It Doesn't Look A Bit Like Christmas

For the past month I have inhabited the surreal parallel world of Australian advent. The blue sky above Bourke Street is veiled with green and red baubles, the town hall is parcelled up beneath a massive red bow, and Flinders Street Station glows each night like the gaudy house front of your most obnoxious neighbour.

On December 13 I returned to Melbourne from Byron Bay to the dulcet clash of glass bottles against tram tracks, Spring Street having become the venue for a late night street brawl. Running up Bourke Street, I wormed my way between Santas, uncostumed and alone in a thirty degree Where’s Wally world. On Christmas Eve we climbed Hanging Rock and looked down with sunlit faces at the land, Tuscan yellow and far below us. Christmas day was Christmas dinner, hosted by a kindly Old Boy from a friend’s school and his wife. The sun was shining and there was hardly a pine tree in sight.

Christmas in Australia and Christmas in the UK are very different, notably that here it’s just somehow… less. I think a lot of that is down to the weather. Come late December, we Brits are desperately in need of something to lift the spirits. But here, with the sun shining and the days drawn out long, the celebration is just an added bonus.

Ridiculous.

bronte beach was sun on my salt-flecked face as i balanced, whooping for joy, on flash's shoulders, the sea up to my chest, bubbles rising from where he stood, submerged. my eyes wept for the salt, tears mingling with ocean, and i did not worry about the burn scar on my back or the precariousness of bikini tops, normally so infuriating. we floated over the first wave, dove under the second, and paddled furiously until we caught the third.

manly was avocado and soft boiled egg salad and a parking space right next to the sand and the story of how flash and gabi met, told lovingly over a jug of water and a bowl of chips.

new year's eve was dancing and photos with full makeup and kati's dress. it was hearts to hearts, sing-alongs, the sound of music, go-pro close-ups of charlie’s face, ice-cold chilean liquor and linked arms. it was stargazing, head skyward, alone atop the wrought-iron garden gate. it was fireworks over the bridge and a grumbling old man promising us we'd end the night in a paddy-wagon. we woke in the same room, exactly where we fell, having eaten all the chicken sandwiches at 4am.

2015 started with a swim in flash's pool. i anchored my ankles against the edge and starfished on the surface, gazing at the peeling eucalyptus whose leaves flecked the blue sky. cockatoos flirted, frangipanis floated, and sia sang through declan's speakers.

we drove everywhere in flash's car, triple j blasting. louis and i bickered in the back seat and kati cackled constantly while gab danced and flash showed us all his favourite places. we rolled down the windows and sang along and didn’t care.

and when my ferry left mosman i stood at the prow, gazing forward.

The 65-year-old who hosted us for Christmas: “What’s a selfie? Sounds like a type of cheap ice cream.”

“I don’t know what my boyfriend sees in me. Look at me. I’m wearing socks and sandals. What the fuck?”

 “God, Miriam, take some time off from being a feminist. Get out from under the king’s horse.”

On Tasmania and Birthdays Abroad

It wasn't until midsemester break arrived that I realised just how much I needed a rest. I went straight from class to Tasmania, travelling for two days from Launceston to Hobart via, among others, Wineglass Bay, a beautiful curving beach reached via scrambling rocks cast with the dappled shadows of eucalypts. In Hobart we spent two days ambling slowly from cafe to bar, as well as visiting the infamous MONA.

The Museum of Old and New Art was founded by multi-millionaire gambler David Walsh. From the surface, it looks like a shopping centre mid-renovation; inside it's a web of windowless stone catacombs worthy of a movie supervillain. Upon entering you're given an iPod loaded with information about the artworks. Most people would just put a sign next to the art, but Walsh is too rich for that. MONA is a thrilling lair of decadence, its art a combination of the grotesque, the humorous, and the macabre. One room stinks of shit from an artificial glass digestion machine; 151 vagina casts line one wall like stag heads in an English country manor; a beanbag cinema displays around forty Madonna fans singing the Immaculate Collection. A bloated red Porsche squats near a waxen little girl who is entombed, glassy-eyed and drooling, in a rabbit hutch. A carved door is notable for its caption: 'David made too much money on this trip to South Africa, and had to spend some before leaving the country.'

I also met a wombat joey called Tina. Photo by Sarah.

