Trivial Observations about Australia (that are different from the US)

Toilet flush controls

Bathrooms

• Their toilets often have two flush levers, one for a pee and one for a dump. We thought this was a great idea, and I like how the icons suggest the difference (how much water is flushed).
• Many cafes don't have bathrooms for their clientele, but most towns have public bathrooms available in several places, and they're usually clean.
• Few bathrooms offer paper towels. Most have an air blower instead, which is more sanitary but takes more time. It seemed like the result was that fewer people washed their hands, which of course is less sanitary.
• Walendo saw a bathroom in an airport that had a container labelled "Used Needles Only." We don't know what that was about.

Used Needles Only

• They say "take away" instead of "to go."
• They say "Give way" instead of "yield"
• They say the weather is "fine" in the way we say it's sunny and warm, or possibly "nice," except that it seems to be an official term for weather. Even the weather news reports list places as "fine."

• They call it an Overtaking Lane instead of a Passing Lane

  Overtaking Lane sign	Warning sign

• Their warning signs are more graphic than ours

• Their road signs are in one color for the main roads and another color for the side roads, which is helpful
• The A roads seem to be major roads, B roads are smaller, and C roads are local roads. There are also M roads that are main highways as well.
• The dividing lines are white, not yellow, so you can't tell the difference between driving on a two-lane road (one going in each direction) and a divided road with two lanes (both going in the same direction). Then again, there are few roads with more than one lane in each direction.

• Prices include tax.
• Tipping isn't expected (though we'd get a different answer each time we asked). But everyone agreed that you don't have to tip unless you actually liked the service, and you wouldn't tip more than 10% at most.

• Their outlets have an on/off switch, we think because they have more voltage and are therefore more dangerous.

  Outlet switch

• Most shops have vertical plastic strips covering the entranceway to keep out the flies.
• Sugar is packaged in long, thin tubes rather than rectangular packets so you can fit more in a jar.

  Tall sugar packets	No junk mail

• We saw a mail slot that had "No Junk Mail" signs on them. I wonder if that works. (There did seem to be some junk mail in one of the slots.)

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