I understand fully where you're coming from, Banana.
I too moved from the big city (London) to a rural community (Cornwall).... and I love it..!! No, I'm not a gardener by nature but now that Manda and I have our own house we have a nice sized garden that we want to make look nice so we are going to work hard on that.
This weekend is a public holiday weekend. Monday is Spring Bank Holiday in the UK (Memorial Day in the US, I believe) and so we are going to use this time to dismantle the old garden shed that we inherited with the house and dig up the concrete base it's built on in preparation to building a new shed. It will be hard work, but we're competent, capable women and we'll manage.
We have a vision of how our garden will look when everything we have planned is finished... which won't be for some time.... but we're patient and have no shortage of advisors. lol. It seems all our neighbours have advice and tips for us, which is lovely, I think.
I've moved to Cornwall and fully embraced the pace of life and the culture, traditions and lifestyle of my new home. I've integrated and I think that is a good thing.
It's almost like I'm an immigrant in a new country (and there are plenty of Kernews who think of Cornwall as a country in it's own right). When Asians or other Europeans come to Britain, some people claim that those "incomers" don't integrate with British ways. Well, what this girl from the big city has done is to become a part of the community I have moved to. Oh, I know I will never be accepted as a Cornish woman.... my Home Counties accent (Our American friends would probably call that "posh British". Think Elizabeth Hurley. lol) is too deeply ingrained. I can do "Cockney" when I want to though. (Think Martine McCutcheon for that
). That puts me in the favourite two categories of accent, according to the poll on the link:
https://www.iloveyouraccent.com/accent-blog/?p=234
Take that with a pinch of salt if you will... I do. LOL... but it's a fun thing, isn't it..? But I'm digressing again.....
I'm sure the lovely people of New Zealand don't worry about you not having the gardening bug, Banana. I'm quite sure they don't hold it against you one bit. Perhaps in time their ways will slowly rub off onto you and one day you will find yourself pottering amongst the Irises and fretting over weeds growing on your lawn. You may wonder how the heck you ever got to that stage, but you won't mind when your neighbour leans over the fence and points at a daisy pushing up onto your otherwise flawless greensward, so you can remove it straight away.
Good luck, and enjoy. It's good to integrate.
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