Go shorty, it’s your birthday, we gon’ party…

Did you know June 11 is a public holiday in Australia?

It’s the Queen’s Birthday. Well, actually, it’s not the actual Queen’s birthday. Liz gets her cake in London on April 21, but for some reason, Aussies celebrate on 11 June. That Australia celebrates anything to do with the Queen of England strikes many as odd. Elizabeth II’s position as Queen of Australia remains a fairly controversial issue down under. But – even though I’m not a monarchist and voted (unsuccessfully) for Australia to become a republic back in 1999 – I’ll take this holiday and I’ll damn well enjoy it.

Just as we slide into winter here in the Great Southern Land, we have a long stretch of uninterrupted working weeks before us. The next nation-wide holiday isn’t until Christmas Day. That’s more than six months away!

Each state has a holiday between now and then; folks from the Northern Territory have Picnic Day in August; splitters in Western Australia delay the Queen’s birthday until October (with so much cake, it’s a wonder the old girl isn’t fatter than she is); locals in northern Tasmania have Recreation Day; the remaining states and territories mark Labour Day on 1 October; and – finally - in my home state of Victoria we have to wait until November for the world’s only public holiday to celebrate a horse race – Melbourne Cup Day.

So – like it or not – I’ll be toasting the Queen on her ‘birthday’, knowing that I’ll be waiting another six months for a day off. Hmmm, no wonder the pro-republic movement lost that referendum…

–Mr. X

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 23rd, 2007 at 9:37 pm and is filed under Australia & Pacific, Destinations. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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