Get informed before taking off

New Zealanders, also known as "Kiwis", use the internet heavily. You will find that some of the sites ranked on top 10,000 by Alexa.com are actually in New Zealand. Most of the businesses here have their own websites which are up-to-date and are very informative; most of which feature online shopping.

Here are some interesting NZ websites:

http://www.metroinfo.org.nz/
http://www.trademe.co.nz/
http://www.finda.co.nz/

For those wanting to come to visit, work or immigrate, you can always refer to the NZIS (New Zealand Immigration Service) website at: http://www.immigration.govt.nz/. You can find guides, fees, forms and many other information there. It's very up-to-date and relatively easy to use; it's easy enough to find the information you need.

I would highly recommend that before you decide on what country to fly to, you must do a thorough research about it. Especially the people, environment, prices of goods, rent, electricity, etc. -- the usual stuff for your day-to-day living.

Create a journal on your notebook as it's so easy to forget these stuff. It's also a nice way of doing a comparison among the countries you've researched so far.

Once you have a good idea of what you're getting in to, try and paint a picture of what your finances would be like depending on your circumstances. Like if you have a child or two, how much would you be spending for childcare, education; all that kind of stuff.

Based on your research, you can then better negotiate how much your salary would be in a prospect company. It's also an added bonus for you if you know some bits about the country you're going during the job interview as you might be asked what do you know about their country; it will show how interested you are.

So go ahead, do some web searching, read books and magazines. Also do ask around with your friends and relatives. Beware, however, people's impressions about the country they've been to are a result of their own experiences. Do not take it as if it's the reality. I've heard a lot of different stories about NZ when we were coming here; very diverse stories from good to bad to worse. The reality is, people see the same thing differently. One person may hate snow but one may party with it. One may hate to give-way to pedestrians but one may have no problem giving-way to anybody anytime even to cows, sheeps and ducks.