It's a Match!!!!

Probably the most exciting thing in ages. Check this out:

It's a Match!!!

If you don't understand the picture, rumour had it that Cambridge University had the actual breastplate worn in the iconic and famous historical drawing of "A Native of Feejee Islands" so Our Venerable Leader, Bainimarama, himself flew to England to check it out.

As you can see here, it was a righteous call because it is indeed the very same breastplate. Exciting, right?

And isn't it just creepy that this Rawdon sketch is called "Native of Feejee Islands" when it is actually Tanoa Visawaqa, Vunivalu of Bau, the father of Fiji's very own King George (Seru) Cakabau, who ceded Fiji to Queen Victoria in order to stop the Americans from acquiring it in order to turn our beloved islands into a single giant cotton plantation. Hardly your typical "native", right?

That type of thing - European ethnography's habit of misrepresenting foreign Kings and such as "Natives" - happens a lot because just about all of 17th and 18th century explorers' "Native" portraits are actually representations of very important people.  It's because the common people and the poor people the world over tend to dress pretty much the same way - just covering up the dangly bits however they can - whereas it's the important people in most cultures who are the ones with the very best examples of those classic "native costumes".

When Queen Elizabeth made her historic first visit to Fiji back in 1953, her gifts won everyone's hearts and minds because what she'd done was gather together all the Fijian "ethnography" from around England and Europe, identify who was who in each of these "Native" photos, paintings, drawings and sketches, and then gift copies of each image to those "Native's" descendants. 

Nice, right? It was like saying "I recognise that you are NOT "natives"; that you are people in your own right, with names and lives and all the rest of it, just like WE do."  

Keith was saying she did the same thing on her first visit to New Zealand as well. No wonder she has been such a beloved Monarch for so many decades. 

However, what is really happening here - why someone in Fiji can now say things like "Tui Tanoa's breastplate in this picture is to be found at Cambridge University." - is that Fiji Museum has spent this entire year visiting England and European ethnographic collections to see who has what that came from Fiji, recording and photographing and giving Fiji back an idea of its own heritage:

 

 Cambridge University shows Bainimarama

its Fiji Collection.

And what is particularly exciting is that the UK itself has become so excited by the scope and extent of Fijian cultural material objects they have in England that they are putting together an Exhibition called "Fiji" that will open for the Summer of 2013, so we can see all of it put together in one place.

AND Keith informed me yesterday that, during the Summer of 2013, WE will be walking the length of Hadrian's Wall - sooo not doing this - which means we'll be in UK then so I'll definitely be agitating to see it for ourselves. 

You're Kidding Me, Right?

My i-photo program keeps crashing under the weight of my several hundred thousand photographs and so I'm currently deleting thousands ... and keep coming across shots I took for this blog for stories I never got around to writing.  

Here's one:

When we were on holiday in Melbourne all those months ago, we visited a great many churches and were bemused to find that the Protestant churches have been removing statues of saints and replacing them with these sorts of things:

Yup, instead of, say, a perfectly viable St Whoeveritis, you get a very annoying dripping-water chunk of badly carved granite or a piece of drift wood, petrified rock and part of an old tree trunk that is so very strange it's .... it's ... gosh, you'd have to make this a Rorschach's Test to decide what it is. 

After the expected reaction of "WTF?" the only thing that springs to mind is "WHY???" Yes, I get that this is all kinds of Zen but WHY???? Seriously, why would you do this?

I mean, these things invite questions, right?, and you don't go into a church or a temple or a wat or an ashram or ... or ... or a synagog or even a pagan-style tree-fringed sacred grove or whatever you choose as your personal sacred space to be asked questions.  You go in expecting to be given good solid answers.

Being me, I naturally hunted down some random priest in one of these "sacred spaces" and asked WTF?, wherein I was told in the most avuncular, gentle and kindly manner that it's offensive to people of other religions to have images of saints because they are automatically EXCLUDING. 

I kid you not.  This is what I was told. I could only shake my head and turn away to stop the very nice priest from seeing my look of combined sadness and derision.

I'd show you a photo of him only, you know, I don't want to single him out for what I want to say to the Protestant churches of Melbourne:  

For heaven's sake, it's a sodding CHURCH! Even going into one is automatically EXCLUDING! You even choose which one to enter by being EXCLUDING! And surely "those excluders" go into their church of choice with certain expectations, and that these are NOT being met by very annoying dripping-water chunk of badly carved granite thingies or pieces of drift wood, petrified rock and parts of an old tree trunks.

