A MEMOIR – my life through the lens of culture from 1954 to 1991 -
My maternal grandparents were born in
Ireland. My paternal
grandparents were born in England and Ireland. My paternal grandfather
anglicised the spelling of the surname 'Coughlin' to 'Coghlan' on
arrival in
England to conceal his Irish identity. Interestingly, my maternal
grandparents
altered the spelling of their surname - O'Burn, to Burns on arrival in
Australia for the same reason. It was more acceptable to be considered
Scottish
in this country in the early part of the 20th century, and it also
served the
purpose of masking the fact that they were Catholic. Being Catholic was
a
definite bar to respectable employment in Australia as late as the
1960's. I was born on the 26th of May, 1954, in
Adelaide's only
Catholic hospital - Calvary. I was the third born into a loving and
heavily
Catholic family. Three of my grandparents died before I started school.
I can
only remember the fourth grandparent, my father's 'very English'
mother, with
any clarity. It is then of some interest that I have always considered
myself
to be more Irish than English. I'm not sure why. Certainly my mother
was much
prouder of her Irish heritage than father seemed of his English
heritage. My mother
told of leprechauns, sang Irish songs, and her 'Irish temper' was
infamous in our
family. The only effect I can pinpoint in my childhood that may have
stemmed
from my part English background, aside from the obvious influences of
language
and the predominant Anglo-Saxon mores, was an inherent snobbery that my
father
possessed, and a concern for class that frowned upon we children mixing
with
those he deemed below us. This, despite his own relatively humble lower
middle
class socio-economic status. My paternal grandfather however was often
spoken of as a man
of letters, a man of high culture, who insisted occasionally that his
nine
children spoke French at the dinner table. This my father never tired
of
telling. Until age seven, the predominant cultural
values surrounding
me were an Anglo-Irish hybrid. This included religion, family life, and
as I
became increasingly aware, sport – a sub-cultural aspect that took over
my life
about this time and continued well into my adult life as a key to
acceptance in
many different situations. How very Australian! My early contact with
sport
also brought my first encounter with Australian Aborigines. My first contact with Aborigines was in the
local football
team. There were a few black members of the team who were irregularly
present.
This irregular attendance was ascribed to the blanket phenomenon of
'walkabout'. Even in 1962, Aborigines did not seem to live in one
place. They
seemed to wander at will from town to town. I don't know if it was
true, but I
accepted it totally from others as fact. An incident concerning
Aborigines which
made a significant impression on me was a conversation I had with a
black teammate
in the town's public toilets. He informed me that his people did not
like to be
called 'boongs', but 'darkies' was a term they did not consider
insulting, and
they used it to refer to each other. The first time I remember someone from a
different culture
causing conflict in my life was a day when two newly arrived Italian
lads
joined in on the lunchtime football field. The older of the two, though
his
command of English was limited, was fairly aggressive and fairly
assertive in
his knowledge of the rules of our great Australian game! I remember
feeling
very annoyed, disagreeing with him vehemently, thumping him one, and
running
home from school to the protection of my mother. How could one so
recently arrived
with so little English know the rules of OUR game! We moved back to the city; I to college.
Very little
cultural contact there apart from I moved schools. As a day scholar in a
boarding school, I
came into contact with people from Asia for the first time. What
contact I had
with them was always as part of a group, and relations seemed friendly.
Perhaps
the fact they were boarders, and lived at the school, enabled them to
mix more
freely with Anglo-Australian children than the Italian children did in
my
previous school. I began studying French and Latin. French I
was vaguely
aware as a 12 year old Australian schoolboy was a language spoken by
real
people in some place far away called France. I felt absolutely zero
connection
between myself and those people living far away in France. Latin was
referred
to as a 'dead language', spoken long ago by the Romans but no longer in
current
usage as a form of oral communication between real people. It's
interesting to
consider that the fact that French was a 'living' language and Latin
'dead', made
absolutely no difference to my appreciation of them. They were simply
subjects
I studied at school. I found Latin easier than French so I persevered
with it
longer. Writing now I wonder whether it is actually erroneous to
consider
studying these subjects as I attended Catholic schools. I was impressed
by a
priest/teacher who was able to come in at the start of each class with
greetings in Latin. He taught us to say the prayers at the start of
each class
in Latin. However, just as it was in Mass, we understood nothing of
what we
intoned. It was at this same time at the same Jesuit
school that I
had a teacher who was the only vaguely foreign teacher I ever had
throughout my
school life. He was Irish and spoke with a heavy accent. He was
eccentric and
would occasionally get wildly angry, further corroborating my
prejudicial
belief that all Irish possessed tempers to be feared. Catholic schools were of course religious,
and they
purported to be strict, and depending on the teacher, they were at
times
extremely so. Schools function as transmitters of culture and when a
particular
religion is the focus of the acculturation intended you get a more
thorough
dose of those aspects of your culture considered to be more important.
