Its been a diverse year In That Howling Infinite. We have traveled, to quote Bob Dylan, “all the way from New Orleans to Jerusalem” – and to many other places in between. Vikings and Roman legionaries; Bob Dylan, Jackson Browne and Bruce Cockburn; Britain in the ‘forties and Paris in the ‘fifties; America, the Levant, and even Wonderland. By Year’s end a million souls will have journeyed to Europe from the war-ravaged lands of the Middle East, and my final posts for the year contemplate what it might mean for refugees who find to safe haven in Australia.
Here is a retrospective.
The year began with a short piece on recent archeological discoveries in Jerusalem that strongly suggested that the Via Dolorosathat Jesus trode on his final journey to Golgotha was the wrong route, and that instead, it began just inside of the Jaffa Gate. I took a light-hearted look at the Jerusalem Syndrome, a mental condition involving the presence of religiously-themed obsessive ideas, delusions and other psychoses triggered by a visit to The Holy City.
I read but one piece of fiction this year – a sad admission from a lifelong bibliophile – but this one book was probably one of the best I have read: The Incorrigible Optimists Club, winner of the prestigious Prix de Goncourt, by Jean Michel Guenassia. It is set in Paris’ Rive Gauche, as the ‘fifties gives way to the ‘sixties; as the crooners makes way for rock n’roll; as the Cold War divides a continent, sending dissidents and refugees fleeing to a safe haven in Paris; as the Algerian war divides and destroys families: and as the seeds of ‘les evenments de Mai 1968’ are sown in the hearts and souls of France’s young people. It is a coming of age book, of young hopes and fears, love and loss, a book about writers and reading, and the magic and power of the written word in prose and poetry.
March saw the passing of my old friend Dermott Ryder, chronicler and luminary of the Folk Music revival in Sydney in the early ‘seventies. Dermott’s Last Rideis my tribute to him. And April was a month of anniversaries and remembrance. Forty years since the outbreak of the Lebanese Civil War, and the centenary of the landings of the ANZACs at Gallipoli. Pity the Nation takes its title from Robert Fisk’s tombstone of a book on the long war; and he had taken it from a poem written in 1934 by Khalil Gibran, Lebanon’s most celebrated poet, a poem that was both a prophetic testament and a testimony of times to come: “Pity the nation divided into fragments, each fragment deeming itself a nation”. The Watchers of the Water is a song about Gallipoli sing by a Turkish solder.
May saw two diverse pieces of social history. The Spirit of 45 takes personal perspective of British filmmaker Ken Loach’s documentary of the excitement and optimism that followed the Labour Party’s election victory at the end of World War II. This laid the foundation stone for the British welfare state. Bob Dylan’s Americana discusses the meaning and significance of the lyrics and the imagery of Dylan’s early ‘eighties masterpiece Blind Willie McTell, a harrowing journey through America’s dark heart.
In June, we visited Yorkshire and in London, conjuring up memories and historical connections. Harald Went A Vikingis a saga about the first of two kings to die on English soil in the late summer of 1066, and the adventures that took him from Norway to Constantinople and Jerusalem and finally, to Yorkshire. Roman Wall Bluestakes its title from WH Auden’s poem about a homesick and grumpy legionnaire on Hadrian’s Wall, and contemplates the lives of the ethnically polyglot soldiery who defended the Empire’s borders. And June saw another famous anniversary, the Bicentennial of the momentous and bloody Battle of Waterloo. The Long Road to Waterloo prefaces a song for the men who, after twenty six long years of war, never came home.
Battle of Stamford Bridge, depicting King Harald Hardrada hit in the neck by an arrow
In July, controversy erupted in the Land of the Free over the flying of the Confederate Flag in states that were once part of Old Dixie. The dead hand of the Civil War reached out and touched the hearts of Americans and their friends throughout the world in the wake of yet another mass shooting. This time, a young man gunned down worshippers at prayer. That the victims were folk of colour, and the shooter, a young white extremist, reopened wounds that have never really healed. Rebel Yellsurmises that The South will always be with us, in our thoughts, in our historical memory, in our art and literature, our books and films, and our favourite music.
September marked the one hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the publication of Lewis Carroll’s timeless, fabulist masterpiece Alice In Wonderland. Go Ask Alice, I Think She’ll Know reproduces Australian critic Peter Craven’s masterful celebration of Alice 150. The title belongs to the mesmerizing Grace Slick of Jefferson Airplane who cut through to the rabbit chase channeling the long-gone Lewis in a psychedelic musical masterpiece.
On an infinitely sadder note, Ruins and Bones is a tribute to the memory of Syrian archeologist Khaled Muhammed al Asaad, murdered by ISIS in August 2015, and of Palmyra, the ‘Pearl of the Desert’.
Allende’s Desk and Osama’s Pyjamas is a brief commentary on the extension of American military power and the pathology of demons and demonization. Tales of Yankee Powerlooks at American foreign policy during the 1980s from the perspective of the songs of Jackson Browne and Bruce Cockburn.
November’s Children of the Revolution looks at the events that led up to the beginning of the Syrian Civil War, and the early days before it became too dangerous to gather on the streets, when men, women and children would parade in public places, waving the flag of the old Syria, the one that flew before the Assad clan seized power in 1966. Canny camera men could take media-friendly shots of photogenic little girls in face makeup looking sad, vulnerable and defiant. Those days of hope are long gone.
A highlight of this past year has been my work as a volunteer with the Humanitarian Settlement Services programme. The HSS’ mission is to assist newly arrived refugees to settle in Australia. In No Going Home, I endeavour to imagine the refugee journey. Hejirais a sequel of sorts and, indeed, a happy ending.
Happy New Year to these prospective New Australians, and to all my readers. May 2016 be fortunate and fulfilling.
I finally broke into the prison, I found my place in the chain. Even damnation is poisoned with rainbows, all the brave young men they’re waiting now to see a signal which some killer will be lighting for pay. Into this furnace I ask you now to venture, you whom I cannot betray.
Leonard Cohen, The Old Revolution
The Syrian civil war broke lose in March 2011, two months after the events in Tahrir Square, and one month after the fall of Mubarak.
Amidst the tumult and media hype of the Arab Spring, it was as if the distant drums had suddenly hit the volume switch. In the dusty border town of Dara’a, just north of Jordan, local kids wrote on a wall: “The people want the regime to fall”. The words had been repeated from Tunisia to Egypt, from Yemen to Bahrain. It was the cry of the revolution. The local governor decided to come down hard. The young people, all under 17, were thrown in jail. The punishment stunned the town, and suddenly, Syria, progressive, diverse, proud, beautiful, but authoritarian Syria greeted the misnamed Arab Spring.
The young men’s families and friends weren’t having any of it. It is said that in broad daylight, dozens of young men pelted a poster of a smiling President Bashar Assad; a statue of the Bashar’s late father and predecessor Hafiz Assad was demolished; and official buildings, including the HQ of ruling Ba’ath Party’ and the governor’s office, were destroyed. “There is no fear, there is no fear, after today there is no fear!” hundreds of men chanted in shaky mobile-phone footage.
Over that weekend, security forces opened fire on marchers. This was the regime’s well tried negotiating technique. But Assad responded immediately, sending a high-ranking delegation to deliver his condolences to the families of the dead. The governor was sacked, and the boys released.
So far, so “I mentioned the war but I think I got away with it” But the die had been cast. The demonstrators made demands the regime was unwilling or unable to meet. And the rest is tragedy.
I am not about to retell the story of the Syrian revolution. It is still being written, and as yet, there is no ending. Only more blood. As I write, well over three hundred thousand souls have perished (soon, it will overtake the butchers bill of the Spanish and American Civil Wars), and tens of thousands have disappeared into prisons and oubliez. Millions have been displaced within the country; millions have sought shelter in neighbouring countries; and at least eight hundred thousand have taken to the roads of Central Europe.
But I will quixotically hark back to just before events reached the fork in the road, to when there was an outside chance that Syria could avoid the chaos and carnage that was besetting other children of an Arab Spring that was turning into a bitter winter.
Back to the days before The Fall when pundits were asking whether Bashar would be Hammersmith Man, reflecting his former career as a successful ophthalmologist in London, and his glamorous, cosmopolitan, former merchant banker wife, or Hama Man, recalling his father’s crackdown on an Islamist rising in Hama in 1982, in which uncounted tens of thousand are believed to have perished. We discovered very soon whom he was destined to become.
To the days before The Fall, before the revolution became weaponized and islamized, and demonstrators danced together in the streets, earning the intifada the short lived sobriquet ‘the Dabke Revolution’, named for the circle folk dance popular throughout the Middle East and the Balkans.
The days before the slaughters began. First by the forces of regime, led by Bashar’s brutal brother Maher and his notorious Fourth Armoured Division. Then by the thuggish Alawi militia – the Shabiha, or “ghosts” or “shadows”, a double-edged meaning alluding to their underworld origin and methods, and also to the fact that they literally turned people into ghosts. And then, in reciprocal ferocity, by opposition militias that grew and proliferated, fought and died, divided, and divided again, and embraced a jihadi creed, sowing the dragon’s teeth that evolved into Jabhat an Nusra and Da’esh.
The days before it became too dangerous to gather on the streets, when men, women and children would parade in public places, waving the flag of the old Syria, the one that flew before the Assad clan seized power in 1966. Canny camera men could take media-friendly shots of photogenic little girls in face makeup looking sad, vulnerable and defiant. When the picture that is the featured image of this blog was first published in Al Jazeera in early 2011, I was both enchanted and inspired. I immediately started using it, with acknowledgements, in my publications and postings. When more and more of these images appeared, I used them too. But I was becoming a tad suspicious. The lasses looked too clean, too cute, and indeed, many actually looked alike. The photographers’ daughters, perhaps, or those of friends. Were they for-real or where they posed? I guess I will never find out.
Needlessly to say, as the rebellion morphed into harrowing civil war, such images disappeared, and in their place, we saw destruction and carnage, and the broken bodies of little girls and boys slain by bomb and bullet, hardship and hunger. Now, as families were forced to abandon their homes and make their way to the borders, and thence, into Jordan, Lebanon, and Turkey, and finally, into Europe, we see children staggering on dusty roads, carried piggy back by exhausted fathers, pushed in strollers, scorched by the sun, soaked by the rain, and frozen by the snow. And we see little Aylan on his golden beach, a Kurdish toddler now a symbol of all the drowned babies of the Mediterranean and the Aegean Sea.
