Weekend Coffee Share October 30, 2016.

Welcome to Another Weekend Coffee Share.

It’s already Sunday night for me and Monday’s looming ahead like a dreadful hangover. So, no coffee for me tonight and I recommend you also join me for something decaf.

How was your week? I hope things went well!

This week I decided to package up the sunflower seeds and drove them up to show my daughter’s class. As her school is a 45 minute drive away, I carefully put the sunflower seedlings in a cardboard box and secured them with the seat belt. I wasn’t taking any chances. They arrived safely and I was quite thrilled with how the talks went. I spoke to my daughter’s class and the one next door largely about the importance of acts of kindness and how it only takes a small gesture to show we care. I spoke about how the journalist and photographer who salvaged the seeds from the war zone and brought them back to Australia via quarantine, took great risks so the family and friends of the MH17 tragedy could have a special reminder of their loves ones.

Wednesday, I attended the funeral of an absolutely beautiful lady from our Church. She was in her mid-70s and has been fighting cancer for about 6 years. Now, I can tell that she really fought that cancer like Gethsemane Sam with both barrels blazing. Yet, all that time she continued to look after her disabled daughter and be an active member of her family as well as the Church. She was well known for her cooking and made us a few meals when I’ve been sick as well as helping out with the kids through an after school kids’ club. There were times I used to drop them off and go straight home to bed and sleep the entire time they were gone. I really wasn’t well. So, you could well imagine what she meant to me and how much I loved and appreciated her from the bottom of my heart. I truly wish I could be more like her and fill her shoes. It’s rather intimidating, but I think people can pick up when your intentions were good even when your efforts fall short.

Thursday night, dancing started up for another term. Instead of ballet this term, our adult class is doing lyrical dance. No, this isn’t where you start singing as you dance around the room. Lyrical dance is a style that combines ballet and jazz dancing techniques. It is performed to music with lyrics so that it inspires expression of strong emotions the choreographer feels from the lyrics of the song. This style concentrates on an individual approach and expressiveness of such emotions as love, joy, and anger. It does not concentrate on the dancer’s precision of movement. http://www.omahaschoolofmusicanddance.com/what-is-lyrical-dance-15-interesting-facts-about-this-contemporary-style/

The Scene of the Murder in Balmain.

Yesterday, I attended the awards ceremony for the local short story competition I entered a few months ago. I’d written a short story based on a murder in Sydney’s Balmain in 1903 and it had repressed memory and what I thought were some clever ideas and yet it didn’t even rate an Honorable Mention. I have to be honest and say I was pretty upset by the result but I’ve since revisited it and read more about writing short stories and have identified some changes.

How was your week? I hope it went well and that you also have a great week ahead.

xx Rowena

Rejection…It’s a Short Story.

Rejection..it’s the ugly side of being a writer.Not only that, it hurts…like a knife stabbed deep in our heart and twisted round and round and round by some sadist who doesn’t care about our fragile self-esteem.

Anyway, as much as we hate it and as much as it hurts, we are not on our own. Indeed, tales abound of very successful authors receiving multitudinous rejections. William Golding published his first novel, Lord of the Flies, after 21 rejections. Beatrix Potter decided to self-publish The Tale of Peter Rabbit after rejection letters started to pile up. The original run was 250 copies; the book has now sold over 45 million copies.  J.K. Rowling, the great literary success story, failed to sell Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone to 12 different publishers until the daughter of an editor at Bloomsbury Publishing took an interest in it. Harry Potter is now worth at least $15 billion. Stephen King sounds downright proud of the number of times he was rejected as a young writer. In his On Writing, he says he pinned every rejection letter he received to his wall with a nail. “By the time I was fourteen,” he continues, “the nail in my wall would no longer support the weight of the rejection slips impaled upon it. I replaced the nail with a spike and went on writing.”

 

So, when I share my heartfelt angst over my latest rejection, at least I know I’m not alone and I keep some pretty good company.

The Actual Murder Scene.

A few months ago, I entered a local short story competition. I only had a few days to put my entry together and decided to base it on a murder story I’d stumbled across doing my family history research.It’s set in the Sydney Harbour suburb of Balmain, which was historically quite a rough, working class suburb. I still haven’t been able to establish whether I’m related to these people thanks to a very frustrating dead end I’m unable to shift.

Anyway, after waiting several months for the outcome of the competition, the award ceremony was held yesterday and a room full of hopefuls all sat in their seats with great expectations and for most of us, pending disappointment.

However, I wasn’t expecting disappointment or rejection. I was pretty pleased with my entry and thought I was a strong contender. I was sitting in my seat with sweaty palms and almost making myself ill with stress. I wondered whether it would be better to win a Highly Commended just to put me out of my misery. The list of winners was thinning out and someone else’s name was read out instead of my own, I was gutted. Emotionally kicked in the guts.

While many would say my heartbroken angst was an over-reaction, and that I should have taken it as a sign of failure as a writer, but when you’re trying to make it on the international scene and you can’t crack the local market, you’re hardly going to be all smiles doing the happy dance, are you?!!

Well, to be fair to myself, I don’t write short stories and I had to get my entry together in a couple of days. So, I clearly could’ve used more time. Moreover, once I’d got home and looked up characteristics of the short story, I realised that my story actually needed a lot of work, especially when it came to structure. I’m quite the panster (person who writes by the seat of their pants and by contrast isn’t a planner) and a bit of structure and planning could well be added to the mix.

