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As indicated by the title, it was a public holiday in Victoria today – some other states also, but this particular weekend is not always the option followed by the whole of Australia. It is also the time when there are various festivals going on throughout the state, including Melbourne’s Moomba Festival today, in which activities attracting thousands of revellers, occur in the vicinity of the CBD of Melbourne and the Yarra River/Southbank area. I guess in my younger days, I would be a part of all that excitement, and do recall taking the children to events at different stages of their young lives. These days, I tend to stay well away from such events!

Meanwhile, over in Japan, the threat of a nuclear disaster, arising out of Friday’s earthquake, and regular ongoing aftershocks since then, is building momentum. Some of today’s reports from that unfortunate country included reports that  this afternoon  –  about 200 people have been dealt with for possible exposure to radiation and another 600 residents within a 20km of the plant were ordered to stay indoors;   Japan’s nuclear safety agency said the blast, at the number 3 reactor at the Fukushima No. 1 plant, was believed to be caused by hydrogen;  live television footage is showing large plumes of smoke rising from the building;   the explosion at the plant, which is 250km northeast of Tokyo, has raised fears of a mass radiation leak, but authorities say there is a “low possibility” or a serious leak   “We believe it was a hydrogen explosion. It is not immediately known if it affected the reactor,” said government spokesman Ryo Miyake.   The drama unfolded after false alarms over a reported 3m-high tsunami heading for Japan’s northeast coast.   Sirens went off in the town of Soma as the order to evacuate went out over public address systems.  The wave was reported by a fire department helicopter and the sea reportedly was seen retreating off Iwate prefecture in the northeast of Honshu island, a phenomenon that occurs before a tsunami hits.   But authorities have now cancelled the tsunami threat, saying there are no signs indicating another powerful wave is on its way’.

I read an excellent blog by another writer through one of these ‘blog formats’ today –  basically an eye-witness account from an area some distance from the epi-centre of the earthquake, but nevertheless and obvious frightening experience. Would love to share that piece of writing here, but perhaps that is not appropriate, but it was certainly worthy of retaining. While I have not had any direct response from the person concerned, I had made a general enquiry of them, as to their welfare after the earthquake. The blog answered my queries in any case!  

Though it was not to the degree I had originally planned for the weekend, I did manage to get as bit of work done in the back garden this afternoon, but as I often say, a lot of work still requires my attention! Continued with some more work on my family history’ book’ this afternoon.

Tonight, I went to see a movie at the local ‘Arthouse Cinema’ here in Sunbury – a beautiful movie, though also very tragic, daunting, confronting and sad –  story from the view of an American woman living in Paris, who is researching the arrests of Jewish families in 1942 in Paris, and discovers that she shares a connection with a 10-year old Jewish girl, and their stories unfold in parallel. Or, as in the words of film reviewer, David Stratton,

 ‘Julia [Kristin Scott Thomas], an American journalist married to a Frenchman and living with their teenaged daughter in Paris, becomes obsessed with the story of Sarah Starzyniski, as Jewish girl who in July 1942, at the age of 10, was rounded up by French police and, with her parents, confined with 13,000 others in a sweltering sports arena while waiting to be sent to concentration camps. Sarah is particularly anguished because when the police came she locked her little brother in a secret cupboard in their apartment  –  the same apartment that, in 2009 , Julia’s husband is renovating.’

This film has a heart-rending conclusion following some brilliant acting by Kristin Scott Thomas, as Julia. The film was based on a best  selling book by Tatiana de Rosnay which was published in 38 countries and sold over 2 million copies world  wide.  The movie  moves between two worlds: Julia’s 21^st century world and Sarah’s world of 1942. Julia becomes obsessed with finding out what the outcome of Julia’s and her family’s situation was. What she discovers changes the way she sees her own family and her roles as wife and mother. Her discoveries make her take stock of her own situation and make her think about her future. As Julia learns more about Sarah’s family she learns more about some awful truths about France’s past.

 

I agree with one reviewer, who noted that certain members of the film  cast are magnificent: from Mayance as the young Sarah to Niels Arestrup, who plays a grouchy farmer to a French policeman who is kind to young Sarah. There were many touching moments, others that left you feeling desperate at the heartless attitude of humankind to it’s own. Early in the film, Julia is explaining the 1942 event to some young associates who are claiming never to have heard of  it  – as one says, the Nazis used to document everything, why is so little known about this event. The response is that it was not the Nazis in this case – but the French authorities, acting against their own people who were part of the French Jewish community.

This movie  –  ‘Sarah’s Key’   is a poignant and in many ways, a painful  memoir of a not so long ago time that still has repercussions on family’s of today, and as an important contribution to our learning of recent history – irrespective of the fact that ‘Sarah’ as such did not exist individually, but is representative of the hundreds of Sarah’s that would have gone through the initial part of her experience [most of them didn’t escape] –  I think it’s a film we all should see. But don’t expect it to make you feel happy or good about things!

I was home tonight in time to see  tonight’s episode of  Q & A on the ABC  –  the sole panelist tonight was Prime Minister, Julia Gillard – which I found disappointing – it is a panel program, yet when she appears, it is always a sole appearance! Anyway,. As always, the PM managed to address most questions put to her in a reasonably competent manner, although, as with last year’s pre-election appearance, she has this annoying habit [to me] of laughing [I call it giggling] before she answers most questions!!! The following isa sample of some of the questions put to her, just to give readers some ideas on how she was challenged by the live audience:

• In the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, will the labour party continue to entertain the idea of nuclear power for Australia?
• Is it time for Australia to have a future fund against catastrophe and if so what form would it take?
• In your gushing speech to US congress last week, you tearfully proclaimed that America “can do anything!” Millions of Australians cringed. In the year 2011, can we really not have a relationship with the United States without paying lip service to the myth of American exceptionalism?
• Prime Minister, following Wikileaks publishing of classified documents in December of last year, you labelled the organisation’s actions “illegal”, despite being unable to identify any law which had been broken. Given the increasingly vocal support for Wikileaks, do you now regret such comments?
• Since becoming foreign affairs minister, Kevin Rudd has become ‘Eddie Everywhere’, providing media commentary at seemingly every given opportunity. Today an opinion poll has Mr Rudd ahead of you as preferred labor leader…
  How do you explain his rise in popularity among voters and you feel threatened by the fact that he might want your job?
• Is a no-fly zone over Libya an integral part of Australia’s foreign policy, and something which Cabinet has decided? Or is Mr Rudd “once again off on a frolic of his own”?
• How much of your recent poor opinion poll figures do you attribute to your lie on the carbon tax?
• Is the proposal for a carbon tax coming from the REAL JULIA and was it from the OTHER JULIA that said before the election “there would be no carbon tax ?”
  All Australians are totally confused in regard to your two personalities.
• The language used by The Opposition and their supporters to criticise your Government, and you personally, continues to be testosterone fuelled, macho and crude. When people like Alan Jones use words like “Ju-liar” what would you REALLY like to say in response?
• Much of the scepticism surrounding your carbon tax proposal has to do with household cost of living.
  Have you made any concrete decisions on who will be compensated and by what means?
  And will household compensation be the feature of any upcoming ad campaign?

I think that question which proved to be the most challenging however, and which in the view of many people and the media the following day, was a low act by the ABC – an attempt to set up the PM in a forum where she could not avoid answering the challenge, came from a video question sent in by Wikileaks founder, Julian Assange, who asked the Prime Minister:    “ you just got back from Washington, but what Australian citizens want to know is which country do you represent? Do you represent Australians and will you fight for Australian interests? Because it’s not the first time that you or a member of your cabinet has been into a US government building and exchanged information. In fact, we have intelligence that your government has been exchanging information with foreign powers about Australian citizens working for wikileaks. So Prime Minister, my question to you is this: when will you come clean about precisely what information you have supplied the foreign powers about Australian citizens working or affiliated with wikileaks? And if you cannot give a full and frank answer to that question, should perhaps the Australian people consider charging you with treason?

Tomorrow, the ‘Australian’ newspaper would accuse the ABC of engaging in ‘an ambush, a travesty of politics and news reporting’, and I actually tend to agree – it was an ambush of sorts!  In her answer to Mr Assange, Ms Gillard said she had no idea what he was talking about. The ABC would later admit that it had sought out the Wikileaks founder to get him to question the PM.  Overnight, we would even have members of the Opposition criticising the ABC for their action. As the ‘Australian’ would note tomorrow ‘The ambush of Gillard, with no warning from the program, which claims to provide unscripted questions from ‘you the audience’ was worse television terrorism than the Seven Network’s ‘shit happens’ ambush of Tony Abbott by Mark Riley. At least Gillard knew from experience that silence was not the answer’.

