After all this time travelling around Australia I still hadn’t seen the capital. Now in somewhere such as Italy that would be a heinous crime, however in Oz the situation is slightly different; the capital city is boring. This is not just me being rude, everyone on the planet who has travelled Australia or lives there will agree with me. Canberra was built because Sydney and Melbourne fought for ages like spoilt children over who got to be the capital city, and eventually some genius had enough and built a city between them to settle the dispute. The only problem with this new city Canberra, is that it had been built purely for the purpose of ruling, which meant that it was boring and totally un-distracting to office workers, except if you count the confusing circles everywhere or the porn industry; the ACT is a territory and not a state meaning that while pornography is illegal to sell in all Australian states, their capital isn’t in a state and so the administrative capital is also the porn capital, another gold star for Australia!
I only stayed for 1 day in Canberra, which was enough, however that does not mean I was bored. I have a habit of wandering into the right place at the right time, this habit led me to walk to the National Portrait Gallery and open the door for a lady who immediately afterwards exclaimed at my chivalry and offered me a ticket to the French masters that was currently showing there (her daughter couldn’t make it) this then lead to me having someone to talk to about the paintings which is always nice, and then to being able to see a game of Footsall, which is indoor football with an Australian name at the local stadium just outside the city. Maree also drove me to the new parliament house to show me the line up with the memorial, Canberra was a totally planned city so the layout allows one to stand on the steps of Parliament house and look over Old Parliament house to see the War Memorial which is a cool idea, but overshadowed by a mountain right behind it. In the evening I met some amusing friends, which explain some of the odder pictures from Canberra.
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