Slightly damp this Am and I had to set off earlier than usual so attired myself suitably and swanned off into the gray dawn,tinged slightly pink by a weak, albeit slowly rising sun. Each morning I wander down to the bend in my river to try and get a pic of the water rat as it wends its way home from getting in the days shop,or whatever water rats do of a night.Mostly all i get to photograph is the ripples where said rat dives as it spies me or hears laboured robbi breathing as i lumber to view. Sometimes on the opposite bank a gentleman appears who marches up and down making bird calls. These aren't your everyday strangled childish attempts, like graggggh/hoot, they are full bloodied exact cries of parrot/crow/magpie/duck and other assorted winged creatures. Not all at once mind ,but done on seperate days and normally in various ways.As a parrot he runs about busy like,magpie calls, he is studied in movements etc etc etc, you get the picture, do you not? Sort of in costume if you may, he finishes the cry of the day and strides away at a majestic pace not to be seen for some days, I know that 'cos i go to that spot each day and he only appears about once a week,or in a busy birdy time ,twice. This day (saturday) he was there on the opposite bank uttering cries of great distress like a badly love sick moorhen, but a very very agitated one as he was pacing about most furiously,flailing arms and hooting quite loudly. I do not fear for my safety as I am firmly ensconced on the opposing bank and unless he actually can take on all the characteristics of a bird and fly, I feel quite safe, for myself.. Alas I do feel a trifled concerned for his condtion as with the addition of the moorhen cry he has gone through the entire species of bird on the river, what next ?
In truth I do know that we are all different and there but for the grace of god go I, and self will be the first to admit that his bird calls are very similar to the real thing, buuuuuuuutt?
Leaving all the birdy stuff to one side it would appear that an event which threatens to overtake that of 'the' bomb going off somewhere, has awoken the interest of all bar those who live in outer space. Do I refer to the passing of that icon of crotch grabbing, quite possibly I do. Will anything I say on the matter make one iota of difference, not an atom, so I shall just finish at this point.
There is not one person or thing on the planet that can be all things to all, so whatever floats yer boat.
Many little things grab my attention, sometimes I feel that life is so full of just so much wonderful happenings, of course I dont discount all the crapola, that would be stupid and I know that I am not that. At my time in life I can truly say that I understand most of what makes ME, as a functioning human, tick over. There is no burning desire within me to be something else, I mean to be George Clooney would be okay,if you were George Clooney but imagine how hard it would be to be you and George. Do you see what I'm getting at? See, you are you,okay?, but by some act of something then you can be you and then someone else, just how hard would that be.
I would have liked to have been Marlon Brando when he played in 'The Wild One' because at that time I rode with a motorcycle,call it? a gang okay, DD/MC. (Darlington Devils MC) .
I designed the insignia, the skulls head from the old Mercury Record label(our band did a 45 for them) underneath that a pair of crossed pistons. Yes I did read a lot of books about chivalry, and okay so some of went to my head.The head really was a bit empty back then, looking back it was all pretty awful and juvenile. Perhaps we were the forerunners of Hells Angels here, who knows, but perhaps not as we were pretty tame stuff compared to how they are now. Don't forget this was in 1958 and life was rebellion then for most at 16.The film itself took ages to actually play here in OZ as the local censors were afraid that it might corrupt us poor innocent antipodeans. But all that is well in the past, although it took ages to outgrow the love of riding fast motor bikes as I only sold my last one 7yrs ago. Reaction times just don't cope with a machine that can get to 100kph in 6.6 secs once you get past a certain age. I raced bikes ,tore 'round the streets madly for years and dare I say was an absolute lunatic on them yet never had an accident worthy of the name. fell off a zillion times, but nary one bad prang.
Yes Hortense I know what you are about to say, given half the chance I would be down at the bike shop in a jiff, but not true old girl. Know my limits now, although it would be nice just once,
just like our esteemed prime minister who went to a strip club in New York, just the once mind.
We have had a very strange week in the federal sphere,politics I mean. But the oddest part of the whole week was that the person who actually committed a really heinous affront to parliament was the Treasurer and because of the way the Government could spin the words and muddy the waters, he wasn't made to answer any of the allegations. The opposition handled the affair badly and missed an opportunity to show up the Government for just what it is,on spin cycle numero 9. Wnter here so Horty and I haven't had the nerve to head off to Cocolat, we managed a meal at the Greek restaurant just afew doors up , that was super .Generous plates and lovely food all for $41 for the two of us it's still possible to eat well here in Adelaide at a reasonable price. I feel like indulging myself a little so I am going to leave one of my poems behind. This just came off the cuff from a line someone else wrote that grabbed my fancy, it is like all my stuff autobiographical. I liked writing it as there are memories there that I will hold onto. Grazie per quelle ricordi.
the fish monger sold samphire
(before you steam samphire
wash it carefully under cold water,
then steam over a pan of boiling water
a couple of minutes,
serve with melted butter.)
we picked samphire
she and I,when we wore younger clothes
washed our pickings in the crystal waters
of Salt creek as the tide rushed in
then lay in the lee
of sandhills that were Camelot,
she as Guinevere,I Arthur
and we did as all innocents will
here, it was market day ,
samphire was legitimate
encased in furled paper
a fine morning
with a sometime quick breeze
replete with scudding clouds,
late sun lifted, then
warmed ones back as it should,
given the month
though my June is never warm
unlike this place,
where skeins of history and life mixed,
colours of a different palette
an empty book, artfully laid carelessly to table top
seemingly randomly left, although contrived
forgettable memoirs of a pop diva or some such
lunch arrived , followed by
small talk, brushing the edges of compassion
mixed with truth and regret
reflections that were etched into the glass of time
so it was left to the question,
half full or half empty?
I plumped for half full
but then optimism is a forte,
thus the day was sweet
as time spent like this should be
its memory forever mine
better than pieces of eight
June 27th 2008
Saturday, 27 June 2009
Tuesday, 16 June 2009
Ink marks on a blank page tues 16th June
Just by way of explanation some of you might have noticed my last blog was almost a month ago.That it is I have been a little slack perhaps could be noted, but then again y'all have no idea what is i have been up to.Y'see don't jump to hasty conclusion,could i have spent the last few weeks floating down the Nile in a felucca, searching for the l;ost tombs of Karnak? oh i does wish that were so, or might i had wended my merry ways up a still crystal blue fjiord in Norway. Cuts to the chase and tells you that all this time i have been at home doing not much of anything.
That being almost so I cannot tell a lie so inform you that all this time I have been away from you lot I flailed lens to the bone getting awesome pictorials for all to peruse.In between times I also worked in spot of laser surgery to my left eye,will know the outcome in 6weeks.
Well you do all know where I live as I'm forever banging on about the place and how lucky I am to li(o)ve here. Okay, so y'all live where you do because it is just perfect,understood all that and really you didn't have to say it,'cos where you live would be just right, three bears porridge an all. Doesn't matter where I have been and lived, my philosophy reads like this,once you know your way back from what passes for the corner store ,then you are home',isn't that just so though?On my morning walk I pass the same folk each day,the lady who wears the hoody and walks a maltese dog ,the fellow who rain hail or shine walks in flip flops and leads a huge mastiff, or rather it leads him.
