Humor:

Boat-people's arrival shocks Canberra

Mystery surrounds the arrival of a boatload of 51 strange people in the inland Australian capital Canberra yesterday.

They came ashore at Yarramundi Reach on Lake Burley Griffin about 5.30am.

At first, they were thought to be refugees from the Middle East.

They were cold, hungry and in need of urgent medical attention after many weeks at sea and on the Molonglo River.

Later in the day, however, interpreters determined they were in fact from the Australian island state of Tasmania, very much to the south.

"We're dumbfounded," a normally unreliable department spokesman said. "We haven't got a clue how they got here.

"We offered them some shiny beads to go back to Tassie, but they want say they just want to stay.

"I don't know where on earth we are going to house them. Both houses of parliament are sitting at the moment, so that rules out that option."

There has been a marked increase in the incidence of illegal refuges to Australian shores.

Most of those detected by Australia's aerial surveillance are found to be headed towards northern shores in Queensland, Western Australia or the Northern Territory.

To date, Antarctica to the south has not posed a problem.

This is the first-known successful attempt from Tasmania

Tasmanians in smaller numbers have moved to Canberra in the past.

In fact, there are a number of federal politicians from the island state in the capital, though, they too have refused offers of shiny beads to go home.

"We're in a real pickle," the department spokesman said.

"On one hand, these are not illegal visitors. They seem to be Australian citizens and as such have as much right to be here as you and I.

"So we can't just bung them in the detention centre at Port Hedland, like we normally do with foreign boat-people.

"On the other hand, they are different, even more different than the five Tasmanian senators.

"If we allow them to stay, Tasmania might launch an armada of boat people.

"Who knows? They could already be on their way. Isn't that frightening?"

The people's boat, the Empress of Tasmania, has been impounded for inspection.

NB: I called this site Dunno because I kept drawing a blank when I had to put a name to it