In response, Julia Gillard  said the Australian government exchanged intelligence with foreign governments on criminal matters but did not allow the extradition of Australian citizens to jurisdictions that allowed the death penalty. However, she said that she had no idea what Mr Assange was talking about with respect to disclosures about exchanging information about people who work for Wikileaks because to her knowledge, it hasn’t happened.

While all this was going on, I was enjoying a ‘three way Face Book’ conversation of sorts with a couple of friends about the program, although as I graciously retired for the night, I noticed on with their online debate which seem to drift onto other matters beyond my comprehension.

And so ended another Monday night. But not before some World Cup cricket scores –
Match 32 [Group B]: Bangladesh 4 for 166 defeated Netherlands 160,  and in Match 33 [Group B], Pakistan 3 for 164 defeated Zimbabwe 7 for 157. Getting close to the Quarter Final stages, finally!

As I noted overnight, sleep did not come peacefully, and after waking again, soon after 4.30am, I gave up trying to sleep, and decided to make an early start at the radio station – not due on air until 7am, but I was broadcasting  by 6.15am, and quite happy to be doing so. 

An interesting welcome to the studio  –  lined up on the balcony of the entrance way, for four magpies!  I wondered if they were thinking that I was the presenters who follow me, at 9am, and often feed the birds. However, I think they were there enjoyed another feast  –  as I attempted to unlock the door, I was ‘engulfed’ by a huge swarm of insects, which overnight, in the humid conditions, had been attracted to the external security lights. While I didn’t particularly enjoy having this multitude of different shaped and sized moths and other insects trying to attach themselves to my face, head and general body, I was more concerned about stopping them from coming into the building with me. I think I was relatively successful, although it was obvious that the last people here on air last night, had left the front doors open whilst here – to presumably get some air into the building – and in the process, allowed quite a lot of insects inside. So the passageway was already occupied on the ceiling, windows and walls with sundry flying creatures/ Thankfully, numbers in the actual studio, the door to which I kept well closed during my stay, were relatively small, although that could have been worsened, because of the open window – again, someone on air yesterday, had opened the studio window, and as so often happens, neglected to close it upon finishing!

Anyway, despite having to ‘chase away’ from the equipment, the occasional flying bug, I enjoyed the extended program I presented this morning – during the extra earlier period, I played a series of extracts from one of the past concerts put on by my favourite suburban orchestra  – the Heidelberg Symphony Orchestra.

Back home, I remained as quiet as possible in order to allow Susie a reasonable sleep before she had to get up for another shift at Big W. Last Sunday, they had rung in the morning, asking her to go in early – she did not want that today, and I was under ‘instructions’ to say she was ‘out’ if we had any early morning calls!!  Shortly before 3pm, Susie left for work [3 hour shift] –  just as a major rain storm hit  – I’m hoping that it will be over in 3 hours, because at 6pm, she hits the highway again for the drive back to Bendigo. As it is, she is probably going to get drenched getting from her car to  her work place – not good, as she still seems to have that cold that has been bugging her for the past week, Getting wet, and working in that condition for 3 hours will not help!  Just glad she is not on the highway now – the rain is coming down in torrents, and the patio outside the front door is already flooding , as is the ground around the house.  I find myself worrying at this time each week, as Susie heads off – the return trips do not stress me as much – mainly because I’m not sure when she is on the road!

At 7.15pm, I’m wondering how far from Bendigo, Susie has to go. I wouldn’t hear from her tonight, and knew a message of enquiry from me would most likely be not appreciated.  So I simply assumed silence meant no problems on the road, etc. Certainly, down this way, the weather had calmed down a little, and driving conditions up north would be a little better by now.

 Meanwhile,  the eldest, James is playing in a weekend poker tournament  at the Crown Casino – out of some 434 hopeful starters, the last I read from him was that he was still in – the last 18 – playing for about $56,000! He invited me to go down to the Casino and watch, but I suggested such an action might jinx him!!!  Is that for real, was my thought?  I would later learn that James finished in 11^th position, and for that privilege, earned himself  $2,605, not a bad return for a weekend’s ‘work’. These days, I need nearly 3 weeks to earn the equivalent. His regular updates while engaged in a tournament reveal a high knowledge of what he is doing with full details of a statistical analysis of the main players, and his progressive position in the competition.

A continuation of the tragic scenes on the TV from Japan tonight – now they are being realistic – instead of talking about death tolls in the hundreds, and with at least 10,000 missing from one coastal city alone, it is been accepted that the death toll could reach figures of that level!! It’s depressing, to say the least. Decided to switch off the news for an hour, and watch a program on the history of Scotland – think it’s a repeat, but that’s okay. It fits in with my current family history research. The following is an example of the many reports coming out of Japan at present.

More than 200 bodies have been found at a new site in northeast Japan, where an earthquake and tsunami caused massive destruction, police say.  “We have received a preliminary report that more than 200 bodies were found in the city of Higashimatsushima,” a National Police Agency spokesman said, adding that local police are starting to collect the bodies. Hundreds of other residents in the city’s Nobiru district are unaccounted for, the Sankei Shimbun and other newspapers said. Police in the city of Sendai said yesterday at least 200 and up to 300 bodies had been found on the shoreline there. Earlier today, the National Police Agency said in a statement the confirmed death toll from Friday’s twin disasters is 688, with 642 missing and 1570 injured.  That figure did not include the bodies found at Sendai and Higashimatsushima. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yukio Edano has said it was believed more than 1000 people had died nationwide.   Amid a mass rescue effort there were grim updates indicating severe loss of life along the hard-hit east coast of Honshu island, where the monster waves destroyed or damaged more than 12,250 homes and other buildings.  At least 2400 houses were flooded by the tsunami, while more than 100 houses had been burned, police said, adding that there were 60 landslides.  Broadcaster NHK reported that around 10,000 people – roughly half its population – are unaccounted for in the Japanese port town of Minamisanriku in quake-hit Miyagi prefecture.                                                       AFP

In other reports overnight, a Japanese  man who was swept 15km out to sea by Japan’s deadly tsunami was plucked to safety today after being spotted clinging to a piece of wreckage, officials said;   an Australian woman evacuated from near Japan’s stricken Fukushima reactor will be medically evaluated for radiation exposure when she returns home;   Japan’s Meteorological Agency says it has upgraded the magnitude oftheearthquake to beyond a scale of 9; while  Japan’s top government spokesman Yukio Edano said Sunday that radioactive meltdowns may have occurred in two reactors of the quake-hit Fukushima nuclear plant.. The Government says they are sure they can bring a crippled nuclear reactor under control, but experts say it may already be too late.

Cricket scores from today’s World Cup games saw: 

Match 30: New Zealand 6 for 358 defeated Canada 9 for 261 [Group A game at Mumbai]

Match 31 involved the Australians – I watched the closing stages of the Aussie innings which left a  big score for their opponents, Kenya,  to chase – at that point, I switched the TV off, and was asleep rather quickly!!  Result – Australia 6 for 324 defeated Kenya 6 for 264. The Australians should not have been too pleased with the outcome despite the win  –  our bowling proved unable to get the Kenyan team out, something that should not have been a difficulty!

Saturday, 12^th March 2011  –  a lethargic day at home!

It was a very warm and humid March day – and this scribe didn’t get out into the garden as planned – but instead worked  on the family history research.  Also went for a walk again, late afternoon – realised along the way that I should have gone this morning, when a bit cooler, as by the time I returned home, was feeling the opposite of what I should have been. Later, cooked a meal for Susie, who had been working all day ay Big W [despite still suffering from a persistent cough]  – although I think she was happy to return to a cooked meal, I actually didn’t feel like eating & didn’t really enjoy it tonight!