Photogenic children no more. Just victims, survivors, lost souls.
I fought in the old revolution on the side of the ghost and the King. Of course I was very young and I thought that we were winning; I can’t pretend I still feel very much like singing as they carry the bodies away. Into this furnace I ask you now to venture… you whom I cannot betray.
On a personal note, we were last in Syria in March 2009, and whilst visiting the famed Roman amphitheater at Bosra, just northeast of Dera’a, we had the pleasure of the company of a crowd of Syrian school children. They treated us like visiting celebrities and sang us a song of welcome. It is saddening to look at these pictures now, and wonder where these children are now.
London, back in the day. What wonders dwelt within. I recall here but a few. The old church of St. Bartolph-Without, which turned up in later days in a bad Dracula movie. The churchyard of St. Paul’s, a haven for summer’s day lunch-timing. Green Park in spring sunshine as the lily white skin of England divests for primavera. Berkeley Square, where the fabled nightingale sang, and where Clive of India, his mind curdled by corruption and conscience, and haunted by guilt and ghosts, cut his own throat.
Read more in Tabula Rasa – Poems of Paul Hemphill, Volume One
My first political excursion. The CND Aldermaston March reaches London, 1966
Never in modern times – since the Second World War – have there been so many refugees. There are over sixty nine million people around the world on the move today – people who have been forcibly displaced from their homes and are fleeing from persecution or conflict. Forty million people have been internally displaced within their own countries – including six million Syrians. Over 25 million are refugees in neighbouring countries and further afield -. 25% of them are in Turkey, Lebanon, Iran, Pakistan, and Uganda. five million are Syrians. These figures are of those registered by the UNHCR. The real numbers are much higher. [See below, The World Refugee Crisis in Brief, and The Refugee’s Journey]
Just imagine …
Millions are on the move – , and you are one of them.
Lebanese American BBC Journalist Kim Ghattas says well:
I often get asked why my family never left – or more pointedly, why my parents kept us there, dodging sniper fire on the way to school and back. The answer is this: We stayed because leaving is hard. Becoming refugees meant leaving our lives, our identity, and our dignity behind…No one’s first instinct is to leave. Their first choice is usually to hold on to the comforting familiarity of home; when that becomes impossible, you leave for another safer area within the country. Then you leave for a neighboring country, so you can return as soon as possible or even keep an eye on your property while you’re away. Only when the walls are closing in and the horizon is total darkness do you give up and leave everything you have ever known behind, lock the door to your home, and walk away.
no one leaves home until home is a sweaty voice in your ear saying- leave, run away from me now i don’t know what i’ve become but i know that anywhere is safer than here
Somali poet Warsan Shire, Home
A million spaces in the earth to fill, here’s a generation waiting still – we’ve got year after year to kill, but there’s no going home. Steve Knightley, Exile
Oh, the wind, the wind is blowing, through the graves the wind is blowing, freedom soon will come; then we’ll come from the shadows. Leonard Cohen, The Partisan
I pity the poor immigrant whose strength is spent in vain, whose heaven is like ironsides, whose tears are like rain. Bob Dylan, I Pity the Poor Immigrant
Just imagine …
What if you had to leave behind everything that you hold dear. Your identity, culture, language, faith. You job, your school. Your loved ones, your friends, and your play-mates.
What if you have to sleep with your shoes on so you are ready to run if your enemies are approaching your village? And then you have to flee your home and climb the mountain to escape, helping your youngsters and old folk up the rocky slopes in the summer heat, and there is nothing to eat or drink, and nothing you can do except wait for capture or rescue.
What would YOU do if you had but a short while to gather a few things together and run, leaving your whole life behind? What would you try and take with you?
Then you wash up, literally and figuratively, on foreign shores – in border refugee camps, dusty border towns or urban slums. And there you stay, with other tens, hundreds, thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands in like dire straits.
Until one day, you are selected for humanitarian settlement in a strange land at the other end of the earth.
That day may never come; so, impatient, frustrated, desperate, you use your family’s savings to pay smugglers and traffickers who prowl the desert and jungle camps like predators and the port cities of Turkey, Libya and South East Asia.
So you take to the seas in frail boats and brave the the deep and dangerous waters of the Mediterranean, the Adriatic and the Indian Ocean.
You might only have enough money for one passage, so you go on ahead and hope to send for your kin once you have reached safe haven.
You may be one of fortunate ones who make it – not one of those cast ashore, lifeless flotsam and jetsam like baby Aylan on his golden beach.
You are now one of tens of thousands in a river of desperate endeavour.
You walk the long miles of the unwelcoming highways of Eastern Europe to a German or Swedish sanctuary. You might end up in a detention camp in Italy or Spain, stranded in the Calais Jungle, or the harbours of Java and Sumatra.
Or else, you are parked in a hot and hostile makeshift camp somewhere near the Tropic of Capricorn.
Just imagine …
You have fled the terror of the warlords and the militias, the holy warriors and the ethnic cleansers.
You discover that the border camps of Jordan and Lebanon, Turkey and Afghanistan, Thailand and Malaysia, Kenya and Namibia have their own ecology of hardship and handouts, rape and robbery, beatings and bribes, illness and neglect, cursory and desultory treatment by overworked and under-resourced aid workers, and shake-downs by the criminals who thrive in these places and the cops who take a cut and turn a blind eye or else enforce punitive directives from politicians, parliaments and bureaucrats.
There, you and yours’ attempt to rebuild a semblance of a life-before amidst the tents and the shanties, the dust and the sewage, the summer’s heat and the winter’s cold. A mosque to pray in, a school for the children, games of football or backgammon for idle youth and menfolk.
You try to keep the children warm and fed and free of mortal illness; you try to keep the spirit alive in a time of anxiety, fear, threat, loss, and confusion, a time of hopeful emptiness and of empty hopelessness.
Zaatari refugee camp, Jordan July 2013
Just imagine …
You are one of the lucky few selected for settlement in the fabled, unknown ‘west’.
New lands, under foreign skies, different constellations, so far away it might as well be the moon.
You now dwell among strangers. You neither speak their language nor comprehend their ways or their foreign gods.
You have no friends or family to call on in time of need.
You must rebuild the basic buildings blocks of a normal life – where even the idea of a normal life has now changed utterly.
The houses, the streets, the shops, the money even – are all new.
The things you took for granted are no longer there, and in their place are new ways and means.
New systems and processes – social, welfare, health, education – with new rules and ways of getting things done. Going to the doctor, to the bank, to government offices.
Understanding that policemen and soldiers are not people you have to pay off or flee from.
Learning English.
Finding a home.
Getting the kids into a school.
Finding a job when your qualifications are not recognized, and work-ways are different to what you know.
The laws are new, the language is new, the way people dress and behave, talk, walk and eat is new.
Many new things are fascinating, tempting.
Others, confronting and insulting to your morality and values.
Some are alien, even, beyond your comprehension.
Codes of behaviour, dress, decorum, politeness, are new. Less formality, respect and deference; open displays of sexuality, affection, and rudeness that would not have been tolerated, permitted even, at home.
You don’t understand what makes the locals tick – their mannerisms, their speech, their body language, their concept of time and space, even.
And you are shocked and frightened by their hostility. Not all – just a noisy and troublesome few who talk quietly amongst themselves, or hurl abuse, or march through city streets with signs that scream, “go back to where you came from!”, “go home!”
Home?
There is no home.
Home is far, far away.
So far away, it might as well be on the moon.
Just imagine…
This is the new. And you still bear the cross of the old. The world you left behind is still with you.
You miss your family, your friends, and the comfort and support you all gave each other.
You miss your old life. The streets, the sounds, the smells. The weather and seasons. Your job, your status, your school, your neighbourhood.
You yearn for street and shop signs you could read, voices you understood on the radio and television, on the street, and on the buses.
You hate having to try and make yourself understood to officials and doctors, desk clerks and shop assistants, and even the supportive and ever helpful case workers whose mission is to help you get through all this.
You are homesick, and lonesome; you feel isolated, helpless, dependent.
There is a terrible ache in your heart and a rift in your soul.
And then there are the scars that won’t and perhaps can never heal. The psychological and physical effects of the events and experiences that forced you to flee your homeland.
Conflict and violence, intimidation and discrimination, torture and brutality, even. You have flashbacks, bad dreams, anxiety attacks, and actual physical and mental pain and anguish.
They say that PTSD is endless. There is no cure …
Just imagine…
You are a stranger in a strange land, and there’s no going home …
They that go down to the sea in ships, that do business in great waters; these see the works of the LORD, and his wonders in the deep. For he commandeth, and raiseth the stormy wind, which lifteth up the waves thereof. Psalm 107
no one leaves home unless
home is the mouth of a shark.
you only run for the border
when you see the whole city
running as well.
your neighbours running faster
than you, the boy you went to school with
who kissed you dizzy behind
the old tin factory is
holding a gun bigger than his body,
you only leave home
when home won’t let you stay.
no one would leave home unless home
chased you, fire under feet,
hot blood in your belly.
it’s not something you ever thought about
doing, and so when you did –
you carried the anthem under your breath,
waiting until the airport toilet
to tear up the passport and swallow,
each mouthful of paper making it clear that
you would not be going back.
you have to understand,
no one puts their children in a boat
unless the water is safer than the land.
who would choose to spend days
and nights in the stomach of a truck
unless the miles travelled
meant something more than journey.
no one would choose to crawl under fences,
be beaten until your shadow leaves you,
raped, then drowned, forced to the bottom of
the boat because you are darker, be sold,
starved, shot at the border like a sick animal,
be pitied, lose your name, lose your family,
make a refugee camp a home for a year or two or ten,
stripped and searched, find prison everywhere
and if you survive
and you are greeted on the other side
with
go home blacks, refugees
dirty immigrants, asylum seekers
sucking our country dry of milk,
dark, with their hands out
smell strange, savage –
look what they’ve done to their own countries,
what will they do to ours?
the dirty looks in the street
softer than a limb torn off,
the indignity of everyday life
more tender than fourteen men who
look like your father, between
your legs, insults easier to swallow
than rubble, than your child’s body
in pieces – for now, forget about pride
your survival is more important.
i want to go home,
but home is the mouth of a shark
home is the barrel of the gun
and no one would leave home
unless home chased you to the shore
unless home tells you to
leave what you could not behind,
even if it was human.
no one leaves home until home
is a damp voice in your ear saying
leave, run now, i don’t know what
i’ve become.
