Country Life...

feeling like on the set of mcleod's daughters or similar, out here in the middle of virtually nowhere, in a lil town called Berrigan... ;p nice place tho, really, been lodging with ian & inara fox, a really lovely couple... they own a 30 acre property and an american-style house made from imported american pines and things, but it's soooo comfy!!! jus now moved again, staying with lorraine & rob beard, who live jus across the road from the fox's, it's really nice here too, tho they're renovating their driveway atm (so my car's living outside now under assault from the beating sunrays) ;p but it's all good... soo nice of them to billet me here!!! get treated like a king by my wonderful hosts!!!

it's a nice lifestyle actually, once you overcome the isolation... get woken in the morning by the crowing of the rooster and the beams of sunlight piercing the curtains... the beds are so comfy u jus don't want to rise, but then the idea of a nice warm shower and cooked breakfast beckons, as well as a day's duties to attend to at the hospital... - well, for us, could hardly call it duties ;p more like tourism...

amongst other things, been out to horse farms: some famous horses and breeders came from up here around berrigan... seen the extent of primary industry around, with rice crops traditionally being the dominant industry in the area (though in the last few years, because of the drought, wheat and maize have become the favoured crops of some of the farmers)... there's also some dairy, grain milling, and the basic amenities available in the town... there's not a whole lot more to do, except get involved in community activities - had a lion's club meeting on wednesday (where a few young ppl from the area got up to talk about issues - the one who ultimately won put together a well-woven speech about the rural community and what it means to live here...), and the swimming pool was kept alive with a fundraising swim-meet on friday night...

outside of berrigan, there's the nearby towns of finley, tocumwal and barooga, the latter two being situated on the banks of the murray river... finley had a huge tractor pull event on saturday night - wow, the dust and noise were incredible!!! the machines had to pull weights that redistributed themselves in such a way that as the tractor pulled further, more force was required to drag them... it's a rich man/woman's hobby, with hundreds of thousands of dollars being poured into modifying and supercharging the agricultural engines, which guzzle a tankload of aeroplane fuel over their 100m or so course... it's quite interesting, but a day close to the action is pretty well guaranteed to wreck your ears for at least a few days... and probably do some permanent damage too... at the end of it all, there was a humorous demolition derby where the final two cars left alive battled it out at speeds under 10kph, their engines were so shot by that stage!!!

in contrast to the calamity of the saturday night, so much of the stay here has been spent observing the peace and docility of country life, and the beauty of nature... always reminds me of God's amazing creativity to see such diverse plant and animal life so richly abundant, and without rigorous structure and routine to follow... such a beautiful change from the hustle and bustle of city life... even decided to take a glider flight (at sportavia) and see the landscape so wonderfully expanded out below... the weather, unfortunately, wasn't ideal, and there were some spots of rain... and my camera ran out of film... so i jus hope that the shot i have from up in the glider turns out well!!! but the breathtaking scenery from the glider will probably draw me back to tocumwal to take a glider course sometime in the future!!! ;p the aerodrome is also planning to start hang-gliding instruction in a few months' time...

anywayz, will update properly when i get the chance... country life is really enjoyable, but at the same time, really looking forward to returning to melbourne... really missing friends (especially missing u, sal)... - but will be back in not too long!!!

God bless,
dave

ps... in future blog, will talk about the state of healthcare in this town... since this is the major reason why we get posted to rural areas... coming soon ;p