Few things are as perplexing as Australia’s identification with an ineffective piece of rubber that can send you hurtling chin first onto scorching asphalt after busting a plugger.
The thong is as Australian as sushi, based on the Japanese zori which has kept its countrymen shuffling since the seventeenth century.
At least New Zealanders had the decency to call them jandals, a cheerful portmanteau of Japanese sandal. We chose a word that leads visiting Americans to question our vocal admiration for wedgie-inducing underwear.
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Since the end of the second world war the thong has become a barnacle on the esky of Australian culture, representing a laid-back approach to life that hasn’t existed since people could afford to rent in Sydney.
Before local production began in 1960, rubber manufacturer Dunlop imported 300,000 pairs of thongs from Japan, making the flat footwear as synonymous with Australia as football, meat pies, kangaroos and Holden cars. Decades later local production has dwindled, and we are watching women’s soccer, eating shawarma and driving Teslas, but we persist in cultivating calluses between our big toes and the little piggy that stayed home.
Part of our cultural identification with thongs comes from their affordability. They tapped into an Australian anti-establishment mindset without resorting to Chinese bu xie (pronounced boo-shyeh), the black cloth slip-ons worn by communists and kung fu followers.
Back in 1978 you could buy a pair of thongs from your local supermarket, Safeway or Franklins, for 99¢. Thongs manufactured in Australia today cost $49.95, or you can splurge on a $550 pair from Jimmy Choo, which is about as establishment as ordering flatbread at Totti’s.
Despite the recent efforts of Jimmy Choo, and Chanel to popularise thongs, they fail to showcase people’s feet to their best advantage. Even the most manicured toes seem overexposed beneath strips of rubber.
