Things that are different in NZ

Jester here.
They say that travel is broadening, and the point of travelling is to KNOW that you're somewhere different. In the spirit of adventure, I though I'd comment on some things that we've found that we've noticed are different than they are in the states.

Good stuff:
-food has a British twist on it, but not in the "boil it until it's grey or dead" sense of the word. Eggs and food here are generally VERY fresh, so food is quite flavorful. Also, service is quite cheerful, and it's generally NOT a tipping society, so they're this cheerful genunely by default. This is TheCleric's breakfast from this morning in Wellington. Even the EGGS are cheerful. :)
-coffee is milder and less acidic, but more muddy "brown tasting". Generally quite good. Not sure about the caffeine content. Ask us again in a few hours to see if we're still on a good caf buzz.
-Coin change is the same as in Britain: satisfyingly meaty change. Big, thick coins with crinkled edges and interesting motifs are the norm. Change that, with a slingshot, you could hunt birds with.
-New Zealanders (we were warned by one of the guidebooks) are much less stuffy and uptight than most other world cultures. The book says something like "they'll greet eveyone like old friends". What I didn't realize this extends to is that they'll also RAZZ you like old friends. We were at the Vodaphone counter, they've known us for like 30 seconds, and they were giving us heck about USA policies on Nuclear Arms, and were telling us about many Americans pretending to be Canadians. That is, they said "until you open your mouth".
-We're still getting used to the idea that we're now "the folks with the funny accents". Not only do they have an interesting accent, but they speak FAST here. And of course, they're using idioms that we're not familiar with ("Oh, you've got me on the hop there. I should know that..."). It's a lot of fun, but it means that cell phone conversations are interesting.

Not so good differences:
-Wrong-side-of-the-road driving. We've found it easier to adapt than we'd thought. Little bit of brown pants motoring early on, but otherwise do-able.
-However, there isn't more than 0.1km of straight road ANYWHERE IN THE COUNTRY. The drive down from Rotorua to Wellington had some switchbacks that we didn't belive were correct on the GPS maps until we drove them. Like 190 degree switchbacks with a bit of Armaco to protect you from careening off the cliff to your doom. wow. We'll have to upload the GPS tracks for our motorcycling friends.
-telecoms are insanely expensive here. They're like the US cellphone and Internet market in 1998. From TheCleric's Vodaphone pay-as-you-go plan, Cell phone rates are the same inside of NZ as they are to something like 13 other countries, including the US. Which means that the marketing people are trying to convince us that the "same low rate" of $1.30 a minute during daylight hours to call inside of NZ is a *good* thing. We've carefully NOT told them that we're used to $0.10/min cellular and $0.12 International Calling.
-this "paying by the hour for internet access" thing is a bit like metering the air. Painful, and it means that you're actually not able to SURF, so much as you have to attack the Net with a mission. $2-$10 NZD an hour seems to be the going rate. We're counting ourselves lucky that our hotel today seems to be hip enough to offer 24 hours of Net access for $15NZD, which is totally awesome.
-The real kicker is that they have the British/European cellular model of "caller pays", which is good because when someone calls us, it doesn't cost anything. The consequence, however, is that it seems all the calling card plans we can find BLOCK access from NZ cellphones, because the insane charge is reversed to them, and they won't accept the call. Which means that TheJester's calling card is totally rubbish from within NZ. Bah.

Rant on telecoms aside, we're having a great time, and really enjoying it here. We've had several moments of "Dude! We're road tripping in NEW ZEALAND"