Thursday, April 29, 2010

Nothing says, "Christ has Risen!" like a bandicoot

Hmmm, almost May. Let's see what the camera has in it... Oh, Easter!Like Christmas, Valentine's Day, etc. the Aussies don't decorate nor make near as much of a hoo-haw of holidays as we Yanks tend to. So the Yanks cluster in our own groups and hoo and haw privately. There was a fun party with egg dying and egg hunting organized by Tom's boss. I brought red beet eggs. All the usual Easter foods were there as well, except Kowalaneck's keilbassi. It was a nice, family-style day.
Thomas will forever remember it as the day he got his ShamWow; a gift from friends there. He spent the rest of the party making and sopping up spills (outside). You following me Camera Guy?

The greater version of Tom's work organized a super-duper Easter fest

with egg gathering (I can't call them "hunts" since no eggs are ever hidden but rather tossed on the ground to be grabbed up as fast as possible by the participants), cake walk, games, bunnies to pet, thousands of flies, the ubiquitous sausage sizzle, a guy losing pounds of sweat in a bunny costume, face painting, crafts and American CANDY! I didn't realize I missed Reese's peanut butter cups till then.

Easter morning, we found our basket full of toys and treats including, "the biggest bowl of jelly beans ever!"We're not sure if the Easter Bilby (see above) or the Easter Bunny left them.
Bilbies are a small bandicoot which once roamed the sands of Alice but kinda got eaten by feral house cats. Since introduced rabbits are also a huge problem in Australia, the bilby has a force of people behind it to make it the symbol of Easter in Oz.
There was a partially chewed carrot on the table. We all know bunnies enjoy a nice carrot, but bilbies also are known to eat bulbs and roots, so it remains speculation. The bilby gains a bit of an edge being native and possessing a handy pouch.
I also got a chocolate wombat, but that's another story.

We had planned to go to Glen Helen Resort / waterhole for Easter dinner after church, but decided to come home, play with our toys and have steaks on the grill.

I did not expect the steaks to be so appropriately shaped. Pretty cool, huh?

Re: the baked beans - it was one of the prizes in our home egg hunt. Thomas LOVES baked beans. He couldn't believe he won a whole can.
Easter Monday is a holiday here as is Good Friday. In fact, more places (Kmart, Target, grocery stores) were closed Good Friday than Easter Sunday.
School was on fall break for three weeks following Easter. I'll try to remember what we did.

5 comments:

  1. Thanks for sharing your Aussie Easter :)

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  2. OK, so I'm pretty behind on reading blog posts but even from a distance I can say with confidence that this is the best blog post title ever written.

    And it is SO you.

    Great post, great update!

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  3. Oh yes, the Easter Bilby, another country another story ... in Belgium it's the bells that come out of the church towers that get wings and fly all the way from Rome to drop off the Easter eggs ... go figure! (It's a Catholic thing) Anyway, sounds like you guys had fun, and as long as it wasn't 120 degrees and the chocolate eggs, bilbies and bunnies didn't melt it will be an Easter to remember, baked beans included.

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  5. I am a little behind in reading your blog but I am so glad I did. I love reading about Thomas and your adventures and I also enjoy the pics!! :-)

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