John Lapsley takes a sidelong look at the things Kiwis apparently believe Australians do better, following the release last week of a survey conducted by Taylors Wines.
We need to shackle our hackles when digesting the Taylors Wines survey of 500 New Zealanders which showed many Kiwis were lunatic enough to believe there are a number of things Aussies do better.
I'd - wrongly, it now seems - thought it a Kiwi article of faith that no good came from Australians unless they were spending their dollars on our tourism, or missing penalty kicks.
Yet here we have 69% of Kiwis agreeing Aussies are better at cooking a shrimp on a barbie, and 78% conceding they brew a better shiraz. While it may be OK to think that, I thought it was never admitted.
One should always suspect research made on behalf of commercial enterprises.
Taylors is a Clare Valley firm which produced the research for Australia Day.
It's clear there was some dastardly screening used when selecting this biased survey sample.
Presumably the research team went looking for Kiwis at Bondi Beach on Boxing Day, when it would be denuded of Aussies who were all at home dressed up in sackcloth to watch the Ashes.
"Are you perhaps Kiwis?" the researchers asked a hunch of hangovers they found sheltering in a pile of eskies.
"Good, then to pre-qualify you for the research, I must also check you're not quite the full quid. So - is there any chance you've got a 'roo loose in your top paddock?"
No? But back at school you were a member of Calf Club? That's good enough - now the first question is . . ."
I suppose I have some sort of duty to analyse the research scientifically: 78% of these Kiwis said Australians cook a better shrimp on a barbie.
That's an obviously loaded question.
We don't even have shrimps, so how could we grill them better? Never mind that from the halls of Oodnadatta to the bars of Long Bay jail, shrimps are called prawns.
And we know the percentage would have been reversed if the delicacy chosen for the BBQ was more fairly - a lamb chop.
I'd concede the Aussies may do a better hangi because here they'd have the advantage of not knowing where to start.
Did you ever go to a hangi where the food was less than atrocious? The only fit use for the hangi pit is burial of the chef. (The page opposite bears details of where to send your letter to the editor).
Equally loaded research questions elicited responses that Kiwis would like to steal several items from the Aussies: the Australian climate, Elle "The Body" McPherson, and the Melbourne Cup.
I'm afraid we have to concede these people gave pretty naive answers which now leaves New Zealand wide open.
Any moment soon John Key will be mailed the Queensland floods, and more distressing, the rest of us will be receiving the Julia Gillard swimwear catalogue.
As for the Melbourne Cup - we lift it most years anyway, but only the bookies think it's theft.
If the Aussies do get picky and insist on restitution they can have their pick of Hone Harawira, the Chinese Gardens, or either half of Rodney Hide.
But not Sonny Bill, he stays.
Fifty-one percent of Kiwis admitted the Aussies were better at Rugby League, which is a truth we're too polite to mention unless first asked. It's not their fault they can't help it if an errant gene keeps popping up in the family.
The last time a Kiwi league team arrived at Sydney Airport immigration, the manager shuffled up to the desk with the team's passports.
His face fell when he was asked if they had any criminal convictions.
"Convictions?" he asked.
"We're terribly sorry, but we weren't informed they were still your prerequisite for entry.
"Would things be OK if we promise to trash our pub?"
I worry that the Kiwi interviewees were being a touch xenophobic when they refused to allow an Australian made Anzac biscuit may be superior; (87% claimed Kiwi Anzacs were better - almost as many as the 91% who thought New Zealand fish and chips were the finer resting place for a newspaper).
In the interest of fairness, I researched the subject via the Digger History website.
Here it's explained that during the Great War there was a shortage of eggs because most Aussie chook farmers had left the nest to serve King and Country.
So instead of using eggs to bind oatcake-based biscuits for servicemen, Aussie women substituted treacle.
I'm fairly convinced that as many New Zealand chook farmers as Aussie poultry-people (proportionately speaking of course) marched off to ruffle the feathers of the Kaiser.
But it can't be proven, and I hear someone saying this wasn't actually part of the questionnaire.
Still, all said and done a lot can be forgiven when you pour a glass of the Taylors Estate 2008 shiraz.
Or better still a whole bottle of their Jaraman Cabernet.
Any family who produces these can't be all bad.
Not even Bill Taylor, their founder. (And by the way Bill, you still owe me 10 bucks).
• John Lapsley lives in Arrowtown.
