As I walked through the familiar doors of Gosford Sailing Club for the Australia Day Regatta on Saturday, I pulled out my camera and thought: “You’ll do. That’s Thursday Doors done and dusted.”
When you visit Gosford Sailing Club, you’ll find the front door is located at 28 Mason Parade, Gosford and the back door and marina, is parked on Brisbane Waters, a vast expanse of stunning blue water ideal for sailing, water sports and the oyster industry.
Gosford Sailing Club started out in 1932 as the Gosford Rowing, Sailing and Motor Club.
By the end of the 1932/33 season the club was referred to as the Gosford and Brisbane Water Aquatic Club and in 1941 it changed its name to the Gosford Sailing Club. It was not the first sailing club to be formed on the Brisbane Water but it is the only club that has survived. If you’re interested in maps and sailing, you can click through HERE/ to a map of Brisbane Waters put out by Marine Rescue.
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
Rather than focusing on doors this week, I thought you’d all appreciate experiencing the Australia Day Sail Past, which took place before the Regatta.
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
Our son took part in his Flying 11 and when we last caught sight of him, he was on the boat. However, as they say: “never turn your back on the ocean” and our son and many a teenager has much in common with the sea. The next time we see him, his boat is being towed past by the rescue boat with his crew member steering and he’s out the back being towed along on an inflatable donut printed with the Australian Flag. Just to add to the overall look, he was wearing the Australian Flag top hat my husband had bought him.
Happy as Larry…Our Junior Aussie Larrikin.
However, what I noticed most about him was his smile. He was absolutely beaming. Happy as Larry. That’s something any parent of a teenager is also thrilled to see. After all, life with teenagers can be a bit like life at the top of Enid Blyton’s Magic Faraway Tree. You can never be sure who you’re going to run into.
By the way, our son received the Junior Aussie Larrikin Award at the Awards Presentation later in the day. Parenting a larrikin can be a mixed blessing and it’s not the sort of thing that attracts awards. They’re usually awarded to the kid who can sit still the longest, not the one who climbs the walls. An adult larrikin award was also presented. That character was throwing water from a water bottle at the crowd going past and managed to get both the Commodore and General Manager of the club.
A Fire in the Sky… taken from Gosford Sailing Club November 2018.
Quite aside from sailing, Gosford Sailing Club is a fantastic vantage point for photographing magnificent sunsets. Although I have bucket loads of sunset photos stored up on my hard drive, I can’t resist and stand their soaking up all those magnificent golden rays through my lens feeling like I’m in heaven.
Sea Mists Gosford, Australia Day 2019.
However, last Saturday afternoon, the sea mist rolled in instead for quite a different and beautifully mysterious experience. Nature is so incredibly beautiful and so ephemeral. Never the same.
Well, I hope you’ve enjoyed our visit to Gosford Sailing Club. This has been another contribution to Thursday Doors hosted by Norm 2.0. Why don’t you come and join us and share a few of your favourite doors. It’s a lot of fun and helps you see parts of the world you’ll never get to visit.
As far as George Bates was concerned, “the only good Indian was a dead Indian”. Yet, his wife was always nagging him with the words of that blasted do-gooder, Atticus, from To Kill A Mocking Bird:”You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view. Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.”
That was how he found himself spending a week out in Cherokee territory, sleeping in a tee pee and mingling with their people.
However, George was a slow learner. Had to be taught a lesson instead.
….
99 Words
As an Australian who has never been to America, I found it difficult to grapple with the Native American theme in this week’s prompt. From where I sit, it seems that Native Americans are largely invisible and it’s very rare that you see Native Americans on TV or discussed as part of the political process. This has concerned me for some time and aroused my curiosity. I had to do a fair amount of reading tonight before these ideas started peculating through. I was quite shocked to read that “the only good Indian was a dead Indian” is line from Laura inglus Wilder’s Little House on the Prairie.
I read in Wikipaedia:
“An important moment concerning Wilder’s depiction of Native Americans occurred in 1998, when an eight year old girl read Little House on the Prairie in her elementary school class. The novel contains the line, “The only good Indian is a dead Indian”; and this caused the girl great distress. Her mother, Waziyatawin Angela Cavender Wilson, a member of the Wahpetunwan Dakota nation, challenged the school on its use of the book in the classroom.[15] This prompted the American Library Association to investigate and ultimately change the name of the Wilder Award, an award named after Laura Ingalls Wilder, to the Children’s Literature Legacy Award.[15] This award is given to books that have made a large impact on children’s literature in America.[16]”
I knew none of this before so feel I’ve learned quite a lot tonight.
I hope you’ve had a great week and being the Australia Day long weekend, I’d better offer you a Vegemite sandwich along with our choice of beverage. Please don’t all run for the hills. I won’t force you to eat it!
We have had a busy and interesting week. It was the last full week of the school holidays and so there’s been that desperate urge for the kids to squeeze as much fun as they can out of those shrinking hours, while all the organizational nightmares of “Back to School” (Golly, why hasn’t anyone made a horror movie out of the return to school for the new school year? Or, perhaps, they have and I just haven’t heard about it. Anyway, for those of you scattered around the globe, the Australian school year starts after the Australia Day long Weekend and that’s what’s wrapping up today. There’s a bit of variation between the schools. However, teachers go back tomorrow, our son on Wednesday and our daughter on Friday. So, come Monday, my New Year begins in earnest and all those best laid plans of mice and mum, need to swing into action…and I definitely need a good breather too! After all, all work and no play makes Mum rather dull and cranky too.
