Carole Anne and I went out with the car to get a feel of the lay of the land and do some grocery shopping Friday afternoon. We were intent on comparing about four key locations, the prices, the quality, and the variety -- to make informed decisions on where to buy our food stuffs.
The photos you see attached (above and below) depict a bit of what we found just outside and inside the "Eco Meats" shop near some other specialty markets offering a variety of "organic" foods raised locally. We feasted our eyes on something new...but weren't sure our stomachs could handle it all, just yet!
Because so many kangaroos were proliferating abundantly in one big park-like tract of land owed by the government, the border of which is less than a kilometer from the neighborhood we live in. As they overpopulated the space, they were prone to venture (...er, shall we say: hop out) all over the place, through various suburbs of this capital city, onto golf courses by the dozens, often leaping into the paths of vehicles (just like deer do in the States) causing great damage and disturbance. Officials opened it up to licensed hunters to shoot about 400 of them just a couple weeks ago, but not without plenty of protest by the animal lovers. Not sure if this "Roo Jerkey" we saw resulted from all that -- or not!
Shopping here is indeed quite the experience, and puts a major dent in the wallet, as well. We are definitely NOT in Indiana (nor Kansas, for that matter) any more. For example, organic free range eggs here are a mere $10.00 a dozen AUD.
Because of the dropping value of the US dollar over the last few months, AUD dollars are now almost on par with USD. (When we first visited here in March the AUD dollar was still at about 91 cents USD, so the power of our savings we have in American banks has just lost 10% of its value now that we have moved here. And from analyzing the trends, it looks like its only going to get worse, so we are getting ready to move most of it here quite soon, and invest it in the international markets. Wonder how many Americans realize that banks in Australia have been offering an average of about 8% interest on savings accounts, and for quite some time!)
The terrible floods in Iowa and other parts of the Midwest this week are making the news here in Australia - we can only imagine the incredible stress for folks in that region - it's hard just to watch it all happening again, from afar, and hear our friends and family members talk about it (we are using Skype.) It's finally been raining here in the ACT the last couple of weeks, off an on, after a year or two of drought conditions. Even though we could use still use plenty of extra water around these parts, we don't want THAT much!
Counting our blessings,
Clair
Thanks for sharing, Clair, via your blog. Most exotic game me I ever had was "agouti" in the Ivory Coast -- not sure how that translates, perhaps to ground hog or porcupine. I tried some ostrich once too. In general, I don't much care for wild game meats of any kind. Blessings to you and yours,
ReplyDeleteStuart W. Showalter