This Syrian mother and her child were rescued by the Greek Coast Guard.
The World Refugee Crisis in Brief
The Melancholy Mathematics
Like death and taxes, the poor and racism, refugees have always been with us. But never in modern times – since the Second World War – have they been so many!
There are over sixty nine million people around the world on the move today – that have been forcibly displaced from their homes – fleeing from persecution or conflict.
This doesn’t count economic migrants who have hit the roads of sub Saharan Africa and Central America fleeing drought and crop failure, economic recession and unemployment, poverty, gangs and cartels, seeking a better life for themselves and the families in Europe or the USA.
Three quarters of a million ‘economic migrants’ are on the move in Central America, whilst the UN estimates that at least four million people have left Venezuela because of its political and economic crisis in what has been described as the biggest refuge crisis ever seen in the Americas. There are refugee camps on the Colombian border. Most are in Columbia but others have entered Brazil and Peru. But these are not by legal definition refugees – see below, The Refugees’ Journey .
Of those sixty nine million people over 11 million or 16% are Syrians. The numbers keep growing Thirty one people at being displaced every minute of the day. In 2018 alone, 16.2 million people were newly displaced.
Forty million people have been internally displaced within their own countries – this includes six million Syrians and off our radars, some two million souls who once lived in the contested regions of eastern Ukraine.
Over 25 million are refugees in neighbouring countries and further afield. 25% of them are in Turkey, Lebanon, Iran, Pakistan, and Uganda. Some 57% of them come from three countries: Syria, 6.3 million, Afghanistan 2.6 million and South Sudan 2.4 million. The top hosting counties are Turkey 3.5 million, Lebanon, 1 million, Pakistan 1.4 million, Uganda 1.4 million and Iran 1 million.
Jordan shelters over three quarters of a million Syrians; during the Iraq wars, this relatively poor country sheltered a similar number of Iraqis, and still hosts tens of thousands of Iraqi Christians who’ve fled persecution at home.
These figures are of those registered by the UNHCR. The real numbers are much higher. The Lebanese government estimates that there are more than 1.5 million Syrian refugees in the country.
Much of the focus these days is on the Middle East – Syria and its neighbours, on Libya and the frail boats crossing the Mediterranean, on the war in Yemen which has killed over thirteen thousand and displaced over two million.
But situation in Africa is as dire.
More than 2 million Somalis are currently displaced by a conflict that has lasted over two decades. An estimated 1.5 million people are internally displaced in Somalia and nearly 900,000 are refugees in the near region, including some 308,700 in Kenya, 255,600 in Yemen and 246,700 in Ethiopia.
By August 2018, the Democratic Republic of the Congo hosted more than 536,000 refugees from Burundi, the Central African Republic and South Sudan. And yet, there are over 4.5 million Congolese people displaced inside their own country and over 826,000 in neighbouring countries, including Namibia, Angola and Kenya.
Should the present situation in Sudan deteriorate into civil war, another tide of humanity will hit the road.
And closer to home, there are millions of refugees in Asia.
As of March 2019, there are over 100, 000 refugees in 9 refugee camps in Thailand (as of March 2019), mainly ethnic Karen and Shan. Refugees in Thailand have been fleeing ethnic conflict and crossing Myanmar’s eastern border jungles for the safety of Thailand for nearly 30 years.
There were an estimated 1 million Rohingya living in Myanmar before the 2016–17 crisis, and since August 2017, an estimated 625,000 refugees from Rakhine, had crossed the border into Bangladesh.
The top-level numbers are stupendous. The detail is scary.
Some 52% of the world’s refugees and displaced are children. And many are unaccompanied. Every hour, around 20 children run for their lives without their parents to protect them.
Children are the most vulnerable to disease and malnutrition and also to exploitation and lose years of schooling. Millions are elderly and are also face health problems.
And the problems facing young people and adults are all enormous. International aid is limited and host countries often unsympathetic. Work opportunities are few, some countries even forbidding refugees to take work, whilst unscrupulous employers exploit the desperate. Migrants are often encouraged, sometimes forcibly, to return to their countries of origin regardless of whether or not it is safe for them to return. There are reports that many have returned to Syria into the unwelcoming hands of the security services.
Refugees have lived in camps and towns in Pakistan and Thailand, Namibia and Kenyan for decades. Most refugee children were not born in their parents’ homelands.
And the camps are by no means safe havens. There may be no shelter or only basic shelter in tents; no privacy; a lack of clean water; meagre food; limited medical care; and the threat of injury, disease and epidemics. They may be poor physical security and armed attacks, and abuse by the authorities and officials. There may be organized crime, shakedowns and extortion, corruption and bribery.
Families may have become separated, exposing women and children without the protection of male family members to more fear and violence. Women are subsequently vulnerable to harsh conditions, including potential sexual and physical and abuse, poor healthcare, and unequal access to food and water. They may be coping with the loss of the head of the family and with the changing roles and responsibilities that come from being the sole parent. They may not know if their male family members will return to them safely and they must deal with the stress and anxiety, the grief and loss arising from their recent experiences. They might be fearful of the future, which in a camp is unknown and unpredictable
Australia and Refugees
Of all displaced peoples, 17% of them are being hosted in Europe. According to recent data published by the UNHCR, Germany is home to the most refugees by far in Europe – 1.4 million in total. By comparison, France and Sweden have 402,000 and 328,000 respectively, and the UK, 122,000.
Australia’s contribution to the world’s refugee problem is but a drop in the ocean. But we have a long established humanitarian refugee settlement programme for people officially recognized as refugees by the UNHCR and selected for third-country settlement in Australia.
Our humanitarian migration intake for 2016 -17 was the highest year on record. The intake of 24,162 was some 10% of our broader migration program which saw 225,941 permanent additions to the Australian population, and included the special intake of Syrian and Iraqi refugees (an estimate 12,000 places over several years).
The figures are 17,500 in 2017-18 and similar in 2018-19, whilst Scott Morrison has pledged to freeze the number of humanitarian arrivals for the next term. Under the policy there will be an overall target of 60 per cent of the offshore component for women, up from 50.8 per cent in 2017-18. The Government will also push to increase the number of refugees and humanitarian entrants being settled in regional Australia from a target of 30 per cent to 40 per cent in 2019-20, whilst insisting that new arrivals will only go to areas where there is strong community support.
Coffs Harbour
Coffs Harbour is one of several refugee intake towns in NSW, along with Armidale, Newcastle, Wollongong and Wagga Wagga. It’s medical and educational facilities have….
Coffs Harbour hosts several organizations dedicated to helping former refugees settle in Australia. They arrive in Australia on specific humanitarian visas and become permanent residents the moment they are admitted into the country. – and hence cease to be refugees.
SSI looks after them when they first arrive in Coffs Harbour. North Coast Settlement Services, a division of Saint Vincent de Paul Society, takes over once SSI’s work is done – after between six and eighteen months depending on a family’s needs, whilst the privately run Sanctuary organization assists settled migrants with such matters as family reunion and employment. An ancillary NSW government agency, the NSW Service for the Treatment and Rehabilitation of Torture and Trauma Survivors (STARTTS), assists new arrivals with psychological support, and particularly, the effects of PTSD. STARTTS services include counseling, group therapy, group activities and outings, camps for children and young people, English classes and physiotherapy
I spend two days a week as a volunteer with Settlement Services International, a Sydney-based community organisation that administers the Humanitarian Settlement Program (HSP) which supports refugees from the moment they arrive at the airport, provides essential support and information to assist refugees settle in Australia and empower them to gain independence and build strong connections in their new communities. SSI helps with the needs of new arrivals and the challenges of settling in a new country. Its aim is to enhance self-reliance with a focus on English language skills, education and job readiness.
SSI administers the Humanitarian Settlement Programme in several centres in regional NSW, including Coffs Harbour, Newcastle and Armidale. In all three areas, SSI has teams of staff on the ground who work with refugees, humanitarian entrants and their local communities to help new arrivals to through their initial settlement. The SSI team includes case managers and volunteers from the local community and from the refuge community itself
SSI’s work includes meeting and greeting, arranging temporary accommodation on arrival; orientation, including familiarization with Australian ways, our services and institutions, and getting around Coffs Harbour; basic official matters like Centrelink, banking, and health services; English classes at TAFE and enrolling children at schools; dealing with real estate agents, rental leases and looking after their rental properties.
Where do our clients come from?
When first volunteering, I worked for Anglicare. New arrivals were largely from Myanmar and Congo – mostly Christians – and from Afghanistan. Many of the latter came to Australia under the “woman at risk” programme – mothers and children with no father. Whilst all are Muslim, many were Shia Hazaras, a Turkic people persecuted by the Sunni Taliban. Since SSI took over from Anglicare in September 2017, whilst Burmese and African families continue to arrive, the emphasis has been on Yazidis from Iraq and Syria, and particularly from the Yazidi heartland of Sinjar in northern Iraq, where they endured enormous suffering and hardship at the hands of the Islamic State. Considered infidels by Da’ish, they were targets of a campaign of genocide from 2014. More than five thousand were killed, and some five to seven thousand were abducted and enslaved – mainly women and children. Such was the danger that the UNHCR and the Australian and other governments took whole families straight out of the war zone rather than from camps outside Iraq.
Yazidis are ethnically Kurdish, and their language, Kurmanji, is Kurdish. Their society is hierarchical and endogamous. Their religion, Yazidsm, is a monotheistic religion and has elements of ancient Mesopotamian faiths, including ancient Persian Mithraism, and some similarities to the Abrahamic religions, Judaism, Christianity and Islam. Because Yazidis believe in reincarnation and turn to the direction of the sun when praying, it has been thought – erroneously, that the religion has its origins in ancient Persian Zoroastrianism and Hinduism. They believe in the one god, the creator of all things, who delegated the ongoing management to a heptad of seven holy beings or angels, the chief of whom is Malek Taus – the Peacock Angel.
Malek Taus has in the past been associated, by Muslims and Christians, with Iblis, Satan, and the fall of proud Lucifer. This misinterpretation has led, historically, to Yazidis being perceived as devil worshipers, and thus being subject to persecution and pogrom. The atrocities of Da’ish were only different from past assaults and massacres in their scale and longevity.
