Joey board

Joey board
Originally uploaded by Broken Piggy Bank.

(click photo to view)

I don't have any kids. As such, I'm usually oblivious to the kid-related world around me, such as whether there is a ramp for strollers, kids' menu, booster seat, play area, mothers' room, kids' discount price, Toys-R-Us, Babies-R-Us, etc. It's not that I agressively ignore the kiddie mundo around me, I just filter out things that don't pertain to me. (You do the same thing, too.) Conversely, I filter in things that do, such as anything orange-, Austin-, Texas-, Mexico-, or Australia-related. Sometimes, my filters get crossed.

For example, I was meandering around the annual Austin Thailand Festival at Fiesta Gardens last April. While there, I had to see a man about a horse. Having negociated a good deal, I washed up, and then noticed this pull-down board thingy on the far end of the men's room wall. What caught my eye was a diaper-clad baby koala ("joey") with arms raised -- not the fact that it was a baby-changing table.

I stood there pleasantly stunned for a few seconds because I noticed a koala in Austin! Let me give you a bit of context: in Australia, the koala caricature permeates popular culture. There are heaps of koala-themed clothes, tea towels, pencils, notebooks, snacks, children's shows, hair accessories, games, soft toys, playground bouncy rides -- I even saw a smiling koala firefighter reminding me to "Install a Smoke Alarm" on the side of a Brisbane firestation. So, now you can understand why I was surprised to find an Australian koala slapped up on an American-made baby changing table from a Colorado company inside a men's room located on the grounds of an Austin park with a Spanish name, all during the Thailand Festival.

Then, my smile dropped. Because, well, because I realized that I had seen those baby-changing tables in Austin men's rooms for several years prior to my stint in Oz. I just never paid attention to them before.

Why do I travel so far away from Austin only to come back and notice what was always around me?