Last Tuesday, my daughter and I attended Charlie & the Chocolate Factory…the Musical at Sydney’s historic Capitol Theatre. Our dance teacher, Miss Karina Russell, has a lead role and is playing that horridly spoiled brat, Veruca Salt. Miss Karina wears the most incredibly poofy and gorgeously delicious pink tutu, which reminds me of fairy floss and is straight out of a ballet girl’s pure imagination. She also has a double-decker tiara and pointe shoes and she actually does quite a lot of ballet throughout and her dance with the squirrels is simultaneously hilarious, terrifying and… (No spoilers here!) Anyway, we met up with Miss Karina and Willy Wonka played by Mr Paul Slade Smith at Stage Door and that was so much fun. We had the best day.
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
Above: Meeting up with Miss Karina Russell at Stage Door to get our programs signed after the performance to to say hello.
It was interesting for me to revisit Charlie & the Chocolate Factory and I can see that I’ll be having to read the book yet again so I can shake out what I’ve seen in various versions and get back to what exactly came out of Roald Dahl’s head. You see, while the action is set with the sweetly delicious context of a chocolate factory and I’ve read that it was based on Roald Dahl’s childhood experiences as a chocolate taster at a chocolate factory himself, there is a very dark and almost sadistic side to Willy Wonka and there is no doubt in my mind that this book really delves into the dark side, questioning why bad, greedy people usually win out at the expense of the good. Indeed, I feel Roald Dahl takes matters into his own hands and turns things around, ensuring that Charlie Bucket a boy growing up in grinding poverty but with a great brain triumphs over all the brats. You can read more about that in: Our Visit to Charlie & the Chocolate Factory…the Musical.
The front doors of the historic Capitol Theatre, Sydney.
I also wrote about the musical and more specifically about the historic Capitol Theatre for Thursday Doors.
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
Saturday took us off on a very different trajectory. It was Australia Day and Geoff and our son both took part in the Australia Day Regatta at Gosford Sailing Club. We had a wonderful day and a real highlight was the 11.00am Sail Past where skippers decorated their boats in as much Australia Day gumph as they could muster. It was a lot of fun and while someone else’s son was the obvious winner for the best decorated boat, our son won the Junior Aussie Larrikin Award. Instead of staying in his boat, he was towed along behind on an inflatable donut while his crew member steered and they were actually towed along because their wasn’t enough wind to compensate for the big lump of a teenage boy out the back. I must admit that his father and I were not impressed at the time, but it’s hilarious in hindsight and he was quite a hit. After all, you can’t really expect an entertainer to just sit in their boat counting knots, can you? Moreover, I really have to admit, that he’s very much my boy. I’d love to do something like that even now!
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
Above: Our son the “Junior Aussie Larrikin” with his Flying 11.
Well, they’re very much the highlights of the last week. I should also mention that it’s been very hot and that the heat could make for a post all on its own. However, I don’t want to become an Aussie whinger so I’ll keep my mouth shut and head for the air-conditioning.
This has been another Weekend Coffee Share, hosted by Eclectic Ali.
Buying bread from a man in Brussels
He was six-foot-four and full of muscles
I said, “do you speak-a my language?”
He just smiled and gave me a vegemite sandwich
And he said
I come from a land down under
Where beer does flow and men chunder
Can’t you hear, can’t you hear the thunder?
You better run, you better take cover, yeah
Yesterday, our family headed off to Gosford Sailing Club for the Australia Day Regatta. The Australia Day Regatta is the oldest continuously-conducted annual sailing regatta in the world. It has been conducted each year since 1837. While based on Sydney Harbour, races are held around the coast and apparently our winner is off to receive their medal from the Sydney Lord Mayor.
Our son with his Flying 11 ready to set sail.
By the way, if you know anything about boats, our son was competing in his Flying 11, a small sail craft and Geoff was sailing in a Magic 25 (as in 25 ft) as part of his sailing course. Meanwhile, yours truly was armed with her Nikon D3100 and left on dry land.
“There is nothing, absolutely nothing half so much worth doing as simply messing around in boats.”
-Kenneth Grahame
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
However, before the race got underway, our son was part of the Australia Day Sail Past. This was a real extroverted parade of sailors with most of the boats decked out in the most garish and ridiculous Australia Day gumph they could find. There was an inflatable boxing kangaroo and a plethora of flags and the one thing which was missing was our unofficial Australian National Anthem Down Under by Men at Work .
Above: We have my son’s boat being towed along by the support boat and his crew managinjg the boat while he (the skipper) is pulled along behind. Not the plan, but he clearly enjoyted himself, created a spectacle and won an award.
Our son had Australian Flag bunting on the stays, was wearing an Australian Flag Top hat and out the back of the boat, they were towing an inflatable plastic donut again bearing the Australian flag. For a brief time, our son managed to convince his sister to ride along behind in the donut. However, she baulked and the next thing we see is our son’s boat being towed by the support boat under the command of his crew member while the skipper was being towed along out the back with the biggest grin you’ve ever seen. He’d broken just about every convention in the book, but that’s entertainment and when it came to the award presentation at the end of the day, he took out the Junior Aussie Larrikin Award along with a $5.00 cash prize. As you may recall, our son recently made quite an impression wearing his ghillie suit at the Australian Scouting Jamboree won the dance competition winning backstage passes to see the band Justice Crew. He’s been busy!
