Welcome to the inside of the main Concert Hall of the Sydney Opera House. Nearly 50 years ago, on an extremely hot Saturday in October 1973, my mother and I attended the opening ceremony of the Opera House. How did we find ourselves there? My father.. Dad worked on the foundations of this building in the 1960's. Anyone who worked on building the Sydney Opera House was put into a ballot and if your name was pulled out then two tickets came your way for the opening ceremony. Dad said he never won anything in his life, but lo and behold his name was pulled out of the thousands of names that went in. Mum and I sat on the stairs outside to watch Her Majesty the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh go through the motions, surrounded by a flotilla of boats on the harbour, the release of balloons, and the inevitable speeches. When it was over, and Her Majesty was directed up the stairs to go inside, I grabbed my mother by the hand and ran to the top of the stairs so we were within a few feet of her as she passed by (see photo below). We stood with the crowd of journalists taking photos for their newspapers and magazines. The Queen, the Premier's wife Mrs Askin and my Mother were all suitably attired in a dress, heels, a hat, and gloves "just in case I meet the Queen", said Mum. That night at the opening concert, my father sang before the Queen as part of the Sydney Philharmonia Choir, accompanied by the Sydney Symphony Orchestra.
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It has been a while since writing my last blog in June 2018. It is only now I feel I have something to try to put into words. It is simply ... life moves on! Keep moving. On a personal front, two things happened ... Firstly I moved house. It was not my choice to do so. Secondly I realised that five of my six nieces and nephews were now over 40 years of age. Not children any more, not even close .... unexpectedly a whole generation moved up into the beginning of "middle age". Where does that put me? As I said, moving house was not my choice. I used to to think I could live anywhere and not complain. I have lived in very different places and situations, all without complaint (I think). I once shared a "room" about 12ft x 5ft for three years in the middle of a light industrial district in an Asian city. The small business factories around me worked hard ... unfortunately for us ... because the sounds of drills and tools were not subject to "normal" regulatory hours or conditions. It is only in my later years that I have had my own place to live. A small apartment that I made my own ... I did not need to move again. Then it became evident that the whole block would be demolished. I would need to move. I was the last one to move out over a two year period ... for various reasons ... including the need for sensible level access. So I waited. Eventually a similar apartment became available. I said goodbye to my sunset view and moved. Nothing is the same when things change and it can be hard to move on with life. My move was a minor change, and I found myself saying to someone about a week later ... "I've shut the door on the old place and moved on!" ... and as I said it I realised it was actually true. Life moves on! Change happens ... Lockerbie is a small Scottish town, bypassed by the M74, the major route North on England and Scotland's western Coast. This motorway funnels traffic up to the ancient cities of Glasgow and across to Edinburgh. Carlisle is the last city in England, and Lockerbie is close to the first town after the Scottish border.
December 2018 is the 30 year anniversary of a horrific night that would haunt the lives of thousands of people, including the small population of this Scottish town. Four nights before Christmas, Pan Am Flight 103 was unfortunate enough to be the flight chosen by someone to place a bomb on board. The timing of the explosion, accidentally or intentionally, brought the plane wreckage and its contents down over Lockerbie and surrounding countryside. It so haunted me, a 30 something person who lived on the other side of the world, that I paused on my drive up to Glasgow, four years ago, to stop over night and walk their streets ... and visit the church 3 kms out where the nose cone landed. All 259 passengers and crew did not survive, nor did 11 Scots on the ground. These are my reflections as I wrote it at the time. I came across these notes this week. The last paragraph I have added from the online Wikipedia account, because it says so much about the towns people of Lockerbie, despite their own horror. Photos also follow. It was her 3rd birthday party. Mum & Dad had worked hard to prepare for the day. Invitations sent out and accepted. As parties go ... I think it was a success. Food was prepared and consumed, cake with candles were lit, we sang and the candles were blown out. We played games, opened presents ... we learnt to say "thank you for coming" and give hugs ... wave goodbye. But I think the best was yet to come.
April of 2016 I posted a blog titled "When Fear Knocks at the Door". It was about Germany's then situation when nearly a million refugees poured into that land, and Chancellor Merkel "opened the doors" to receive them.
In that Blog, I related my story of meeting four young German girls on a "gap year" about to return to their homeland ... they respected and supported Merkel as their leader. They understood their country's past and the need to be generous and welcoming of these refugees. However, at the same time they feared the Germany they were born into might never be the same again, and would not be as they left it 12 months prior. You may notice it has been two months since I last wrote on this Blog. In that time life has taken an unexpected turn, and instead of enjoying a month in Italy, I am with family after the sudden loss of a family member. She had a severe stroke and died at 73. A vibrant, glass half full, always welcoming, always including, passionate and happy person. And we are reeling at her loss.
Before I move on in my blog writing, I felt to show you some pictures offered free on the internet by Nasa. They are of course our planet, taken from space.
It is such a beautiful world that we need to protect. How tiny is this world in the scheme of things. How perfect was the size of the moon, captured into orbit around our planet for the "lesser light" at night, and for the movement of the tides. And one of my favourites, the Earth Rise from the moon. I will never forget seeing this for the first time in the late 1960's when men first landed there. Finally, "The Pale Blue Dot" - it is a remarkable story of one man's decision to take one more photo of Earth from the Voyager mission - on the edge of our solar system. How a pale blue dot was caught in a ray of light .... and it was us! I wake up this morning thinking of four world leaders - Donald Trump age 71, Xi Jinping age 64, Vladimir Putin age 64, and Kim Jong-un age 33.
