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Back home in Canberra the prime minister is making this historic apology on behalf of the Parliament and the Government of Australia:
Today we honour the Indigenous peoples of this land, the oldest continuing cultures in human history.
We reflect on their past mistreatment.
We reflect in particular on the mistreatment of those who were
Stolen Generations---this blemished chapter in our nation's history.
The time has now come for the nation to turn a new page in Australia's history by righting the wrongs of the past and so moving forward with confidence to the future.
We apologise for the laws and policies of successive Parliaments and governments that have inflicted profound grief, suffering and loss on these our fellow Australians.
We apologise especially for the ...
Posted by Justine at 17:00, February 12th, 2008 under Praising, State of the World, Sydney/Australia |
In the vociferous arguing about the ins and outs of who behaved worst over the second test etc etc there are people implying that criticising the Australian cricket team is unAustralian and whingey. ((Though what's more Australian than whingeing?!))
Please! I love my country, I love cricket, but when the men's team behave like dickheads they should be called on it.
People who play sport at a professional level are not exempt from the social contract. No one is. Writers (to pick a random example out of the air) shouldn't behave like dickheads either. Recently I was at an award ceremony where the speeches of the winners were generous and moving. All but one. This one person got up to accept their ...
Posted by Justine at 0:01, January 9th, 2008 under Cricket, Sport, State of the World, Sydney/Australia, Whingeing |
I've had a few people writing to ask why I'm not commenting on the disastrous second test between Australia and India. There are several reasons. I've not been able to follow any of the cricket as closely as I'd like. I haven't had time.
But mostly because I'm embarrassed. And, well, I think
Greg Baum and
Mike Coward have expressed what I feel about it so well that i don't really need to add anything.
I will though: I'm sick of Aussie sportsmen (and, frankly, it's the blokes, not the women) behaving like dickheads. I'm not Indian, so the bad behaviour of the Indians doesn't make me ashamed, and, you know what? We're the host country here. We should be ...
Posted by Justine at 0:00, January 8th, 2008 under Cricket, Sport, Sydney/Australia |
My dad continues to send me photos from home. These two are taken from Bicentennial Park which is just round the corner from my parents' house:
Yes, that's the Harbour Bridge in the background there---that teeny arch.
I loves me some Rozelle and Blackwattle Bay . . .
Homesick, me? Don't be ridiculous.
Posted by Justine at 2:41, January 1st, 2008 under Sydney/Australia |
Posted by Justine at 11:07, December 18th, 2007 under How To Ditch Your Fairy, Sydney/Australia, Writing goals & milestones |
A passionfruit flower from Jan and John's backyard. These are my favourite flowers in the whole world and not just because they turn into one of the world's great fruits.
Isn't it fabulous?
Photo by John Bern
I just wish I was back home to see it.
Posted by Justine at 17:53, December 15th, 2007 under Praising, Sydney/Australia |
I would bake a pavlova. And it would be covered in passionfruit and strawberries.
Homesick? Me? Don't know what you're talking about.
Posted by Justine at 13:20, December 13th, 2007 under Food, Sydney/Australia |
Because Eric Luper had the temerity
to suggest that quokkas are not the cutest animals on the planet I have devised a new poll. It goes up exactly a day after the last one which I successfully managed not to break---so you were all wrong. Yay, me!
I like having polls but I definitely need less buggy WordPress compatible software.
The "How To Rewrite" post will go up as soon as I, um, finish, the book what I have to rewrite . . . And the manga/manhwa/graphic novels one not long after that. Promise!
Update: Eric Luper jinxed me into breaking the poll! Oh noes. Oh well, at least the quokkas were ahead. But I had planned to leave it ...
