Oi, Aussie!

I spent Australia Day this year at home with the kids, and then, in the evening, we went to a barbecue with a bunch of friends. The same group has gathered on Australia Day for the last few years at someone or other's place, but I don't think it's had anything much to do with Australia. It's just that it's a public holiday and we're usually all available. Do we talk about our country? Rarely. Do we toast the great homeland and her leader Jules? Not that I recall. Do we stand and sing the anthem together before tucking into the sausages and burnt onions? Er...no.

This week's blog task has really had me thinking about what this day means to me, and I think I can report here honestly that it means very little. Does that make me unpatriotic? Maybe. Un-Australian? Heaven forbid.

I think, like my fellow Tale-of-Three-ers, it was all a bit more meaningful in the years I spent out of the country. When I lived and travelled in Europe over 10 years ago, I loved that I was an Aussie. I was proud to tell people and got a kick out of answering all the questions about Vegemite and koalas and deadly snakes. My American friends thought the words I used were hilarious. "What a dag!" Te-he. "Shall we grab some brekkie?" Ha-ha. "He's a spunk." Guffaw. 

But what is the day about anyway? I don't want this to be a diatribe on the plight of our Indigenous people, but, hey, our national day is a celebration of invasion. By us. We're not stopping to remember the day our forefathers defeated the enemy and won back our lands from some faceless foe so that we all may prosper and populate. It's just the day we came in, took over and stomped all over the place.

Combine that with events five years ago at Cronulla and, I have to say, the sight of an Australian flag waving on a car bonnet or draped over a usually young person's shoulders leaves me feeling cold.

But that aside, and apart from the invasion thing, what else are we celebrating? It all just sounds dreadfully cliched. The lucky country. The land of opportunity. Beaches ahoy, mate. They say we're a laidback people who don't let work rule our lives. But here in Sydney, most people I know are working their tooshies off and just scraping by. And, yes, we've got all the good stuff here - high levels of stress and depression, high rates of cancer, heart disease, obesity, suicide. Are we that different from other Western countries?

The success of our sportspeople or artists overseas rouses a real pride in me. The Sydney Olympics were that good. And the World Cup in Germany changed me forever, it's true. Those are times I've really felt a patriotic fervour.

And, yes, I love this country. I love the landscapes, what little I've actually seen in person. I've spent time in places as disparate as Broken Hill and the Whitsundays Islands. I can't imagine two such different landscapes and yet it's all part of the same place. The stuff about droughts and floods, cyclones and bushfires - terrifying, deadly, but part of it all. But we don't celebrate climate and countryside on Australia Day, do we? 


I love the diversity of the people, the cosmopolitan nature of the big cities, the art, the food. My kids have a long, unwieldy surname and I love that this is a country where people like my in-laws could come and build their lives. I love so much about it, yet I'm not convinced the stuff I love is great because it's 'Australian'. And it would be fair to say a lot of the stuff I love, I hate as well. Cosmopolitan - great! Big, traffic-filled, congested, expensive - same place. Multicultural people and incredible ethnic food - swell! Flag-toting racists, detention centres, boats full of 'illegals' sinking or crashing on rocks...

And then there's the fact of my birthday being so close to Australia's 'birthday'. The two have become entangled in the routine of my January. I always get a day off work a couple of days before my birthday, the nation joins me in celebration and, like this year, someone usually bakes me a birthday cake at the Australia Day get-together. 

Perhaps it's just me...or just about me.

With a lot of Australians in my office Australia Day is taken very seriously. The emails started about two weeks prior to the big day with a call out for home baked lamingtons, Anzac biscuits, pavlova, rum balls and a cry for someone to please queue at the Australia shop in Covent Garden for twisties, burger rings, barbeque shapes, tim tams and mint slices. Then there were the emails planning the afternoon and evening celebrations with talk of barbeques at a mates place or perhaps the Walkabout pub or even the Jetlag bar in Soho.

Waking up on Wednesday my first thought was 'I should be having a public holiday right now'. Not the most motivating thought to start the day with but it was actually a cracker. Finding the office decorated with Australian themed balloons and flags was a highlight only eclipsed by the spread of treats laid out for afternoon tea. I've had three years celebrating Australia Day in London and this by far the best effort by all.

