Wrapping the Week with Kate Hawkesby and Tim Wilson: Holidays, travel, the new business outside NZME

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The Mike Hosking Breakfast 10 min 4 speakers 5 chapters transcribed 2 months ago
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Marin Alsop 0:00
I love you, Tim. Good morning.
Tim Wilson 0:29
I love you, Mike. Miserable and angry. Doesn't that sound like the Kiwi public square at the moment?
Mike Hosking 0:33
But anyway, we know that soundtrack. It does indeed. And Kate, I love you very much. Good morning.
Kate Hawkesby 0:38
Good morning.
Mike Hosking 0:41
Welcome home, guys.
Kate Hawkesby 0:42
Yeah, it's funny you say the New Zealand miserable and angry because it's interesting when you travel. It's really good to get perspective because you think, gosh, it's such a good reminder how insignificant and tiny we are and there's just a big world out there getting on with it and it's so... refreshing but then you come home and you go do you know what this is the greatest country on earth we came home and we were like New Zealand is awesome in so many ways like I love New York to death I love London but nothing beats home the air is clean there's no smog it's not filthy It's just, it's not overcrowded. It's just a lovely, lovely, great little country.
Tim Wilson 1:20
I used to, when I come back from New York, the smell of the Kiwi air, the lightness, the fragrance, it was just like, oh, wait, yeah, there's no smog, there's no petrol, there's no, well, not too much marijuana, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. I mean, it's just love.
Kate Hawkesby 1:39
It's interesting, both New York and London do smell a lot of weed and wheeze.
Tim Wilson 1:43
Yeah.
Kate Hawkesby 1:43
The homeless.
Tim Wilson 1:47
It's disgusting. Do you think? Take away the weed and you've got the smell of our place. But anyway, that's another story.
Mike Hosking 1:55
All the word is from the people who have travelled in this Armageddon of travel that we've had in the last post-COVID period. Everyone goes, oh, it's so good to get away from New Zealand. New Zealand's so bloody depressing. Oh, the world's moving on. And I thought this will be interesting to experience this to see if it's true. It isn't. Well, it is true. No, it isn't, it isn't. I explained this to Greg, my hairdresser, yesterday. And I said, the thing about it is when you go to a London or a New York, they're two of the great cities of the world and they will always be great. They can't not be great. But the problems that we face are the problems they face and the problems they face are the problems we face.
Mike Hosking 2:36
You know, the lack of hiring, the crappy service, the thing that's too expensive. If you look as a non-tourist, you can find all the problems there that we have here. And Katie's 100% right. Honestly, hand on heart, as I stared out the window as we landed on Sunday, I felt good to be home. I thought, this is awesome.

What perspectives on travel do Mike and Kate share?

Mike Hosking 2:56
I loved being away, don't get me wrong, but I love being here more, and I don't sit here this morning with any great desire to get on a plane for a very long time.
Kate Hawkesby 3:07
That's probably because we did too many plane rides.
Tim Wilson 3:10
It didn't sound like a holiday. It didn't look like a holiday. I don't know what you shmucks were thinking.
Kate Hawkesby 3:14
It was way too hectic. Do you know the best thing, Tim? You've got to admit, Singapore has an incredible service culture, and for a country the same size, they are so slick.
Mike Hosking 3:27
I've been saying that for about 20 years, and I say it to Luxon every second week. Why aren't we more like Singapore? Why isn't Singapore Airlines, why isn't Air New Zealand more like Singapore Airlines? Why isn't any airport in New Zealand more like Changi Airport? Why isn't anyone serving any food in New Zealand like the people who serve food in Singapore? Why don't we just replicate Singapore and we would improve ourselves immeasurably and no one can argue with that concept, except for the fact we can't do it.

How does returning home change their view of New Zealand?

Tim Wilson 3:55
Singapore's basically perfect. It's a bit like America in some way in that it's an idea. And I don't think New Zealand's quite an idea. We sort of don't know quite who we are. There's an argument about it.
Mike Hosking 4:12
That's good.
Tim Wilson 4:12
We're working through it. Very good point. In Singapore, just one more. They dammed the marina, the freshwater marina there. We would never dam a harbour because we thought we didn't have enough fresh water. There'd be too many squabbles over it. But they were like, we need fresh water. We've actually got lots of it, but we just need more. Let's do it.
Mike Hosking 4:30
But that's their political system.

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