It's a long way to the shop if you want a sausage roll...

Australian ex-pat trying valiantly to uphold national pride in -20C. Photo: Charles Cardinal

The title of this post is something probably only Australians of a certain age would get. It's a schoolyard twist on the lyrics to AC/DC's It's a Long Way to the Top (If You Wanna Rock 'n' Roll); just try singing it and you'll see what I mean...

Today is Australia Day, and despite all the broader political ramifications and my personal uneasiness in recognition of Invasion Day, as it is also known, I am a little more nostalgic than usual for my home country. I celebrated by listening to '80s Oz Rock and making a batch of lamingtons to share with my classmates tomorrow. Surprisingly, there are two other Australians in my class, so I am not as much of an exotic creature as usual. I also made a batch of sausage rolls for Charles and I, which turned out to be the best I've ever tasted, perhaps because I've been so deprived. Like any good immigrant, I have soulful longings for the unique tastes of the Old Country.

It's a curious thing, being an expatriate. There is all the excitement and novelty of a new country, culture, and—frequently—language to explore, but it is so often clouded with a few greying drops of homesickness, as well as the involuntary comparisons. I can't even imagine what it must be like for immigrants who have had to leave their home against their will or for the preservation of their lives.

As always, I remind myself that the purpose of this blog is to enforce a positive view of change on myself so, like a happily tipsy father of the bride, I take the view that I am not losing my own culture, but gaining a second. (Gosh, I just remembered having a jumbonormous fight with a German boyfriend in 1998, when he claimed Australia didn't have a culture. Oh, my goodness!) As I sit here, I've been contemplating just what it is that I'm invoking when I think of that mythical beast that is "Australia." In essence it seems to be wide, open spaces, a freshness of both spirit and produce, and a lack of taking anything or anyone, including oneself, too seriously. But mostly it is the wide, open spaces. Oh, and warmth!

For years I have celebrated drives through those wide, open spaces with a stop at a country bakery for a sausage roll and a Farmers' Union Iced Coffee. It was a little tradition that I made for myself somewhere along the line, to the point now when a long car trip will induce sausage roll cravings. I've managed to find a suitable iced coffee substitute here, at the ubiquitously Canadian Tim Horton's chain, but it looks like I'll be doing a little pre-trip baking from now on because there really is no suitable alternative to the sausage roll here, and 16,000km is indubitably a long trip "down the shops."

A Farewell to Oz

Change is upon me so fast and furiously at the moment that - obviously - I am not having time to write about it. Not to worry, I am stockpiling stories in anticipation of a relaxing couple of Northern Summer months ahead in which I will play catch up, even though I suspect I will be laughing at my current naiveté by August.

At the moment I am in my hometown of Adelaide, South Australia, undertaking Phase 2 of the Farewell to Oz Tour ahead of my final decampment for Canada next week (Holy Crap!) The trip has been fantastic so far, made all the sweeter by the presence of one of my besties and former bridesmaid, Morgan, who flew over from Melbourne for her first proper experience of SA.

My parents, all four of them, live in the Adelaide Hills, so my trips here these days tend to be more semi-rural than urban, though Saturday involved the mandatory Central Market/Lucia's visit, and last night the mandatory Ying Chow meal. It would be fair to say that a large part of South Australian life revolves around good food and wine.

And this has had me thinking: did the place make the girl, or was the place perfect for her? Is my love of good food and wine nature or nurture? And was I, despite so many grass-is-greener, wanderlust tendencies, in fact born into just the perfect place for me? Ever since I brought Charles here in 2010 and he fell under South Australia's spell, I have viewed my hometown far more favourably than in previous years, and entertained more often the notion of - one day - maybe moving back.