“I would rather die of passion than of boredom.”
-Vincent Van Gogh
Our Junior Aussie Larrikin.
Meanwhile, at 2.00 pm the Regatta was off. Geoff tells me that there were 50-60 boats ranging in size from the juniors in their baths tubs (Optimus) to 40 footers, which looked like giants next to the fingerlings. Apparently, I wasn’t the only one who missed the start of the race. Geoff’s boat couldn’t hear the start gun and had to scramble to get away. Unfortunately, our sailors didn’t place. However, I’ve heard tales from our son of waves from the bigger boats crashing over the side of his tiny Flying 11 and the boat filled up with water. The spinnaker rope also slipped under the boat putting the spinnaker out of action and slowing them down. Apparently, spinnakers are known troublemakers. They’re known unaffectionately as “the divorce sail” and “prawning” is when you’ve spinnaker drags along through the water. There was a complaint yesterday that one of the sailors had go prawning but hadn’t shared his catch. They have a good sense of humour at Gosford Sailing Club.
Here’s the “Senior” or adult Aussie Larrikin at work shooting water out at the crowd, including the General Manager, who is wearing the hat in the foreground and the Commodore.
“The sailor sits by his tiller, waiting and watching. He knows he isn’t sovereign of earth and sky any more than the fish in the sea or the birds in the air. He responds to the subtle shiftings of the wind, the imperceptible ebbings of the tide. He changes course. He trims the sheets. He sails.”
– Richard Bode: First You Have to Sail A Little Boat.”
Anyway, I hope you enjoy the photographs of the line up. We had a lot of fun and loved being a part of this great event.
We would like to wish all our fellow Aussies a Happy Australia Day, while mindful of the concerns of Indigenous Australians. What, if anything, did you do to celebrate? Any sailors out there? Any great stories you’d love to share? I’d love to hear from you!
Best wishes,
Rowena
PS Here’s a few photos of the sea mist which floated in at the end of the day. It was scorchingly hot.
On Tuesday, my daughter and I ventured into Sydney with a group from her dance school to see Charlie and the Chocolate Factory…the Musical. Being a Roald Dahl tragic and chocolate lover, this musical was a must see.
My daughter with her dance teacher, Miss Karina Russell, at stage door after the performance.
However this production had an added attraction. Miss Karina Russell, our dance teacher, was playing Veruca Salt. That’s right. She was playing that awful rich brat of rich brats who I remember so clearly demanding: “I want an Oompah Loompah and I want it NOW!!” However, that’s not all. We’d already seen her costume when the cast performed at Carols in the Domain and she’s wearing what looks like a double-yoker of a tutu, a double-decker tiara, a faux mink jacket and pointe shoes and she actually manages to get some ballet in before she meets her demise. She looks amazing. Indeed, all the costumes were fantastic. However, that’s all I’m going to say about the show other than, you should try and see it.
Does doing adult dance classes make me the ultimate dance Mum? After years of driving my daughter to classes and concerts, I suddenly wanted to get out of the chair and have a go myself and I loved it. Found them so invigorating and creatively it blew me away.
However, if we go back to the title, you’ll see that this post addresses our visit to the musical, and it is in no way intended to be a review of the show. Rather, this is more of a review of how yours truly can complicate matters and achieve the extraordinary without even leaving her seat. It also looks at my personal connection with Roald Dahl. I know that might sound a bit full of myself and you’re probably wondering what this mad Australian woman has in common with Roald Dahl the literary genius. “Tell ‘er she’s dreaming!” Well, I’ll get to that.
Inside the theatre.
If you know anything about me at all, you’ll know that when my daughter and I went to see Charlie & the Chocolate Factory- the Musical, that it had to be out of the ordinary. That since we don’t do anything via the road well-travelled, that we’d wind up on our own trajectory.
Firstly, as I explained, OUR dance teacher, Miss Karina Russell, is playing Veruca Salt. Yes, that’s correct. Your eyes aren’t playing tricks on you. She is OUR dance teacher. I know that probably sounds preposterous… Rowena learning dance when I have a debilitating cocktail of significant disabilities/chronic illnesses (hydrocephalus, dermatomyositis and Institital Lung Disease). However, somehow I found a pathway through and around all of that to take adult dance classes at the same studio as my daughter, Dancin Mates, here on the NSW Central Coast. I did some sessions of lyrical and contemporary dance with Miss Karina a few years ago. Moreover, in addition to the steps, she took us on a journey through how contemporary and lyrical dance rose out of the relative straight-jacket of classical ballet and introduced me to a range of choreographers and their philosophies. Naturally, this was of particular interest to me as a writer, and I’d go home and Google them all. Of course, Miss Karina asked me if I watched them dance. Of course not. I was interested in the words.
