As promised, Santa and Little Darwin have a wonderful treat for the Northern Territory in the shape of gift wrapped articles by adventurous architect/cartoonist/author Peter Burleigh, back from an epic journey across the top of Australia-guided by Leunig's direction finding duck , the plump quacker sadly cooked over a campfire in the great outback when Pete's party got lost and ran out of caviar and baked beans. During the trip he reflected on all the name calling in our fair land , especially in parliaments, newspapers and via the irksome shock jocks ; as a result, he came up with some brilliant new nomenclature in this,his first epistle ,surely the start of an award winning series .
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South Australia: Jacob’s Creek (or Tween).
Western Australia: New Broome (or Wazza).
Northern Territory: Norn Terry (or Barraland).
Queens Land: Peanutbutt (or Banananannia).
New South Wales: Nowhere Near Wales
Tasmania: Even Lower Down (or Maniacs).
ACT: Australian Capital Purgatory.
Victoria: Billabong Flats.
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Before Australia declares itself to be a republic, there’s something more important to do and that is, rename every one of our States. This may be a pioneering idea but before you conclude I’m a vote short of a quorum I ask you to think about it.
A credible republic must eliminate monarchist names like Queens Land and Victoria. Even worse are the names the Poms used when they couldn’t think of anything – South Australia, Western Australia and especially The Northern Territory. As poetic as mud. You might as well call those places "Down There", "Over There" and "Up There". If you were trying for colourlessness, and if you could spell it, you couldn’t have picked better names. (I don’t know what to say about Tasmania, although "mania" is a good start.)
Canada is an independent Dominion with lots of non-Poms who speak Quebecoise– for example, "le weekend", yet they hang on to names like British Columbia, New Scotland and Northwest Territories. They were nominated for the "Best Blandness" Oscar. Even Holland, one of the more uninspired countries as far as names go, has a state named after Limburg cheese, and Austria is named after Australia*, at least the Americans think so. If our country really is young and free, let’s start the bottle spinning with a few suggestions :
South Australia: Jacob’s Creek (or Tween).
Western Australia: New Broome (or Wazza).
Northern Territory: Norn Terry (or Barraland).
Queens Land: Peanutbutt (or Banananannia).
New South Wales: Nowhere Near Wales
Tasmania: Even Lower Down (or Maniacs).
ACT: Australian Capital Purgatory.
Victoria: Billabong Flats.
You’ll notice my suggestions aren’t flippant. I could have put in Bob Katter or Kerrie Ann. I’ve seen a W.A. numberplate which said "State of Excitement", so don’t suggest names like State of Denial" or "Grace" or "Hysteria" – we can do better than that. Be proud! Call a State a State. Remember we are part of Asia; maybe we should use Chinese names. You think of some more names while I work on the new State Emblems. The new RepOz (Republic of Australia) will be grateful. All of us could get knighthoods.*And in Norway, "aust" means "east".