A couple of interesting horse racers in Melbourne today – in the Newmarket Handicap over 1200 metres, we saw short priced favourite ‘Black Caviar’ streak away from the field in the final straight  – what a horse, just 10 starts, for 10 wins, first horse out here to win it’s first 10 races in a row. The crowd burst into applause over that last 200 metres, even before the horse took the lead, they could see what was coming – don’t like this overused word – but simply ‘awesome’!!!  Before today, Black Caviar’s nine starts – 3 wins over 1000 metres, 6 wins over 1200 metres –  a brilliant mare, had to shoulder a big weight today, but possibly aided by the small field  of 11 starters. Ridden by Luke Nolen, trained by Peter Moody.   Meanwhile, another star performer today was former Melbourne Cup winner, ‘Shocking’  – loves Flemington, and proved it again today, in the 2,000 metre Australian Cup – ridden by Corey Brown, trained by Mark Kavanagh.

The news from Japan continues to depress and horrify. With more than half the population of a small port town is unaccounted for [up to 10,000 people] following the earthquake and tsunami that devastated Japan and has subsequently caused a nuclear emergency which over the next few days would become t5he focus of much of the media attention, even over the massive rescue and recovery effort that was underway.  As I watched various reports of the disaster throughout the day, I continue to be shocked at the massive force of the tsunami that has obviously caused the bulk of the destruction and loss of life. Japan is well used to earthquakes, and of all countries, their buildings in general have been constructed to counter the average earthquake. So in Tokyo for eg, there did not seem to be anywhere like the building damage that we saw in Christchurch, NZ, just recently. Mind you, I think the epi-centre of the earthquake in Japan was a few hundred kilometres away from Tokyo, but the strength of the quake was such, that buildings swayed and a certain degree of damage was caused to infrastructure throughout the country. But, it seems, the real damage, as mentioned, came from the tsunami. Over the weekend, a friend would post the following quote on Face Book –  ‘The New York Times’ Kenneth Chang explains that last week’s devastating earthquake and tsunami in Japan has actually altered the earth’s coastlines and changed “the balance of the planet,” in addition to leaving more than 10,000 people dead….’

Fig. 1. A view of tsunami damage from the east of Aonae, a small town on the island of Okushiri, which is in the Sea of Japan, east of Hokkaido. (Courtesy of Y. Tsuji.)

Cricket scores from today’s one World Cup game saw:  Match 29: South Africa 7 for 300 defeated India 296 [Group B, at Nagpur],

As almost comes to be expected on a Saturday night,  despite a quite early night, my sleep was restless, and constantly broken, waking from a series of dreams  –  at one stage, I was running [literally] late for my daughter’s wedding, and could do nothing to change that situation –  a common theme of my dreams, running late, not quite achieving what I set out to do, just missing out on some event or occurrence  –  as suggested previously in these pages, no doubt some dream expert out there could quickly place a range of interpretations  on that ‘theme’ of my dreams. Many years ago, the theme concentrating on ‘falling experiences’  – I seem to have gone beyond that, and now things are related to this aspect of always ‘chasing’ time, someone, something!!!   Such is life!!

 

It was a  relatively quiet day for myself  – intended to spend part of it out in the garden but didn’t quite get around to doing so – weather a bit suspect at times, and I seemed to get tied up with tasks inside, including preparing radio programs for the next few days. I was expecting Susie back some time later this afternoon, from Bendigo but didn’t really know when, or whether she would be expecting and/or wanting a meal this evening.

During the afternoon, had a planned visit from a couple of local air conditioning maintenance people  –  the unit in/on our roof had not been services for over five years [we had it dome when we moved in here in 2005]. Quite a big unit, a Brivis Networker, providing both heating and cooling as required throughout the year. The ‘cooling’ aspect doesn’t get a great deal of use, and that was certainly the case, this summer just past, one of the coolest for many years, but the heater, mainly because of Susan’s residing here, is considerably over-used in my view – both because of the number of times she is here during the day hours of winter, and her night time habits of studying, etc, into the early hours of the morning. While that use will probably be much lower this year [hopefully meaning a slightly winter gas accounts] with Susan studying up in Bendigo during the week, I wanted to have it serviced and checked before another winter arrived.  Anyway, apparently everything was working okay – a bit of a cleanout of the system was needed [something I could have done but wasn’t aware of it] which it was suggested was a possible reason why heat was not getting down to ‘my’ end of the house as effectively as the rest of the  place.  The comment was made that the unit was one of the larger ones of it nature.

Went out for a walk at around 5pm – it was at that time that I received a response to my enquiry of Susan, regarding her return to Sunbury  – expect her quite late, don’t worry about dinner!

It was also about that time, that for thousands of people in Japan, the end of their lives, either directly, or as they had known it, basically came to an end and/or changed for ever.  An earthquake hit Japan  just before  5pm tonight, daylight saving time, and this was followed by huge tragic tsunami. I discovered this when I returned from my walk, and would watch the ‘live’ reports coming through from Japanese television for the next hour or so before I went out to the radio station.  Perhaps the following ABC report of the interim coverage, best summarises the situation tonight.

“Large areas of Japan’s northern Pacific coast have been swamped by a devastating tsunami, engulfing entire towns following a major 8.9 offshore quake. The massive wave of water, as high as 10 metres in some parts, reached more than five kilometres inland. The meteorological agency issued its top-level evacuation alerts for the entire Japanese coast amid warnings of a tsunami of between six and 10 metres. Towns and farms around Sendai city in northern Japan have been engulfed by a seven-metre tsunami, while a four-metre wave swamped parts of Kamaishi on the Pacific coast.  Residents have been ordered to high ground and stay away from the coast as tsunamis can strike in several waves.   Seismologists say the quake was 160 times more powerful than the one that devastated Christchurch last month.

• Wall of water crosses Japan’s east coast
• Large parts of Miyagi prefecture engulfed
• Homes flooded, cars and boats washed away
• No leaks of radioactive material from power plants
• BOM says no tsunami warning for Australia
• Contact DFAT on 1300 555 135

Japanese television has shown pictures of a wall of water kilometres wide moving its way across the countryside, engulfing everything in its path.  The Cosmo oil refinery in Chiba prefecture outside Tokyo has exploded, sending flames dozens of metres into the air, with firefighters unable to contain the inferno. It is one of more than 40 blazes burning across Japan.  “An earthquake of this size has the potential to generate a destructive tsunami that can strike coastlines near the epicentre within minutes and more distant coastlines within hours,” the agency said. A tsunami warning has been issued across the wider Pacific including Russia, the territories of Guam, Taiwan, the Philippines, the Marshall Islands, Indonesia, Papua New Guinea, Nauru, Micronesia and Hawaii.  Russia has evacuated 11,000 people from areas that could be affected, including Kuril islands and Sakhalin island. Hawaii has also ordered evacuations.  The Bureau of Meteorology says there is no tsunami threat to Australia.  The quake, already considered one of the worst in Japan’s history, struck about 382 kilometres north-east of Tokyo at a depth of 24 kilometres, the US Geological Survey said.  The USGS reported at least eight strong aftershocks, including a 6.8 quake on the mainland 66 kilometres north-east of Tokyo”.

Certainly, the scenes on the TV screen were quite chilling, almost hard to believe the power of that tsunami as it literally engulfed towns, roads, cars, trucks, boats, etc, and swallowed them up like toys .  Someone used that analogy on Facebook tonight – words to the affect that  ‘while I was watching horrifying video yesterday morning of that wave sweeping across farmland with cars in the distance, all I could think of was h…ow they looked like the toy cars in Godzilla. I feel appropriately shamed, but still…’.- while the reports of deaths were quite moderate at first, it was obvious that with half of one city wiped away by the tsunami with 10,000 people missing there alone, that we were in for a terrible outcome.  I found myself, as always, feeling quite helpless, at what almost seemed like some kind of horror movie on the TV – yet it was all for real, happening on our screens in real time – as I watched hundreds of cars, etc, being swept along  like some kind of massive avalanche of flotsam, I had to assume that there were people in many of those vehicles. Terrible situation. Perhaps someone else’s more light hearted attitude might be the better way to think – from the same Face book entry [which I think is an American source] we read that  ‘Anyway, as with all disasters like this, the scope of it all is mind-boggling and a little humor is absolutely required,  especially since none of us are about to put on hard hats and overalls and fly over to move rubble. Feel a bit helpless really… There’s a definite cultural difference in attitude towards these things. Over here, any kind of tragedy like this is treated with utter seriousness and spoken of in hushed tones. We re-edit movies and kill tv episodes that involve anything similar to the event for fear of offending someone. The Japanese embrace these things. I like their way better.’

