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Aussietrekker's memoirs (in many instalments)
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aussietrekker aussietrekker has been starred
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PostPosted: Mon Feb 17, 2014 5:28 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

A more immediate bane was the radiogram. This contraption was the size of a dressing table, and I know not how it was transported to the hostel from Footscray, as it must have weighed several tons. It had a radio with all the proper local stations printed on the glass panel (no Luxembourg!) and little storage cupboards at the sides. But it was the record player that worried me. Not so much the player itself, but the records that were bought to play on it. I should have been happy to have a record player in our unit, but when Dad came back from the city one day, triumphant with some bargain vinyl, my heart sank. I should have expected lots of classical music, as he was fond of hearing it on the BBC broadcasts back home. Fair enough. But I hadn't counted on one solitary 45rpm. Was it too much to hope for - my Daddy buying a Beatles record? I rejoiced upon seeing the title- I WANT TO HOLD YOUR HAND, then shock and horror was revealed. It was not a Beatles record, but a sacrilegious imposter by the Boston Pops Orchestra, conducted by Arthur Fiedler! Dad played it, and I could have wept. It was ghastly. The Beatles had been violated, but that was not the worst. What if the other kids and any of the hundreds of hostel inmates passing by thought it was mine? I would be the laughingstock of the whole camp. I lived in dread of being associated with this vulgar mutation, and every time it was played, I wanted to crawl into a hole and die.
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PostPosted: Mon Feb 17, 2014 6:10 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Some of the classical records weren't too bad. I could live with Beethoven and Great Italian Operas, and I grew to like Saint-Saens' Havanaise, mostly because of the novel story of its inception. SS and his violinist mate were travelling in France long ago in the winter. They lit a fire in their bleak lodgings, and the wood in the fire started to whistle. The resourceful composer detected the nucleus of a tune, and over 100 years later, it would be entertaining an Irish family during an Australian winter via a secondhand radiogram from Footscray. Isn't life wonderful. I inherited all Dad's records (even the mongrel Boston Pops anomaly), and should I be moved to play the "Crackling Wood" violin concerto on a cold day, I am ten years old again, and back in the hostel.
Sometimes we'd break the pattern in the furniture hunt, and go to the Altona auctions instead. I preferred the Altona auction, as it was closer and you could always be guaranteed a good laugh by the jolly auctioneer. It was held in a big shed in Pier Street, near the Red Robin sock factory, on the site of what is now the recently-built megropolis of expensive apartments. The auction was run by a Scottish bloke named Stan McIntosh. His sales method was a tonic, everything he said would have the audience in stitches and even if you were unsuccessful in bidding, you came away at the end of the day feeling uplifted. I was too young to know or appreciate that Mr.McIntosh was also Shire President of Altona, but do remember all our family being sad when he was killed in a car accident in 1967. With his bubbly personality, and Altona only a year away from being proclaimed a City, he would have been such an asset as inaugural Mayor.
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Robert (Bob) Taylor
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PostPosted: Tue Feb 18, 2014 2:37 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Takes me back to 1961 in NZ, my parents bought a Murphy radio /record player Stereo probably about the same size... a real piece of furniture.
I loved it because being a valve radio it had great pulling power especially at night time and could pick up 2UE and others in Sydney.
They seemed to have much better coverage of pop music than here then.
I had catologued all the times when pop sessions top 40 s etc both Australian and NZ would be airing. Hard to get my homework done then. Was real bragging rights to go to School and be able to talk authoritavely re the pop scene.
I remember one stick out in the mind occasion, in ways similar to yours. My parents bless their soles. went to town one day and bought a whole load of bargain bin records..thinking it would be cool. They were all old never heard of, or never made it artists. I was so brassed off that I took them all back and somehow at the age of 13 managed to get a Laughing refund and swap for some hot at that moment discs. Dont think you would have any such luck trying that move today.
Cheers. BOB
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Joy52
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PostPosted: Thu Feb 20, 2014 8:53 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

All this talk of radiograms brings to mind an amusing episode and a story that I have told many times and always gets a laugh. As you know, entertainment was a bit thin on the ground in those hostels and one day my brother came home with an old gramophone that he had found in the bush. It was the type that you wound a handle to play the music and had a large trumpet shaped "ear" on the top. As the handle wound down so would the music and you had to quickly wind it up again. Anyway, there was a record on the turntable and I got a few of my friends around to play with it. We each took turns at winding the handle while the others danced to it. We twisted and rock and rolled all afternoon to that one record. Around 5 o'clock my mother walked in with her mouth open and finally spluttered "That's the German national anthem"! Laughing
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aussietrekker aussietrekker has been starred
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PostPosted: Mon Feb 24, 2014 11:09 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

That's gold! laugh
When I was church organist, late 70's, there was a great new hymn called "Praise the Lord". I came home and practised it to death on our own organ. Mum came in, just like yours and said with horror, THAT'S THE GERMAN NATIONAL ANTHEM!!!!!

