Australian Aboriginal flag
For Valentine's Day, GK made (vegan) rainbow caviar to express
support for LGBTI individuals in Russia. An entry regarding this can
be found on his new blog,
Game of Thorns. The caviar and blog are quite impressive, so
if you get a chance, I recommend having a look.
The colourful spheres reminded me of the dots in Aboriginal
paintings, so I asked him if I could use some of what he made for my
own purposes. I wanted to try to create a version of the Aboriginal
flag. I am not a fan of the actual Australian flag.
Australia Day is January 26th.
Many Aboriginal Australians refer to Australia Day as Invasion Day,
and for them it is not a day of celebration, but of mourning. To put
a positive spin on this, it is sometimes called Sovereignty Day,
Survival Day, or Arrival Day and there are those who spend the day
trying to bring awareness to certain issues.
Indigenous Australians are still experiencing the effects and
aftereffects of British colonization. They have a much lower life
expectancy and quality of life than other Australians, and are more
likely to die in custody or get shot. They still don't have adequate
land rights, and their lands have been used for things like
uranium mining, or nuclear testing, and nuclear waste
disposal has been proposed.
Most people are probably just happy to have some time off, but
celebrating in a certain fashion can come across as saying 'we are
happy to have killed off your ancestors, and we have no intention of
acknowledging the richness of your culture on our day.' This might
change if there was a more inclusive kind of celebration.
I spent the day listening to the Triple J 100. I didn't start
drinking until around the top 20. My room is above the garage, and in
the garage, Kiki and her new baby Oz were in a nestbox that is
situated in the garage (it's the only nestbox that isn't outside). It
was the first time the baby had been seen out of the pouch.
One DJ did ask listeners to think about what Australia Day might
mean to indigenous Australians.
Maybe I wasn't totally paying attention, but it seemed to me that
most of the people phoning in were spending Australia Day in
extremely conventional, unimaginative ways: playing cricket or footy,
drinking beer and eating sausages, sausage rolls or meat pies. I was
a bit surprised that the concepts behind a 'progressive' station like
Triple J don't apply to other areas of Australian lives. Why do food
and activity choices have to be so limited? So many
of them have been brought over from you-know-where.
When celebrating a country's name day, it would seem to make sense to
celebrate what is unique or special about that particular country. Do
Australians appreciate or acknowledge the cultural contributions of
indigenous Australians? The incredible diversity of flora and fauna?
In a sense, native animals are also indigenous Australians, but they
don't have as many rights as cats and dogs, and most Australians
really don't know much about them.
To sum it all up: a more progressive, inclusive approach to Australia
Day is needed.
->exile on meme st: a diary
->xesce.net