It wouldn’t be an Aussie Xmas without sun, prawns and native birds. Perhaps too many native birds. Patrick Lenton investigates
Coming back to Australia after doing most of my primary school years overseas involved a couple of moments of cultural discord – chief among them the bizarre, almost organic stage-musical moment of watching everyone suddenly break into The Nutbush, unrehearsed. But nothing has ever made me feel truly like I’m living in a strange make-believe country than when I first heard an Australian Christmas carol.
I don’t know what it is about our national psyche, this urge to remake Christmas carols that are hyperspecific to our nation. But it probably has to do with climate dysphoria – when almost every Yuletide song mentions the snow, the fireplace, the warm eggnog and Santa getting frostbite and losing his fingers, the contrast between the Australian Christmas experience of a stinking hot summer day and various prawn-related crises becomes stark.
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