Tag Archives: Australia

Today is not a great day to be in Melbourne … but there will good days to come

August 3, 2020Monday Travel PostsAustralia, lockdown, Melbourne, Travelmelindacousins

I wasn’t planning on writing another Monday travel post quite so soon, but I’m thinking of and praying for all my friends and family in Melbourne as they start a new stage of lockdown, with curfews and restrictions that are hard for me to imagine. And so they and their beautiful city are on my heart today.

I’ve visited Melbourne many times. So much that it’s been strange to now have had six months without a visit. It was the last place I visited, in late February when it was starting to become apparent that we’d all be travelling a lot less this year.

But I don’t have a huge number of photos from Melbourne, and certainly none that come anywhere close to capturing all its beauty and diversity. Perhaps because it is so familiar and doesn’t need recording for me to remember. Perhaps because I’m usually there to connect with people and work, not as a tourist. Or perhaps because I’ve always assumed I’d be back soon.

What do I love about Melbourne?

Growing up in Sydney, there’s a deep-seated inter-city rivalry with our country’s second largest city. Iconic globally recognised landmarks or quirky cosmopolitan laneways? 2000 or 1956? NRL or AFL? Traffic or trams? Harbour or River? Most well known or most livable? Less rainy days or less rain? There’s a good reason our politicians needed to find a compromise and build the capital somewhere in between!

And living in Adelaide for my adult life, there is a different kind of rivalry. Perhaps more of a one-sided younger sibling vibe that may at time verge on an inferiority complex in our side. Yes, we know that lots of things we do you have already done first, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t cool in our own way. (And most of us have almost forgiven you for the Grand Prix).

But spending a fair bit of time in Melbourne for work, study, and collaboration with various people over the last decade has truly developed my love for this city!

Melbourne has a great cosmopolitan vibe. From street art to high fashion, relaxed river walks to bustling nightlife. And plenty of amazing food! Delights from all over the world, not to mention everything artisanal from chocolate to coffee, dumplings to dessert.

(It was Melbourne, rather than Paris, where I had my first macaron)

I love the markets, large and small, with their fun and funky vibes.

The city views from up high are spectacular, whether from a ritzy event at the Eureka SkyDeck …

… or from a sneaky visit to the bathroom in a hotel on Collins St.

Melbourne also has a great arts scene.

(My second to last visit, late last year, was a crazy 18 hour whirlwind with an equally crazy friend to see a stunning musical whose themes resonate in the current season)

Melbourne loves its sport and does its sporting events so well.

Even for someone who is less “devoted fan” and more “casual spectator”, the atmosphere can’t be beat.

(Put 80,000 Aussies into the MCG for the Commonwealth Games and we all become instant aficionados of shot put, pole vault, and long jump)

What have I learned from Melbourne?

I hope it doesn’t seem unkind to reflect on all these great things about a city when its people can’t currently enjoy them. But I think part of lamenting includes naming what we appreciate (and therefore miss). All these things make Melbourne a great place to visit and we know they will again, hopefully in the not too distant future.

But even more than all the city has to offer, what I love most about Melbourne are the people I know there. And they are the ones who have much to teach me, as they have in the time I’ve spent there with them. Melburnians know what they like, they love who they are, and they lead in so many innovative ways. Even in this last week, I have been challenged, encouraged, and inspired by many Melbourne friends as they respond to the situation they find themselves in with courage, grace, ingenuity, and good humour.

We Aussies love a good inter-state rivalry. But one danger we currently face is that our usually good-natured competitiveness, comparison, and ribbing can too easily turn into compassionless judgment, fear, or disdain. I hope that reflecting on this beautiful city invites all of us to stand with our neighbours in Melbourne today, praying for them, and looking in hope to how this challenging time will draw out their strength, community, innovation, and sense of fun in all kinds of new ways.

You’ve got this Melbourne. We love you.

And we’re cheering you on.

When you can no longer say ‘I didn’t know’ … it’s time to #changethedate

January 26, 2018Culture, Politics#changethedate, 26 January, Australia, Australia Day, Day of Mourning, History, Invasion Day, learning, listening, Survival Daymelindacousins

Thirty years ago today, I was a schoolgirl standing in the crowds around Sydney Harbour watching a re-enactment of the landing of the First Fleet 200 years before. I didn’t know then that at the same moment, the largest protest in Australia since the Vietnam War was happening just down the street.

I didn’t know then that the day I had been singing about as the “celebration of a nation” was for many others felt and remembered as “Invasion Day”, “Day of Mourning” and “Survival Day.”

I didn’t know then that the Prime Minister was making a promise that day that there would be a treaty with our indigenous peoples within two years, a treaty that has still not eventuated, making Australia the only Commonwealth country without one.