Around 4pm there is was a call for 'pens down' - it was 'beer o'clock'. We decided on the Jetlag Bar spending the night celebrating with some old school friends of mine. Sally is famous for organising us all to get together each year and this year was no exception- she'd even snuck some lamingtons into the pub for dessert.

Australia Day in London is a contradiction for me. Its a day where I reflect on the wonderful friendships I have in London with my fellow Australians, a day for being able to be celebrate openly and loudly the wonderful country we come from and to show pride in all things Australian. On the flip side its the one day of the year that I am guaranteed to get homesick!

A country rich and clever and I still....

Nothing pulls at the heart strings of being Australian than being away from your beloved country.I have long believed your country is tattooed across your psyche for life no matter where you end up. As you know I often ponder if I could find another landscape as breath taking as that golden sun and smell of dry earth and endless bold blue. Perhaps not. And I always wonder what will it be for my kids.

But considering Hugo went to Australia Day celebrations on Wednesday and then to Chinese New Year celebrations in Chinese National Dress the day after, I hope he will have a sense of being Australian and being a member of the International Community too.

So what does being Australian mean to me; it is the sounds of Paul Kelly crooning about Kings Cross in the rain, it is eating a sausage sambo under a tree looking out for green ants, it is an afternoon beer looking at the beach, it is that breath we draw in as we dive under that first cold wave, it is sand through the house, a salty sexiness that your flat white is delivered by, it is that wide welcoming smile of folks back home.

This is what I dream; I dream of local public schools producing Prime Ministers, I dream of freedom of speech and fairness no matter what your back ground, I dream of everyone benefiting from the gifts of our nations resources, I dream of stir frying of the BBQ, I dream of our arms stretching wide across the oceans of the world. Most of all I wish for Australia to be a place of tolerance and knowledge.

There are heaps of Aussie's here, so we had a nice afternoon at a Aussie Day picnic raising

money for the flood devastation back home: Sausage sambos and an all round go at tug-o-war.

Nothing like a 3 year old to capture that less than glam moment of sinking your choppers into a snag!

Task # 29

Australia Day! What is happening in your hood for our national day? And what are your thoughts and memories and hopes for our homeland on this day?

A blank sheet of paper

I started 2011 with the words ‘2 months to go’ which has so quickly become 5 weeks to go. This new year is one of endless possibility with a completely blank sheet of paper. It’s a rare opportunity that I intend to cherish. I’m leaving my London life and heading home to Australia!

A year ago I was sitting with the girls in a sunny café in Canberra, soaking up the incredible joy of being around friends who make your heart sing and saying out loud that it was time for me to come home. I don’t think I actually believed I would do it and I probably wouldn’t have been brave enough without the courage the lovely Tim gives me on a daily basis.

I’ve had people give me very strange looks when I mention that I’m leaving my job in London, I’ve had many ask why I would walk away from the last three years of hard work when we were so close to the finish line. Others have asked what I plan to do when I get back to Australia. They all have so many questions. My answer to all of these questions is not in words, rather it’s the gigantic smile that breaks out on my face and the happiness that seeps through to the core every time I think about the adventure Tim and I are about to share.

For me 2011 is made up of lots of little goals that I think might lead to one big one in time. I want to pick up my study of nutrition/ natural health again, I want to start working on my own business ideas, I want to try teaching so I can give something back after all these years and the list goes on. The hardest thing for me about 2011 is learning to go with the flow, to let go of being defined by one single job and letting myself be fluid in the work and study I choose.

Most importantly 2011 is about my home life. This year feels like one of those unique cross roads – how I start this year, the choices I make, the lifestyle I create and the attitude I set out with all feels like the foundation for the years ahead. May it be a very happy and prosperous year!