I posted the story today in its original format today and you can read it here: The Secret. I’d really appreciate your feedback. I’ve decided to make quite a few changes so please don’t hold back.

How do you deal with writing rejection?

Personally, I’m trying my best to be pro-active and learn from the experience. Rework it. Not just file it in the waste paper basket out of hurt disgust and despair.

After all, there’s always next year.

xx Rowena

PS if you want to see a great image for rejection, click here: http://rejectiondigest.weebly.com/

 

 

 

 

The Secret- Short Story

“There are no secrets in Balmain.” – Dorothy Mullins.

1. Sunrise, Balmain… July 21, 1903.

 

 “Singing Tooral liooral liaddity.

Singing Tooral liooral liay.

Singing Tooral liooral liaddity.

And we’re bound for Botany Bay.”

 

Setting off in their fishing boat, Dadda was the Captain and Maggie was 1^st Mate.

“Fishy!” Maggie squealed, as Dadda helped her reel in her fish. “Bweckfsst!”

2.

That’s all Margaret remembered about before.

A book with no beginning, Margaret had been adopted as a tot and her story now began at Chapter Three. All the previous chapters had been ripped out. Thrown away. She wanted them back. Not that she and her sister didn’t love their second family. But you are who you are, and then you’re not. Sometimes, Margaret wondered if finding out would turn her into someone else. Or, whether she was more than a just a name.

Years ago, Margaret had consulted the tea leaves .Yet, as she peered into the tea cup, there was nothing… only the scream. She had lived with the scream all her life, never knowing why.

Now in her late 60’s, the beginning didn’t matter anymore. She was “Grandma”.

 

3.

Moon Landing, Balmain…Monday July 21, 1969, Sydney Time.

As the neighbours crammed into their sardine tin of a terrace, everybody knew Bob’s brand new telly had fallen off the back of a truck. No one cared. Man was landing on the moon. There was barely breathing room left!

Grandma was knitting footy socks in the front row. 1969 would be a good year for the Balmain Tigers. She felt it in her bones.

“Robbie, Tom, Arty, Jack…these should fit Paddy,” she mumbled.

Knit one, pearl one but then Grandma dropped a stitch… and another.

More than her knitting was unravelling. Mary Mullins’ perfume had unwittingly unlocked a secret inner labyrinth, and the Minotaur was out. The room was spinning round and round like a record on acid and Margaret felt incredibly dizzy. Being sucked into this swirling vortex, she reached out a frail, desperate hand. Bob steadied her back in her seat.

“Lottie, tell Mum Gran’s had another turn,” Bob yelled. Even if his mother-in-law dropped dead in front of the telly, he wasn’t budging. He had the best seat in the house.

Lottie found her mother bailed up in the kitchen, making curried eggs and cups of tea.

“Dot, I can’t watch! They’re gunna die!” her cousin wailed, who clearly hadn’t read The Power of Positive Thinking.

“Mum, Gran’s had another turn.”

“Mother Mary!” Dot gasped, crossing herself. “Grant me peace!”

Dot’s blood pressure hit the roof. She ripped open the Bex and made one for Mum and one for herself.

Bex might be a universal panacea, but they knew Grandma had more than a headache. That she was on the blink like a broken telly. At times, she didn’t know who or where she was, retreating inside watching her own, private movie. How long would it take? Dot’s eyes welled up, as she pictured spoon-feeding her mother like a baby.

“How’s your Mum, luv?” a neighbour asked. “Saw she had another turn. Have you taken her to the quack? Don’t mean to pry but don’t you think it’s time?”

“There’s no way I’m sending my own mother to the asylum. She’s just under the weather. That’s all. She’ll be right.”

“None of her business,” Dot muttered.“We’ll get by. We always do.”

After all, they were Balmain born and bred… tough as old workman’s boots, and never gave up!

Dot’s sister turned up with the kids.

“Gran’s got purple hair!” The cousins all burst into hysterics.

Engulfed by the intensifying vortex, Margaret had arrived home with a new “do”. New hair always helped, although she wasn’t too sure about this purple halo, which seemingly glowed in the dark.

Like an apparition, a sketchy white figure appeared through the fuzz, bouncing along like a kangaroo. “The Eagle has landed…That’s one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind “

The room erupted with applause until Robbie’s home-made detergent bottle rocket missed the moon, smashing through the back window, hitting Grandma on the head.

“Robert Joseph Augustus Mullins!!!! Go to your room!”

Robbie bolted off to save his hide.

Meanwhile, Grandma wandered out the front door heading for Darling Street. An old lady slipped out behind her. Lottie had seen her before at Mass.

“Mummy! Mummy! Grandma’s…” Lottie shrieked.

“Not now, Lottie,” Dot snapped. “Grandma can wait!”

Yet, before she even stood up, a pamphlet slapped her in the face:

“Save our Sons…The government has failed to convince Australians that Vietnam is truly a war in which young lives must be sacrificed. That is why it relies on unjust conscription law which forces young men into the army against their moral convictions.”

“Dotty, you’ve got five boys. You’ve gotta sign up. This war’s the devil’s work!” Her sister insisted. Bernadette had married well and moved up to Wahroonga. They even had their own swimming pool.

“Mrs Mullins, don’t listen to that pack of hysterical mothers with nothing better to do,” groaned a bloke in a suit. “Without the Yanks, the reds will move in. We’ll all be speaking Russian.”

