Shit Things About Being Australian: Part One

 Distance

Australians have no concept of distance.

None whatsoever. 

It's a notion that doesn't compute in our brains. 

Tell an Englishman something is 100 kilometers (or 62 miles) away and they go into paroxysm of fear. Australians just shrub their shoulders, get behind the wheel and get on with it. If you're lucky, it will take you and hour. Unlucky - like there are sheep on the road, or roadworks, it might take an hour and 15 minutes. 

Australians think nothing of driving three hours for a party, sleeping behind the sofa and driving back the next morning after the host's mum makes you breakfast and offers you a shower. (See Shit Things About Being Australian: Part Two: The Expectation of Hospitality).  

Long distances, particularly when you're travelling by road, are something in our DNA. You used to wind the window down. When you were a kid you looked forward to interminable games of Spotto or Car Cricket. (Black Car, six and out). As you got older, the game became "What's That Dead Thing on the Road".

You also look forward to roadhouse food. I still ascertain that the Keith BP servo on the way to Adelaide does the best milkshakes in tin cups - which is the only way to have a milkshake (See Shit Things About Being Australian: Part Three: Food Nostalgia)

And if you're told that something is across the country, you don't blink about getting on a plane and going there. It's just what we do. 

Distance is in our blood. Over 98% of the current citizenry of Australia have roots from elsewhere. If you listen to the colonials, the white population were shipped over or were forced by poverty and the thought of a better life. This at best, took a long plane journey. At worse, three months on a rickety boat. 

And travelling to Europe or America. Australians look at the flight, chuck on a neck pillow, take some melatonin and veg out for the flight. If you want to do anything that isn't Australian, you're going to have to travel. 

Which is why planning a jaunt around Brittany and Normandy in France with a non-Australian friend is so hard. 

To me, 100 kilometres is nothing. To get from one place to another is just a fact of life. If there's old shit to see, I'm happy to drive miles to see it. 

My friend is not Australian. He was raised in Europe. He's used to old shit. 

Also, because he's used to driving on the incorrect side of the road, where the steering wheel is on the other side of the car, I think he'll be doing the bulk of the driving - if he lets me drive at all. I don't want it to be a Driving Miss Daisy experience, but we could be in for an interesting road trip. 

Today's song: