We’ve seen photos of the early days in AU when they brought in big heavy machinery with giant chains and just mowed down these enormous old Jarrah trees to make room for the farms. Amazing, and rather sad to get rid of so much timber, when the rest of AU is so lacking in it!
A common reference is made here to POMEs. People might say of someone, “He’s a POME.” Or they might even refer to themselves as POMEs. (rhymes with Tom’s) It stands for Prisoners of Mother England. Most of the English emigrants who came here in the 1800s were prisoners. But their descendants also kept the distinction. So today it means “persons of English descent.”
The Queen of England celebrated her 60th year as queen this week (Diamond Jubilee). So, this being part of the Commonwealth, it was closely followed and much talked about, both on the TV and among the people of Australia. Did you see the salute of the boats and ships in the Harbor? What a grand celebration! It was quite inspiring!
Being among
so many English descendants, I find myself remembering Mother Goose’s Nursery
Rhymes and certain fairy tales from my childhood with a new understanding! For example, “porridge” is nothing more than
a bowl of oatmeal! Many surprising
sayings and customs have been passed down from their English forefathers. It’s actually quite delightful to hear the
many different accents of so many shires of England, and different countries
too!
I like the way they have a town center, where there is information about the town, points of interest, maps, and public toilets, etc., no matter how tiny the town. That has come in very handy for us, to be truthful, because there are no businesses open late if you happen to be on the road, and the businesses don’t have public toilets anyway!
People of Australia love gambling! Every day they have lottery numbers on the TV; I know there’s betting on games and horse races all the time. There are casinos in the East, but thank goodness, life here in the West is slow and quiet.
I love to see the children on a warm day, with their school uniforms, including hats, out in the play yard, or walking to school. People are very mindful of the sun, wearing hats or umbrellas in the sunshine.
I like the way they have a town center, where there is information about the town, points of interest, maps, and public toilets, etc., no matter how tiny the town. That has come in very handy for us, to be truthful, because there are no businesses open late if you happen to be on the road, and the businesses don’t have public toilets anyway!
People of Australia love gambling! Every day they have lottery numbers on the TV; I know there’s betting on games and horse races all the time. There are casinos in the East, but thank goodness, life here in the West is slow and quiet.
I love to see the children on a warm day, with their school uniforms, including hats, out in the play yard, or walking to school. People are very mindful of the sun, wearing hats or umbrellas in the sunshine.
We had a rainstorm here last weekend that beat anything we’ve ever seen. Our bedroom was lit up intermittently all night with lightening! The thunder roared, the hail beat against the roofs, and I thought we would wash right out to sea, there was so much heavy rain! What a storm! But in the morning, it was gone, at least for us (some had flooding), and the sun came out! One thing about Albany weather, it changes, often hour by hour! What’s happening at home?
1 comment:
We've also had storming...I was loading the kids into the car to go help at the community garden and it started to blow like crazy. Branches and dirt flying everywhere... I looked up and watched as the shingles on our roof lifted off one by one like dominoes and flew away. We are in the process of trying to find some that match. If we can, it'll cost around $300. If not, and we have to replace the whole roof, it'll be more like 2 or 3 thousand $$! Ugh...
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