Yeah Bob, what our parents thought was cool, was cringeable to the kids. Music was the main bone of contention in the Generation Gap back then. But the baby boomers won in the end...I skipped generation X and bred generation Y when most of my contemporaries were having grandchildren and guess what my girls (18 and 24) and their mates play and have reverence for our 60's music as well as their own. thumbsup
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PostPosted: Tue Feb 25, 2014 12:03 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

We would barely have noticed our first Winter coming and going as it was comparatively exotic to what we had left behind, and none of the Australian trees ever lost their leaves, but when Spring arrived in September, the temperature did start to crank up. We started to hear lots surfing music on the radio by the likes of the Beach Boys, Jan and Dean and many homegrown bands which were mostly from Sydney. There was also a sudden onslaught of Girl Bands, singing tragic tales of teenage angst and generally being drama queens when romance went wrong. The girls on the school bus revelled in these offerings, but the highlight of their year came with the Australian tour of the Beatles in June, and many of them had gone to the city to line the streets and catch a glimpse of our collective heart-throbs. On the British music scene, the Beatles reigned supreme in 1964, but many new artists were up and coming towards the end of the year. The Zombies, Kinks, Herman's Hermits, Eric Burdon and the Animals, Georgie Fame, P.J.Proby - but there were many more that became household names in Britain but got no airplay at all over here. Songs that would have been censored or banned a mere five years earlier started to emerge. The Rolling Stones sang of a Little Red Rooster, (which I believed was a pet chook) and Eric Burdon sang of a dodgy brothel in New Orleans. P.J.Proby got into strife for splitting his pants on stage, and in Brighton, the Mods and Rockers were slaying each other. Band members grew their hair even longer than the Beatles in an effort to compete in scruffiness, and ceased dressing in suits and ties, preferring the creative clobber of the boutiques in the fledgling Carnaby Street. It was a good time to be young.
Meanwhile in the hostel, boatloads of new settlers arrived almost by the week. We lost our next door neighbours, who went to a hostel in Queensland, with the cute name of Kangaroo Point. A few families did the same. I remember a tiny Irish lady from Dungannon whose husband went ahead of the family and when he was established, she rounded up the eight children, the eldest being no older than Grade Four, and took them on the train to Brisbane, which would have taken several days back then. Other families started moving to Laverton and Werribee, to the recently built Housing Commission estates. But for each family that left, there seemed to be even more arriving. Looking back, I still can't imagine how everyone fitted in the place.
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Robert (Bob) Taylor
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PostPosted: Tue Feb 25, 2014 2:30 am    Post subject: Constant new arrivals. Reply with quote