It would seem to me that the current world stability and peace lies in the hands of these four men. Each of them have powerful egos. Each of them however also have powerful political influences somewhere in the background, perhaps in their hallways of power. My understanding of how Kim Jong-un wields his power is less known, or even how much ultimate power he has .... Out of the four leaders it seems Xi Jinping might be "the man for this time". If Putin wants to leave his name in world history as a leader of substance on the regional and international political stage, then now is his time to step up with the Chinese President. If it was at all funny, the cartoonists in the West could have a wonderful time facing off the two red angry swollen faces of the 33 year old and the 71 year old. But it's not funny any more ... Etched in my memory, when travelling through Germany last century, I visited what is left of Dachau Concentration Camp. The frosty cold morning matched our mood as we all went our own ways to wander through the site. No one talked to each other. What I also remember is a sign - "Never Again".
Do we learn from the past? Man's inhumanity to man. It continues in different ways, with different technology ... and then we need to put good men and women in a place where they need to make decisions of life and death to stop the inhumanity ... and we find, it is never straight forward. We are above all things, human. Very complex, very imperfect. In my last blog I contemplated the resurgence of nuclear weapons and restocking of these weapons by various countries. It had taken decades last century to bring the world back from the edge, and I wondered what was it that was so successful to achieve that end. I wondered whether we could learn from it. 2017 continues to be a year of uncertainty. We are now into April - spring in the northern hemisphere and here in the southern hemisphere we are feeling the relief of cooler nights and pleasant autumn days.
However I feel the northern hemisphere is starting to reflect the change into warmer weather and the heat of summer on the horizon ... many European elections will perhaps mirror this season of uncertainty ... and the Brexit move has officially begun. Did I hear the words spoken ... "there is no going back"? It is time, I believe, to start dreaming for our world .... What do we want it to look like in 10-20 years time, 50 years time, and longer term for our descendants who are not even "a twinkle" in anyone's eye yet. It is time for leaders to stand up, take the blindfolds and blinkers off their eyes. Blinkers that narrow their focus. We are at a point in world history where we need wise leaders with vision and hope, so that this world can "pull it together". As well as the threat of terrorism through all sorts of methods, including chemical warfare, the ugliness of nuclear weapons is beginning to reappear. I know I sometimes look back and reflect on the "cold war" period - a time in world history, that as a young person, I felt overwhelmed with the enormity of the nuclear race. I felt we were doomed as a planet to the consequences of such weapons. And indeed it came very close to the edge. Today however, I again worry about certain countries feeling the need to build up these destructive weapons once again. Undoing the good achieved in the 1970's and 1980's. Therefore, I ask the question, what was it that we did do well 50 years ago to stop that downward spiral? What was it that gave us our planet back? Is it relevant to what is happening in 2017? What makes a good leader?
Leaders seem to be "coming and going" at the moment, a bit of a changing of the guard. People's fears are coming to the surface and they are looking in different directions, and electing leaders that in a normal world, they wouldn't elect. So, who do we look to as good examples of leaders? And how do we judge that? By successful outcomes? By the passage through tumultuous times and coming through the other side? By the peace it brings and righting the wrongs in our societies? Or perhaps by their skills as a good orator and their presentation? Leadership pops up everywhere! Not just Presidents and Prime Ministers, but local club leadership, committees, school captains .... parents! Therefore, when we look at leadership in any category, what is it that transfers across the board ... whether you are a nation's President .... or whether you are school captain ... or Head of a local community club ... or leading your family through the ups and downs of life. I'm not talking skills here ... but what characteristics transfer across this wide spectrum of leadership? A very happy new year to all of you. A holiday with friends from Boxing Day to New Years Day found me at a ski lodge in the Snowy Mountains Region of NSW in Australia. It is summer here, but it rained mostly while the rest of Australia had heatwave conditions. The photo was on one sunny day, and this was my lunch spot next to the alpine daisies halfway up to the summit of Mt Stillwell in The Kosciuzko National Park. On New Years Eve my friends and I sat on a rocky outcrop to watch the sun set on 2016 behind Mt Kosciusko. A moonless night gave us an exceptional starry night with Venus leading the way as the evening star. What a blessing to have friends to share that moment on the "top" of Australia. It was a wonderful way to farewell the old and welcome the new. I often drive or walk down the street at night and suddenly look up to see a beautiful moon. It might be a crescent moon or a full moon. What ever the shape, it always brings me great delight to see the "lesser light". I'm so grateful that we have this perfect natural satellite that orbits our planet, it seems especially for us and our needs. Also, it draws me to think of people around the world, doing the same thing a few hours later, looking up admiring the same beautiful moon .. and it connects me, to you.
I just lost my first draft ... would you believe I didn't save it. It's probably a good thing too, as first reactions are sometimes not the best. But now I need to start again. I can't help myself, I feel to get this down in writing. Because, I wonder if in the end, I will be surprised ... I do hope so!
Can you believe it? President Elect Donald Trump. Who would have thought? It's spring in the Southern Hemisphere. Daylight saving has kicked in and the weather warming up brings thoughts of summer holidays, and of course Christmas.
During the Christmas season, one of the things we love to do is sit around outside if it's not too hot. Then get up "to do something" - swim, a walk, cook, water the garden, get the barbecue ready - then we sit around again. It's holiday season! Relax! I usually look for the shade to sit in. If early evening, perhaps a small glass of wine is in hand and ... we chat ... and sometimes we give ... opinions. I try not to be too strong in my opinions. I try to understand others. But ... ahh, there's that "but" .... Every now and then I "hear" myself speak, and afterwards I am surprised. I really didn't know I felt so strongly about my opinion. |
AuthorSamthoughts.com is authored by an Australian, who recently discovered a love of writing. CategoriesArchives
December 2019
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