Back and Forth

A lot can happen in a year. In January 2010 I had only one child. A year later, I have three. I wasn't blogging back then. Now I blog in two places and can't imagine not. A year ago, swollen with a pair of foetuses in my belly, I felt brave and optimistic and determined I could survive whatever they threw at me. That stoicism has wavered a little bit as time and again I've felt myself sinking under the weight of this responsibility, ever so briefly, before I pull it together and pop back above the surface. A year ago, all I wanted was to get out of Sydney. Now circumstances suggest I may be here for a while yet.

It's been nearly a year with two babies attached to my boobs, vomiting on my clothes, waking me night after night, crying to be held day after day, smiling when I walk in the room, giggling when I tickle their squishy bits, gazing with awe at their big sister, learning to roll and sit and crawl and stand, growing into wildly different, endlessly amusing, heartbreakingly beautiful little beings. And their big sister, she of the "Why?" and "But why?" and "Just 16 more minutes, Mummy," how she has challenged me and exasperated me, brought out an impatience in me that leaves me despairing, and given me several-times-daily cause to laugh and marvel and just love.

And I know this blog task isn't about my children, and yet it is entirely, because while I had given 2010 over to just surviving the second (and third) baby thing, until recently 2011 was going to be about clawing back something just for me. I was going to list creative endeavours crazy and simple, like buying a piano and playing it, going to the movies more regularly, seeing a bit of theatre, pursuing this craft bug that has bitten, letting the blogs be an outlet for the writing that has lain dormant for so long. And yes, that's all still on the list.

But whatever lies ahead, I now declare 2011 the year of just getting it right with my girls. Being their mama; nourishing their bodies and spirits; showing them how to cook and read and hold a pencil properly; letting them show me how to play and dance and make fairy wands; and weaving all of the piano-playing and movie-going and knitting and sewing and writing in and out of our days together.

love in the digital city

If all New Years resolutions came true, how does your city weave into your creative aspirations for 2011?

mmmm nothing like putting something down on paper to solidify a project! Or at least make you contemplate why you perhaps didn't attempt it.

So in 2011 I vow that Hong Kong and I will become closer.

OK so firstly 2011 brings a creation in its oldest form - a new birth. And Astro, babies working title, will be a Honkanese bubba. The first member of our little family to be born outside of Australia.

And with this birth comes a whole new level of letting go. When Hugo was born, he was proceeded by a carefully typed birthplan and a high set of expectations with the precise birth I wanted for us. I can happily say it all came off in its own way and I was well supported by the amazing staff at the Royal Womens Birth Centre in Sydney. But there are few city's that offer the progressive facilities I was given access to in Sydney.

This time around my options are somewhat more '1950's' should we say. Hugo's dimmly lit, midwife led, water birth is about as far from Hong Kong reality as it could be. But early on in my pregnancy, I promised myself I would let go of trying to control this process and I would trust Hong Kong with my baby number 2. And I do. I trust these fabulous Hong Kong public hospitals, I thank them for their caution and streamlined processes, I thank them for taking me in so happily and I trust that however different this birth experience will be, I am in the safest hands. I did promise myself that I would bring my sense of humor to the ward with me and it hasn't let me down thus far. I thank the patient midwives for enduring my giggles as I line up with 20 other pregnant ladies clutching their paper cups of wee, and I am weighed on a digital display that announces to the entire room how much heavier Aussie women are than their up the duff Cantonese sisters. So Astro's (working title) entry into the world will be vastly different to Hugo's, as they will be different from each other. But I look forward to it with as much anticipation. How lucky am I, a Chinese bubba, well not in the genetic sense but certainly in where it arrives!

On a creative level I want to crack a layer of Hong Kong that has been keeping me at bay. I want to stop judging her and comparing her to Sydney. Only when this happens will I see the artistic possibilities within. And once on that platform I have two challenges.

1 - write, shoot, and edit a short (non-narrative) film on the neighboring island of Peng Chau. I am capable of all those aspects of film making, I just choose to procrastinate about it. So with bubba number 2 strapped to the outside of my belly, and Hugo probably running off on me, I will put a little vignette together that reveals this ancient fishing town in its beauty.

2- finish a script. nuff said!

Welcome 2011!

Task # 28 - Welcome 2011!

If all New Years resolutions came true, how does your city weave into your creative aspirations for 2011?