Stage Door
Secondly, while we were sitting in our seats waiting for the curtain to rise, we had a drama of our own. While it’s our role as audience to sit in our seats while the performance is on stage, yours truly took off her glasses for a group photo, and put them on the floor under her seat. Of course, you know what happens next, don’t you?!! They disappeared. In a truly farcical “only you, Rowena” way, my glasses vanished. So, I start blindly groping under my seat probing through the dark like my fingers have eyes. Yet, on the first couple of sweeps, nothing. My daughter is sitting next to me, she gets recruited and switches on the torch on her phone. Tips out all our merchandise and starts going through our backpack (which was packed with the kitchen sink) searching for them. Nothing. Although I lose my glasses almost every morning under my bed and always find them, I’m now starting to panic. Really panic. Here we are on our musical theatre experience of a lifetime, and I’m not going to see anything at all. CATASTROPHE!! Of course, I didn’t want to alert the rest of our group. I didn’t want to be the problem child, especially when I was one of the parents. However, just as mysteriously as my glasses vanished, they returned. They must’ve gone off in the Tardis and returned.
Anyway, as I said, our experience of Charlie & the Chocolate Factory…the Musical was unique and treading down roads few have trod.
This takes me onto Roald Dahl and my incredibly personal connection to the man. While we know his books, Roald Dahl himself is an enigma of his own making. Indeed, when it comes to getting to know Roald Dahl, he’s quite the slippery fish.
I first started researching Roald Dahl a few years ago, when I included him in my blogging series: Letters to Dead Poets Letter to Roald Dahl. What particularly attracted me to Roald Dahl the man was our shared experience of going through a major neurological event and how that impacts on just about every part of your being.
Roald Dahl with his plane.
You see, during WWII, Roald Dahl was a pilot in the Air Force and he fractured his skull when his plane crashed and experienced personality changes as a result. Indeed, it was after this accident that Roald Dahl started writing and left behind his job working as an engineer for Shell. His biographer, Donald Sturrock, wrote:
“A monumental bash on the head” was how Dahl once described this accident in the Western Desert, claiming that it directly led to his becoming a writer. This was not just because his first published piece of writing was a semi-fictionalised account of the crash, but also because he suspected that the brain injuries which he received there had materially altered his personality and inclined him to creative writing.”
His daughter Ophelia recalled her father’s fascination with tales of people who had experienced dramatic psychological and physiological changes – such as losing or recovering sight – after suffering a blow to the head. He also told her that he was convinced something of this sort had happened to him, as it explained why a budding corporate businessman working for Shell, without any particular artistic ambition, was transformed into someone with a burning need to write and tell stories. This hypothesis was doubtless attractive, too, because it pushed potentially more complex psychological issues about the sources of his desire to write into the background.
Nowadays doctors might well have diagnosed Dahl as suffering from what is called post-concussive syndrome. The initial symptoms of this condition are normally forgetfulness, irritability, an inability to concentrate and severe headaches. Dahl suffered from all of these. In some patients the symptoms disappear, but leave behind longer-lasting behavioural changes, which are usually associated with mood swings and an increased lack of inhibition. In some cases, too, it can also result in a fundamental alteration of the perception of the self.1.”
Roald Dahl with wife actress Patricia Neal
However, that was not the end of Roald Dahl’s involvement with the neuro ward. 5th December, 1960 Roald Dahl’s son Theo was out walking with his nanny when a taxi veered into his pram and he was thrown into the air and landed head first onto the pavement fracturing his skull. Moreover, Theo also developed hydrocephalus or fluid on the brain and was given emergency brain surgery where they inserted a shunt. However, shunts were particularly unreliable back then and were notorious for getting blocked. This required a surgical fix, and there were serious concerns about how these surguries would affect Theo’s cognitive development. I remember how my Dad rallied when my shunt blocked, and how Dads can be a mighty force fighting to save their child no matter how old they are. So, I wasn’t surprised that Roald Dahl decided to take matters into his own hands. Dahl recruited the guy who made the hydraulic petrol pumps for his model planes and Theo’s paediatirican and togehter they developed a new shunt which saved thousands of lives, before it was superceded.
Then, as if the Dahl family hadn’t already seen enough of the neurology ward, in February 1965 his wife Patricia Neal suffered a severe stroke after an aneurism burst while she was pregnant with their fourth child, Sophie. She spent three weeks in a coma and then Roald Dahl devised a grueling rehabilitation program, which saw her return to the screen. However, that is a story in itself.
Who would’ve thought that a secret harbour was inside my head?(Hydrocephalus)
As you may be aware, I was born with hydrocephalus after Mum had a very difficult birth (not unsurprisingly I was facing the wrong way something which hasn’t changed unfortunately). However, for some reason it lay dormant like a volcano until my mid-twenties, when for some strange reason whatever had been compensating for the presence of this harbour in my head stopped and within about a six to twelve month period it blew its stack. Indeed, just about the only symptoms I had growing up was being a bit clumsy, rather extroverted and impulsive and having difficulty finding a hat which fit. It was only when I was 26 and a sense of vertigo I’d had after a bad flu didn’t clear up that I went back to the family GP who’d been treating me since I was 12, and the long and short of that, was that I was diagnosed with Dandy Walker Syndrome, a variation of hydrocephalus. After a grueling six months where I rapidly went down hill, I had brain surgery in July 1997, where they inserted a shunt. I was off to rehab for 6 months as an outpatient and left wondering if I would ever reclaim my life. The impact of all of this was like being struck by a bomb only I could never see or confront my enemy and it took a few years to feel vaguely myself again.
