Proud moment

IT was a proud moment for me last weekend - for one, our eldest was chosen as part of a school rugby team to play in the interval of a national game in Melbourne.

We set off citybound in the sunshine and met up with other parents outside the AAMI Park stadium - one of the newest additions to Melbourne's sporting arenas, opened last May.
Being home ground to the NRL's Melbourne Storm team, the arena was the venue for our Saturday night of pre-show entertainment, sporting hi-jinx and welcome return of the Storm team after a suspension saw them off the field last season.

After a salary cap breach, NRL chief exec, David Gallop, stripped the Melbourne Storm of their 2007 and 2009 premierships and their 2006, 2007 and 2008 minor premierships, fined them an Australian sporting record $1,689,000, deducted all eight premiership points they had already received in the 2010 season, and barred them from receiving premiership points for the rest of the season.

So their return game was a biggie and seeing one of our two sons out there, in the middle of the turf, chucking a rugger ball to his fellow team-mates was the absolute highlight for us.
His 15 minutes of fame was a little shortlived but it was long enough for me to receive a text from a friend watching the game at home back on the peninsula who asked where we were. She and her family were watching the game on TV and spotted our boy on the field during half time.

But the second proud moment for me was standing up and singing the Australian National Anthem with the other 14 and half thousand people alongside us.
Belting out the words 'Beneath our radiant Southern Cross, we'll toll with hearts and hands, to make this Commonwealth of ours renowned of all the lands. For those who've come across the seas we've boundless plains to share, with courage let us all combine to advance Australia fair...' is always a spine tingler for me - be it during school assemblies or major sporting events.

With a patriotic hand on heart, I'm looking forward to seeing off the next two years Down Under so we can then apply for Citizenship of this beautiful land... by which time our house will have been totally renovated and I can sit back, relax and count my many, many blessings.