Im curious - what do foreigners living here NOT get about Australia?

[eidsvold]

just following on from not get about UK thread - curious to see Aus from another perspective.

Dh finds the idea of picking an ordinary child's name and then imagining the wackiest spelling you can just so your child can be different.

oh midnight oil

what about Paul Kelly - now that is as aussie as it gets.....

dh and I are off to see him late Nov. Three concerts in a row - my goodness what gad abouts we are

went to Dixie Chicks last week, off to see U2 Melbourne Cup Day and then Paul Kelly late Nov..... then probably won't go out again for months

haven't heard of Paul Kelly, will ask dh when he comes home. It's funny, he has shed loads of these guys on tape and is desparatley trying to gte them on CD (that's an idea for his b'day actually!)

The quality os so bad, he barely listens to them now!

eidsvold - think the hypermarket at Aspley would qualify for the food/clothes/homewares/gardening all in one store wouldn't it?? only one we have though. btw if you ever need paint etc it is far cheaper than Bunnings!!!

chubbleigh, I don't think the choc is Yak. Different, certainly, but not yak. At least the chocolate I eat isn't!

oh yeh had forgotten about the hypermarket....

tim tams - utterly over rated
Coles - it's like a feeble Safeway circa 1988
all the "catalogues" from the big stores that come in the (outside I may add, not even in the door ffs) mailbox with this week's specials including poor resolution photographs of trays of mince and cans of beans. Soooooooooo unsophisticated.

Can you tell I just got back from Waitrose, I mean London?

Will get back to you, there are loads more

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Things in NZ I don't get:

Cheerios - horrible, MSG laden, colouring riddled, testicle containing...(possibly)

Why there are 20 different electrical stores in each shopping mall (how many TV's does one person buy in a year) but you can never find the post office.

Having post delivered to your mailbox, when you have a perfectly good front door they could put a letterbox in.

Milk being delivered at tea time.

Having you newspaper thrown into your garden at 5am.

Sausages made from mutton.

Egg and grated cheese in filled rolls (as well as say a piece of ham).

Briscoes - does anyone ever pay full price?

Sales that are really just 3 days of taking 20% off everything, and then it all goes back up.

Not being able to buy people carriers new (except for Previa) and so having to look at ones you just know have been taxis.

Are these Cheerios sausages of which you speak similar to Footy Franks they have in Aus? Red/Orange skin and sacks and lips slurry inside and obligatory at every kids' party? 'Gustin.

I cannot believe Coon cheese exists either. One day they will get busted for sure, eh.

yeh like little footy franks.

vegemite is sooo much nicer than marmite.

love aussie cadbury's or lindt choc.

beetroot and egg in a burger - oh yeh!!! yummy!!

bloss - potato oysters are the same as potato scallops - sound familiar.

be quiet ms wong - nobody cares about your waitrose visit

Yeah totally agree sandwiches are weird!! A chicken sandwich comes with CHEESE!
ham sandwich comes with BEETROOT - yuck! ....and grated carrot!

Also Aussie winters can be cold (we lived in Melbourne) and wrapping up warm with jackets, wooly hats can be necessary but is a total waste of time if you then wear a pair of THONGS!!!
Winter = warm wolly socks people!!

That there are about 3 different street names and every town has at least a dozen of each

Christmas in summer...you can't help it but it is odd.

Smarties coming in boxes not tubes. Of course that changed recently here too....smarties come in tubes dammit!

The number of things that will kill you

Oh gosh I don't know, there are so many amazing things too. Screens are great on all the doors, timtams are the most amazing things in the world ever. The dark ones that is, which of course Tesco don't stock. Coming round the corner to move the cattle in the morning to find a literal herd of kangaroos.....

Actually after spending a fair amount of time playing in central QL I found myself laughing at my fellow foreighners in the cities petrified that a redback might bite them and they would die in a matter of minutes!

Bloody love Cornjacks though, only veg other than chips ds2 will eat

It's been a while but...

weird things - blood on the pavements on Sunday Mornings outside bars
'spunkrat' as an (alleged) compliment
kebabs (in flat bread rather than pitta bread)
definitely drive through bottle shops
another vote for food shopping at Woolies (extra weird as I was a manager for Woolies in the UK at the time)
people wrapped up in coats complaining it was cold whilst I was running around in T Shirts.

things I still miss 10+ years later
going to the supermarket to buy malt honey and egg flavoured milk for breakfast
smoothie shops
breaded veal sandwich thing that I used live on for lunch (sorry baby cows)
space
the people

oh yeah, I was also shocked at the huge amount of casual drug use, pretty much everyone I met grew their own. It could just have been the people I met though.......

I always thought pampers were universal.
Sorry but Aus cadburys just isn't the same - good for my waist line though.
Fish and Chips - Grilled flake with lemon - fab, chips/oysters/scallops - [hmmm]
Freakishly strong sun, sits outside for half hour on cool spring am and re enters house with sunburnt chest
Love all the thai food, could actually just live on thai take out - there goes the waist line again.
Aussies being such amazing hosts, always ready to have people popping over unannounced, staying indefinitely, as a bit of an anal brit find that difficult - struggle to maintain guest/visitor standards in house at all times!
The Burbs - sorry just don't like it, all a bit Cath and Kim!

Hey...HauntedSandcastles; I'm not a fan of many mail services anyway...a long history of things being lost between continents (I detest Royal Mail too) but I couldn't get on with the whole mail box thing at the bottom of the garden. What's that about? Then most folks I know had to rent mailboxes too. Very strange. Easier to pop it through the door no?

Oh yeah, and that orange man on good morning Australia Is here still there? I lived there about 4 years ago. Argh...all the terrestrial channels showing cricket or Aussie Rules on a Sunday!

Don't get me wrong, I loved the "bottle-o", but that wasn't a very healthy interest!!! 5 litre casks of wine didn't go too far in our house

Yes!! That's the other thing. What is it with the PO boxes? Why?!? Why would you PAY to rent a small box at your post office and then have to go to collect it? I would only do that if I was up to something dodgy.

Hmmm. I see the manchester mystery is a puzzling one. I might have to wikipedia it.

Suzy - you can recreate the Waitrose experience in David Jones, but just triple the bill.

I also have to put a vote in for the marvel that is drive through bottle shops.

Manchester is so called because that's where the cotton things came from. All those dark satanic mills you know.

Ahhh, the nostalgia. I actually really miss it. I'm in the process of re-applying for my spousal permanent resident visa. I'm at the police check stage now, it's been going on for a while.

I don't want to get my hopes up, I had a bit of a "reckless" time when I was a TEFL teacher in Asia and I have no idea what they have in their files about me

pie floaters - yuck

I could have written all of this about South Africa. Even the shopping at Woolies!! Weird.

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some people rent mail boxes as a safety measure - had a tiny letter box and worked full time had mail going astray - easier to have a mailbox and collect it first thing in the morning on the way to work. Also never missed getting a parcel - rather than having to get off work early and picking up parcel.

IF you lived in the bush - some friends have a mailbox as they live outta town and again - their mailbox is miles from their front door.... so they collect when they come into town. WOuld have to be a postie out west - never get his route done going door to door.

Dds love the daily trip to the letter box.

Found it weird having it shoved through your front door - along with teenage pranks of dog poo in nappy bags through front door mail slot!!

the flip for me was going into woolies in the UK and finding no grocieries

suzy have you tried vege fingers - our dd's love them - mashed potato with corn and peas and othe diced v eges I think coated in bread crumbs - the dds love them - sometimes the only way to get veges into them.