Taking over the world on the 14th November (D5)

Got here. Arrived after another massive flight in a Cathay Pacific massive carrier thing. I was in the middle of the middle row and got virtually no sleep.

Guess what? The Aussies win again. The airport has obviously prepared well. They've been practicing. At peak landing time for several massive flights they put on three passport control people. Then, to keep things interesting everyone has to go through a line of customs guys who unpack almost one in three bags looking for smuggled in drugs, fresh fruit (why would you do that?), fresh meat (
Yes the Aussies beat the Chinese, hands down, in The 'standing in a line' competition. I can tell you Hong Kong 'you're wasting you're time'. The Aussies have it.

They cheated of course. What d'you expect? At least half of the people were themselves Chinese. Clever these Aussies. You can tell the original immigrants here were a cunning lot, beating the Chinese at their own (queuing) game!

I was met by my lovely wonderful cousin Marilyn and her husband Dave in a massive 4x4. Dave's a high school teacher. We drove through the busy Saturday afternoon suburbs to pick up my aunt Marceline (Matant)and had lunch with another cousin Joceline and her husband Rob. Rob is an ex cockney who is a proper Sydney Aussie now, accent and all.

I gave Aussie a B- for first impressions. Could do better.

I was surprised by the views expressed by Matant about the Chinese. I think she was joking. She must have been joking. When my parents moved us to England there was a lot of overt racism. There still is. Now more dark and pernicious and ominous. I'm pretty sure the same is true in. There's a lot of xenophobic invective on the radio about asylum seekers. For all their apparent easy goingness, my impression of many Aussies is that they're a pretty conservative bunch. I'm sure Matant, and her husband Guidoux(now died) and children Joceline, Vivianne, Jean-Daniel, and Marie-Claire were no strangers to prejudice. We certainly weren't in England when I grew up. A 'no tolerance' policy seems right. My preferred response is ridicule, I'm too soft for confrontation and too old for violence.

I'm afraid Aussie, you better get used your Chinese neighbours. There are more of them, it's their part of the world, and they'd win in a fight. Meanwhile, good on ya mate for showing them how to be world champion 'standing in a liners'