So I’m back at work after six days on Rarotonga in the Cook Islands.

Now, I’m not going to big note it and tell you how wonderful the weather and the food and the snorkelling and the reading and the sunsets were, even though all of the above was amazing. I’m just going to talk about the Cook Islands a bit because after all they’re a bit of New Zealand.  A very interesting bit of New Zealand.  One of us and yet not.  Similar advantages and problems and yet different ways of handling them.

So the Cook Islands.  There are 15 of them.  The country is self-governing in association with New Zealand.  This means New Zealand is responsible for the Cook Islands' defence and foreign affairs on consultation with the Islanders. You may remember their first Premier Albert Henry.

Cook Islands nationals are citizens of New Zealand and can receive New Zealand government services, but the reverse is not true; New Zealand citizens are not Cook Islands nationals which means the place is not full of rich Kiwis buying bachs.  Cookies look after Cookies and I have no problem with that.

For instance, the guy who owned the place we stayed at bought it after selling his Auckland business.  He went through two years of getting approval despite the fact his Dad lives on Raro and has done for 45 years, his daughter had also been living there for five years but still he had to prove how much he was committed to the Islands to get permission to invest in it. Not like Americans buying High Country farms in Otago.

So Cookies are Kiwis but Kiwis are not Cookies. But they use our money. They have some of their own funky coins but Kiwi money is Cookie money.  But use your phone on the Cooks and be prepared to take out a mortgage. The roaming rates are insane. 

So if you need to have a phone with you all the time you need to stump up 50 bucks for a tourist SIM card to Bluesky, the phone provider whose phone network is called KOKONET. Ba doomp cha! This is obviously a rort. A rort Bluesky rorts all over the Pacific.  Someone is making a lot of money and frankly if they want to use our money then they ought to use our telcos too.

But here’s a thing at the Avarua market: I saw a family of four all phoning away like crazy.  I guess Dad was happy enough to spring 200 bucks for the privilege. Helen and I just turned our phones off and paid 25 bucks for 1.5 Gig of bure wifi.

So one of the issues of the moment for the Cook Islands is whether they add a Cook Island Maori name to the country.  The suggestion was Kuki Airani, but that’s actually a made up name.  That’s hilarious.  The other suggestion is Avaiki.  But as the opponents say, why break 40 years of branding. 

The islands have their Maori names. Rarotonga, Aitutaki, Atiu. But the Cook Islands is a collective name that the tourists can actually say.  And those tourists are so important.  Every couple of hours a jet lumbers in from the Pacific, landing at the international airport New Zealand built 40 years ago, and if you look at the planes they look like big piggy banks that land and then vomit cash all over the island.

This past week they’ve also been looking at the National Super scheme.  Employees pay in five per cent and employers match it.  The fund is worth about $160 million for the 17,000 Cookies. But the new idea is that the fund should look after the sick and housing as well as retirees. 

If you’ve got cancer on the Cooks then you’re off to New Zealand for treatment and that’s expensive, especially finding somewhere to stay.  Meanwhile, with the tourism boom houses on the island are running short so that’s expensive too.  So the suggestion is that part of the Super fund help the sick and the homeless.

I thought that was sweet.  Because the one thing I saw in the Cooks was a pride in their island and their people and a desire to support each other. It’s a good place and if you are lucky enough to have Cook Island heredity you are a blessed person.  Oh, and the weather is pretty good too.