Australians celebrate Australia Day with hot air balloon rides in Western Sydney

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Australians are gathering across the country this morning to celebrate Australia Day. In Western Sydney, people took to the sky in hot air balloons to celebrate Australia’s national day.  Reporter Anushri Sood has the details from Parramatta.

Transcript

00:00We're here at Parramatta Park in Sydney's west and over the course of today more than

00:06350 locals will fly over Parramatta in hot air balloons as part of the city's program

00:13for Australia Day.

00:15The balloons began taking off at 6am just in time for sunrise and I've been told it's

00:20after a year or so that the hot air balloons are being featured at this event due to weather

00:25conditions.

00:27They only started going up this morning but the event actually kicked off last night where

00:32stationary hot air balloons were lit up to the beat of Indigenous music.

00:38We heard from the Lord Mayor of Parramatta who said that it's not just important to celebrate

00:43this city's present and future but also acknowledge this country's colonial past.

00:49So Parramatta specifically here in Australia, we've had our First Nations have stayed on

00:54this land for over 65,000 years and now today Parramatta's got over 128 different nationalities

01:01with 117 languages spoken so it's important that we celebrate both the past, the present

01:06and the future and that all of our community comes together to celebrate what unites us.

01:11We've spoken to a number of people at the event who all have different reasons for being

01:15here.

01:16Here's what some of them had to say.

01:18We moved to Australia 20 years ago for a better life and we all are happy living here so Australia

01:25Day is important for us as we're celebrating it's a land of Aboriginal people which is

01:34good for us to celebrate something special.

01:37We come every year just to celebrate and to show the kids, you know, the traditions of,

01:42yeah, very nice.

01:44Our understanding of cultural identity in Australia and coming together as one is through

01:51hard times and all that, sometimes we have to make it right for other cultures, even

01:55though where we come from or who we believe in but at the end of the day we need to stand

01:59together because when there's diabetics or the world's flooding or fires are happening

02:04we're all standing together no matter the culture, no matter the race, you know what

02:07I mean.

02:08Basically from India, in India it's a Republic Day, my birthday, here it's Australian Day

02:13so it's a good coincidence.

02:16This event precedes the next event in the program where the annual citizenship ceremony

02:21also held in Parramatta will take place and that's where the 2025 Parramatta Citizen of

02:28the Year awards will be announced and 50 members of the community will receive their citizenship.

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