They both say morning to I, as does the lady with the odd looking poodle thing,dog that is. The chap who rides towards me just after her, he nods his head in a sort of ,I want to be friendly but am peddling so can't stop expression. The man who follows about two minutes later, doesn't matter what I do,he never even rings his bell,just peddles on grimly as if I was something he'd rather wish not get stuck on his tyres. I would like to think that's because he wear little sunglasses like John Lennon even when it is dark or very dim with heavy black cloud, he always has his light on too.
That reinforces my theory of folk who wear sunglasses at all times, even 9o'clock at night, and I don't live in midsummer Norway either.They,(darkish glasses wearers) live in a type of jaundiced nether world where all is colourless/muted and amorphous, so to him peering through Lennon type haze I perhaps look like a golem or creature from a dank nightmare.Actually I kind of like that idea of I, might just run with that next dress up day.oh, by the by, the pic is of the sunrise this am.
Inded so Hortense old bean the locals are restless at this moment are they not.what with that lovely Mr.Costello giving Parliament the old heave ho after 20years was no real shock now was it.We all knew he only had until the 30th of this month because they have to bed in new canditate for his seat.
The journo's seem a bit out of sorts with our Prime Minister too, he was flavour of the month a while ago now it seems even they have got tired of the spin cycle always on fast forward. He had his face on the TV so much some even thought he was the new logo for that free to air station. Would it be dear Horty that you have been right all along about him, he really is a bit too good to be true. Then yesterday that old gangster fellow 'tuppence ' Moran got himself executed proper goodfellows style coming out of his favourite deli, seems rather ironic as well that today the police arrested his ex sister-in-law and her sister/boyfriend for setting up the hit and then doing it. Hollywood might well have written the script Horty, except it was real and tuppence got his come-uppence.
That movie we went to was abysmal,('a film with me in it' ),those actors should have been shot instead of tuppence. Just as well life doesn't always imitate art is my new motto, the gelato was great at Cocolat after though.
That being almost so I cannot tell a lie so inform you that all this time I have been away from you lot I flailed lens to the bone getting awesome pictorials for all to peruse.In between times I also worked in spot of laser surgery to my left eye,will know the outcome in 6weeks.
Well you do all know where I live as I'm forever banging on about the place and how lucky I am to li(o)ve here. Okay, so y'all live where you do because it is just perfect,understood all that and really you didn't have to say it,'cos where you live would be just right, three bears porridge an all. Doesn't matter where I have been and lived, my philosophy reads like this,once you know your way back from what passes for the corner store ,then you are home',isn't that just so though?On my morning walk I pass the same folk each day,the lady who wears the hoody and walks a maltese dog ,the fellow who rain hail or shine walks in flip flops and leads a huge mastiff, or rather it leads him.
They both say morning to I, as does the lady with the odd looking poodle thing,dog that is. The chap who rides towards me just after her, he nods his head in a sort of ,I want to be friendly but am peddling so can't stop expression. The man who follows about two minutes later, doesn't matter what I do,he never even rings his bell,just peddles on grimly as if I was something he'd rather wish not get stuck on his tyres. I would like to think that's because he wear little sunglasses like John Lennon even when it is dark or very dim with heavy black cloud, he always has his light on too.
That reinforces my theory of folk who wear sunglasses at all times, even 9o'clock at night, and I don't live in midsummer Norway either.They,(darkish glasses wearers) live in a type of jaundiced nether world where all is colourless/muted and amorphous, so to him peering through Lennon type haze I perhaps look like a golem or creature from a dank nightmare.Actually I kind of like that idea of I, might just run with that next dress up day.oh, by the by, the pic is of the sunrise this am.
Inded so Hortense old bean the locals are restless at this moment are they not.what with that lovely Mr.Costello giving Parliament the old heave ho after 20years was no real shock now was it.We all knew he only had until the 30th of this month because they have to bed in new canditate for his seat.
The journo's seem a bit out of sorts with our Prime Minister too, he was flavour of the month a while ago now it seems even they have got tired of the spin cycle always on fast forward. He had his face on the TV so much some even thought he was the new logo for that free to air station. Would it be dear Horty that you have been right all along about him, he really is a bit too good to be true. Then yesterday that old gangster fellow 'tuppence ' Moran got himself executed proper goodfellows style coming out of his favourite deli, seems rather ironic as well that today the police arrested his ex sister-in-law and her sister/boyfriend for setting up the hit and then doing it. Hollywood might well have written the script Horty, except it was real and tuppence got his come-uppence.
That movie we went to was abysmal,('a film with me in it' ),those actors should have been shot instead of tuppence. Just as well life doesn't always imitate art is my new motto, the gelato was great at Cocolat after though.
Saturday, 16 May 2009
ink marks on a blank page Sunday May 17th
Seing as none of you were really interested in our Federal Budget 'cos it turned out to be a complete waste of time even having it on TV as the damn thing was such a negative and nothing thing, this then in the main is a blog about a wonderful little marsupial that we have here in OZ call a Bandicoot. But first I shall endeavour to give you a bit of background into our animals vis a vis yours.
One of the more endearing things about the names of animals here in the Antipodes is that none of the nomenclature of the little beasties sounds threatening or majisterial. Unlike those beasts of Africa ,Europe,Nth /South America and Asia we here in Australia don't having any screechy roary, mad things that will devour you in one bite. None of our nasties are like that,bit like us really, we do have nasty things that snap, poison and kill very quickly but all that is done with style and finesse.The taipan snake is the deadliest in the world,no roar at all, dead in 30 seconds, funnel web spiders creep beneath the sheets,one nip, goodnight you,not a peep out of it either.Box jelly-fish, get that down your speedos and look out, lets hope the beach resort is close to a hospital.Keep the trainers on when you go for a paddle in the waters of Queensland's Great Barrier Reef, that's in case you step on a stone fish,oops you didn't need that leg anyways.Ssssshhh though, notice just how quiet our deadliest things are? Unlike other countries .
Take TIGER for one, doesn't that conjure up a fierce, striped wild animal with enormous great teeth and very bad breath that will just be waiting in the wings to bite off a slice, of YOU? Then on the other hand we have here in OZ, the echidna, ooohhhhhhhhhh, how sweet, a little cutey pie thing that just curls up into a wincy little ball when frightened and only eats ants, those nasty critters that spoil your picnic, shame on you ants.Like the platypus, Echidna is a monotreme, an egg laying mammal. Next there is Rex the LION.Great hairy bit of a thing it is too, always poncing about the veldt like it owns the place, well you try and tell it to shove off then, see how you get on sistaaaahh.In the OZ corner we have the platypus, soft sleek furry type of creature that just burrows in the river bank for worms and stuff, doesn't even make a noise when doing so either and if frightened by any loudness will whip into its burrow where it hides until the nasty crashing about thingy has sloped off. Last but not least is the ELEPHANT, a monstrous great lump of a pachyderm that you cannot even make piano keys out of anymore, really good for nothing else than leaving massive huge piles of 'IT' all over the grass . Noisy sod of a beast too, trumpets away sixty to the dozen, then stomps all over the farmers maize crop,useless.
