LOCALS treated some international guests to a true Aussie experience when they visited Moree this week.
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On Tuesday evening First Moree Scouts were honoured to host 51 delegates representing 20 countries for a night of fun and fellowship.
The group were part of the International Scout and Guides Fellowship (ISGF) and were on the tour following the annual conference held in Sydney last week.
The international president from Portugal, Mida Rodrigues, was amongst the delegates as were many of the secretaries from the representing countries.
“ISGF is for anyone who was a member of Scouts or Guides when they were younger who want to continue working for the group, supporting the local community and growing themselves.
“ISGF is six-years-old and we represent more than 100 countries around the world,” Mrs Rodrigues said.
“After the conference we had the option of taking two tours, one which came to Moree. From here we’ve visited several towns.
“By visiting Moree we’ve been able to see the real Australia,” Mrs Rodrigues said.
“When you are in the city you don’t see how tough life is for you, waiting for the rain to come, and the heat; it must be a hard life,” she said.
“This is a very nice town and very different to our own countries. It’s been a really nice experience even with some dishes we aren’t used to,” she smiled.
Scout leader Lila Fisher said the group enjoyed talking and swapping badges with the youth members and were encouraged to teach the Scouts and Guides about their home country.
“They were very keen to see the Southern Cross, but it was too low in the sky so they had to be content with my chalk board description of how to find south,” Ms Fisher laughed.
“The representative from Bahrain taught me the Turks’ head knot which is used as a woggle for Scout scarves,” she said.
One of the greatest wishes of the visitors was to see a kangaroo up close, and luckily the locals were able to provide two joeys for them to cuddle, feed and take hundreds of photos of. “This was a highlight for many,” Ms Fisher said.
During their time in Moree the group visited a cotton farm, pecan nut farm, Goondiwindi and Lighting Ridge as well as a tour of the sites of Moree, including the local pools.
On the Saturday night Anna Simmons passed around a hat to collect for the Relay for Life and a delegation of them walked across to present the money to the Relay for Life committee.
A lady from Luxemburg commented that if they had Relay for Life in her country they would have to be careful not to walk into the neighbouring countries. Their country is 42km wide by 81km long.
There were four delegates from the Caribbean Island of Curacao that is so small it is not on any world map. It took them 20 hours to get to Australia and they couldn’t believe it took them another 12 hours to get from Sydney to Moree.