Photo February Day Fifteen

Photos from Home, 2003-2005

I've not shown you much of where I'm from, so here are a couple of shots from home.

The concrete dragon looks after me. His name is Alastair and he sits at my front door. I think every home needs a dopey looking concrete dragon. My mum has one in the loo who's equally as dopey as Alastair.

Alastair is named after an old boss of mine who had very little hair and a permanent dopey look on his face.

Alastair has been through a number of house moves, he gets bumped by the hoover twice a week, tripped over regularly. Though he can be a nuisance, he's very good at holding the door open.

This is my mother's kangaroo, Mabel and her joey. Mabel is not a pet kangaroo, more she's one of the Eastern Greys that frequent my mother's garden. She's quite used to people. I took this one morning when I was staying down at the bed and breakfast. I got within about three metres of her when I took this. She was unperterbed  and continued to munch on the lawn. We hung out together for about half an hour on this day, just sizing each other up.

Going to my Mum's place is cool in that you often find roos under the clothes line in the morning when you get up - or they're in the driveway when you get home at night. Going for a walk up the hill into the scrub behind the house you often find a group of them sleeping in the sun.

Eastern Greys have really pretty faces. 

This is possibly the last photo taken of my grandmother.

Taken on Boxing Day in 2003, I dropped in to see her in the nursing home before going back to Melbourne.

I was only with her for 20 minutes, her dinner was about to arrive and I was shooed away. This was normal behaviour. NOTHING interrupted dinner time.

She had a massive stroke a few days later, clung to life just to see the New Year in and passed away in the first few days of January, 2004.

Some facts about Gran.

She was born in a gold mining town in 1899, the youngest of six. Her father used to drive the Nhill Express train. He was with the railroads all his life.

She saw two world wars, Federation, the abolition of capital punishment, the invention of the telephone, computer, car, bus, washing machines, television. She could only use some of these. She never learned to drive.

One of my grandmother's brothers was at Gallipoli.

Another was stationed on the Western Front in France.

She married my grandfather in 1923.

When she died, she had three children, twelve grandchildren, about fifteen great grandchildren and a smattering of great, great grandchildren.

Of the family, many have gone into service industries - nurses, doctors, police, clergy. There are two Order of Australias, a number of doctorates and many university degrees floating around the family. She never made it past the second year of high school, instead, she was farmed out to her brothers to look after their children and to do some factory work.

She taught me how to knit and crochet and bake. Things I love to do now.

She also loved to give me merry hell when she could.

When I was overseas, I wrote to her every month religiously. When abroad on shorter trips, hers was alway the first postcard I wrote.

She loved to read - and read until she lost most of her sight to macular degeneration when she was 100.

She was as deaf as a doorpost most of my life - though we reckon much of this was selective.

She appeared to like me for my irreverence. The card I gave her for her 90th sat on the fridge for nearly ten years. It had a badge on it which read "Living Fossil." The card read, there must be somebody older than you. Inside was a picture of a dinosaur.

I still miss her terribly.

This is an old picture of my niece, Elle. Elle started high school last week. This was taken when she was about four-years-old, doing the pink goodness thing like only a four year old girl can.

Elle is the family princess, all wrapped up in pink, dainty and she has these big brown cow eyes that can beat down most people in seconds. She can bambi with the best of them.

She's cool. She still gives hugs and will sit on your knee and give you a cuddle. I know it won't last, but it's nice to have while it's there.

She's a lovely girl, but this shot captures how I still see her in my mind.

Photo February Day Fourteen

Hairy Cows, The Isle of Skye, 2006

I have a list of near mythical places I've always wanted to visit.

On the list we have (in no real order) Buenos Aires, Rio de Janiero, Cancun, the Canadian Rockies, the Sahara, Cape Town, Mount Kilimanjaro, Angkor Wat, walking the Milford Sound, going on the complete Camino de Compostella de Santiago, more of Wales (I've been to Tintern Abbey, that's it) Koh Phi Phi, The Whitsundays, the Bungle Bungles... too many places, too little time and money (and I must renew my passport!).

