Culturegram #1

We thought we'd take advantage of these last few weeks to document some of our lasting impressions of Australia ... there were so many things that impressed us and took some getting used to when we got here ... and now are just life as usual. So, for the first few thoughts ...............

LANGUAGE

Although they do speak english down here, it's their own unique version different than the Queen's or that from back home. The sentence structure is obviously the same, but it's mainly the vocabulary. When I was working with the young men in church there was a rarely an evening or Sunday meeting that went by when they didn't snicker at something I said or there was something they said that I had to ask for clarification on. And for those words that we do have in common, they tend to pronounce a lot of them differently. Just today I heard someone say the word, 'advertisement', but it was not prounounced 'ad-ver-TISE-ment' it was pronounced 'ad-VER-tiz-munt'. They also like to shorten everything that can be shortened; and even those that can't be shortened. An example, in their local footy games they have 'spectacular' plays but call them 'specky' for short ...

BIRDS

This is something I am truly going to miss. We walk outside of our house and it's literally like being in an aviary. Just this morning we had 1,000's of white/yellow cockatoos flying around the trees across the street. They were making their 'caw' sound and flocking this way and that and then landing in the gum trees. They occasionally play with each other by hanging upside down and spreading their yellow wings as far apart as they can. Then there are the lorikeets that are bright green, red, blue, yellow and are very fast. They love to sit in our little bush tree outside and munch on the seeds ... they also like to hang out in pairs like little love birds. Then there are the galahs that look like cockatoos but are pink and gray. They make a less than pleasurable noise and love to chew up the grass looking for whatever. They are still pretty to look at. And then finally are the gigantic magpies that dive bomb you while riding your bike and the little robber birds that look like robbers (they're called miner birds and make a sound like a ringing cell phone), and are also pretty adept at kamikaze tactics.

FOOD

Can't have a culture gram without food now can you. Ok, so for the biggest thing to miss -- TIM TAMS!! Those delectable chocolate covered wafers sandwiching a smooth chocolate cream. And then bite off a corner from each side and suck in some hot chocolate through the cookie (sorry, biscuit) and you've got a little piece of heaven. Lemon squash is like carbonated lemon juice and is sour, but refreshing. We also like passionfruit crush, and the kids like ginger beer. And what would be a summer drink without some cordial (something like very concentrated liquid koolaid that is diluted directly in water.) We love the aussie barbies, especially the kids and their sausages (hot dogs) on white bread with ketchup (and grilled onions for the adults). There aren't many choices for ice cream here, so we'll be happy to get back to that action!