In my earlier
years at school, Catholic schools existed to produce Catholics. Every
day and every
lesson began and ended with a prayer. We had a period of formal
religious instruction
every day - it was given as least as much weight as any other subject
being studied.
On average, we attended Mass at school once a week. Most of the
teachers throughout
my school life were priests, brothers and nuns. As I grew older we had
more Strict meant corporal punishment, and it was
practised
daily. As early as grade four I witnessed nuns venting their anger on
young children
with canes to the hands or the backside. Some were quite savage in
their fury
and infliction of punishment. Such scenes of caning and strapping were
a
regular theme throughout my school life. It was not questioned by us
whether or
not it should occur. It simply did. It was a given. The effect of it
all upon
myself was not to inspire fear, but as I grew older I came to realise
that its paramount
effect was to lessen my regard for authority and those who wielded it.
I think it's
unfortunate that it also resulted in me regarding religious with
disdain. I was
regularly caned and strapped, and I could never understand how people
who lived
'a life with God' I could not end any discussion of my school
life without
reference to sport and the role it played in my development. It may be
that
sport in Australia is a core value of the dominant Anglo culture, but
my
contact with other realms of Anglo - Australian culture far removed
from the
world of sport made it seem more to me like a sub-culture that I
regularly
retreated to and was enveloped in. It had the dual effect of both
making me
feel totally accepted by those who embraced the values of this
sub-culture, and
at other times making me feel quite alien in the company of other
Anglo-Australians
with whom I spent a great deal of my time. Despite the reputation this
country
has of being sport crazy where everybody to a man embraces its value, I
can
testify that there are a great many individuals who loathe sport , and
who
found it extremely puzzling that a seemingly intelligent, sensitive
person as myself
would devote so much time to it. I devoted so much time to it because I was
very good at it,
and I discovered very early its value in establishing oneself as an
important
member of groups, particularly in schools where it was looked on with
admiration by peers and teachers. Without going into sentimental detail
about
it, the doors that sport opened for me made my life growing up
immeasurably easier
and more pleasurable. It gave me friendships, it boosted my confidence,
it gave
me health, and was an open ticket to peer group acceptance whenever I
changed
schools. However, the older I got the more I became aware of the
typecasting 'sport
freaks' were subject to. For another group of people that I was
increasingly It was the 1960's and "the times they were
a’
changin'." The Vietnam war was on, I had moved out of home, and drugs
had
become a part of my life. I had become aware of and part of a struggle
between
two sets of contrasting values within my own culture: a struggle
between new
and old ways, modern and traditional, young and old. I signed up for
the new,
the modern, and the young culture; that offshoot of mainstream culture
that Theodore
Roszak labelled the "counter culture." I had become aware of greed,
materialism
and war, and was only too keen to blame my parents' generation for the
inequality
and hypocrisy I saw around me. I rebelled against my middle class
upbringing and
the values they represented: security, family life, and conservatism. I
expressed my Looking back it was an unlikely set of
cultural influences
that were operating upon those Throughout this period at university, I
travelled
extensively in Australia and overseas, My next journey overseas was to South East
Asia. The journey
began in Singapore when it was still an underdeveloped society. The
abundant
squalor and overcrowding and streets teeming with life had a profound
impact on
me. Nothing in my life prior to that first day in Singapore as an
impressionable nineteen year old had prepared me for the shock I felt
that day.