Posted by Justine at 17:32, December 11th, 2007 under Admin, Bloggery, Excuses, Sydney/Australia |
All my life I have stayed out of the sun, diligently following the instructions of the anti-skin cancer campaigns. I have slipped on a long-sleeved shirt, slopped on sunscreen, and slapped on a hat. ((That campaign turned me into a life-long hat addict.)) As a result (unlike quite a few people back home) I've never had any skin cancer scares. But it turns out that I've been putting myself at
risk of rickets:
MILLIONS of Australians are exposing themselves to bone disease, fractures, diabetes and cancers by failing to get enough vitamin D, a crucial nutrient produced when skin is exposed to sunlight.
Experts have warned the highly acclaimed "Slip Slop Slap" campaign may have been taken too far by a ...
Posted by Justine at 0:00, December 11th, 2007 under Science, Sydney/Australia |
When I started this blog I was very definite that I wasn't going to blog about politics or religion. I'd seen too many flame wars, too many blogs overrun by indignant trolls. My blog, I decided, was going to be sweetness and light and avoid incendiary topics.
But then the
John Howard regime finally fell and I couldn't contain myself. And, you know, what? I've gotten not a single troll. The discussions generated by my political musings have been thought-provoking, fun, and, most unexpectedly, my traffic is up. Who'd've thunk it? I love youse all!
I now feel free to blog about whatever the hell I want to blog about. If any trolls show up I'll just nuke 'em.
That said, I'm ...
Posted by Justine at 11:28, November 30th, 2007 under Admin, Bloggery, State of the World, Sydney/Australia |
If I could have any pet at all I'd have a
quokka.
I once heard
Tim Flannery say in a radio interview that they make excellent pets and that we would be doing them a favour by bringing them into our homes. Flannery reckons that a sure fire ticket to species survival is domestication. You don't hear much about cows, horses, cats, dogs or pigs being on the verge of extinction, do you?
So there you have it. I wants a quokka.
Posted by Justine at 0:02, November 29th, 2007 under State of the World, Sydney/Australia |
Not really.
For all the papers are touting the enormity vastness hugeness snufflufflagusness of Labor's win back home I think it's important to remember that the gap between Labor ((For those who are wondering, no, I'm not spelling it wrong. It really is the Labor-without-a-U party. It is confusing and annoying.)) and the Coalition is not that big: 41.59% of voters gave the Coalition their first preference and 43.9% gave it to Labor. Then there's the 7.57% who voted for the Greens and the 1.97% who gave Family First the nod. In fact the only places where there was a genuine landslide for Labor was at certain polling booths in the
Northern Territory. Indigenous voters gave Labour more than 90% ...
Posted by Justine at 0:02, November 28th, 2007 under State of the World, Sydney/Australia |
In Australia voting is compulsory. Everyone is expected to do it. Basically that's because everything back home is geared towards making voting as easy as possible. Over here in the US of A it often seems to me like everything is organised to make voting as difficult as possible. What's up with that?
In Australia if you don't vote you pay a fine. Some people routinely pay the fine. Others who don't want to vote register their dissatisfaction by filling out their ballot wrong or donkey voting. Often by scrawling a message across the ballot. Usually their message is a bit on the rude side. That's fine. They've done their democratic duty. They showed up. The percentage of people ...
Posted by Justine at 0:06, November 27th, 2007 under New York City/USA, State of the World, Sydney/Australia |
It wasn't until I'd lived outside Australia for awhile that I realised just how
anti-intellectual my homeland is. One of the worst things you can be back home is a "wanker" which more times than not is used to refer to someone who thinks too much. Oh, the horror!
At most of the schools I attended it was far better to be good at sports than at schoolwork and no one ever admitted to studying hard. "Oh this? I only started it ten minutes before it was due. Don't know what the teacher was thinking giving me such a good mark." Roll of eyes.
I'm still not sure what we were afraid of. Well, yes, the scorn of ...
Posted by Justine at 13:24, November 26th, 2007 under State of the World, Sydney/Australia |
There's a lot I don't like about the US political system, but there's one thing they have absoluately right: No head of state should be in power for more than eight years.
I think John Howard has demonstrated this truth as did Robert Menzies before him and Margaret Thatcher and Tony Blair in the UK.
