Shannon and Sam at the Australian Education trade Fair in HCMC yesterday with the indestructible hanball board.
Last weekend, the Swannies were out in force in both Hanoi and Saigon promoting Australian education as part of an Australian Education Trade Fair sponsored by Austrade and Study in Australia.
On Saturday, the Swannies in Hanoi went to the Chu Van An High School where the Trade Fair was being held. hanoi Coach, Adrian Enright and Hanoi President, Daniel Hopkins led the keen youngsters through some basic handball skills to prepare them for an important aspect of studying in Australia: playing Australian Rules Football.
Chu Van An is a selective entry school for Hanoi’s best and brightest – and it showed with the students quickly adapting to the peculiarities of the oval shaped ball. The Vietnam Swans rewarded the most accurate handballers with Vietnam Swans and AFL Merchandise.
Hanoi Coach, Ado, offers some useful tips.
Meanwhile Dave “SOS” Skowronski and David Diviny introduced the students to the vagaries of kicking and marking and provided an outline of the basic rules of the game.
Overnight, the Trade Fair rolled on down to Saigon where it was met with a fresh set of Swannies; namely Saigon Prez, Sam Conroy, Shannon Leahy, Model Hewy and Phil Johns.
Hewy was the instant crowd favourite as there was a giant poster with his image on it. Ms Thanh Thu from the cable TV station, VTC, came over to have her photo taken alongside the Hewy (to see photo, click here).
Loads of students gathered and had great fun handballing and kicking the footy at the indestructible handball board.
Alas, handballing through the hole in the board, the bull’s eye, was proving quite the challenge for, not just the women wearing their traditional Vietnamese dress, the ao dai – but for everyone including the Swannies’ players. Enter Austrade Commissioner, Tony Burchill.
Playing footy in an ao dai is not a problem for Vietnam’s versatile women.
“Give me the ball”, he ordered. And so we did. He then nonchalantly handballed the footy through the hole without it even touching the sides. A bull’s eye in the most emphatic fashion! Tony then retrieved the ball, tossed it back to an adoring crowd and walked off giving a generous wave. The stuff of champions.
Soon after, the Australian Consul General, John McAnulty, arrived. Hearing about Tony Burchill’s performance, John tried his hand and was very unlucky not to score a bull (click here for photo). But as he pointed out, it has been much longer since he has handballed compared with the Austrade Commissioner.
Meanwhile, the students kept handballing and kicking the footy, having a great time. They loved it.
The same students may visit other education trade fairs put on by the French, English and Americans – but there, they won’t find the Vietnam Swans demonstrating Australia’s signature sport, Aussie Rules.
To see more photos of the footy clinics in Hanoi and HCMC, click here.
