Boxing Day

Boxing Day in Australia is not snow and hot drinks; rather it is ice in cold drinks, or cold drinks on ice! It can be beach and sunburn or recovery on the lounge watching one of the regular sporting events that have become de rigeur for Aussies on this day.

There isn’t a lot of commemoration of the original reason for Boxing Day anymore, and I don’t think the crowds camping outside Myer and David Jones in the big cities had giving leftovers to the poor on their minds.

I have a strong memory of a cartoon which appeared in a Sydney newspaper on Boxing Day a fair while ago. It showed a fierce looking woman, who had survived the traumas of Christmas Day, standing with hands on hips, berating a rather the worse for wear aussie bloke sprawled in a chair, and telling him in no uncertain terms that “if they can play cricket and sail to Hobart today, you can get out of that chair and mow the lawn before mother arrives!”

I couldn’t find the cartoon; but here is a video of the start of the Sydney to Hobart yacht race and a picture from the Boxing Day Test from the MCG (Melbourne Cricket Ground – hallowed ground for cricket in Australia), with Australia playing South Africa. The photo is of the Australian captain Ricky Ponting thanking the crowd after he reached his 100 runs.

Update 29 December Wild Oats Xl was the line honours winner and Quest the overall winner on corrected time. Video is no longer current so below is a picture of Wild Oats Xl sailing into Hobart.
(Picture from Rolex - Daniel Forster)