Volunteering
Whilst case managers specifically look after the new arrivals, they depend upon a team of volunteers to assist them in a wide variety of tasks that we locals take for granted. for example: taking new arrivals them to medical or bank appointments, showing them how to use the bus network, setting up accommodation prior to arrival, minding children whilst parents attend appointments, and even helping folk to purchase use lawn mowers – there are few lawns in Iraq and Afghanistan.
As a volunteer, past and present tasks have included walkabouts to familiarize new arrivals with Coffs Harbour, accompanying clients to house inspections when seeking new rental accommodation, and assisting with rental application forms; sending important documents like birth, marriage and education certificates to Social Services’ translation service for official translations; helping clients to apply for bus concession cards, school bus cards, and children’s sport vouchers; and assisting with NBN plans and connections. I have fixed broken cupboards, replaced light bulbs, checked out washing machines and kitchen stoves. and taking families to school interviews.
As I can get by with spoken Arabic and can read and write the language, and as i am reasonably proficient with computers, I have helped with online applications and prepared resumes. I have shown clients how to budget their money, and have run a class on how to set up and use smart phone calendars to help them make and keep appointments. On occasions, I am asked to just drop in on clients to see how they are getting on, and sort any basic house problems.
My most rewarding experiences have been: assisting case managers at the airport when the clients first arrive. It’s a very emotional moment for all involved; Taking families who have never seen the sea before to the seaside; helping a clients get a job; and helping STARTTS run a youth group for children and young people by registering the young attendees
How I got into this
Since my twenties, I’ve had an interest and, indeed, a passion for the Middle East, its history and politics, its people and culture, its languages and religions. I’ve travelled often to the region, and have studied it formally and as a hobby. I learned standard Arabic in the seventies and worked in academic and government research. Though I took a very different road for two decades, I returned to Syria in the noughties and got back into Arabic both standard and colloquial (two relatively distinct languages).
On retirement, I wanted to do volunteer work, and by happenstance, Coffs Harbour was a refugees intake town with several organizations dedicated to assisting new arrivals. At first, I used my knowledge of Arabic script to assist Farsi-speaking Afghans, and then the Iraqi and Syrian Yazidis arrived. Though their native tongue is Kurdish Kurmanji, and few could speak English, many spoke Arabic. SSI had several Arabic speaking support-workers, and some new arrivals had good English and now work as Arabic and Kurmanji speaking support staff, I am able to step in when they are already booked. Who’d ever have thought I’d be able to use and grow my Arabic in Coffs Harbour.
The Refugees’ Journey
Who is a migrant? Who is a refugee? Who is an asylum seeker?
Migrants
A migrant is a person who makes a conscious choice to leave their country to seek a better life elsewhere. Before they decide to leave their country, migrants can seek information about their new home, study the language and explore employment opportunities. They can plan their travel, take their belongings with them, and say goodbye to the important people in their lives. They can continue to phone friends and family, or write, email or Skype them without fear of adverse consequences. They are free to return home at any time if things don’t work out as they had hoped, if they get homesick or if they wish to visit family members and friends left behind.
People who choose to migrate for economic reasons are sometimes called “economic refugees”, especially if they are trying to escape from poverty. But they are not recognized as refugees under international law. The correct term for people who leave their country or place of residence because they want to seek a better life is “economic migrant”.
However, the displacement of people caused by such economic circumstances, or by natural disasters like flood, drought or extreme weather, can contribute towards political, social and ethnic tensions that can precipitate refugee crises. Effective and timely external assistance from neighbours and donor nations will often help to avert this. Aid is therefore provided in an effort to keep people in their homes or in their home countries.
Refugees
The 1951 United Nations Convention relating to the Status of Refugees states:
“Any person who owing to a well founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his/her nationality and is unable, or owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself/herself of the protection of that country.”
Refugees are forced to leave their country because they are at risk of, or have experienced persecution. Their concerns are human rights and safety, and not economic advantage. They leave behind their homes, most or all of their belongings, family members and friends. Some are forced to flee with no warning, and may not be able to say goodbye to friends and family, and may never be able to contact or see them again.
Many refugees have experienced significant trauma or been tortured or otherwise ill-treated. Their journey to safety is fraught with hazards, many risking their lives in search of protection. They cannot return home unless the situation that forced them to leave improves.
Location is all important. During civil unrest and conflict, people may be forced to leave their homes, but do not leave their country. These internally displaced persons (IDPs) are often referred to as refugees. But, whilst refugees and IDPs may flee for similar reasons, their legal status is very different. Whilst remaining within the borders of their home countries, IDPs are legally under the protection of their own government, even in cases where the government’s actions are the cause of their flight. A person cannot be recognized as a refugee unless they are outside their home country.
Asylum Seekers
These seek protection as refugees, but their claim for refugee status has not yet been assessed. Many refugees have at some point been asylum seekers, that is, they have lodged an individual claim for protection and have had that claim assessed by a government or UNHCR.
Some refugees, however, do not formally seek protection as asylum seekers. During mass influx situations, people may be declared “prima facie” refugees without having undergone an individual assessment of their claims, as conducting individual interviews in these circumstances is generally impracticable (due the large numbers involved) and unnecessary (as the reasons for flight are usually self-evident). In other cases, refugees may be unable to access formal status determination processes or they may simply be unaware that they are entitled to claim protection as a refugee.
It is important to note that refugee status exists regardless of whether it has been formally recognized. People do not “become” refugees at the point when their claims for protection are upheld – they were already refugees, and the assessment process has simply recognized their pre-existing status. People become refugees (and are entitled to international protection and assistance) from the moment they flee their country due to a well-founded fear of persecution, as stipulated in the Refugee Convention.
What causes a person or a people to flee their home country?
The most common causes are war and civil unrest, persecution for political or religious beliefs, or ethnic and racial identity, and human rights violations by government authorities or rogue militias. There could be extreme political instability and fighting; assassinations of people associated with certain political or social groups; arbitrary arrest and torture, mutilation and degradation that can happen without warning; routine sexual violence towards women and girls; forced conscription of child soldiers, forcing families to flee to protect their children; and conscription for slave labour. Governments are unable to protect their citizens, and may actively participate in violations, leaving people with no place or person to turn to for protection.
Often people will hang on, hoping things will improve. Flight is the last option because it means leaving everything behind – home, possessions, jobs, education, family and friends, language, culture and identity. People are often forced to flee with very little warning, no time to collect identity documents or precious things, or say farewell to family, friends and neighbours. They may have to travel long distances, often on foot or in small boats, and through dangerous territory or waters. They may go for long periods without food and water. They may become in danger of being intercepted, robbed or recruited, raped or killed, imprisoned or repatriated.
Life in the Refugee Camps
The fortunate might reach a camp or other place of relative safety. In the camp there may be no shelter or only basic shelter in tents; no privacy; a lack of clean water; meagre food; limited medical care; and the threat of injury, disease and epidemics. They may be poor physical security and armed attacks, and abuse by the authorities and officials. There may be organized crime, shakedowns and extortion, corruption and bribery.
Families may have become separated, exposing women and children without the protection of male family members to more fear and violence. Women are subsequently vulnerable to harsh conditions, including potential sexual and physical and abuse, poor healthcare, and unequal access to food and water. They may be coping with the loss of the head of the family and with the changing roles and responsibilities that come from being the sole parent. They may not know if their male family members will return to them safely and they must deal with the stress and anxiety, the grief and loss arising from their recent experiences. They might be fearful of the future, which in a camp is unknown and unpredictable
The Role of the UNHCR
The office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is mandated by the United Nations to protect refugees and help them find solutions to their plight. It has over 4,000 staff in 120 countries and an annual budget of about US$1 billion. In addition to legal protection, UNHCR now also provides material relief in major emergencies either directly or in partnership with other agencies.
Refugee protection is covered by International Human Rights Law, and this sits within a broader framework of international law. The agency responsible for the oversight of international human rights law is the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UNHCHR).
Refugees are accorded certain rights under international law, including
The right not to be sent back to a country where their life or freedom would be in danger
The right to receive public relief and welfare support at the same level as nationals
The right to access education and health care
The right to work
Entitlement to be issued with identity papers and travel documents
The role of the UNHCR is to
Safeguard the rights and wellbeing of refugees
Ensure that every person can exercise the right to seek asylum and find safe refuge in another country
Promote long-term solutions to the refugees’’ plight utilizing the options of voluntary return, local integration in the country of first asylum, or resettlement in a third country
Ensure that refugees are treated appropriately by countries that have signed the UN Convention
Ensure that refuges are given the same rights as nationals of the countries they are accepted into
Protect refuges from being forced to return to their home countries if it is likely they will be persecuted
Promote the reunification of families
Take into account the special needs of particular refuges classes, e.g. women and children
UNHCR’s “durable solutions” for refugees:
Voluntary repatriation, the preferred long-term solution – going back to the country of origin when it is safe for them to return country. Voluntary repatriation is encouraged if it is safe and reintegration is viable. Indeed, most refuges prefer to go home as soon as circumstances permit and a degree of stability has been restored.
Local settlement and integration is the next preferred option – making a home in the country to which they first fled. Such local settlement may e spontaneous with new-comers establishing a new community. Integration is facilitated there are common ethnic groups or co-religionists. However, there may be a political affiliation between the government of their homeland and the country of first asylum which may lead to continued harassment and persecution.
Resettlement in a third country – often as a last resort, when refugees can neither return home nor remain in the country of first asylum, and are then selected by the UNHCR and sent to a third country to start a new life. Some eleven countries offer resettlement on a regular basis: Australia, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Ireland, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Sweden, the UK, and the USA.
Whilst the UNHCR strives for “durable solutions”, the reality of the global refugee problem is that many countries hosting refugees embrace “non-durable” solutions such as:
“Warehousing” – refugees remain indefinitely in a camp where freedom of movement is restricted, basic supplies are scarce and there are few opportunities for any meaningful activity
Involuntary Repatriation – refugees are sent back to their country or origin while it is still unsafe. Sometimes refugees are forced back; sometimes they return because this is the “least bad option”
Secondary Movement – refugees themselves attempt to get to a western country in which they can lodge a claim for refugee status. This often involves clandestine travel using people smugglers and it can be very dangerous.