So, rewinding back to 1997 in Perth’s Mount Hospital, you have a young Australian woman who experienced a reversal of Roald Dahl’s big bang. Instead of having all my neurons suddenly switched up at once, mine were all switched down just as suddenly, when the shunt was put in. I very distinctly remember waking up from surgery and feeling like someone had turned down the lights. Not in terms of what I could see or hear, but I guess something along the lines of how I processed everything. I felt very, very quiet. This wasn’t, I believe, something which was apparent to those around me and I am still to this day, an extrovert and I’m sure countless people are still trying to tone me down. This was all about how I felt inside myself. Naturally, when I read about Roald Dahl’s experience, I understood what he went through immediately. Wished I could talk with him about it.
There is so much more which could be said about how personal tragedy shaped Roald Dahl’s writing. However, that will be another post. However, I hope this might encourage people who have experienced an adverse neurological event, that there is hope. That the light can switch back on. Never give up. You might even become a best-selling author, especially if you actually get your book finished!
This week, my daughter and I waltzed through the doors of Sydney’s historic Capitol Theatre to see Charlie & the Chocolate Factory- The Musical and had the experience of a lifetime. You see, our dance teacher, Miss Karina Russell, is playing that most annoying of spoilt rich brats, Veruca Salt and we attended the performance with about 20 other students and parents in a great big riotous rabble who were very one-eyed with our affections, while of course wanting to enjoy and absorb the entire show to the max.
While I’m busting to share a bit about seeing the musical, first I’m going to run through the architectural aspects of the theatre because, after all, doors are about architecture. Yet, at the same time, you could say that for a fledgling performer, getting their foot in the door and better still, having their name printed up on their dressing room door under that golden star, represents the fulfillment of a journey of a thousand miles, a lot of hard work and faith in their vision no matter what.
The Front Doors – Capitol Theatre
This year, the Capitol Theatre will be 127 years old. That’s older than any of us will ever be, and naturally this grand old dame has a past. Indeed, you’ll hardly be surprised to know, that she’s been revived (and you could even say reincarnated) into various guises over the years. After all, even a building must feel like a change from time to time.
A horse bus trundles past and carts line up outside the New Belmore Markets, published by Kerry and Co, Australia, 1893-1909, MAAS Collection, 85/1284-1538
The Capitol Theatre started out in life in 1892 as the New Belmore Markets, in Haymarket (although they were officially named after the mayor, Sir William Manning). The building was designed by council architect, George McRae, who also prepared the design for the Queen Victoria Markets. The market’s motif of fruit and foliage may still be seen in the terra cotta decorative relief of fruit and foliage in the spandrels of the arches.
2012/104/1-2/9 Photographic print, black and white, mounted, elevated view of Wirths’ Circus performers and animals on stage and in circus ring watched by the audience at the Hippodrome (Capitol Theatre), Sydney New South Wales, photographed by J D Cleary
In 1916 the building was converted to a hippodrome designed specifically for the Wirth Bros circus, which included a reinforced concrete water tank for performances by seals and polar bears. The tank had a hydraulically controlled platform that was raised from the base to form a cover that doubled as a circus ring when the pool was not in use. While I know the use of live animals in circuses is something many of us no longer condone, the clowns and acrobats still make the circus a show.
Inside Capitol Theatre – Charlie & the Chocolate Factory…the Musical.
Within 10 years the circus became financially unviable and Wirth Bros initiated the idea of converting the theatre to a picture palace or movie theatre and Union Theatres became its next tenant. The classical reproduction statues and architectural props were manufactured in the US, scrupulously numbered for shipment and reassembly – supervised by Sydney theatre designer Henry White. Opening night was held on Saturday 7th April, 1928:
OPENING CEREMONY
The effect of the new Capitol Theatre on the crowds which entered it on Saturday night was bewildering, and a little overwhelming. One seemed to have stepped from under the dull skies of everyday life and passed into an enchanted region, where the depth of the blue heavens had something magical about it, and something heavily exotic. Clouds passed lightly over; then stars began to twinkle. Then again all was blue and clear.
This “atmospheric” effect had been carried out, not only in the auditorium itself, but also in the entrance lounge, so that it leapt upon the visitors the instant they left the street. The construction and decorations were all in the Venetian style. Facing the entrance above the doors which led to the stalls ran a slender balustrade, with tapestries hanging over it and lying against the pinkish-brown, variegated stucco of the walls. At either end stairways in two flights ran up to the balcony. Everywhere one looked there was bas-reliefs set into the wall, tapestries hanging, twisted pillars of red and gold.
In the auditorium itself there was a much greater profusion of sculpture and architectural detail and objects of art; but the great size of the place enabled all this to be set forth with no suspicion of cramping. Indeed, the designers have achieved a remarkable feeling of depth and vastness. The two sides of the theatre are quite dissimilar in treatment. On the left, as one faced the screen, the irregular facade terminated in a delightful garden, with a round tower in the midst, supported by red and white Florentine pillars, with flowering vines drooping down towards the orchestra, with flocks of snowy doves. On the right a series of huge pedestals and niches, bearing reproductions of the Hermes of Praxiteles, the Capitoline Wolf, and other famous statues, and thrown into relief by the decorative cypress trees behind, led down to a large palace-front with a balcony. As for the proscenium itself, that was roofed in red tiles, to heighten the feel- ing of out-of-doors, surmounted by groups of beautiful glowing lamps, and very richly ornamented, a particularly attractive feature being a row of peacocks with electric lights behind them.