Look, seriously folks, the function of churches is to be a place where John and Jane Public can go to ask their deity of choice to not let them be squashed like a bug. And does this annoying dripping-water thingy does not invite that? No, not in the least.

What all this made me think of was how, when we were at Auckland Museum in the 80s, we were shocked to discover that they'd taken away the most magnificent and awe-inspiring white marble ancient Greek statues and replaced them with second-rate and half-rotten wooden Buddhas. When I tracked down some random Museum person to ask why, I was told, with the great hair-tossing and snooting of aloof contempt, it was because Greek mythology had nothing to do with NZ. And wasn't I greeted with a snort of derision when I asked "And Buddhism has a huge connection, how?"

So that's what I want to say to the Protestant churches of Melbourne: that they desperately need to stop being such sad and stupid tossers and get over this sodding need to be such dire religious apologists and realise that in situations like this it's entirely NOT inappropriate to just be themselves!

Farewell Loloma Beach!

I know I mentioned this over a month ago, but it's finally struck me with the full horror of what is happening:

LOLOMA BEACH WILL NO LONGER BE OURS!

The incredibly beautiful 

Loloma Beach in Deuba, Fiji!

I've already told you how it's been bought by American developers and they're building a wall to turn it into a gated community, off-limits to we locals:

Our beach house just off Loloma Beach.

You can't get any more local than this!

I've ranted long and hard about the illegality and unconstitutionality of Fiji cutting off the beaches and banuves (the Fijian word for land beside the beaches) from locals because all Fiji is meant to have free and unhindered access to the sea at all times ... but I won't do that here and now.  I just want to farewell our beautiful beautiful beach and thank it for all those decades of beautiful memories:

My mum died looking at this exact 

scene so it's very special to me, 

It's wonderful, isn't it. I've already told you how, when I was in Fiji a few months ago, and saw the wall and realised it was all to be lost to us, I decided it was my last chance to relive my mother's last moments, to see what she saw and to understand why she died smiling. 

Little Brother (who doesn't wish to be named in my blog) was with her when she died. They were walking the dogs on the beach together at sunset so, back after it happened, he was able to walk us through the scene and tell us the exact spot where mum suddenly sat down on the beach, and how she was looking out in this direction and was smiling as the light went out in her eyes. 

Although she was such a wonderful lady and her passing so young was such a sad loss for so many people, we all have to admit it was definitely a lovely death, and how special is it to be so at peace with yourself that the passing is easy and beautiful.

Anyway, since we were back in Fiji and knew we were about to lose all, I thought it was my last chance to sit on that exact spot at the exact time of day she died and get a record of exactly what she saw in her final moments. I thought beforehand that it would be morbid and twisted, reliving our mum's final moments, but it wasn't. Just look at that photo. It was a simply beautiful experience, yes, and I love having this as a record.

So do you too understand why she smiled. I certainly know.

However that is just one memory among very many more memories that go back for nearly five decades, back well beyond my birth, back to when mum and dad were first married - and they got married several beaches along from this one too - and used to camp right on this beach ...

 Loloma Beach, 1953. 

Check out their bivouac! 

... promising themselves they'd one day build a beach house right there so they'd one day raise their future children to be wild and free, enjoying it all.

And they did, and we did, and it was such a beautiful gift from our parents to us and it's only just now, when we're on the verge of losing it all, that I realise that we can't take these things for granted because they are life's true blessings.

Such fun we had here, most weekends and during holidays at our little cottage ... but it's also where mum and dad moved after they retired, after we'd left home and gone out into the world, although they had to build a couple of extensions because originally being just a hut it wasn't designed 'for real life' everyday living and quickly became impractical.

But the memories!  Such lovely memories of growing up here.

Like that reef you can see in that photo there. All those late afternoon walks at low tide, examining all the interesting things trapped in the rock pools? Mainly little fish and lots of crabs and vivid blue starfish, sea urchins and, hey, once there was even an octopus in there and when I poked it it squirted all this black ink, but then it couldn't escape as it usually does because it was trapped, so we recalled mum's injunction never to stress wild animals because it could kill them, so we left it alone.

Or when the tide was coming in, we'd go body-surfing over that reef with snorkle and goggles ... being dragged in and out by the waves, and learning the hard way to always wear a T-shirt - or even better a wetsuit - because that red coral could really burn and sting.

