Continuing in our series of Migrant Stories: first hand accounts of migrant life in New Zealand, taken from locations around the net.
Today’s posts are taken from expatexposed, a self help forum formed to help migrants living in New Zealand. An American university lecturer tells of how her job offer was mis-sold to her (a common complaint among migrants in NZ) and of how her well qualified husband has been unable to find paid employment in New Zealand:
“This is my intro. I came here only in February for a post as a lecturer at uni. Found out early, much I was told at interview was not true (no time for research, cuts in funding, I would have to fund most, if not all, of overseas conferences). Also, that my husband, a mid-level project manager would easily find a job with his graduate degree and +10 years experience in marketing…
I am not going to go on, except to say, of all places I am in Palmy. From what I read, it is not better elsewhere–but, could it be worse??
Either way, I am stuck for a while as the uni paid for my move and I owe them if I leave for three years. I could kick myself as I came here from a very well-known uni program in the U.S. and didn’t even bother to fully interview before I accepted the position.
…I am so tired of hearing from friends and family abroad, “Oh, you are so lucky to be in NZ; it’s so beautiful!” They haven’t seen Palmy…
6 months later:
“I have posted before, just after arriving 6 months, already knowing it was time to hit the road. Spouse came here with me for my job. However, despite a graduate degree in business and 10 year’s management experience, he cannot find a job.
I decided to call it quits. I find it is not useful to sabotage my career, either, which was promising to be pretty good, any longer. Also, found out I am pregnant–and having had abysmal health care experience thus far, I will be moving once the kid is born.
My job paid all moving expenses (if I leave before the 3 years, I owe uni a third for every year. I am leaving after year one, so owe them a two-thirds, technically.)…
I have to say, it’s been a real wake-up call, and each day my husband is out of work, it is a real test. He is currently volunteering, offering 260 hours of business development ideas to a website…
Combined with the crappy “research” job I got at a uni here, my husband’s inability to get work (even with a graduate degree) and the fact that I do not want to raise a child in this place, we are on the way out! thank God!!”
Their departure will be a great loss to New Zealand and there are lessons that can be learned from this family’s unfortunate experience: NZ employers should not over-sell jobs to attract well qualified people from abroad, nor make promises which they have no intention of keeping. What they will end up with are very disillusioned, highly skilled and valuable employees who, in addition with dealing with culture shock, have to come to terms with having been taken for suckers. Even a three year lock-in isn’t going to keep good staff tied to bad employers.
In addition migrants are led to believe that there are skills shortages in New Zealand for which they are greatly in demand and that the country is crying out for people just like them. When they arrive and discover that there are no suitable jobs open to them (often because of a lack of ‘Kiwi experience’) it causes a great deal of stress and hardship for all those concerned. Who can blame them for wanting out?
We are seeing stories like these over and over again, always with the same unsatisfactory results: disillusioned migrants, unimpressed with their treatment leave New Zealand for countries that are willing and able to accommodate their exceptional skills and talents and reward them appropriately.
For more Migrants’ Tales click HERE
Today’s posts – click here
E2NZ.org 
Thanks for the links.
Does he say why he feels the need to be absent from his adopted homeland for three months every year? That is a luxury that most migrants cannot hope to achieve. He’s a “dip in and dip out” migrant at best.
He says that NZ is a “paradise” because of its low population but then extols the country’s virtues and encourages people to visit. Perhaps the review of the book by Phil Goff, Minister for Foreign Affairs, prominently displayed on Amazon,gives us a clue as to the book’s true ‘campaign poster’ intentions? :
“Since arriving in New Zealand four years ago, Jeffrey Masson has traveled widely and met thousands of New Zealanders as part of his quest to better understand his adopted homeland. His book reflects that. Written by someone who clearly loves the country and is prepared to say so, it’s an effective introduction to anyone who wants to know more about a society on the cusp of new beginnings. New Zealand isn’t just a scenic wonderland, or the place that gave us Sir Edmund Hillary and Peter Jackson, and Masson suggests the reasons why.”
One of the other reviewers also sensed an agenda:
“I found this to be a strange book, poorly edited, and without much of a focus – except, of course, the author’s focus on himself. As others have pointed out, many “facts” are not verified or true. The author’s privilege blurs his vision of a land that is beautiful, but very complex. It was almost as if he had a deal with NZ immigration – that if he wrote a book about NZ, he could immigrate there…and the book was pandering to that. The final “travel guide” pages were bizarre – if I had wanted to buy a travel guide, I would have. ”
New Zealand is not a gentle Eden. Or a comfortable old slipper, as Jeffrey Masson seems to be hinting in his book “Slipping into Paradise”, but this may be a good book to read if anyone wants to find out why some people think New Zealand is a very special place:
http://www.amazon.com/Slipping-into-Paradise-Live-Zealand/dp/0345466144/ref=cm_cr_pr_product_top
Publisher’s Weekly even felt compelled to add some balance to ethicist Jeffrey Masson’s paradisiacal hallucination:
“Though Masson is eager to portray New Zealand as “benign, gentle, friendly, and safe,” he also acknowledges that it can seem remote, provincial and dull. Actually, the country’s isolation may explain why it has one of the world’s highest suicide rates, and why Masson spends three months of each year elsewhere. Blending history, geography, memoir and travelogue, Masson’s book is a hodgepodge, but it succeeds in promoting New Zealand as an attractive place for a vacation—if not a permanent stay.”
The reader critiques are diverse and fun:
http://www.amazon.com/Slipping-into-Paradise-Live-Zealand/product-reviews/0345466144/ref=dp_top_cm_cr_acr_txt?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1