Test yourself on how well you know New Zealand now

1. The country geographically comprises …………………and numerous smaller islands.

a. the North Island b. the South Island c. the North and South Islands…d. only numerous smaller islands

2. The first European explorer who discovered New Zealand was…...

a. Tasman b. Cook…c. Vasco da Gamma d. Amerigo Vespucci

3. The capital of New Zealand is ……………………..

a. Wellington b. Auckland c. Christchurch d. Canberra

4. The head of New Zealand is ………………………

a. the Governor General b. the Prime Minister c. the Queen of the UK d. the Cabinet

5. The country’s economy depends on ……………….

a. foreign trade b. the service sector c. manufacturing d. raw materials extraction

6. The national currency of NZ is ……………………

a. the dollar b. the Kiwi dollar…c. the pound…the euro

7. The highest mountain of New Zealand is …………

a. Mount Ruapehu b. Aoraki / Mount Cook c. Mount Abel Tasman d. Ben Nevis

8. The national symbol of New Zealand is …………….

a. a dolphin b. a tuatara c. a flightless bird Kiwi…d. a kangaroo

9. The indigenous population of New Zealand is called ……

a. the Maori b. the Aborigines…c. the Polynesian people…d. the Kiwis

10. New Zealand is famous as a place of filming ………..

a. Life of Pi…b. Waterworld…c. Pirates of the Caribbean …d. The Lord of the Rings

 

Supplementary reading

Some interesting facts about New Zealand

Useful vocabulary

A cloud – облако

similar – похожий, подобный

an anthem –гимн

a logo – эмблема

to permit – позволять, разрешать

educational purposes – образовательные цели

a fine – штраф

to explode – взрываться

to pioneer – быть первым, продвигать

 

Task I. Read and translate the text

The Māori name for NZ, Aoetaroa, means ‘land of the long white cloud’.

No part of the country is more than 128km (79 miles) from the sea.

New Zealand is similar in size to the UK, but only has a population of about 4 million (compared to 63 million in the UK).

New Zealand is one of the only countries to have two national anthems- God Save The Queen and God Defend New Zealand.

Wellington is the southernmost capital city in the world.

The logo for the Royal New Zealand Air Force is a kiwi- a flightless bird.

Only 5% of NZ’s population is human- the rest are animals.

New Zealand is home to the world’s smallest dolphin species.

NZ is home to more species of penguins than any other country.

Organized commercial bungee jumping first began in New Zealand.

The national sport of NZ is rugby union.

NZ high schools and universities are permitted to keep a pound of uranium for educational purposes. However, there is a $1 million fine if it explodes.

The man who pioneered plastic surgery, Harold Gillies, was a Kiwi.

 

Task II. Answer the questions

1. What country New Zealand is often compared to? Why do you think it is so?

2. Why do you think the county has two names? What is its second name?

3. Are there any facts that surprised or impressed you?

4. Do you know any additional information about New Zealand?

 

Outstanding New Zealand personalities

Task I. Read and translate the text

William Atack

Inspired Referee

William Harrington Atack, of Canterbury, was the first sports referee in the world to use a whistle to stop a game.

Today the referee’s whistle is a ubiquitous feature in sport. It now seems logical and obvious, but it was a New Zealander who first thought of it in June 1884.

Burt Munro

New Zealand’s Fastest Man: Salt Flats Speedster

Burt Munro, known as the fastest man from New Zealand, became internationally known for the records he broke at the Bonneville Salt Flats in Utah in the 1960s. In eleven record attempting trips to the National Speed Week, the Kiwi broke three world records on his Indian motorcycle – one of which still stands today. The “World’s Fastest Indian” from the edge of the world believed in boundless opportunities and in the importance of never giving up his dreams regardless of challenges along the way.

Maurice Wilkins

DNA Enabler

A Nobel Prize winner in Physiology and Medicine in 1962 for his contribution to the discovery of the structure of DNA – the very essence of life itself – and a New Zealander by birth, Maurice Wilkins is among our greatest achievers.

