It’s been a busy week back for me. I flew into JFK on Sunday just as the airport started testing people for Ebola-like symptoms.

Fortunately because New Zealand isn’t yet Liberia on the infectious virus front, I could rely on the lousy domestic airline service to delay me, even when the airport health teams didn’t.

It does seem somewhat histrionic, doesn’t it.. this Ebola stuff. Not to take away from anything in West Africa. God, it sounds awful there, but I saw this amazing photo of a woman waiting to catch a plane in Dallas the other day.

Dallas, where a grand total of three people have had the virus and let’s remember: it’s a virus which is only spread by bodily fluids, and this woman was sitting in the departure lounge wearing a homemade hazmat suit!

Seriously, she’d gone done to Fresh Choice and spent about thirty bucks on plastic rubbish bags and glad wrap and totally condomed herself. Protective goggles, hairnets on her feet! I hate to think what would’ve happened if she needed to go to the bathroom.

Anyway. New York’s splendid. Mild, the trees in Central Park across the road are turning, it’s lovely to be back.

As a nice journalistic break from Ebola, I spent the day yesterday at the United Nations for the vote on the UN Security Council. I’ve spent a bit of time at the UN. I have to go in there for stories every now and then.

I have to negotiate all the metal detectors. Although yesterday, they had the West Indian guard force on the front gates. They’re real dudes eh, bursting out of their shirts, guns on their hips, massive aviator sunglasses.

I went up to the Security Council. If you’ve ever done the tourist tour of the UN headquarters, they’ve got some really cool little displays. My favourite is the AK47 assault rifle that has been turned into an electric guitar. So where the barrel was, there’s a neck and strings instead. It’s really clever.

The UN is probably the best place on Earth for people watching because you get a crazy mix of people in service jobs. People cooking official diplomatic breakfasts and cleaning and securing and that sort of thing. And then you have some of the world’s most powerful politicians and leaders. They’re all in the same enclosure.

And in the Assembly Hall yesterday, before the vote for the Security Council, all the various diplomats and representatives from different countries were dottering about and hob-nobbing as they do.

But it’s extraordinary, because you have Europeans in suits and bowties chatting away with African diplomats in dishikis and full body robes.

And let me tell you, there are some attractive people at the UN. You know how – I dunno who it was, Freud probably – reckons we as people are attracted to people who are a little bit foreign? Or perhaps not, Freud reckons we’re attracted to our parents, doesn’t he? Anyway, I’m gonna go with the foreign theory, sorry Mum!

And when you think about it, where else in the World do you potentially have people from every single country on Earth, all in the same room? It’s amazing.

I think we should be proud of getting on the Council. Whether you’re left, right or left right out of the political spectrum, we’re got our national identity to thank for getting on. Countries voted for New Zealand, not just because our government has been lobbying pretty hard, but because they think we’re gutsy.

Nuclear Free. Apartheid. The Rwandan Genocide: In the past we’ve stood up to countries to defend what we thought was right. We’ve got a history of it. And though, look, I’m not a huge fan of the UN. It’s unlikely we’ll bring about World Peace, and in the face of the middle east the Security Council’s about as impotent as a goldfish but I personally think it’s quite refreshing that in this age of big money, a little country with a bit of spine still came out on top.