WEEK 9
Dear Lincoln, Lilliana, Leni, Juliana, Evyn, Jack, Faye, Chloe, Emerson, Lake, Rita, Violet, and Ella,
G’day! That’s what Australians will say to each other when they want to say hello. This is short for Good Day! The Aussies love to shorten words. They also say, “How are you going?” a lot instead of “How are you doing?”
Before I tell you all about my first fantastic week in Australia with T-Rex and his family, I thought we should recap on where I’ve come from and where I’ve been.
When I was in Wellington, I found this fantastic beach ball that has got the world printed on it. I bought it so that wherever I go I can blow it up and show kids where I’ve come from and where I’m going. It’s fun to have the whole world in my hands!
Can you see Los Angeles on the map? That's where I started, on the west coast of America, and I flew all the way across the Pacific Ocean and into the Southern Hemisphere, crossing the international date line, remember, to New Zealand, where I visited the North and South Islands.
Well, now I’ve flown east to Australia, which was only 4 hours on the plane, but just look at the size of Australia compared to the size of New Zealand!
Australia is bigger than the whole of the USA, but over 300 million people live in America and only about 21 million people live in Australia, so there is loads of room for everyone, and the government even pays people thousands of dollars for having babies because they want more Australians!
This week I stayed with Tex and his mom and dad and baby brother, Leroy. Tex’s lovely Aunt Beth picked me up from the airport and drove me to their house, which is about an hour or so away, on the Mornington Peninsula. Their family has lived in the area for 170 years! In fact, Tex’s great, great, great, great grandmother (that’s his mom’s mom’s mom’s mom’s mom’s mom!) is believed to be the first white child born on the Mornington Peninsula, which had previously been inhabited by the indigenous people (I will be telling you more about the history of Australia and the native people, the Aborigines, in one of my future letters). The baby was called Polly and she was born in 1841 to some early settlers who had come from England on a boat to make a new life in Australia.
A Peninsula is a piece of land that sticks out into the sea. The Mornington Peninsula curves around Port Philip Bay, which is a huge bay on the south coast of Australia, and you can get a ferry over to the peninsula that is on the other side of the bay.
One of Australia’s main cities, Melbourne, is at the top of the bay.
The great thing about the Peninsula is that it makes the bay a great, safe place for swimming, especially for kids.
On the other side of the Peninsula is the open ocean, which has strong currents, huge waves and a few sharks swimming around in it!
Only super brave people, like Tex’s dad, go out and surf in the ocean, and they have to keep a watch out for sharks all the time. At the surfers' beaches, if you see flags it means it's safe to swim between the flags because lifesavers are patrolling the area.
Tex is 5½ and is named after a famous Australian singer called Tex Perkins. But Tex’s Uncle Andrew told me that everyone gets given a nickname in Australia (he gave me one, which I might tell you later, if you’re lucky!) so I decided to call Tex, T-Rex. His baby brother, Leroy, is 8 months old and was named after Leroy Brown the Baddest Boy in Town (that’s actually a song that your mom and dad might know, and it’s funny because Leroy is not bad at all, he’s actually a really, really good baby!)
I had loads of fun playing with T-Rex when I first arrived. It was so cool because he had a game called Zingo that he’d never played before and Lincoln taught me how to play that game in LA, so I was able to teach Tex.
He also had a game called Bop It that Sam and Isabella taught me how to play in New Zealand, so I taught him how to play that as well. I taught his mom, too, but she needs to practice a little more before she gets as good as Tex and me!
Mornington Peninsula is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. There are beaches with the cleanest sand and the bluest water I've ever seen, and huge waves that crash over massive rocks.
There are also lots of marine sanctuaries around the coastline, to protect the wildlife.
As well as breathtaking coastal views and stunning beaches, there is lots of beautiful countryside where there are lots and lots of vineyards, which are places where people grow grapes to make wine for grown-ups to drink.
The vineyards are all so pretty and the people who run them are very friendly and invite you to come and taste all their wine. Well, that’s only for adults, kids are not allowed to taste the wine, but they can taste the yummy olive oil, which is often flavored with lemon and basil.
My favorite vineyards were the ones that had stuff for kids to do, like a playground, or a sculpture garden to look around.
