42) A Comparison

Someone once said, don’t ask me who, that comparisons are odious but I don’t think they are always so. Having lived most of my life in Africa and coming to Australia late in life one cannot help but make comparisons. Africa has a vast population many without much education so unemployment is always a problem and that tends to keep wages low. Australia is not a heavily populated country, unemployment is not such a problem. With a strong trade union history wages are on average much higher. Because of this many labour saving ideas are used to keep labour cost down. Electrical goods are not repaired here as often as in Africa as an hour of a tradesman’s time can costs more than the price of a new appliance. In Australia people pump there own petrol, and for the most part do their own housework and their own garden. Many jobs like, refuse removal for one, are mechanised. In Africa if a truck load of goods need to be delivered the truck driver will be accompanied by as many assistants as possible and they would physically move the goods from the warehouse to the truck and then again from the truck to the store.

One evening I was sitting in our car outside the receiving bay of one of the large supermarkets that we worked for. A large truck pulled up with only the driver on board. He parked his vehicle but before jumping down from the cab he opened the rear doors with the automatic switch. He then climbed into the rear of his truck and with a hand held remote control moved his on-board forklift into a position to lift a pallet loaded with boxes. He then moved the forklift to the rear of the truck, which was in fact a hydraulic lift and still with his remote control lowered the forklift down to the ground level. Then he drove it through the receiving doors of the supermarket and unloaded the pallet in front of the waiting supermarket employee. Back went the forklift, back on to the hydraulic lift, back into the rear of the truck and collected a second loaded pallet. The process was repeated again and again until the truck was unloaded and boxes were all inside the supermarket storage rooms. I watched fascinated at the whole smooth process and what really amazed me was that while the driver was using his right hand to operate his remote control he was also holding his mobile phone to his left ear and chatting away to someone. So he could really say that he had literally unloaded his truck ‘single handed’.

This reminds me of a joke I heard long ago. They said that a contestant in a Single-handed round the world yacht race had been disqualified because he had used both hands. But this truck driver would not have had that problem.

41) Smart Kids

We really love it when our granddaughters come and spend the weekend with us. They are without any doubt the smartest of all kids and we are very proud of them.

They love to go to the beach, or for walks. They also love board games and cards. They like to use the computer or to read. They never seem to get bored, as they will always amuse themselves. They have wonderful imaginations and think up all sorts of games.

They like to see the Pelicans being fed or to visit the reptile park. Here is a picture of them at the Reptile Park entrance with their Grandpa.

We sometime take them to the market at the Entrance where there is a stall that sells plaster of paris figurines. The figurines have no paint on them but the stallholder supplies the paint and the brushes and the girls have a great time painting whichever figurine they have chosen in the colours that they want to paint it. They have chosen among other things cats, flowers and dragons. When they have finished the stallholder will spray them with a clear varnish and the girls have an ornament to take home.

Once we took them to this contraption set up in our local supermarket that looked as if it was going to catapult our grand children into outer space on a set of rubber bands, my heart was in my mouth. Claudia and Lauren just loved it though. Here is Claudia either on her way up or her way down.

One of their favourite games is "Cafes". They write menus, lay tables, set up the kitchen and we have to be the customers. We are usually very nice customers who enjoy everything we "eat" and we praise the chef and the waitresses and leave big tips but one Sunday I thought I would be a nasty customer for a change. I complained that the table was dirty, that the food was too salty, the meat was tough, the fish was over cooked, the service was slow and everything else I could think of. They were both rather taken aback when I first complained but they soon got the joke and rushed around trying to put right the things I had complained about. I eventually asked for the bill and when I was told that it was $20.30 I said "That is outrageous I could get it for half that price down the road" Claudia just said "Well madam, why don't you just go down the road?" Hows that for smart?

40) Letter boxes

Our delivery business kept us pretty busy so we did not have a great deal of time to become involved with things in our church. But once a year the church would do a letterbox drop and we always helped out with that. It was a pleasant task, we would be given a couple of hundred pamphlets and told which roads to target and we would just go for a stroll and pop them into the letter boxes of each house.


I was amused at the differences in the letterboxes into which we had to put our pamphlets. Some of them are nothing more than a tin box nailed to the top of a pole; others are obviously bought at the local hardware store, a variety of styles, colours and sizes but not with much individuality. Then there are the ones that have been bought at the local hardware store and personalised with flowers or an animal or an Aussie flag painted on them. Then there are the ones that were obviously built by the house builder when he built the house. They are made out of the same kind of bricks that the house is made of, have a place for the letters and a place for the newspapers and usually a nice clear house number on them too. But the best of all are the ones that people have put a bit of thought into. I imagine that these people love getting letters; they have friends all over the place and enjoy writing to them and receiving replies. The designs are very wide ranging, a milk can turned on its side with a slit to pop the letters in, little wooden houses with windows and doors and the occupants name on it, a toadstool with an elf sitting beside it, a beautiful shinny stainless steel one fixed onto the wall and with a sign that said "Please lift flap to insert mail". Square ones, round ones, big ones, small ones, all sorts. Some I can imagine are just there because the post office says one has to have one but are never used except by the people who deliver pamphlets, they are rusted and are falling off while the owners use email for their letters and phone banking to receive their bills. There are those that say "No Junk Mail" and those that say "No advertising material will be accepted" I wonder if the box is trained to spit out any advertising material inserted into those.

