Fun Facts About Australia According to Bill Bryson

Since "69 Fun Facts About Germany" generated so much excitement (although I speculate it is mainly because of that ab-licious photo of Michael Ballack) I've decided to create a similar post about Australia, which is one of my favourite countries. Having read and loved Bill Bryson's In a Sunburned Country (Also known as Down Under to Brits and Aussies, and Frühstück mit Kängurus to the Germans) I decided to base these fun facts from what Mr. Bryson shares with us in his delightful novel. While I did not entirely enjoy Bryson's earlier work Neither Here Nor There, I found him to be highly entertaining in this memoir, as he shares many exciting facts about the land Down Under. I highly recommend this book as it definitely does an amazing job of capturing the spirit of this sunny nation. Here are some of my favourite facts from this book:

• As many of you already know, the Brits sent their convicts to Australia in the late eighteenth century. While the voyage took 252 days they were lucky - upon landing, the Brits spotted two French ships in the horizon. Meaning, had they taken a day longer to arrive, Australia would have been a French colony (49).

• The Opera House was designed by the Danish architect, Joern Utzon. Utzon, surprisingly , never ended up seeing his prized creation, after leaving the project due to disputes about its rising costs, and returned to Denmark (55).

• Sir Eugene Goossens, the man who came up with the idea to build the Opera House, never saw the final creation either - while passing customs in Sydney, he was discovered carrying a large collection of porn and was asked to leave the country (55).

• Lachlan Macquarie, the Scottish governor of the colony in the beginning of the nineteenth century,  was nearly successful at attempting to name every object in the continent after himself. As a result, there is the Macquarie Harbour, Macquarie Island, Macquarie  Marsh, Macquarie River, Macquarie Fields, Macquarie Pass, Macquarie's Chair, Macquarie's Point and a Macquarie town. Macquarie is also a bank, university, the national dictionary, a shopping centre, an ice rink, and countless roads, streets and avenues. And that doesn't even include all the places named after his first name Lachlan... (66).

• A suggested name for the nation's capital Canberra was "Sydmeladperbrisho" (using the first syllables of the state capitals) (86). 

Book review: Bryson's Swiss jokes aren't so funny

Neither Here Nor There is a travel memoir by Bill Bryson about his travels throughout Europe. Bryson, for those who may not be familiar, is the author of multiple non-fiction books, and is well-known for his travel memoirs about Europe, Australia, Great Britain and the US.

Having previously read In a Sunburned Country and thoroughly enjoyed it, I had high hopes for Neither Here Nor There. 

While I did enjoy the first chapter about his journey up to Hammerfest, Norway to see the Northern Lights, I ended up finding the book too predictable after the first few chapters.


The plot for each city goes like this: gets off train, checks into hotel, walks around city centre, [insert cultural jokes here], gets hungry, eats dinner, goes to sleep, and then repeats the same experience in a different city the next day

Having gone to over 20 cities, it gets a bit depressing after awhile. I found it surprising how he never made an effort to meet any locals or other travelers throughout the whole trip, but rather, seem satisfied being in ignorant bliss of his surroundings and passed his time by making jokes, particularly aimed toward the Swiss.

Examples:

Q: What do you call a gathering of boring people in Switzerland?
A: Zurich