In 1982, there 70 million sheep in New Zealand and just 3 million people. Today, it’s 5 million people against a mere 27 million sheep. “So why the overwhelming emphasis on merino in the gift shops?” asks Tim Roxborogh.

A weekly ode to the joys of moaning about your holiday, by Tim Roxborogh

On selling tourists merino and overpriced honey

Tourist shops are a funny beast. Is it really an intrinsic part of being a 21st century New Zealander that you drape yourself in merino and eat $50 jars of honey? Walk into any tourist shop in this country and you’d think all-merino wardrobes and comically-priced honey were as Kiwi as jandals and the All Blacks. So much merino! So much expensive honey!

Granted, sheep have long been one of the key bricks in the wall of Kiwiana, but our sheep population has dropped dramatically in recent decades. Go back to our peak sheep year of 1982 and we had 70 million of the pleasantly dumb creatures. Against a human population of just 3 million, Kiwis would quote the “only 3 million people, but 70 million sheep” line to foreigners years after it stopped being anything close to accurate.

Indeed a caller trotted out that ol’ “3 million versus 70 million” to me on talkback radio the other day and it felt like I’d kicked their patriotic sense of self in the guts when I told them it’s now 5 million people against a mere 27 million sheep. Having spent nearly 40 years clutching on to 3 and 70, it was like a little part of them had died inside learning we’re now 5 and 27.

It’s strange, but despite a fairly widespread collective sensitivity to all those sheep-shagging jokes, there’s obviously a certain type of New Zealander who liked having such an absurdly high sheep population. Ironically, the origin of said jokes, Australia, has the second-largest sheep population in the world with around 70 million, down from 170 million in the early 90s. China is the planet’s most sheepy nation with 110 million, followed by unexpectedly sheep-tastic places like India (60+ million), Iran and the former Sudan (both around 50 million).

Wherever you are in the world though, demand for wool has dropped and with it the numbers of sheep, and New Zealand is no different. So why the overwhelming emphasis on merino in the gift shops? Though like I said, secondmortgage honey is giving the merino a fair run these days and I feel like neither are anywhere near as emblematic of our country as the gift shops would have you believe.

Feedback:

Sneaking into hotel swimming pools

A couple of weeks ago I wrote with a degree of pride and wistfulness at my habit back in my 20s of sneaking into fancy hotels to use their swimming pools without paying. The basis of the yarn was that it’s a shame this essentially harmless practice is so much harder to do these days in the era of swipe-card only access.

Well, from your feedback, I’m heartened to learn I’m far from the only person who mastered the art of the confident walk through of the 5-star lobby en route to the pool of your dreams, if not of your bank balance.

One American reader, who goes by the Twitter handle @mykingdomforad1, reminisced about her annual visits to Cancun in Mexico in her 20s. For seven years in a row she and her friends would stay at a 4-star resort but swim in the “lagoon-style pools of the area’s finest 5-star resorts”. That’s what I’m talking about! Thanks as always for writing: timr@newstalkzb.co.nz.

Tim Roxborogh hosts Newstalk ZB’s Weekend Collective and blogs at RoxboroghReport.com