I’m taking a “me day” today and am watching mundane pointless afternoon television.
So, “Boarder Security: Australia’s Front Line” is on. A couple of things I noticed.
There’s a California valley girl rising at the end of most sentences, whether or not it’s interrogative.
Aunty: Does everyone say “aunty” as opposed to aunt? It sounds bizarre coming from a male adult.
More thoughts to come…
And another thing: I can’t imagine carrying drugs or undeclared items through customs. I’d hyperventilate and collapse in front of them.
“What’s this?”
Thunk…
“Boarder”?
Border. Oops.
Aussies not only talk funny, they spell funny too. 
My question is - WTF does customs have to get a postal worker to open a suspicious parcel down there?? Is Australia Post (or whatever they call themselves) that high and mighty?
First, I carry drugs across the Canada/US border all the time and never declare them since they can lead to all sorts of hassles including confiscation, which would be very deleterious to my health. This started on a train from Vancouver to Seattle, when the border patrolman told the guy in the seat in front of me that is was illegal to take any drugs across the border. This was shortly after the US congress passed a law to prevent Americans to order their prescriptions from Canadian pharmacists (which can be considerably cheaper) and the idiot border patrolman misunderstood, or the bill was poorly drafted or something. Even so, the drugs you carry are supposed to be in their original bottles with their original labels while I have organized them into pill boxes.
Second, yes I have carried newly purchased computers across the border without declaring them. No big deal since I cross the border several times a year and who can know how old a computer is? No sweat.
Oh yes, I almost forgot. I call that rising inflection “Valley speak” since I think it started in the San Fernando. It has not hit the east and perhaps never will. Awful isn’t it?
Using Aunty as opposed to Aunt is pretty standard IMO. I wouldn’t look askance at someone using it.
I’m not sure if the show (or the officials) just uses artistic license with who has to open it, but they don’t need an Australia Post Officer.
A quick excerpt from the Australian Postal Corporation Act Where it stipulates that you need three customs officers to open a package.
What, no one remembers Auntie Mame?
“Auntie” or “Aunty” is also commonly used in Hawaii. There’s even a popular Italian restaurant in Honolulu with the cute name of Auntie Pasto’s.
The rising inflection has been noted as a feature of Australian speech at least since The Story of English in 1986.
“Aunt” sounds rather formal and stick-up-your-butt to my (Australian) ears. “Aunty” is more laid-back. Also - very common word in Aboriginal communities where it’s a pretty standard term of respect/affection to an older woman who may or may not be related to you, and will be used just by itself (“what you up to this arvo, brah?” “Gonna go see Aunty” - that kind of thing)
The rising inflection (I think technically called “uptalk”) is not universal in Australia, or even close to universal.
There are no hard and fast rules but broadly, it’s more common amongst (a) women (b) young people © those of a lower socio-economic background.
I act as a practice moot judge every now and then and almost every year I have to counsel some of the students against uptalking. It’s always young women who have the problem. And it is a problem in the context of a moot because uptalking sounds uncertain and lacking in confidence; as if you are making a statement and querying yourself at the same time.
IME “aunt” and “aunty” are both common.
Three ? Maybe thats why they get ONE post office worker…
But anyway, the post office guy is then able to open the package and then repackage it if its cleared… Or used as sting style evidence (deliver package, see who opens it, try to show they arranged the package to be sent…)
Also, the post office is meant to have the cost of the staff there as their prices for package services… while customs can’t do that (without then imposing a tax or fee on Australia post.) as they don’t want to be hindered in their "try to do 100% " scrutiny strategy. (the freight companies would make it harder to get packages scrutinized if there was a fee for each package )
Interesting thing. Go to google and do image search for “Aunt - site:au” and you get, pretty much, a bunch of links to pictures of old American TV shows. I’m actually hard pressed to find an Australian image on the front page at all - maybe 2 or 3 in the first 20.
Now do it for “Aunty - site:au” Suddenly the image search is filled with a) Aboriginal women, b)Aunty Jack and (this surprised me) sexy Indian chicks. Apparently ‘desi aunty’ is A Thing on teh interwebs
Aunt sounds so English, most people I know say aunty. Australians do have different modes of speech depending on where you are and also back ground, the rising inflection is not used by everyone just as 'ay is not used by all Canadians. Personally I don’t use a rising inflection.
Aussie Post is pretty powerful in Australia, still government owned etc.
Ceci n’est pas une knife.
“Aunty” is pretty common in India as well, sometimes pronounced “anti”.
Weird tangent. Out of a whimsy, I just did a Google search for the phrase “next door aunty”; the top hits contain a lot of Indian sites, a lot of them erotic/pornographic in nature.
The only time I hear “uptalk” is in public, from the young and/or foolish. Schoolkids or hipsters talking in that stupid affected hipster drawl are the only subcultures in Australia that do the Valley Girl thing. You might find the occasional adult dumbarse who talks that way, most Australians don’t.
ETA: Subquestion - do hipsters in general affect the Lumpy Space Princess voice, or is that a purely Australian hipster thing?
Ok, I have a new punch line, now I just need the setup question.
Well, “awnt” sounds English. Back stateside, it was “ant.”