Queen Victoria’s Thongs

At least twice during the conference I attended in Melbourne, once during the opening ceremony, and once before the presentation of the aboriginal interpreters, we heard the words: “We acknowledge that this conference is being held on the ancient lands of the Koorie people”. On 13 February 2008, at the beginning of his term of office, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd made a formal apology to the Aboriginal peoples: ”We apologise for the laws and policies of successive Parliaments and governments that have inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians. We apologise especially for the removal of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children from their families, their communities and their country. For the pain, suffering and hurt of these Stolen Generations, their descendants and for their families left behind, we say sorry. To the mothers and the fathers, the brothers and the sisters, for the breaking up of families and communities, we say sorry. And for the indignity and degradation thus inflicted on a proud people and a proud culture, we say sorry”. And now the Aboriginal flag, top half black (the Aboriginal people), bottom half red (the earth), and a yellow circle (the sun) in the middle, flies together with the Australian flag on government buildings. 

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 At Kangaroo Ground, sadly minus the kangaroos, now a suburb of sprawling Melbourne, I drive up to Garden Hill on a mild winter day to see the glistening skyscrapers of Melbourne some 27km away. Panels tell the history of Kangaroo Ground and deftly try to balance the interests of all the communities. I learn that the area was inhabited by the Wurundjeri clan of the Kulin people. Then in the 1850s came the Scots, who brought their cattle. A picture shows them in kilts. In Victoria men outnumbered women three to one; the English outnumbered the Scots two to one; and sheep outnumbered people by a thousand to one. But not in the close-knit Scots society of Kangaroo Ground.

Many of their descendants were killed in the First World War, especially at Gallipoli. Here on Garden Hill a tower was erected in their memory, and an ANZAC tree was recently planted. On 25 April 1915, 860 young soldiers of the Australian and New Zealand Army Corps were killed when landing to attempt to take the Gallipoli peninsula from the Turks, who were fighting with the Germans. They landed on the wrong beach and proved easy fodder as they scrambled up the steep hill to try to take the Turkish stronghold. More attempts were tried in the next four months, but advances were only temporary, and the Turks, under the command of Mustafa Kemal, later Ataturk, withstood. A total of 8.709 Australian soldiers died before Gallipoli was finally abandoned in January 1916, and a total of 61,522 were killed in WWI. And remember, the population of Australia was only three million. The five Australian colonies had only formed a nation in 1901, and this was their first war. To use a cliche, it was the day when the new country lost her virginity.

ANZAC day is a public holiday here. Many Australians and new Zealanders visit Gallipoli on 25 April. The main cities all have ANZAC monuments. At the supermarket I buy ANZAC cookies, surely tastier than the hard and dry rocks that the soldiers tried to digest. In the War Memorial Museum in Canberra I get an idea of Australia at war. In the Second World War Australia declared war on Germany as soon as Britain did and sent soldiers to North Africa to fight. Then Japan began to flex her muscles in the Pacific, occupying various Pacific islands and parts of Papua New Guinea. A Japanese attack and even occupation to get hold of Australia’s precious minerals was a real threat. The UK was too stretched in Europe to help. So the US sent Australia Kittywake fighters and helped set up aeroplane factories in a country that had never manufactured a car. Though Japanese submarines attacked  in Sydney harbour on 31 May 1942. Japan was eventually repelled, but Australia owed a great favour to the US and sent soldiers to Korea, Vietnam, Afighanistan, and even Iraq.

Australia has been suffering a severe drought, reservoirs are only 25% full; water restrictions are everywhere, but sheep and cattle grazing happily in the showers and lush green of Victoria belie this. In this part of Australia kangaroos are mainly to be found in the reservation areas and sanctuaries. At the entrance to Wilsons Promontory a chubby wombat grazes at the side of the road. I thought I had seen wombats in the trees at night in Fitzroy Park in Melbourne, but no, they were possums, which look like big rats and behave like squirrels. And then there are the smaller roos, the wallabies, the Tasmanian red devils, the only carnivorous marsupials, the lazy koalas, which sleep 20 hours every day up in the gum trees. And here in Sydney many of the trees in the Royal Botanical Garden are full of flying foxes! Weirdest of all the lyre bird, a henlike bird covered on one side by fancy ostrich feathers and the other by a plume which resembles a lyre. It cackles and cawks, imitating all the other birds within range.  http://www.aussie-info.com/identity/fauna/lyre.jpg

And the gawky emu: according to Aboriginal lore, this is how the emu lost its ability to fly: “An emu with very long wings once made her home in the sky. One day she looked over the edge of the clouds, and down on the earth she saw a great gathering of birds dancing by a reed-grown lagoon. High in a gumtree the bell birds were making sweet music with their silvery chimes; the kookaburra, perched on the limb of a dead tree, was chuckling pleasantly to himself; while the native companion danced gracefully on the grass nearby.

The emu was very interested in dancing, so she flew down from her home beyond the clouds, and asked the birds if they would teach her to dance. A cunning old native companion replied: “We shall be very pleased to teach you our dances, but you could never learn with such long wings. If you like, we will clip them for you.” The emu did not give much thought to the fact that short wings would never carry her home again. So great was her vanity that she allowed her wings to be clipped very short. When she had done so, the native companions immediately spread their long wings-which they had previously concealed by folding them close against their backs-and flew away, leaving the emu lonely and wiser than before. She never returned to her home in the sky, because her wings would not grow again. They have remained short and useless ever since. This is the reason why emus run very fast, but never fly”.

 At immigration in Melbourne Airport I shift queues. “Mate, it sometimes pays to stay in the same line”. The Indian-looking official who checks my passport wishes me: “Have a good day, mate!”. And everyone uses the expression I had never heard: “No worries!” The bloke, and here every mate is a bloke, who picks up my heavy bag to put it into the boot of the car I hire, quips, “Bet you got a body in here, mate; it’s gonna do me hernia in!” Our guide round the Victoria Parliament hardly seems to respect politicians: “They put the press up there in the gallery, right over the members of parliament, so they can see who’s asleep”. In the main hall a statue of Queen Victoria faces a cardboard cutout of Mary Poppins. Melbourne, and not Sydney, will now receive the musical production of Mary Poppins, a cause for municipal celebration. The statue of Queen Victoria was rejected by Britain and sent to the colony as the Queen was wearing thongs (sandals not the skimpy bikini bottoms). We were certainly not amused!

On Friday in the Second Test (cricket) at Lord’s, London, the players are introduced to the Queen, as is tradition on the second day of the Lord’s Test. On SBS TV, Stuart McGill, ex-Australian player is the commentator: “Here’s Lizzie being presented to the players. I hope nobody does what Dennis Lillie did and ask her for her autograph!” And we cut from her Majesty to the advertisement for VB beer, celebrated in a march by “Blokes Who Refused To Eat Quiche”. Well, England are now stuffing the Aussies (for a change!)