As Australian as…

Image by Marko Mikkonen

Other folks have it so easy. If they need a badge of honour they’ve got it licked: As American as apple pie, as English as strawberries and cream, as Chinese as chow mein and chop suey… and that’s just the tucker.

Our Australian national identity is a strange thing, and despite what the rest of the world thinks, it’s not something that you can just stick on a barbie. As Australian as abalone? – I don’t think so. And that begs the question: just what is it that makes a dinkum Aussie?

The weird thing is you can forget all sorts of things, but no-one ever forgets they’re Australian. And as much as we take pride in the simple fact of being Australian, and as much as it’s something we’re happy to celebrate and to accentuate when we’re abroad, it’s not something that you can ever quite put your finger on – never mind stick a spoon in to.

Image by Micolo J

Or at least it has been ‘til now. Pokies.com featuring the Pokies Casino was launched in 2015. It’s an online gaming site that first, foremost, fundamentally and irrefutably puts pokies at the front of the house. Those guys have left the food in the kitchen and simply nailed it.

No-one in the world loves pokies as much as we do, almost no-one else even calls them pokies. If you want something that is definitively, distinctly and drop-dead decisively Australian, you need look no further. Pokies are as authentically Australian as Ayers Rock, they’re the cultural equivalent of kangaroos and koalas.

Per capita, Aussies play more pokies (or slots or fruit machines if you’re not from these parts) than any other nation on earth. It’s reckoned that about a fifth of all the gaming machines on the planet are in Australia. That’s pretty impressive for a country of less than 24 million people (or two thirds the size of California if you prefer).

Image by Mads Boedker

But it’s not where you’re from or what you eat that defines your national identity so much as what you do. Americans might eat more of their moms’ apple pie than anyone else, just as the English may spend their three-day summers nibbling away at their strawberries and cream – or they may just say that’s what they do. But there is no doubting what Australians do. Aussies play pokies.

So next time you find yourself searching for the right expression to sum up your sense of national identity give ‘as Australian as pokies’ a try. It’s a lot easier to explain than a shonky abalone – and that’s 100% dinky di.