Breakfast viewers got to meet new co-host Kamahl Santamaria for the first time on Friday morning, ahead of his first day on the show next week.
Santamaria comes to TVNZ from Al Jazeera, having started his career at 3 News before heading overseas.
He's returned to New Zealand after 20 years overseas, having presented news and current affairs in Australia, the Asia-Pacific region, the United States and Middle East.
He told Breakfast it's surreal to be back in Auckland and a lot has changed since he last lived in Aotearoa.
"Physically for me Auckland has changed so much, the mindset of the people has changed, the culture has changed, everything has changed. So, in that sense I'm treating it like I'm coming to a new country."
Santamaria said since arriving back in New Zealand the biggest change he's noticed is how much Te Reo is used: "Just going into a supermarket and seeing it, Māori words written on the walls along side the words of poultry or fish or whatever and that's wonderful to see."
Co-hosts Indira Stewart and Jenny-May Clarkson joked with Santamaria about whether he prefers Vegemite or Marmite, to which he said "neither".
"I will use them on roast potatoes, if you're cooking roast potatoes and you've parboiled your potatoes and you get your olive oil, you put a spoon of Marmite in there and mixed it all up it gives this lovely kind of savoury umami flavour."
Santamaria said now he is to be back in Auckland to be joining the team, "I wanted a new challenge, I wanted to come home and do something which I hadn't done before and this is it, and I am so excited, I really am."
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