AUSTRALIAN STORY Well-known migrants tell Jane Rocca what they found when they first arrived on our shores - the good, the bad and the surprising.
Aliir Aliir Mathias Cormann Poh Ling Yeow Colin Fassnidge Carla Zampatti Akira Isogawa Rebecca Gibney Harry Triguboff Tara Moss Piero Gesualdi Pettifleur Berenger PHOTOGRAPHY: Anthony Johnson, Philip Gostelow, Ryan Pierse, Eddie Jim, Hugh Stewart, Nick Cubbin, Louise Kennerley COLIN FASSNIDGE 42, chef Came to Australia from Ireland aged 26, and was sponsored to work in a Sydney restaurant.
"Ilanded in Sydney just before the Olympics, and the place was exploding with energy. In England, cuisine was French driven, but Sydney was embracing Japanese, Italian and Chinese ingredients, and you could mix them.
InLondon at that time, you wouldn't do that. Sydney was amelting pot of people and techniques. That was very eye- opening. I couldn't believe that in the morning you'd go to work and then head to the beach. 
Australians made the most of freetime. That really stood out."
TARA MOSS 42, author Came to Sydney from Canada aged 22, when she was working as an international model.
"Iarrived in Sydney on Australia Day. I had already spent seven years travelling and living in New York, Madrid, Hamburg, Milan and London as a model.
Iremember going straight to Bondi Beach with my suitcase, because it was a famous place.
Istayed in a small hotel room that night, waking to the sounds of the waves. Most of what I knew of Australia was through Hollywood, or from photographs of Uluru and Bondi Beach. I suppose I imagined kangaroos and Crocodile Dundee, as many international travellers did in the 1990s. I didn't realise that I would later make Australia myhome.
In2002, when I became an Australian citizen, it was one of the proudest moments of my life."
POH LING YEOW 42, chef and artist Came to Australia from Malaysia aged nine with her family. "I never felt I really belonged in Kuala Lumpur. I was a terrible student.
Ialways felt I had been beamed in from somewhere else and that something was not quite right inmy life. When we landed in Adelaide, I felt a huge relief. I loved everything about it right away - the street signs, the smell of eucalyptus, the birds, the sound of magpies warbling. I grew to love Vegemite too.
PETTIFLEUR BERENGER 51, property developer, star of The Real Housewives of Melbourne Came to Australia from Sri Lanka at 19, joining members of her extended family.
"Iused to watch the TV show The Sullivans as a teenager and dreamt of being in Australia and riding a horse.
Ifellin love with the lifestyle.
Ilanded at Melbourne airport at 5am wearing a polyester suit and was bombarded with a freezing cold winter. I remember the airport seemed so clean and the lawns were manicured - it was the opposite of Sri Lanka."
PIERO GESUALDI 68, designer Came by ship to Australia from Italy aged seven with his mother and sister to join their father, who was working here. "I remember pubs on every corner in North Fitzroy, where we lived. All my Aussie mates had dads who would drink there, but my father never went near pubs. It was the time of the six o'clock curfew, and I would go with the Aussie kids to pick their fathers up out of the gutter because they were pissed every night. I became known as 'Peter', because nobody could pronounce my name. I wanted to become Australian and felt a bit embarrassed about my Italian culture. Everyone was eating sandwiches with hundreds and thousands, peanut butter or cheese, and I had salami in mine.
Iembraced the Australian way untilI was 19.
While studying architecture atuniversity, Idiscovered the beauty of Italianism and decided my name wasn't sobad after all."
AKIRA ISOGAWA 51, fashion designer Came to Australia from Japan aged 21 on a working-holiday visa. "In Sydney I instantly noticed the freedom. I was a university student and didn't feel bound to home any more. In the '80s, it wasn't common for Japanese tovisit Australia, but the government was encouraging young Japanese to explore the world. I noticed Sydney's colours: green, yellow and orange. The city didn't feel hectic and it was safe. It was the right fit for me."
REBECCA GIBNEY 51, actor Came to Melbourne from New Zealand at 19 for a holiday and found work on a children's TV show. She intended to stay for sixmonths, but Australia became home. "I vividly recall the smells of Asian cuisine in Victoria Street, Richmond. Coming from Wellington, I hadn't tried many different foods. It was the smell ofcultural diversity, and it opened my eyes to what a melting pot Australia was and how welcome everyone was. The landscape was huge and vast. I remember seeing Uluru and thinking, 'Wow'. I felt the Indigenous spiritual energy rightaway."
HARRY TRIGUBOFF 83, property developer Came to Australia from China aged 14 with his elder brother, Joseph. His parents stayed in China, later migrating to Israel.
"When my brother and I arrived at Kingsford Smith Airport in Sydney, we had to find a hotel.
Someone showed us a pub and explained that this was a hotel - we could get a room on top of it.
It was new to us. I remember going to see the Three Sisters inKatoomba. The [Blue Mountains] range was very long and it impressed me. I saw so many white people at Bondi Beach. They were all brown fromthe sun."
ALIIR ALIIR 21, Sydney Swans AFL player Came to Australia with this mother and siblings aged nine, after being born in a refugee camp in Kenya to Sudanese parents. "I was only interested in playing sport with my friends.
Ididn't know much about the political situation in Africa. We just loved being outdoors and kicking a ball. I remember arriving in Sydney and it felt massive.
Learning the language was the hardest thing - it was difficult to communicate with other kids.
Iwanted to fit in as soon as Iarrived, and playing football was a good way to meet people."
CARLA ZAMPATTI 73, fashion designer Came by ship to Fremantle from Italy aged nine with her mother and brother tojoin her father, whowas working in the West Australian gold-mining town ofBullfinch. "I left a valley and mountain range in northern Italy that was lush and green and arrived in the outback town of Bullfinch, which was flat with lots of red dust. I learnt what a willy- willy was: a sandstorm that rises and which you can see in the sky.
As it comes towards you, you have to run or you'll be covered in red dust. I attended a school with five pupils, and was the only foreign child, but I found it exciting and adventurous. I loved the openness of Australia and within a month I started to feel like this was home."
MATHIAS CORMANN 45, Finance Minister Made his first trip to Perth from Belgium in 1994 to visit his girlfriend, an Australian he had met while both were studying in Britain. He settled in Australia permanently in 1996. "I remember taking my first 16-hour flight from Brussels to Singapore and then a five-hour flight to Perth. It felt very long. You never get your head around distances until you live in Australia. In Belgium, we would go on holiday to the coast, 200 kilometres away, and that felt like a very long trip.
In Australia, 200 kilometres is like a trip from Perth to Bunbury.
Now that I travel a lot, I don't think about the distances and time as much.
As an Australian, you get used toit."