We have the means to make this easier for ourselves

New Zealand must chart its own course as it navigates through the Covid19 crisis, writes Peter Lyons.

‘‘DON’T leave home till you’ve seen the country’’ was a famous marketing catchphrase from the 1980s. I discovered New Zealand in my late 20s. And I am a native. I had done my OE.

I hated coming back after several years away. It seemed such a dull, small, boring place. Noone was interested in my overseas adventures. I was expected to get a job, marry, settle down, buy a house, have kids. Get real about life.

I’ve never ‘‘settled down’’. I don’t want to. Life’s too short.

I ended up working in the bush in Australia for several years. I worked for Outward Bound as a senior instructor. I used to spend several months in the bush training army officer cadets from the Duntroon military academy.

It was during this time I discovered my own country. A friend and I decided during a break to hitch around New Zealand. We stayed at a backpackers in Picton. We met a group of lovely Swedish ladies. They were not charmed. Andy and I slept on the veranda.

The following morning we awoke slightly jaded. I heard an elderly local lady on the pavement lamenting that she wanted to rent her Morris Minor car for 10 dollars a day. She had a parrot on her shoulder. Somewhat eccentric. I immediately leapt up and said I would take it. A verbal agreement was sorted.

I fell in love with this country after years of overseas travel. I have never lost that affection.

Andy and I travelled from Picton to Westport to Greymouth. We arrived in Greymouth just as Pavlova backpackers was setting up. This was the late 1980s. The first bus load of backpackers was about to arrive. Andy and I offered to cook a big feed for them in return for free beer. It was a great, hazy night.

We stayed at the famous and thennamed Blackball Hilton hotel in Blackball. Coalmining country. The place where the labour movement started in New Zealand.

I came to appreciate my own country’s rich history. I have learned much more since. We have a fascinating history, well told by our historians. Great reading in quiet times.

We travelled down the West Coast through the gorgeous Haast Pass and into Central Otago.

We eventually arrived in Dunedin. Dunedin is a gem of a city. A living museum of our country’s history. A city that still embraces the Scottish enlightenment love of education.

I would later spend many years in Dunedin. I have written for the Otago Daily Times for almost 20 years.

I am a legally blind man. I can’t drive. I have crisscrossed this country many times, often using my thumb.

One thing I have come to realise about this cool little country is that we are unique. We are different from the rest of the world.

There are some amazing people here. We aren’t perfect but we have a huge array of talent and skills.

Too often we worry about what the rest of the world thinks of us. We adopt their ideas and ideologies as a result, particularly in our economic policies. We fail to adapt these ideologies to suit our own unique society.

We are now being given this opportunity, in a very strange way. We need to come up with our own unique answers to suit us.

We are lucky to live here. We produce our own basic needs. We produce the essential foodstuffs, and toilet paper. We cover both ends. We are politically cohesive compared with many other nations. If we are cut off from the rest of the world for a while, we may realise how lucky we are to live here.

We seem to obsess about what the rest of the world thinks of us. A huge cultural cringe. We need to lose that.

There is nowhere else I would prefer to be in the world right now. We are in a unique position to lead the rest of the world. But we need to plot our own course.

It’s going to be tough but let’s stop thinking the leadership will come from elsewhere. It’s not there. We can do this together. We have the resources and talent and leadership to make this much easier for ourselves.