Dot was saved by a knock at the door, although the front door was wide open and the flotsam and jetsam were letting themselves in and out.

“Quick! It’s the coppers”.

They all knew Constable Baker. He was a local lad, but he still meant trouble.

“The telly!” Bob panicked. “Fell off the back of a truck…Struth! Should’ve known. This time, it’s the slammer!”

Bob had been charged with receiving stolen goods before.

Meanwhile, the toilet flushed…just in time.

“Mrs Mullins, your mother’s down at the wharf again. You’d better come.”

“See, Mum,” Lottie snapped. “Tried to tell you Gran had wandered off.”

Riddled with guilt, Dot grabbed her purse.

As usual, Bernadette was “busy”.

4.

The pressure was building. Hauling herself into a dinghy, Margaret thought she was fishing with Dadda again. Yet, the voices were still yelling and screaming with violent horror. Margaret could no longer block them out.

 

“Brownie! Gotcha Brownie!” Her father threatened, holding a razor to her mother’s throat.

“Stop, Jack! It’s me…Florrie!”

Blood squirted like a fountain from her mother’s neck. Miraculously, Muvver ran down the hallway clutching Sadie.

Then, Maggie heard a thud, another scream and found Dadda also bleeding by the throat beside Muvver.

“Muvva! Muvva! Wake up, Muvva!” Maggie shrieked.

But Muvva was gone.

Maggie heaved Baby up all by herself. She was Muvver now.

“Ssh, Bubba. Sleepy-byes.”

Then, the lights went out.

5.

“Mum!” Dot called, holding her hand.  Margaret had taken off her coat and was holding it like a baby.

“We’ve called the ambulance, “Mrs Mullins.”They’ll be taking her to hospital,”

“But she’s my mother. She belongs at home,” Dot pleaded.

“Mum. It’s me, Dotty.”

There was no response. Margaret was rambling and her words were like autumn leaves scattered by the wind. All Dot heard was: “Uncle, Dadda did it.”

“Dadda, did what?” Dot gasped, but she already knew. “I’ll strangle the bastard.”

This was a demon no priest could exorcise. An unforgivable sin. No amount of Hail Marys could fix this. Dot fell to her knees.

“Your mother’s not losing her memory, dear. She’s getting it back.” Said the voice and Dot realised an old lady was holding her up.

Who was she? An angel? She seemed so familiar. Yet, Dot couldn’t place her. Those eyes! Finally, the penny dropped. The stranger had her mother’s eyes. Pedalling backwards through time, she’d almost arrived back at the beginning, crash landing in an eerie corridor overflowing with ghosts. Suddenly, she remembered the lady hugging her at her first Holy Communion.

“I’m Aunt Cissie…your mother’s aunt. Florrie was my sister.”

Dot shuddered. “Florrie…” even the name sounded like a ghost.

Words were inadequate. Aunt Cissie reached into her handbag, pulling out a well-worn newspaper clipping.

BALMAIN SENSATION.

SAD DOMESTIC TRAGEDY.

A TAILOR KILLS HIS WIFE.

AND ATTEMPTS SUICIDE.

A MOTHERLESS BABE.

EXCITEMENT IN DARLING-STREET.

The busy waterside suburb of Balmain was

thrown into a state of unusual excitement

this morning, by the news of one of the saddest

domestic tragedies imaginable, a tragedy

which was committed by a man of good re

pute, worried by business troubles into a

state of temporary insanity…[1]

“I’ll never forget her little voice: “Dadda hit Muvver”.

“Not a day has gone by that I haven’t thought of Florrie and the girls. My poor Ma, bless her, went to her grave a broken woman. As much as we loved the girls, we had to set them free.”

Dot held her hand tight just to make sure she was real. That she wasn’t an angel.

Aunty and Dot climbed into the boat beside Margaret.

Finally, they were all in the same boat together.

 

Balmain’s secret was out.

 

[1] The Australian Star (Sydney, NSW : 1887 – 1909) Friday 24 July 1903 p 5 Article

This is the short story I submitted for the Central Coast Short Story Competition. I have identified some changes I’m going to make but I wanted to post the original and would appreciate your feedback and suggestions.

Many thanks!

xx Rowena

 

 

Hi, my name is Erin, and I have a mental illness.

For anyone who has loved, know n or cared about someone living with bipolar, this is an insightful, sensitive and encouraging account of living with bipolar. xx Rowena

It's Fine.

I have bipolar disorder.

This is not the best way to start a conversation, maybe, but it certainly does separate the wheat from the chaff.

You get a lot of different reactions when you tell people you have a mental illmess. Some people will act surprised (“WHAAAAAT?? But you seem FINE!”), or try to relate (“I’m so moody and random, I’m probably bipolar too!”), or awkwardly change the subject. Some people will be awesome and understanding. Some people will use it against you every time you get angry or sad. Some people will use it to discredit you (“Well, sure, she said that, but you know she’s bipolar, right?”), and others will use it as a reason to disappear from your life entirely. It’s okay. Let them go. Those are not the people you need to have around you anyway.

I didn’t receive my diagnosis until I was an adult…

View original post 1,770 more words

Sunflower Seedlings…Lessons in Kindness.