While in Hobart we stayed at the Pickled Frog, one of my favourite youth hostels. Cheerfully decorated, with its own bar, cafe, and very lovely staff, the Frog is the place to be. Not least because of Baloo, an enormous three-year-old malamute, affectionately dubbed the 'resident wolf'. I've never been so in love.

BALOO.

I’m not very good at birthdays.  I’m a people pleaser. I’m very indecisive. I’m a massive fan of democracy. Being the designated centre of attention for a day is something I always find pretty daunting.

And, of course, I’ve never done it so far away from home before.

Fortunately, I have some super cute friends here.

We ate a lot of food – Indian dinner, cheesecake, Lentils breakfast, pub pizza. We hunted out bars in Hobart and did a lot of beer tasting. After arriving back in Melbourne I had a nap and was woken by a knock on the door and presents from two friends I hadn’t seen while I’d been away. I lay on the grass outside with two friends and talked about the ups and downs of study abroad. We went to the city for pizza, then found ourselves firstly in a terrible Lizard-esque club and finally looking out over the city from the Rooftop Bar, my new favourite tourist trap.

Birthdays are all about the people you spend them with. It was strange to be so far away – no breakfast with Christina, no evening with Harry, no family within an hour of my term address. But it’s the people I’ve met here that meant that, despite being so far from home, I had something to celebrate.

Cheesy or what?

In the scrapbook this week is a spot o' Yeats, prescribed by a Red Cross poet doctor, some gratuitous Shakespeare, marriage equality rally scraps, and some Tasmanian travels.

x

Weddings, Singers

Ten years ago, some key words were added to the Marriage Act. Marriage was formally and legally defined as a `voluntarily entered-into union of a man and a woman to the exclusion of all others'.

This weekend I attended a rally organised by Equal Love to commemorate this law and call for change. Standing in the crowd on the steps of the State Library, I listened to several speakers, including Tony Briffa, the world’s first openly intersex mayor. Briffa made sure to point out an often-forgotten yet hugely limiting aspect of marriage inequality: as an intersex person who identifies as both male and female, they cannot legally marry without defining themselves as either a woman or a man – they cannot marry without lying. The term ‘same-sex marriage’ does not cover the problems faced by intersex people, nor trans people, who, when marriage is not equal, must annul their marriage for their gender identity (NOT necessarily sex) to be fully recognised in law. Equal marriage is not as simple as 'same-sex marriage'. And while we’re at it, the idea of sex as a simple binary doesn't take into account all the variables: sex can be defined through chromosomes, hormones, and both external and internal genitals.

After a performance by Monique Brumby (video below), we marched to Parliament, signs aloft: the serious (‘Marriage Equality is a Priority’) and the scandalous (‘I love vagina, but Tony’s too much of a c*nt even for me.’) When we reached Parliament, a collective illegal marriage ceremony was conducted on the grass, each set of vows the couple’s own. “Say what you want,” the conductor said ruefully. “It’s not legal anyway.”

Despite the absurdity of having to protest this injustice, the rally had a sense of optimism, I felt. With 72% of Australians in favour of equal marriage, and plans for two bills on their way, Australia seems to be reaching a turning point. I can only hope change happens swiftly. Equal marriage is just one rung on the ladder to dismantling our societies’ shared homophobia and heteronormativity. Both Australia and Scotland are climbing – slowly.

Disclaimer: word count approximate.

Ever since deciding to study at St Andrews, home of The Other Guys, I’ve wanted to do a capella – but, for some reason, it’s never made it to my weekly schedule. Until now. I can now call myself a member of Ring of Choir.

Ring of Choir were going to be called Student Union Voices, but it sounded too much like the socialist political campaigners who stand outside the library. The campaigners are just as loud as us, but have a slightly different focus.

Sunday was the University of Melbourne Open Day, and we spent our morning flashmobbing campus, lining the echoing stone pillars of the Old Quad and greeting prospective students with Vance Joy’s Riptide. If you don’t know it, here it is. Obviously our version is far superior, but it’s the kind of spiritual experience a video wouldn’t do justice to, even if I had a recording.

Here, neds are called bogans.

Barbecues are shockingly common. To the point where it’s not a special enough occasion to buy hot dog or burger rolls. A burger, two slices of white bread, and Bob’s your uncle.

Tim Tams are Australia’s answer to Penguins. I’m not being snooty, they actually are.