The lighting in fact, played a great part in the theatre’s success. In general it was diffused, and gained a pleasantly restful quality from the blue that floated In the roof; but at the same time bulbs bad been concealed here and there, so as to bring out the features of the decoration and give the surroundings vivacity. Sometimes, when all the main lights had been extinguished, there remained a charming half-glow on the proscenium, with the lamps, a glow of scarlet in the niches behind the statues, and a yellow glare behind some trelllslns at the sides as the dominant notes.
The first event on Saturday night when the curtain of rich varigated red and green rose from the footlights was the official opening of the theatre by the Chief Civic Commissioner (Mr. Fleming). The directors of Union Theatres, Ltd., said Mr. Fleming, deserved the highest praise for this venture, which had cost them £180,000. It was remarkable to think what progress the films had made during the very few years they had been in existence. He himself could remember attending the first motion picture screened in Sydney.”Sydney Morning Herald(NSW : 1842 – 1954), Monday 9 April 1928, page 4
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
However, thanks to the advent of TV, attendances at theatres plummeted and after the very successful staging of Jesus Christ Super Star in 1972, the future of the Capitol Theatre hung in the balance once again and plans were made to demolish it and replace it with a modern lyric theatre. In 1981 Australia’s last remaining atmospheric theatre was snatched from the jaws of the bulldozer by a Heritage Council conservation order and plans were made to restore the building and create a world-class lyric theatre. You can read more about that here.
So, after all these different roles, as I said, the Capitol Theatre is currently hosting Charlie & the Chocolate Factory…the Musical. Although my daughter does a lot of dancing and has appeared in multiple performances, we only get to one of these big shows every couple of years and when we do we get right into it buying the merchandise, the musical score and feeling lost somewhere in between this fabricated world and reality. The first big musical I went to was Annieand then my daughter and I went to see Matildaa few ago. However, Charliehas a special place in our hearts thanks to Miss Karina, who I mentioned is our dance teacher and staring as Veruca Salt. She spends the entire show in a very fancy and oh so over the top pink tutu, pointe shoes and a double-decker tiara…only the best.
Although Miss Karina has one of the lead roles, we didn’t know how long she’d appear on stage and whether she’d actually get a chance to dance very much. Aside from having seen her costume and being warned she gets eaten by squirrels, we were in the dark. Her performance was going to be a complete surprise. Moreover, that’s what it’s going to stay, because I don’t want to spoil your fun either. Let’s just say there was much more that I expected and that if you like a bit of ballet but might not get through an entire ballet, you’ll love this. Indeed, it might even encourage you to hit the big time.
After the performance, we all headed round to Stage Door to meet up with Miss Karina and we had the added bonus of Willy Wonka as well. I think all of us had seen her the day before in the studio. However, it was like we hadn’t seen her in years and as she walked out stage door, she was swamped. A performing artist can have fans, but nothing compares to this. I hope she felt the love, because I sure did.
I am still working on a more extended post about our Charlie experience, but it’s taking longer than I’d hoped. I researched Roald Dahl a few years ago for a series I wrote: Letters to Dead Poets. It turns out the Roald Dahl and I have some peculiar similarities and while I been beavering away on that post for a few days, I have to get a lot of details right and it’s taking longer than I’d hoped. However, getting historical facts wrong is worse in my book than making grammatical errors or spelling mistakes. Yet, I haven’t given up. It’s simply a work in progress.
This has been another contribution to Thursday Doors hosted by Norm 2.0. Why don’t you come and join us and share a few of your favourite doors. It’s a lot of fun and helps you see parts of the world you’ll never get to visit.
There was something eerie and chilling to the bones about finding this old dead Chev dumped deep inside the woods. While Jane had seen deceased, decrepit vehicles rusting into the dirt on local farms, she’d never seen something like this in the woods before. As she cautiously edged towards the car, she almost leaped out of her skin, as leaf litter crunched under foot and she remembered a story about young lovers who disappeared without a trace. She thought they’d been driving a Chev, but how had it resurrected from the dead? Why now? Where were they?
Well, it’s just hit Monday afternoon at my place just North of Sydney, Australia and you’re welcome to join me for a cup of tea or coffee and even a chocolate macadamia cookie. Virtual consumption doesn’t put on any weight!
How has your week been?
The kids BEFORE Jamboree
It’s hard for me to know quite where to start, because I was about to say that my new car was the best thing about my week, but then I remembered that the kids also came home from the Australian Scouting Jamboree last Tuesday and nothing compares to having them back home. We really missed them and I must admit that I was rather pathetic scouring through photos on the Facebook page trying to find them. Often, it was like “Where’s Wally” and our eyesight isn’t what it used to be either. It’s almost comic in hindsight, but on the morning they were due back, arrival times kept getting put back and it was becoming quite difficult to guage when the bus was going to pull up. Of course, there was no way I was going to miss the actual arrival of the bus and that incredible moment when the doors burst open and our scouts (in what ever condition they’d arrived back home in) burst through the doors. We allowed ourselves a 15 minute head start on the last message and I didn’t care about being early and waiting. I HAD to be there. However, we we’re about 5-10 minutes away when a text arrived saying the bus was off the freeway and it was clear that it was going to get there first. Yikes! Of course, this doesn’t sound very sensible, However, as they say, never come between a mother and her baby. Fortunately, Geoff was driving and he was more sedate and level-headed. However, as we entered the road where the bus was pulling up, council had decided to do roadworks. So you have a bus load of Scouts just off the bus and hoards of parents coming in to pick them up and you have this piddly council worker on his steam roller very sedately driving across blocking the road and there’s was also one of those !@#$ lollypop people standing there with the stop sign. Well yours truly with stitches in her foot and doing a hop-along Cassidy routine, jumps out of the car and hobbles off to her children on foot. Love knows no distance, or it seems, no common sense either. Well, this must’ve jolted these council workers into action because they suddenly allowed the traffic to go round them. So, while I’m hobbling along at a galloping snail’s pace, Geoff drives straight through and pips me to the post. That’s the last time I act like an irrational maniac, I mean, mother. Well, maybe not. It seems that I was put on this planet to act as a cautionary tale for others.
