Ten things Aussies dream about Australia.

1. Sports hero:
   Become a national sports hero: win not one (Australia collects numerous medals each Olympics), but lots of gold medals at the Olympic Games, like swimmer Stephanie Rice winning three gold medals in the Beijing Olympics. Highly honoured will also be the person who hit a century in the decisive fifth Ashes test cricket match against England. Sports personalities are regularly nominated for `Australian of the year` showing the Aussie passion for sports. Rugby, Australian Rules football (footy) and cricket are the most popular, but soccer and cycling are on the rise.
    
2. Win the lottery, or cash in at the `Pokey’s:
   Australians are among the biggest gamblers in the world, spending over 14 billion dollars a year (about a 1000 dollar per adult) on all sorts of games, especially racing and the `Poker machines`. Per Capita, Australians spend more money on gambling than any other nation. With less than 1 percent of the world's population, Australia has more than 20 percent of its poker machines. It provides the government with large amounts of tax-dollars, but raises questions about the danger of gambling addiction.
    
3. Breed race horses and win the Melbourne Cup
   Horse breeding is popular in country Australia and the nation is well known for bringing forth top talent race horses. Top of every breeders list is `to own and/or ride a horse that wins the Melbourne Cup: Australia is the only country in the world where a horse race, brings the nation to a stand still. The race has turned the first Tuesday of November into a public Holyday in Victoria, and the winner is a true hero.
    
4. Beer: Get life supply of beer, Shiraz or Chardonnay
   For long Aussies were the biggest beer drinkers in the world (only to be surpassed by the Czechs and Germans). Australian hospitality means that you will be invited to a traditional Aussie BBQ. BYO of course, which means `Bring Your Own`. So bring a few steaks or sausages but surely don’t forget to bring some beers, as a BBQ without beers is like Kangaruni without students. However: the last few years, wine has become extremely popular. Not surprising considering the fantastic quality of Australian drops. Most popular grapes: Shiraz (red) and Chardonnay (white).
    
5. Own a home or `act` the suburb life in soap series like Neighbours
   Australians dream of buying their own, free standing, home in the suburbs: More than 90 per cent of 16- to 24-year-old students say buying a home is their biggest goal in life. However this dream is being chattered as average house prices related to average income are among the highest in the world. It means that half of the people under thirty still live at home. As living the dream becomes more and more unattainable, you can dream of it while acting in, or watching, the daily popular soap `Neighbours`. To honour this Aussie Icon of suburbia life, the Melbourne museum displays the first kitchen from Neighbours. A role in Neighbours is a dream for many and can lead to great acting/singing careers like Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan (Photo: Neighbours wedding Charlene and Scott).
    
6. Become a volunteer, either at home or overseas
   While the government spends less than half on international development aid compared to other Western Countries, many individual Australian students dream of helping the needy or poor in this world. Almost a third of the population turns this dream into reality making Australia a county that largely runs on volunteers.
    
7. Beach House
   Spend summer holidays in your own beach house, maximum one hour drive from home. Aussies love the beach and they don’t want to be too far away from it so they can go to their beach house for the weekend. This means that throughout the country, many beaches are empty and land is cheap. However prices of beach houses near the capital cities have multiplied in recent years, making it a relative expansive way to spend your holidays. Some people have chosen to move entirely to the coast and commute back to the city. This trend became immensely popular after the soap `Sea Change` aired on national television.
    
8. Travel overseas after finishing school and before attending University
   Many young Aussies travel overseas to study, live and work in another environment. As Australians are allowed to work in England for a certain amount of time, whole communities of Australians populate the large English cities. Recently a new sort of traveller emerged: the baby boomer. After retirement baby boomers go either overseas for many months of the year, or buy a luxury camper/caravan and travel north in winter. These `Grey Nomads` or `Geriatric Gypsies` are flooding the Interstate desert highways in the mornings, to arrive at the next stop in the early afternoon, setting up camp at one of the numerous road stations and turning them into virtual `old peoples campuses`, best to avoid if you are under 40!
    
9. Private Education
   Send your kids to one of the private schools. As private education is seen as the `holy grail` of parenthood, private schools have been able to raise their fees to amazing proportions. Parents are often asked to pay double the amount compared with only a few years ago, with the top schools charging well over 20,000 dollars a year. Individual Australians pay the second highest amount for education compared to state contribution in the Western world. Still statistics show no significant better career achievements for kids from private schools compared with children from (free) public schools.
    
10. Buy a dream car or make a real difference for the environment: Two opposites.
    As the majority of Aussies until recently never really cared about pollution, big, fast, eight cylinder cars are still a dream for many, especially men. The Rudd government put the climate change discussion on the agenda, 4 out of 5 Australians now list the topic as the most important political issue. Australia finally signed the Kyoto treaty and many dream of a real change in attitude towards the environment.