So last night my buddy from Australia pinged me about a Zoom call. He’s doing business in Noumea now and kept messing up meeting times. Got me thinking – I always struggle with Noumea’s funky timezone too. Like is it tomorrow or yesterday compared to Tokyo? Nobody got spoons for mental math at 3am.
First Try: Googled Like a Dumbass
Grabbed my laptop around midnight, yawned like crazy. Typed “Noumea time now” first. Google flashed back 3:07pm Tuesday. Brain went: Wait… it’s Monday night here in Seattle… so Noumea’s already in Tuesday? Felt like time travel without the cool DeLorean.
- Tried comparing manually: “Okay Seattle is UTC-7… Noumea is UTC+11… that’s uh… 18 hours? No wait
- Counted on fingers across timezone map like a kid
- Forgot about daylight saving mess
- Nearly threw coffee at the screen
Epic Fail Moment
Remembered London has big time diff. Pulled up clock for London – showed 8:07am Tuesday. Noumea was 3:07pm same day? So Noumea is 11 hours ahead of London? But Seattle was Monday 11:07pm… This is when I banged my head on the table. The numbers swam like drunk ants.
Then my disaster struck – cat jumped on keyboard, spilled cold brew everywhere. While I scrambled for paper towels, that “smart” tab auto-refreshed. POOF! All my time tabs gone. Felt like screaming into a pillow.
Gorilla Solution Time
Gave up on browsers. Wrote actual places on sticky notes:
- Seattle (UTC-7/PST)
- London (UTC+0/GMT)
- Tokyo (UTC+9/JST)
- Noumea (UTC+11? NCST?)
Scratched times on paper comparing Noumea to each:
Seattle: Noumea = current time + 19 hours (yep feels like tomorrow)
London: Noumea = London time + 11 hours (afternoon vs morning)
Tokyo: Noumea = Tokyo time + 2 hours (not huge diff!)
Slapped sticky notes on my monitor like a cave painting. Forgot daylight saving existed until Windows popped up “time zone update” alert. Almost cried.
My Ghetto Winner Tool
Ended up making a stupidly simple HTML table. Like back in 1999 web design. But hey, works for my monkey brain.
City VS Noumea Time
London +11 hrs
New York +16 hrs
Seattle +19 hrs
Tokyo +2 hrs
Sydney -1 hr
Now I just peep this crusty chart before scheduling calls. Still wonder why Noumea is UTC+11 when neighbors have +12. Who even decides these things? Anyway now when my Aussie mate asks, I sound like a wizard instead of a lost puppy.