You have just jogged another point of memory. The new faces and characters that kept on coming, soon made you feel like an old hand in the ways of life in Australia. Having been there for a few months you felt it was your calling in life to show the new kids around and warn and inform of the pitfalls and pleasant experiences that awaited around each corner or in town or down at the beach etc. It was as if you had done your apprenticeship or had gained your stripes and were an authority on this wild and woolly outpost....miles away from the old motherland. The different speech mannerisms and quirks of a new country unfolded to your constant amazement.
Cheers, Bob.
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PostPosted: Thu Mar 13, 2014 11:28 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Spring also brought the happy news that Colette would be making her First Communion at St.Mary's. No drama- Mum was prepared! She had packed my own beautiful dress from Ireland in anticipation of passing it down when the time came. But as she read further down the note, complications arose. The girls were all to wear long-sleeved dresses, and mine had short sleeves. There would also be a professional photographer by way of additional expense, and finally, the children were expected to take part in a "Communion Breakfast" to the tune of something outrageous like Five Shillings. We were not used to this complexity in Ireland, and no new settler would welcome the associated cost. Contacting the school to make an exception for the dress was fruitless. It was long sleeves or nothing. Mum was furious, and no way was she going a buy a new dress. She couldn't see the logic that short sleeves had been good enough for an Irish summer, but would not be acceptable in a warmer climate. This posed a dilemma until she finally hit on an idea. She went into the city one day on the train, and sought out a fabric shop, where she found some white material that was compatible with the dress. She then skilfully hand-sewed a perfect pair of long sleeves, and attached them so well that no-one could tell the difference. Dad brought his own camera on the day, and we have a great picture of the little girls in procession, with Sister Philomena gazing intently at our Colette's dress, and looking very puzzled.
There was another hostel boy in Colette's class, John Higgins, who was also making his First Communion. As the family had no car, Dad kindly offered to provide transport on the day. We had a prior evening visit from Mrs. Higgins to make arrangements, and it was very entertaining. Mrs. Higgins had the funniest comical accent, being from Londonderry, and I tried not to laugh all night as she regaled us with tales of everything from the sea voyage to Australia to life as an employee of the Mr. Frozo ice-cream factory. I remember her glowing account of a port stop in Malta, where the harbour was full of colourful traditional fishing boats. But no Dghajsa or Luzzi for Mrs. Higgins....she marvelled all night in her comical voice about her "wee boats in Malta".
The day arrived- October 25th. The children were rounded up and walked in a procession into the church. With the exception of Colette's friend Michael, who was wheeled in his wheelchair. There was great excitement. This would be no ordinary Mass, and for weeks before, the Grade Sixes had been practising appropriate Communion hymns to accompany the ceremony. I had learned a new one called "Where there is Charity and Love" which was exceptionally beautiful, and with my classmates, sang it piously. But as subsequent events unfolded after the Mass, I quickly became neither Charitable nor Loving!
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PostPosted: Sat Mar 15, 2014 12:42 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

Can�t wait to find out what the subsequent events were.
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 19, 2014 4:18 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

After the Mass was over and the newly-purified children assembled for the photographer, all the families were herded into the hall. Eventually the children filed in, and were ushered through a cordoned-off area, to magnificently appointed tables. This was the "Communion Breakfast", complete with beautiful tablecloths, silver cutlery, and ladies-in-waiting wearing white gloves. COMMUNION BREAKFAST??? There was not a bowl of cereal, a slice of toast or even bacon and eggs in sight. Instead, there was a feast of which I'd never seen the like. The tables were piled high with elegant sandwiches, party pies and sausage rolls, pastries of all kinds, and big sponge cakes displayed on pedestals. I was gobsmacked. Martin and I had the misfortune to make our First Communions in Ireland, where you did the deed and went home and that was that. Suddenly, we were feeling robbed. It wasn't fair! Being happy for our sister became irrelevant. The insult was not in her good luck, but in being forced with all the other siblings to stay throughout the entire performance behind the cordon, and watch all these Giggling Gerties stuffing their faces for what seemed like hours. We were like a load of starved dogs denied entrance to a butcher's shop. Forcing young children to watch this spectacle was a tactless thing to do, and I started to get cross. Worse, an emotional conflict between the religious solemnity of the occasion and my own righteous indignation was brewing, and it felt almost sinful in itself. We managed to slip away from the crowd once or twice, no doubt to grumble in the playground, but sooner or later, it was back to our parents behind the Exclusion Zone. The ordeal finally ended, and we drove home. Mum was marvelling at the wonderful display of sponge cakes, and wondered why they remained untouched all morning. According to Colette, the staff had failed to provide cutting knives. Mum was sympathetic, but Martin and I just gave each other a look that sarcastically said "ah, isn't it a pity of them!" But it didn't make us feel any better.
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 19, 2014 4:50 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Nor was there hope of any forthcoming compensation to make up for our loss. It wasn't our parents' fault that Australia rejoiced in religious events in a different way, and after forking out Five Shillings for the feast that followed would have impacted greatly on the budget that week. Fair enough, but try telling that to a ten and eight year old. My day was to get worse. Soon after we got home, a knock came to the door. On the other side stood John Higgins, still in his Communion suit. He said nothing, just stood there. Then my Dad did something weird. He put his hand into his pocket, fished out sixpence, and gave it to John who said thanks and walked away. I was mortified. If I'd been cross before, now I was ropable. My sensible Dad, who never spent a sixpence without staring at it, was giving money away for nothing. Where was OUR sixpence? He'd already given them a lift there and back to the church and saved his Ma the price of a taxi-fare, and the thought of wasting sixpence on John Higgins was too much. I thought it would have been better spent on my brother and I to go buy an icy pole round at Mrs. Salamon's. This gesture was a mystery until I was in my 40's. I read somewhere that it was a custom for children in some parts of Ireland to go from door-to-door in their finery, where a killing would be made collecting coins from glowing Catholic neighbours. Not so in Bangor, where each street had very few Catholic families, and back then you would have likely attracted more insults and stones from other children than coins. Anyway to this day I think it's a rotten practice, using Jesus to beg.

