Bird Watching

Trudging back from Parliament to the rented apartments we use when we're in Canberra last night, I was depressed by the bureaucratic wasteland created by the Communist-style planners - wide highways with hardly any cars circling vast anonymous office blocks surrounded by dusty, sunburnt verges.

Some of the verges do have lush grass and these have sprinklers installed which spring into life with no warning and give your suit a good soaking. There is possibly a knack to knowing when they're going to start up but, if there is, no one's told me. Canberra is not as friendly as the rest of Australia, with the exception of the mainly immigrant taxi-drivers, and I am beginning to see why. It's not a good place for the soul.

However, in the vacant lot next to the Department of Foreign Affairs, waddling around in the scrubby grass, I found four galahs, splendid plump, pink and grey parrots, and a sulphur-crested cockatoo, which, as the name suggests, sports a fine yellow quiff, contrasting with a pure white body. They were only a few feet away and completely unperturbed. But then they are big birds. They added a welcome touch of the exotic to the bland surroundings.