I moved on to Djakarta and the shock was even more resounding. People
living and
dying in the gutter; the smells and sores of abject poverty. I was
virtually
penniless and I felt like a rich man, having to brush past the
outstretched
arms of a row of crippled beggars. It was an easy and logical step to
return to
my studies in Adelaide and begin a passionate inquiry into why the
world could
be so unequal, and it served to reinforce my denunciation of the middle
class
western culture that I had been brought up in, and that I saw as
responsible
for the inequities that I came face to face with in Asia. It was in Asia too that I became aware of a
way of living
that was less clock oriented, more relaxed and much more public about
expressing religious worship. Shrines and alters to deities dot the
cities and
countryside. Burnings of incense and offerings of food to deities at
these
shrines and alters happened on the street. People did not dress up to
attend temples
or mosques. Religion seemed more part of life, not apart from it as it
did at home.
Some religious even used marijuana to heighten the sense of the
spiritual. It
was not just deemed an anti-social and irresponsible act. For me, it
was as if
the taking of mind-expanding drugs was validated by other creeds. I completed my B.A. and went to England - my
first
experience of living and working in a foreign land. I felt at home and
away
from home all at once. I was vaguely embarrassed by my
'Australian-ness'. We
were popularly depicted as beer swilling lovers of sun and sport,
somehow
barbaric for our pursuit of pleasure, and not 'cultured'. I did not
feel like I
fitted the typical mould, and this experience of the English (and later
Europeans) wanting to stereotype me I'm sure was partly responsible for
me attempting
to 'de-Australianise' myself. I did not want to speak like an
Australian; I did
not want to be associated with the brash and ugly stereotypes that the
British
media portrayed. I wanted to show that Australians could be more
sophisticated
than that. (I don't think this was a pretentious or artificial act on
my part.
It was more a natural result of my upbringing that I had till now
resented, and
a reaction to the situation I found myself in.) Throughout my educational life to this point
I had been fed
the notion of the mother country with its royalty, nobility, and
manners. As
the origin of our culture, the spawner of a great literary tradition,
the
masters of the empire on which the sun never set, I guess I was in awe
of
Britain. I consequently looked up to it. It was with some surprise then
that I
found so many of its inhabitants narrow minded and myopic, almost
peasant like.
Denigrate the popular image of the Australian they may have done, but
for
thousands of British citizens Australia was this paradise on the other
side of
the world where their dreams could be realised. I had never considered
my
homeland to be a paradise, but the more I travelled the more I saw it
as that.
(I still do.) The longer I stayed away the more I threw off the
cultural
cringe. I became proud to be Australian, and my visit to the national
centre of
births and deaths in London helped me to understand just what that
meant. To see, on paper, in the vaults of that
building far away
from home, the names of all my grandparents as having been born in the
United
Kingdom reduced me to tears. I felt at home. Home somehow seemed a much
larger
place than it ever had before. I felt part of something much bigger
than I had
ever imagined. I felt part of a culture that had been split in two, and
it felt
sad, awesome and wondrous. I travelled to the Isle of Wight, to the
church
where my maternal grandparents had married, and stood contemplating the
fact that
two people, one of whom I never knew, did something in that church long
ago
that eventually led to my existence. Gone was any feeling of resentment
of my
upbringing, my heritage. I was glad to be alive. I was glad my
grandparents had
got married, and raised my father who in turn had me. I felt English,
Irish,
and Australian. If I was in awe of England, I was even more
so of Europe. My
education had told me that England was the birthplace of our culture,
but that
Europe was the cradle of our civilization. This time it was seeing the
white
cliffs of Dover recede into the distance that felt like another
umbilical cord
being cut. I found myself in situations where no one spoke English and
unlike
Asia, people were not so ready to offer assistance to a stranger in
need. I
discovered a German population intent on atoning for the sins of the
holocaust.
I discovered that the continental cradle of our civilization was home
to
hillbilly like peasants in the mountains of Austria. I saw again how
warmer
climes relaxes the pace of living in places like Greece. In Greece too,
I
experienced how migration between our two countries My first visit to Europe though did not
provide me with any
feelings of any deep cultural connection as England had. In Israel
however, to
be in the Holy Land where Christ had walked, had a far deeper effect on
me.
