I have about four blog entries started- long overdue for completion and posting. But every time I start to finish them, I get distracted. Either I'm tired, uncomfortable on the patio chair placed at the computer or just distracted by other things. With resolve, I will refocus myself by posting the distraction.
Lots of people walk in and out of the courts where I work and the parade of names is very entertaining. [I'll be careful here not to release any sensitive or identifying information. Names might be slightly changed to protect the innocent, guilty and, especially, myself.]There are the usual oddball spellings of common names that too many people think is clever when it actually looks dyslexic or worse. Names like Dryw or Linzee. There are the very common Australian names: Kylie, Charlene, Dannii (also a candidate for the previous category), Graeme/Graham, Shane and Marie/Maree (both pronounced MAR-ee, not ma-REE). Don't look for any Britneys (any spelling) or Tobys , these are strictly American names.
And while we're on national sounding names, hark unto these British options. The reverted: Bevan, Desmond, Llewellyn. The boys-only-no-girls names: Lindsay, Ashley. It's perfectly acceptable to call a red-haired boy "Ginger". Catch these names whose spelling or hyphenation say "God Save the Queen": Hayball, Arkwright, Spratt, Fearnley-Goodacre, Shallcross, Passmore, Oldacres-Dear. And one morning I thought we had the cast present of a 1970's British comedy, "Are You Being Served?" when a Humphries and a Slocum appeared.
We are now seeing an extraordinary amount of Indonesian people-smugglers coming through. Not the top of the pyramid organizers, but the guys who do all the sailing and dirty work. They are at the lowest rungs of Indonesian society. Some have but one name only: Glus or other one syllable utterance.
Is it a quirky sense of humor or an ill-considered act of cruelty that would lead a parent to name their kid after a favored fictional character or car? Aston Martin Smith. Christopher Robin Jones. Thank you, Mother, for not naming me Rusted-Out Rambler Radowick.
And the name that started the musing. I cannot tell myself, much less you, why such a name would capture my imagination. Neither is common but neither is unheard of. The combination is odd. But the possibilities for Melvin Rex are endless.
Saturday, May 8, 2010
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
Second Anniversary
Today - April 14, 2010 - is the second anniversary of my arrival here in Australia.
No, my life isn't exactly how I envisioned it, particularly in the career category. The state's boom economy apparently bust for me long before the GFC hit. So although I am not on a high-powered, fast track professional position (at the mo), the position I do have provides some of the variety and voyeurism enjoyed in my previous life in the media.
In an international move, one wonders, " Will I ever fit in?" or even "Will I fit in too well?" I rather fear the day when my blood has gotten "too thin" to enjoy the wintery weather that allows one to make snow angels or obliges you to scrape ice off the windshield on a daily basis. Or getting to the point that 89F is too cold to go swimming. Uber wimpy.
When do people cease to sound foreign? Australians, of course, not me. Last year Kev and I took a road trip south to the Pemberton area. It's a rare and delightfully green place, which is why a movie was being shot there. We managed to catch a bit of work as extras and bumped into one of the lead actors, an American. I asked how he liked it here and he had a prepared statement about the area. This is all well and good, but showed that he didn't "hear" a foreign voice. After many years in this country, an Australian accent sounded as familiar as an American one. I was slightly annoyed by the lack of recognition at the time. Last Sunday I had to laugh at myself. After church, woman asked where I was from. I gave my customary "US/Canadian border" answer and then detected a faint annoyance in her expression. I wasn't listening for her accent, which it turns out is more like mine than Kev's.
Do I remember the day I arrived? Of course. It was almost half past one in the morning when the taxi dropped us off at home after a 20 minute ride from the airport. Kev went to work several hours after that. I went to the library and signed up for a library card. What else does one do on their first day in a foreign land?
And how did I observe this anniversary? I mailed my U.S. tax return. Not quite the same as a glass of champagne.
No, my life isn't exactly how I envisioned it, particularly in the career category. The state's boom economy apparently bust for me long before the GFC hit. So although I am not on a high-powered, fast track professional position (at the mo), the position I do have provides some of the variety and voyeurism enjoyed in my previous life in the media.
In an international move, one wonders, " Will I ever fit in?" or even "Will I fit in too well?" I rather fear the day when my blood has gotten "too thin" to enjoy the wintery weather that allows one to make snow angels or obliges you to scrape ice off the windshield on a daily basis. Or getting to the point that 89F is too cold to go swimming. Uber wimpy.