This morning, I carefully packaged the sunflower seedlings up into a protective box. It wasn’t Fort Knox but they looked safe, especially once I’d strapped them into the back seat with a seat belt. I know this might sound over the top and I don’t know if you can be a helicopter parent to plants. However, if you’ve been following the progress of the sunflower seeds, you’ll know these aren’t any ordinary sunflowers. These sunflowers seeds came from the site of the MH17 crash in the Ukraine in 2014. They’re incredibly precious!

 

That’s also why they were in my car.I wanted to share their story with my daughter’s class. Miss goes to school 45 minutes drive away from home and with my “creative” approach to driving, that was a very long journey up along the free and through bumper-to-bumper peak hour  traffic. Slam on the brakes…ouch.

Hence the seat belt!! Moreover, you could say the cardboard box was somewhat like one of those protective car seats you sit your toddler in. I wanted them to be so safe, that I could’ve bought a Volvo.

The Sunflower Seedlings.

Of course, I could’ve left the sunflower seedlings safely at home but I felt there was something bigger at stake. That I didn’t need to wait until the flowers actually bloomed to share their message of kindness, love and reaching out even to complete strangers when tragedy strikes. That we all start out as seeds and with love, care and nutrients and we can grow up into someone gorgeous and productive, giving our seeds back to the earth, feeding the animals and helping to wipe away the dark clouds by simply being ourselves…nothing flash. I also thought of the teachers who were onboard and how they sowed those metaphorical seeds into so many students, who went on to carry their message forward. BUT…then I also think of all those beautiful passengers whose lives were tragically cut short…every day people who were just coming home from holidays. Of course, I think of the Maslin family who lost their three beautiful children and have created a foundation to raise money for children with dyslexia. I want to help sow those seeds too. After all, words are seeds and being able to read is something most of us take for granted.

So, as I watched the sunflowers poke their heads through the soil, I came to realise that  just the fact that the seeds had sprouted, was enough for them to speak. Tell their story.

The sunflower is extraordinary and I’ve always had a connection with them but not in the same way I have now.

In August 2014, commercial flight MH17 was shot down by terrorists in the Ukraine killing everyone on board. That plane which bore the brunt of so much anger and hate, crashed into a stunning field of sunflowers, a coincidence not lost on the media. Photos and footage appeared of the ugly scar carved into the sunflowers’ heart and photographer said that the sunflowers even turned their faces away from the wreckage.

Paul McGeough is the Sydney Morning Herald’s Senior Foreign Correspondent specialising in the Middle East. He’s accustomed to reporting on horrific events around the world, the same way the rest of us eat toast for breakfast. “When most people are running away from a place, photographer Kate Geraghty can usually be found running towards it.” Yet, they were guttered by what they saw and felt drawn to bring sunflower seeds back to Australia from the crash site to give to the families and friends of the victims.  They wanted to give them something to remember and honour their loved ones who weren’t soldiers fighting in a war. There weren’t going to be any medals. They were just everyday people going on a holiday.

Nothing more, nothing less.

Our children making the hearts cards we sent out. They look quite young now.

I received about 40 seeds and decided to share them with our local schools to create some kind of ongoing tribute of legacy for those who died.  However, I was too anxious to plant the seeds last year but I planted the first lot of seeds ten days ago and six have sprouted.

Of course, the seedlings arrived safely at school and I ended up sharing them with my daughter’s class and a year 6 class.  I also shared the letter I’d received with them wishing”May your sunflowers bloom” and the photo of the original plant in the Ukraine. I also had one of our red hearts stuck in there.

It was a simple story with a few precious props but the kids were riveted, sitting still and absorbing it all and asking questions at the end. I spoke to them about the kindness of the journalist and photographer salvaging the seeds and bringing them back to Australia via quarantine. I spoke about how we can feel powerless when someone is going through hardship and that though we can’t change anything, we can show we care through little things like a card. I also spoke about the importance of learning and literacy. Many of the Australians killed had been teachers and a little boy from Perth, Otis, had dyslexia and his family has set up a fund to raise money for dyslexia. I wanted them to appreciate that you can plant a plain, ordinary seed and when you nurture that seed, it can grow into something big, bold and colourful.

You can tell kids to be kind, keep their hands and feet to themselves, watch their language, and you might be lucky to see some change.However, I know these kids were changed by this story…a very simple story of plucking, sowing and nurturing the seeds  and I can’t wait to witness the harvest.

It is my hope that these sunflowers and their story will truly honour all those whose lives were tragically cut short through anger and hate and somehow carry their legacy forward.

While sowing a few seeds might not seem monumental and the sort of thing you’d ever expect to change the world, but I strongly believe they can!

They’re sowing the seeds in our hearts!

xx Rowena

 

 

Rainbow Bike & the Bookshop…Weekly Smile

Last Thursday, while I was being led astray by detour after detour after detour, I felt a strong twitch which turned into something of a magnetic pull and before I knew it, I was inside yet another bookshop.

Yikes! There’s something about bookshops for me, which is like the call of the wild and I am absolutely powerless to stay away. Like the children being lured away by the Pied Piper of Hameln, I am always lured in,. Moreover, shame upon shame upon shame, I almost never leave empty handed. Resistance is futile. It’s beyond my control.

