Odd Bits

This will be a running list of things we find...let's say interesting, here.
The eggs are sold by how the chickens are kept: cage eggs, free-range, barn-laid. The price goes up by how well the hens are treated. Now, the same company will sell both cage and barn eggs. So, isn't that kind of extortion? "Pay $5 a dozen or the hen gets caged."
Ants. You can see more ants here in one day than you've seen in your WHOLE LIFE (if you're an American say, between 18 and 35). And they're FAST, so very, very fast. What's the hurry?
In a restaurant, even a pretty nice one, you sit and look at the menu, then go up to the counter, order and pay. Go to the glass cooler and take your bottle of tap water- usually in a decanter or clean wine bottle- and however many glasses you want. They will bring your food and drink and you'll never see them again. Obviously, no tipping. Almost everything comes with roasted pumpkin and/or beetroot (pickled beets).
Schnitzel is VERY popular.
Deluxe pizza has prawns and pineapple.
The language differences would fill a book; and has. My current favorites are:
thongs = flip-flops. I met a gal who couldn't figure out why "thongs" weren't allowed in restaurants - and how they knew!
whipper-snip = string trimmer
Stanley = razor knife
concessions available = discounts available for seniors, students, etc. (NOT hot dogs and drinks)
TEA is dinner.
Supper is a snack. I wondered why they asked who wanted to bring supper to the next Naturalists Club meeting and why Thomas's teacher said I brought him tea - it was a casserole for gosh sake!
The toilets give you a choice of a half flush or a whole flush.
Prostitutes advertise in the classifieds. "Minnie - Stay for a while, leave with a smile," seems to be a regular. The rest come and go ;)

People celebrate and happily share their cultural differences. At church, there's the African group, the Philipino group, the Islanders group. The South Pacific Islanders (i.e. Fiji, Bali) invited the whole congregation to a party. They dug a pit and made a fire in the bottom, when it turned to coals, they filled the pit with chickens, pork, curry casseroles, spinach, pumpkin and taro, buried it and let it cook all day. They dug it all up and boy, was it good!
There was traditional islander dancing after dinner, but it got late quickly and we had to get Thomas home. We did have some entertainment while waiting for the food to arrive. If you can't tell, that's one of the Missionaries of Charity nuns (Mother Teresa's gals) wailing on the drum.

There is a didgeridoo shop downtown where they give free lessons twice a day. They're beautiful and heavy. You play a didge by blowing raspberries into it; then, trying to make words with your raspberries. MUCH harder than it sounds. Look. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9g592I-p-dc&NR=1 I'm told women are not supposed to play them, which is good because I could never carry off those horizontal stripes.
I joined the Alice Spring Field Naturalists' Club. We're birdwatching at the sewage ponds next Saturday.
I joined an aqua-aerobics class; about 5 other dugongs and me.
Tom is dabbling in aikido.