When do people cease to sound foreign? Australians, of course, not me. Last year Kev and I took a road trip south to the Pemberton area. It's a rare and delightfully green place, which is why a movie was being shot there. We managed to catch a bit of work as extras and bumped into one of the lead actors, an American. I asked how he liked it here and he had a prepared statement about the area. This is all well and good, but showed that he didn't "hear" a foreign voice. After many years in this country, an Australian accent sounded as familiar as an American one. I was slightly annoyed by the lack of recognition at the time. Last Sunday I had to laugh at myself. After church, woman asked where I was from. I gave my customary "US/Canadian border" answer and then detected a faint annoyance in her expression. I wasn't listening for her accent, which it turns out is more like mine than Kev's.
Do I remember the day I arrived? Of course. It was almost half past one in the morning when the taxi dropped us off at home after a 20 minute ride from the airport. Kev went to work several hours after that. I went to the library and signed up for a library card. What else does one do on their first day in a foreign land?
And how did I observe this anniversary? I mailed my U.S. tax return. Not quite the same as a glass of champagne.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
Easter Bilby
Happy Easter! OK, a few days late but I had to get artwork for this postcard. By now, you've gone through the initial supplies of chocolate goodies, painted eggs, jelly beans and ham. Perhaps you've already made a raid on the post-holiday, 50% off sales racks in the stores. Look closely, you may be surprised at what you find. I sure was.
Hello Easter Bilby and Easter Wombat. You may be hollow creations of Cadbury chocolate but you bring great joy to Australian children on their way to diabetic shock. Never mind those Easter bunnies, a reminder of the scourge they have become on this land after some farmer brought them in from Europe for hunting without realizing they had no natural enemies to keep their numbers down. A pox on them. We have the shy Bilby, with its looooong ears, loooong nose and looong tail to immortalize in mounds of theobroma. And let us not forget you, O Humble Wombat, built like a fire hydrant with four legs and a hairy nose. You have a cute name and are positively adorable with your fur the color of milk chocolate. munch, munch, munch. No wonder Aussies of all ages hold you in awe and fond memory.
What is noticeably missing here are the mounds jelly beans that appear at Easter time in North America. And outside a few notable cultural cliques (like the Polish Heritage Centre), decorated chicken eggs don't figure prominently in the celebrations. Did I smuggle a PAAS egg dyeing kit into the country? Can't find it if I did. That's OK, I'm good. And waiting for the 75% off sales.
What is noticeably missing here are the mounds jelly beans that appear at Easter time in North America. And outside a few notable cultural cliques (like the Polish Heritage Centre), decorated chicken eggs don't figure prominently in the celebrations. Did I smuggle a PAAS egg dyeing kit into the country? Can't find it if I did. That's OK, I'm good. And waiting for the 75% off sales.
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Irish Need Not Apply
Top O' the Morning to ye. And for the rest of the day. I was not born Irish, nor raised by leprechauns. But, by jiminy, on March 17, I am ready to speak funny for association and eat for the cause. No, not that nasty looking American bar creation, green beer, but Corned Beef & Cabbage. Add a carrot and potato,if you like, and call it a New England Boil. I get fainty just thinking about it.
Keep fainting because I have discovered that Corned Beef & Cabbage is (like German Chocolate Cake) an 'American thing.' Yesterday I went to the green grocer and butcher shop (you know, where they sell nothing but meat) and he didn't even have corned beef --called "silverside" here-- in stock. Minimal stocks of cabbage at the green grocer. Quick, run into the big grocery store....and even more disappointment. No packages of corned beef marinating in spices, no wheeled bins of accompanying produce, not even a plastic shamrock on the wall or green frosted cupcake in sight.
Paddy, where are you?
The Irish in this area are forced to congregate in just a few bars with Irish names. They advertise an "Irish breakfast" of Black Pudding (a pork sausage made with pig's blood), bacon, tomatoes, toast and beans (ummm, that last bit sounds rather English.) A few Irish bands and a Celtic dancer or two.
And not a slice of corned beef to be had. No parades. No greening a river. No shamrock-shaped baked goods. No special Masses. Few people outside JB O'Briens wearing green. Not a rainbow in sight. A sorry way to spend St Patrick's Day, to be sure, to be sure.