And there was the time, as a teenager, I took my new boyfriend Rod snorkling along the outer edge of the reef at high tide. It was all great until Rod freaked out when we saw a shark right beside us. It was the usual one that always hunted there so I was used to it, so I told Rod that it was only a grey nurse and was simply looking for food, so we should just ignore it and it would ignore us, and then, minutes later, while I was exploring a little cave, something grabbed my flipper and shook ...

... and I came to on the beach where Rod had dragged me. And what was so particularly astonishing was seeing those brutal gouges all over Rod's body, and the savage bruising that quickly followed, and realising that I'd given that 'shark' a most vicious battle, even though I'd been ostensibly unconscious at the time.  Odd, right! But at least it taught Rod to not play stupid practical jokes on me!

Other memories:  oh, here's a good one: whenever the wind blew from the north, sand would bank up and cut off the creek so the fresh water flooded the banuve-side of the beach, and that water was always so warm and pleasant and the trees provided such good shade that we'd spend hours in it pretending to be crocodiles.

And then there was blue-bottle jellyfish season where, if the wind blew from the west, they'd be acres of them covering the sand, all looking like beautiful azure bubbles, so we'd have race down the length of the beach to see who'd reach the farthest end first ... but since this was a Murphy Game there was a catch. We called this Girl's Club and you couldn't be our friend unless you could play without crying because The Rules stated you could only move if you jumped directly atop a jellyfish - they'd make the most delicious squelching sound when they popped - and this game took all afternoon and naturally the tide would come in, and the waves would wash the jelly-fish tentacles around our ankles and we'd end up stung like anything.  But no matter how much it hurt, you had to take it with stoical fervour.  Gosh, it was such great fun.

 (Actually, once you'd played it a couple of times, you knew to always carry a stick so you could hold the tentacles away from you when you saw a wave coming.  But the new kids never knew this so ... yeah, yeah, a worthy initiation.)

Oh, and let's not forget that stand of ancient giant buttress trees at the other end of the beach, down beyond the Governor's Cottage, that always felt so sacred we called it "The Cathedral" because it always felt so appropriate. That part of the banuve always had the most extraordinarily rich and majestic silence and almost preternatural stillness that you could only speak in whispers, and since you're coupling that with the most sublime, unearthy light coming through the trees' canopy, being there always felt like a religious experience.

Many many years ago, when I was still a child, British writer Jessica Mitford was holidaying in Fiji just down from us. Mostly she and dad talked for hours on end, but one afternoon she said to me "You look like a girl who'd know all the secret and special places around here. Will you share them with me?"  I had grown up knowing all about the fabulous and famous Mitford Sisters and thought that I couldn't show her anything she'd find "Wow!" but I took her up Red Hill (which came down in the violent storm surge that also knocked our house off its foundation) to pick wood roses, and then, when I saw that the tide had gone out, I took her onto our reef to look into the rock pools, and then, late afternoon until just before sunset, I took her to The Cathedral, and then we sat on the beach to watch the sun go down and she looked at me with tears in her eyes and said "You have the best secret and special places I've ever seen."  

So, yes, I can tell you that all this specialness was once endorsed by Jessica Mitford, my favourite ever Mitford Sister - even before I met her - because the Mitfords' novels always felt exactly like us growing up - what with the larger-than-life father, the sweet and gentle mother, and far far too many kids who were all so quirky and badly behaved - and Jessica was the sister I always most identified with!  And when she said to me "You're the ME in your family." I felt so entirely validated.

By the way, these developers cut down all that stand, the vicious swine.  In most of the rest of the world, old stands of buttress trees are World Heritage, with good reason, so this is definitely a rat act of the first order.

  

I could go on and on and on because I've barely scratched the surface of these memories, but the day has got away from me, so I'll end with just one more.  

Let's make it a good one: OK, got one:  the time that travel writer Paul Theroux left our beach in a kayak to row to out to Beqa, the island you can see out there in that photo, and Little Brother, who was only about three at the time, saw him go and, since there was an old bilibili (bamboo raft) left abandoned on the beach, decided to follow him ... and got so far out to sea before we even noticed he was gone - and without Theroux even noticing a very little boy was rowing behind him - that when mum finally spotted him she had to race home to phone Robert Miller, who was back then running the local marina down at Pacific Harbour, to send out a boat to rescue him.

And now I think about it, Robert often had to send out a boat to rescue lots of people. A huge number over the years. Loloma Beach could do a spectacular rip and a great many swimmers would be pulled out to sea, including us, although we knew how to get out of them so never needed rescuing. 

And let's not also forget that Loloma Beach also does a very savage and destructive storm surge. 

