Observations from the Land Down Under

While we were on our trip, Curt and I made a few fun observations on Australia and how they are (in a great way) different and unique!

First of all, everyone always hears how friendly Aussies are, and it’s true – we found it to be so refreshing not only to be in a Western country, but any time we needed ANY help, we hardly even had to look around before it was offered readily and with a friendly smile. Felt like home!

Certain things are expensive… on the whole, you’re going to spend a lot of money on vacation so we try to cut corners where we can. In Oz, a lot of items are expensive, but then other things that you think would be, aren’t so much? It’s a mixed bag and you never know what you’re going to get when going to pay… for example, bottled water is expensive, so we tried to get tap wherever we could (duh, you say, but it’s not available everywhere, and when it’s not, expect to pay $4 for a bottle – yikes)!

The HARDEST expense that I had to swallow was in one of the many airports we were in… I brought two books with me, and I finished one of them on the plane ride down, and I couldn’t bear starting the other one and then be left without a book SO early in our trip.

So I browsed the airport book store, spent a lot of time finding just the right book, and was so excited when I found a great historical fiction about Australia’s women prisoners! For the first time, I flip the book over to see how much it is (it was a paperback, mind you), and my knees almost buckled in shock when I saw it was $32 Australian dollars!!! I couldn’t believe it, so I quickly started checking other paperbacks, and sure enough, all of them ranged from $29 to $35 (books that would cost MAYBE $14.99 at home).

The small junky paperbacks that you can get at home for $7.99 cost $20. I was SHOCKED, and curiously went up to the counter to ask the guy why books are so expensive. I was thinking maybe because they have to import them, or maybe because we were in the airport they charged more, but both were wrong… first he looked at me like I was crazy until I explained that the price was over double of what you could get a book for in the states, and then the other guy working chimed in and he said he’s pretty sure it’s because they print all of the books on the island, so maybe they don’t have the economies of scale… whatever the reason, I was heartbroken.

Curt had given me $25, and I went back to him and said it wasn’t enough… he could tell my heart had been set on this book, so he gave me the difference, and we joked that I could only read a chapter a day to make it last, and when we get home I have to frame it in a shadow box as the most expensive paperback I’ll ever own.

Seriously, if you know me, you know I can drop more money on books than clothes, shoes, purses, etc. combined, and I constantly have to find books in our library to sell to the used bookstore because when we moved we were VERY out of room for all of our shelves, so there’s one reason why I can’t ever live in Australia for a long period of time – we’d be BROKE!

This is also why I think book exchanges at hotels/traveler’s places are really the coolest thing in the world – before we left I traded the first book I had read (it was hard to let it go) for another great one. Whew!

Another unique thing about Australia, and these are things I’m not a fan of, are there are CCTV cameras literally EVERYWHERE, and they seem to fine people for EVERYTHING.

At any given point in Oz you can stop, pause, take a look around, and probably count at least 5 to 8 CCTV cameras in your immediate area. To give an idea, one takeaway food restaurant counter had them placed between every light fixture, for a total of 4…. For a sandwich place, people, please. I got used to this somewhat when in London, but in Australia it was even more so to the extent of overkill. We were never sure if this is more of a preventive measure, like a Big Brother “we’re watching you” type tactic, or a tactic to make people feel safer and they don’t really ever to utilize them. Either way it creeped me out a bit – I mean, they took away everyone’s guns already, why exactly do they need 8 cameras on you at all times, in every place except your toilet stall?

And the fines – they have signs posted everywhere that you’re fined for X or Y, and for how much. On the flip side, because they do seem to fine for such a wide range of violations, I think this is how Australia paid off their deficit in 10 years, but still. Don’t even look at someone cross-eyed or you could get slapped with a fine that far outweighs the act (in my opinion) – like if you forget you have an apple in your bag coming through customs, they could get you for a few thousand dollars.

On to more fun things, Aussies love their tattoos, and they seem to love to show them off. Culturally, I’m not sure where this comes from… while in NZ we learned about the Maori and their tattoos, but on the whole we didn’t find Kiwis to be more decorated than their Australian counterparts, and since Maori are the New Zealand indigenous people, and Aborigines Australians, that doesn’t fit. On the whole Australians are more lewd, crude, and open about certain topics as well (not the point of being offensive, just to the point where you notice it because initially you’re shocked that “x” can be said on the radio, TV, or overheard in public), and I wonder how much of this is a throwback to Australia’s beginnings as a convict state.

I learned a lot in the book I read about Australia’s beginnings, and if people had to be a bit rougher to make it here, then it makes sense that you might see some of that in today’s society, I guess?

Their fashion taste is a bit different from ours as well – not in a bad way, like “I would never wear that,” but for women, more in the pairings of things together that I really would not think of because I haven’t seen it before… it was interesting and Curt and I had fun picking out some of the more “out there” styles!

We spent roughly the same amount of time in New Zealand, and our two observations from there are one, they seem to like to be naked and are very open about it… not in the nude beaches and colonies sort of way, because we didn’t see any of that, but I first noticed it with the Air New Zealand safety briefing (which I LOVE), but also in play posters, billboards, etc. Nothing was ever SHOWED but the suggestion seems to be prevalent, which is curious.

The second observation was how the Maori people play heavily into their culture, which we both liked. Certainly it is evident that there have been problems and obstacles with the assimilation efforts and people have differing opinions, but on the whole their culture is not only accepted, it has been adopted in some ways as their own. The Maori people actually have *support* for sustaining their culture, which in no way detracts from the other and the two seem to coexist harmoniously enough. I found myself wishing it had been more like that for our own Native Americans in our nation’s history, but maybe lessons from them could be used for us still today going forward.

So those are some observations from our short time there. I disclaim they are strictly the observations and opinions of what WE observed and took note of, so obviously we could be off base, but it’s what we saw from the time we were there.

But we loved every minute of it, and can’t wait to go back and spend some more time to learn more about both of these amazing and interesting countries...

And yes, this is what I think about. Take note of something, and then ask why and ponder the question... it makes life fun!