Research undertaken by Maurice Wilkins, with support from Rosalind Franklin, led to the discovery of the DNA molecule structure. This discovery, by American geneticist James Watson and British biophysicist Francis Crick in 1953, revolutionised biology and medicine.

DNA (deoxyribonucleic acid) is known as the ‘building blocks of life’. It contains material that is unique to the individual but also inherited. It can tell us possible diseases an individual may suffer, or any number of human characteristics. Because it is unique, DNA testing is now a common tool used by police for accurately pinpointing criminals, the same way fingerprinting has been used for the last 100 years.

Alexander Aitken

The Human Computer

Alexander Aitken was the greatest mathematician of his era and possessed an astonishing computational brain that could complete challenges that today are reserved for the most complex computers. As one of the most remarkable mathematical brains of all time, Aitken could recite Pi to 707 decimal places, multiply two nine digit numbers in his head in 30 seconds, and render fractions to 26 decimal places in under five seconds.

Almost mystical acts, which would appear more at home as part of a magic show, were put to use by Aitken to advance mathematical knowledge and impress amazed undergraduates at Edinburgh University, Scotland, where he spent most of his working life.

In psychological tests in Britain in the 1920s he took thirty seconds to multiply 987,654,321 by 123,456,789 and produce the correct answer: 121, 932, 631, 112, 635, 269. Asked to render the fraction 4/47 as a decimal, he waited four seconds and answered: “Point 08510638297872340425531914 – and that’s as far as I can carry it.”

He had such a prodigious memory that he could store away solutions to problems and then call on them from his brain when needed. He could do a series of calculations by mental arithmetic and hold the answers to all of them in his head long enough to bring them all together at the end and have the final answer.

Alan MacDiarmid

Plastic Fantastic

For a hundred years young graduates have been told that “there’s a great future in plastics.” That exhortation continues to have currency today, thanks to the work of New Zealand born and educated scientist Alan MacDiarmid who was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for 2000 for his and his colleagues’ “discovery and development of electronically conductive polymers.” The Nobel Prize recognized advances that are seen to be the future of the technology fuelling the age of information.

The discovery of organic polymers revolutionised materials science to give us plastics, amongst whose myriad uses is to safely insulate wires in electrical leads and devices. But the ability to make these polymers conduct electricity awaited the work of Alan MacDiarmid and his colleagues.

Harold Williams

Voice of the World

New Zealander Harold Williams was listed by the Guinness Book of Records as the world’s greatest linguist. He is said to have spoken over 58 languages fluently, as well as some of their dialects. Among these were Swahili, Hausa and Zulu. This amazing polyglot was said to “read grammars as others read detective stories”. Williams’ editorials on foreign affairs were regarded as the authoritative version. His personal qualities and his expansive knowledge, particularly of Russian affairs, led to associations with some of the most influential people of the time, from statesman, to writers such as H.G. Wells and Hugh Walpole (also born in New Zealand).

Te Rangi Hiroa / Peter Buck

Aotearoa Anthropologist

Te Rangi Hiroa/Sir Peter Buck’s achievements are astonishing for their diversity, reading more like a list of possible careers than a biography – a pioneering and internationally renowned anthropologist, the first Maori medical doctor, a politician, administrator, soldier, sportsperson and leader of the Maori people.

Colin Murdoch

Disposable syringe inventor

He wanted to design a more effective vaccinator for animals and, in doing so, designed and invented the disposable syringe: a device that has saved millions of human lives. Sufferers of diabeties depend on Murdoch’s invention every day to administer their dose of insulin safely. He also conceived and developed the tranquilliser dart gun, which has saved the lives of millions of animals.

Alan Gibbs

High-speed amphibian

The earliest amphibious vehicles date back to the 1700s, but it was businessman Alan Gibbs who launched the world's first road-legal, high-speed amphibian in 2003. The following year, Richard Branson drove one of Gibbs' vehicles to break the record for an amphibious crossing of the English Channel. His third design, the Quadski, went to market early last year.