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Anyway, last Thursday I went on a bit of an “excursion”. To be exact, it started the moment I left the doctor’s surgery in St Leonards when instead of catching the train North towards home, I jumped platforms and was soon click clacketting my way across the Sydney Harbour Bridge, through the city and alighting at Kings Cross Station. From there, I explored the Anne & Otto Frank Exhibition at the Sydney Jewish Museum and then took a right and stumbled across Darlinghurst Gaol, which is now the National Art School. Struck by it’s imposing sandstone architecture, I HAD to explore it further especially as I had my camera with me. Before long, I was in Surry Hills, my usual stomping ground.

That’s where I stumbled across The Oscar & Friends Bookshop.

Well, in terms of budget control and not spending any money, I kept stumbling over.

Or, you could look at it on the bright side and say I only bought two books. One is a gift for my brother so I won’t give it away but the book, which I bought for myself, was very pertinent:

Tim Harwood’s Messy: How to Be Creative & Resilient in a Tidy-Minded World.

‘Utterly fascinating. Tim Harford shows that if you want to be creative and resilient, you need a little more disorder in your world. It’s a masterful case for the life-changing magic of cluttering up’ – Adam Grant

Ranging expertly across business, politics and the arts, Tim Harford makes a compelling case for the creative benefits of disorganisation, improvisation and confusion. His liberating message: you’ll be more successful if you stop struggling so hard to plan or control your success. Messy is a deeply researched, endlessly eye-opening adventure’ – Oliver Burkeman

Now, I know that when you’re a bit quirky and spend your life swimming against the flow, you can get rather excited when you finally find someone who agrees with your point of view…AT LAST!! Indeed, given the thrill of finding a so-called published expert supporting your long held philosophical stance when you’ve been as a lone ranger on a tiny Pacific atoll,  is such a relief that you don’t even question whether the author’s legit. Indeed, here’s finally the proof you’ve always been looking for that messy desks beat tidy desks. Yippee!

Anyway, as you might gather finding Tim Harford’s book is a good enough reason to smile.

However, as I’m leaving the bookshop, I spotted a bicycle, which had been painted in luscious rainbow colours and I was in heaven.

Indeed, I thought about riding that rainbow bike right up into the sky and into the heavens. That was, until I spotted the very secure bike chain.

While everyone has their own perspective of what rainbows mean to them, I love all the bright colours and how rainbows are formed by that mingling of sun and rain which must be viewed from the correct angle in what must be a fusion of magic and science.

Rainbows make me smile.

Hmm…and now thanks to Tim Harford I can ignore all the crap on my desk until my keyboard gets buried again and a rescue mission is required.

What has made you smile this week?

This has been part of The Weekly Smile hosted by Trent’s World. You can click on the linky here to check it out.

xx Rowena

 

Weekend Coffee Share 23rd october, 2016.

Welcome to another Weekend Coffee Share.

You’re just lucky that it rained. Otherwise, you’d be joining me in a tent camping at the Scout Hall right on the waterfront.

That said, I still haven’t decided whether I was lucky or unlucky the weather saved me from camping. While I was looking forward to giving camping a go and sleeping metres from the water, I did get cold feet which had nothing to do with the rain! I’ve now decided I should start off with camping in the backyard where everything but the camping is familiar.

How was your week?

Now, that we’ve established that we’re not roughing it, can I offer you a more civilised beverage than billy tea? In case you don’t know what billy tea is, that’s tea made in a tin pot over the camp fire.

Last week, was really hectic for me. There were a couple of tough, difficult days for my son, which have come good but they were incredibly stressful and we are still concerned about him. He is 12.5 years old and in his first year of high school and I guess that says it all. He has taken up sailing so hopefully that will provide him with a relaxing outlet to get him through the swirling vortex of pubescence. I might need to take it up too, although writing and photography are my outlets.

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Thursday, I had a medical check-up in Sydney and as usual, I went off the grid afterwards. I went to the Sydney Jewish Museum to see an exhibition about Anne Frank and also a collection of letters from Otto Frank, which he’d sent to an Australian and a New Zealander who’d written to him after reading Anne’s diary. That was fantastic. Here’s the link.

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After going to the exhibition, I started walking towards Surry Hills and Central Station. En route, I stumbled across  Darlinghurst Gaol, which has been the National Art School for some time. The old sandstone architecture was very striking and intriguing and I could sense the stories hovering in the air…and a few ghosts.

I love Surry Hills and stopped there for afternoon tea, wandered through Salvo store there and a bookshop, which had a stunning rainbow-coloured bicycle parked out the front. I could almost picture myself riding it but am not so sure. It is very rainbow.

I also saw some fabulous Street art in Surry Hills:

Saturday, I went down to the Scout Hall to join in with the fishing, which largely involved me taking photos and watching a few of the kids. In retrospect, I realise that I should’ve had a few lessons myself as I have no idea how to cast off and so was of little help to the kids. The kids caught a few undersized whiting and bream which were thrown back after photographs were taken but one boy managed to catch a flounder, which was exciting…not a common fish. I also spent considerable time following mother duck and her ducklings with one of the cubs. The ducklings were adorable!

 

Our Daughter Fishing.

 

Australian ducklings with mother duck.

Meanwhile, last Sunday we finally planted 12 of the sunflower seeds salvaged from the MH17 crash site in the Ukraine. You would be so proud of how lightening fingers here is looking after those precious seeds. A week later, seven out of the twelve seeds I planted have sprouted but one had it’s top nipped off. I am moving them out in the the sun outside every morning and then bringing them back in at night and watering them with a spray bottle. My other half-dead plants are complaining of preferential treatment as they continue to experience neglect but I have to ensure these sunflowers not only survive but also produce a bumper crop of seeds, which don’t get eaten by the birds either! It’s a big job!