I agree with
George Washington that any one person staying in power for too long starts to stink of monarchy. ((I am with Winston Churchill who said, "Democracy is the worst form of government, except for all those other forms that have been tried from time to time". And monarchy is amongst the worst.)) It leads to corruption and to the one ...
Posted by Justine at 16:13, November 25th, 2007 under New York City/USA, State of the World, Sydney/Australia |
Oh, yes, it is. If only I was home to enjoy it.
Posted by Justine at 4:52, November 24th, 2007 under State of the World, Sydney/Australia |
So today is a big ole USian holiday where at some point you're all supposed to give thanks for all the stuff that's making you thankful. It's called---wait for it---
Thanksgiving. We have no equivalent in Australia. Though we do have, Australia Day, where we commemorate the successful invasion of Australia by white people. As you can imagine the indigenous population consider it to be a day of mourning. ((I'm one of those weird people who thinks there are things to mourn and celebrate about that day. As in, yes, Australia was invaded and taken over from the people who were already living there. And, yes, the early settlers of Australia were also brave and resilient making new lives for ...
Posted by Justine at 10:31, November 22nd, 2007 under Food, New York City/USA, State of the World, Sydney/Australia |
I so wish I was back home right now. I'd get to follow the cricket and the election. It would be warm. The sun wouldn't be setting just a few hours after it rose. No one would be asking me about my accent. People would know that Errol Flynn is Australian. I'm sick of being a foreignor. Back home I don't have to explain myself nearly so often. I can't tell you how tiring it gets.
If I was in Sydney right now I would go for a long walk. I'd hear
flying foxes in the trees. I'd smell all the night flowering plants. I'd watch the light sparkling on the harbour. I'd be HOME. And I'd go to Forbes ...
Posted by Justine at 7:41, November 16th, 2007 under New York City/USA, Praising, Sydney/Australia, Whingeing |
I've been cooking with pumpkin a lot of late. ((Note for USian readers, Australians do not use the word "squash" to refer to anything pumpkin-like. Squash is a soft vegetable that bears no relationship to any gourd.)) Mostly butternut because I loves it. But also spaghetti cause, well, weird! And I'm starting to experiment with pumpkins I'd never seen before. The US is the land of gourds. But I'm running out of ideas.
Here's the thing though: I do not have a working oven or grill. All I have is gas burners on top of the stove. I can boil, I can steam, I can fry. I cannot bake or grill.
Thus far I've made pumpkin stir fry, pumpkin curry, ...
Posted by Justine at 12:29, November 11th, 2007 under Food, New York City/USA, Sydney/Australia |
I was asked today why I say sorry so much. ((not for the first time))
It's true. I do say it a lot. I say "Sorry!" even if I am not even slightly at fault: like when, say, someone has bumped into me, or spilled something over me. I say sorry for pretty much everything. Even when I'm not at all sorry. Mostly when I'm not at all sorry.
As to the why of all those sorrys. I used to think it was just me. That I have this weird sorry-saying nervous tic. But I now know it's cultural. I say sorry all the time because I am an Australian girl.
I realised this when I was living in Spain ...
Posted by Justine at 12:15, November 5th, 2007 under State of the World, Sydney/Australia, Travelling, Words & Language |
There are many Australian writers in town at the moment and there has been much socialising to celebrate. ((And, yes, that plus deadlines plus the blah blah blahs being out of control has put a crimp in my bloggery. Sorry!)) I can't tell you how much fun it is to be in NYC and not be the only Aussie in the room. ((Also for once it's all of them who are jetlagged while me and Scott are perfectly fine. It's usually the other way around.)) Especially when the other Aussies are fabulous folks like Deb Biancotti, Rob Hood, Margo Lanagan, Garth Nix, Cat Sparks, Trevor Stafford, and Jonathan Strahan. Much fun has been had. ((Though it's making me ...