One place I have knocked off the list a few years ago is the Isle of Skye, the largest of the Scottish Islands found on the west coast. Home to the Talisker distillery (yum - love peaty single malts) and some of the most stunning scenery I've ever witnessed. A place where the wind can carry the bleat of a bagpipe for miles.

Criss-crossing the country, starting at Inverness in the north east, I made my way down Loch Ness and across the country to the original Glenelg - which is nothing like the beachside suburb in Adelaide - actually, I think Glenelg is Scottish for Woop Woop.

Anyway, taking the bridge across the spit, I finally made it to this mythical place that they write songs about, the place where the MacLeods and MacDonalds come from, this place which has the feel of a place that has been ravaged by war and left to its own devices for centuries - and in many ways it has.

Skye is like no place I have ever been before or am likely to go to again.

The Isle of Skye is one of the most ruggedly beautiful places I have had the honour to visit. Amazing scenery -  but that is the case for the whole of Scotland - okay, maybe not the outskirts of Glasgow...

Staying at a bed and breakfast outside of the town of Broadford, I found that being there out of season ( I was there in May), I needed to drive forty kilometres or so to find myself some dinner. So, a half hour drive was made, up to the town of Portree, the largest town on the island.

After a pleasant dinner at the pub I drove my trusty rented Skoda back. It was well past nine p.m.when I stumbled across these wee beasties grazing in the long paddock.

I love Highland cattle, or hairy cows as they are known, which is pronounced "herry coo", (it might take you a while to work out what the locals are going on about). They're as docile as regular cows despite the horns, complete with the big eyes which are hard to see because nobody appears to cut their fringes and lolloping gaits and an unwillingness to move out of the way of cars. The road was not much more than a sealed track so going fast wasn't an option - but they weren't going to get hit. The hairy cows had right of way.

The little hairy cow had a bit of personality too.

When I got back to the B&B around ten that evening, it was still dusk. I was happy. Seeing hairy cows was as good as witnessing the Loch Ness Monster. Little things make me happy, as you are well aware.

The other thing I love about this photo is what is in the background. Surrounded by a rugged, windswept coastline, the greys of the sky take on hues I've never seen before. Pinks, peaches, vanillas, blues and meld in together. Breathtaking.

As with all of my travels, I wish that somebody was there to share it with me. Radio National doesn't quite cut it for company on a road trip that takes you places such as this. At least I got to see hairy cows on the Isle of Skye.

And next time I'm going to the Talisker distillery with a designated driver...

Photo February Day Thirteen

Door Knocker, Durham Cathedral, 2006

I'm a cathedral junkie.

Not many people get this obsession, but there is something about cathedrals that I can't get enough of. The older the better. They're like cats, or children. They all have their own personalities and foibles and indiosyncracies and a very vibrant life of their own.

I really like English Cathedrals and the rich history they provide, what with the reformation and the disolution of the monasteries, the pure destruction and tentative rebuilding of these megatliths which were built out of love with what are now primitive tools and have somehow stood the tests of rampaging time. Could you imagine them building a cathedral in modern times (okay, scratch that, the Sagrada Familia in Barcelona is still not finished 100 years on - with modern tools... and modern unions... and modern standards...) 

I spend hours wandering through these structures when I get the chance. My record would be spending seven hours going through York Minster on my first visit there - time well spent pouring over chapter houses, vaulting, masonry, right down to the little mice carved into the pews near the Lady Chapel.

Ely Cathedral is breathtaking, this 'Ship of the Fens' visible on the horizon for miles, the pure white light of the Lady Chapel, exquisite. Love the place. Lincoln's dog legging nave is a testement to time and engineering (and goes to prove that modern engineering would have put the structure out of the town on firmer ground. St Paul's whispering gallery still gets my imagination, even if it does mean scaling these large, circular staircases. Westminter Abbey, a Royal Peculiar rather than a cathedral can be dwelled on for days - there's so much to take in.

Yeah, you got it, Cathedral Nerd. (She shrugs and sighs)

Another favorite place that I go back to if I'm in the area, is Durham Cathedral, with its unusual fluted vaults (as seen in the flms Elizabeth and the Harry Potter films) a structure has been on the site for over a thousand years. It's one of the oldest standing Cathedrals in the country and a fine example of Norman architecture.