I’d planned to go out tonight, and spend three hours on the radio – watching and listening to what was going on in Japan,  and my mood to do so, changed a little.  However, I went ahead as planned, and would spend nearly 3 ½ hours on air tonight –  all of it, jazz music, both traditional and contemporary.  While I had the TV monitor on in the studio, keeping an eye on both the tragic unfolding of the Japanese disaster, and the Australian Football Pre Season Grand Final [Collingwood vs Essendon], I also really enjoyed the music I was playing tonight. The trouble is, as this was not a regular time spot of mine, the fact that there was three hours of jazz on air for those who might have been interested, would not been known, and that, together with the fact that the football final was on the TV, well I had to wonder, again, throughout the night, whether anyone was listening!!  This is the 3^rd Friday night I have filled in a vacant 3 hours over the past 5 or 6 weeks, and during that time, have not received one phone call! That of course, doesn’t mean no-one is listening – unless you are a talk back show, people don’t generally ring a radio station. Nevertheless, as I’ve noted previously, some kind of feedback is occasionally nice to get. Tonight, I offered to play requests – nobody had any!!  On radio 8pm to 11.23pm – all jazz – no response from anyone

Incidentally, the Collingwood Magpies, who you may recall, won the 2010 AFL Premiership, began their back to back campaign in good fashion, by winning tonight’s Pre-Season Final against the Essendon Bombers  – Mick Malthouse’s first victory as coach in a pre-season competition was harder than expected given the reigning premiers dominated the opening half but were pushed to the death by the rejuvenated Bombers, under new coach and former player, James Heard,  before winning 1.15.9 (108) to Essendon’s 0.13.8 (86).

Meanwhile, in the World Cup cricket tournament, some more results from the past few days are to hand.

Match 25: 9^th March [Group B]: India 5 for 191 defeated Netherlands 189, at Delhi

Match 26: 10^th March [Group A]: Sri Lanka 6 for 327 defeated Zimbabwe 188 at Pallekele

Match 27: 11^th March [Group B]: West Indies 275 defeated Ireland 231

Match 28: 11^th March [Group B]: Bangladesh 8 for 227 defeated England 225  [another shock loss to the English team, but I haven’t heard from any of my English friends as yet, keeping a low profile I think ].

Family history day in the city today. Left the car behind on a day which began with drizzling rain after quite a heavy downpour in some parts overnight, but as the day went on would become quite humid and uncomfortable. Caught the train into the city [off peak train, as I discovered with a slightly cheaper fare, but also limited the times I could use the same ticket to return – though needn’t have worried, I intended to be in the city until this evening in any case]. From Southern Cross caught a tram too the inner suburb of North Melbourne – passed through many times in the car, and in years gone passed, watched Carlton play against North Melbourne at the old Arden Street football ground – no idea what it is used for these days!  The area unfamiliar to me on foot, so took a few minutes to find where I was heading  –  the Public Records Office of Victoria [PROV], Archives Department, for a 10.30 am meeting with members of the late Emily Bower’s family.

Now Emily had been I think, the last surviving grandchild [when she died a few years ago] of our original Australian ancestor settlers in this country – William Kirk and Isabella Kennedy – who reached these shores in the early 1850s, and were married in Melbourne in 1854.  My companions at the PROV this morning would be three of Emily’s five ‘children’, most of them around my age, or a little older, and a generation ahead of myself  –  Janice [whom I’ve been in contact with quite a bit over recent months], Harry and his wife [I met Harry, probably at the Bower’s old Pascoe Vale home many years ago, and more recently at his mother’s funeral  – in fact, it was Harry who advised me of Emily’s passing], and Dell, another daughter. They all arrived a little while after I did – I’d already registered my presence with the authorities, and noticed that the security in terms of who could go into the Archives area, was quite tight and regimented. Rightly so. I had a particular task here this morning, as did each of the others, so after an initial greeting and a cup of coffee [iced coffee for me – needed to cool down after a humid walk from the tram], exchanging and viewing of family photos, etc, we all completed our registration processes, entered the Archives area, and basically went our separate ways for an hour or so.

My specific search this morning was to peruse a set of divorce papers from 1875.  All of us had only just learnt in recent weeks, that William and Isabella had separated and then divorced after about 20 years into their marriage – which amongst other things explained why she was living alone in Talbot when she died in 1892, while the rest of the family, all children included, had moved to Charlton and elsewhere.  Anyway, through the newspaper courts reports that I had studied before Christmas, it became evident that the court cases were not particularly amiable with charges and counter charges regarding behaviour etc, dominant. Of particular concern to me was that at one point, it had been suggested that one of the couple’s children was in fact not William’s son!  And while eventually while he apparently accepted that the boy was his, it became evident to me that the child in question was in all likelihood my direct great grandfather! For a while there, after years of researching the Kirk line, I had myself wondering whether or not I was actually descended from the Kirks!!!  So, with that in mind,  I registered the relevant divorce papers – I wanted to find that aspect of the case, and while no names had been reported in the newspaper reports, was hoping that the ‘queried’ child’s name might be mentioned.   Unfortunately, time was limited – my companions had ‘shorter’ tasks to explore whereas I could have spent an additional couple of hours on the facility – as a consequence, because of the volume of papers available, I did not get through all the material on hand, and didn’t [on this occasion] find the specific  references I was searching. I did however manage to copy the the full transcripts of William Kirk’s ‘Petition for divorce’ etc, and Isabella’s [as Respondent] response to that Petition  –  fascinating reading on both cases, and depending on which arguments who wanted to believe, neither side came out of those documents looking ‘very clean’ though on evidence, it seemed fairly clear [though not clearly established according to the outcome of the case] that Isabella was generally the ‘villain’, quite a naughty lady in fact!!

Anyway, as suggested, I did not complete my set task this morning, so determined to return in the near future.  From the PROV, the five of us caught a tram back into the city, and from there strolled over the Yarra River into the heart of the Southbank complex of entertainment, eating & shopping facilities, and eventually found our way to a particular restaurant that Janice had in mind that would be suitable for us all to enjoy lunch together. Quite expensive meals but there were a couple of set price lunch time meals plus a glass of wine that we all determined upon. Writing this some days later, I’m not sure what I had now  –  some kind of Rizzotto meal with a garden salad. Very nice anyway, and hopefully quite ‘safe’ for my health’s rather ‘fussy’ eating needs these days!! That was a very pleasant couple of hours in the company of these ‘relatively newly found’ family members. Whilst there, plans were made for our intended ‘centenary’ celebrations on the 3^rd September this year.  On that date, it would be 100 years to the day from the death of William Kirk, our ancestral settler. Janice & her siblings had organised the creation of a plague to be placed on William’s grave on that date later on this year, and plans were afoot for this immediately group plus a few others to visit Charlton on that day for an official ‘family’ ceremony, unveiling of the memorial plague, and for myself [at Janice’s invitation] to read the official Obituary which had been published shortly after his death. I think all present were looking forward to that occasion. I wondered at the time, though didn’t push the issue, whether it might be worthwhile inviting the local paper up there, to be present. I might follow that through later on, and suggest it to Janice and the others – they might prefer to keep things strictly private!

It was around 3pm, when we said our goodbyes, etc – I left alone, and made my way back across the Yarra River to the CBD and caught another tram up Swanston Street to the State Public Library. My task here, where I would spend over 2 ½ hours was to research some microfiche of old newspapers. I haven’t done this since the 1970s – in those days, one could look through the actual newspapers, which I certainly preferred. However they needed protection of course, and in the intervening had all been copied to microfiche – which I to be honest didn’t enjoy using, because of the physical strain on the eyes, hands etc [manoeuvring the mouse and so on]. However, there was no alternative, and I eventually found the material I wanted to look through, and after some period of time trying to work out how to use the equipment, was under way. In fact, once again, I would have liked to have stayed longer, and I really didn’t get into the swing of using the microfiche to their full capacity until near the end of my session. First task was searching through the Castlemaine  [old gold mining town of Central Victoria] newspapers of the period 1854-1855. We had only recently discovered that William & Isabella’s first child was born [and died] in Castlemaine, obviously during the time that William was engaged in gold mining in the area. The child’s birth had been reported in the Argus newspaper [in Melbourne] a few after the birth in April 1855, so I assumed from that, the couple, or William at least, might have been known in the area, and there would perhaps be other reports of his activities. Again, because of time, my search was not as thorough as I would have liked, and I found no reference at all to him – not even to the birth of the child. Presumably that had been reported in the Melbourne paper because Isabella’s parents and a large number of siblings were residing in Melbourne at the time. A bit disappointed, but certainly given time, the papers of that period were extremely detailed and full of much material about the gold diggings etc, and again I determined that I would return here in the near future for further more detailed study of that era.

