In April 2010, A year after moving to Australia from the Philippines, my family was able to attend the Sydney Royal Easter Show. At the time, I had no idea what the show is about. All I got from my classmates was that it’s a huge event with rides and showbags. Also, there was this ad on TV for the event and promoted this huge robot called ‘Robosaurus’.
Luckily, thanks to the generosity of my dad’s former boss, we managed to get some free tickets and off to the Sydney Olympic Park we go.
First Impressions
I may have underestimated how big this event was as the Sydney Royal Easter Show covered a majority of the Sydney Olympic Park Showground. From the train station to Qudos Bank Arena, so much is going. If there is one tip of advice I can share with you before you attend, it is this: PLAN EVERYTHING IN ADVANCED!!!
Money, itinerary, everything in between… you need to plan out everything you want to do. When my family was there, my brother and I wanted to go to all the rides while, my mum wants to see the farm animals, and my dad wants to talk with the emergency services. We all have different things we want to do so we brought up our map and planned our day accordingly. Also, as a new migrant family, we didn’t have a lot of money and ride tickets cost a lot. So we also have to plan and budget which rides we’d want to go.
Showbags
One of my favourite memories as a kid was the showbags. There are so many options and we can’t get all of them at once. There were so many to choose from. So many brands, so many goodies. And as mentioned earlier, we didn’t have a lot of money. Since the Sydney Royal Easter Show is a huge deal, my parents went lenient on us and we were allowed to pick at least 2 showbags to choose from.
A year after, The Sydney Morning Herald has a large segment on the Easter Show and in it was EVERY SHOWBAG AVAILABLE. So my family was able to choose and budget better.
The Activities
Along with the rides and showbags, there’s also plenty of activities to do for the whole family. Remember when I said that my dad wanted to talk with the emergency services such as the firemen and police? Well, NSW Police had an exhibition at the time and we got to play with their metal detectors. There was also a small arts and crafts section and I got to do some painting.
But I think the most notable was the petting zoo as I got to feed some goats, interact with the chickens, etc. There was this huge interactive and educational activity that happened during that year called ‘Passport To The Show’. Essentially, children are given passports and the way to fill them up was to visit every animal shown on it. We are then given small facts about the animals and tested on them. I think I struggled with either the cows or pig when I was doing it at the time. I think what’s great about it is that these farmers or animal presenters are enthused and passionate about the animal they’re presenting and really want kids to learn something.
How I found my first Sydney Royal Easter Show?
Overall, I really did enjoy my first experience at the Sydney Royal Easter Show. So much so that when my relatives came over from the Philippines, we manage to take them along with us to experience this event. In my opinion, The Sydney Royal Easter Show played a huge part when it came to my family settling in Australia. We got to experience one of the big events in Sydney and made us feel more at ease when living in a new country.
I haven’t been to the Easter Show after 2011 but I look forward to returning in 2021 to see how much has changed since then.