I didn’t know then that sixteen years earlier, a tent embassy had been established outside Parliament House as a response to our nation’s refusal to recognise the rights of our indigenous peoples. I had caught a glimpse of that tent while on a school excursion two years prior, but I certainly hadn’t been told what it was or had that story included in our introduction to our country’s (white) history.

I didn’t know then that fifty years earlier, Aboriginal men had been locked up at the Redfern Police Barracks stable and then forced to be unwilling participants in an (inaccurate) re-enactment of the events of 150 years prior.

I didn’t know then that the mortality rate of indigenous children in Australia is twice that of non-indigenous children, or that there is a life expectancy gap of between 10 and 17 years.

I didn’t know then the words “stolen generations.” I had never heard them and would be horrified to discover what they mean.

I didn’t know then a single Aboriginal person. I hadn’t heard their stories, been welcomed onto their lands, been embraced by their communities, sung together as sisters and brothers, learned from their incredibly rich and diverse cultures.

And I didn’t know then that as well as my First Fleet ancestors whom I was taught to take such pride in, I have ancestors who participated in massacres of indigenous Australians. That this, too, is my history.

I didn’t know then. But I know now.

And now that I know, I can’t find today a day of celebration.

Now that I have learned, I can’t pretend that this doesn’t affect me or touch my life.

Now that I have listened, I can’t ignore the pain and hurt that has been shared with me by those who carry it.

That’s why I believe it’s time to #changethedate.

*Just to be clear, I do think 26 January should continue to be a day on which we acknowledge and remember the troubled history of this land and consider how we can work towards greater reconciliation and justice. But I think we should choose another day for our National Celebration Holiday.

Today would be a good day to be at Gallipoli

April 28, 2014Culture, Monday Travel PostsAnzac Day, Australia, Gallipoli, Travel, Turkey, warmelindacousins

It seems appropriate to follow up Friday’s post about what Anzac Day might say about Aussie culture and the gospel with my own reflections from visiting Gallipoli a couple of years ago.

What did I love about visiting Gallipoli?

We stayed the night before at Çanakkle and watching the sunset over the Daranelles looking toward the Gallipoli peninsula was quite moving.

Visiting a place which you have heard of so frequently but never really known much detail about is an engrossing experience. For starters, I found Anzac Cove much smaller than I expected.

The whole peninsula is fairly barren and undeveloped, and just seems like such a desolate and strange place for our national myth to be centred on.

I’m not generally the most nationalistic person, but it was powerful to reflect on the heartbreak suffered by so many so far away back home whose sons never returned from this place.

I was also impressed by the hospitality of the Turkish people in welcoming us to remember and commemorate our story in the midst of their own.

The words of Atatürk, Turkish Commander at Gallipoli and later President of Turkey

What did I learn from Gallipoli?

The number of graves alone tells the story of the futility of war. This is not a place for celebration, but for sombre contemplation on the darkness of human history.

I knew we had a distant family connection to Gallipoli, but was not expecting to find a family name on the memorial to those who have no known grave. Certainly that gave me a deeper sense of connection to this place.

And yet I struggled as I stood there to reconcile all the stories, the legends, that I have heard over the years, with the stark reality of this place. I’m not convinced that every individual Australian who faced death in this place was “staunch to the end” or “steady and aglow.” I wonder how many of them were afraid, humbled, and confused.

I couldn’t help wondering how often Australians erroneously glorify this place and what happened here.

I had an intriguing conversation with my Turkish guide, when I asked him what he thought about all these Australians coming here to remember. At first he brushed me off with a smile, “We love it! We love you!” but when I pushed deeper, he admitted that he really didn’t understand it. That from his perspective it was a little strange, and that perhaps at times he found the way we spoke and acted while in his country a little offensive.

Across the Dardanelles — The Dur Yolcu memorial reads in Turkish: “Stop passerby!   The ground you tread on, unawares, once witnessed the end of a generation.   Listen, in this quiet earth beats the heart of a nation.”

It can be so hard to see things from another perspective, to put ourselves in the shoes of the “other side.” But perhaps that is the most important lesson of a place like this. How can we move beyond our own side of the story to embrace the truth, which surely includes fault and failing on both sides, as well as inspiration and courage, again on both sides?

The Mehmetcçik Memorial, showing a Turkish soldier carrying an injured Australian back to his trenches

This was really brought home to me a few days later in Ankara, where I saw this painting inside Ataturk’s museum. It looked so familiar … and yet the ones I am used to seeing come from the perspective of the other side. People who place ourselves on opposite “sides” and yet we are all so very similar, so very human, so very caught up in seeing things our own way that perhaps we don’t even notice that those who seem so different are actually very much the same?

In the end, at the going down of the sun, I hope we do remember them, all of them, from all sides, and learn from them all.

Thinking Out Loud …

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