Posted by Justine at 11:33, October 31st, 2007 under Bloggery, Cons & Other Gatherings, New York City/USA, Sydney/Australia |
We're two Saturdays away from an all-Aussie (+ one permanent resident) fantasy explosion: the Printz-honour genius
Margo Lanagan, editor extraordinaire
Jonathan Strahan, bestselling author of the Sabriel and Keys series
Garth Nix, not to mention Aussie-by-marriage
Scott Westerfeld, oh, yeah, and me!
Has there ever been such a line up?
No, there has not.
Saturday, 27October 27
3-5PM
Books of Wonder
18 West 18th Street
New York, NY
Stick it in your dairy. Tattoo the details on your little brother's cheek ((Okay, don't really do that. That would be wrong.). Carn out and see us!
We'll read (a little), answer all your questions (almost), and teach you how to talk Australian (maybe).
Posted by Justine at 0:01, October 19th, 2007 under Cons & Other Gatherings, New York City/USA, Sydney/Australia, Young Adult literature |
David Levithan's speech at Reading Matters inspired me to put together a list of Australian gay and lesbian young adult books.
I could not do this on my own. Thank you Lynndy Bennett, Kate Constable, Susannah Chambers, Pamela Freeman, Simmone Howell, Judith Ridge, Penni Russon and Ron Serdiuk for all your help and suggestions.
This list is definitely not complete and is not annotated. It's just a start. If you can think of any more titles, please let me know! And if you've read any of the books on the list and can say a bit more about them that'd be great too.
Lili Wilkinson has said that the
Centre for Youth Literature will give the list ...
Posted by Justine at 12:06, July 1st, 2007 under State of the World, Sydney/Australia, Young Adult literature |
The
wonderful speech that
David Levithan gave at Reading Matters is now
available as a podcast. You all should listen to this passionate, galvanising call to arms that left most everyone wanting to go out and slay vampires right that very minute. Or, you know, get the books that kids need into their hands.
I'm still mulling over my response to David's call to arms. On the one hand, I think he's totally right. On the other, it's so annoying to have a foreignor come in, spend a few minutes in the country, and then tell us Aussies what to do! We hates it, we do. Especially when they're right . . .
Posted by Justine at 0:12, June 20th, 2007 under Cons & Other Gatherings, Praising, Ranting, Reading, Young Adult literature |
John Hinde was one of my favourite film critics of all time. He was a wonderfully warm and funny man. He could give charmingly negative reviews to sucky films without a hint of rancour, reviews that made you want to see the crappy film just to see what he was talking about. I always wanted to meet him. When he died I cried.
Now he's made me cry again by setting up an
extraordinary literary prize in his wife's memory. It's the "Barbara Jefferis Award for the best Australian novel that empowers the status of females or depicts them in a positive light." The award goes to an Australian writer, but isn't restricted by setting or genre, ...
Posted by Justine at 10:23, April 3rd, 2007 under Reading, Sydney/Australia, Unicorns, Zombies |
All my friends are zombies:
Posted by Justine at 13:13, March 26th, 2007 under Sydney/Australia, Zombies |
A number of people have asked if they could see the original photos
Scott and me took that were used for the cover for
Magic Lessons.
Here you go. (The majority of the photos were taken by Scott.)
Camperdown Cemetery is one of my favourite cemeteries anywhere in the world. Enjoy!
Posted by Justine at 18:39, May 31st, 2005 under Magic or Madness trilogy, Sydney/Australia |
So apparently it's
de rigeur for the first entry of a brand new blog to feature the cover of the blogger's latest book. I mean, if the blogger in question happens to be a writer with a brand new cover to display to the masses, which this particular blogger does. To wit the cover for the second book in the Magic or Madness trilogy:
Colour me very happy indeed. Aside from anything else, that photo of the tree there? I took it! It's a moreton bay fig. In fact it's the fig tree just past the front gates of Camperdown Cemetery in Sydney, which cemetery makes an appearance in both Magic or Madness and Magic Lessons. The photo on ...
Posted by Justine at 0:09, May 25th, 2005 under Admin, Bloggery, Magic or Madness trilogy |