Whilst at the State Library, I also searched through the East Charlton papers at around the time of William Kirk’s death in 1911 – we knew the Obituary [mentioned above] had being printed a few days afterwards, but were keen to see whether there was a specific death notice, etc. In fact, yes, I found both a formal Death Notice, printed three days after he died,  and a couple of days later, a bereavement notice of thanks from the family.  Copied both of those and would later tonight, send copies to Janice.

By the time my subsequent tram and train journeys back to Sunbury were complete, and a bit of shopping undertaken prior to collecting my car, it was close to 8.30 pm, and a rather interesting and busy day, following through on my lifetime interest, was drawing to a close. Later in the evening, I emailed Janice a bit of a summary of my day’s findings, or otherwise.

The complete iPod playlist:

Paul Kelly

To Her Door (Paul Kelly’s Greatest Hits: Songs from the South, Vols 1 & 2)    From Little Things Big Things Come (Paul Kelly’s Greatest Hits: Songs from the South, Vols 1 & 2)

Geoffrey Gurramul Yunupingu

Bapa (Gurrumul)   Wirrpangu (Gurrumul)    Djarimirri (Gurrumul)

Temper Trap

Sweet Disposition (Conditions)        Love Lost (Conditions)

Panics

Don’t Fight It (Cruel Guards)

Dan Kelly and the Alpha Males

Star of the Sea (Drowning in the Fountain of Youth)

Hill Top Hoods

The Hard Road (The Hard Road)   The Nosebleed Section (The Calling)

John Butler Trio

Funky Tonight (Grand National)    One Way Road (April Uprising)     Used to Get High (Grand National)

Angus and Julia Stone

Big Jet Plane (Down the Way)

The Herd

I Was Only 19 (The Sun Never Sets)

Jimmy Barnes

Red Hot (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)  That’s Right (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)  Hallelujah (I love her so) (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)   That’s How It Is (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)   Keep a Knocking (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)   Reconsider Me (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)    Shake Rattle & Roll (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)  Rockin    Pneumonia (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)    A Fool In Love (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)   You Can’t Judge a Book (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)   I was Made to Love Her (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)   Young Blood (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)     My Baby Just Cares for Me (The Rhythm and the Blues Album)

Ian Moss

Good Times (Soul on West 53rd)   Standing in The Shadows of Love (Soul on West 53rd)

Dan Sultan

Your Love is like a Song (Homemade Biscuits)

INXS

Never Tear Us Apart (Platinum Greatest Hits)   Need You Tonight (Platinum Greatest Hits)   The Loved One (Platinum Greatest Hits)

New Sensation (Platinum Greatest Hits)

Xavier Rudd

Let Me Be (Solace)   Better People (White Moth)

Midnight Oil

King of the Mountain (Blue Sky Mining)   Blue Sky Mine (Blue Sky Mining)   Beds are Burning (Diesel and Dust)   Short Memory (10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1)

Nick Cave (and the Bad Seeds)

Into My Arms (The Best Of….)

Troy Cassar Daly

Bow River (Standing On the Outside: The Songs of Cold Chisel)

Kasey Chambers

Pony (Wayward Angel)   The Captain (The Captain)

Jessica Mauboy

Burn (Been Waiting)   Time After Time (Been Waiting)

Crowded House

Now We’re Getting Somewhere (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)   World Where You Live (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)   Weather With You (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)   Something So Strong (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)   When You Come (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)   Four Seasons in One Day (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)   Distant Sun (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)   Sister Madly (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)   Better Be Home Soon (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)  Mean to Me (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)   It’s Only Natural (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)   Fall At Your Feet (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)   Don’t Dream It’s Over (The Very Very Best of Crowded House)

Kylie Minogue

Confide in Me (Ultimate Kylie)   Where the Wild Roses Grow (Ultimate Kylie)

Megan Washington

How to Tame Lions (I Believe You Liar)  Sunday Best (I Believe You Liar)

Bliss n Eso

Bullet and a Target (Flying Colours)

Yothu Yindi

Treaty (radio mix) (Tribal Voice)   Djapana (sunset dreaming) (Tribal Voice)  Dots on the Shells (One Blood)

Cat Empire

Hello (The Cat Empire)   Days Like These (The Cat Empire)

Hunters and Collectors

Holy Grail (Cut)   Throw Your Arms Around Me (Natural Selection)   When the River Runs Dry (Natural Selection)   Do You See What I See (Natural Selection)

Augie Marsh

One Crowded Hour (Moo You Bloody Choir)  Janelle (Standing on the Outside)

Missy Higgins

Scar (The Scar)   The Special Two (The Special Two)   Steer (On a Clear Day)

James Morrison

Chameleon (Scream Machine)  God Bless the Child duo with Deni Hines (The Other Woman)   St Louis Blues (Quartet)   St James Infirmary Blues (Tribute to Louis Armstrong)

Powderfinger

These Days (Odyssey Number Five)   Burn Your Name (Golden Rule)   My Happiness (Odyssey Number Five)   Baby I’ve Got You on My Mind (Vulture Street)   Lost and Running (Lost and Running-Single)

Bernard Fanning

Wish You Well (Tea & Sympathy)   Songbird (Tea & Sympathy)   Watch Over Me (Tea & Sympathy)   Thrill Is Gone (Tea & Sympathy)   Wash Me Clean (Tea & Sympathy)   Which Way Home? (Tea & Sympathy)   Hope and Validation (Tea & Sympathy)   Down to the River (Tea & Sympathy)   Yesterday’s Gone (Tea & Sympathy)   Not Finished Just Yet (Tea & Sympathy)   The Strangest Thing (Tea & Sympathy)   Sleeping Rough (Tea & Sympathy)   Further Down the River (Tea & Sympathy)   Believe (Tea & Sympathy)

Clare Bowditch

Message to My Girl (She Will Have Her Way: The Songs of Tim and Neil Finn)   Modern Day Addiction (Modern Day Addiction)

Guy Sebastian

Like It Like That (Like it Like That)   In the Midnight Hour (The Memphis Album)   (Sittin On) The Dock of the Bay (The Memphis Album)

Living End

All Torn Down (The Living End)   White Noise (White Noise)

 

Silverchair

Straight Lines (Young Modern)   Tomorrow (Frogstomp)   Anas Song, Open Fire (Neon Ballroom)

Wolfmother

Joker and the Thief (Wolfmother)   Woman (Wolfmother)

Tame Impala

Solitude is Bliss (InnerSpeaker)

Eddy Current Suppression Ring

Which Way to Go (Primary Colours)

Tina Arena

Chains (Don’t Ask)   To Sir With Love (Songs of Love and Loss)

Savage Garden

To the Moon & Back (Truly Madly Completely: The Best of Savage Garden)   Affirmation (Truly Madly Completely: The Best of Savage Garden)

Lior

This Old Love (Autumn Flow)   Tumbling into the Dawn (Tumbling into the Dawn)

Christine Anu

Island Home (Stylin Up)   Sunshine On a Rainy Day (Come My Way)   No Woman No Cry (Liberation Blue Acoustic Series)

GANGgajang

Sounds of Them (GANGgajang)

The Go-Betweens

Streets of Your Town (16 Lovers Lane)

Archie Roach and Ruby Hunter

Little by Little (Ruby)   Coolman Baby (Ruby)   Nagarrindjeri Woman (Ruby)

Archie Roach

John Pat (Journey)   Too Many Bridges (Journey)   Liyarn Ngarn (Journey)

The Waifs

London Still (Up All Night)   Lighthouse (Up All Night)   Bridal Train (A Brief History)

 

 

Renee Gayer

Heading in the Right Direction (The Ultimate Collection)   Stares and Whispers (The Ultimate Collection)   It’s a Man’s Man’s World (The Ultimate Collection)

Saltwater Band

Compass (Malk)  Djarridjarri-Blue Flag (Djarridjarri)   Arafura Sea (Gapu Damurrun)

Busy at the office today, Jackie present for most of the time, Mark down in the southwest at Portland, etc, again.  Of course, it was VPTA General Meeting day  – that’s why it was busy! About 2 dozen turned up, a few newcomers, and as always, at least one trouble-maker!!  Who shall remain unnamed.  A very nice guy actually – outside of the meeting type environment, at which point he becomes ‘difficult’!!