Initially, it had the effect of raising my consciousness as a
Christian. I felt
part of something ancient and tangible as I wandered the old city of
Jerusalem
and the shores of Galilee. I relived Christ's last night on earth in
Gethsemane
much more easily than I could feel the power of the ancient Greeks in
the Acropolis.
It was with some confusion that I had to come to terms with the fact
that here,
in the birthplace of Christianity, my religion was of little
significance for
the Jews and I lived on a kibbutz for six months and
enjoyed my first
taste of large scale communal living. I had been raised in a nuclear
family.
Mum stayed home and did the domestic duties while Dad spent long hours
at work.
Male and female roles were divided in the traditional way. Back in
Australia
during my university days I had lived in share houses where the
traditional
division of roles was discarded - a by-product of the alignment with
counter-cultural
values. On an Israeli kibbutz I saw at close hand a society where all
adults
worked. Children were cared for cooperatively in children houses and
only
returned to their parents' house at selected times each day. This was
partly to
offset what was seen Looking back at my father's working life, it
was clear that
he was imbued with the Protestant work ethic (though he was Catholic.)
I had
had odd jobs in Australia, but had never derived true satisfaction from
them.
Working on a kibbutz, where one's labour is unpaid, and where how well
one
works is the most important measure of acceptance in the community, I
simply
fell in love with hard work. I learnt to take pleasure in a job well
done. I
could regulate my own work hours and it was assumed that I would
complete any given
task responsibly, and I did. I doubt I ever would have learnt this
valuable
lesson in the Australian workplace where people are watched over and
work more
in response to subtle coercion than a desire to do a job well. Living in Israel also showed me how the
whole concept of
manners was culture bound. Unlike the opposite extreme I had
encountered in
Britain, Israelis are by any Australian definition, impolite. They
never say
please, they push and shove in queues, and raising one's voice in
public was an
accepted and expected way of getting one's own way. I found it
frustrating that
my own culturally ingrained ways got me nowhere in banks, post offices
and on
public transport. It was with great delight after some months that I
found that
I too could push and shove and raise my voice in public and earn
respect. It
was empowering! My continuing contact with Israel over the
years has taught
me how easily won is our freedom and standard of living here. To live
in Israel
means to struggle. Peace and security are won by constant vigilance,
and I
regularly met people my age who were already the veterans of two short
wars.
They cared more passionately about their homeland than my compatriots
did, and
were willing to fight for it. I came from a country where comfort and
freedom
were mine by birthright, and I realised what an absolute luxury that
was. I enrolled in my first foreign language
class - Hebrew.
Classes were conducted entirely in Hebrew. With delight I discovered I
could
communicate in this language from the first lesson. If the context was
sufficiently clear, one could deduce meaning in a foreign language and
reproduce it accurately. As I learnt more it became clear how speaking
another
language effects your personality. A different linguistic system will
dictate
how you express things. I had seen this first years before in Indonesia
when a
German acquaintance who was quite mild in manner when speaking English,
became
vociferous and argumentative when he spoke his native tongue. I too
when
speaking Hebrew became rather more direct and abrupt in my
communication than I
was in English. On my return home from my first long trip
abroad my friends
remarked that the whole experience had softened me. Indeed, in the
first few
weeks back I felt like a stranger in my own land. Australia seemed like
a brash
and beautiful place with odd customs. Australians undoubtedly though
were
friendly and open people, and slowly I became one of them again. I enrolled in a Dip.Ed., and for the first
time in my life
studied with a sense of purpose. I was older and knew that I enjoyed
studying
and wanted to do as well as I could at it. The following year I was
offered a
job in a Catholic school. My chance to enter the establishment! I took
it. I
now had to examine more closely those elements of my culture, and
religion,
that I thought worthy of passing on to my students. I tried to give my
students
an appreciation of the best that I had been given: to use the Catholic
faith as
a basis for moral development that left ample room for freedom of
personal
conscience; to instil a social conscience of what was happening on a
global
scale. My experience as a teacher on the other side
of the fence in
a Catholic school was invaluable in redressing the harm done during my
own
school life. I worked alongside religious who had no wish to inflict
physical
harm upon students. The majority operated out of a love for God and
humanity. I
saw the Catholic faith as a source of care more than an excuse for
wielding
authority. I was able to select from its doctrines those I was
comfortable
with. I felt happy to be a part of the Catholic community, even if I
