Two truths, one lie

Yesterday, as part of an "ice breaker" for a pre-employment training program, I was asked to provide two truths and one lie. It was harmless enough, and so I decided to tell two truths that nobody believes, and one lie that everyone thinks is true:

(1) I was born in Tasmania.
(2) I have five sisters.
(3) I am a published author.

I wasn't sure about putting the "published author" bit in there, as it is so easy to prove. I am a verified Goodreads author, I have an Amazon profile and there are books you can buy with my name on them, and yet that was the first one I was accused of lying about. The rationale was "no authors write about different topics - they pick one topic and stick to it."

I was offended, even though it was just a game. Perhaps I had struggled to explain that I had written in anthologies, as I worried that they wouldn't understand what they were. They put me on the spot to name the books.

The next one they thought was a lie was that I had five sisters. Nobody believes that. It's too many to have. Of course, only one is a full sister, the others share either a father or a mother, not both. They are not step-sisters, though, as that's something different again.

Nobody asked me about Tasmania. Apparently I have a Tasmanian accent, so there was no need to ask me questions. I lived in Tasmania for 16 years, but I wasn't born there. I was born in Melbourne. I've lived about the same amount of time in Tasmania, Melbourne and in the Northern Territory (split between Alice Springs and Darwin). I didn't even think that there was a Tasmanian accent.

One man there could apparently tell that I had a Tasmanian accent. I don't know how you can tell as it is not something I've ever noticed. The only regional accent I was aware of in Australia was in Far-North Queensland, where the speech slows down to nothing.

I had considered a multitude of things that nobody believes, such as:

* I used to share a back fence with Ricky Ponting.
* I used to work for covert operations within Victoria Police.
* I used to do hair modelling.
* I once held the Tasmanian record for Triple Jump.
* I went to the red carpet of the Lion King musical in Melbourne.
* I was a member of the West Coast Eagles cheer squad for two years and went out onto the MCG holding the banner.

And, for my believable lies, there were others I could have chosen:

* My wife was born in Chile (she is Chilean but was not born there).
* I am related to Megan Gale (I'm related to Brendan Gale, not Megan).
* I have a twin cousin who was born on the same day as me (he was born 6 days after me).

I had never played the game before, but it was interesting.