I do hope someone informs those nasty developers.

But this is meant to be saying a fond farewell to our beautiful beach. And also, I guess, to our wonderful childhood.

So Goodbye Loloma Beach.  For over 50 years we Murphys loved you so much and you will be deeply and sorely missed.  

Ave, Hail and Farewell.

Lance Armstrong. The Best Laugh in Ages.

This is to be found in the remainders bin down at our local bookshop.  It's the best laugh I've had in absolutely ages.  Enjoy!

The saddest part, however, is that Brad Kearns obviously put a big chunk of his life into writing this book, and that's such a waste, isn't it! 

What Kills Us This Week!

Is it just me or does CY Leung look a lot like Bela Lugosi?  Let me check this out:

 

Both images

are undoubtedly copyrighted!

I found them on Google.

Yes, I can definitely see it ... so indeed they do; two men who look like they were born to play characters we'll one day dress up to look like during Halloween.

I'm currently hating CY Leung so much; like a deep quiet hatred right at my core.  I haven't felt this way about any leader since ...

... since ever.  I grew up having a truly GREAT leader: Fiji's  Ratu Mara: 

 

6 feet 9 inches of regal elegance, noblesse oblige and downright SMARTS with his finger right on the pulse of our very best selves ... and I think it was no accident that the wonderful film "The King's Speech" was written by David Seidler, Ratu Mara's former speech writer,  because anyone who ever knew Ratu Mara definitely KNEW what elements go into making a truly GREAT leader.

And I too, like David, and thanks to Ratu Mara, know what makes a great leader and I know that CY Leung definitely isn't one!  The Beijing Wolf is probably the worst leader I have ever known, what with having a conniving and sly entry into the leadership position, no understanding of what makes HK people tick, a secret agenda and ...

... no ... wait a sec! ... I lived in Australia when Paul Keating was leader and, yes, that guy too was truly a dick and I hated him too in the same deep quiet way - all that calling himself "the world's greatest treasurer" and meanwhile he's making stupid economic decisions that were genuinely screwing over the people and creating poverty everywhere which he has since apologised for and admitted he was very wrong - and also don't forget that it turned out he was lining his own pockets with his secret pig farms and such - and I also decided back then that he too looked a lot like Bela Lugosi.  Let's check that out too: 

 

 Ooooh, yeah!

Definitely got a Bela there!

And like CY, Paul had that conniving and sly entry into the leadership position, no understanding of what made his constituents tick, and since he always made what were ostensibly such clear-cut impossibly bad choices it's quite possible that he too had a secret agenda.

So yes, I have known bad leaders before, and so I know that CY Leung is definitely one.

The latest that's made me so cross with CY?  He's stirring up such anger in HK people that we're protesting him like crazy and in recent protests HKers have taken up waving the British flag.  I do have a great many photos of this, but I'll have to find them, and they're not very good anyway.  Nothing iconic and worth showing in any of those many downloads.

Anyway, waving the British flag is actually meant as a signal to Beijing that we here in HK have still got the Freedoms that the British put in place before The Handover and which THEY, the Chinese Communist Party, signed: the Joint Sino-British Agreement that for 50 years we'd still have Rule of Law and Freedom of Expression, Religion, Thought, and the Rights to Oppose, Direct, Demonstrate and Demand Change.

So THAT is what the British flag means here! However this isn't how it's seen in Beijing.  We now hear that the very highest ranking members of the Chinese Communist Party saw these protests and demanded CY have those flag wavers arrested for TREASON and CY had to explain to them what they had so obviously forgotten: that HK still has the Rights to Oppose, Direct, Demonstrate and Demand Change as enshrined in our Basic Law that THEY agreed to and we have their signatures to prove it.

So that's the latest: Beijing has now demanded that CY change things so Beijing CAN have HKers arrested for High Treason, which means that Article 23 is back on the table.

We can and MUST keep fighting this.  The CCP's hideous Article 23 HAS to be resisted with all our might because it will definitely undercut all those Freedoms that the Joint Sino-British Declaration has in place for us FOR ANOTHER 35 YEARS!!!

Mainland China simply doesn't get it.  Everything they're currently doing just says "We are sly, conniving and deeply dishonest and our word means NOTHING so don't trust us in the slightest"!  Oh yeah, good one, CCP!!!! THAT'S the message you want to send when you're trying to win hearts and minds!  NOT!!!!

So that's the Threatdown for this week, and it's a simple one:

THREATDOWN

Nasty bullies who bully nastily!