If you are not Australian, but want to visit us “down under”, here are a few pieces of information that may stand you in good stead.

First of all, don’t call Oz and NZ “down under”.  You wouldn’t like to be called “up over”.

Because we live on the opposite side of our planet, the Earth appears to spin in the opposite direction to the northern hemisphere.  This has the effect of apparently making the stars and the moon appear to be upside down.   The sun still rises in the east and sets in the west, but it travels via the north, not the south.  This makes our sun travel anticlockwise.  This may disorient you to start with.  We have our galaxy on our side of the planet so that on a clear night you will see far more stars than in the northern hemisphere.  There is a constellation called Crux Australis.  This is not Latin for “Australian Crooks”, but rather “Southern Cross”.  And yes, the water does go down the plughole in the opposite direction, but please don’t try it during a drought.

In a Linnean species name, it is unfortunate that “australis” is the word for “Southern”.  If you want to name something specifically “Australian” we use “novaehollandiae” which translates as “New Holland-ish”, (New Holland being one of the old names that the Dutch used when they discovered Australia almost a hundred years before Captain Cook).  Or else we just say it’s Aussie!

Australian life is seldom like that of “Home and Away” or “Neighbours”.  Edna Everage is a man.

Sydney has a gay Mardi-Gras.  Many of the participants are not gay, they just like the freedom once a year to dress outrageously – and good on’em, which is Australian for “well done”.  Also, the Mardi Gras (Shrove Tuesday) procession is always held on a Saturday.

Nobody that I know of in a posh restaurant will give you a menu, and then ask whether you have chosen your meal.  Instead, except in all but the most exclusive restaurants a young man or woman will come up to you, give you the menu, and say, “I am Wladislav, I am your waiter for today” - “Dya know what you want?”  When you choose, it will be written down and the waiter will say “No worries” This is Australian for thank you; I understand; of course; we, of course, can accommodate you, as for instance, “May we have whole roast crocodile roasted in its skin” will elicit “I’ll just check with the Chef – Yes, no worries!”  In the trendier parts of our cities, “no worries” may be replaced by “good choice!”.  It may be of help to find out where the waiter/waitress originally comes from, but only if you speak their language.  And as you leave the establishment at 3.30 am, after the meal of the Century, Wladislaw will probably farewell you with "Have a good night!")

Most Aussie taxi drivers are honest god-fearing people.  They do not cheat on you like European taxi drivers do.  It’s just, as Chinese migrants, they do not know where they are going in the large foreign city, which they are just beginning to call “home”.  On two separate occasions I have had taxi drivers who have not known the way from the Airport to the main railway station.  They asked me for directions!  (Since GPS, this is less of a problem).  ALWAYS sit in the front passenger seat of a taxi if it’s vacant –  it's good Aussie etiquette, and it might help with the navigation.

Barbeque is nearly always spelled BBQ.  Do not try and pronounce that with your mouth full.

Australian lamb is the best in the world, no joke.

Please do not call the indigenous people “blackfellas” or “abbos”.  It is disrespectful. 

Captain Cook discovered the east coast of Australia in 1770 for the United Kingdom almost exactly a quarter of a millennium ago.  The Normans invaded England about a millennium ago, and the birth of Christ and the Romans were about two millennia ago.  Stonehenge was built five millennia ago, and the rock paintings at Lascaux in France about sixteen millennia ago.  The oldest Australian indigenous rock paintings are over three times their age, over an unimaginable fifty millennia ago.  The oldest civilisation in the world.  That demands awe as well as respect.

And finally,( for this bit of the story only), the “First Fleet” carrying the first colonists including the first Governor of New South Wales, arrived in Botany Bay on 26^th January 1788.  Literally, only two days afterwards a very unexpected ship arrived flying the French flag. 

(To think that if he had been only three DAYS earlier, we would have had the Marseillaise as a National Anthem, and the Sydney Tower would be a different shape)  The ship carried the Comte de la Perouse, who was also on a world circumnavigation.  He and his officers dined with the British officers, and they exchanged mail “for home”.  His officers included botanists zoologists anthropologists and people with other interests, to gain the maximum knowledge from one voyage.  Many of them were successful applicants from the Ecole Militaire in Paris.

Sadly, La Perouse sailed north a few days later, and was never seen again.

Not one of them survived.

Because he failed the interview, a Corsican student  named Napoleon Bonaparte was never picked to go on the Expedition.  He did survive.  He also went to the Southern Hemispere to the island of St Helena.