did not embrace
all its values, and felt relaxed about conveying the Christian
perspective to
my students. My conscience ( the use of which had been encouraged in my
schooling) allowed me to be non-Catholic in regard to some issues (for
example,
compulsory attendance at Sunday Mass) and still not feel too out of
place as a
teacher in a Catholic school. After three years of teaching I travelled
again. This time I
went first to Sri Lanka. I had been there briefly before but this time
stayed
several months. I lived in a fishing village with local inhabitants and
learnt
the rhythm of hand to mouth existence. If a good part of the day was
not spent
in the pursuit of food, then there was none at night. Husbands (and I)
spent
the morning fishing. We used to return to shore, take the catch to the
fish
market, receive payment, give the days earnings to the wives, who would
go
shopping for food and then cook it while the husbands untangled and
repaired
nets. It was life in delicate balance such as I had never known. Here
people
spoke only of the days events with immediate relevance. Western
knowledge was
irrelevant. My body was a useful extra In this Sri Lankan village too I had to
learn to live as
part of a crowd. The villagers spent very little time reading and
writing and
whenever I engaged in either of these activities it attracted a large
crowd of
interested onlookers! We as Westerners regularly seek time alone; these
Sri
Lankan villagers never did. They in fact considered it quite odd that
we should
actively seek time alone! I had to adjust to going to the toilet on the
beach
with only the privacy of a sarong to hide behind. Those months in Sri
Lanka had
an enormous impact on my evaluation of my own culture. On return to
Australia,
so much of life here seemed absurd. It seemed so much of our time is
spent
placing so much stress on non-essentials. In Sri Lanka I had
experienced a way
of living that was stripped down to the bare essentials and I found it
liberating and illuminating. Perhaps the greatest lesson I learnt from my
time in Sri
Lanka was how uncomfortable I was initially being among people who gave
totally
of their meagre resources without any expectation of return. I learned
later
that this is an essential tenet of Buddhism, but as Sri Lankan codes of
hospitality don't allow guests to repay favours I felt totally unable
to deal with
this constant barrage of generosity. In true Western style I sought the
privacy
of my own company for a few days and left the village to ponder why it
was I
felt this way. I realised slowly that I could accept the villagers'
kindness
without guilt, and as the weeks went by I found I could repay them by
entertaining them with my guitar. It is appropriate at this point to
mention
that on countless occasions I have been extremely fortunate to forge
links
across cultures with my music. This often referred to 'international
language' is
indeed just that. So often it has enabled me to cross barriers of
language and
custom. On occasions we would go to the village cafe
for tea or
coffee. Sri Lanka is tropical, hot. I thought nothing of going to this
rather
seedy, if quaint, cafe bare topped, clad only in sarong. I noticed
vaguely that
Sri Lankan men may go topless on the beach, but certainly not to the
cafe. I
thought it rather silly of them. Eventually my host politely suggested
I wear a
shirt when we went to the cafe. It took some time for me to realise
that it was
not care for my welfare that prompted his suggestion but rather that I
had
already caused him acute embarrassment a number of times by going to
the cafe
topless. I felt ashamed of my ignorance. I subsequently learnt that it
was with
great difficulty that the villagers tolerated Western women wearing
bikinis on
their beaches. It flaunted their sense of decency and appropriacy for
women. It
taught me that one should not practice one's own customs automatically
in a
foreign land and that no matter how senseless something may seem In Sri Lanka I had no difficulty living with
crowds. I later
spent three years in Holland where crowds of people living in high
density
urban conditions in a cold wet climate depressed me thoroughly. Again I
was
acutely aware of how the availability of unlimited space in Australia
had
influenced how I function. I was driven to distraction by walls and
inclement
weather, but slowly learnt too how the Dutch notion of 'gezelligheid'
(it
loosely translates as comfort) is crucial in learning to enjoy being
confined
for long periods inside. They pay much more attention to interior
decoration
than we do and their living and entertainment areas are far more
aesthetically
pleasing than the equivalent in other countries. On a particular day in Holland we attended a
party with
about fifty guests. I was told some days later that several people at
the party
who had not spoken to me asked who I was because even in a crowded
party they
said that the way I carried myself made it apparent that I was not
Dutch. I
can't be more specific but I found it intriguing that the way I sat or
stood
marked me as being from a different culture! I also had many American and English friends
in Holland and
I was always amazed how much easier I could relate to Americans than to
English
people on first meeting. It seemed that as fellow citizens of 'new
world'
countries, Australians and Americans readily found a communicative
rapport.
