@_@

So let me give you a scenario. I'm sitting in a cafeteria. The cafeteria is in the student union building of Massey University. I've got some lunch from the cafe. I am wirelessly connected to the Massey staff wireless network via my laptop. I'm munching on my lunch (Spag since you ask); listing to some Orbital on my iPod, going..."I must be in the twilight zone". And yet, this kinda summarises my experience at Massey so far. The default is open. The default is trust (Within reason). The first things when I walked in the door weren't:

1) Reduce costs
2) Reduce costs
3) Reduce costs

...And while cost reduction is surely in the back of someone's mind somewhere, or as an engineer is in my mind from an efficiency perspective, there is just something about this place. I know it is only week two, and one can't judge yet. But it is just so fundamentally different from anything else I have experienced previously. Obviously someday I will become as jaded as everyone does who's been anywhere for any length of time. But things here are just different.

The first things I noticed are the qualities I would use to describe the environment. Not specifically ITS where I work, but the University itself. Words like 'bohemian' and 'intellectual'. I don't imagine it is necessarily 'egalitarian', as I'm sure there are some egos around somewhere. Discrimination is something I have seen none of. Is this a university thing? Is it a generation thing? As I read somewhere, is this because the student body is of an age where their minds are broader than their waste-lines, which is a trend which tends to reverse with the marching advance of age? There are people here of all ages, genders, races, beliefs and abilities. It's just awesome to see. No over-dressed corporate snobs looking down their noses at someone in a pair of jeans. Surely there must be some type of snobbery around though, and I have yet to recognise it. At the end of the day, people are still people.

So as I said to the head of ITS while passing in the hall, "I think I've finally found the place I can call home". It's only taken a few years...:-)