Dead kangaroo comes back to life
Ron Mita
I was recently told a story where two guys driving through Australia
spot a dead kangaroo at the side of the road. Thinking it would be
funny, they put a shirt on the dead animal, set their camera for auto
and prop up the creature for a photo with themselves. The 'roo is not
dead but only sleeping. It wakes up and slugs the one guy breaking his
jaw. The animal then hops away with the shirt. The guys are stranded
miles from nowhere since the car keys were in the shirt pocket.
This story smells of urban folklore. Anyone out there heard it before?
Robert Warinner
Ron Mita (urban...@earthlink.net) wrote:
: I was recently told a story where two guys driving through Australia
How about this:
The book's title [_The Gucci Kangaroo_ by Amanda Bishop], for
example, refers to a story about tourists driving in the outback who
hit a kangaroo. Thinking the animal dead, they prop it against a fence
and dress it in someone's jacket, intending to take a gag photo.
But the stunned 'roo revives and bounds away with the jacket
containing the driver's passport, money, return ticket, etc.
Jan Harold Brunvand, _The Baby Train_
Or this:
Subject: The Gucci/Boston Celtics roo
From: mhol...@dircon.co.uk (Mike Holmans)
Date: 1996/11/17
Message-ID: <56npg4$a...@newsgate.dircon.co.uk>
Newsgroups: alt.folklore.urban
From the Sydney Morning Herald, November 18, 1996
COLUMN 8
WE ARE delighted to pass on this story from Lisa Haertsch, of
Rushcutters Bay, just back from Chicago. She says she was told about
two Americans who went driving in a 4WD in the Australian outback.
They hit a kangaroo, dragged it, apparently dead, from under the car
and propped it up against a tree. "But who gets this close to a
kangaroo ever?" she says. "One of them put his Boston Celtics jacket
on the kangaroo and they each took a picture of the other with the
dead roo." But the roo wasn't dead. It came to, lashed out, breaking
the jaw of one of them, and hopped off into the night, still wearing
the bright green Celtics jacket - with the car keys in its pocket.
GEE, thanks Lisa, for showing that one of the Great Urban Myths
is still around. Another Sunday Newspaper in 1986 told this GUM as
having happened to two Italian yachtsmen who lost a Gucci coat -
giving Amanda Bishop a title for her book on myths, The Gucci Kangaroo
and Other Australian Urban Legends.
[end quote]
From the AFU FAQ:
Fb.Driver runs over exotic animal,wraps in coat for fun photo;it revives, runs
off! Similar story: A hunter poses for picture w/deer w/rifle in antlers.
Andrew "you've got a name to live up to" Warinner
wari...@xnet.com
wari...@ttd.teradyne.com
http://www.xnet.com/~warinner
Home of the Flying Chickens: http://www.xnet.com/~warinner/chickens.html
Mike Holmans
Robert Warinner <wari...@typhoon.xnet.com> felt like reposting
wot I dug up
> From the Sydney Morning Herald, November 18, 1996
>
> COLUMN 8
> GEE, thanks Lisa, for showing that one of the Great Urban Myths
> is still around. Another Sunday Newspaper in 1986 told this GUM as
> having happened to two Italian yachtsmen who lost a Gucci coat -
> giving Amanda Bishop a title for her book on myths, The Gucci Kangaroo
> and Other Australian Urban Legends.
>
> [end quote]
>
To add some more to this, Graham Seal records it in his _Great
Australian Urban Myths_ (details and review at
http://www.urbanlegends.com/books/australian_myths.html ).
This is his commentary (written by an Australian for an Australian
audience):
"The Well-dressed Roo" gives us a chance to have a laugh at the expense
of those 'bloody tourists' who have helped to make tourism our fastest
growing industry. Not surprisingly, this tale is an old favourite and is
probably derived from bush yarns about a kangaroo mimicking the actions
of humans, especially in relation to arm-lifting at the pub. The story
has frequently appeared in the Australian press, and local folklorists
have collected and published numerous old and new versions of the yarn.
In the 1950s the tale was told about visiting English cricket sides, and
in the mid 1980s about an Italian America's Cup team in Western
Australia. [refers to Bishop] ...
But the theme of this tale is not unique to Australia - the concept of
poetic justice meted out to humans by supposedly dumb animals has many
international variations. [refers to Brunvand, TMP] ... There are even
German variations.
[end quote]
The interesting data point in that, to me, is the reference to the bush
yarns about humanlike behaviour by kangaroos, since I've not heard much
of those beyond the FAQ allusion to roos delivering the mail in the
outback. And Skippy.
Mike "This kangaroo hopped into a bar..." Holmans
El Sig has been looking to buy a suit. Hmmm.
The exciting AFU FAQ, and many other things, may be found at
http://www.urbanlegends.com