There seemed to be a cultural bond that permitted levity and less
formality in
communication between relative strangers. A Swiss friend commented that
she
always found Americans and Australians refreshing because we were free
of a cultural
burden that she said belaboured communication between people of other
cultures. I enjoyed my time in Holland. There I felt
freer than most
Dutch people, less reserved and more spontaneous. In Australia,
behaving in
similar fashion, I don't feel particularly outgoing or spontaneous. I
believe
Australians are less shackled than Europeans in the way they relate to
each
other on a personal level. Europeans may be more sophisticated in
appearance
and manner and may be more progressive in their thinking, but
Australians relate
more easily and openly to each other. Before I returned to Australia I journeyed
to Portugal to do
a course in teaching English as a foreign language. It was an
educational
influence of great consequence. I had already spent several years as a
teacher.
This course made me question everything I had ever done in a classroom
and
revealed many practical and theoretical weaknesses to my teaching -
quite a
shock for one who thought he had done a pretty good job as a teacher
hitherto!
It brought home to me the importance of dynamic behaviour on the part
of the
teacher, the value of a teacher as an entertainer, and the crucial fact
that
all learning must take place IN CONTEXT; that it must be perceived by
the
learners as being relevant. These points may seem obvious but so much of
teaching in
schools is governed by pressure to complete a syllabus that is remote
from
people's life experiences, and little attempt is made (and I am still working in this field and it is
like going to the
world every day because every working day I spend with people from many
different cultures I'm exposed daily to cultural influences that clash
with my
own. I could write at length about specific items of culture that have
surprised, shocked, and amazed me in the course of four years teaching
adult
migrants, but that would be a separate memoir in itself. Obviously in
this job
I must try to impart the values of our own culture that are essential
if one is
to live here harmoniously. I am forced to be selective about what is
essential.
I must differentiate between my own personal cultural system and other
group
cultural systems at large. I must be a conveyor of Australian culture
and be
sensitive to what manifestations of other cultural systems can be
sensibly
maintained in Australia. I must help newcomers from other countries
understand
what will shock, and what will be appropriate here. The continuing influence that this job has
on me is
generally a positive one. In the main my students are impressed by
Australia
and its people. I daily re-evaluate the group culture that I have been
born
into and constantly see it through the eyes of outsiders. SUMMARY I have spent a good deal of my life
travelling and living in
other cultures. Consequently I see myself as something of a cultural
chameleon.
I have been in too many foreign situations to blindly accept my own
culture as
better than others. I see myself as the product of many cultures, and
yet I
feel undeniably Australian. I do not readily identify with many aspects
of what
may be seen as Australian culture, and so abroad I am not easily
recognised as
Australian. Yet, when abroad, I announce with great pleasure and pride
that I
am Australian. To some degree I can feel at home in many different
cultures, but
I still feel a stranger until I return home. There have been times when
I have
known My educational experiences have instilled in
me a love of
learning. I like to use my intellect. Whatever my painful memories of
my
education in Catholic schools, I am eternally grateful that my parents
sacrificed a great deal to expose me to the 'cult of learning' of the
Jesuits.
I am happy to describe myself as Catholic in the literal sense of the
word - universal,
and spiritual. I consider myself fortunate to have had an education
that encouraged
independent thinking within a Christian framework that stresses care
for others.
I believe this, coupled with the fact that I grew up in a time when
young
people were granted much more freedom and responsibility, and exploited
the
possibility of mobility around the world, has allowed me (and others of
my
generation) to have a religious outlook that is certainly more
eclectic, and to
be more able to cope with a society whose values are changing rapidly.
