That's MR Martin to you....

One thing that the Australians do well, is 'bloke'. Some of the women do it almost as well as the men. There's something disarming about the way that distinctions between people that you'd commonly expect to find in the UK, are not really that prevalent here. For example, the custom here is that if you work with your hands, you wear blue shorts and a yellow and blue shirt. If you work in an office, you wear smart stuff, like in the UK, but us handy types are an amorphous spectacle. Many of the handy ones also drive utes too, which helps to emblazon your identity.
You'd half expect this to make a distinction MORE prevalent. But somehow it doesn't seem to. A blue and yellow person carries at least as much kudos as a tie wearer amongst the general throng. Women are referred to as 'mate' just as readily as the term is used for men, and they ask cute little questions like 'how you travelling?' followed with 'not too bumpy today?', referring to what kind of day you're having. People are not really all that stressed, and by and large they are law abiding and moderate in all they do. Machismo is not so much noticed here, since masculine is quiet and accepted as normal. I mean to say that in the UK, there has always to my mind, been an implicit apology in being a man. The state of masculinity in the UK has been in a long challenge with political correctness and it has been found wanting. I have found that this manifests itself in me at least as a pulling away from expressing my 'inner bloke', if you know what I mean. Here though, men have sheds, drive 4WD's, drink beer and fish. All is perfect in best of all possible worlds to misquote Voltaire.

Even the louts are self governing. If you pull up at a set of lights next to a boy racer, you typically find that he'll blat away from the lights as if NOTHING could stop him, and then suddenly level off at 80kph, the speed limit for that road. (50mph) The top speed for most motorways here is 100kph (60mph) although the very straight one to the Gold Coast is 110kph.

The main drawback for these speeds is that the trucks are very capable of doing them, even fully loaded. The roads are narrow in places and sometimes contained by massive concrete walls, so it can be disconcerting. In fact this is the main arena for displays of Machismo, and that is why Daile is not keen for me to get a motorbike.

So imagine that. Here I am, in a perfect land where at last I'm comfortable in my 'male-ness'. and what happens? .... I get stopped from having a bike!

I wonder if I can do a trade on a kitten?