A Kurdish-Iranian academic living in Auckland says he was "devastated" after allegedly being labelled a criminal and told his home country is "full of shit" in a racist outburst at a tyre repair shop.
Dr Jiyar Aghapouri, a postdoctoral researcher with Middlesex University who lives on Auckland's North Shore, says he'd started to assume racism didn't exist in New Zealand after eight years without experiencing it first-hand.
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"While smiling, I asked him to put on a tyre that doesn't blow up after a few days or weeks, because one of my friends had experienced this before while trying the cheaper tyres," he explained.
The owner appeared to take offence, Dr Aghapouri says, and allegedly told him "it's in your f**king country that tyres blow out... in New Zealand we don't do these shitty things".
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"He said 'you are very lucky to be in New Zealand... You know, your country is full of shit'," Dr Aghapouri recounts. "I was flabbergasted."