Welcome to american.nz!
I’m Dan Keane, an American writer in Aotearoa New Zealand. I cover all angles of the US-NZ exchange, and the joys and pains of gringo life abroad in these ever stranger days. I think of each post as a letter home, written to both ccountries. Subscribe and you’ll receive one each Wednesday in the US, or Thursday in NZ. (Down here, see, we live in the future.)
If you enjoy what you read, consider a paid subscription! It’s cheap, about the price of a coffee each month, and your support buys the excellent New Zealand coffee that keeps this whole machine turning.
Heading South?
If you’re thinking about moving to New Zealand, I’d love to talk! Sign up for an Ask Me Anything subscription and we’ll meet for a one-on-one Zoom to talk all things Aotearoa, and the weird joy and struggle of living abroad.
How can I help? My family and I have been here five years now. Before that, I’ve lived in seven countries on four continents, writing and teaching the whole time. I can help you think through both the nitty-gritty of NZ life and the big questions about moving your soul across the world—and I’ll tell you what never to bring to a Kiwi potluck. Interested? Drop me a line at dan@american.nz.
Who am I?
I’m a writer, journalist, teacher, and now a PhD candidate in creative writing at Te Herenga Waka Victoria University of Wellington. My work has appeared or is forthcoming in The Washington Post, Harper’s, North & South, McSweeney’s, ChinaFile, Zoetrope, The Austin Chronicle, and The Best American Nonrequired Reading, among others. I’m a former Bolivia correspondent for The Associated Press, and I covered the U.S.-Mexico border for The Big Bend Sentinel in Marfa, Texas. I grew up in Tempe, Arizona, sister city to NZ’s own Lower Hutt. We live just over the hill in the Wairarapa. Maybe this was fate.
What’s with Superman?
That’s Superman and Wanganui Hills (1994), by NZ artist Graham Kirk, used with his generous permission. Kirk’s got a whole series of American icons superimposed on Kiwi landmarks, with our familiar heroes quite lost but swaggering on anyhow. They’ve been my daemon for these letters from the jump. Thanks, Graham!
