A Five Year Old Talks Illegal Immigrants & Travelling To Australia
They’ll need a bigger boat!
I had a dinner date the other night. It involved some good food, a glass of something chilled and some vibrant conversation. These ingredients are typically my preferred way to spend a Friday night. Classy but casual clothes, a civilised atmosphere, and the focus being more upon the company and the conversation as opposed to the price of the tequila shots and how fast we can get drunk before we get cut off. Sigh. The only down side was that my company happened to be quite a few years below the legal drinking age. Bummer.
Resignedly, I substituted a glass of crisp Spanish white wine for a sippy cup of grape juice and passed over a lovely fresh salad for greasy pizza. Ham and Pineapple of course. Despite the changes, we still managed to laugh so hard we almost fell off our stools and successfully tipped over our drinks on more than one occasion. Falling over, spilling drinks, and slurring words is a standard Friday night by all accounts right?
In all seriousness, it was actually a pretty awesome Friday night. Chatting with the little munchkins, JP and CP, was highly entertaining. Especially considering we uncovered something vitally important, 1 simple and quick tip that I’m about to share with you, about how best to travel to Australia (if you’re an illegal immigrant per se).
I had jumped at the chance to do a last-minute babysit for these two rascals because I hadn’t seen them in ages, they had escaped the Australian summer for the cool ski slopes of the crisp American winter, the lucky ducks! Which of course meant that I had almost forgotten what it was like to be constantly challenged by little minds who know better and whom are fiercely independent.
In between crying over spilt juice and fighting over the bigger piece of pizza, we discussed whatever random thoughts popped in to their minds at the time. Apparently, this time we were embarking onto the somewhat touchy subject of illegal immigrants, because 5 and 8 year olds have opinions too.
Australia is a very lucky country. We’re an island which makes it a very safe place to live, said JP.
Plus all of our cities are along the coast which means that the Army and Navy and Police can easily protect us, said CP.
Not sure about this one. In theory, I would have thought it would be easier if we were all inland. But props for contributing!
We don’t have many immigrants (pronounced: im – i – grens) in our country. Not as many as America. They’re not an island like us, said JP.
That’s right, they have Canada and Mexico on each side. (Geography seemed a safer topic than to speculate on the number of illegal immigrants).
They need a boat to come here to Australia. A big boat, not a dinghy, said CP.
I stifled a giggle as it reminded me of a classic insurance advert: Charter Boat, What Charter Boat? Yes well sometimes their boats are big, but they’re very old. It depends where they’re coming from too, I countered. Where do you think they’re coming from?
..[pause]..[blank look]..[ignore the question]..
Yeah! That’s why a lot of them get rescued by the Navy. They don’t have good boats and they don’t get very far, said JP. A dinghy wouldn’t even get half way. Not like our boat. Our boat is really big. We go to Fiji all the time in our boat!
Right, as you do. And yes, that last comment came from Miss5, the not so tactful CP. Just an ordinary and typical Friday night in the #nannylife: getting it all out on the table on the topic of boating to Fiji, opinions, America and illegal immigrants. Like I said, ordinary!
When has your little one brought up a dicey topic like this? How did you handle it?
