today. He was a lot funnier when he was on drugs.

"For the refugees and migrants, it will leave 15,000 people a year confused."
But Cr Ngaire Button said the centre had…

In all my time working behind bars the types that I found who were looking for freebies were professional freeloaders, pure and simple.
Some in the media, some in politics, some in sports but all of them with the blood-red…

But that is probably just me

I'm sure you're not alone. But me, if I'm having a discussion about when and if it's okay to use the word "nigger", I will use the word nigger in that discussion. And if it's useful to illustrate this by using other racial slurs,…

Appropriate topics for small talk include work, hometowns and regions, family, travel, sports, recreational activities, and film.

How could they forget weather? It's an awful cliche that it's become my stand-by topic of discussion in a taxi. Stops me being grievously but silently offended when some driver who obviously spends…

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Never mind, I found an unlocked full-length version for you.

Key Points:
New Zealanders are sociable and fond of small talk.
Appropriate topics for small talk include work, hometowns and regions,
family (without getting overly personal), travel, sports, recreational
activities, and film.
Few topics are taboo for discussion;…

Then, in the very next paragraph, the article points out that if you're going to generalise about anyone, you should generalise about Samoans!

To be fair, while they're both generalisations, one at least is a generalisation backed up by some data. Whether or not it's appropriate to put it in…

When I was in the UK, the company for which I worked was purchased by a US firm. A number of interesting consequences ensued. One of which was that we got…

I would be interested in hearing what people who identify as Chinese think about this post, particularly the title. Might be flippant to us but it could still hurt.

Um, isn't that the entire point I was making? That these old expressions, in this case one used by both Robyn…

More recently, you've probably seen the emergence of the weeaboo crowd. Justifiably piss-taken too.

My other grandfather, Pop-Popps*,…