Category Archives: Politics Shmolitics

Do not attempt to adjust your computer monitors

Posted on by
2

Window View

Window view with dust

The top image is what the view from our livingroom window would look like on an average sunny Sydney day.  The bottom image, is the view we woke up to on Wednesday September 23rd, 2009, the day an epic dust storm blew over the city.  This dust came all the way from the arid west, and blanketed most of the state.  Keep in mind that the continental land mass of Australia, is nearly the same size as the US, but has only six states.  That would be like the entire midwest getting lost in a cloud.  It’s no wonder they saw this dust from space!

The dust took over 12 hours to clear out, slowly becoming a grayish vale before the sun started to peak through.  So Sydney went from looking like the Mars landscape in Total Recall (minus Schwarzenegger) to Could City (without Billy Dee) and back to normal again.  Though the high winds proved very helpful in clearing the dust out to sea (actually up to Brisbane before heading over the ocean, sorry Brizzie) they also blew the dust into every nook and cranny capable of containing particulates.  So, trips outside required interesting headgear . . .

Gabe Bandana

And my apartment, which I had just cleaned last week, is now a dusty mess.  What you see here is a bookcase where an alarm clock and two pairs of binoculars were sitting during the storm.

Dusty Bookcase

News reports of this record breaking event yesterday, ranged from discussion about how well the car washing businesses were going to do, to the environmental implications of acres of missing top soil.  With raging fires and massive floods in the US, earthquakes in Southeast Asia, and a martian haze clouding Sydney, I can’t help but wonder if the Mayans were right.  So what do you think?  Is this a sign of things to come?

Bedroom window dust

Foreigners and Placeism

Posted on by
7

It didn’t take very long, and probably mostly because of my extraordinary ability to absorb media, to adjust to the Australian accent.  On a day to day basis, I can have several conversations, watch countless awfully produced televisions ads and read signs that say “speed hump” without thinking twice about it.

The only things that still throw me off are two particular Australianisms.  One is “How you going?” the Aussie’s way of saying “How are you?” “What’s up?” or “How is IT going?”.  And even though I can answer the question without hesitation, it still incites in me a desire to respond with what my American instincts would consider a misuse of grammar like, “I go fine”  or “It be well”.  And the other one the induces a bit of a shudder when I hear it is “Ta” yes, just “Ta.”  I think it’s a shortening of “That’s alright” which is the common response to “Thank you” out here, along with “No worries” which reminds me a bit of the Americanism “No problem” (an expression hammered out of my vocabulary long ago, by a boss who wouldn’t stand for the lackadaisical “Jamaican” nature of the response, and preferred the much more gracious “You’re welcome” (that’s still what I always say)).  But “Ta” like the Hawaiian “Aloha” also seems to mean thank you, hello, goodbye, and many other things I’m sure I haven’t figured out yet.  Personally I prefer “cheers”.

So since my daily interactions with Australians, are only peppered by the occasional language confusion, I forget that I am now the one with the accent.  It only takes one or two sentences before they ask “Are you on holiday?” or get more straight to the point with “Where are you from?”.  It’s easy to forget I’m a foreigner.  Sydney is like an odd collection of the neighborhoods I know from LA and NY, in look, pace, lifestyle and culture.  So unlike when I lived in Italy and felt as obviously American as I’m sure I looked (not that I wore a Mickey T-shirt or anything, but come on, the Europeans know Americans when they see them) I expect to blend in here like a eucalyptus tree.   And I pretty much do, until I start talking.  It’s then that I get a taste of what I’m sure every immigrant in the States gets at one point or another.  It’s pretty interesting being on the flip side of those accent induced conversations.

The other outsider viewpoint that being a foreigner has made me privy to, is an objective look at the practice of placeism.  Placeism, like all isms, is a bad thing, yet it is one that we accept into our everyday lives because it victimizes places, rather than people.  I myself have been guilty of placeism on many occasions.  It’s why I stopped telling people I was from Beverly Hills, often inducing drawn out conversations that go a little like this:

“Where are you from?”
“LA.”
“Where in LA?”
“West LA.”
“What part?”
“About 20 minutes from the coast” (45 by today’s traffic standards)
“Which area?”
“Between Hollywood and Santa Monica.”

