Happy Wagga Christmas
It really is that time of year
By Sophie Elmhirst Published 13 November 2009 17:58
Ah, Wagga Wagga. Why have I not visited you before?
In fact, Santa pipped me to the proverbial post. I love it that Santa makes it all the way to Wagga Wagga. You'd think it might be an Australian outpost too far, but no, there he is with his reindeer and his sleigh. But look closely at the photo -- is that a Woolworths I see before me? They have Woolworths in Wagga Wagga?! Or maybe that's where all the defunct Woolworths went when they were shut down over here. I can just imagine a great ocean liner, full of rather forlorn-looking shops, all awaiting a new life on sunnier shores. I'm sure they have a nicer time in Wagga Wagga than they would on the average British high street, so we shouldn't feel too bad about it.
Anyway, it all went extremely well with Santa.
While Santa's arrival was the highlight of the night, shoppers had already enjoyed plenty of entertainment with giveaways, face-painting, roving entertainment and the popular bouncing kangaroos.
What was the roving entertainment? That's what I want to know. I do like entertainment that roves, that's on the move, but in a sort of skulking way. It's much the best.
And as for the popular bouncing kangaroos -- it's just too good. Christmas simply isn't Christmas without popular bouncing kangaroos.
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1 comment
Woolworths in Australia is a completely different company that pretty much dominates the grocery and retail sector here.
Wagga Wagga is hardly an outpost - 47,000 people in the centre of an agricultural zone that produces about 1 billion Australian dollars (which buy a lot more pommy pounds than they used to) each year.
Perhaps if you did visit Wagga you could acquaint yourself with the vernacular and discover, just as Betty Windsor did, that people in far off places actually talk differently from the English. You would probably also find that the arch condescension so loved of the poms has been replaced with something a bit more robust and direct.
That said, the curse of Christmas descends just as heavily in the Antipodes as anywhere else.