Keep fainting because I have discovered that Corned Beef & Cabbage is (like German Chocolate Cake) an 'American thing.' Yesterday I went to the green grocer and butcher shop (you know, where they sell nothing but meat) and he didn't even have corned beef --called "silverside" here-- in stock. Minimal stocks of cabbage at the green grocer. Quick, run into the big grocery store....and even more disappointment. No packages of corned beef marinating in spices, no wheeled bins of accompanying produce, not even a plastic shamrock on the wall or green frosted cupcake in sight.
Paddy, where are you?
The Irish in this area are forced to congregate in just a few bars with Irish names. They advertise an "Irish breakfast" of Black Pudding (a pork sausage made with pig's blood), bacon, tomatoes, toast and beans (ummm, that last bit sounds rather English.) A few Irish bands and a Celtic dancer or two.
And not a slice of corned beef to be had. No parades. No greening a river. No shamrock-shaped baked goods. No special Masses. Few people outside JB O'Briens wearing green. Not a rainbow in sight. A sorry way to spend St Patrick's Day, to be sure, to be sure.
Saturday, March 13, 2010
AC/DC
A group of old men came into town. Long graying hair, craggy faces, comfortable paunches and riding in SUV's, they could have been anyone coming in from the beach or heading out to the hills. But these guys are special.
In Fremantle, there is a statue of a particular Scottish emigre' whom you might not expect to be immortalized in such a way. Not a famous explorer, founding father, politician, priest or pioneer. He did not die heroically (indeed, he is the poster child for not downing bottles of liquor as if bottles of pop) nor did he die old. Charismatic, driven with an appetite for thrills, this bagpipe playing man captured Western Australian fancy in a big way. He is Bon Scott, long dead leader of a band favored by college guys, AC/DC.
And the band plays on. Somehow, recordings are not enough for people who enjoy songs with titles like "Highway to Hell" and "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap" so Bon's bandmates still tour. Angus Young, wearing his trademark schoolboy uniform onstage, doesn't hold up to close inspection anymore and frontman Brian Johnson doesn't need elastic vocal cords to howl out hits first sung 35 years ago.
So, for two (I suppose) magical nights, Perthians were thrilled that AC/DC had come home. Grandpas brought their sons who brought their sons to the concert. The Premier (Governor) of WA was in the mosh pit. The TV news channels did liveshots. Everyone seemed abuzz over the whole "Acca Dacca" thing.
I don't get it, but there you have it. Perhaps another look at music here another day.
And the band plays on. Somehow, recordings are not enough for people who enjoy songs with titles like "Highway to Hell" and "Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap" so Bon's bandmates still tour. Angus Young, wearing his trademark schoolboy uniform onstage, doesn't hold up to close inspection anymore and frontman Brian Johnson doesn't need elastic vocal cords to howl out hits first sung 35 years ago.
So, for two (I suppose) magical nights, Perthians were thrilled that AC/DC had come home. Grandpas brought their sons who brought their sons to the concert. The Premier (Governor) of WA was in the mosh pit. The TV news channels did liveshots. Everyone seemed abuzz over the whole "Acca Dacca" thing.
I don't get it, but there you have it. Perhaps another look at music here another day.
Funny Money
When I first arrived in OZ, I took a look at the money and mused at just how odd it looked. For the record, the currency is: 5¢ (very small), 10¢ (slightly larger), 20¢ (bigger still) and a 50¢ piece (largest); two "gold" coins of $1 and $2 (which is smaller than the modest $1 coin)-these have taken the place of bills. The bills are different sizes and colors for each denomination: $5 is light purple and the smallest, $10 is blue, $20 is red, $50 is gold (nicknamed a "pineapple") and the $100 is dark green (or so the rumor goes, they don't come my way for visual inspections). Besides having the Queen's mug on each bill (this is a Commonwealth country after all) notable Australians appear on the bills-- some of them are actually known to the general public. And, they are made of plastic, not rag or paper.
Truth be told, it all looked like funny money. The colorful stuff of board games played as a kid. And here is a cultural difference. If Australian bills look like Monopoly money to me, U.S. bills are boring and deceptive to Australians. How can you tell the difference between one bill and another? (Apparently the different numbers, different presidents and reverse designs are indistinguishable to the average inebriated Aussie backpacker.) But ask people who do a lot of travelling and they'll tell you that any currency not their own is just funny money.
I remember thinking in those early days; Would I ever spot this for real money if I saw it on the sidewalk?
