The only time I really feel “Australian” is when I’m out of the country.

It’s not until you’re standing at a bar in Florence, amongst fast-talking, smartly attired Italians drinking your morning coffee, or looking longingly at a jar of Vegemite in a raucous, noodle-packed supermarket in Ho Chi Minh City, that you realise that we’re a bit different.

After my first trip overseas, which I loved – I hasten to add, when I boarded the Qantas plane in Athens and the pilot said, “Gidday, I’d like to welcome you on board…” tears rushed to my eyes: an Aussie accent – I’d missed it and I realised I was glad to be going Home. Yes, Australia was now Home with a capital “H”. I’d never really thought that before then.

It’s only when you’re travelling that you really become aware of all those things that make you Australian, and all the things that you take for granted. A recent trip to San Francisco where I met a number of homeless people, reminded me how fortunate we are to have systems that provide social security and a good level of health care. What we have isn’t perfect, and people still fall through our “safety nets”, but we do tend to look after people pretty well.

The other thing that always strikes me when I travel is how much space we have in Australia.

We can breathe! We can move about without having to always negotiate crowds. We can, if we want to and have the money, build houses with big back yards. And just a short drive from most of our cities will take you into a big expanse of space, with few houses and big, big skies. I love Australia’s big skies.

We joke about being the Lucky Country. Our Luck is mostly spoken of ironically, but the fact is, we are lucky. We have tremendous freedoms, most of us lead comfortable lives and each night most of us go to bed in a safe home with our bellies full. But we are a bit mean with all our advantages, despite the fact that there really is enough to go around.

There’s enough to work together with our Indigenous people to enable them to lead the lives of dignity, self-respect and health that non-Indigenous Australians take for granted. There’s enough to welcome in asylum seekers and refugees and help them build lives free from the war, discrimination and deprivation that they have fled. There’s enough to give a hand up to those who we sometimes begrudgingly give a hand-out.

I feel very lucky to be Australian and to live in this country.

I value our freedom and our plenty. I love our sense of humour and playfulness. I love our larrikinism. Our country has a breadth and a beauty that moves me deeply but sometimes I feel just a little bit ashamed of how we as a people care for others. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could share all that we have with all that live within our shores? And maybe even with some of those who don’t…