Anyway, I’d better head off and start getting ready for another week. It’s now Sunday afternoon and Monday morning is just around the corner.

Hey, just wondering, if I turn back and go round the other corner, does that mean I’ll go back to Saturday and get another weekend? After all, it makes perfectly logical sense. If only this were possible, I might just be ready for another week. What do you think?

Anyway, thanks for catching up and I hope you’ve had a great week and an enjoyable weekend.

This has been part of the Weekend Coffee Share run by Diana over at Part-Time Monster and you can read the other posts by clicking here on the Linky.

Love & Best Wishes,

Rowena

 

 

 

Wandering into Darlinghurst Gaol, Sydney…

Continuing further along my meanderings through inner Sydney, I stumbled across Darlinghurst Gaol, which is now posing as the National Art School. Is it a coincidence that these art students are creating within the walls of a former prison? I’m not sure but society has often locked up it’s most innovative thinkers. Indeed, Australian poet Henry Lawson himself was locked up within these walls back in the day.

Anyway, you’ll be pleased to know that I wandered into Darlinghurst Gaol and wandered straight out again.

This photo was taken in the tunnel leader into the chapel.

Perhaps, you might think they’ve made a huge mistake. That they should’ve locked me up and thrown away the key. Some days, I truly wouldn’t mind. After all, if that’s what it takes to get a bit of peace and quiet, I’ll lock myself up any day. I’m sure you know what I mean. We’ve all been there!

Old and New Stand Side by Side.

As I said, I was  wandering through Eastern Sydney starting out at Kings Cross Station and walking along Darlinghurst Road to the Sydney Jewish Museum. Then, I turned the corner and saw a high and continuous sandstone wall. Although I don’t get down to this part of Sydney very often, I knew it must’ve been Darlinghurst Gaol. While it closed as a gaol back in and is now the National Art  School, it had some high profile inmates back in the day. Poet Henry Lawson spent a bit of time there, calling it Starvinghurst Gaol. A few notable bushrangers were  inmates of Darlinghurst Gaol:

• Thomas and John Clarke – bushrangers from the upper Shoalhaven in south-east New South Wales, hanged on 25 June 1867.
• John Dunn – Australian bushranger, member of Ben Hall‘s gang, hanged in the gaol on 19 March 1866.
• John Vane^[3] – bushranger from Carcoar in Central Western New South Wales. Johnny Vane was member of Ben Hall‘s gang.
• Frank Gardiner – Australian bushranger and mastermind of the Forbes gold escort robbery at Eugowra on 15 June 1862 (sentenced to 32 years, but pardoned early).
• Andrew George Scott – known as Captain Moonlite, Irish-Australian bushranger.

Watercolour of the Gaol by inmate Henry Louis Bertrand, 1891

Construction on Darlinghurst Gaol wall began in 1822 and finished in 1824 using convict labour. However, due to a lack of funds, the site sat empty for 12 years. Construction of the rest of the complex did not begin until 1836, with completion of some of the cell blocks in 1840. The gaol was ready for occupation a year later, with the first prisoners occupying the gaol on 7 June 1841.

The gaol was finally completed in 1885. The main material used for construction of the gaol is Sydney sandstone, cut into large blocks by convicts. Convict markings on the blocks are visible along the upper half of the wall on Darlinghurst Road. A tall circular chapel stands in the middle of the site, around which are sited the six rectangular cell blocks in a radial fashion.

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The Mortuary.

The site was transferred in 1921 to the New South Wales Department of Education, who adapted the building for use as the East Sydney Technical College. The National Art School was established in 1995 and is now the sole occupant of the site. The Darlinghurst Road side of the Gaol, (commonly known as “the wall”) was for many years a popular place for male prostitutes to offer their services.

I have to ask if it’s a coincidence that the National Art School is housed in a former gaol? After all, doesn’t society like to lock up those who think outside the square and who better than artists and creatives!

The guard at the gate told me that there was a tunnel from the courthouse to the gaol and so I wandered round there and took some photos. The architecture is just begging to be photographed and is, as I’ve heard said: “very instragramable”. That is if you’re on Instagram.

Stumbling across the gaol was a reminder of the chance finds you come across when you explore a place on foot. I had a great uncle who was particularly well-travelled for his day. He used to say that if you wanted to know a city, you needed to walk around it on foot. He was so right and he was in great company with these minds:

“What strange phenomena we find in a great city, all we need do is stroll about with our eyes open. Life swarms with innocent monsters.”
― Charles Baudelaire

“There is nothing like walking to get the feel of a country. A fine landscape is like a piece of music; it must be taken at the right tempo. Even a bicycle goes too fast.”

-Paul Scott Mowrer

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However, as much as I love walking around the inner city exploring every nook and cranny, time was not my friend. Mum was minding my kids and I really had to get home. So, after already deviating via the Anne Frank Exhibition and Darlinghurst Gaol, I was now Cinderella at 5 minutes to midnight.  I  needed to hot foot it to Central Station via Surry Hills to catch the train home.

Well, maybe just one last detour. After walking out of gaol, I wandered into a chocolate shop. Just goes to show that it doesn’t take much to lead me astray!

