Haiku by Michael - The Rocks
Views - harbor-bridge-opera house
Expensive restaurant/ uneatable chicken
Where is Pizza Hut?
Haiku by Thomas – Blue Mountains
The koala eats
Then sleeps 20 hours/day to digest
Well yes says the teen
Haiku by Julie Bramkamp – Bondi Beach - Christmas Day
I am so sandy
And I am so very cold
Help me up
Haiku by Andrew – Tour Bus
I am still and smooth
Unemotional response to crisis
I have no wrinkles
Inspiration: The whole damn country

Why Australia? Well of course, why not?
My grandmother died on Christmas Day the year before. My mother who would deny having any feelings or panic or pretty much anything did declare that she couldn’t stand the thought of Christmas at home, where she was when her mother died. What to do?
A family friend who for years made home wine with my husband, had enrolled in the enology department at University of Adelaide. We decided to bring along the boys – seniors in high school, and spend two weeks over Christmas break ostensibly visiting our friend, but really to escape the holidays and drink more Shiraz than was good for us.
The trip was a rousing success. Australia is a wonderful country, populated with wonderful people who I believe speak English but their slang is so inventive and so prevalent, it was difficult to tell. And there are a plethora of wonderfully unusual animals most of which are deadly. For teenage boys, fantastic.
- We learned a lot about box jellyfish.
- We learned a lot about flies.
- We loved spending Christmas Day on Bondi Beach.
- We loved every minute.