Today is Prince Charles’ birthday. He is 64. A special celebration was held in Government House with 63 guests who have a birthday today. They had to apply and were chosen by ballot. The chef made 64 small cakes – one for each guest including the Prince. Each cake was decorated with a New Zealand icon – something that New Zealand is famous for. The icons were all made of icing or something else like chocolate that people could eat.

　　Here are some of the icons on the cakes: jandals, buzzy bee, kiwi fruit, gumboots, hokey-pokey icecream in a cone, and a woolly sheep.

　　Vocabulary

　　?apply – send their name and say they wanted to be invited

　　?ballot – by chance, like a lottery; their name was pulled out of a box

　　?chef – expert cook (French word so ch is pronounced like sh)

　　?decorated – a picture or design on top of the cake

　　?icon – something that is important to a culture

　　?jandals – flip flops, thongs; rubber sandals with a rubber piece between the first two toes.

　　?buzzy bee – a child’s pull-along toy

　　?gumboots – boots made of rubber, worn by farmers

　　?hokey-pokey – a crunchy icecream flavour made of golden syrup

　　Questions

　　1.If you live in New Zealand, can you think of other icons?

　　2.If you live in another country, what are the icons for your culture?