Bill, in true recognition of my lowly status in employment life these days,  organised lunch, them had to sit through another part of the meeting, in the office, while I tried to work. Not quite sure why that change of location was made during the afternoon?  However it didn’t concern me too much apart from the later ‘gossip’ that seems to happen when these women all get together, usually about someone else in the organisation who is causing problems, of which admittedly, there is always somebody!! Apart from that, I was looking forward to being away from here for a few days [again] – Monday is a public holiday in Victoria, and I’ve arranged to have the next two days off as well – bit of a family history research day planned for tomorrow.  Meanwhile, another meeting tonight, in Sunbury – the monthly Committee meeting of the local Family History Society. Under new President Peter Free [who was also the founding President back in 1984], these meetings are efficient and short, and within an hour, it was over by 9pm!  Time to get home and catch Susie before she left again.

Yes, she had caught the train down from Bendigo late this afternoon – luckily it was raining when she called me, unexpectedly from the town, looking for a lift home, because I would have been out walking had it not been raining.  I was back home before Susie left [picked up by Jimmy] to catch the train back to Bendigo – Susie had come down to play in a Volleyball Grand Final,  which her team won – showed me her trophy, so obviously the quick trip down had been worth the effort.  Mind you, Dad was a little concerned about her arrival back at the car park of the Bendigo Station late at night, though Susan herself seemed to have no such concerns, of course. She was in fact unwell  – had  suffered from a cold & cough all week, and it would be with her until this coming weekend.

Over the past day or so, much has been made in the media about Prime Minister Julia Gillard’s gift to US President Obama on her meeting with him in the States a day or so ago.  It was an iPod filled up with Australian music. Nothing wrong with that, and I could include the long list of tracks included below, but I won’t. I will however note the reaction of one of my regular music magazines – ‘Limelight’ magazine, obviously somewhat bias [as would rightfully be expected] towards it’s genre of music – being the official magazine of ABC Classic FMs classical music programs. In an online communication with supporters such as myself, “Limelight’ had this to say.

“Gillard’s gift to President Obama of an iPod loaded with Australian music is marred by the conspicuous absence of our classical composers.  Jimmy Barnes, Kylie Minogue, Paul Kelly and Yothu Yindi rub shoulders on the iPod Julia Gillard presented to Barack Obama this week, on her first official tour of the United States as Prime Minister.  The selection of tunes has been widely praised for showcasing the diversity of Australia’s local talent, including Labour’s own Peter Garrett (four Midnight Oil hits) and indigenous artists Geoffrey Gurramul Yunupingu and Archie Roach. Some have criticised the compilation’s absence of AC/DC, but far more disturbing is one major oversight: where’s the classical music?

The Government has exposed its cultural priorities and a worrying lack of interest in Australian art music in its decision to snub the nation’s internationally acclaimed composers. Where, for example, was Bliss, Brett Dean’s recent operatic sensation based on the quintessentially Aussie Peter Carey novel? Surely Peter Sculthorpe should have made the cut; the elder statesman of Australian classical music was one of the first to evoke the sound and spirit of our unique landscape in the orchestra. His Earth Cry, featuring William Barton on solo didgeridoo, is a glaring omission.  What of Australian artists? The late Sir Charles Mackerras was one of the first homegrown conductors to make a lasting impression on the world stage. Mackerras’ nephew Alexander Briger conducted Australia’s first opera, Don John of Austria, in its premiere recording for ABC Classics. Soprano Emma Matthews was the first Australian artist to make a solo recording for Deutsche Grammophon.  The list goes on, but not a single megabyte on Obama’s iPod was given over to Australia’s distinguished classical composers and artists. Is the Government remiss in its failure to represent an important facet of our national cultural identity?”

Now looking at list of inclusions, which Limelight to it’s credit, published in full, I probably couldn’t argue with most of the selections that had been included. But yes, surely composers and artists of the calibre mentioned above, deserved a place in a compilation of representative Australian music!! As indicated by my range of musical programs presented on the radio, I have a broad view and taste for different music genres, so I don’t think I personally can be accused of bias by making that suggestion. I can easily recognise the disappointment by those fans and lovers of  Australian produced and performed classical music.

Another quiet day for me  – even more so, following a fear overnight that I might have given myself a little dose of food poisoning? That shouldn’t have been the case, though some of the symptoms overnight indicated something of that nature. Or, maybe that early evening walk in the sun [minus a hat, which I was actually carrying at the time] might have been the cause!! Whatever the reason, it was not a comfortable night, and then this morning, one of those horrible trips in peak hour traffic that added almost 40 minutes to a normal trip, and finally got t5his driver to the office, feeling less than impressed!  I’m still counting down the days!

Even, surprisingly, not really in the mood for a radio show tonight, but we met that commitment as usual, and the mood quickly changed with the help of some great music. In view of the fact, that yet once again, the so-called regular presenters who were supposed to be on air, both before and after my time slot, did not turn up, I was particularly glad to have made sure I did!!  Eventually got home afterwards – to an empty house [with Susie up in Bendigo] –  after visiting the Treasurer of the local Uniting Church who has asked me to audit the Church Accounts for 2010. A few years ago, that was one of                  my voluntary tasks I decided to say ‘NO’ to,, because at the time,  the ‘books’ that were being given to me to audit were in such a state, that there was absolutely no pleasure or enthusiasm in undertaking the role. However, the new Treasurer came back to me last year, and asked to reconsider my view! I found things were now much better managed, and it was again a voluntary task which did not leave the doer in frustration and suffering from major headaches!  So I said,  yes I will do it again next year!!  Well, that time has come around again, and to be honest, I’m quite happy to help out!!

 

I seemed to have overlooked the last few games in the  World Cup Cricket tournament, which is currently underway on the sub-continent, so here is the latest. Tonight’s game is between  India and the Netherlands, at Delhi.

Match 21:  6^th March – England 171 defeated South Africa 165 played at Chenai

Match 22:  6^th March – India 5 for 210 defeated Ireland 207 played at Bengaluru

Match 23: 7^th March –  Canada 5 for 199 defeated Kenya 198 played at Delhi

Match 24: 8^th March -New Zealand 7 for 302 defeated Pakistan 192 played at Kandy

Must have been feeling lonely tonight – sent Susie a text message, enquiring as to how things were  –  the typical ‘annoyed’ daughter’s response came back  –  ‘Yes yes Dad, all fine’. Apparently, according to an entry I noted in Facebook later, she had a fairly noisy ‘party’ going on in a nearby apartment [on a Tuesday night!]. Knowing Susie, it probably wouldn’t have worried her much at this stage of the year, as she would be up quite late studying in any case!  Sounds like it was an ‘intoxicated’ group who had been refused entry elsewhere, so had returned to somebody’s apartment in Susie’s accommodation venue, to ‘party’ on!!

Back tomorrow!!!

This is the day of the week when I introduce the participants to  my readers, of the weekly ABC TV panel show ‘Q & A’ [Questions and Answers], but it’s also an opportunity for myself to catch up on the major personalities in our society these days, and generally learn a bit more about them. Many of them, I am usually quite familiar with, others, perhaps just the name has crossed my mind for some reason, through the media, etc. So apart from the topics which are discussed each week [and which generally relate to the major news stories of the week past, etc,], I like to use this program as a bit of an educational process, for both myself, and anyone else who might be interested. Most of the comments and bios below, about the program come from ABC websites, and I fully acknowledge that. In terms of the bios, no point to trying to reinvent the wheel!!

First of all, a reminder of what the program is on about, and who it’s host is each week.  Q&A puts punters, pollies and pundits together in the studio to thrash out the hot issues of the week. It’s about democracy in action – on Q&A the audience gets to ask the questions. It doesn’t matter who you are, or where you’re from – everyone can have a go  and take it up to our politicians and opinion makers. Energetic and opinionated – Q&A brings Australia’s egalitarian and larrikin spirit into the studio. Q&A is about encouraging people to engage with politics and society. Q&A is hosted by one of the ABC’s most respected journalists – Tony Jones. Q&A is live to air – it’s happening as viewers watch.  If you want a chance to ask the questions,  you are invited to register online.