Settlement and Arrival
Refugees are selected for settlement in Australia by the Department Immigration and Border Protection, in conjunction with the UNHCR. Before arriving in Australia, humanitarian entrants are required to go through security and health checks.
The Australian Cultural Orientation program (AUSCO) is provided to humanitarian visa holders who are preparing to settle in Australia. The program provides practical advice and the opportunity to ask questions about travel to and life in Australia. It is delivered overseas, before they begin their journey. The International Organization for Migration (IOM) is currently contracted to deliver AUSCO on behalf of the DIBP.
The average length of time spent in a camp or in a place of first refuge is 17 years, and migrants may have little experience beyond this. Children may not even have known their home country. Many will have experiences extreme instability and uncertainty. Being selected for resettlement can be an overwhelming experience, and can include feelings of intense elation on one hand and fear and anxiety on the other.
Under such circumstances, a person may not always be aware of the potential difficulties of resettlement. On arrival, feelings can quickly move from elation and joy to culture shock, resentment, dislocation and confusion. It can take months, years even, for new arrivals to understand aspects of their new country and adapt to it.
To rephrase Euripides, those whom the state wishes to destroy, it first demonizes.
When the president of Chile was killed in the military coup d’état that brought Augusto Pinochet to power on 9th September 1973 (yes, that first, forgotten 9/11), ex post facto justification for the bloody coup and its equally bloody aftermath was provided by the content of the drawers in the dead presidents desk. Though never corroborated, there were alleged to contain proof of an imminent communist takeover, and evidence of drug taking and black magic.
Cut to Panama in December 1989, and the US invasion of Panama, ostensibly to take out strongman and erstwhile ally Emmanuel Noriega. There, in the ruins of the city, was Allende’s desk. The same communist literature, the drugs, the voodoo.
Cut to Mogadishu, Somalia, December 1992. US marines led a doomed UN intervention to take out the warlord. Mohamed Farah Aideed. Enjoy the folly in widescreen in Ridley Scott’s masterful Black Hawk Down. And although the villain decamped unscathed, guess what he left behind? Yes, Allende’s desk, contents intact. Actually, the desk had transformed into a bedside table, but the contents now included, shock horror, red silk pyjamas!
Communism. Drug taking. Black magic. And the sheer, un-American decadence of red silk pyjamas. The State Department pressed the hot buttons of white, Christian US morality to garner domestic support for its military adventures. The desk never came to light after the fall of Slobodan Milosevic in 2000. No doubt the Serbian authorities kept is existence hidden.
And it was never found at Waco because it was no doubt destroyed in the fire of state retribution. But David Koresh, self-proclaimed millenarian prophet, with his apparently indoctrinated and deluded followers, his harem, and his guns, was singled out for treatment very different to that meted out to scores of likeminded and heavily armed fringe dwellers scattered across the USA. To paraphrase Colin Powell, they were demonized, they were isolated, and they were destroyed. And on prime time television too. In that land of paradoxes, few eyebrows were raised when gun-toting members of the KKK offered to assist the DFDA and FBI in their assault on the besieged compound.
When Navy SEALS swooped on Abbottabad in Pakistan to take out long-sought-after Big Bad Osama bin Laden, they took careful notes of the contents of his bookshelves. An eclectic collection of reading matter – and pornography. No kindles, no iPads, so no eBooks or ePorn, which just went to show what a tired, old, out-of-date codger he was at the end of his days. The Pentagon has yet to reveal what they found on Osama’s bedside table. Maybe that voodoo and witchcraft stuff? And Osama’s pyjamas?
Though they both bequeathed sumptuous palaces to their conquerors, Saddam Hussein and Muammar Gaddafi were both spared the indignity of their cupboards being laid bare. But they were both caught hiding in drainpipes, which may show that the restless ghost of Allende’s Desk may have be laid at last.
Rumours of the inevitable demise of current bogeymen Bashar al Assad, Vlad Putin and Abu Bakr al Baghdadi are exaggerated. And the Fat Controller of Korea is still entertaining the world with his eccentricities and imaginative executions. So what will it be? Desks or drainage. And the long arm of the law has yet to reach inside another famous public enemy’s Knightsbridge hideaway. Yet, being the on-line, wired chap that Julian is, we may be disappointed.
And so it goes, as Vonnegut’s Kilgore Trout often declaimed when mad things happened. The American way of preparing the nation and its friends for a military adventure. First select your enemy. Give him horns and a tail. The latter day manifestation of the Judeo-Christian personification of the evil Other, the Dark Side of us all, and the public swallows and follows…Because it supports their own value system, their own perception of self, their own identity, and thereby, they’re own interpretation of what is and what is not appropriate behaviour. Then, hang on for a bumpy ride!
Last Sunday, The Guardian published a delightful opinion piece by Guardian producer Madhvi Pankhania entitled ‘So long and thanks for all the flat whites: an English view of Australia’.
She began: “Recently my colleague Paul Owen shared his experiences about being an Englishman in New York, from the volatile customer service, to the way bragging is completely normal. This was after American Scott Waters FaceBook post about being won over by the England’s quaint villages where pubs are “community living rooms” went viral. I lived and worked in Sydney, Australia, for two years until this July, and I got to know its people and its outsider’s view of the rest of the world. Australians know something of the English – there are enough expats over there, and they also still have our Queen. Here’s my take on Australiana”.
I was amused and inspired enough to write a response from the land down under.
Dear Madhvi,
Seeing the title, for a moment, I thought you were writing about me. I enjoyed your article immensely, and was inspired to pen (type, really, but you know what I mean) a detailed response. Here it is, your points, one by one, and my perspective thereof in parenthesis.
1) Government policies on asylum seekers, prime ministerial cock-ups and sports achievements drive the international perception of Australia.
Sadly so, but our embarrassment of a prime minister was replaced and even though his replacement is still a Tory, it is as though a dark cloud has lifted. Politics dominates our front pages to the extent that old timers pine for the days when sport dominated the front pages. These days, it does so only when there is corruption, inappropriate behaviour or a doping scandal.
2) Don’t feel guilty about not tipping – unlike the US, businesses are responsible for paying staff decent wages and benefits, so anything extra you give doesn’t serve to prop up pay, but is a bonus. Cuts to take-home pay on weekends and public holidays, though, are a big current issue.
“Penalty rates” as we call them, on weekends and public holidays, including double-time on Sundays, are sacrosanct to unions and to those who have to work on weekends, but a shibboleth to conservatives and business who would like to see them smoothed out if not abolished.
3) Many Australians are the sons and daughters of migrants from all over the world, and have incredible stories of their journey to the country. And they’ll share these with you.
4) Australians have the gift of the gab; you can expect to hear some great stories.
5) There’s never a wrong time to strike up a conversation – the taxi driver, the barista, the dentist, the guy fixing your internet – they will ask how you are and tell you about their day. And why wouldn’t you want to hear their opinion on Tony Abbott’s latest blooper?
Yes indeed. But don’t let some people loose on issues like Muslims, asylum seekers, and immigration. We can be quite a conservative country at heart. And ironically, it is the naturalized immigrants who can be quite opposed to our “humanitarian intake” policy (Australians have a great penchant for euphemisms). And we do love a tall story. Like this one.
Number Six is missing? Was this censored or self-censored? Australians are great ones for conspiracy theories, especially those subtly alluded to above, though no here near as bad as the Americans.
7) But a word of warning, Australians can be sensitive – convict jokes will go down like a lead balloon.
8) In fact, making quips about Australia – unless you’re Australian – is a big no no.
Strange observation these. Apart from historians and politicians who like to engage in culture wars no one really thinks or cares about our convict heritage. And as for quips about Aussies, you might’ve been talking to the wrong Aussies. Generally, anyone and everything is fair game.
9) Europeans in Australia are ubiquitous. Try not to fall into the trap of only hanging out with other British people, as many others do – how else will you ask them about Peter Andre and Shane Warne?
Certainly true. There is a world of diversity here, and some great stories. See 3, 4, and 5. As our National Anthem says, “For those who’ve come across the seas we’ve boundless plains to share”, (except if you arrive in small, leaky boats).
10) Whether it’s state, postcode, sports, media, or politics, competition between teams can fierce. Pick your side and be loyal. This is truest for contests like State of Origin – a rugby league match between states where the real prize of winning is the feeling of superiority.
We are quite a tribal bunch, and yes, irrationally loyal to our mob of choice. It’s often a bad case of “my mind is made up – don’t confuse me with the facts!”
11) In politics, even within parties, rivalries can go on for years. Prime ministers come and go, ousted by colleagues driven on by the spectre bad opinion polls. They are usually replaced by a former PM whose resentment has been bubbling for years. It’s the Dynasty of political entertainment.
12) Politics is the entertainment. Live, routine interviews with politicians’ scripted responses is considered prime time television. No one seems to get bored with impromptu press conferences, maybe because the rerun shows on other channels are about as interesting as watching paint dry. It’s either that or sports.
Indeed. Politics is our very own “blood sport”, and prime- time entertainment. And views can be quite polarized, predictable, and passionate. Virulent too – Games of Thronesy, even, but without he blood and bonking. Loyalties and hatreds linger for year – generations, evens. Voting is compulsory DownUnder, and elections are full-on, emotional, high octane events. Election Day at the booths is one big party whilst the evening coverage of the counting, on all free to air channels, is all-night family entertainment, often filled with argument and alcohol.
13) A politics/current affairs show is the most popular TV programme. Q&A is a politer version of a Question Time panel because why would they interrupt each other? British comedians and Greek singers are invited to make the panel more lively. And if you don’t watch it, you’ll be completely out of the loop with stories in the newspapers for the next few weeks.
Q&A is a strange beast, part current affairs, part reality TV show, loathed by the more extreme partisans of left and right, and often used as the whipping boy for conservative politicians who would like to see the ABC abolished or owned by Rupert Murdoch. And yes, those British comedians and exotic singers often look and sound like lost extraterrestrials. But Nana Mouskouri and Joan Baez gave the oldies some sublime kumbaya moments at the end of all the partisan posturing.
14) Many politicians become big media presences. Like Clive Palmer, the Australian version of Donald Trump. He was a billionaire, says what he thinks and before he was an MP he was the owner of a dinosaur park and twerked for the public. It’s true! Some other politicians have done strange things, too, like threaten Johnny Depp’s dogs, or eat raw onions.
