Happy Jingo Day
Jan. 26th, 2009 11:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
highlyeccentricSo, tonight, I went in to town with one of my soon-to-be workmates and sat by the lake and watched the Australia Day shenanigans and then a pretty damn spectacular firework show (fireworks! Off the roof of the National Library!). Quite a few spectacles were cancelled because of high winds, but the Army's display parachute troupe made it out and were pretty impressive, and also there was a local band playing who were so-so, but one of the members got his fourteen year old daughter up to sing some of her own songs, and damn, she was good.
Between events they were playing some sort of pre-recorded radio thing, with Classic Aussie Music and Famous Aussie People Telling You Why They Like Being Aussie. Lots of blather about a fair go, helping each other out, freedom of speech (which, you know, we don't actually have guaranteed, or anything) and multiculturalism (which seems to be back in vogue as a buzzword, after suffering a downturn since the Cronulla Riots). Only two things on there moved me particularly: one was that I quite like living in a country where, despite recent efforts to improve the status of the Citizenship Pledge (or whatever it's called?), it remains so obscure that the event host turned off the patriotic broadcast thereof in order to get the crowd to cheer a passing jet-skier.
The second was the soundbite from the Umbilical Brothers (comedians), who proudly declared their love for Australia and it's 'healthy disrespect for tradition', being a country that 'doesn't take itself too seriously', and 'cares enough not to care too much: to care about others and not just yourself'. Which, er, was not necessarily logically coherent, but I liked it anyway.
Without further ado, here are some things I like about Australia:
* Our relatively high distrust of patriotism and jingoism. Granted, the year I was in Sydney in Australia day I was verbally abused on a train for not wearing green and gold, and there's a high proportion of patriotic bogans you'll find in Nelson Bay. Canberra, on the other hand, was remarkably calm and quietly proud.
* Our extremely high disrespect for politicians, even the ones we like. I believe it was Labor partisans who christened Kevin 07 K-Rudd, and if it wasn't, then they took it up with enthusiasm, since I picked up both that title and 'Ruddbot' from Young Labor members before the election had even happened. Unwarranted faith in and emotional attachment to politicians can only lead to bad places. *looks stern*
* We have a damn good public health system. The Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme is a wonder which I have cause to stop and appreciate every time I talk to an American.
* In a similar vein: HECS is a gift from the deities of Higher Education. And in Australia, because we used to have completely free university education (back in the Whitlam era, which really is quite a while ago now, isn't it?), we bitch and moan about HECS increases all the time. But really, honestly. I have a 20-something thousand dollar debt, equal to one eighth of the cost of my education. The government picks up the rest of the bill. I have to pay this debt back now, but it is paid back to the government, out of my tax, without any effort on my behalf. If I had not got a job which paid more than 30 000 a year (is that the limit?), I wouldn't have to pay anything until I did. If I lose my job, quit my job, go back to uni, take up international money laundering, or do anything else which reduces my taxable income below that threshold, I stop paying. And I start again at such time as my taxable income goes back over the limit. Easy as pie. I know people who finish uni in the states with sixty and seventy thousand (US) dollar debts, and have to scrape to pay them back right away. I don't fully understand the situation in Britain, but it doesn't involve anything as awesome as we have. Let us all now give thanks for HECS.
* We are not in a recession. YET. But that puts us miles ahead of much of the world at the moment. I was asking my Dad, who used to work for a bank and thus has some idea about invisible money, why this is, and I did not understand the answer very well, but it seems that loans and mortgages in Australia, while they've become easier to access and to borrow larger amounts of money with, remained somewhat more tightly regulated than in the States. This turns out to have been a sensible idea. And Dad also said something about foreclosures being dealt with differently- if the bank sells your house for less than they loaned you, you still owe the difference. Which sounds nasty, but does not reduce the total amount of invisible money in the country, which turns out to be a good thing.
* We finally have a government who got off their high horse and apologised to Indigenous Australians, although they haven't exactly done anything remarkable in that direction since then. But still. Something to be mildly proud of.
* Our National Library makes an excellent staging-point for firework displays, which is just what you need in a civic monument, y/y?
