I love Australia. Big surprise right?
I also love storytelling. Ask me a simple question and you’ll probably get a detailed response with loads of facial expressions and hand gestures.
I love being a resource for others on topics I’m experienced with — you’ve got questions, I’ve got answers! Need some career or job search advice? I’m your gal.
And, I love my church. So when the pastor’s wife asked if I would represent Australia at a cultural event, I couldn’t say yes fast enough.
The purpose of the event was to highlight missionaries that our church supports and the countries in which they live. Though we have no missionary in Australia, the church wanted to include all continents and immediately thought of me — the storyteller who (not so) recently returned from Oz.
The event was mostly staffed and attended by families with younger children, so I brought a few items to have on the table for the little ones. A jar of Vegemite joined the cute and fuzzy.
I provided the church with a list of tidbits and facts about Australia, which were printed and posted at the booth, along with photos the church had on hand.
A family had volunteered to make all of the backdrops and cut out shapes of Aussie animals and icons.
I decided that my cultural dress should be my Queensland Maroons t-shirt, and the outfit only got better when I found my maroon wig from State of Origin!
I had to think of one food item to have at the table and suggested ANZAC biscuits. Our pastor’s wife made them, and it was fun to see the kids’ reactions when I explained that YES, these are cookies 🙂
People loved asking questions about Vegemite — “is it really as bad as people say it is?!” Here’s my answer. And that jar of Vegemite on the table? Soon I plan to make homemade cheesymite scrolls after one of my favorite snacks from a popular Aussie bread company.
Of course there is SO much more to Australia than Vegemite, sports, and cute animals — I just didn’t have as many questions about other topics. As kids munched on ANZAC biscuits, this storyteller offered up facts and trivia about her favorite home away from home.
Later this week I’ll have an opportunity to represent Australia in my local community again — and of course I’ll tell you all about it in the next post 🙂
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Love the post and that you were able to share your knowledge and the experiences of your travels again with a new audience. 🙂 Looking gorgeous as normal, the wig looks good, but I like the smurf hat :-*
Looking forward to trying the cheesymite scrolls at some point, kind of ;-P
I’m sure your next Australian story telling will be awesome 🙂
I think I’m making the scrolls on Australia Day O:-) But if you want to try them in December, maybe I can talk you into bringing a jar of Vegemite with you!
I’ll see what I can do 🙂
Top effort. I’m sure people loved your enthusiasm!
People LOVED the wig. 🙂
LOVE your table spread with the cute Aussie animals, Aussie alphabet book & of course Vegemite! I’m sure you helped to educate & inspire lots of future travelers with your story-telling! 🙂
I feel like I need my own children’s TV program!
So cute! I can’t imagine a better representative than you!
That is too cute… it’s like a fair project we used to have to do in school way back in the days…lol. You know print outs and paste pictures on the tri-fold things. Im glad you were able to give them some great info on Oz. All the pictures look cute… now when I get back I wanna do one of the world…lol and talk about all the countries I have visited.
Heather, It all looks so perfect… except that you included Vegemite!! (If I were Australia, I’d be ashamed of it and probably hide it when tourists come. But that’s just me.)
You really are the Aussie rep…every time someone tells me they’re going to visit Oz I send them to your blog. And tell them to eat macarons.
Aww, thank you Kyle! I’m always happy to talk to people about Oz and hope my posts give folks some helpful info 🙂