AUSTRALIA, NEW ZEALAND

AUSTRALIA, NEW ZEALAND

Australia is situated in the eastern part of the Southern Hemisphere. It is surrounded by the waters of Pacific and Indian Oceans. Official name of Australia is Commonwealth of Australia. The capital city is Canberra. Other major cities are Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane or Darwin. The country is divided into six states and two territories – New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia, Tasmania, the Northern Territory, Coral Sea Islands Territory and Australian Capital Territory.

The first settlers came across the land bridge from South-East Asia. Original inhabitants are nowadays called Aboriginal Australians (Aborigines). In 17th century the land was named New Holland. Dutch explorers mapped a big part of the western and southern coast. But they didn’t want to settle down. At the end of the 18th century James Cook mapped eastern coast and named it New Southern Wales. The land became the British penal colony. Thousands of men and women were brought to Australia as prisoners until 1868, when the transports stopped. Unfortunately, the new settlers disrupted the lifestyle of the indigenous people and many became sick from new illnesses and died. In 1901, the Commonwealth of Australia was founded and the six colonies (New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania) federated as sovereign states. Nowadays Australia is wealthy country, thanks to gold and iron resources.

Australia is about as large as the USA, but some of the areas are completely unhabituated. The population is concentrated mostly on the coast. The centre of Australia is very dry – there is a dessert. The western part of Australia is flat, in the eastern part there are Eastern highlands or Great Diving Range. Than there are also Austrian Alps where the highest mountain of the land is situated. Australian alps are covered in snow even in summer. The largest river is the river Murray. Most of the Australian rivers are small creeks, when there is not enough rain. The largest of many lakes is Lake Eyre. Seasons in Australia are opposite to those in the Northern hemisphere. Northern part lies in tropical climate zone, the rest in subtropical or temperate zone. The country is often visited by hurricanes.

As I mentioned before, Australia is a part of Commonwealth. The official head of the state is Elizabeth II. Queen is represented by governor general (Peter Cosgrove). The Queen actually doesn’t have the main word. The real ruler is the Prime Minister (Malcom Turnbull). There is Federal Government for the whole country and each state has its own government and institutions. The Federal Parliament consists if two houses – the Senate (64 senators) and the House of Representatives (elected in proportion to population of each state). The Australian flag is dark blue, with the flag of the United Kingdom in the upper left-hand corner. The lower left-hand corner contains a seven-pointed star known as the Commonwealth Star. Each of the star's points represents one of the six sovereign states, and the seventh point represents all of the territories. The rest of the flag is a picture of the Southern Cross constellation, which can only be seen in the southern hemisphere. It has one small star and four larger ones.