More Random Tidbits About Aussie Life

First observation – there is no paying for gas at the pump here.  We’ve literally driven over 9,000 km and have not encountered one gas station with the option to pay with your card outside.  Not a big deal right?  Well no, not unless you’re on empty and you pull into the nearest town only to discover the only gas station is closed for the night (at 6pm!) and the next station is another 37km away (yes we made it but we were on pins and needles those last 10km).  

Women here play netball (which is basically basketball without a backboard and no dribbling, who knew?!) and they do it wearing skirts.  Maybe to those of you with European roots this isn’t so weird but for me, it’s crazy.  I’ve never even heard of netball and didn’t know it was such a big deal as it is over here (they have a professional league and air the games on TV).

Speaking of TV, Australians probably live more active, friend and family-centric lives because there is absolutely nothing to watch on TV, even if you were so inclined to be a couch potato.  There are only a handful of channels and they air old US shows or the Aus rip-off version of US shows.  And the original shows they do have, they air five to six days a week for months on end (seriously, I became addicted to The Block, a renovation show, and we watched it non-stop back in Cairns for over two months when I wasn’t working at night).  There is one bright spot though and that is Adults Only Cops.  It’s all the stuff that you really want to see on regular Cops back home but don’t because they have to cut it out to make it airable.  In the Adults Only version they show it aaaaaalllll – prostitutes, drunks, police literally beating the you know what out of uncooperative perps, check, check, and check.  It’s sad but, like a train wreck, you can’t tear your eyes away. 

Moving on to a little bit classier subject; I love all the public artwork on display everywhere in Australia.  There is such a wealth and diversity of public art - there are statues and monuments and art pieces and huge TV screens with public lounge seating playing free art house movies and more.  You can’t walk two blocks without seeing at least one fun installation, and oftentimes there are more than that.  Amazingly, none of them ever seem to be vandalized either.  It’s sad to admit but back in the US, some jerk would tag these wonderful works of art with graffiti and ruin them for everyone else.

I’ve said before that things are called different names here and I have some new examples for you.  Jack Daniels, called JD at home, is known as Jaxon here (that one never failed to confuse me at the bar) and Southern Comfort, aka SoCo, is just Southern.  The letter Z is Zed.  ANZ, the bank we use, is called A, N, Zed and people look at us weird when we ask for directions to any nearby A, N, Z.  Burger King is called Hungry Jacks and cereals here ALL have different names (Rice Krispies are Rice Bubbles, weird?!).  And it’s not referred to as ‘drunk driving’ or ‘driving under the influence, it’s ‘drink driving’. 

Drink driving is apparently not as big of a deal here as driving tired though because there are signs all across Australian highways warning of the dangers of tired driving but none about drink driving.  They are often quite blunt – ‘Tired Drivers Die’ is one of my personal faves – and encourage you to pull over to any of the numerous rest stops for a cat nap or cup of coffee (free to the driver in many places) rather than continuing on.

Believe it or not, the police of the numerous small towns dotting the highway up the west coast are kind enough to let law breakers know what bad behavior they are currently monitoring.  They had huge signs as you entered many of the towns that said ‘Local Police are Targeting’, with a huge yellow stripe in the middle that told you whether police were on the lookout for drink driving, speeding or some other infraction.  I found it a bit weird and wondered what was the point… like, if you’re speeding but police are targeting drink driving, are they not going to pull you over??

Something else I find super funny is the terrible team mascots they have over here.  The poor guys on the Rabbitohs; a) what is a rabbitoh (I googled it and there are conflicting opinions - the old rugby team used to have rabbits on their field so it either stems from them yelling ‘rabbit oh’ when they tried to catch them or yelling ‘rabbit oh’ as they sold the meat from the rabbits they caught on the streets to fund their club) and b) their uniforms are hot pink!  Then there are other teams like the Pigeons – really?  Where is the intimidation factor of a pigeon?   I think back to my days of high school and how we used to make fun of kids on teams with bad mascots (Geneseo Cogs for example) and I wonder if these guys take abuse on the field.  There are so many more bad mascots but sadly I can’t think of any right now.

See if you can figure this out; you don't mail things at the post office here.  You can buy a stamp or collectible coins or a menagerie of other things at the post office (if you’re British it’s where you HAVE to go to get a new passport, as Alex can attest) but if you want to mail anything, you have to go to a post box and drop your letter in.  It’s so weird, and often frustrating after waiting in line for 15 mins just to buy a stamp, that the post office won’t take your mail.

Another thing that kills me here is that addresses don’t line up.  There is no grid system; so it might be 300 N Lake on one street and a block over it is only 120 N River St.  Plus, it is different on each side of the street.  You can be at 300 N Lake on one side of the street and 101 N Lake on the other side.  It makes it impossible to know how far it is to where you’re going if you’re not a local and can be especially annoying when lugging around a 50lb backpack!

Lastly, eggs are not in the refrigerator section of the grocery store here.  I find this really weird.  Do eggs need to be refrigerated or not?  At home I always assumed so but here they are not so now I’m confused.  Perhaps eggs do not need to be refrigerated…  Discuss & let me know what you guys think.