That is just Asia / Africa, space wont allow me to list all the yelling loud things from Europe along with the Americas .I have shown you just some of our nice little creatures who have no real obnoxious habits and finish up with a most personable lovely chappie who is a soft cuddly wuggly, that I myself relate to well.
We have the wombat, a pleasant sort of fattish fellow who is most congenial only coming out of his burrow at night making no sound as he goes about his business. He just eats, roots and leaves.
Enter my lovely little BANDICOOT.Not a monotreme like his friends the platypus and echidna just a common old variety marsupial and very shy, also where we stumbled across him, quite rare.To see him well you will have to enlarge the pic.
So there we have just some of our lovely sweet harmless denizens of the forest and glens of OZ, nice homely sort of a quiet likeable spot is OZ, but don't stand under the black wattles in midsummer as a pile of follow- me -caterpillars might drop down on you and their collective bites are deadly,no known antidote either.....sorrrrreeee, but I did warn you.
No Hortense I don't know the official name for those caterpillars, we used to see them on the farm. Remember when they fell on the horses neck and he could never race again? those little green ones that ball up together until one crawls out and they all go marching off in line.If you pluck the middle one out they all stop and ball up again until a leader just wings off , squash them and they give off a really punguent eucalypt smell. You do remember !, and that green stuff you could never get off your blouse so you had to throw it away, was a nice shirt that too.
Horty you didn't really like that Government minister who rabitted on about the infrastructure spending this morning, the Hon.Anthony Albanese . You don't like him, good, he sounded like a goat talking about billyons of dollahs then wouldn't admit to the fact that all the money he talked about wasn't actually going to be spent this year or even next,not for another 10 yrs Horty. What a load of old cobblers girl, to be quite frank m'dear I think he didn't really give a damn , just wanted to hear himself talk over the top of the interviewer.
Good deal that going to see 'angels and demons' friday then 'star trek' today, I does like a rollicking good movie or two.The gelato was at its best in Cocolat as well me lovely, in all, a top weekend
One of the more endearing things about the names of animals here in the Antipodes is that none of the nomenclature of the little beasties sounds threatening or majisterial. Unlike those beasts of Africa ,Europe,Nth /South America and Asia we here in Australia don't having any screechy roary, mad things that will devour you in one bite. None of our nasties are like that,bit like us really, we do have nasty things that snap, poison and kill very quickly but all that is done with style and finesse.The taipan snake is the deadliest in the world,no roar at all, dead in 30 seconds, funnel web spiders creep beneath the sheets,one nip, goodnight you,not a peep out of it either.Box jelly-fish, get that down your speedos and look out, lets hope the beach resort is close to a hospital.Keep the trainers on when you go for a paddle in the waters of Queensland's Great Barrier Reef, that's in case you step on a stone fish,oops you didn't need that leg anyways.Ssssshhh though, notice just how quiet our deadliest things are? Unlike other countries .
Take TIGER for one, doesn't that conjure up a fierce, striped wild animal with enormous great teeth and very bad breath that will just be waiting in the wings to bite off a slice, of YOU? Then on the other hand we have here in OZ, the echidna, ooohhhhhhhhhh, how sweet, a little cutey pie thing that just curls up into a wincy little ball when frightened and only eats ants, those nasty critters that spoil your picnic, shame on you ants.Like the platypus, Echidna is a monotreme, an egg laying mammal. Next there is Rex the LION.Great hairy bit of a thing it is too, always poncing about the veldt like it owns the place, well you try and tell it to shove off then, see how you get on sistaaaahh.In the OZ corner we have the platypus, soft sleek furry type of creature that just burrows in the river bank for worms and stuff, doesn't even make a noise when doing so either and if frightened by any loudness will whip into its burrow where it hides until the nasty crashing about thingy has sloped off. Last but not least is the ELEPHANT, a monstrous great lump of a pachyderm that you cannot even make piano keys out of anymore, really good for nothing else than leaving massive huge piles of 'IT' all over the grass . Noisy sod of a beast too, trumpets away sixty to the dozen, then stomps all over the farmers maize crop,useless.
That is just Asia / Africa, space wont allow me to list all the yelling loud things from Europe along with the Americas .I have shown you just some of our nice little creatures who have no real obnoxious habits and finish up with a most personable lovely chappie who is a soft cuddly wuggly, that I myself relate to well.
We have the wombat, a pleasant sort of fattish fellow who is most congenial only coming out of his burrow at night making no sound as he goes about his business. He just eats, roots and leaves.
Enter my lovely little BANDICOOT.Not a monotreme like his friends the platypus and echidna just a common old variety marsupial and very shy, also where we stumbled across him, quite rare.To see him well you will have to enlarge the pic.
So there we have just some of our lovely sweet harmless denizens of the forest and glens of OZ, nice homely sort of a quiet likeable spot is OZ, but don't stand under the black wattles in midsummer as a pile of follow- me -caterpillars might drop down on you and their collective bites are deadly,no known antidote either.....sorrrrreeee, but I did warn you.
No Hortense I don't know the official name for those caterpillars, we used to see them on the farm. Remember when they fell on the horses neck and he could never race again? those little green ones that ball up together until one crawls out and they all go marching off in line.If you pluck the middle one out they all stop and ball up again until a leader just wings off , squash them and they give off a really punguent eucalypt smell. You do remember !, and that green stuff you could never get off your blouse so you had to throw it away, was a nice shirt that too.
Horty you didn't really like that Government minister who rabitted on about the infrastructure spending this morning, the Hon.Anthony Albanese . You don't like him, good, he sounded like a goat talking about billyons of dollahs then wouldn't admit to the fact that all the money he talked about wasn't actually going to be spent this year or even next,not for another 10 yrs Horty. What a load of old cobblers girl, to be quite frank m'dear I think he didn't really give a damn , just wanted to hear himself talk over the top of the interviewer.
Good deal that going to see 'angels and demons' friday then 'star trek' today, I does like a rollicking good movie or two.The gelato was at its best in Cocolat as well me lovely, in all, a top weekend
Sunday, 10 May 2009
ink marks on a blank page Sunday 10th May
Our federal budget day looms on Tuesday, not that it will bring any surprises as most of the details have been carefully leaked to the media over the last few days. The treasurer is a chap who like the three main players in this Government appears to have completely mastered the art of talking whilst the mouth is full of marbles and under water at that. The whole of the cabinet can mouth the same mantra of rhetoric at warp speed, and really have been able to spin at force ten of the cycle. For some weeks now the top movers and shakers in Government have been flogging themselves ragged to sell just how wonderfully conservative and fiscally responsible they are, at the same time though they have been handing out cash to all and sundry like drunken philanthropists. Poor old OZ is going to be in debt forever and three days, the legacy of their largesse will be carried by the grandchildren of this generation.