We are
not culturally stultified; we expect, even encourage, change. My
perception of
my culture and my religion has limits that are not so well defined, and
at that
point where cultures meet, I expect dynamic interchange. The group
cultural system
that I most identify with does not fear changing values as much as my
parents'
generation did. We recognise that it is inevitable, and expect it. And
this, much
to my parents' chagrin, is the result of the excellent job they did of
raising
me to be independent, conscientious, and free to make my own decisions. ADDENDUM
(2020) Feedback on this essay from
Prof Jerzy Smolicz prompted me to add these notes on Portugal, Ireland,
and other cultural influences since 1991. Michael – I was pleased to read your long and illuminating essay – and I can see that you are only halfway there! Portugal still to describe; Ireland still to visit. I think that you have described very sensitively the array and variety of cultures that have influenced you – while you continue to maintain a strong Australian identity, but of the kind which permits you to adjust your personal cultural system through interaction. A very perceptive memoir. PORTUGAL I did spend a month in Lisbon in the mid-80s but it was solely to learn the trade of teaching English as a foreign language (TEFL). I learnt little of Portuguese life as I spent this month either in the classroom or studying back in my apartment. I do remember being shocked at how poor parts of the country looked. I hadn’t seen that level of neglect and disrepair in houses and public infrastructure in Europe before – I thought that such rundown sights were the province of the developing world, or as it was commonly called then, The Third World. Carminho (WOMADelaide, 2014)
My only other encounter with strands of
Portuguese culture
was via their form of blues – Fado. I first heard it at WOMADelaide,
and was
drawn to its soulful, doleful cadences. A music full of feeling that
oozes
sadness and at the same time carries tones of beauty. I have always
been
intrigued by the musical sounds that cultures produce – they are unique
and
often specific to place. Sitting under the stars at The Treasury –
the star
attraction at Petra in Jordan – I was moved to tears one night as the
sounds of
an oud supporting that instantly recognisable vocal style of
Arabic
music washed over us as we sat in candle light in the desert night. The
fact
that that place – those rocks, that sand, those warm nights had produce
these
unmistakably Middle eastern sounds enthralled me. Somehow that
particular mix
of geography and culture had conspired to create those sounds that are
a
signature of the Arab world. I imagine sitting in a café in a Lisbon
miradouro listening
to Fado might have the same enthralling effect. IRELAND All my life I had dreamed of going to
Ireland. As an
undergrad at university we studied J.M. Synge’s Playboy of the Western
World.
The Western world in this play was the west coast of Ireland, and I was
beguiled
by its peaceful wilderness. I kind of promised myself that I would get
there
one day. As the years passed I had made several visits to and even
lived in the
UK but had not yet crossed the Irish Sea. I think I was waiting for a
time when
Ireland would be THE destination and not just an adjunct to another
trip to the
UK. Much later in life I finally had it planned.
I would spend a
couple of weeks in Ireland exploring Dublin, our family seats of Cork
and
Clare, and the west coast. As fate would have it, just as I was set to
depart I
was offered some work out in the Pacific. If I went ahead with Ireland
it would
be Dublin only; or no Ireland at all. I chose the ‘just Dublin’ option. I’m glad I did it – I’ve yet to get back to
Ireland – but I
think I’d put such expectation on the whole experience of finally
seeing
Ireland that it was bound to fall short of those expectations. And
Ireland is
not Dublin. So I’m going to leave any further discussion of Irish
cultural
influence till such time that I can get into the Irish countryside. I have played my guitar and sung in cafes,
bars, and
restaurants many times over the years. A few times I’ve been approached
after
singing in such places by people saying something like “you have to got
to be
Irish!” or “you must have some Irish in you” because there is
apparently
something in the way I sing that reminds people of Irish music. But I
don’t
sing any Irish songs. I must say though that I enjoy the idea that
people say
this about my singing. Perhaps there is something of my mother’s Irish
genes inhabiting
my musical soul? THE PACIFIC Save for a short holiday to Fiji, I came to
the Pacific much
later in life. Offers of work in my new semi-retired phase of life took
me to
Vanuatu, Fiji, Tuvalu, Samoa and New Caledonia – all different
countries with
their own distinct cultures – but there are common cultural threads in
the
Pacific that are found in many of these small island nations. And these
common
threads start with Christianity. I had made many visits to Asia over the years, and as much I love it Asia is nearly always crowded. The Pacific right from the start for me felt like Asia without the hassle. It affords a gentler version of the tropics where there’s nearly always breezes blowing from the sea, the pace of life is equally languid, and the standard of living is basic but not too depressing. Few go hungry in the Pacific.