One of the vineyards had a huge vegetable garden (the Aussies call this a veggie patch, remember how they like to shorten all their words) to walk around in. We saw all kinds of vegetables, including rhubarb, one of my favorite things, and pumpkins.
I told Tex to touch a pumpkin and he decided he wanted to kiss it. He must really love pumpkin, like me!
I was interested to learn a little more about wine production, like seeing the huge metal containers they store it in until it is ready to drink.
I also learnt that they plant a rose bush at the end of each row of vines. This isn’t just to look pretty, it’s also to show the vineyard owner how good the soil is in that row of vines. If the roses look healthy, the grapes will all be healthy and juicy; if the roses look a little sickly, the grapes are probably sick too. Very clever!
At one of the vineyards, I saw this beautiful plant with a white flower. It’s called a peace lily, and I have one in LA. It looked just like mine. I really miss it, but my good friend Kit is looking after it until I get back.
In the parking lot at that vineyard, we saw this very old car, called a Rolls Royce. Tex had never seen one before.
At this vineyard they obviously really liked Americans and Canadians as they were flying their flags!
In between the vineyards we found a place where you can go and pick your own strawberries. We had so much fun picking them, and even more fun eating them.
There weren’t too many left when we got home. We also found some wild blackberries growing nearby.
On the way home from strawberry picking, we saw this sign that said Foxey's Hangout. Years ago, farmers used to shoot foxes and hang them from the tree as a warning to other foxes to stay off the farm. I'm glad to say that they don't do that anymore, but the sign is still there, and people hang wooden foxes on the tree instead!
On one of the days I stayed with Tex, it was raining hard so we went to an indoor play center. It was a Thursday, which is the day that Tex’s mom always meets with her mother’s group.
When a woman has her first baby in Australia, the government puts her in a group with 5 other moms so they can be friends and help each other with questions about having a new baby for the first time. They might not know anyone who has had a baby, so this makes sure they don’t feel lonely or scared about it, that they always have someone to chat to. Tex’s mom has stayed friends with her mother’s group for nearly six years now. It seems to me that Australia is a pretty good place to have babies!
We met at a great place called Planet Kids, which was decorated in so many bright colors and had loads of giant inflatables and toys to play with. Tex had his last birthday party there.
Tex is very lucky because he lives next door to his best friend, who was born on the same day as him, in the same hospital. They ride their bikes all day long, even when their dads are trying to cook!
The main event this week was that Tex started school. I went along on his first day so I got to see what an awesome (this is a word Tex uses a lot!) school he is going to.
There are so many things to see and do. They do loads of art projects and play sports and can even come early to school and run around the track if they want to do some extra exercise.
Leroy was a little disappointed that he didn't get to go to school with Tex. He even tried to sneak into Tex's school bag!
Their whole play area is under a big shade to protect them from the super strong sun, and behind the basketball court, they have a veggie patch and chickens.
Tex was in Prep F and had a special place to put his bag.
I loved the picture that all the new kids were making to celebrate their first day at school.
One of the things I liked best about Tex’s new school is that they are really careful about preserving the environment. They use solar power, which means they have huge black panels on the roof to collect the power from the sun. They use that to power the school, and any power that is left over they give to the local power station. They also have a policy of “nude food” at school. This means they are not allowed to bring food with any wrappers on it. Everything has to be brought in a lunch box that the kids take home at the end of the day to get washed. This is so awesome because, not only does it cut down on trash produced, but they also don’t use unnecessary zip-lock bags and other unnecessary wrappers that harm the environment.
Because T-Rex is now at school, he is old enough to do chores and earn some pocket money. I helped him make a chart so he can get stars each day for the chores he does. If he gets enough stars at the end of the week, he gets his pocket money.
I think he might spend it all on movies and St. Kilda stuff. St. Kilda (nicknamed The Saints) is the football team Tex supports (and the team I support, too).
But this is not the kind of football you’re used to, it’s called “Aussie Rules Football” and it’s a mix of soccer, football and rugby. It’s very difficult to explain, I might have to show you on TV or on the internet one day!
I had such a great time with T-Rex and his family and I was sad to say goodbye, but I think I might see them again before I leave Australia because they all became good friends of mine.
I’m off to meet a new family now. I’ll write again next week.
Still missing you all. All my love, hugs and kisses,
Susie
xxxx
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