This photo is of the door knocker on the North Door of the cathedral. Known as the Sanctuary Knocker because of its former use.

"The knocker on the Cathedral’s northern door, known as the Sanctuary Knocker, played an important part in the Cathedral’s history. Those who ‘had committed a great offence,’ such as murder in self-defence or breaking out of prison, could rap the knocker, and would be given 37 days of sanctuary within which they could try to reconcile with their enemies or plan their escape." The right to sanctuary was recinded in 1624.

The original one is sitting in the cathedral museum, but this is a great replica.

I love stuff like this. Finding out information such as this on an item as trivial as a door knocker... like, cool!

It makes travelling all the more enriching.

Photo February Day Twelve

Great Ocean Road, past Apollo Bay, 2009

This majestic coastline is a place I need to explore more. It's truly wonderful - an exceptional part of the country, and I've only been there once.

Glen Waverley took me for a drive one day on a cool and blowy early Winter's day. A favour to me - and in part because Merijn gets car sick and Glen Waverley drives like a hooligan and I'd never been there I got to sit in Merijn's spot while she was home with the cat.

It was a great day.

Picking me up at the crack of dawn, we made our way down to Geelong, where he put the roof of his car down and we drove for most of the Great Ocean Road in the open air. Thank goodness for scarves - convertibles and long hair really don't go.

It was a really wonderful day for me - I got to knock off another thing on the bucket list. Other than cranking the Discovery Channel Song up to eleven on the way through Apollo Bay (and I wanted to brain him) and not being allowed to drive - even though he borrows my car when he needs a sensible car - one capable of hauling hime a few bags of groceries - because he really does drive like a hooligan - still we didn't come to blows. It's hard to bicker when the scenery is so wonderful.

There are so many places around the state I haven't seen, so many places to go. I've never been to Wilson's Promontory, Philip Island, Sorrento, Marysville.... I have been to Daylesford, but just for the day - never stayed over. I haven't been away on long weekends anywhere. The last time I was in the Grampians I was a child.

Most of my travelling in Australia  is done driving to and from Adelaide once a year - with the odd trip to the Dandenongs or down to the Mornington Peninsula.

It's one of the things I want to change about my life. I want somebody I can go places with and enjoy them.

Is that too much to ask when there's scenery like this about. Going alone on road trips should only be done when the travel is necessary - not for fun.

Photo February - Day Eleven

Monk and Doorway, Bangkok, 2008

I take lot of photos of windows and doorways on my travels. You never know what you're going to find down a passageway.

I've been with travellers who knock on large doors in castles and cathedrals wherever they go - just to see who will open them, so it seems we nutty people with a fascination for buildings are around the place. It comforts me.

Me - I'm forever looking for what is around the corner or down the lane. I look down passageways, out windows and through doors - just to see what is there. It has to be done.

I found this monk in a courtyard in Bangkok, quiet in contemplation.He stood there for ages, just watching whatever he was watching. He was so peaceful.

One of my dream holidays is to travel to Chiang Mai and spend a week at Wot Doi Suthep learning about Buddhist meditation - what a great way to do very, very little in an incredibly beautiful place.

Until I get that dream holiday, I'm just going to have to ponder this monk, pondering whatever he may be pondering.

This is one of my favorite photos I've taken in my life.

 

Photo February Day Ten

JFK Library Flag, Boston, 2010

Americans do flags really well.

As a rule, Australians don't.

I find it quite distubing seeing these yoofs at the cricket draping the Australian flag across their shouldres like a cape, wearing Australian flag tattoos on their cheekbones, or the new seemingly eponymous Southern Cross tattoo plastered about the place. See, what happens when move country, or get another passport? Then there are the people who fly the flag in their front yards - again, don't know if I agree with this - though it comes down to personal choice. Personally, I don't think the Australian flag is that inspiring - nor does the website "Bad Flags of the World" which give our flag a C  -something about being colonial rubbish - worth a look the site - though I do think it strange that the nearly identical Australian and New Zealandish flags are rated very differently. (The website is really worth a look for a giggle - some people have too much time on their hands)

As a kid, nobody had the flag flying in their front yards - now, it's becoming more common. Then you have the Aboriginal Flag, the rather menacing Eureka Flag (you know when that's being flown men in the building trade are about) and the completely uninspiring state flags. Think about it - what is a flag other than a bit of material with a uniform pattern on it?