The first time we did the job we were given an area where there are many Housing Commission homes, these would be called Council Houses in England. It is policy here to build a certain percentage of Housing Commission houses in most suburbs and not to have estates of wholly commission houses but Bateau Bay West does seem to have a pretty high allocation of Housing commission. Most of them are well looked after by the tenants but some are very neglected and run down looking. Some with one or two old rusty cars propped up on bricks with the weeds growing up around them. I wondered how the occupants of the nice tidy homes feel living next to the badly neglected ones. Once we saw a house with a high wall and a big gate, there was a security system and an intercom to gain admission. This is very unusual for small homes in Australia but on each side of this ‘fortress’ were two very scruffy homes. Rubbish piled high in the garden, unkempt kids and their unkempt dogs playing noisily amongst it and torn curtains hanging at dirty windows. I could almost feel the animosity of the owner of the centre house as he built the high wall and locked out his neighbours. Generally Australians are petty easy going and live and let live but the owner of the ‘Fortress’ had had enough and did not love his neighbours.

39) Mr. Possum

The windows of the back room that we use as an office overlook the roof of the spa bat

h room that belongs to the lower part of the house. We do not have access to that room but the roof is a wonderful place to put out food for the birds. When we first started feeding them there we would put out bread or birdseeds on an old tin tray and the magpies and the brush turkeys were our most frequent diners.

The man who lived behind us once tore us off a strip for feeding bread to the birds. He said it was not good for them. We have since learnt that he was correct but he rather spoilt his story by ending up saying “and the noise that those turkeys make on your tin roof wakes me up at 4pm every morning” We were sure that he only complained because it disturbed his sleep and not because of any harm it might do the birds. We don’t feed them there anymore but before we gave up we had great fun there.

Often in the evening there was some food left over from the days feeding and when night fell we would just leave it there for the birds who came early in the morning, it was always gone by the time we got up. One evening as I was in the office, shutting down the computer I saw a black shape run across the roof. It was gone too quickly for me to see what it was but it was too big for a rat and certainly not as big as a kangaroo. I called Jonny and he suggested that we turn off all the lights and wait and see if it would come back, it was obviously attracted by the left over food. We sat quietly in the dark for a short while and slowly the little animal tiptoed back to the table. There was enough light from the surrounding houses for us to see him quite clearly, it was a possum. He enjoyed his supper but was edgy and as soon as we moved he was off like a shot, crossing the roof and scuttling up the tree in double fast time. We were sorry to see him go but felt privileged to have had a few moments of his company. We consulted our reference book

s and identified him as a Brush Tail Possum. The next evening at about that time we turned off the lights and waited to see if he would come. Again he came and we watched him for a little while. After that although we did turn out the lights and look out for him we did not see him for a few days and we felt sure that he had moved on and that was the last we would see of our furry friend. Then about a week after we had first sighted him and we were no longer turning out the lights we looked out of the window and saw him sitting at a very bare food table as if he was waiting for the next serving. We quietly and slowly got him some more food and although he moved back a few steps when we actually opened the window he did not run away. We put the food out and he came back and ate it. We were really enchanted with him and began putting down not only the bread but also adding fruit to his evening meals. He seemed to be getting more and more used to us and to trust us more. One evening when we were both busy with something or other and had not got round to replenishing the table I looked up and saw him sitting on his hind legs, looking at me through the window as if he was complaining that there was not enough for him to eat. I quickly collected some food and slowly slid back the window while he just stood there and waited for it to be delivered. Seeing him standing up on his hind legs and facing me full on enabled me to see him much more clearly than I ever had before. It was obvious that Mr. Possum had a pouch so we had to rename him Mrs. Possie.

As the days went by Mrs. Possie became more and more friendly, she would tap on the window to call us when she arrived and we could feed her by hand and even stroke her gently. It was clear to see that there was a young one in her pouch as we could watch it moving around and then one evening while we watch a little head peeped out of the pouch to see how things were going along in the big wide world. Sadly a little while later we found the baby dead in our garden. We did not know if it had been killed by a dog or a cat or maybe another possum, they are said to be very territorial. But life goes on for possums and Mrs. Possie did not have time to mourn for long over her loss, as there was soon another little head peeking from her warm pouch. This little one we watched grow too big for the pouch and graduate to riding on Mom’s back. Every evening they would come for food and we would spend a great deal of time watching them.

After a couple of months they just stopped coming. They had been at the table one evening and we had heard another possum making a great deal of noise in the surrounding trees but we could not see it at all. We thought maybe it was a male possum and that it was mating season. Our two little friends did not come back for a couple of weeks and then once again Mrs. Possie came to call bringing with her another new baby in her pouch. We also watched this one grow to young adulthood and then they left us once again. We had hoped that they would return as they had before but we have not seen them since. We sometimes hear possums in the trees but they do not come down on the roof.

Sometimes when we are sitting on the front balcony we see what we think is a Ring Tailed Possum going for an evening stroll along the electric cables or the telephone lines. He is a bit smaller than their Brush Tailed cousins and not as friendly either. One evening while I was working on the computer I heard an animal noise near the back door and went out to investigate. Over the top of the balcony rail I saw a pair of rather large claws but the way the light was shining I could not see the rest of the creature. It looked like part of some horror movie, the kind of film when some mutated species comes out of the swamps to terrorise the whole world. When I turned on the light I could see the whole animal, it was a flying fox (a large bat). It was about 14 inches long and hung there for a while before deciding not to attack me and to fly away.

I hope that Mrs. Possie is well and happy somewhere. I would like to see her again but it has been a long time since she called on us so I don’t expect we ever will. It was great while it lasted and we are grateful for the experience.

Mrs. Possie and her baby