HOME HUNTING ROUND THE GLOBE

New Zealand Listener, Volume 18, Issue 450, 6 February 1948, Page 11

HOME HUNTING ROUND THE GLOBE

ANY of us in the last few years have at some time spent our off-work hours hunting for a home, and though, as the .search has grown more anxious, the field of inquiry has widened few have gone beyond the outer suburbs of the town or city where a job was held. But into the Auckland office of The Listener the other day came a young home-hunter whose scope was not limited by the perimeter of any city, nor even by the boundaries of any

country-and for him there was nothing grim about the search for a home; it was, in fact, a gay adventure. His story had an almost fairy-tale quality about it. He was a _ business man hailing from Devonshire with an interest in hotels and beauty parlours; his friend, who was making the round-the-world tour with him, was also an English business man-a manufacturing chemist. "So. this is a business visit?" a Listener reporter asked. "Oh no. Naturally, being business men, we take an interest in business conditions, but the purpose of the trip is to find somewhere we would like to live. We feel it is a bad thing to stay ‘in one place so we are looking for a new home while we are still young." "And will you sell your businesses and start afresh wherever you decide to settle?" "No. My business now runs itselfit did so during the war. I'll just need to go home once a year and sign the balance sheets. My friend is in the same position." The two men joined forces in Bermuda and after a visit to the Bahamas went on to Jamaica, "where the hospitality was so good that we lingered." In Jamaica they became friendly with the gun-toting politician W. A. ("call me Buster’) Bustamente and had several interesting, if one-sided-"It was hard to get a word in"-discussions on worid politics. Pre-war output of sugar was doubled and Jamaica was also going all out to encourage tourist traffic-"something

New Zealand ought to do"-but there still remained some serpents in the Jamaican paradise. During their stay the English visitors witnessed a_ riot when 5000 people turned up to get one of the 600 tickets being issued for relief work, and the police had to use’ tear gas to quell the outbreak. From Jamaica they went to Columbia, Panama-where they witnessed a riot started by students at the time of the treaty with United States-Colon, Balboa, Guatemala, Mexico City-"incred-ible place’-where they landed at fiesta

time. They were scarcely appreciative of the curried dishes they were fed there. "They were about four times the strength of ordinary curry and I felt as though I was on fire. What made matters worse was that no drinks were taken until some time after the meals," one of the Englishmen stated. There they attended a bull fight, which was "not so exciting as anticipated nor so gory." After Mexico followed a visit to the United States, where they found the people uninformed on the way of life in Britain. They knew there was rationing in Britain but they did not realise just how small the British ration was. The Americans thought in terms of their own mild war-time rationing. There was an incredible waste of food in the States. About three wabies were spent in| America and then the Englishmen flew to New Zealand. "Everyone here seems terribly quiet and extremely solemn on the surface compared with where we have come from. "Auckland is like the larger county towns in England. "We think the licensing laws are a little difficult to understand, especially as we have been travelling in countries where there are no licensing hours." These were the first impressions, doubtless added to since the interview, for the Englishmen intended to spend two or three weeks here before going to Australia and then on to they didn’t know where. For them home-hunting is good fun,