That’s when people who know their maps would figure out I just covered a pretty large area of the city, and I would have to admit the truth, which was usually followed by:

“No, there is no West Beverly High.  I live in 90212 NOT 90210.  And no, I didn’t get a BWM on my 16th birthday.  But yes, I know people who did.”

I felt justified in my defensiveness, because judgements were often placed upon me because of where I was from.  And why shouldn’t they judge?  We all do.  But since I’m no longer in a place where I get why people from New Jersey say they are from New York (you’re really not), and us blue state residents feel compelled to make fun of the red states, I can tell you first hand that placeism is pretty pointless.

The Australians I’ve met have either vehemently defended where they were from, or preemptively made fun of it before anyone else could.  Each city seems to come with it’s only set of preconceptions.  Sydney is the urban active city, Melbourne following as a close second, while Brisbane and Adelaide are considered country, and Perth might as well not even been on the map.  Or at least, that is what I have gathered from these conversations, although I can’t really remember, because I don’t really care.  I came here completely free of any knowledge or preconceptions about any part of the country, and very willing to experience every part of it, good and bad.  So when people begin to launch into conversations about which places are dodgy or where the bogans live, I usually zone out because, in reality, I’d prefer to find out for myself.

So the next time you meet a foreigner, even if they seem to think that all Texans are George W. Bush, and all Californians are Paris Hilton, instead of launching into a well practiced diatribe in defense of your hometown, give them a chance to figure it out for themselves.  I, for one, will stop hiding the fact that I’m from Beverly Hills.  They can figure out for themselves that I don’t have a trust fund.  It shouldn’t take long.

Progressive? Or just for laughs?

Posted on by
7

I was told, and knew to expect before I came to Oz, that it was a very progressive country.  This means “liberal” in the American sense, although “liberal” means the opposite here when it comes to politics, so let’s just stick with the word progressive for now.  So it was no surprise when I saw an ad for feminine hygiene products that featured a beaver.  Yeah, you heard right, the animal that builds damns across water.  The tagline was something along the lines of “it’s the only one you’ve got, so be good to it.”  Yes, it was funny, and might have been played on MTV in the US, but probably never made it as an ad during ANTM (“America’s Next Top Model” for those of you who don’t know) but during ANTM is precisely when I saw it the other day (of course the A stands for Australia’s out here).

But, I don’t think you would ever see and ad in the States for help with premature ejaculations that featured an, *ehem* animated logo.  I’ll let your imaginations sort that one out.  And even though it was a documentary, on after 10pm, I’m not sure KCET would have ever played “The Perfect Vagina.” This British documentary featured no shortage of “fannys” or “lady bits” (as the Brits call them) and even footage of an actual labiplasty, a surgery I hope to never have to talk someone out of.

But among all the eyebrow raising ads, are hints of what I would call a few old fashioned notions.  Advertisers still imply that making a good roast is women’s business, and watching rugby is men’s.  The other day while walking around my neighborhood, my attention was attracted by a bright pink van.  Upon closer inspection, I saw that it was a handyman service called “Hire a Hubby”.  As cute as the van was, with it’s little stick figure wearing a tool belt as a logo, I’m sure the company name would have never made it past the planning phases in an American business model.  Even if it had, some political interest group or another would have attacked the company for promoting the stereotype that women can’t preform household repairs and, lacking a husband, must turn to a handy-MAN.  If you’re anything like me, you would think that they should go out and find something better to do with their time, but that wouldn’t stop them from getting press.

Of course, are all these ideas really so different from what we get bombarded with in the states?  Isn’t dishwashing soap still sold to women, and large TVs for watching “the game” still sold to men?  There is still a rating system for televisions shows, and it functions on parameters similar to those in the US.  Even the word “balls” was bleeped out during and episode of The View, though in the states we’ve grown far past “The 7 dirty words you can’t say on television”, of George Carlin’s day.  (well, maybe not most of them, but I think the FCC has come to at least accept “tits” (the word, not the act of exposing them during the Superbowl))  I think the only real difference is, that Americans worry much more about who they might offend, and get offended a bit too often.

Documentaries aim to bring about an understanding of something we couldn’t possibly understand if they were edited down.  Cute company names are created to help you remember them.  And funny ads are simply that, funny.  So I can only hope that my exposure to Australian media will, in addition to re-familiarize me with “Magnum PI” (You haven’t aged a day Tom Selleck), also encourage me to lighten up.