NZ Trades the Kiwi for the Bin-Chicken

It’s official: Stuff is “bizarre”. Don’t take my word for it, this is straight from Newshub, which is outraged that an Australian journalist has noticed what is passed off as “news” by other members of the Team of $55 million.

(Also: are you OK, New Zealand? Have you really turned into a nation of unwashed, filthy, smelly bin-scabs? What has Jacinda Ardern done to you?)

An Australian journalist has made a bizarre accusation the cost of living is hitting Kiwis so hard that people have resorted to eating snails and not using toilet paper.

Journalist Angela Mollard appeared earlier this week on Australia’s The Morning Show on Channel 7, during a segment called ‘What’s the buzz’.

Newshub

Bizarre! Insane! Utterly fake news!

In a word: Stuff.

With food prices spiralling, the cost of petrol and power soaring, and interest rates rising, New Zealanders are pooling tips to survive the cost of living crisis.

For some, this goes beyond shopping for specials and turning the lights off when you leave the room.

Weeds, garden snails and even roadkill are on the menu for more radical fans of frugality, who may also do without toilet paper, take cold showers, or eat other people’s leftovers.

That was Stuff, just last month.

It appears that Jacinda has lived up to her socialist credentials and established the People’s Republic of Aoteazuela in all its socialist glory. New Zealanders aren’t quite eating their pets — yet — but they are scavenging around food courts like Bin Chickens in jandals.

Some fans of free food say there’s no shame in eating items that other people have left on their plates in cafés or restaurants and that otherwise would be thrown away.

More FM radio announcer Paul Flynn admits to being a “free food moocher” in food courts, picking up containers of sushi and tempura left on the table by other diners, and even once asked a waiter in a “fancy winery” if he could eat the pizza leftover from the next table.

Ew. If the kid at the next table picked his nose, ol’ mate Paul would probably ask if he could eat that, too.

And remind me to bring my own bed linen, next time I visit.

Jocelyn Kroll has been using cloths from op shop-bought flannel sheets for six years instead of toilet paper, as well as what’s known among frugalists as a “bum gun” – “a spray bottle with water as a hand held bidet” […]

A daily shower is unnecessary, says [Emma Healy] […]

Kate Todd even eats the snails from her suburban garden, encouraged into the frugal life by her “green-fingered” partner […]

Aucklander Barbara Caisley started intermittent fasting as a way to lose weight, but discovered it saved money too.

Stuff

At least we Aussies will be able to spot — or smell — newly expat Kiwis a mile off.

Dirty, smelly, emaciated, more flies around their bums than an un-mulesed ewe, and forever asking, “You gonna eat that, bro?”

Don’t take my word for it, after all: this is straight from the New Zealand media.