Our son AFTER Jamboree
If we reverse up a bit, you might recall that I mentioned a “new car”. You might also recall that I’ve had more than my share of car troubles lately after badly scraping the car one week and writing it off in the hospital car park the next and two week’s later the replacement car was caught in a hail storm and we also expect it to be written off. All up, we were in the market for two replacement vehicles as the Nissan Pulsar we bought just after we were engaged and bought our house, is now something like 18 years old and it’s time for it to move out.
Feeling like a new woman in my hot new car.
As it turned out, my husband became rather “absorbed” by his car quest cruising round online auction sites like many a crazy desperado hunting around Tinder. However, his dogged persistence paid off and he certainly caught my attention when he pointed out a red Alfa Romeo 159. While the Italians consider it a “family sedan”, it’s still rather sporty, very stylish and in addition to being RED, has a sunroof. I was in love. So was our daughter. We had to have that car. Yet, we also had to keep our heads. It was an auction and as Geoff reminded us, you’re not supposed to become emotionally attached before it’s yours. However, it was too late. I was all but dribbling all over my laptop screen.
Obviously, we won the auction and yesterday we took “Blue” as I think he’ll become known (a bloke with red hair in Australia at least used to be called “Blue” hence Virgin Blue) for a drive to get some good photos. That was a lot of fun. Blue is really good to drive and not just a car to get you from A to B. It’s an experience. Fingers crossed it remains a good experience. We are a little concerned about whether performance and reliability will live up to it’s Italian good looks and style.
Anyway, we drove Blue down to Patonga. However, there was no parking by the beach or jetty and so we cruised around the backstreets until we found a more secluded location. It was very relaxing and serene and we also happened to spot a pelican cruising along.
Our next location was in front of the Imagine sign at either Tascott on Brisbane Waters, near Woy Woy. That was a lot of fun too. Hard to believe that I’ve never photographed this sign before when I photograph almost everything in sight. However, I’m also a bit of a perfectionist and am wanting that perfect shot. I would’ve liked more sun and blue sky. However, I really wanted to share my good news and a compromise was in order.
My daughter and I.
This week, I’ve also been writing up about our trip up North staying with my husband’s sister at Newrybar, near Byron Bay. This region is not only famous for its stunning natural beauty. It’s also bursting with creative energy and there’s music almost on even street corner in Byron Bay, and so many artists at the markets. I always come home feeling so inspired and that despite my devotion to my writing, photography and violin, that I’m only living at half mast and there’s so much more I could do. That I need to stop being afraid and stop aiming for absolute crippling perfection before I even get started and just do it. That there really is something inside which is worth coming out.
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
????????????????????????????????????
Here are some links to the posts I’ve written so far:
Well, I think we’re into the last week of school holidays, which means it’s time to refocus on all the nuts and bolts of life and get organized. Find shoes for feet and sort out uniforms. It goes quite against the grain of wanting to make the most out of the last precious days you have left. Meanwhile, my daughter and I are off to see Charlie & the Chocolate Factory…the Musical tomorrow and one of my daughter’s dance teacher plays Veruca Salt so it will be particularly special. We can’t wait!
This has been another Weekend Coffee Share, hosted by Eclectic Ali.
“Red has guts …. deep, strong, dramatic. A geranium red. A Goya red … to be used like gold for furnishing a house … for clothes, it is strong, like black or white.”
–Valentino
For those of you who have been following my ups and downs here on Beyond the Flow for awhile, you’ll know that I’ve had some car troubles over the last couple of months. These began with a nasty scrape in the supermarket car park and was following up with driving into a concrete divider in a car park which cracked the radiator and our red Nissan Pulsar was written off. For those of you who appreciate a bit of humour, I say that I took my son to the Emergency Department but my car didn’t make it home alive. My husband bought a Subaru Forester and we all really loved that car. However, I think it was only two weeks after we bought it, that I got caught in a hail storm and the car is covered in dents and everyone else we know, has had their cars written off. So, we were back to the online auctions and that’s when my husband stumbled across an Alfa Romeo 159. I can’t remember what year is was made and I struggled to remember the 159 part, but the trait I never lost sight of, was that is was red. An absolutely luscious red that makes you want to go and put on your tap shoes and dance on the table.
“There is a shade of red for every woman.”
-Audrey Hepburn
I need to brush up on my modelling skills.
However, it wasn’t just the colour that lured me in. It is Italian and oozes with Italian style and pizazz. Indeed, the Italians invented pizazz. This included a leather interior. I have always wanted a sports car, and while this is technically classified as a family sedan, this Italian sedan has nothing to with being sensible, responsible and did I mention anything about being dowdy? Not on your life. In other words, my Red Alfa, who in typical Australian fashion, could well be named “Blue” is my midlife crisis, post-disability and chronic illness mobile.
