Having been away from Australia for over two years now, I feel that there’s this common mate ship that is only found between Australians. We’re a very patriotic breed and whether you’re in an elevator or waiting in a line at the post office if you hear that distinctive accent the question is always posed, “oh which part of Australia are you from?”

That usually leads to a nice conversation of “back home” and common struggles of adjusting to new countries and lifestyles away from that big slab of land often referred to as “Down Under”, or as most Aussies would say “Down Unda!”

For those of us in Vancouver, Australia day is quite a big deal and everyone gathers at the local Australian run pub called “Mooses Down Under”. Other than Whistler (which seems to be an extended state of Australia), I’ve never seen so many Aussies in one place at one time! The pub definitely makes you feel at home with signs pointing to the “Dunny” (Australian slang for toilet) with “Bloke’s” written on the door for Mens and “Sheila’s” on the door for the womens toilet!

It was great to see all the nostalgic memorabilia plastered on the walls, with all the guys donning AFL jersey’s, Cricket shirts, Rugby Union jumpers, and even some local Western Australian Football League tops! There were a few people wearing T-shirts with witty slogans like “Didgeri-doo-me”, and “Happy little vegemite”… but the best dressed person would have to go to this guy who wore a suite made out of the Australian flag complete with the Southern Cross on his bum…

There’s nothing like having a nice meat pie with gravy, CHIPS, and chicken salt, listening to music that we would normally hear on Triple J during Australia day and kicking back with your mates having a few cold ones. One thing we have to work on is getting more local beers imported here… XXXX and Victoria Bitter just doesn’t cut it… It’s only a slight improvement on Foster’s which any true Australian wouldn’t touch even if it was the last cold beer left in the Eski! A local Aussie band did come great covers of classic Aussie songs and definitely got the crowd going.

Happy Aussie day everyone! Feel free to leave a comment and don’t forget to check out the rest of the photos in the gallery… shoot me an email if you would like the high resolution versions.

Aussie! Aussie! Aussie!