I got my answer today at the Canning Vale Markets. The market is only open for two hours, so the patrons are very determined locusts hovering about boxes & crates of produce and noticing nothing else. And then I saw it. Wait, what was that? Could that purple slip be.......? Yes, it was! It took me three glances, but I recognized a $5 bill lying on the floor. Did no one else notice? Ha. It's real! Finders Keepers. I almost laughed out loud, not because of the financial windfall, but because it answered a question hovering at the back of my mind for almost two years. OK, it still looks funny, but at least I recognize it as money.
Stopped chuckling a few hours later when a fifty dollar bill fell out of Kev's pocket on his way to playing lawn bowls. I'm keeping an eye peeled on all future walks.
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Truth be told, it all looked like funny money. The colorful stuff of board games played as a kid. And here is a cultural difference. If Australian bills look like Monopoly money to me, U.S. bills are boring and deceptive to Australians. How can you tell the difference between one bill and another? (Apparently the different numbers, different presidents and reverse designs are indistinguishable to the average inebriated Aussie backpacker.) But ask people who do a lot of travelling and they'll tell you that any currency not their own is just funny money.
I remember thinking in those early days; Would I ever spot this for real money if I saw it on the sidewalk?
I got my answer today at the Canning Vale Markets. The market is only open for two hours, so the patrons are very determined locusts hovering about boxes & crates of produce and noticing nothing else. And then I saw it. Wait, what was that? Could that purple slip be.......? Yes, it was! It took me three glances, but I recognized a $5 bill lying on the floor. Did no one else notice? Ha. It's real! Finders Keepers. I almost laughed out loud, not because of the financial windfall, but because it answered a question hovering at the back of my mind for almost two years. OK, it still looks funny, but at least I recognize it as money.
Stopped chuckling a few hours later when a fifty dollar bill fell out of Kev's pocket on his way to playing lawn bowls. I'm keeping an eye peeled on all future walks.
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Saturday, March 6, 2010
Winter Olympics in a Sunburnt Land
As the final wrap-ups and analyses are made of the Vancouver Winter Olympics, while the last inflatable beaver is being deflated, during this last push to finally get people out of the ice rink where Canada won the men's hockey gold medal, let me offer a few observations of my own from a vantage point below the equator.
It's true-- Australia and the Winter Olympics are an odd mix. For starters, the Games occur in the dead of summer. The incongruity of watching snowy athletics while melting in triple digit heat is lost on no one. Second, snow-based sports only occur in a small area of New South Wales (the eastern state that contains Sydney) euphemistically called the Australian Alps. Yeah. So the majority of the native Aussie athletes tend to enjoin the "freestyle" sports. You know, the kind where you flip into the air and do some kind of acrobatic twisting before landing on your skis/board/plank/butt. One doesn't need long winters to practice jumping and gymnastics. The imported athletes pick up the other sports.
Total medal count from 20 female and 20 male competitors: 3. Two golds and one silver. Two freestyle females and one transplanted Canadian guy skiing the moguls. Channel 9 replayed the glory and re-interviewed the gals in an endless loop. Occasionally, they replayed the fading glory of their athlete-turned-commentators, but good looking faces squealing and woo, woo, woo whooping it up make good TV. This posed a problem with the Canadian guy, Dale Beggs-Smith. Dale abdicated from the Canadian team early on because their training system interfered with his "internet business". Dale's "internet business" has made him quite wealthy so he can train in his own time and can afford not to smile. He is all business on the hill as he is at the keyboard. He barely cracked a grin when winning the silver, didn't mug for the camera when being interviewed shortly thereafter, hardly looked excited on the podium. Telegenic he is not. And he didn't give interviews to media organizations outside of Australia. The sports show at my radio station figured out why he keeps such a low profile: Dale has gotten rich creating spam on the internet--one very good reason for staying below the radar.
Channel 9's coverage of the Games was a bit of a "dog's breakfast". They also had the broadcast rights to the Cricket- which is an all day sport, not just a couple of hours. Western Australia gets a lot of its "live" programming tape delayed from the east coast, so much of our Olympic coverage looked like this: delayed morning chat show until 9 am, a couple of hours of Olympic action (delayed, not live), Cricket, evening news, Cricket, sitcom, and at 10:30pm a round-up of the day's Olympic action. They frequently tapped into the BBC's or VOC's play by play announcers- a smart move when dealing with sports one knows nothing about. Channel 9's morning anchor did a competent job and one of their announcers, Phil Liggett, does a very good job describing what he sees without overreaching his knowledge of the sport. Their evening anchor is just plain shocking. Eddie McGuire is liked for his background story, florid face and constant smile. A real mate at the pub type...with the same mistaken image for having an opinion that counts. The slights to people (and apologies the next day) were a fairly regular occurrence. Truly an amateur interviewer (long wind ups to four or five entirely unrelated questions in one hit; questions a kindergartner would ask) he wasn't always accurate. When interviewing ice hockey great, Wayne Gretzky, he talked about the "ball going into the net". Luckily, it was in the middle of one of his long spew of questions, so either Gretzky didn't notice or graciously chose to ignore it as he picked one of the questions to answer.
