A question for my overseas viewers
Jul. 31st, 2008 05:52 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alias_sqbrReading TV Tropes to fill in the time until Cam comes home and we can go shopping, I came across this:
Australians as a nation are, for the most part, utterly mad about almost all forms of sports (but especially the ones they're really good at, such as cricket and Australian Rules Football). Here's a fun exercise; watch any Australian commercial TV news broadcast and make note of how many of the stories relate to sport in some way. Bet it's over half. Of course, if you happen to live in Australia and aren't particularly interested in sport, it makes an otherwise wonderful country somewhat less wonderful to live in. It doesn't help that when they lose something that they normally win (as happened a couple of years ago, when England unexpectedly won the Cricket Test Series), they can be pretty bad losers.
That doesn't happen in other countries? You guys's news is actually mostly news? You don't have national holidays based around horse races? o.O
Australians as a nation are, for the most part, utterly mad about almost all forms of sports (but especially the ones they're really good at, such as cricket and Australian Rules Football). Here's a fun exercise; watch any Australian commercial TV news broadcast and make note of how many of the stories relate to sport in some way. Bet it's over half. Of course, if you happen to live in Australia and aren't particularly interested in sport, it makes an otherwise wonderful country somewhat less wonderful to live in. It doesn't help that when they lose something that they normally win (as happened a couple of years ago, when England unexpectedly won the Cricket Test Series), they can be pretty bad losers.
That doesn't happen in other countries? You guys's news is actually mostly news? You don't have national holidays based around horse races? o.O
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no subject
Date: 2008-07-31 11:50 am (UTC)Trying to explain this at the highly international call centre I work at was so odd.
Q: So, you celebrate horses?
A: Not really. We'll be having a long lunch to bet on them since we've had to work today though.
Q: So, you celebrate betting? You have gambling holidays?
A: Uh, no. I think we just celebrate anything that lets us not actually work when at work.
Q: So why horses then? Is gambling at work even legal here?
A: If you keep questioning the mystery of our national horse god Phar Lap, you can't have any of this alcoholic punch to "enhance" gambling at your workstation. It's lotto or data entry, take your pick.
no subject
Date: 2008-07-31 01:11 pm (UTC)I have a bit of a thing against gambling and the pressure to be involved in tipping etc at my work (for the government!) is pretty intense. Still, if I can get a long catered lunch and the chance to wear a silly hat out of it I'm not complaining...