Life in the Australian Army

Probably old, but….

*Dear Mum & Dad,*

I am well. Hope youse are too. Tell me big brothers
Doug and Phil that the Army is better than workin’
on the farm – tell them to get in bloody quick smart
before the jobs are all gone!

I wuz a bit slow in settling down at first,
because ya don’t hafta get outta bed until
6am. But I like sleeping in now, cuz all
yagotta do before brekky is make ya bed and
shine ya boots and clean ya uniform. No
bloody cows to milk, no calves to feed, no
feed to stack – nothin’!! Ya haz gotta
shower though, but its not so bad, coz
there’s lotsa hot water and even a light to
see what ya doing!

At brekky ya get cereal, fruit and eggs but
there’s no kangaroo steaks or possum stew
like wot Mum makes. You don’t get fed again
until noon and by that time all the city
boys are buggered because we’ve been on a
‘route march’ – geez its only just like
walking to the windmill in the back paddock!!

This one will kill me brothers Doug and Phil
with laughter. I keep getting medals for
shootin’ – dunno why. The bullseye is as big
as a bloody possum’s bum and it don’t move
and it’s not firing back at ya like the
Johnsons did when our big scrubber bull got
into their prize cows before the Ekka last
year! All ya gotta do is make yourself
comfortable and hit the target – it’s a
piece of piss!! You don’t even load your own
cartridges they comes in little boxes and ya
don’t have to steady yourself against the
rollbar of the roo shooting truck when you
reload!

Sometimes ya gotta wrestle with the city
boys and I gotta be real careful coz they
break easy – it’s not like fighting with
Doug and Phil and Jack and Boori and Steve
and Muzza all at once like we do at home
after the muster.

Turns out I’m not a bad boxer either and it
looks like I’m the best the platoon’s got,
and I’ve only been beaten by this one bloke
from the Engineers – he’s 6 foot 5 and 15
stone and three pick handles across the
shoulders and as ya know I’m only 5 foot 7
and eight stone wringin’ wet, but I fought
him till the other blokes carried me off to
the boozer.

I can’t complain about the Army – tell the
boys to get in quick before word gets around
how bloody good it is.

Your loving daughter,

Sheila