Now, it’s time to get on with the weekend!

xx Rowena

Beyond Anne Frank…Her Father’s Gift to the World.

Yesterday, I visited the Sydney Jewish Museum to see two overlapping exhibitions: Anne Frank- A History for Today and Otto Frank’s Lost Letters. This was naturally a deeply moving experience and it was wonderful to recapture the intimacy I shared with Anne Frank as a 13 year old and revisit it now as Mum to my  13.5 year old son and almost 10.5 daughter, who are about to step into her shoes.

As a writer, it always interests me how we hear a story from a certain perspective and then we rediscover the story completely when we see it through someone else’s eyes. After all, when you read The Diary of Anne Frank, you are drawn completely into her world, her perspective, her heartbeats. We know nothing about how the rest of the people in the annexe saw her.

Otto Frank is the only survivor and the best one  to provide that outside insight into Anne . He said:

“For me, it was a revelation. There, was revealed a completely different Anne to the child that I had lost. I had no idea of the depths of her thoughts and feelings.”

Otto Frank

As much as we revere Anne Frank through her diary, her father is has a different, but equally important. After all, he had it published and gave it to the world when he could have locked it away in a drawer. This was all her had left of his precious daughter…along with his wife and older daughter, Margot. However, he shared it with the world and gave millions, upon millions a precious soul mate who knew them intimately in ways we couldn’t even express to ourselves. She is the voice of the misunderstood teenager, the Jewish people, the oppressed, the writer and much more.

Anyway, following the publication and subsequent translation of Anne Frank’s Diary, young people wrote letters to Otto Frank  and he replied. Although copies of the letters he received have been retained by the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam, he didn’t keep copies of his own letters. So, in 2015, a world-wide search began and the Australian Jewish Museum located two Australian women who had written to Otto and had kept his treasured replies…Diana Munro and Anne Finlayson. Indeed, Otto Frank became quite close to Anne and called her the “Other Anne” and they met several times, becoming good friends.

So after getting off the train and slowly walking along Darlinghurst Road taking photos, I arrived at the Jewish Museum. I have never been there before. I’m immediately struck by how this isn’t like your average museum. It’s more like a home, a definite Community Centre and no doubt a sacred place for Jewish people. It is cared for, loved and polished. As I said, I felt like I was being invited into someone’s home and made very, very welcome.

The exhibitions are upstairs and I’m conscious of time pressures because Mum is minding my kids and I wasn’t supposed to be detouring after my medical appointment. So, I’m trying to make sure I see and absorb Otto Frank’s letters and return to see rest. Yet, the exhibition of letters from the Holocaust attracts my attention and I had a quick look.

Back to Otto Frank…

There is correspondence between Otto Frank and a young New Zealander, Diana Munro and Australian, Anne Finlayson. The letters on both sides are incredibly deep and philosophical and you get to know just a bit of who Otto Frank was as a person, Anne Frank’s father and also someone determined to make the world a better place for the future, fight against the sins of the past.

While I could’ve typed these quotes up and prettied them up a bit, these are photos I took at the exhibition. I particularly wanted to share these with Merril Smith from Merril’s Historical Musings to thank her for telling me about the exhibition and I felt very much like we were there together and had a coffee and chat afterwards.

What I noticed first about Otto Frank’s letters was that they were typed. His typewritten letters instantly reminded me of my grandfather’s typed Christmas newsletters and their different circumstances. The type also places his letters in the past, in a different era and they feel special.

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In addition to reading the letters, there was an excellent exhibition about Anne Frank’s life, the Holocaust and the secret annexe. This was a great refresher for me as it’s been 25 years since I visited her house in Amsterdam.

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The Secret Annexe

Peter’s Room

The people in the annexe and their helpers.

Anne Frank’s House

Since I visiting the exhibition, I’ve found that if you speak to ten different people about how The Diary of Anne Frank has touched their hearts, you could easily get ten different answers… all valid.

A replica of Anne Frank’s Diary on display.

That’s because in this complex diary commenced on her 13th Birthday, we each find something that relates to us in such a personal, intimate way. It’s like she’s peering deep into the inner-most secret passages of our soul, speaking out the cryptic writing on the wall and somehow made sense of it all. She has a clarity of vision which is astounding in anyone and I’m not going to put down young people by saying they can’t see more clearly than adults because so often they can.

Australian author, Jackie French said in conversation with Yotam Weiner, Education Manager, Sydney Jewish Museum:

“It is so easy to think of people who suffer, or have suffered, as other than ourselves. The very magnitude of the Holocaust means that single voices can be lost. Anne’s words make it personal. It is so very easy to lose track of major events in history. There are many to remember. It is much harder to forget the voice of Anne. Anne has been my companion, perhaps, for the forty six years since I read her book.”

So, if you’re interested in seeing these  exhibitions, you will need to hurry into the Sydney Jewish Museum. The exhibition closes mid-November.

Sydney Jewish Museum
148 Darlinghurst Road
Darlinghurst, NSW
Australia 2010
+61 2 9360 7999
info@sjm.com.au

 

xx Rowena

You might also enjoy reading about our vigil commemorating the 70th Anniversary of Anne Frank’s death last year: https://beyondtheflow.wordpress.com/2015/04/15/anne-frank-70-years-on-our-vigil/

Advance to King’s Cross Station, Sydney.