Queensland mining magnate Clive Palmer is a legend in his own longlunchtime, larger than life literally and figuratively. Not only was he actually elected to parliament – quite an achievement for an independent, but he formed his own party (which very rapidly disintegrated), and he donates his parliamentary salary to charity. And yes, Tony Abbott’s onion eating was very peculiar, and the less said about Neanderthal Party deputy leader and wannabe dog killer Barnaby Joyce, the better.
15) Remember when Australia passed the law mandating plain packaging for cigarettes and another one imposing a price on carbon and people thought they were a new progressive force in the world? Now they can’t even pass gay marriage legislation, even with widespread public backing.
Relax, Madhvi. The world will be set aright. The carbon tax was abolished by the next, and now defunct prime minister, and Big Tobacco is taking us to court in Singapore to overturn the plain packaging legislation. Gay marriage will get through in the short to medium term now that the dead hand of Toney Abbott is taken off the wheel of state, but the Republic is still a long way away. Though we love Her Maj to death, and have no time for Chuck and Camilla, young and old alike are mad about Kate, Wills, George and Sophie.
16) is missing. See 13 above.
17) If you didn’t guess it yet, everyone’s really into politics. And sport. Football is Australian Rules football (AFL), and football is soccer or A-league, rugby league is NRL. Or you could just follow the international cricket – but don’t mention this year’s Ashes.
19) Fancy learning to surf? It will only take years of practice and dedication to tame those waves – and most of the time you’ll feel like you’re drowning and being slammed against the bottom of the sea floor. And if you break surfing etiquette, you’ll feel the hard anger of professional surfers and wave police.
Sport certainly is a national religion, although we are quite ecumenical. Anything with a ball is divine, and horses, dogs and pokies are holy too. Even politicians who hate sport are obliged to attend the various Finals and look enthusiastic about it. Serious interviews are interrupted with questions about which team they are barracking for on Saturday, or their tips on the Melbourne Cup. When one bookish state premier was filmed reading a volume from the western canon (probably Flaubert in the original French), he was ridiculed from Bendigo to Broome. Scandals, whether of substance abuse or sexual excess, are salaciously savoured with a mix of sadness and satisfaction.
20) The birds are beautiful, but why can’t they just stop squawking in the mornings and respect that you need a lie-in?
The birds are indeed amazing. They rise at five o’clock in the morning and sing, cackle or squawk all the live long day. Bye the bye, item 21 is missing too. See 13 and 16. What was it you were not permitted to say in print? The fact that we have some of the most venomous snakes and spiders in the Universe, and some pretty mean denizens of the deep? Wouldn’t want to scare the tourists away.
22) Cockroaches will enter your home without fear, swivel their antennae and scuttle across your floor.
Yes, roaches can be very cheeky. As can fleas, ticks, sand flies, blowflies, horseflies and leeches which refuse to respect one’s personal space.
23) Queues are non-existent. Apart from when you wait to get a sandwich at lunchtime as they’re making it from fresh ingredients for every customer.
24) A sip of coffee is nectar to your lips, and even the cheap coffee is good. Some places even measure the water to the “perfect” temperature in chemistry beakers, and guys with big bushy beards hand you your flat white in the street.
Queues for good coffee are ubiquitous. Especially first thing in the morning when you crave a slug from the wonderful jug before you hit the hamster wheel. And yes, coffee here is the world’s best. Starbucks went broke in Sydney because it couldn’t compete (which is why it pays very little tax in Oz – but that, and the matter of Google, Apple, IKEA, and others paying their jus and fair share of income tax, is another story, and another upcoming political battle).
25) A daily commute for some people is sailing past the Opera House and the Harbour Bridge, watching the occasional pod of dolphins.
And don’t forget the whales that play in Sydney Harbour, one of the most beautiful in the world.
25) People regularly sell all of their unwanted clothes and furnishings in front gardens, like an impromptu garage sale. You can go out for a walk and return with an old salad bowl.
In England, car park sales are held in, well, car parks. In Australia, garage sales are held, well, not in garages, but in front yards, and on the pavement. You can find everything that you never really wanted, from china to chainsaws, books to banana chairs, dildos to desks.
26) Cars are king of the roads and cities mainly have highways running straight through them. If you do walk in the centre of cities, the minutes spent waiting for the lights to change will feel like an eternity. Jaywalking is illegal though, so you’ll need to not let impatience get the better of you.
The car is indeed king (it was forever thus) and public transport neglected. Politicians promise public transit infrastructure, and pledge millions of dollars or our money, and all we get is roads, roads, and more roads. It could be to do with influence of the road transport and fossil fuel lobbies, but that is probably just another conspiracy theory – see 6. And yes, jaywalking is illegal and you can actually be fined in Sydney – although this is often to do with the fact that incredulous pedestrians start arguing with the enforcement officer.
27) Avocado is fresh, ripe and ubiquitous. Order it served on toast with some lemon and pepper and you will be told it’s the best brekkie in the world. It is. 28) Vegetables aren’t sold in packages of plastic. Then again, it’s just easier to eat out; Vietnamese pho is one of the great migrant dish imports.
Ah! The fruit and veggies. In abundance, but can be pricey in the wake of droughts, fires, and floods. The Thai, Arab and Turkish restaurants and cafes are great too.
29) If you get homesick, there’s a UK shelf in some supermarkets that stocks Marmite, PG Tips and Tunnocks caramel wafers
And there’s Barry’s Irish tea and Harrogate Yorkshire Tea, digestive biscuits, liquorice allsorts, and Dr Who tea pots. And of course, UK TV and BBC First channels on FOXTEL cable with a surfeit of English soaps, comedies and drama. Not to mention the History Channel’s stodgy diet of long-dead kings and queens.
30) There are English people everywhere. Most still believe they’ll move home one day.
31) There are none of the familiar comforts of high-street chain stores. No Marks & Spencer, Primark, or WH Smith. Small independent stores and restaurants do a better trade, and you tend to get better quality, individual products
And there ARE English people everywhere. And most will never go home. Why would you when this place is perfect one day, paradise the next (except for all the usual first world maladies like racism, refugees, child abuse, domestic violence, ice, corruption, inequality, and poverty). Lots of Irish people too, but the way. And Indians. Almost like home, really.
32) Anyone who’s everyone is on social media, and Instagramming every small achievement is standard … breakfast – delicious! New casual sportswear – so hot! Selfie on the beach – so amazing!
Social media is definitely full on, though no more so than in the UK, where wi fi availability is streets ahead of us. Here, it is patchy, depending on where you are, and vulnerable to political posturing and promises. We live in the bush and we are definitely the forgotten people.
33) Flying between states is the equivalent of taking a really luxurious bus.
We have forever suffered the tyranny of distance. It is a very long way between places, and whilst road trips are fun, and the scenery magical, the bush does tend to go on and on and on. Bus and train services are neglected (see 26), interminable and uncomfortable, so, unless you really like driving very long distances, flying is always the preferred option. Expensive but – it is cheaper to fly to Bali for a beano. See 44.
34) Australian slang – arvo, onya, sledge – is more fun, loose and creative than proper English, and the shortness is useful for Twitter. I remember hearing “ranga”, though, about someone with red hair and reeling at how mean it sounded. The words are good ammunition for Australian humour that laughs political correctness in the face. They laugh at everyone and everything, politicians, friends, family, but most of all you. Self-deprecation is a form of modesty, guys.
Language is fun in Oz. and yes, Madhvi, you are spot on. But I reckon the Poms are more politically-correct, particularly the liberal, middle class ones. You would never get Greek, Arab and Vietnamese comedians doing things like “Wogs out of Work” in the UK. Offensive. Off-colour (sorry about the pun). Tsk, tsk!
35) Finding a late-night drinking venue is an arduous journey that reaps few rewards. You think it’s because you’ve missed hidden spots, but no, they just don’t exist. Fun has a curfew of midnight; some Cinderellas have to go home. And no, one seedy hotel does not count as a late-night venue. What happens is that karaoke replaces real going out. Yep, it’s either that or a casino. Daytime weekend electronic music festivals also don’t count.
There is a good reason for this. Innocent people were literally getting killed on the streets at night. The “lock-out” laws have seen the level of booze-induced violence decrease dramatically. The owners of the swill palaces and 24 hour party people would dispute this, but.
36) Listening to Triple J’s Hottest 100 will keep your finger on the pulse of cool.
There is music for all tastes and passions on the dial, from hip hop to be bop, and all beats in between. Concerts by big name overseas artists require a small mortgage, however.
37) Everyone goes on about which is better – Sydney or Melbourne. What I’ll bring your attention to though, is that Brisvegas (Brisbane) has the better nickname.
Melbourne is cool, but Sydney is better. Brisvegas? Must be a Pom term. We don’t use it around here.
38) Wherever you are, you’ll have a great time commemorating Anzac Day. This national day, to mourn and respect soldiers who died at war, is when crowds come together to hoot, whoop, get steaming drunk and bet on the winner of … a coin toss.
This is the uncool picture of Anzac, our secular Christmas, Easter, Eid, and Hanukkah rolled into one. It is now a political and marketing extravaganza as people get up at dawn for the memorial services, watch the parades and the piped bands, and endure hours of History Channel commemorations whilst Aussies young and old wonder the globe, suffering crowds and cold on the scattered battlefields of old. But folk still do get drunk and play Two Up on the “one day of the year” that it is legal.
39) The Australian way to drink beer is: on tap, all day long.
An old and increasingly inaccurate. stereotype. Wine sales overtook beer sales a long time ago. And Australian wine is world-class and reasonably priced in Sainbury’s, Tesco’s and M&S.
40) Indigenous Australians tend to be ignored on national holidays. They don’t really celebrate much – they’ve had their land stolen, their children taken, and have high suicide and incarceration rates. Many Australians do care about these issues, even though there isn’t a quick fix solution. A referendum in 2017 may give them recognition in the Australian constitution.
Yes, the indigenous Australians are still with us, contrary to the expectations of early twentieth century missionaries who endeavoured to give them comfort on their way out of this world. Our treatment of the aborigines and their present predicament is our original sin and national stain. Many care about these issues, and many don’t. Much has been done, and much still must be done. It’s a long winding road strewn with lost opportunities, good intentions, broken promises, and political expediency. But, as Martin Luther King once said, “Lord, we ain’t what we want to be; we ain’t what we ought to be; we ain’t what were gonna be, but thank God, we ain’t where we was!”
