Contemporary Australian culture combines influences from around the world. The dragons and fireworks of Chinese New Year, the carnival atmosphere of an Italian street fiesta, the gongs and flowers of a Laotian Buddhist festival - these diverse celebrations are as at home in contemporary Australia as Christmas, Anzac Day and cricket. Australia's cultural diversity ensures it receives the best the world can offer in the performing arts, as well as producing masterpieces of its own. Open any city newspaper for advertised performances of chamber music, opera, avant-garde plays, Shakespearian classics, world-class music, rock concerts, Broadway hits, dance, Aboriginal theatre, comedy, cabaret, and art shows plus touring exhibitions from the top galleries of Europe and North America. Australia's two largest cities, Sydney and Melbourne, compete to present the most impressive cultural events. However, Adelaide, in South Australia, hosts one of the most an extensive and exciting events - The Adelaide Festival, held biennially in even-numbered years. Thousands of Australian and international performers meet to create this spectacle, praised by arts writers for its originality, dynamism and fluid brilliance. The Adelaide Fringe Festival runs parallel to the main event, beginning a week earlier and featuring hundreds of performances in venues across the city. Every other February (odd-numbered years), Adelaide presents Womadelaide, a music festival presenting indigenous musicians from around the world who perform to thousands of people under a canopy of trees in Adelaide's Botanic Park. Outside the cities, just about every country town hosts an annual agricultural show. As well as providing a lot of family fun, these displays of local crafts, produce, livestock and horse riding, sheep shearing and wood chopping offer a memorable look at rural Australia
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