ANZAC Day is Australia’s most sacred day. It is the 4th of July and Memorial Day rolled into one. The holiday commemorates the landing of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps, ANZAC on the Gallipoli peninsula on 25 April 1915. This campaign would turn the acronym ANZAC into a noun because of the awesome fighting reputation these troops gained in that hell on earth. Thereafter, all Australian and New Zealand soldiers have been called ANZACs.
ANZAC is celebrated in Australia as remembrance to the fallen and to honor the veterans. As of last year there were exactly 50 WWI Australians left. The day is spent with parades and ceremonies, much like our Memorial Day. However, to an Australian it is also like Independence Day. The Australians consider the landing at ANZAC Cove to be the De Facto beginning of their national identity. For the first time, they had stood as a nation, fought and died as a country. ANZAC day is also the only day that the Australian (made famous by the ANZACS in WWI) gambling game, Two-up, is legal to play.
