peacemaker gypsy

Australia Day

I apparently was not the only person to be concerned about the possible hi-jacking of our national holiday by a small group (although I note an even smaller group demonstrated about our racist attitudes - possibly would never had made the news at all if a relative of the PM was not involved). 

Still it seems that Oz Day was overwhelmingly a family day with nary a riot reported (and so hopefully there were none).  In my own house and I suspect many others ... that day (or part thereof) was dedicated to the consumption of carcinogenic meat (i.e. barbecue) and a trifle assembled by the children (who had great fun with the gloopy custard).

In Sydney, Australia Day also marks the end (or nearly the end) of the Sydney Festival.  You could go broke and get very very tired attending everything that is on but I have had a wonderful time attending that stuff I have attended.  Maybe I will be even more in the swing next year!

One of the best things perhaps was this year's diversity in the honours' list: a psychiatrist, a cooking foodie, a soldier and a food recycler (in the nicest possible way) ... presumably there was a sportsman or two in there somewhere but I didn't hear (or it didn't register).

So in spite of the apparent mis/cross-communication attached to previous missive (where I was not anti-Oz Day ... or anti the flag per se but very anti the potential for the holiday to be hi-jacked and turned into something much less than the day of unity it was planned to be), it seems that Australians all did rejoice ... in being Australian.  Which is nice.

A holiday of xenophobia?

When I used to live in Oz (before the o'seas stint in my life) Australia Day was the official end of the school holidays and therefore marked by nothing more than stationery supplies and new uniforms (plus a lot of furniture moving when I was a classroom teacher).  While I was o'seas, apparently it became the reason for a lot of community gatherings - face painting (green and gold of course ... or maybe red white and blue, wallaby patting and barbecues (total fire bans notwhithstanding).

Then last year I was stunned by the number of Southern Cross car decals, tattoos and beach towels.  Aussie flags flying from cars and off balconies.  The whole flag waving thing freaks me out a bit (shades of post 9/11 in the US where (so I was told) every street looked like some sort of parade and if you didn't fly the flag you were somehow on "their side" (a sort of if you are not for me you are against me).  Anyway ... extreme patriotism has always seemed dangerous to me especially linked to lots of flags ... perhaps because they are so often linked to martial parades. 

But there is another element ... last year (and apparently in previous years as well) mobs of Anglo-Saxon Australians of the yobbo variety rioted and insulted and bashed non-Anglo looking Australians with the usual epithets and cries of "go back home". 

Given that my Aboriginal colleagues used to call January 26 "Invaders Day" I wonder how the yobbos would react if the "Go back home" cries were directed at them (because in fact we ... the Anglo-Saxons of Australia, are descendents of the invaders if not actual invaders ourselves).  We are a nation of immigrants and this is our home.

Given that almost half of Australians do not have English as their mother tongue, given that we have the largest mosque and the largest Buddhist temple in the Southern Hemisphere (apparently), perhaps we need to keep clearly in mind that we are (whether some like it or not) culturally diverse and this holiday that we are about to celebrate is supposed to be a holiday of unity.  I really hope that this year it can be.