Look who popped out of my sunroof! Photo Geoff Newton
Although the car actually arrived home on Friday, I wanted to wait and get some good photos incorporating our beautiful local scenery rather than photographing it while it was simply parked in our driveway. While I clearly need more experience posing as a photo model, we haven’t turned out too badly and didn’t crack the lens.
The pelican didn’t seem that interested in my new car.
On our first photo stop, we drove over to Patonga about a fifteen minute drive away. Being a Sunday during the January Summer school holidays, there were no parking spots at the beach or near the wharf and so we meandered around through the back streets until we found a spot on the Hawkesbury River side and there was a stunning pelican swimming back and forth doing its rounds.
The backwaters of Patonga, NSW.
We also thought we’d head over to Koolewong on Brisbane Waters to photograph the car in front of the Imagine Sign. Based on the game of Scrabble, IMAG_NE features large letter pieces which spell out the word “IMAGINE”, with a space where the second “I” would be and invites the community to interact with the sculpture to complete the word.
Created by Australian visual artist and creative producer, Emma Anna, the artwork originally exhibited at Bondi’s famous Sculpture by the Sea in 2008, and has since featured around the world including at Denmark’s inaugural Sculpture by the Sea in 2009.
I think the sculpture was installed on the Gosford Waterfront towards the end of 2016 and yet I’ve never stopped and photographed it, which really is rather extraordinary when you think of the vast myriad of things I have photographed. I don’t often drive into Gosford so it’s probably a case of out of sight, out of mind. However, I’ve always loved it. Not only do I love to imagine, but I also love Imagineby John Lennon.
Let me reassure you the car was stationary when these photos were taken. Photo: Geoff Newton.
Needless to say, the kids are expecting to be driven to school in the Alfa, instead of the bomb which usually gets parked at the station. We’ll have to see.
Lastly, I’ll leave you with some of my favourite driving songs:
Lastly, as I was just wrapping up with a Google search for “red car” to see what turned up, up popped The Wiggles hit: The Big Red Car, which dare I say it, has to rate as a driving song and has certainly been a big hit. It just wasn’t quite the driving song I was hoping for:
Toot Toot, Chugga Chugga, Big Red Car We’ll travel near and we’ll travel far Toot Toot, Chugga Chugga, Big Red Car We’re gonna ride the whole day long Murray’s in the back seat Playing his guitar Murray’s in the back seat Of the Big Red Car
The Wiggles: Big Red Car
I’m not sure that the Wiggle’s Big Red Caris a good place to finish up, but c’est la vie. What do you think about my new set of wheels? What are a few of your favourite driving songs? When it comes to what I usually listen to in the car, it’s usually the local radio station or a CD like David Bowie. I do like listening to him in the car. Ed Sheerin’s another but I usually hear him on the radio. That reminds me of beautifully moving ballad: Perfect.
Please don’t mention red trees to my husband. Once when we were driving around Byron Bay, I kept pointing out red trees and wondering out loud what type of tree it was, which resulted in years of stirring and him or the kids pointing to every red tree we came across and calling out: “Red tree!!” I would’ve thought a bit of passion and enthusiasm was a good thing, but clearly you’re supposed to hide your love away. Be more contained.
“Red has guts …. deep, strong, dramatic. A geranium red. A Goya red … to be used like gold for furnishing a house … for clothes, it is strong, like black or white.”
–Valentino
Anyway, as soon as I drove into Bangalow on our recent holiday, I spotted the beautiful bright red tree in the grounds of Bangalow Public School. Indeed, I’m lucky I didn’t drive off the road. Red trees have that kind of effect on me, not unlike Chris de Burgh and his Lady in Red:
“Trees do not preach learning and precepts. They preach, undeterred by particulars, the ancient law of life.”
― Herman Hesse
The Red tree viewed through the school gates.
For those of you for whom the name “red tree” is woefully insufficient, and you need to know the official scientific names of trees, this is an Illawarra Flame Tree or Currajong.
It grows up to 35 m in the wild but only about 10m in gardens. The bright red bell-shaped flowers grow in clusters at the end of branches, often after the leaves have dropped, giving the plant a distinctive look. It is a deciduous tree that is often found growing alongside the Red Cedar in lowland rainforest habitat.
A few months after the jettisoning of the leaves, the tree produces masses of bell-shaped vivid scarlet flowers. They do not always flower annually and put on their best display maybe only once every five years, especially after a hot dry summer. In between these times, they may only produce one or two branches of flowers on the whole tree.
It produces a tough leathery dark-brown seed pod, containing rows of corn-like seeds that are surrounded by hairs that will irritate the skin and nose and throat if inhaled. They are toxic to many native animals and birds.
The twists and turns of these dazzling red flowers is so intriguing. I could stare at them for hours grappling with their idiosyncrasies.
“Trees are poems that the earth writes upon the sky. ”
― Kahlil Gibran
“Put on your red shoes, and dance the blues away322222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222222666666666666666666666666666666666666666666666666666666666666666666666666.”
David Bowie
“Until you dig a hole, you plant a tree, you water it and make it survive, you haven’t done a thing. You are just talking.”
― Wangari Maathai
“Character is like a tree and reputation like a shadow. The shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.”
-Abraham Lincoln
These root protuberances reminded me of chicken feet.
“I am old enough to know that a red carpet is just a rug.”
Beyond the Flow 