Last edited by aussietrekker on Wed Mar 19, 2014 5:23 am; edited 2 times in total
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 19, 2014 5:18 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

After a dreadful morning, it was a relief when the canteen provided a distraction at lunchtime. I spent the whole afternoon like a simmering volcano in the playground down by the creek, in the company of my new friend Pat, who had just arrived from England. We had the playground to ourselves which was just as well, as I was fit to do battle with anyone else who came within spitting distance. After a while we were approached by a stranger, a well-dressed adolescent girl with dark hair. She was very pleasant, and represented some do-good organisation, possibly the "Good Neighbour Society" which placed their free literature in the reception area where the mail was collected. I'm sure they helped assimilate migrants in ways I knew not, and maybe they were the folk who distributed powdered milk to the nursing mothers in the hostel, which I was told of many years later. The girl struck up a conversation. Pat was very shy and never said much, so I did all the talking. The girl was putting out feelers to start up a Sunday School, and asked if we would be interested. For an Ulster Catholic child, being recruited was not an option. I tried to be tactful and not rude, but after the day's events, I wasn't exactly feeling like "Defender of the Faith" either. She asked us if we'd heard of Communion. I told her I
knew all about it and in fact, (like I needed reminding!) my sister had made it for the first time that very morning. Eventually she moved on, minus two potential students.
Fifty years down the track, I sincerely hope my sister had a wonderful and memorable day. But for me, the complexity of unwanted emotions and the guilt they brought in a few short hours, is something in my life that was thankfully never repeated.
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 21, 2014 5:00 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

I took my First Holy Communion in England probably about the same time as you (I am 61). It was a lovely day with new white dress, veil and new white socks and shoes. We did have a Communion breakfast afterwards and I remember jelly and chocolate biscuits but I don't think that it was the sumptuous affair that your sister enjoyed. Nor did we go around begging afterwards! My grandmother gave me a silver locket which I still have and I also still have a photograph of the occasion with myself lined up with several little friends. We were told to put our hands into the prayer position for the photo but when it came back there was one little Irish girl (Sadie Kerrigan) who had her hands in the wrong position and oh boy did Sister Mary Ambrose give her heaps! I felt really sorry for her as she cried and she was a really lovely, quiet little girl. The other memory I have of the day is that that was the day when I found out the truth about Santa Claus. At the breakfast we were talking about Christmas and I made a comment about what I wanted Santa to bring me that year. One of the girls at the table then told me that he didn't exist and I argued back that he did. I went home and told my mother about this terrible lie and she also then told me the truth. I was devastated!
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PostPosted: Fri Mar 21, 2014 9:25 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

We were in England when I made my First Communion, and I would have been very envious of both Aussietrekker and Joy�s veils and white dresses because I was off school with whopping cough at the time of the official ceremony, and so my First Communion took place wearing ordinary clothes at an early morning mass without any celebrations at all, and no one in the church except my mother knowing that it was my First Communion. It hardly seemed official without a white dress and veil.

We were in Australia at the time of my Confirmation, and I couldn�t wait to wear a white dress and veil at last. I was horrified when I learnt that Reverend Mother Conleth wanted us to wear school uniform instead, because she argued that too much attention was being paid to the clothes and very little to the religious aspect of the ceremony, which was quite true in my case. However, spirited Australian mothers rebelled against the ban and sent daughters dressed like brides up to the church that day, so when I arrived I found, to my horror, that I was the only one there in ordinary clothes: not even school uniform, because being a migrant child I didn�t have one. To add to the humiliation, kind Mother Conleth noticed my outcast state and took me into the convent where she found a plain off-white dress for me to wear: a dress too short and too wide. I think I�d have preferred death to Confirmation that day.
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PostPosted: Mon May 12, 2014 12:04 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

How sad for both of you that a supposedly happy day should be so traumatic.
I wonder if any possible occupants of other planets place such emphasis on outer garments as humans do? Our whole existence revolves around it, and often I think we'd have been better off starkers, post-Garden-of-Eden. Rolling Eyes
A lot of migrant girls could relate to the problem of outward appearance, as I'm sure there were many who were the target of mockery in the street when their clothes were the wrong size or badly outdated.
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