Okay so I'm not an economist, who has to be when there is at this moment the country is saddled with largest national debt ever and theGovernment of the day can't even tell us, the people, how they will manage their way out of the fiasco. The only thing that they can actually say forcefully is "Why haven't the opposition been putting forward their policies". Got news for the Government, the opposition aren't actually wielding the reins of power, you lot are.
We are relatively well off here with a very stable banking system, there once was a lovely big surplus in treasury as well, we still have stuff to dig up that folk need and we beat the New Zealand team in the rugby test, so all is not so bad in the land down under.
Just made myself an espresso,cut a wedge of home baked fruit cake then sat down if front of the TV . Not much of note flickering away on the lcd, puerile offerings even on the public channel that I normally watch. So I turned to the commercial lot, even worse there. One of the commercial stations had a really slow cops and killers show,on one,football (oz style) another,a more juvenile USA cop shoot 'em up, last also very least was a chat show run by 30 something folk who all spoke in shouts with lots of face gestures. One segment on the chat thing was a young fellow who looked as though he had been dressed by the op-shop doing a voice over to a filmed piece on the philosophy of fate. The only thing interesting was the title , but perhaps I show my age here as all the 30 somethings laughed their collective heads off. Never like to get on stage about age either, you are each and everyone of you all sorts of age. I am 67, love being that, cannot wait to be 68 then 69 etc etc etc. My generation had all been married for years with children when we were thirty, not saying that was a good thing, but it was different times with a different set of values. Here in OZ we had lived an insular sort of life for years even as far up to the Vietnam war, the normality of life hadn't changed much for most of us until after that conflict had been and gone. Lots of young Aussie men and women had been to wars all over the place as far back as the Boer war but had come back here then just picked up as nothing much had happened. Perhaps it was the tyranny of distance from anywhere that was anything that isolated us, or was it just in the national physche that we were who we are and that made us different ,willing to stay the same. Folk from OZ travelled far and wide doing all sorts of things but they always came back and then settled back into being parochial Aussies almost as they stepped off the plane. Just about every jouralist who interviewd any visiting famous o/s person as they stepped off the plane asked this question,"What do you think of Australia?" There was a famous incident in Melbourne when Frank Sinatra was asked a bunch of really fatuous silly questions, he got very upset with a female journo then called all Australian female journo's "$20 Hookers" The local transport union got so incensed they refused to allow Sinatra's plane to take off. We really didn't appear to be very cosmopolitan at that point but life here moved on allowing us to gradually catch up with the world. So we are now at our place in time where on a per capita value we have almost as many murders per thousand as London, drink more beer than the Germans, become alcoholics as fast as the Russians, rack up credit card debt at a rate similar to Americans, have the same rate of obesity in major cities but thankfully we now smoke less per thousand than almost all Western Democracies. We have devoured the American way of life so well most of our children know more words of the American national Anthem than their own. A survey was conducted recently where the respondents related more to Barack Obama than their own Prime Minister. Hey, but who could blame them,that man is charisma. One thing that we must stop doing as a nation though is having our movers and shakers fly o/s, get sold the latest snake oil(that dont work), then come back here to install it to be the next great hope only to see the wheels fall off two days later. Grow up OZ, we can do our own version of snake oil!
Indeed so Hortense, news wise it is a mighty poor week. you rightly point out too m'dear that most of the budget has been leaked out. That might make a mockery of the journo's all getting locked in a room with no communications to read the budget papers, then when the doors get opened all run to file their stories at the same time, so as not to spill the beans scoop wise an all.
As if! Yes I do agree Horty, the treasurer is a sort of smarmy looking fellow at that, the sort who when he was at school would tell the teacher on you before you did stuff,then swear he didn't.
Sorry about the trip to Cocolat old girl, no movies this week either.Still Mothers day lunch was pretty full on, the call from daughter was great, life is good init.
Okay so I'm not an economist, who has to be when there is at this moment the country is saddled with largest national debt ever and theGovernment of the day can't even tell us, the people, how they will manage their way out of the fiasco. The only thing that they can actually say forcefully is "Why haven't the opposition been putting forward their policies". Got news for the Government, the opposition aren't actually wielding the reins of power, you lot are.
We are relatively well off here with a very stable banking system, there once was a lovely big surplus in treasury as well, we still have stuff to dig up that folk need and we beat the New Zealand team in the rugby test, so all is not so bad in the land down under.
Just made myself an espresso,cut a wedge of home baked fruit cake then sat down if front of the TV . Not much of note flickering away on the lcd, puerile offerings even on the public channel that I normally watch. So I turned to the commercial lot, even worse there. One of the commercial stations had a really slow cops and killers show,on one,football (oz style) another,a more juvenile USA cop shoot 'em up, last also very least was a chat show run by 30 something folk who all spoke in shouts with lots of face gestures. One segment on the chat thing was a young fellow who looked as though he had been dressed by the op-shop doing a voice over to a filmed piece on the philosophy of fate. The only thing interesting was the title , but perhaps I show my age here as all the 30 somethings laughed their collective heads off. Never like to get on stage about age either, you are each and everyone of you all sorts of age. I am 67, love being that, cannot wait to be 68 then 69 etc etc etc. My generation had all been married for years with children when we were thirty, not saying that was a good thing, but it was different times with a different set of values. Here in OZ we had lived an insular sort of life for years even as far up to the Vietnam war, the normality of life hadn't changed much for most of us until after that conflict had been and gone. Lots of young Aussie men and women had been to wars all over the place as far back as the Boer war but had come back here then just picked up as nothing much had happened. Perhaps it was the tyranny of distance from anywhere that was anything that isolated us, or was it just in the national physche that we were who we are and that made us different ,willing to stay the same. Folk from OZ travelled far and wide doing all sorts of things but they always came back and then settled back into being parochial Aussies almost as they stepped off the plane. Just about every jouralist who interviewd any visiting famous o/s person as they stepped off the plane asked this question,"What do you think of Australia?" There was a famous incident in Melbourne when Frank Sinatra was asked a bunch of really fatuous silly questions, he got very upset with a female journo then called all Australian female journo's "$20 Hookers" The local transport union got so incensed they refused to allow Sinatra's plane to take off. We really didn't appear to be very cosmopolitan at that point but life here moved on allowing us to gradually catch up with the world. So we are now at our place in time where on a per capita value we have almost as many murders per thousand as London, drink more beer than the Germans, become alcoholics as fast as the Russians, rack up credit card debt at a rate similar to Americans, have the same rate of obesity in major cities but thankfully we now smoke less per thousand than almost all Western Democracies. We have devoured the American way of life so well most of our children know more words of the American national Anthem than their own. A survey was conducted recently where the respondents related more to Barack Obama than their own Prime Minister. Hey, but who could blame them,that man is charisma. One thing that we must stop doing as a nation though is having our movers and shakers fly o/s, get sold the latest snake oil(that dont work), then come back here to install it to be the next great hope only to see the wheels fall off two days later. Grow up OZ, we can do our own version of snake oil!
