Everyday Life

After living in New Zealand for over four months, there are many things that we have adjusted to and that just feel normal, like driving on the opposite side of the car, the opposite seasons, the time differences between NZ and US, and the metric system…okay, still working on learning that one! Though we are used to a lot of things, there are still things that surprise us or shock us. One of those things is the cost of groceries!

Today I made a quick run to the store to pick up 'a few things.' Now you know how that goes, a few things turns into a small basket and all of the sudden you are spending twice as much as you planned. Today, I had my list, and for the most part I stuck to my list, adding only a couple of things that were on sale (like the shampoo that is normally 8.99 on sale for 4.99, or the cookies that were a dollar cheaper than normal.)

Here is a picture of the groceries that I picked up. Very simple and basic in my opinion, some name brand, some budget brand. Ingredients for pasta bake for dinner, yogurt and fruit for breakfast and snacks, cookies for evening tea when people come over, a block of cheese, milk, butter, paper towels, toilet paper, pine-sol type cleaner, toilet cleaner, and bread. It still came as a shock to me when I got to the checkout line and my bill was $72! The prices of some things still amaze me.

When I got in the car after grocery shopping, my gas light came on. I stopped at the gas station to pay $1.79 a liter for gas. Four liters make a gallon which makes it $7.16 a gallon. If you factor in the conversion rate (at an all time high of .83), in US Dollars, gas was $5.94 a gallon. Luckily, my expensive tirp to the grocery store earned me a voucher of .06 off each liter!