THE COLOUR OF MADNESS
A Blog About Living with Mental Illness
Straya, Mate
So today is Australia Day, I would like to start off by saying that there has been a lot of controversy surrounding the date. The current date is the 26th January to coincide with the anniversary of the arrival of the First Fleet back in 1788. For many it also serves as a sad reminder of what is often deemed “invasion day” and the atrocities that occurred causing a devastating impact on the Indigenous people of Australia.
Traditions are hard to break, I know most people, particularly the older generations in the small town where I live hate the thought of change and we all love a good public holiday, but they are talking about changing the date, not scrapping the Day itself. We have successfully managed to cope okay with changing public holidays in the past and I am sure as long as there’s still cold beer and a sausage sizzle, we could do it again.
Personally, I feel that Australia Day should be about celebrating our triumphs and growth as a nation, part of that growth is accepting that the current date holds deep emotional scars for our Aboriginal community. I feel that perhaps a new date would be the best thing to do, a demonstration of understanding and solidarity as a nation allowing us not to forget or ignore our rich and troublesome history, but centre our celebrations around the idea of building a new history together, as the wonderful multicultural society that Australia has become.
So, on a lighter note, I thought I’d throw in some Aussie anecdotes for your amusement and or education, feel free to have a squiz, make a cuppa, take a load off and enjoy. I would also specifically like to dedicate this next part of the post to the lovely and hilarious Dyane Harwood who’s awesome memoir Birth Of A New Brain I reviewed here. Her comments are always chockablock full with attempts at Aussie lingo, she never ceases to crack me up!
*Firstly, a little reminder that ‘Aussie’ is pronounced “Ozzie” and ‘Australia’ is pronounced “Uh-Stray-Yah”! Got it? No worries mate.
10 Fun Aussie Facts:
- As an underage Australian teenager, your drink of choice isn’t going to be beer, particularly not Fosters. It’s “Goon”. Goon is the silver bladder full of liquid stupidity that you find inside of a wine cask (the cheaper the better). Goon may be carried around town over the shoulder or hung from the clothes line for a game of “Wheel of Goon”. Goon is available for purchase at any local bottlo’ where you can bribe Dazza to turn a blind eye to your age by giving him some free Durry’s (smokes) ((cigarettes)).
- Touching the seatbelt buckle in your car during Summer can give you third degree burns, so can touching the steering wheel.
- You can’t ride a Kangaroo. Ever.
- It is perfectly acceptable to buy thongs for your 3yr old daughter and 80yr old grandmother. Because they are simply practical footwear.
- Prawns not Shrimp. And they taste like crap ‘chucked on the barbie’ so for best results Aussie’s recommend they areserve fresh over ice.
- Kangaroos can be well over 6ft tall and built like brick shit houses. They can and will hurt you if you get too close, so if you over do the goon and come across Skippys scary older brother, don’t try and prove your manhood, simply walk away quickly in the opposite direction. (See #3)
- The word “Fuck” can and will be used to replace pretty much every other word in a standard sentence.
- “Yeah, Nah, Yeah” means Yes “Nah, Yeah, Nah” means No.
- Vegemite and banana sandwiches are WAY better than Peanut butter and Jam.
- Aussies invented WiFi. Your welcome.
Traditional Aussie Summer Cuisine :
- Fairy Bread (white bread with too much cheap margarine covered in 100’s & 1000’s)
- Iced Vovo’s
- Snags (sausages)
- Meat Pies from the servo (fuel station)
- Zooper Doopers (Ice blocks in a long plastic tube)
- Flies. Okay this is mostly unintentional, but there are just so many of the little bastards that you are bound to eat a few along the way. But she’ll be right, just try and think of the protein…
This is my favourite (scarily accurate) Aussie meme:
I love living in this vast sunburnt land, I whinge about the heat and the cold and the snakes and the spiders and the… well I whinge a lot, but I love watching the wallabies playing in my garden and I wake up every morning to the sound of Kookaburras and Magpies. I wouldn’t trade it for the world!
Well I’m off next door to crack a cold one, have a snag & play a game of backyard cricket,
Happy Australia Day Mates!
7 Comments on “Straya, Mate”
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THE COLOUR OF MADNESS 
Love it!! A Louisiana tradition is fast approaching. Mardi Gras. It gets wild!
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Wahoo! Sounds fun!
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Happy Australia Day to you! Love your post. Very entertaining and accurate! 🙂
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Happy Australia Day! I always did love Aussies, (especially the men) Haha!
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This was fantastic to read! That meme is accurate and I’m fucking terrified of the funnel webs the most that would potentially inhabit in that scenery. Love snags, allergic to prawns, love cold alcoholic beverages and love public holidays. I’m a little late but Happy Australia Day!!! 🙂
Ps yes I think just move the day, we can celebrate another time as long as it’s a day off in summer 🙂
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Thank for your post and all the trivial information. I love stuff like this, I had fun reading it. Maybe one day I’ll do something similar with France and Switzerland. Bye mate!
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I am FINALLY here, mate, and how I loved every word! Thanks for the glorious shout-out! This was not only hysterical and educational but sobering, i.e. the meme of the deadly creatures! I’m glad I did read the meme before I went there solo in 1994!
“Travel Australia” – too funny but also scary & true, right? Plus it gets bonus points for the Austin Powers shark reference.
I had NO idea Australia gave us WiFi – it wasn’t Silicon Valley? (My freaky neighbor!) I’d rather have it be Australia!
I’d fit in there, I know I would, since “fuck” is my every other word!!!!!
Sending you lots of love and off I go to read your other posts to get caught up!
XOXOXOXOXOXO
p.s. as I Neil Finn groupie, I mean FAN, I dedicate the song “Dots on the Shells” to you
As you may know, it’s by YOTHU YINDI & Neil Finn, my boyfriend, I mean the acclaimed musician.
I saw them perform it at Womad, San Francisco.
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