The EKKA and Zonta-ing

Wow….the EKKA was amazing and we had a really good day out. There was a mixture of funfair rides, agricultural shows and an amazing array of animals from cattle to cats. We did wonder what the day had in stall for us as we left Roma Station with crowds of people, similar to the HK rush hour, but then the penny dropped and we realized we had chosen to visit this annual show on a public holiday! We have all the time to plan but still manage to choose one of the busiest days in Brisbane, heading out with 60,000 residents doing the same thing.

On arriving via the EKKA express (a train journey of about 5mins from our departure at Roma Street), we negotiated the funfair and fast food outlets which by the way were amazing. At most events, your fast food options are usually an over-priced burger or an even more over-priced cheeseburger! Not in Oz, you could have half a roast chicken, lamb shank or a “Dagwood” – which is a very large battered sausage on a stick that has typically been dunked in tomato ketchup, Hmmm!

Anyway, back to the show and our first visit was to the cattle sheds. We were able to walk through the sheds and the cows looked in very good health, large and nearly all munching their food (just like most people). The only disconcerting part was that they were all facing the other way ……and we had to walk through the middle – which felt like running the gauntlet past the backend of approximately 150 cows. I know my maths is not that brilliant, but I understood the rules of probability enough not to hang around!

After the cattle, we entered into the main arena in time to watch the Annual parade which was a showcase of every animal at the EKKA. This included racing horses which were fun to watch as they didn’t really understand what was going on and just wanted to be let loose and run riot, which provided a challenge for their riders.

Throughout the day, there were various shows and entertainment and we were lucky enough to come across a tap dancing show by a group called “Those Tap Guys”.  5 guys who put on a show which amalgamated all the genres of tap dance from the classics e.g. Singing in the Rain to modern songs e.g. Beyoncé – Put a finger on it! It was a really brilliant and included some humor and fun – they were clearly enjoying it as much as the audience.

From dancing to diving, where a group of stunt divers were plunging into a 2.4metre pool from 80feet up…including one which set himself alight before diving into the pool, but not before we could all feel the heat from the fire down on the ground….so I’m sure he was glad to hit the water and put out the fire.

Our last show was the log-cutting competition where 2 teams compete to chop a number of logs. It sounds easy but the speed and skill of these teams was incredible – one false move and it would have been the self-amputising competition. The climax was for 2 loggers to climb their trunks using a set of planks, these were wedged into cuts which they made as they climbed to the top. To do this they had to do the same procedure twice each side of the log. To add spice to the competition, the two finalists were father and son – so it was evident that it meant more than just winning the event.

The show carried on into the evening and we left about 7pm, with achy feet and rather chilly as the heat from the sun had disappeared and a cold wind whipped up from nowhere, so we headed for the train after purchasing a big (cannot buy anything less than half a kilo) bag of macadamia nuts and covered in a nice sticky sweet toffee to take home and replenish after having had a really enjoyable day.

Zonta International.

As we have been in Brisbane for 3 weeks, we decided that it would be good to do some volunteering and we found an opportunity to support the Zonta International organization in assembling birthing kits!

Sounds a bit odd I know but we got up early (7 am) which felt like being back at work and used our super City Cycles to get to the venue – a school on the South Bank and offered our services!

The target was to assemble 12,000 birthing kits which comprised of 1 x plastic sheet, 5 x gauze's, 3 x pieces of string, 1 surgical blade, 1 bar of soap and 1 pair of latex gloves, all inside a small plastic bag with a self-sealing top similar to a sandwich bag. These kits were destined for Papua New Guinea where the local services and care is very limited and 1 in 12 women encounter issues during childbirth.

Surprisingly, we started at 8 am and were finished by 11.30 am – so I think they had a good number of volunteers, but I’m sure the organization and preparation for the event took much longer.

So we did our bit while here and it felt very productive, although Patrick decided he was not very dexterous at some of the tasks and remarked that he thought a chimpanzee may have been more efficient. But that’s not true as he did do well in between chatting up the local ladies!

Joking aside we did meet a few nice people and it was good to find out a little more about life in Brisbane and Australia in general and see if there was anything else we should do while here.  

Next stage is to plan our journey for the following weeks when we will be travelling north, hopefully to more warm weather and staying at a few places along the Sunshine coast.