Indeed so Hortense, news wise it is a mighty poor week. you rightly point out too m'dear that most of the budget has been leaked out. That might make a mockery of the journo's all getting locked in a room with no communications to read the budget papers, then when the doors get opened all run to file their stories at the same time, so as not to spill the beans scoop wise an all.
As if! Yes I do agree Horty, the treasurer is a sort of smarmy looking fellow at that, the sort who when he was at school would tell the teacher on you before you did stuff,then swear he didn't.
Sorry about the trip to Cocolat old girl, no movies this week either.Still Mothers day lunch was pretty full on, the call from daughter was great, life is good init.
Sunday, 3 May 2009
Ink marks on a blank page Sunday 3rd May
Been away for a week or so,went to see daughter and her family in another state,Victoria that is.
Nice trip, but missed the goings on here in SA ,the rain and then more rain. All good that, it did pelt down too. Just in case y'all didn't know we are or were going through an almighty drought, worst for years so 'they' say. Mind you ,a lot, and 'they' said it as well, all down to climate change, 'they' said. Let me put you in the picture regarding the robbi thought on climate change. Notice I said thought and not the plural as I only ever have the one thought at a time. Of course it is all down to climate change, irrefutable reasoning that as it be the Earth is continually changing and has done for millenia. Humans have repeatedly polluted the Earth, been doing so for 40k years or more , the Australian aboriginals lit huge bushfires each year to burn off country to 'manage' it for their way of life. The burning off in some places altered the ecology of Australia and made the Eucalypt the dominant tree specie there. So much so that many indigenous shrubs and trees do not reproduce each season unless there is fire. We had been living on our farm for some ten years when a wildfire came through and after the next rains some two weeks later on the roadside verge across from the house there were three species of plant growing that had not grown there for ten years(acacia family). Some of our natives need smoke to germinate,Discaria pubescens and those in that family are just some. This blue ball we live on is in a continual state of flux and change,so why am I back on this hobby horse? as I seem to remember not so very long ago I waxed on lyrical in a similar vein.You may well ponder but there is a simple answer, not related to a senior moment either.
On the way back from Victoria I decided to make a detour and drive the coast road(Great Ocean Road) to a place in my state called Nelson. One reason was to see if I could get down on a beach called Dinosaur Cove( in Victoria), yup there are lots of nice fossils there to scrabble for if the tide is out that is. Hortense had never been to that part of the country as well but I do not equate Horty alongside fossils either.
I do have more that a passing interest in fossils and this particular place is a great example of the early Cretaceous period (100+m-y), bad luck robbi the tide was well in and as I only go 5'7'' in my shoes I would have been about a foot underwater. However the drive is nothing short of spectacular and for 400kms the scenery is just awesome. You drive into the bottom half of the Otway ranges which has some of the best stands of mountain ash forest in OZ and some really dense rainforest as well. The tree top walk (rainforest) on suspension bridges is one of those things that make your head spin, in an inspiring way. Coming out of the Otways the descent down to Apollo bay is breathtakingly beautiful and the town itself is friendly and just a great spot to lunch, plenty of top restaurants and a couple of good bakeries.
Drove on after lunch to the Twelve Apostles and then stayed the night at Port Campbell.
The Twelve Apostles have been carved out of the cliffs by wave action as well as the normal gyrations of the tectonic plates over millenia and are sculpted into amazing shapes,whilst the cliffs and bays are geological time capsules that show how the Earth has continually evolved over time. After Port Campbell comes the Bay of Islands and for me the most spectacular of sights and if the weather is on,that is a stiff onshore breeze blowing with the tide incoming the blow-hole there is a fantastic sight. We had a long drive back home on leaving the motel so although the day promised a good breeze we had to get there at 0700 when it was relatively calm. Good things happen when you least expect, walking up the track to the viewing platform there in front not 10mtrs away was a bandicoot. These little marsupials are very shy and rarely seen in daylight, especially here where there are normally lots of people. I managed to get quite close and took as many pics as I could before it scampered away in the undergrowth. Bandicoots have become rare there as they have no defenses against feral cats and foxes, they are also solitary animals and seem only to pair when they mate.
The drive back to Adelaide was about 540kms, a good road, no hills until Adelaide so I just put the cruise control on and we were home at 1830 that night. Got some top pics which I'm about to load on here now.
Hortense hasn't had a Gelato fix for a week plus so we must wend our way to Cocolat in the next day or so, a plan do you think? She is also a little more than miffed that I haven't been able to wind myself up about the Government at all, just far to busy driving and looking at OZ. There is a late news flash though. Surprise surprise, our federal Government is delaying and reducing the Carbon Trading scheme it earlier promised to get elected to one that is going to set the carbon price down to $10 a tonne and will also can the start date until 2011. Old cynic that I am there could also be a stop put on the thing altogether as the next federal election will have to be in 2010, is the timing convenient or what? The Global recession is a godsend for this Government, they have blamed everything from cold coffee to where do the flies go in winter down to it, but then as Hortense will tell you, I really am an old cynic.
Nice trip, but missed the goings on here in SA ,the rain and then more rain. All good that, it did pelt down too. Just in case y'all didn't know we are or were going through an almighty drought, worst for years so 'they' say. Mind you ,a lot, and 'they' said it as well, all down to climate change, 'they' said. Let me put you in the picture regarding the robbi thought on climate change. Notice I said thought and not the plural as I only ever have the one thought at a time. Of course it is all down to climate change, irrefutable reasoning that as it be the Earth is continually changing and has done for millenia. Humans have repeatedly polluted the Earth, been doing so for 40k years or more , the Australian aboriginals lit huge bushfires each year to burn off country to 'manage' it for their way of life. The burning off in some places altered the ecology of Australia and made the Eucalypt the dominant tree specie there. So much so that many indigenous shrubs and trees do not reproduce each season unless there is fire. We had been living on our farm for some ten years when a wildfire came through and after the next rains some two weeks later on the roadside verge across from the house there were three species of plant growing that had not grown there for ten years(acacia family). Some of our natives need smoke to germinate,Discaria pubescens and those in that family are just some. This blue ball we live on is in a continual state of flux and change,so why am I back on this hobby horse? as I seem to remember not so very long ago I waxed on lyrical in a similar vein.You may well ponder but there is a simple answer, not related to a senior moment either.
On the way back from Victoria I decided to make a detour and drive the coast road(Great Ocean Road) to a place in my state called Nelson. One reason was to see if I could get down on a beach called Dinosaur Cove( in Victoria), yup there are lots of nice fossils there to scrabble for if the tide is out that is. Hortense had never been to that part of the country as well but I do not equate Horty alongside fossils either.
I do have more that a passing interest in fossils and this particular place is a great example of the early Cretaceous period (100+m-y), bad luck robbi the tide was well in and as I only go 5'7'' in my shoes I would have been about a foot underwater. However the drive is nothing short of spectacular and for 400kms the scenery is just awesome. You drive into the bottom half of the Otway ranges which has some of the best stands of mountain ash forest in OZ and some really dense rainforest as well. The tree top walk (rainforest) on suspension bridges is one of those things that make your head spin, in an inspiring way. Coming out of the Otways the descent down to Apollo bay is breathtakingly beautiful and the town itself is friendly and just a great spot to lunch, plenty of top restaurants and a couple of good bakeries.
