Ekka 2008

The annual Brisbane Exhibition is here. We are lucky that we did not miss it. It is declared that next Wednesday would be a publlic holiday for this special event. We decided against going on Wednesday as we feel that it would be very crowded. So we went today since we do not have anything planned. Check it out at this site http://www.ekka.com.au/home/default.asp

It starts at 9am. So we decided to go early as we need to find parking. Apparently the nearby carpark lots are limited and we need to pask some distance away from the site. After parking the car, we took that short stroll to the RNA showground. We approached a long queue outside the RNA and we have no idea what that queue was. Adrian went and realised that it's the ticketing queue. I think we waited for around 20 minutes before we got our tickets. Btw the admission ticket for each adult is $22 and it does not include any rides or food or anything.

By the time we walked in, it was already crowded with people taking rides, eating, shopping and all. We just walked around as we were not sure where to start as well. We walked to the poultry section and saw many different types of chickens, ducks, goose, parrots and canary. Sabrina really enjoy watching these animals as she did not fuss at all but just sit in her pram and watch the poultry. There were also horses, cows, goats, dogs and cats exhibition. However, I did not walk into these halls as I could not stand the smell. It's due to my pregnancy. Little change in smell and I will not be able to stand it. Anyway, Adrian brought Sabrina in to watch these other animals and she was most happy to oblige.

After that we decided to just walk around. The place is just too big and we just walked around and walked into any exhibition halls that we passed by. We went to the stadium where they were having a horse competition. Some of the horses look so fine. We even saw a few kids riding ponies with their jockery.

We also went into various exhibition halls where they have exhibits of many things even the Government section has a hall where they exhibit future plans for Brisbane as well as Water Treatment plans. Honestly, I was not really interested in these. I went in just to stay clear of the hot sun. Hahaha.

We also went to this Brisbane Market where there was competition of the biggest vegetables or fruits and arrangement of fruits and vegetables. It was really nice and some of the fruits were really enormous.

Usually for these kind of fairs in European countries, they are famous for what they called ShowBags. These bags basically contain items that cost most their the selling prices of the showbags itself. By now, Sabrina has gone to lala land. So we decided to go into the ShowBags Pavillion to get some of the show bags. We bought Sesame Street Elmo for our son, HI-5 for Sabrina, Darrell Lea, Pepsi, Good Taste, Food Ideas, Women's Weekly and New Women. Each bag cost between Aust$17.50 - $18.50. But just look at the contents. It's definitely cost more than that price. We thought we bought too many showbags but if you have seen the Ang mohs, they can be holding up to 5 or 6 show bags per person per family. Just imagine how popular these show bags are.

Before we go off, we decided to let Sabrina had a go at the games stall since she had behaved rather well today. She looked very interested in the game stall that require the participant to use a net to fish for a fish or reptile from the pool of water. It cost $4 a game and we decided to let her have a go at it. She happily fish for the items with the net. Each itme from the water is labelled with a number that is linked to a prize. But somehow, our lilttle cannot decide which item she wants. In the end, after fishing for about 5-10 minutes, we just ask her to fish one more time and claim her prize. She got herself a crocodile.

We then went to the stall beside this fishing stall and let her try the balls game. In this game, she is required to drop the balls into the mouth of a duck and ater dropping the 3 balls into the mouth, the balls will automatically fall into this number drawers where there are numbers indicators. At the end of throwing the balls, the stall holder will count the sum of the numbers that the balls fall in and you will get a price. She really loves this game and was laughing loudly everytime she drops the balls. She won for herself a toy handphone.

I guess all in all we enjoyed ourselves today. Though we are tired no doubt by the end of the day, I guess it was a real eye-opener for us. We also spent quite a bit of money but at least we feel that it's money well spent. So tired. Going off to la la land.

Updated Aust Time 9.01pm