1. The accent
Like being slapped around the moosh with a Vegemite-slathered dingo steak as you get to Passport Control at the airport. Maaaaaayt, somebody get this country some VapourDrops. You know it’s true.
2. The smell of greenery as you drive away from the airport
My favourite. If you’re lucky enough to arrive back in summer and have your windows down, that thick, raunchy, pungent smell of green plant life steaming in the heat assails the senses and triggers all sorts of wonderful olfactory memories. Just don’t drive off the edge of the Gateway Motorway while you’re in the grip of a reverie about picnics in New Farm Park or some such.
3. How quiet suburban streets are
Is it just me? Is it the countries I go to? Seriously, whenever I come back and walk the streets in Le ‘burbs during the day I feel like I’m in a post-Apocalyptic movie and that I have to keep an eye out for zombies creeping up on me. Or maybe that suburb everyone lived in at the bottom of the hill in Edward Sissorhands. There is NO-ONE on the streets here. Every now and then you’ll get a sleek new broom-broom gliding past, looking like a metallic-paint-finished road whale cruising through the de-populated landscape, to verify that the rest of the human race is still in attendance, but compared to most other countries I’ve been to, where daily life happens on the footpath, this place is spooky at times.
4. How much sunshine there is
Particularly relevant if you’ve returned from a northern hemisphere winter. The non-stop rays combine with that luxuriant heat Brisbane gets to make you feel like you’re wallowing in a daily golden air-bath. Or something. Ahem. Either way, for someone solar-powered like yours truly, it’s delish. I don’t care if we’re nicknamed Skin Cancer Island for a very good reason. At least we don’t get SADS like Londoners or Norwegians. Or Melbournians.
5. The sheer amount of space
Good, but bad. Good, because it feels, well, spacious. I suppose. Err. Yes. But bad because, chances are, if you’ve come back from, oh, just about anywhere else on the planet, you’ll be keenly aware of just how disgracefully corpulent we are in our consumption of physical space. We have road islands bigger than entire city blocks in most other cities!!! And is it written into the Brisbane charter that it’s the right of every citizen to own a four bedroom house with three bathrooms on a 600sqm block? Does every Brisbanite really need (not want, need, people) both a front and back yard (and don’t forget the grassy footpath thanks!!!), in case they go utterly berko one day from claustrophobia?
The average Brisbanite will often respond to such a slight on their locale with something along the lines of “Oh, but we need a yard for our rugrat/s to play in, it’s not healthy otherwise”. Right. So how have the populations of New York, Rome or London (as a short list of cities not exactly swamped by a tidle wave of detached houses contained within grassy yards) not been swiss-cheesed by infant and child mortality and mindless-violent zombie teenagers? Oh that’s right, they actually produce some of the most vibrant, creative and intelligent people on the planet. Might have something to do with fact that kiddies in those cities HAVE TO PLAY WITH OTHERS OUTSIDE THEIR OWN PRIVATE LITTLE CONTROLLED SPACE.
Just a thought. But hey, look at how spacious it feels here in Brisbane. Is that the nearest shop on the horizon over there?
Urban Planner Rant: Complete.
6. How aggressive the drivers are
For the love of Zeus, don’t p*ss them off – they’ll kill us all! If you have the temerity to change lanes in front of their Getz or work ute without indicating, Brisbane’s motorists will haul you out through the driver’s side window and set about you with their stilettos, their Blackberry, their third McMuffin, whatever’s to hand when the red mist descends. That, or tailgate you at 120km/h screaming and gibbering at you in your rearview mirror like an extra from 28 Days Later.
Yessir, Brisbanites can be nice as pie when ambulatory, but get most of us behind the wheel and suddenly you’ve got a potential call-out for the Men In White Coats. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Brisbane drivers are hands-down the narkiest, most fiery and most aggressive 2-tonne-weapon-steering citizens anywhere outside of perhaps the USA.
Cross against the lights at your peril, tough guy.
7. Public transport
Maybe this is why Point #6 is so prevalent. When you can use public transport to zip around more easily in the rural backwaters of the god-awful-poorest region on the planet than you can in Brisbane, you know there’s something a wee bit skewiff, no?
I’m not saying it’s absolutely atrocious here, or that our safety standards are comparable to clapped-out, bulging-at-the-seams Ghanaian mini-bus rides that begin with a local priest leading the passengers in a prayer for the upcoming journey, oh heavens to Betsy, no. Just that when you burn over three quarters of an hour of your life to travel from Mt Gravatt to Carindale by bus, for example, The Irrits start setting in and you start to grasp why tourists find this place……”difficult”. And don’t get me started on the half hour wait for busses.
Just on tourists; They could, and often do, take their chances on Brisbane’s roads in a hire car, of course, but to my knowledge, BCC hasn’t started funding What To Do In a Club-Lock Attack courses for said tourists (again, see Point #6). Needless to say those unsuspecting innocents who’ve rented a car in Brisbane are often seen pulled over on the side of the road wearing the frightened, bewildered look of a small animal that’s just escaped a large predator. Says it all, really.
Someone take Can-Do on a junket to Curitiba for god’s sake. Please.
8. The parochialism of the local media
Hutus versus Tutsis. Jews versus Muslims. Sudanese Muslims versus Sudanese Christians. Cuba versus the USA. Hell, even Irish Catholics versus the Orangemen.
The Queensland media apparently still think Queensland versus New South Wales is on par with these contenders for World’s Greatest Rivalries. Rightyo.
Okay, okay, I’ll admit that the Queensland media does contain more coverage of events in other parts of the country and the world than the media in other states, and more than most American media as well (CNN = newstainment, don’t start with me on that one).
But, to paraphrase Andrew Bolt (I feel dirty even mentioning The Man Who Can’t Spell Research’s name), it’s always horrifyingly mortifying to come back and be subjected to the coarsening of Queensland culture via the media, and with such a blatant pro-Queensland slant too. AND, if you’ll allow me my obligatory Class Snob moment (too bad, I’m taking it anyway) the opinions of people who seem like they either guzzle a slab and beat up their wives/husbands every weekend or who talk like a coal miner trussed up in a $2000 suit can be pretty disturbing for someone fresh off a QANTAS international flight home (We made it!! Thank you Jesus!!).
9. How soft we are in dealing with our climatic “extremes”
Honestly, boo-frickin-hoo. It’s dropped below 20 degrees so it’s time to dig out the scarves and polar fleeces?? Suck it up, you whingers – we live in paradise. Get out of the office a bit more and you might actually discover the Amazing Heating Qualities of Sunshine. Is there any other city on Earth so marshmallow (or so badly designed to cope) when it comes to changes in temperature?
10. The Range of Fresh Fruit and Vegetables.
Seems like a basic one, but shucks it makes a difference. Some cities have fruit and veg that’s as fresh as ours here, but if you’ve got a hankering for anything other than yam, cassava or beetroot you’re sh*t outta luck, Huey. Some cities have as big a range as us, but every goddam bit of it is waxed, sprayed, sealed in Styrofoam boxes, mummified in shrink wrap and generally looks like it could last through a nuclear holocaust……… yummy.
The food we can get here in Brisbane rocks. Pure and simple. We can grow almost anything AND get almost all of it without the dreaded High Food Miles black mark against it. Now, if only we could get back to growing more of it actually within the city…………
Thursday 6 August 2009
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