I received this postcard today from a friend who has recently moved to the other side of the continent.A few weeks ago I sent her a postcard of Sydney Harbour in an infantile attempt to make her homesick; although, the harbour had been touched up a little and was a gorgeous, pre-settlement ultramarine so she may in fact have thought it was a Ken Done painting and that I was a touch loopy (and/or infantile) so quite happy to stay right where she was on the other side of the continent.
Anyhoo, so I pulled my friend's koala missive out of the letterbox and eagerly turned it over to read her latest news. What did I find on the flip side? This:
Thought you would like a postcard showing the many facets of the local fauna. They stretch and they sit and they all look the same... Who knew?Ok so far. Surprisingly not unlike many of the letters I receive. Then she hits me with this bombshell:
The irony being the fact that there are no koalas in WA.! and !! Surely it isn't so. Is it so? This raises many questions: is there legislation outlawing koala gangs in WA? Did all the koalas retire to a leafy Perth suburb with Carmen Lawrence? And, most crucially for all Phascolarctos cinereus-loving numismatists, is the Australian koala 2009 gilded 1oz silver dollar coin legal tender in WA?
So many questions, so few sensible answers.
After pulling the pin on the koalas-in-WA grenade my friend moved on to say: "So the real reason for writing is we found a new place to live. The address is..."
The real irony is that there's a big, smudgy postal mark right over the top of the address so all I can read is the bottom line: WA 6100.
I think all the koalas are working for Australia Post.