Tony Jones is one of Australia’s most respected journalists. As host of Q&A he brings over 20 years of award winning journalism to the table. Tony is known for his incisive and probing interviews on the breaking issues of the day. His role on Q&A capitalises on his ability to tap into the political zeitgeist and keep the discussion focused and on track.
 Tony Jones has won pretty much every award an Australian journalist could wish for. He’s covered the seminal news events of the last two decades – from the fall of communism in Eastern Europe, through the collapse of apartheid in South Africa, to the rise of the Taliban and, closer to home, the revelations of sexual abuse in remote Aboriginal communities. Now with Q&A Tony is embarking on a new kind of inquiry.  He wants to put the Australian public directly in touch with the politicians and playmakers – to give them the opportunity to get some answers, eye to eye.  Public democracy, open dialogue, transparency – it’s what every good journalist strives for.

Tonight’s panellists were  Gail Kelly – Westpac CEO;  Kate Ellis – Minister for the Status of Women; Joe Hockey – Shadow Treasurer; Janet Albrechtsen – opinion columnist for The Australian; and Mike Carlton – journalist and commentator

On Monday, the eve of International Womens Day, we have a great panel to discuss and debate the issues:

From left to right – Joe, Janet, Gail, Kate and Mike

Gail Kelly is CEO of Westpac, arguably Australia’s most powerful businesswoman. Gail took the helm of Westpac in February 2008, and oversaw the merger with St.George Bank in December of that year. Before joining Westpac, Gail was CEO and Managing Director of St.George Bank for five years, at a time when St.George more than doubled its total assets and profits.  Previously, Gail worked at the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, as Head of Customer Service Division and a member of the bank’s Executive Committee. Gail began her banking career as a teller at Nedcor Bank, one of the largest banks in South Africa. She grew up and was educated in South Africa – firstly at Cape Town University and completing her MBA at Witwatersrand University. Gail is currently a director of the Australian Bankers’ Association, the Financial Markets Foundation for Children, and Melbourne Business School. She is married to Allan, and they have four children. The family migrated to Australia in 1997. In October 2004 Kate Ellis made history as the youngest woman ever elected to the Australian House of Representatives, winning the seat of Adelaide. Following the Labor Party’s election victory in November 2007 Kate was elevated to the ministry as the Minister for Youth and Sport, again making history as the youngest ever Australian minister (previous record holder Paul Keating).In last year’s reshuffle she became Minister for Employment Participation, Child Care and Status of Women.
Kate was born in Melbourne in 1977 and grew up in rural South Australia in the Murray River town of Mannum, where her family owned the local bakery. They later moved to Adelaide where Kate attended high school and studied international relations and politics at Flinders University. But a political career beckoned before Kate completed her degree. She began working as a research officer and adviser for federal and State Labor politicians before running for Parliament and defying the national trend in 2004 by winning a seat from the Liberals. In Government Kate has worked to provide a genuine voice for young people and is passionate about the power of sport to strengthen communities, tackle the obesity epidemic and define Australia’s national identity. In her spare time she loves to cook, play netball and ‘attempt to keep her garden alive’. In 2009 Zoo magazine offered to make a $30,000 donation to charity if Kate posed for a pictorial spread, but she declined. Joe Hockey has had to shoulder a big share of responsibility in the Opposition since the coalition lost office in 2007 and some big names left the frontline. Joe is a key member of the Opposition strategy team, and as shadow treasurer he has the challenge of beating Labor on the crucial battleground of the economy. Well-known as a moderate within the Liberal Party, Joe has occasionally been at odds with his colleagues on some fundamental philosophical issues and is seen by many as a future leadership contender.
Joe was born in Sydney in 1965 and has a different background from many of his parliamentary colleagues. His father, Richard, was born in Palestine of Armenian background, and came to Australia in 1948. The family’s original name was Hokeidonian. Joe graduated in arts and law from the University of Sydney, where he was active in the Young Liberals. He worked as a banking and finance lawyer, then as Director of Policy to the Liberal Premier of NSW, John Fahey.  He won the seat of North Sydney for the Liberal Party in 1996, following the retirement of well-known Independent Ted Mack. He joined the Howard ministry in 1998 as Minister for Financial Services and Regulation. His last ministry was in the Employment and Workplace Relations portfolio, which he held while the coalition was fighting an intense political battle over its contentious industrial relations policy, WorkChoices.  Joe and his wife Melissa Babbage live in the Sydney suburb of Hunters Hill. They have three children, Xavier, Adelaide and Ignatius. Janet Albrechtsen is one of Australia’s most prominent conservative commentators. She is a columnist for The Australian and has also written for The Wall Street Journal Asia, The Australian Financial Review, The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age. Janet was a member of the board of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation from 2005 to 2010. She has also been a member of the Foreign Affairs Council since 2003. Janet was born in Adelaide and has a doctorate in law from the University of Sydney Law School. She has also worked as a solicitor, practising in the areas of banking and finance, corporate and securities law. Mike Carlton is one of Australia’s best-known broadcasters and journalists. In a 40-year career, he has been a radio and television news and current affairs reporter, foreign correspondent, radio host and newspaper columnist.  Mike was an ABC war correspondent in Vietnam in 1967 and 1970, and for three years was the ABC’s Bureau Chief in Jakarta. He also reported for the ABC from London, New York and major Asian capitals. In television, he was one of the original reporters on the ABC’s groundbreaking This Day Tonight in the 1970s.  Mike turned to talk radio in 1980, first at Sydney’s 2GB, and then for four years in London at Newstalk 97.3FM. On returning to work in television in Australia in 2008, he reported and hosted Indonesia: A Reporter Returns, a three-part documentary for SBS TV. After 26 years hosting morning radio , Mike finally retired from his Radio 2UE breakfast program in Sydney. He is now columnist for the Saturday edition of the Sydney Morning Herald, having been sacked from the position in August 2008, for refusing to write his column during a strike by journalists at Fairfax media. He subsequently rejoined the newspaper in 2009.
Mike is known for his criticism of conservative public figures such as former PM John Howard, radio personality Alan Jones, and for his criticism of conservative governments, including the United States’ Bush administration. Mike has had a life-long passion for naval history and in 2010 published the book he always wanted to write- Cruiser – the Life and Loss of HMAS Perth and her Crew.  He now lives with his wife and young son on Sydney’s northern beaches.

I actually only realised after the program, that one of the reasons for the concentration of questions and discussions being related to women’s rights etc, was that we have just ‘celebrated’ this year’s International Women’s Day.  Some of the areas covered on the subject of women, and argued about, by the panel, included the fall in relation to most other OECD countries in the proportion of Australian women on corporate boards in this country;  existing pay differences between males and females in the workforce [though this was disputed, if the same work was being undertaken];  a discussion on the use of the word ‘feminism’ today, and it’s significance to the traditional or conservative feminist movements of past years, and so on. Meanwhile there was also some considerable debate about bank fees. The Westpac CEO seemed to have all the answers without actually denying certain fees etc, existed  – in fact, I must admit I was quite impressed by Gail Kelly who spoke confidently, and gave good answers to questions raised about her Bank’s fees, the supposed disparity between salaries of males and females in the finance area of the bank,  and, on quite a personal level, the justification for her substantial $10 million renumeration package compared with average wages and salary levels. She was not afraid to admit it was high while explaining that such a figure was broken up into various packaging components relating to performance levels, bonuses, etc, and that disparity in salaries must by necessity of the levels of responsibilities in roles, and the competitive desire of large organisations to get the ‘best’ people for the job, will always be a major consideration in such matters.

I was interested to hear Joe Hockey’s concern for the low numbers of women in senior roles and corporate boards, and quite obviously, some of the views he expressed tonight would appear in tomorrow’s media! In fact on that very question, this is the kind of report that would appear:-

Opposition frontbencher Joe Hockey says he would back enforced quotas that ensure 30 per cent of board positions are occupied by women. He says corporate Australia has been given long enough to improve gender equality on the executive level after talking about it for more than a decade. “If they don’t meet a reasonable target within a period of time, then more punitive measures need to be taken by the parliament,” he told ABC television on Monday. “I would think that you would need to have a target of about 30 per cent.” Women make up about 25 per cent of board appointments in Australia at the moment, but it slips to 11 per cent for the top 200 companies listed on the Australian Securities Exchange. On the eve of International Women’s Day, Mr Hockey said it was time for real action, although he insists quotas were a last resort. “Corporate Australia has had so many warnings, they’ve put in place so many programs … but Australia has actually fallen behind,” he said.  “I just don’t understand how you can claim that as a director of a company, that all wisdom and knowledge lies in the hands of men only.” Meanwhile, another panellist tonight, Minister for the Status of Women Kate Ellis said the government was committed to its election pledge to have women make up 40 per cent of public board positions by 2015.  In both cases, the two politicians  suggested that quotas should only be used as a last resort, they don’t want to legislate on the matter, BUT…………  An interesting response came from one of the program viewers with a comment to the affect that   ‘Watching two politicians agree is crazy, amazing – more, more, more’!!