Drove on after lunch to the Twelve Apostles and then stayed the night at Port Campbell.
The Twelve Apostles have been carved out of the cliffs by wave action as well as the normal gyrations of the tectonic plates over millenia and are sculpted into amazing shapes,whilst the cliffs and bays are geological time capsules that show how the Earth has continually evolved over time. After Port Campbell comes the Bay of Islands and for me the most spectacular of sights and if the weather is on,that is a stiff onshore breeze blowing with the tide incoming the blow-hole there is a fantastic sight. We had a long drive back home on leaving the motel so although the day promised a good breeze we had to get there at 0700 when it was relatively calm. Good things happen when you least expect, walking up the track to the viewing platform there in front not 10mtrs away was a bandicoot. These little marsupials are very shy and rarely seen in daylight, especially here where there are normally lots of people. I managed to get quite close and took as many pics as I could before it scampered away in the undergrowth. Bandicoots have become rare there as they have no defenses against feral cats and foxes, they are also solitary animals and seem only to pair when they mate.
The drive back to Adelaide was about 540kms, a good road, no hills until Adelaide so I just put the cruise control on and we were home at 1830 that night. Got some top pics which I'm about to load on here now.
Hortense hasn't had a Gelato fix for a week plus so we must wend our way to Cocolat in the next day or so, a plan do you think? She is also a little more than miffed that I haven't been able to wind myself up about the Government at all, just far to busy driving and looking at OZ. There is a late news flash though. Surprise surprise, our federal Government is delaying and reducing the Carbon Trading scheme it earlier promised to get elected to one that is going to set the carbon price down to $10 a tonne and will also can the start date until 2011. Old cynic that I am there could also be a stop put on the thing altogether as the next federal election will have to be in 2010, is the timing convenient or what? The Global recession is a godsend for this Government, they have blamed everything from cold coffee to where do the flies go in winter down to it, but then as Hortense will tell you, I really am an old cynic.
Monday, 20 April 2009
ink marks on a blank page Mon 20th April
I haven't looked through all of the old blogs( ink marks) to ascertain if at some time or other there was some waxing lyrical about where chez robbi is situated (Adelaiode, South OZ). Perhaps there is, but if so then it is back in the annals of and I shall refresh the memory buds anyway.Y'all just knew I'd say that now didn't you, ego tripper that I am. Adelaide being what and where it is folk who live here just mostly accept their lot. We live in a temperate clime, not enough rainfall at the moment but that might change. The city is ringed by hills, faces like most OZ cities, the sea. A great coastline as we are at the top end of a gulf (St.Vincent) plenty of great fishing ,water sports galore couple that with good weather with a smallish population then the recipe is set for a good mix. The population stands at about 1.2mill in the city/suburbs with around 800k living in the country.We have our unique problems of course, any homogenous lot do, but in the main we tend to get along with ourselves and others pretty well.
Adelaide was different in that it was specifically laid out by a surveyor,one Col.Light, settled by free men, plus land was divided up by a title which was unique in the world for its time. The Torrens title, named after the designer, gave unfettered access to a parcel of land in a suburb/subdivision, to the registered owner of that piece of land inviolate to be included on a Government register with the sole purpose of creating one title to ownership. This meant that it became a simple process to but sell or transfer land in one transaction and without re-surveying each time the land was sold. Boring? useful though.
Apart from this great method of flogging land we are reasonably well known for the wine we make, some of the best reds in the world and getting up there with the reds, lots of great whites too. To go with all this fantastic drinkable stuff there are about 800 or so pretty good restaurants in the city and suburbs with lots out in the country as well, especially in the wine region of the Barossa valley, Mc Claren flat,Limestone coast ,not to forget the Clare Valley. Not only do we make great wine, South Australia was the first to give women the vote, forward thinking lot are we not?
I have travelled over a lot of OZ, not all ,but a rather large portion.My own state of South Australia I have covered many times, lived in some of the really remote places. Even survived getting lost in the outback on a couple of occasions, so I know, admire,love it well. I have also been to many many countires all over the globe and will readily admit to being an Anglophile but whenever I return here just the smell of the place brings my legs to quiver. There is just something about Eucalypts that brings out the tears in me, which I suppose is why I live where I live.
Where I live is right on what is quaintly called the Linear Park at Paradise. My front door opens to the garden, a smallish road then the park, so on a water rushing day I can actually hear the river gushing along singing its song. The Linear Park starts at Athelstone right on the Hills Face and follows the Torrens River all the way down to the sea at Henley Beach, some 37kms of park. One reason it is called Linear is perhaps because the Park itself at the widest point would only be 750mtrs and on either side is a cement/bitumen path just wide enough for maintenance vehicles. As befits even the smallest of rivers such as the Torrens it trickles around gracefully with plenty of meander so there is actually a plethora of paths and parks for picnics,lovers to spoon,trysts to make and children to play. Funny quirky little things like a fully functioning suspension bridge such as one would see in a Tarzan movie and of course lots of Billy Goat Gruff bridges for children to look at trolls. We shifted from the farm then across to a Hills village then down here, so folk who knew us were at first horrified to think we would shift back to the suburbs after 30yrs of living like real people, until they saw the place that is. We ride our bikes on several different 5km rides each week, each morning at 0630 I walk up to the big road bridge on Darley rd and back, that takes about 35mins unless I get waylaid by taking pictures. Please don't think that I paint this word pic of my suburb because I want you to believe this is the creme de la creme of living , not at all , just suits me well really. I'm going to put a few pictures that I have taken this week up, you can judge for yourselves.
Oh Hortense I do know that not everything is perfect in Paradise. Look at all the trouble Mr Tom Koutsankanis got himself into as the Roads Safety Minister. Someone found out he had something like 58 tickets for speeding and running red lights etc and then told the newspapers. To make matters worse Horty he went on talk-back radio and said that he was speeding because he was very busy going to important meetings and the like. Tut Tut Hortense, very busy just didn't cut it at all with the good folk of Adelaide so he had to resign that portfolio. Shame isn't it that the honest people who actiually paid their fines, unlike him, they didn't get any reward as Tom did they, $148k per annum plus a driver , not bad for a young chap eh? We finishe the day off well did we not, took the g/kids off to Cocolat for some of their fine Gelato and that lovely young Barista chappie Thanth, made us a super little coffee. A great day !!
Adelaide was different in that it was specifically laid out by a surveyor,one Col.Light, settled by free men, plus land was divided up by a title which was unique in the world for its time. The Torrens title, named after the designer, gave unfettered access to a parcel of land in a suburb/subdivision, to the registered owner of that piece of land inviolate to be included on a Government register with the sole purpose of creating one title to ownership. This meant that it became a simple process to but sell or transfer land in one transaction and without re-surveying each time the land was sold. Boring? useful though.
