Stuff the begrudgers, the liberals and the virtue signallers. Despite the continuing fires, the threat of coronavirus and all the other woes that beset the world, may I wish fellow Charioteers a very HAPPY AUSTRALIA DAY.
OZ
It’s THAT day again
Stuff the begrudgers, the liberals and the virtue signallers. Despite the continuing fires, the threat of coronavirus and all the other woes that beset the world, may I wish fellow Charioteers a very HAPPY AUSTRALIA DAY.
OZ
Boadicea's Chariot 
And a glorious day it was. A country that gave the world the secret ballot, the first place where women — including indigenous women — were allowed to vote, where the 8-hour work day originated, where people from across the world, against all odds, built an admirable quality of life. Australia is a country where peoples who’ve lived there for 50,000 years or who’ve only just arrived have found a way to carve out new niches, a country that has the best coffee, but also the best cheeses. It’s a country that has the best lamb cooked anyway you like — a traditional British roast, or Uygur stir fry. Happy belated Australia Day.
Not so happy for the family of the sixty year old who choked to death in a lamington eating contest. The cake sounds delicious, but I think one would be enough for me.
Poor place needs all the best wishes it can get with the current happenings
I feel so sorry for the wildlife. Pity someone couldn’t have cut the fences for creatures to escape.
Hello Christopher. As Bearsy will attest, I have long been a vociferous admirer of that great antipodean country that is called Australia. So it gives me some cause for hesitation that I must take issue with respect to your remarks regarding the voting rights of women, and Aboriginals. I may be wrong, but it has been my understanding that Aborigines were not granted full voting rights until 1962. I refer you to this site here. https://www.creativespirits.info/aboriginalculture/selfdetermination/voting-rights-for-aboriginal-people
As for being the first modern democracy to grant women the right to vote, I fear that dubious distinction goes to Australia’s cousins across the Tasman Sea. https://nzhistory.govt.nz/womens-suffrage-day
All that aside, I too send my belated best wishes.
Next month we will be taking a houseboat on Lake Kariba with our ‘New Australian’ family, who will be over from Brisbane. In case you are unaware, Lake Kariba, remains the largest man-made reservoir in the world, by some considerable margin. The dam wall was completed in 1959 and for the past 60 years has served as a holiday destination for landlocked Zimbabweans. The fishing and game viewing can be spectacular. In the old days, we used to swim and water ski, but now there are far too many crocodiles. A misguided, in my view, policy by the authorities to maintain a healthy population of the reptiles required crocodile farmers to return a portion of their stock into the lake.
Kariba has also been the main source of electricity for the country. Of course our post colonial leaders inherited what amounted to a free source of power and never felt the need to increase capacity, despite the fact that when the dam opened, the population of this country was 3 million. It is now 15 million. So now we have almost constant power cuts.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kariba_Dam
This gives you an idea of houseboats. http://www.houseboatsonkariba.com/shop/
Pure and simple from me, Bearsy.
‘Advance Australia Fair’
Mainly not too bad an idea.
In my opinion.
Probably.
Sipu: New Zealand granted women the right to vote in 1893 when it was still a colony. Australia became independent in 1901 and women throughout the Commonwealth were given the right to vote in 1902 thus dragging Queensland, kicking and screaming, into modernity. New Zealand became a country in 1907. Pitcairn granted women the right to vote in 1838. South Australia granted women the right to vote in local elections in 1861. Indigenous people in South Australia were given the right to vote by 1895. As such, New Zealand wasn’t any more impressive than, say, Wyoming which granted universal suffrage in 1890.
“When the governor, Lord Glasgow, signed a new Electoral Act into law, New Zealand became the first self-governing country in the world in which women had the right to vote in parliamentary elections.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gough_Whitlam
“With the crisis unresolved, Kerr decided to dismiss Whitlam as prime minister.[152] Fearing that Whitlam would go to the Queen and potentially have him removed, the Governor-General gave Whitlam no prior hint.[153] He conferred (against Whitlam’s advice) with High Court Chief Justice Sir Garfield Barwick, who agreed that he had the power to dismiss Whitlam.[154]”
Sipu: Doesn’t change the fact that New Zealand, in 1893, was a self-governing colony no more remarkable than South Australia, New South Wales, Queensland, Tasmania or Western Australia. Because New Zealand opted out of the Federation with the other colonies, it “claims” to be the first “country” — even though it did not actually become a country until 1907 — 6 years after Australia, and 5 years after all women in the new Commonwealth of Australia had the right to vote.
New Zealand also claims the flat white and Pavlova, in spite of their Australian provenance.
A few days later, and it is that other day again. Groundhog Day !! 🙂
Hi Feeg. What a shame – I never knew that and it’s almost over. Must make a diary note for next year and order some groundhogs.
OZ