The massed forces of the Chinese proletariat are swarming across the sea, onto the mainland of Australia in serried ranks and with determination on their faces. Yes the Chinese invasion is here - and we've just committed another $250 million to help it along.
As our nation is getting older it's getting smarter and what was regarded as a peril a century ago is now seen as some of the best business we have ever had. Here in Business Daily every page holds some story about resources sold for billions, new ventures, new technologies tied to our links with China and the rest of prospering eastern Asia.
This week's focus has been on tourism, with the launch of Australia's new global advertising campaign. Not in New York or London but in Shanghai. Added to the drive for the dollar and euro is the yen for the yuan.
The current campaign does not swear at the visitors. How would "bloody hell" translate into Mandarin anyway? And there are no jolly Hogans putting shrimps on the barbie. But there is a child feeding a joey at the beach. Combining kangaroos and surf was quite a stroke, I thought. I hope visitors don't expect to see pods of them.
I always sympathise with the poor creative directors. They have to make sure each state gets a few seconds on screen or else there is political tub thumping. Already the Victorians are rumbling that their three seconds of Crown's flame-throwing do not equate to the more leisurely flight over Sydney harbour.
Then there's Katherine Gorge, rain forests, Uluru, wombats, Whitsundays, over a soulful background song with a viola that sounds almost Chinese. Oh what a tapestry to weave and make look like you meant it.
The slogan holding the bundle together is the two-years-old tag, "There's nothing like Australia". It ticks the right boxes, stressing our uniqueness and mentioning the product, though you couldn't call it memorable. But if you ever write a campaign to be translated into 17 different languages, as this one is, you learn to keep it simple.
A lot of emphasis has been put on social media, even bigger in China than here. Tourism Minister Martin Ferguson and MD Andrew McEnvoy proudly showed the Chinese media their interactive tablet app that becomes a colourful photographic brochure.
The high Australian dollar has made us an expensive holiday destination, so the campaign is very much targeted at the upper middle classes (forgive me, Chairman Mao, for using such a term) that can afford luxury. But amongst a billion people there are lots of them.
Last year passengers through Tullamarine from China increased by 32 per cent. Indonesia suddenly discovered its great south land, with their numbers jumping 86 per cent. Japan, South Korea and the Philippines also mushroomed.
Walking the city, I see fleets of buses pulling up at rather mysterious shops, around Collins and Bourke. A couple of times I've ventured in to discover big department stores totally geared to the tourist market.
Swarms of tourists rush around buying koala dolls and boxes of macadamias that you know you could get much cheaper at the Queen Vic market. But this is tourism territory, from toys to opals to snow-globe Opera Houses. I've seen variations on these in every tourist centre in the world. So it's good that we come into that category.
And tourism is not just ephemeral. The government is looking for long-term investment from these visitors, with outlines already prepared for some 80 projects - with $42 billion worth either planned or underway already. That's a lot of stuffed koalas.
ray@ebeatty.com
Blog: themarketeer-raybeatty.blogspot.com