41) Most Australians aren’t racist. Not everyone is on board with the government’s hardline treatment of asylum seekers.
Most Aussies are not racists, sure, but there is a xenophobic streak that emerges in times of economic and political stress. Our divided response to asylum seekers and boat people, and Islamic terrorism shows us at our best and worst. But at most times, the better angels of our nature come to the fore.
42) Some of the vast outer suburbs of cities have thriving small communities, with kick-ass restaurants, though inner city dwellers stay away. This could be due to the hours of driving it takes just to get there. Or maybe its ruthless tribalism – a friend who grew up in Sydney said beach suburb kids weren’t too keen on “westies”, and north and south goad each other too.
43) Tasmania in winter is a dark and bleak land of no hope. The exquisite food and wine won’t be therapy enough for seeing barely any human beings. And definitely don’t visit Port Arthur in winter, unless you get a kick out of cold, austere tragedy.
We are a broad, wide land, and a diverse, multicultural society, twenty first century in many places, twentieth in others. That’s the joy of the place.
44) If you want sunset cocktails, Australians decamp to Bali over winter to spiritually revive. Or party.
Ah, to be young and free and living in Australia! But we do have a wee problem with alcohol abuse and binge drinking, and quite a bit of ancillary violence.
45) Australian women have swagger. They’re confident, powerful and words will not puncture them.
But, in Australia, there is still a toughened glass ceiling in politics and business, and two women are killed by domestic violence each week. Confident and powerful, maybe, in some places, but frustrated, exploited, vulnerable and frightened in others.
These are lands of testament and prophecy, of sacrifice and sacrament, of seers and sages, of vision and vicissitude, of warriors and holy men. The spiritual and the temporal have melded here for millennia. We see still the remnants of ancient empires and the echoes of their faiths. We chart their decline and fall in the fortunes of their monuments and their mausoleums, in the “tumbled towers and fallen stones, broken statues, empty tombs” where “ghosts of commoners and kings walk the walls and catacombs of the castles and the shrines”.
The cloud-capp’d tow’rs, the gorgeous palaces, The solemn temples, the great globe itself, Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolve. Shakespeare, The Tempest, Act 4 Scene 1
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare, The lone and level sands stretch far away. Percy Bysshe Shelley, Ozymandias
Read also,The Rubble Of Palmyraby Leon Wieseltier, published in The Atlantic, 5th September, 2014
I didn’t surrender, but they took my horse and made him surrender. They have him pulling a wagon up in Kansas I bet.
Chief Dan George, as Lone Watie in The Outlaw Josie Wales
In the winter of ’65 We were hungry, just barely alive By May the 10th, Richmond had fell It’s a time I remember, oh so well, The night they drove old Dixie down.
Robbie Robertson and The Band
The Band, from The Last Waltz
I do not profess to be an expert on the subject, and being an outsider, I do not presume to preach. Nor am I a civil war tragic like some of our politicians here in Australia – they can tell you precisely who said what at what o’clock on such and such a location on this battlefield or that.
Mind you, a civil war that claimed more than seven hundred thousand American lives, tore a young nation apart, and the echoes of which reverberate still one hundred and fifty years later, is bound to exert a degree of fascination on an inquiring mind.
Recently, the dead hand of the American Civil War reached out and touched the hearts of Americans and their friends throughout the world in the wake of yet another mass shooting. This time, a young man gunned down worshippers at prayer. That the victims were folk of colour, and the shooter, a young white extremist, reopened wounds that have never really healed.
What made this massacre different from all the other massacres was the prominence of the Confederate flag in the iconography of the fresh-faced killer. The battle flag of Dixie has never gone away. It flies inThe Dukes of Hazzard, True Blood, and even The Walking Dead, and is a favoured accessory above government buildings and at right wing rallies in The South, those former secessionists states that lay south of the Mason-Dixon line
But what also makes this slaughter different from all those other slaughters is that something is actually being done about it.
Not, however a tightening of gun laws. The Second Amendment is safe and still well kept. The President mourns with the grieving relatives and congregation and breaks into song. POTUS’ rendering of Amazing Grace goes viral on You Tube. But as ever, nothing can be done. No God or mortal can stymy the U.S’ long-time love affair with the gun, nor challenge the NRA choke-hold on the American polity – particularly with the next presidential race in the starting blocks.
No, not the right to bear arms. But the rather, the right to flaunt the Stars and Bars, an enduring symbol of the lost Confederate cause, and a rallying point for those who still believe the rebel cause to be just, those who take solace from an heroic defeat, and those who believed that “the South will rise again”, and indeed those who KNOW that the South has indeed risen again. For have not the white, right wing, God fearing, Clinton-baiting, and Obama-hating ‘Red’ states of the South conquered and colonized the American political system?
Flags can unite nations. And also divide them. And none more so, it seems, than this one. Professor Colin Tatz once said People will forget what you said. People will forget what you did. But people will never forget how you made them feel. This flag is potent symbol that spans both sides of the great divide. It is seen by many a a symbol of racism, and in the wake of the killings, there has been a loud call to remove it from public places and events. Others see it as part of their identity, of who they and their families are. They refuse to surrender it and to trade it in for Old Glory. The call has been met with with, well, dare I say it, defiance and rebellion. If you’ve got one, flaunt it – on houses, on cars, on roadsides, on Facebook posts, blogs and websites. Here are few of th m, all worth reading to place the battle flag in its social and political context:
I do not want to editorialize here. Rather, I would like to share the following piece in the Washington Post. It is symptomatic of the intellectual and cultural reaction to tragic events. If your cannot do something positive and practical about a problem. Advocate something symbolic, politically correct, a placebo even. Like banning the film Gone with the Wind.
The past is another country. They thought things differently there: The iconic film opened with “There was a land of Cavaliers and Cotton Fields called the Old South. Here in this pretty world, Gallantry took its last bow. Here was the last ever to be seen of Knights and their Ladies Fair, of Master and of Slave. Look for it only in books, for it is no more than a dream remembered, a Civilization gone with the wind…”
So, as students of history, do we call for the suppression of an artistic rendering of the past because we feel uncomfortable with the ideas, opinions and sentiments expressed therein? If this sprawling Southern soap opera, this pseudo Shakespearean tale of love lost and found and lost again, against a backdrop of great events, is to be consigned to the oublier of history, why cease there? Why not Lawrence of Arabia? The Outlaw Josie Wales? The Searchers? Showboat?
Let’s not go there. The South will always be with us, in our thoughts, in our historical memory, in our art and literature, our books and films. It is forever on the border of our consciousness. Even when listening to our favourite music.
One leg up and one leg down like an old cock sparrer, flyin’ over Piccadilly with me bow an’ arra. Sydney Carter, Eros
Eros has had a good Brasso session and is looking grand in the intermittent summer sunshine. The skylines of Regent Street, Piccadilly, and Shaftsbury Avenue look gorgeous in their Georgian and Regency splendour. The traffic is terrible and the tourists throng in confused and bemused bunches. The theatres still advertise musicals I would never see in a month of Sundays. The royal parks are in full bloom and abound with swans, geese and ducks and their young families. Soho looks as tacky as ever. And although Carnaby Street looks like, well, just any other street, and Swinging London is a fading artifact of the past, London is London as it always was and always will be in my mind’s eye and in my memories.
There is something about London. It’s in the air and it’s in the paving stones, in the crowds and the smell of the rain (lots of it). I have been coming back here every few years for over thirty years. And it still feels like coming home. As time goes by, you forget more than you remember, but random memories come breaking through the years, your thoughts wind back to way back when. London with its technicolor costume of colour, creeds and complexions, it’s paradoxes of posh and poor, it’s troves of trash and treasure.
In 1777, celebrated essayist Samuel Johnson said “when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life”. A cliché, yes, over-used and over-quoted, oft times, out of context. A cover story of Time Magazine on ‘Swinging London’ in April 1966 was entitled “You can walk across it on the grass’. That was and remains part of the magic of the place. That, and its art, its architecture, its history. “Don’t look at”, they say, “look up!” And, exploring the main streets, mean streets and backstreets, parks and parade grounds, mews and alleys of Old London, I always reckoned that old Sam got it spot on – and still do today, whenever I chance to return.
And adjacent, in Hayes Mews, the hostelry with the longest pub name in London, ‘The Only Running Footman’. Such a magical name, it was, conjuring up motion and majesty, speed and style. And it remained in my mind this half-century hence. I had an affinity with this anonymous, antique athlete. These were my running days. I ran everywhere. To the underground, to work, to the shops, to the pub (but not back), though the city, around the town. I revelled in the movement, in the freedom, in the physical and psychological exhilaration of it all. My running days are long over, but I still run in my dreams
These were days of adapting to new environments and circumstances. They were exciting, they were challenging. I was young, restless, at turns, idealistic and cynical, puritanical and hedonistic. In retrospect, days of emotional and intellectual ferment. Days of “finding one’s way in the world”. Not some reformationey, renaissancial, enlightenment thingy. Post-adolescent onanism, more like.
As John Lennon sang: “Strange days indeed. Most peculiar, Mama!“ Irish bombs, miners’ strikes, power cuts, rubbish piled up on streets, and economic recession. A three-day week as England closed down for want of coal. Candles and coldness. Late starts and early finishes. A stack of books left in the lift in case I was caught when the lights went out. In one job, I’d walk through a bomb shattered foyer, into the mail room, to put all the mail thru a whopping great X ray machine to see if the paddies had sent us any letters. The police arrested my bike when I left it chained to a parking meter – in case it was used to hide a bomb. And you would actually hear explosions as you went about your business. Arriving at a much smaller Heathrow Airport, finding it surrounded by armoured cars and armed soldiers and police. I got a kick out of the blitz-like solidarity, the trench humour, and deprivation and darkness. Layla rocked a London that was neither as drear not as dammed as some paint it. Back then, I was in love with the place. I was young, idealistic, and as the poet said “Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive, but to be young was very heaven!“
From Tabula Rasa – Poems of Paul Hemphill , Volume One
Over the heather the wet wind blows, I’ve lice in my tunic and a cold in my nose. The rain comes pattering out of the sky, I’m a Wall soldier, I don’t know why. The mist creeps over the hard grey stone, My girl’s in Tungria; I sleep alone. Aulus goes hanging around her place, I don’t like his manners, I don’t like his face. Piso’s a Christian, he worships a fish; There’d be no kissing if he had his wish. She gave me a ring but I diced it away; I want my girl and I want my pay. When I’m a veteran with only one eye I shall do nothing but look at the sky
We’ve marvelled at Roman brickage from Syria to Cirencester, from Bath to Baalbek, but had never ventured to Hadrian’s Wall in Northumbria. WH Auden’s whimsical song, Roman Wall Blues, came to mind as we stood atop the windswept knoll that is Housesteads Roman Fort on a freezing May morning.
