I like Australia
I really do.
Despite an exchange rate that often makes me weep, 4-hour flights surrounded by the worst of humanity, and delivering some of the most gratuitously annoying wildlife I never thought possible, I still head across the vast and treacherous Tasman Sea 3-4 times a year.
When I do travel to Australia, I tend to go to Melbourne. I’ve been to Sydney a few times, but it really doesn’t agree with me (it’s Australia’s answer to Auckland and no-one likes Auckland). I’ve been to the Gold Coast twice but only in transit to and from Japan on the same trip. The 20 degree drop in temperature from when I hopped on the plane in Osaka to when I got off in the Gold Coast didn’t exactly endear me to the place. The idea of ever traveling to Perth scares me as much as travelling to Kalgoorlie or Alice Springs.
If so much of this vast land offends me so, why then do I make so many trips there every year?
Music is the usual reason. A problem with living in New Zealand is that a lot of music promoters overlook our land of the long white cloud and so one’s options often become one of travel or disappointment.
Unless and until someone comes out with a persuasive ad campaign that can convince me that gigs, concerts and festivals are better anywhere in Australia other than Melbourne, I’ll be sticking with Melbourne. Unless and until this effort is made, you’re wasting your time and taxpayer money, Queensland, on ad campaigns like Nothing Beats Queensland.
I mean, its almost as bad as those monstrous Where The Bloody Hell Are Ya? ads your country used to run.