The two journalists on the panel, probably didn’t get much of a go tonight, and when they did, no punches were pulled in their opinions. Janet Albrechtsen came over to me as a bit of a modern day ‘Germaine Greer’ – perhaps a bit unfair on my part, as I’ve not always liked the ‘anti’ tone of some of her newspaper articles that I have read from time to time, the type of journalists [in my humble view] who never seems to have ‘nice’ things to say about the topic she is writing.  Perhaps it just that she is ‘too outspoken’ in a harsh way that gets on my nerves?

One point made tonight [which was basically passed over] – which may in fact have been raised by Janet  –  we hear so much about the advances that women have made in most aspects of modern life to bring them on a more equal footing with men  – but generally, this kind of assessment applies only to women in western countries –  women today remain downtrodden and severely discriminated against in many world societies including parts of Islam and various African and Asian cultures. Like the comment tonight, this fact in the broad sense tends to be bypassed when we look at international improvements in the rights of women.

Of course, with the Labor Government’s plan to introduce ‘some kind’ of carbon tax in the near future,  it was inevitable that a portion of the program would be devoted to that subject – in fact, just briefly, at the beginning and end of the night!  A point made at both ends of the program by Gail Kelly, was that the politics of that type of question was becoming far too personal – if we want to achieve any degree of bipartisanship or agreement on these things, the ‘nastiness’ which seems to be creeping into the debates in parliament and elsewhere, needs to be moderated. It is because of this aspect that ‘progress’ is not been made!  I must agree, and in fact, have been becoming quite disturbed in recent weeks by the vitriol  which seems to be getting thrown around, in both houses of parliament, particularly the emphasis on calling members ‘liars’ etc. We don’t need that!  I would like to see Tony Abbott, as Leader of the Opposition, direct his energies  to more positive forms of ‘attack’ against the government – this sort of ‘letter to the faithful’, I personally don’t want to keep seeing, where the emphasis is on dishonesty, and by association, lies   –  he wrote last week  –  “Julia Gillard couldn’t have been clearer before the last election when she said, ‘There will be no carbon tax under the government I lead.’. We now know that keeping the Greens happy matters more to Ms Gillard than keeping her promises. As a result of Ms Gillard’s dishonesty, Australians face higher household bills and lost jobs.”   Okay Tony, you made your point, over the past couple of weeks – but what are you achieving in terms of progress to a better alternative. Your letter indicated that the Coalition had a climate change strategy based on direct action to reduce emissions and improve the environment. Well then, can we please move on  –  direct your efforts into telling the Australian electorate what those plans are, instead of all these constant negative verbal assaults  –  let’s move on!@!!  I think that is what Gail Kelly was attempting to suggest we need to do last night.

When I started this particular show, I never imagined I could keep things going for so long – 250 Sunday mornings over 5 years that I have been up and in the studio well before 7am to present one of the music genres I enjoy sharing the most.  That suggests not too many Sundays have been missed – and all for legitimate reasons – out of town on  holiday or a weekend away, occasional illness or hospital recovery, and one Sunday when my daughter’s car was blocking mine in, and I was not game to wake her up!  No Sundays missed because I ’couldn’t be bothered making the effort’ or ‘had nothing prepared’, a record I fairly proud of as of course the role is completely voluntary. Mind you, I sometimes feel I’d like to give it away occasionally, but I want to keep playing the music, and for a station that only has one classical music program through the week, no other time seems really appropriate. I’m hoping that once I retire from fulltime work, that it will all become a little easier!

Played some of my favourite composers, and artists this morning, but as usual ran out of time – could have gone on for a few more hours, but I’m certain that the country music fans [and presenters] would not have appreciated that –  my Sunday program is followed by 3 hours of country music presented by a couple who have been on air for many more years than myself. Today’s chosen composers included Beethoven, Ravel [Bolero], Tchaikovsky,  Mozart, Chopin, Janacek [to name a few], while the performers I featured today, just had to  include the late Joan Sutherland [song from 1965], the American black singer, Marion Anderson [Softly Awakes My Heart from Saint-Saens’ ‘Samson and Delilah’, sung in English and originally recorded on Mono back in 1930], my favourite Australian musicians [the Australian String Quartet] and favourite suburban orchestra [the Heidelberg Symphony Orchestra], and Sally Maer [the cello diva, playing ‘The Prayer’]. Not sure how we managed to fit all of that into two hours, and meet all of our sponsorship commitments, concert diary, but we did it!! 

I was meanwhile, back on air again this afternoon for a few hours of folk, blues, country, pop and world music, almost all of it, relatively new releases. Came back from that tonight fairly tired, although later, I wondered whether much of that was my weekly apprehension about Susan driving back up to Bendigo for another week of study. She seemed in no hurry to be off this evening, so by the time she left, just after 8.30pm, it was already dark.  There was little I could say – she already knew that ‘Dad’ worried about her driving up the highway alone, and particularly at night. It was in fact a fine night this time but with all of the Autumn and Winter months ahead,  that trip through he mountains north of here can be fairly uncomfortable in terms of bad weather, fog, frost, etc!  I guess I have a lot of worrying Sunday evenings ahead of me L

I finished reading one of Thomas Keneally earlier novels this evening – think I recall picking it up at a book stall last November, and have been reading a few pages at a time before trying to sleep. It was titled ‘Flying Hero Class’, and first published back in 1991. While it was an interesting enough story, it didn’t leave as satisfied as I generally feel after a good novel. I guess it is really a story of moral dilemmas on both ‘sides of the fence’ as Keneally examines and on observes the reactions under pressure, etc of the various characters involved in the hijacking of an airliner flying between New York and Frankfurt – a jet carrying an Australian aboriginal dance troupe and its white tour manager.   Just wasn’t sure how I felt about the story – found myself at times wanting it to keep moving on the ‘hijack’ aspect of the storyline, whereas the writer kept diverting to ‘other matters and past events’ as part of his ‘observations’ of the various participants. Normally, that wouldn’t worry me, and I would find it an essential part of the novel. I think the following précis from one reviewer I came across, and in particular the words I have highlighted demonstrate partially what I am getting at. Maybe I am unfairly feeling the whole thing was ‘too slow’ because in reality as suggested below, the drawn out tension of the situation was probably [and would be] all too real to those who were involved.

‘A tale of intrigue and hijacking. Frank McCloud is the manager for the international dance tour of the Barramatjara, a remote Australian tribe. On the troupe’s flight to Europe, a small band of Arab terrorists hijack the plane in hopes of obtaining the release of political prisoners. McCloud and two other men are singled out as the people’s enemies. Taliq, the terrorists’ leader, accuses him of exploiting the tribe for their land and begins brainwashing the crew, passengers , and the Barramatjara themselves to turn them against the scapegoats. Keneally, in a slow methodical plodding style, allows readers to see, and sometimes feel, the plight McCloud and his companions experience. The tension and psychology at play here are believably presented and add greatly to the book’s appeal’.

Perhaps my uncertainty was a little like this comment – ‘I was not sure if this was a black comedy; but as the book went on, it was not’  –  I felt on occasions that I was reading  a ‘cheaper’ version of Keneally’s writing style, although it certainly wasn’t one of his earliest publications, many great books came before it, such as ‘Schindler’s Ark’ for one! Anyway, after all that, I think I will give the book 2 stars out of a possible five – but that is purely based on my enjoyment or satisfaction of the novel, not any kind of pure literary assessment.  Meanwhile, I have for some months being slowly reading through one of Thomas Keneally’s more recent projects – the 1^st part of a history of Australia. I must admit that I haven’t made much progress yet, being determined to finish John Howard’s book before I concentrate on another major reading project. So we will come back to that one a little later.