Within an hour of arriving on my first visit
to Tuvalu I was
asked what church I would be attending on Sunday!! There were multiple
options
– all manner of Christian churches have colonised the Pacific – and I
neatly
side-stepped the question. It seemed to me that about 90% of the
population do
attend church in Sunday mornings. I eventually learned to walk around
near
empty neighbourhoods on Sunday mornings and just get close enough to
churches
to enjoy the angelic sound of gorgeous voices wafting out through the
palm
trees. It always sounded beautiful and sometimes extraordinarily so.
Everybody
in the Pacific sings. Men and women, young and old – everyone joins in
in
perfect harmony. Such wondrous vocal choruses also happen at other
significant
events outside of church but to be a non-Christian in the Pacific would
mean
much less music in your life. The Christian influence is everywhere. Samoa
actually
advertises itself as a Christian country and proudly spruiks the fact
that
Christianity is the state religion. I was never close enough to the
inner
workings of Pacific society to know what pressure is exerted on
everyone to go
to church and live by religious values, but as a foreigner I felt
absolutely no
pressure to be a part of it. I was left in peace on Sundays. There is a cruel and ironic flipside to this
ubiquitous
Christianity. Just about everywhere in the Pacific there are the
conjoined
problems of alcoholism, domestic violence and diabetes. Beneath the
veneer of
Christian love and tropical ease is an undercurrent of deep
unhappiness. Most
of the drinking is done by men who routinely bash up their women and it
is
almost accepted as normal. Clearly links to traditional culture have
been
broken and many feel a sense of disconnection from any meaningful life
purpose.
The diabetes epidemic stems from overeating.
Many Pacific
cultures have sadly lost the skills and knowledge to cultivate
traditional
foods and instead eat mostly processed carb rich foods from Western
style
supermarkets. I was quite taken aback by the amount of food consumed at
meal
times by both men and women. They eat larger lunches and evening
dinners than
most do in countries like Australia, and this was presented to me as
part of
their culture. I was often told that “We like to eat” without any shame
or
embarrassment. Another curious aspect of culture in the
Pacific is the
intersection of French and English cultures. Both the French and the
English
had colonial footholds in the Pacific for many decades. In most places
these
European monoliths divided their spoils – the French for example had
Tahiti and
New Caledonia; the English and their Anglo-Pacific partners (Australia,
NZ) had
Fiji, Tuvalu, Nauru etc. But Vanuatu was a shared situation and still
today the
small nation is divided along language lines. Local languages are
spoken
regionally, but about 40% speak French as their second language and 60%
English. This has significant ramifications for education and training
where
everything needs to be published in both languages. It was certainly my experience that people
from the French
parts of the country spoke very little English and found anything other
than
very basic English too hard to comprehend. WOMADelaide I wrote above about the role of the
sub-cultures of sport
and counter-culture. In the early nineties I encountered another
sub-culture
that was to have a profound and lasting impact on me. WOMAD is an
acronym for
World Music and Dance and it became an incorporated body that sponsored
global
musical festivals. My hometown Adelaide was chosen as the site of the
Australian WOMAD festival and hence WOMADelaide was born. “What
first attracted me to the festival was
the truly exotic – Russia’s Terem Quartet, a lone kora player from
Africa,
throat singing from Sardinia, Madagascar’s Justin Vali Trio – music you
would
never hear anywhere else, and where you felt extraordinarily privileged
to
witness things you otherwise had no access to.” I fell in love with
music played by
people I had never heard of, playing instruments I’d never heard of,
singing in
languages that I didn’t understand!! And I was smitten! There is something
subliminal, primal
about appreciating culture that depends on recognising difference and a
shared
humanity at the same time. Language is an expression of culture but
understanding a culture’s language is not a precondition for enjoying a
culture’s public manifestations – dress, art, food, music. And music as
an
expression of sounds that can both convey and provoke depths of
emotion, is
rightly dubbed the universal language. Once a year WOMADelaide
delivers a
cultural smorgasbord from across the planet. “The Sounds of the Planet.”
(page updated 17/7/20)
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