Between events they were playing some sort of pre-recorded radio thing, with Classic Aussie Music and Famous Aussie People Telling You Why They Like Being Aussie. Lots of blather about a fair go, helping each other out, freedom of speech (which, you know, we don't actually have guaranteed, or anything) and multiculturalism (which seems to be back in vogue as a buzzword, after suffering a downturn since the Cronulla Riots). Only two things on there moved me particularly: one was that I quite like living in a country where, despite recent efforts to improve the status of the Citizenship Pledge (or whatever it's called?), it remains so obscure that the event host turned off the patriotic broadcast thereof in order to get the crowd to cheer a passing jet-skier.
The second was the soundbite from the Umbilical Brothers (comedians), who proudly declared their love for Australia and it's 'healthy disrespect for tradition', being a country that 'doesn't take itself too seriously', and 'cares enough not to care too much: to care about others and not just yourself'. Which, er, was not necessarily logically coherent, but I liked it anyway.
Without further ado, here are some things I like about Australia:
* Our relatively high distrust of patriotism and jingoism. Granted, the year I was in Sydney in Australia day I was verbally abused on a train for not wearing green and gold, and there's a high proportion of patriotic bogans you'll find in Nelson Bay. Canberra, on the other hand, was remarkably calm and quietly proud.
* Our extremely high disrespect for politicians, even the ones we like. I believe it was Labor partisans who christened Kevin 07 K-Rudd, and if it wasn't, then they took it up with enthusiasm, since I picked up both that title and 'Ruddbot' from Young Labor members before the election had even happened. Unwarranted faith in and emotional attachment to politicians can only lead to bad places. *looks stern*
* We have a damn good public health system. The Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme is a wonder which I have cause to stop and appreciate every time I talk to an American.
* In a similar vein: HECS is a gift from the deities of Higher Education. And in Australia, because we used to have completely free university education (back in the Whitlam era, which really is quite a while ago now, isn't it?), we bitch and moan about HECS increases all the time. But really, honestly. I have a 20-something thousand dollar debt, equal to one eighth of the cost of my education. The government picks up the rest of the bill. I have to pay this debt back now, but it is paid back to the government, out of my tax, without any effort on my behalf. If I had not got a job which paid more than 30 000 a year (is that the limit?), I wouldn't have to pay anything until I did. If I lose my job, quit my job, go back to uni, take up international money laundering, or do anything else which reduces my taxable income below that threshold, I stop paying. And I start again at such time as my taxable income goes back over the limit. Easy as pie. I know people who finish uni in the states with sixty and seventy thousand (US) dollar debts, and have to scrape to pay them back right away. I don't fully understand the situation in Britain, but it doesn't involve anything as awesome as we have. Let us all now give thanks for HECS.
* We are not in a recession. YET. But that puts us miles ahead of much of the world at the moment. I was asking my Dad, who used to work for a bank and thus has some idea about invisible money, why this is, and I did not understand the answer very well, but it seems that loans and mortgages in Australia, while they've become easier to access and to borrow larger amounts of money with, remained somewhat more tightly regulated than in the States. This turns out to have been a sensible idea. And Dad also said something about foreclosures being dealt with differently- if the bank sells your house for less than they loaned you, you still owe the difference. Which sounds nasty, but does not reduce the total amount of invisible money in the country, which turns out to be a good thing.
* We finally have a government who got off their high horse and apologised to Indigenous Australians, although they haven't exactly done anything remarkable in that direction since then. But still. Something to be mildly proud of.
* Our National Library makes an excellent staging-point for firework displays, which is just what you need in a civic monument, y/y?
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Date: 2009-01-26 02:27 pm (UTC)no subject
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Date: 2009-01-27 01:35 am (UTC)Do you think the rest of the free world lacks kittens? We have kittens here. They tend to chase after native birdies. And also get into fights with goannas, which goes badly for the kitten.
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Date: 2009-01-27 01:48 am (UTC)Oh and true, true, there are kittens everywhere, but they are not THESE KITTENS:
I have very little American pride, but I am an overzealous, rabid, these-guys fan. ;)
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Date: 2009-01-27 01:55 am (UTC)(Now, when there's public health care for kittens, then we can all rest easy at night)
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Date: 2009-01-27 02:01 am (UTC)