In the preface to Pax, the latest volume of his magisterial history of the Roman Empire, English historian Tom Holland notes that the northern bank of the river Tyne was the furthest north that a Roman Emperor ever visited. What was so important about Hadrian’s visit to Tyneside in 122AD was his decision there to mark in stone, for the first time, the official limits of his Empire. North of this great wall, there was paucity and unspeakable barbarism, scarcely worth bothering about; below the wall was civility and abundance and the blessings of Romanitas. To this day, those 73 miles of the Vallum Hadriani across the jugular of Britain still shape the common conception of where England and Scotland begin and end, even though the wall has never delineated the Anglo-Scottish border. For this colossal structure left enduring psychological as well as physical remains. To the Saxons, it was “the work of giants” and was often thought of as a metaphysical frontier with the land of the dead.
George RR Martin, author of The Game of Thrones, the artistic juggernaut, has said that his Ice Wall separating the northern wintry waste with its nomads and its demons from the settled and temperate Seven Kingdoms of Westeros with it castles and cities, it’s palaces and slums, it’s despots, destitute and the depraved, was inspired by a visit to Hadrian’s Wall – only he built it much longer and much, much higher.
“We walked along the top of the wall just as the sun was going down. It was the fall. I stood there and looked out over the hills of Scotland and wondered what it would be like to be a Roman centurion … covered in furs and not knowing what would be coming out of the north at you. George RR Martin has said that his Ice Wall separating the northern wintry waste with its nomads abd its demons from the settled and temperate Westeros with it castles and cities, it’s palaces and slums, and destitute and the depraved, was inspired by a visit to Hadrian’s Wall – only he built it much longer and much, much higher. “We walked along the top of the wall just as the sun was going down. It was the fall. I stood there and looked out over the hills of Scotland and wondered what it would be like to be a Roman centurion … covered in furs and not knowing what would be coming out of the north at you”.
There we were, then, on the edge of empire. The Roman Empire, that is. Among outposts and outcasts. Up on the hills in the nithering wind and the cold rain, the snow and the sleet, and in the valley below with the baths and the brothels. This is where worlds collided. Between the Roman cives and their satraps, and the barbarians of the northlands. Between Britannia and Caledonia. Where solders from Rome and the Italy-yet-to-be that surrounded it, from Gaul, Batavia, Asturias and Tungria, now France, Spain and the Low Countries, from Germania and Sarmatia in Central and Eastern Europe, marched and marauded, drank and dined, foraged and fucked, lived and died.
At the height of Empire, some seven hundred soldiers manned the fort we now call Housesteads, up high on the moors, a windswept outcrop with a vista of 360 degrees and a temperature near zero. Many more legionaries garrisoned the more sheltered Chesters Fort in the nearby-by valley below where the wall crosses the Tyne. These included cavalry, drafted from Sarmatia, in present day Hungary. This was the fanciful premise of King Arthur (2004) starring Clive Owen as a handsome, tortured soul wandering through a flawed film and Keira Knightly as a scantily clad, elfin warrior Guinevere, backed up by a gallant band of photogenic heroes who hailed from the eastern steppes.
When the Romans departed Britain, Hadrian’s Wall fell into disrepair – it was always permeable, and in time, had served its purpose – which was perhaps as much about public relations as protection. Archeologist Terri Madenholme wrote in Haaretz: “Despite itself having a culture of violence, Rome aimed to project an image of a nation of the civilized, and what better way than having it monumentalized in stone? When Hadrian set to build the 73-miles-long wall drawing the border between Roman Britannia and the unconquered Caledonia, the message became even more clear: this is us, and that’s them. Hadrian’s Wall was much more than just a border control, keeping the Scots in check: it was a monument to Roman supremacy, an attempt to separate the civilized world from the savages”.
“He set out for Britain”, Hadrian’s historian tells us, “and there he put right many abuses and was the first to build a wall 80 miles long [Roman miles] to separate the barbarians and the Romans.”
Housesteads Fort
At Vindolanda, to the south, a small town grew up around a large military camp. First of wood and then of stone, constructed by the legionnaires themselves, who included in their number skilled masons and carpenters. Their settlements endure to engage our imaginations today. In times of turmoil, these soldiers fought and fell. In quieter times, they relaxed and recuperated. And the locals gathered about them, built houses and gardens, opened shops and pubs and those aforementioned brothels. And life went on like it does in our time.
During conflict, the Roman auxiliaries guarded the borderlands, deterring the Picts, a dark-skinned painted people who raided from the northern badlands. When peace prevailed, the locals visited, traded, and settled in the viccii or villages that grew organically to the south of the forts that were constructed at intervals along the empire’s perimeter wall. There, they traded, and provided goods, services and entertainment for themselves and for the martial strangers that had come among them from faraway places they’d never heard of.
In the early days, the auxiliaries were not permitted to bring wives and children to the frontier. But folks being folk, they very soon established friendly relations with their neighbours, and legionaries would keep informal wives and families in the vicus. Soviet writer and war-correspondent Vasily Grossman encapsulated all this poignantly and succinctly in An Armenian Sketchbook: “The longer a nation’s history, the more wars, invasions, wanderings, and periods of captivity it has seen – the greater the diversity of its faces .Throughout the centuries and millennia, victors have spent the night in the homes of those whom they have defeated. This diversity is the story of the crazed hearts of women who passed away long ago, of the wild passion of soldiers intoxicated by victory, of the miraculous tenderness of some foreign Romeo towards some Armenian Juliet”.
Officers were allowed to bring their wives and children to their postings, and these endured their provincial, primitive exile by importing the necessities of a comfortable Roman life, including the celebrated Roman plumbing and central heating. Chesters boasts the best preserved military bathhouse in Britain. And so, the accessories of civic consumerism reached the frontier. Food and wine from the warm South were transported to the cold north-lands. Fashions in clothes and jewelry, day-to-day articles and artifacts, from glass and pewter dinnerware to cutlery, tools and sundry hardware. Recently, it has been revealed that these domestic items included what is believed to be the only known Roman dildo. Remnants and reports gathered in the Vindolanda museum open a window into a gone world.
Housesteads Fort
The wonderful Vindolanda tablets have preserved a picture of the oh-so-normal lives of these transplanted souls so far away from home. Amidst accounts and inventories, orders and troop dispositions, a quartermaster reports that supplies of beer are running low. An officer writes to another in a neighboring fort inquiring about the availability of accommodation for visitors and the quality thereof. One tablet reveals that Roman soldiers wore underpants, which, in view of the locale and climate thereabouts, is comforting to know. And another recounts workplace harassment and bullying that would today invoke grievance procedures. The wife of an officer invites another to a birthday party at her house in Vindolanda. There is an undercurrent of “Please come, I am bored shitless”, though a polite Roman matron would not commit such sentiments to a wooden tablet (nor reveal to her friend the existence of that aforementioned sexual comforter). It is probably the oldest surviving document in Latin written by a woman.
So who were these folk so near to us in their needs and desires, their hopes, fears and expectations, and so far from us in time, space and purpose? What did they think and feel? It is a question oft asked by empathetic history tragics. The thinking of another time can be hard to understand. Ideas and ideologies once compelling may become unfathomable. And the tone and sensibility that made those ideas possible is even more mysterious. We read, we ponder, and we endeavour to empathize, to superimpose the template of our value system, our socialization, our sensibilities upon the long-dead. And thence, we try to intuit, read between the lines, draw out understanding from poems, plays, novels, memoirs, pictures, photographs, and films of the past.
We feel we are experiencing another facet of the potential range of human experience. But in reality, we are but skimming the surface, drawing aside a heavy curtain for a momentary glimpse through an opaque window into the past. Yet, we persist nevertheless, because that is what humans do. Over two and a half thousand years ago, the controversial Greek poetess Sappho wrote ”I tell you, someone will remember us; even in another time”.
And in Vindolanda, up there on the wall, on the weather-beaten rim of the long-gone empire, we do …
One of the great unsung saviours of the UK’s heritage is remembered in the museum housing his remarkable collection at Chesters Roman Fort Museum which houses the Clayton Collection of and 5,500 catalogued items from a variety of sites along the central section of the wall.
Few people today have heard of John Clayton, yet he is one of the single most important individuals in the history of Hadrian’s Wall.
A classically educated Victorian gentleman who combined demanding roles running the family law firm and acting as town clerk for the city of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, Clayton had a passion for archaeology and the Roman military legacy in his beloved Northumberland.
Were it not for Clayton, large parts of Hadrian’s Wall would have disappeared as the industrial revolution fuelled the demand for stone to build factories, mines and mills. His role in the preservation and survival of Chesters Roman Fort – the best-preserved Roman cavalry fort in Britain, is now undisputed.
In the early 19th century Clayton lived at Chesters House in the parkland surrounding the Roman fort and from an early age became fascinated by the Roman relics that surrounded him.
By the 1830s he began buying land to preserve the Wall, at a time when what is now a World Heritage Site was little understood, and was being unthinkingly vandalised by quarrying and removal of stones for reuse. Clayton’s enthusiasm helped preserve the central stretch of Hadrian’s Wall that includes Chesters (Cilurnum), Housesteads and Vindolanda. He carried out some of the first archaeological excavations on the Wall and even brought early tourism to the area by displaying some of the finds at Chesters. Clayton managed the estate and its farms successfully, generating cash to fund further preservation and restoration work on the Wall. He never married, and died in 1890
The museum housing the Clayton Collection was opened next to the fort site in 1903, 13 years after his death. It is privately owned but curated by English Heritage on behalf of the Trustees of the Clayton Collection, and has been refurbished to bring it up to 21st century standards of conservation, display and interpretation. Yet, great care has been taken to respect its character and to retain the feel of a 19th century gentleman antiquarian’s collection, and many of the labels and original cases have been retained..
In That Howling Infinite 