“You will never hear a lawn mower in Kings Cross and that, for many of us, is entirely a sufficient reason to live here. Give me sirens any day.”

Anne Summers: “In the Gutter … Looking at the Stars. A Literary Adventure Through Kings Cross (Edited by Mandy Sayer and Louis Nowra)”

 

Following an  appointment in Sydney today, you could say I was lured off by the pixies. By the way, this is a rather common scenario whenever I have appointments in Sydney. I love going off the grid, wandering into other worlds and exploring through my camera lens which gives me vision, not simply sight. As a mother of two gorgeous children and host to a few medical annoyances, I also love going, doing, being myself without anyone else in tow. Or worse still, towing me off somewhere else.

I was able to go on today’s detour, as usual, because my mother was picking up the kids and I am incredibly thankful. Mind you, today’s detour was a bit of an indulgence because Mum hasn’t been well lately  and she made a point of saying: “Come straight home”. She knew I wouldn’t come straight home, but I did say I’d be home by 6.00 PM so she could get home early.

Today’s destination was an exhibition of letters by Otto Frank, the father of Anne Frank, at  the Sydney Jewish Museum in Darlinghurst.

Kings Cross is on the left hand side where you’ll also find Darlinghurst, where the museum is located.

I caught the train to Kings Cross  Station and while walking along Darlinghurst Road into neighbouring Darlinghurst, I had my SLR camera with its huge and heavy zoom lens dangling around my neck. That is, when I wasn’t peering through it.

If you have read anything before about my relationship with my camera, you’ll already know that I see so much better through my camera lens. Or, even just when I have my camera with me. I’ll spot some teeny weeny detail and zoom into it, in a sense blowing it up into a world, filling the shot. It is all I see…this tiny piece of detail. It resonates so strongly with me in photography mode, yet I would’ve missed it looking through my own eyes. Walked straight past it.

So before I take you to the exhibition, I thought I’d take you on a brief photography tour from Kings Cross Station into Darlinghurst, which coincidentally, is where I was born.

You can see Sydney Tower in the Middle and the brown building on the left is where I used to work.

This is a view of Kings Cross by day, which I can assure you, is totally different from Kings Cross by night. Kings Cross is Sydney’s red light district. I have experienced the distinction between Kings Cross by day and Kings Cross by night personally. My first job after graduation was working for Dun & Bradstreet at 100 William Street. This was a very corporate job and if I worked back, I’d leave the office in my navy to suit to see a line up of “working girls” of a different sort lined up along William Street. Naturally I felt uneasy waiting for my boyfriend to pick me up after work…even though my knee-length blue suits put me in a different league.

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I wonder where this door came from? It really intrigues me.

Other than working in Kings Cross for a year, it’s not a place I’ve spent a lot of time. That said, after clubbing we used to go to  Dean’s Cafe in Kellett Street which had exotic  lounges, a surreal fish tank the best nachos back when nachos were a thing. It was and remains a cosmopolitan, bohemian hangout a world away from Sydney’s conservative North Shore where I grew up.

While Kings Cross has attracted sleaze, drugs, crime and everything on the wrong side of the law, it’s also been a creative haven, particularly during the 1920s. POet Ketheth Sleesor lived there and wrote his famous poem about The Cross, William Street:

William Street

The red globe of light, the liquor green, 
the pulsing arrows and the running fire 
spilt on the stones, go deeper than a stream; 
You find this ugly, I find it lovely 


Ghosts’ trousers, like the dangle of hung men, 
in pawn-shop windows, bumping knee by knee, 
but none inside to suffer or condemn; 
You find this ugly, I find it lovely. 


Smells rich and rasping, smoke and fat and fish 
and puffs of paraffin that crimp the nose, 
of grease that blesses onions with a hiss; 
You find it ugly, I find it lovely. 


The dips and molls, with flip and shiny gaze 
(death at their elbows, hunger at their heels) 
Ranging the pavements of their pasturage; 
You Find this ugly, I find it lovely.

Kenneth Slessor.

St John’s Anglican Church, Darlinghurst Road, Darlinghurst.

In his essay  My Kings Cross Slessor reflected:

“For whatever happens to its landscape, Kings Cross will always be a tract apart from the rest of Sydney, still contemptuous of the rules, still defiantly unlike any other part of any other city in Australia. And, though its skyline keeps on changing in an unpredictable and bewildering way, its essence of individuality doesn’t change, its flavours, noises, sights and smells remain the same immutably. For this reason I find as much pleasure in contemplating it today as I did when I looked out of a Woolcott Street window in 1922- indeed with its unending flux of lights and colours and its gaudiness and reticence, its sunsets and midnights, it seems (to me) a good deal more beautiful than the highly advertised stones and sand of Central Australia. To me, the Chevron Hilton Hotel, with its glittering windows and huge verticals, is as awe-striking as Ayers Rock.”

He obviously loved Kings Cross!

I was quite surprised to find this  historic Georgian house at 207 Darlinghurst Road. Once known as “Omrah” and used as a private hospital, it now stands alone.

My thoughts are that you can find joy, beautiful, love, inspiration anywhere as love as your eyes are open. That is, the eyes of your heart. You just need to look, keep an open mind and not judge.

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Have you ever been to Kings Cross by day? Perhaps, your Kings Cross is in London or somewhere else? I’d love to hear your G rated stories!

xx Rowena

I found this one way sign pointing back to St John’s Church rather amusing.