Apart from this great method of flogging land we are reasonably well known for the wine we make, some of the best reds in the world and getting up there with the reds, lots of great whites too. To go with all this fantastic drinkable stuff there are about 800 or so pretty good restaurants in the city and suburbs with lots out in the country as well, especially in the wine region of the Barossa valley, Mc Claren flat,Limestone coast ,not to forget the Clare Valley. Not only do we make great wine, South Australia was the first to give women the vote, forward thinking lot are we not?
I have travelled over a lot of OZ, not all ,but a rather large portion.My own state of South Australia I have covered many times, lived in some of the really remote places. Even survived getting lost in the outback on a couple of occasions, so I know, admire,love it well. I have also been to many many countires all over the globe and will readily admit to being an Anglophile but whenever I return here just the smell of the place brings my legs to quiver. There is just something about Eucalypts that brings out the tears in me, which I suppose is why I live where I live.
Where I live is right on what is quaintly called the Linear Park at Paradise. My front door opens to the garden, a smallish road then the park, so on a water rushing day I can actually hear the river gushing along singing its song. The Linear Park starts at Athelstone right on the Hills Face and follows the Torrens River all the way down to the sea at Henley Beach, some 37kms of park. One reason it is called Linear is perhaps because the Park itself at the widest point would only be 750mtrs and on either side is a cement/bitumen path just wide enough for maintenance vehicles. As befits even the smallest of rivers such as the Torrens it trickles around gracefully with plenty of meander so there is actually a plethora of paths and parks for picnics,lovers to spoon,trysts to make and children to play. Funny quirky little things like a fully functioning suspension bridge such as one would see in a Tarzan movie and of course lots of Billy Goat Gruff bridges for children to look at trolls. We shifted from the farm then across to a Hills village then down here, so folk who knew us were at first horrified to think we would shift back to the suburbs after 30yrs of living like real people, until they saw the place that is. We ride our bikes on several different 5km rides each week, each morning at 0630 I walk up to the big road bridge on Darley rd and back, that takes about 35mins unless I get waylaid by taking pictures. Please don't think that I paint this word pic of my suburb because I want you to believe this is the creme de la creme of living , not at all , just suits me well really. I'm going to put a few pictures that I have taken this week up, you can judge for yourselves.
Oh Hortense I do know that not everything is perfect in Paradise. Look at all the trouble Mr Tom Koutsankanis got himself into as the Roads Safety Minister. Someone found out he had something like 58 tickets for speeding and running red lights etc and then told the newspapers. To make matters worse Horty he went on talk-back radio and said that he was speeding because he was very busy going to important meetings and the like. Tut Tut Hortense, very busy just didn't cut it at all with the good folk of Adelaide so he had to resign that portfolio. Shame isn't it that the honest people who actiually paid their fines, unlike him, they didn't get any reward as Tom did they, $148k per annum plus a driver , not bad for a young chap eh? We finishe the day off well did we not, took the g/kids off to Cocolat for some of their fine Gelato and that lovely young Barista chappie Thanth, made us a super little coffee. A great day !!
Wednesday, 8 April 2009
ink marks on a blank page Thursday April 8th
Just a little bit of trivia to start the day. Some years ago Feng Shui got a bit of a roll on here, and possibly just about anywhere there was enough money to start up and run a Feng Shui business. Not that I am knocking it , not at all, as I have always believed that cultures such as the Chinese can teach us many ways to live a better life. Many years ago my maternal Grandfather had a great deal to to with the Chinese and worked in business partnership with them. He often told me of the degradation that Opium had caused the Chinese and laid the blame squarely at the feet of the East India Company and its practise of paying the Chinese in Opium and conversely enlarging the Opium trade. Australia played a part in this and an Australian diplomat and adventurer ,Morrison, was so incensed by the corruption and double dealing by some of his diplomatic colleagues he tried to stop this trade. He was also a bit of a wheeler dealer and womaniser himself and possibly was not quite the white knight he appeared on the surface. Grandfather painted such a dire picture of Opium dens, the joss houses, that I lived in fear of falling into one on the way past the local Chinese herbalist shop.
Have you ever been into a genuine Chinese herbalist? They are fascinating places and for a small boy with a large and vivid imagination simply worth all the trepidation of falling into an Opium den or Joss house just to visit. The shop we used (Mr Wu) was an Aladdin's cave full of dried shark fins, snakes and things in ceramic pots, stranges twisted roots, powders in large jars all to be weighed out on brass scales and wrapped in brown paper, the bill was totted on an abacus at lightning speed and written in a neat hand on strips of very light paper like a present day cash out strip. Mr. Wu, who appeared to be the apothecary, was a tiny man normally to be seen sitting on a high stool with a rattan back and gazing out of the window into the street as if he could somehow mesmerise customers into coming in. His parcels were always wrapped in brown paper and tied with a dark brown twine whilst his recommendations for taking the medicine were written both in Chinese and English on the left hand side with your name printed in large block letters on the right. Heavens knows why he bothered to write in Mandarin as to my knowledge there wasn't anyone in the family who could read the characters. If by any chance it was me who needed his potions and Grandmother couldn't come with me I would appear at Mr Wu's with a note from her, place it on the wooden counter top and repeat, in my piping little voice, exactly what Nana had told me. "Please Mr Wu my Nana says I am to ask you nicely to read her note and then ask me what is wrong" Whereupon he would leap from his chair ,read the note and then come around the counter and hold my chin in one hand and look intently into my eyes. He then would take my hands one by one and look very carefully at the back first then the palms,each of the fingers/nails. He would speak very slowly in measured very quiet tones "Missy Grace say you feel not well here,(poke) ahhhh so, that is feeling bad?"Sometimes he would look through my hair, take a few strands and disappear into the back of his shop. I could then spend time gazing in wonder at the various odds and sods on the shelves and hanging tied with that brown string all over the shop. What was I looking for, I never asked myself that, but quite possibly it was eye of newt, frogs tongues, bat wings or dried dragon blood, anything that a small boy might think he would find in a Chinese apothecary. Once, after reading a story about Brooke of Sarawak and the Dyak headhunters I ran to Wu's shop looking for dried and smoked human heads,alas none to be found, but it was fun to sneak into the shop when he was busy and look.
Back to Grandfather. Over years he made many Chinese friends and along the way developed a love of Chinese architecture, artifacts, including the Chinese way of doing business. He used to tell me that if you do 'good' business with a Chinese on the shake of a hand then years later you will be able to do the same business with his son and his son and their cousins and their cousins relatives. The Chinese played a big part in the development of early Australia as thousands of Chinese came here in the gold rush days to work the emerging goldfields and create business such as market gardens in the mining settlements. Melbourne, which was at that time the richest city in the world, became a hub for the Chinese immigrants as did the provincal cities of Bendigo and Ballarat. Many Chinese also landed in the port of Darwin and stayed there to make a vibrant and busy culture. Gowdowns became during that early period a feature of the wharves in Darwin and much trade was done in trepang,beach-de-mer,shark and pearl shell to many Asian countries. Grandfather was a part of all this and I have been fortunate in being able to keep some of the artifacts and antiques he collected or was given over his years in dealing with the Chinese traders.