In the US, the flag is EVERYWHERE. You can't look right and not the see the good ole red, white and blue flying in your face. When you're not used to such rampant patriotism, it's all a bit confronting.

Regardless, I look at this photo and see a poignancy to the American flag that I don't reckon I've witnessed before.

This shot was taken in the atrium of the John F Kennedy Library in Boston.

It's a remarkable place for a number of reasons. Firstly, it's a bugger to get to if you don't have a car. You take the 'T' the Boston Metro out to what feels like Woop Woop, then you hop on a free bus which takes you the rest of the way. The building is stark, standing on a bit of land near the seafront of Columbia Bay. There is nothing else around. It would have been peaceful there if it wasn't for the biting wind.

JFK is an American icon. He lead America though an era of change, an incredible era era where America started to live out out some of it's dreams. And battle some of its demons.

The museum is fascinating. Unlike Australia and much of Europe, the Americans charge through the nose for you to go to museums and galleries, so you hope that the visit is going to be worth you dishing out your hard earned coin. I arrived late afternoon, only just making the final cut off for visitors. I wish I had a lot longer. This is an amazing place. Fascinating. Reverent. And very, very well done.

I stayed in the atrium and pondered this flag for a long time before I was ushered out the door to the bus stop. It was a cool, blowy Boston day, the sky overcast, the night drawing in quickly as it tends to do in Massachussetts in October. Looking up amongst the railings and struts of the ceiling, the flag hangs as a symbol for everything America stands for.

In this majestic setting, you get an inkling into the greatness that America can be.

I don't make statements like this often.



Photo February Day Nine

Daggers, Canterbury Cathedral, 2006

I'm one for pilgrimages. I have this desire to do the Camino Compostella de Santiago one day, traipsing across the North of Spain checking out cathedrals and pondering the steps that millions have taken over centuries.

This photo is of one of my pilgrimage places.

Every time I'm in England I like to come here and sit for a while and ponder. I've been drawn to this place since I read the Canterbury Tales at uni. These daggers mark the spot where St Thomas a Becket was murdered. The place - Canterbury Cathedral.

So why does a murdered twelfth century saint have such meaning for a woman in the 21st Century? Thomas a Becket, a common man, a merchant's son, a soldier and a lawyer, who rose his way up through the ranks to finally make Archbishop of Canterbury, the most powerful role in the country beside the king at the time, tha king being Henry II. Henry and the turbulent priest were the best of friends in the early days. Once a Becket rose to the bishopric, he wouldn't let Henry walk all over him, stopping his old friends desires for the throne to take on more power and to weaken ties with Rome. Thomas, agreeing with what the king was saying, but had massive reservations wouldn't sign Constitutions of Clarendon - stormed out of the talks and fled to France, effectively exiling himself. During his time as Archbishop of Canterbury, Becket was exiled many times. Becket was seen as a bit of a ratbag.

Thomas returned to Canterbury some time later and took up his place back at the Cathedral, but the King was pissed, and whether by royal decree or misunderstanding, sent four knights after him after asking who would rid him of the turbulent priest.

These daggers mark the spot where he died on 29 December 1170.

Thomas a Becket was a man of principle. A man who believed that he was accountable to his faith first and his government second. A man who was taunted and tainted and stood up for what he believed. A man who overcame many odds. A self-made man.

It may also have something to do with the fact I saw Derek Jacobi and Robert Lindsay in Anouilh's plau, Becket on the London stage in the early nineties- still one of the best performances I've ever witnessed.

I'll go back to Canterbury and commune with Becket once again. I can sit at the place where he died and feel him, stomping around in his sandals and hair shirt, uncomfortable in body, but still in mind. He stood his ground in times of struggle.

Thomas a Becket will continue to fascinate me, no matter my faith, beliefs or reasoning. He's somebody I mention in my fantasy dinner party guest list.

He's somebody who holds a great deal of meaning for me. There is something very inspiring and very special about this man and this place.