Kevin made an observation at the end of it all. It seemed to him that, especially during the opening and closing ceremonies, the hosts were more inclined to say "We are not the U.S." rather than "We are Canada." My dear northern neighbors: your slip is showing.
Yet for all this, I hung on as much as possible to the TV coverage. There is something so very normal about snow in February, sports played on ice skates, cross country skiers with rifles strapped to their backs, toques and giant inflatable beavers & moose. Same time next year?
It's true-- Australia and the Winter Olympics are an odd mix. For starters, the Games occur in the dead of summer. The incongruity of watching snowy athletics while melting in triple digit heat is lost on no one. Second, snow-based sports only occur in a small area of New South Wales (the eastern state that contains Sydney) euphemistically called the Australian Alps. Yeah. So the majority of the native Aussie athletes tend to enjoin the "freestyle" sports. You know, the kind where you flip into the air and do some kind of acrobatic twisting before landing on your skis/board/plank/butt. One doesn't need long winters to practice jumping and gymnastics. The imported athletes pick up the other sports.
Total medal count from 20 female and 20 male competitors: 3. Two golds and one silver. Two freestyle females and one transplanted Canadian guy skiing the moguls. Channel 9 replayed the glory and re-interviewed the gals in an endless loop. Occasionally, they replayed the fading glory of their athlete-turned-commentators, but good looking faces squealing and woo, woo, woo whooping it up make good TV. This posed a problem with the Canadian guy, Dale Beggs-Smith. Dale abdicated from the Canadian team early on because their training system interfered with his "internet business". Dale's "internet business" has made him quite wealthy so he can train in his own time and can afford not to smile. He is all business on the hill as he is at the keyboard. He barely cracked a grin when winning the silver, didn't mug for the camera when being interviewed shortly thereafter, hardly looked excited on the podium. Telegenic he is not. And he didn't give interviews to media organizations outside of Australia. The sports show at my radio station figured out why he keeps such a low profile: Dale has gotten rich creating spam on the internet--one very good reason for staying below the radar.
Channel 9's coverage of the Games was a bit of a "dog's breakfast". They also had the broadcast rights to the Cricket- which is an all day sport, not just a couple of hours. Western Australia gets a lot of its "live" programming tape delayed from the east coast, so much of our Olympic coverage looked like this: delayed morning chat show until 9 am, a couple of hours of Olympic action (delayed, not live), Cricket, evening news, Cricket, sitcom, and at 10:30pm a round-up of the day's Olympic action. They frequently tapped into the BBC's or VOC's play by play announcers- a smart move when dealing with sports one knows nothing about. Channel 9's morning anchor did a competent job and one of their announcers, Phil Liggett, does a very good job describing what he sees without overreaching his knowledge of the sport. Their evening anchor is just plain shocking. Eddie McGuire is liked for his background story, florid face and constant smile. A real mate at the pub type...with the same mistaken image for having an opinion that counts. The slights to people (and apologies the next day) were a fairly regular occurrence. Truly an amateur interviewer (long wind ups to four or five entirely unrelated questions in one hit; questions a kindergartner would ask) he wasn't always accurate. When interviewing ice hockey great, Wayne Gretzky, he talked about the "ball going into the net". Luckily, it was in the middle of one of his long spew of questions, so either Gretzky didn't notice or graciously chose to ignore it as he picked one of the questions to answer.
Kevin made an observation at the end of it all. It seemed to him that, especially during the opening and closing ceremonies, the hosts were more inclined to say "We are not the U.S." rather than "We are Canada." My dear northern neighbors: your slip is showing.
Yet for all this, I hung on as much as possible to the TV coverage. There is something so very normal about snow in February, sports played on ice skates, cross country skiers with rifles strapped to their backs, toques and giant inflatable beavers & moose. Same time next year?
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