For us who live in the Southern part of OZ sometimes we forget that at the tip of our country (Cape York) it is only 20 nautical miles to a foreign country which is part of Asia. In 2007 I stood right on that very tip and if you look at a map of OZ you will see that Cape York goes to a point. Well I can vouch for that as I stood right on that tip and looked down into the crystal clear water I could see the tip of OZ. The helicopter I had hired landed some 60metres from the actual tip saving us a three hour walk and a massive climb down (and back up)from the normal landing site. That time ,(hour or so) I spent there was in retrospect an extremely cathartic experience, as not many folk actually get to go there for to drive from the nearest settlement is ,if the road is passable, about a four hour trip and then you have at least another three hours of strenuous walking and climbing.
Yes Hortense I do know that our esteemed leader can speak perfect Mandarin and that he is great mates with everyone who is anyone in China. Me?, you also know that I have a few words of Mandarin, don't look like that, I do know that there are some of those phrases I could never use in polite society. Being friends with the Chinse is wonderful stuff Horty but I don't think that our Defence Minister should have had his business trips paid for by that lovely Chinese lady who seems to know every top General in the Peoples Army. He also rents an apartment from her when he is Canberra too, possibly gets a cheap deal I would think. Do you think he asked her what all the echoes and beeps / whistles were in every room whenever he discussed Government business? Oops! best I stick to stuff I know lots about, like the wonderful selection of Gelato at Cocolat we had Saturday morning after the moving picture show. Wasn't such a bad movie either, 'The Boat that Rocked', not Gone with the Wind or anything but it was great fun. Nope,I'm not going to apologise for leaping up from my seat and singing along with the EasyBeats to 'Friday on My Mind'. Oh, and I wont mention that you sang along with the Supremes either.
Great day it was Hortense and I thank you heartily for being the you that you are,"gonna have fun in the city, be with my girl she's so pretty,I'll be right tonight, toniiiiighhhht, for I've got friday on my mind, na nah nuhhnahhh na nah....i've got friday on my mind"
Have you ever been into a genuine Chinese herbalist? They are fascinating places and for a small boy with a large and vivid imagination simply worth all the trepidation of falling into an Opium den or Joss house just to visit. The shop we used (Mr Wu) was an Aladdin's cave full of dried shark fins, snakes and things in ceramic pots, stranges twisted roots, powders in large jars all to be weighed out on brass scales and wrapped in brown paper, the bill was totted on an abacus at lightning speed and written in a neat hand on strips of very light paper like a present day cash out strip. Mr. Wu, who appeared to be the apothecary, was a tiny man normally to be seen sitting on a high stool with a rattan back and gazing out of the window into the street as if he could somehow mesmerise customers into coming in. His parcels were always wrapped in brown paper and tied with a dark brown twine whilst his recommendations for taking the medicine were written both in Chinese and English on the left hand side with your name printed in large block letters on the right. Heavens knows why he bothered to write in Mandarin as to my knowledge there wasn't anyone in the family who could read the characters. If by any chance it was me who needed his potions and Grandmother couldn't come with me I would appear at Mr Wu's with a note from her, place it on the wooden counter top and repeat, in my piping little voice, exactly what Nana had told me. "Please Mr Wu my Nana says I am to ask you nicely to read her note and then ask me what is wrong" Whereupon he would leap from his chair ,read the note and then come around the counter and hold my chin in one hand and look intently into my eyes. He then would take my hands one by one and look very carefully at the back first then the palms,each of the fingers/nails. He would speak very slowly in measured very quiet tones "Missy Grace say you feel not well here,(poke) ahhhh so, that is feeling bad?"Sometimes he would look through my hair, take a few strands and disappear into the back of his shop. I could then spend time gazing in wonder at the various odds and sods on the shelves and hanging tied with that brown string all over the shop. What was I looking for, I never asked myself that, but quite possibly it was eye of newt, frogs tongues, bat wings or dried dragon blood, anything that a small boy might think he would find in a Chinese apothecary. Once, after reading a story about Brooke of Sarawak and the Dyak headhunters I ran to Wu's shop looking for dried and smoked human heads,alas none to be found, but it was fun to sneak into the shop when he was busy and look.
Back to Grandfather. Over years he made many Chinese friends and along the way developed a love of Chinese architecture, artifacts, including the Chinese way of doing business. He used to tell me that if you do 'good' business with a Chinese on the shake of a hand then years later you will be able to do the same business with his son and his son and their cousins and their cousins relatives. The Chinese played a big part in the development of early Australia as thousands of Chinese came here in the gold rush days to work the emerging goldfields and create business such as market gardens in the mining settlements. Melbourne, which was at that time the richest city in the world, became a hub for the Chinese immigrants as did the provincal cities of Bendigo and Ballarat. Many Chinese also landed in the port of Darwin and stayed there to make a vibrant and busy culture. Gowdowns became during that early period a feature of the wharves in Darwin and much trade was done in trepang,beach-de-mer,shark and pearl shell to many Asian countries. Grandfather was a part of all this and I have been fortunate in being able to keep some of the artifacts and antiques he collected or was given over his years in dealing with the Chinese traders.
For us who live in the Southern part of OZ sometimes we forget that at the tip of our country (Cape York) it is only 20 nautical miles to a foreign country which is part of Asia. In 2007 I stood right on that very tip and if you look at a map of OZ you will see that Cape York goes to a point. Well I can vouch for that as I stood right on that tip and looked down into the crystal clear water I could see the tip of OZ. The helicopter I had hired landed some 60metres from the actual tip saving us a three hour walk and a massive climb down (and back up)from the normal landing site. That time ,(hour or so) I spent there was in retrospect an extremely cathartic experience, as not many folk actually get to go there for to drive from the nearest settlement is ,if the road is passable, about a four hour trip and then you have at least another three hours of strenuous walking and climbing.
Yes Hortense I do know that our esteemed leader can speak perfect Mandarin and that he is great mates with everyone who is anyone in China. Me?, you also know that I have a few words of Mandarin, don't look like that, I do know that there are some of those phrases I could never use in polite society. Being friends with the Chinse is wonderful stuff Horty but I don't think that our Defence Minister should have had his business trips paid for by that lovely Chinese lady who seems to know every top General in the Peoples Army. He also rents an apartment from her when he is Canberra too, possibly gets a cheap deal I would think. Do you think he asked her what all the echoes and beeps / whistles were in every room whenever he discussed Government business? Oops! best I stick to stuff I know lots about, like the wonderful selection of Gelato at Cocolat we had Saturday morning after the moving picture show. Wasn't such a bad movie either, 'The Boat that Rocked', not Gone with the Wind or anything but it was great fun. Nope,I'm not going to apologise for leaping up from my seat and singing along with the EasyBeats to 'Friday on My Mind'. Oh, and I wont mention that you sang along with the Supremes either.
Great day it was Hortense and I thank you heartily for being the you that you are,"gonna have fun in the city, be with my girl she's so pretty,I'll be right tonight, toniiiiighhhht, for I've got friday on my mind, na nah nuhhnahhh na nah....i've got friday on my mind"
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