Here, currently, as possibly in a number of other places, there is a mad craze for Yotam Ottolenghi and his food. My stepmother has just returned from a trip to London and Israel to visit relatives with her mother, and went to Ottolenghi's restaurant and stopped by a number of places in Israel that he featured in his cooking show. I was just reading the Introduction to the Jerusalem cookbook that he co-wrote with Sami Tamimi and found a passage on page 9 that summed up my present navel gazing:

"It is more than 20 years since we both left the city. This is a serious chunk of time, longer than the years we spent living there. Yet we still think of Jerusalem as our home. Not home in the sense of the place you conduct your daily life, or constantly return to. In fact, Jerusalem is our home almost against our wills. It is our home because it defines us, whether we like it or not."

There is a huge part of me that will always be defined by Adelaide's gastronomic obsessions, and its most particular sensibilities.

The pictures that accompany this post are of Sunday's trip to Port Willunga, my favourite beach near Adelaide, about 45-50 minutes drive south of the city. My parents, Morgan and I popped in there after visiting my grandmother in McLaren Vale for her 90th birthday and then having an entertaining family lunch and a drive around the Vale. There is certainly something about the clear Southern light, I think it is just beautiful.

Just because it's called Rainbow, doesn't mean it's a hippy commune!

Is there such a place as Paradise On Earth? I suspect one's options on this expand considerably in line with one's tolerance to mould. I love Cairns. No, I do...it's just that the first third of the year always brings with it a constant battle against the forces of evil. I mean, mould. Ahem.

As pre-empted a while ago, I just went to Northern New South Wales to visit some beloved friends and their munchkins as part of my grand Farewell to Oz Tour. I've only been to Northern New South Wales once before as an adult, in the mid-'90s, and I have a very Romantic view of it as one of the most beautiful places to live in Australia. It is also the hippy 'capital' of the country. I think I had been there less than 24 hours this time when Jane drew my attention to a jacket that she'd just pulled out of the wardrobe that was fluffy with subtropical mould. Cue needle dragging across a record...

But if you can get over that (or yourself, and Lord knows I need to do a bit more of that of late!), then gee willikers it's pretty. My friends live near The Channon. There's a creek at the bottom of their driveway and a waterfall at the end of their road. They live on a multiple occupancy intentional community, on which the husband grew up. And yes, it's called Rainbow. No social profiling, please! They are building their own solar-powered, composting toileted, hempcrete-lined, passive solar, recycled or reclaimed when possible, totally awesome home that looks straight out into rainforest. It's truly beautiful and very contemporary in design.

Chedy's mum still lives on the community. She's a ceramicist and a fanatical collector of vintage objects and textiles. I was lucky enough to sleep in an alcove of her studio and woke up each morning to total eye candy of old kitchenalia and a ceramicist's tools of the trade. Heaven for me! She had a very established orchard and veggie patch, and here's what's so great about this region: rosemary grew next to pineapples, roses grew next to pawpaws, Brazilian cherries grew alongside grapefruit, and both strawberries and bananas looked happy. For a gardener like me that's a pretty impressive interzone of domestic food crops! It wasn't long before I was emailing Charles to suggest that maybe Northern New South Wales could be a good  spot for us eventually, if we find our way back to Australia. The big, fat kookaburras and the mix of rainforest and eucalypts were giving me a pre-emptive strike of homesickness, too.

That's about it for the blabbing. I mostly wanted to get back in the writing saddle today, and I'll leave you with more pictures than words. Please find here some images of a very extended Anzac Day long weekend holiday: the 'Goldie' from Coolangatta; views from the Pinnacle looking out to Mt Warning; happy snaps from Rainbow; and the mandatory trip to Byron Bay, at the Tallow Beach end.

 

 

 The End

Montréal Calling

The last few weeks have been a bit odd. By day I have been going to work in Cairns, or cutting down bananas, and other very tropical things, and at night I have been roaming the streets of Montréal - virtually, at least. Charles has to move out of his apartment there and so, sooner than we'd hoped, we've been looking for an apartment together. We had expected that we'd at least get to do it in each other's physical presence, but no, from 16,000km apart it is. Thank God for that Internet thingy! I conservatively estimate we looked at about 150 apartments combined, with Charles doing the legwork to go see six in person after a process of elimination by committee.

I've also been trying to find a decently priced flight to visit my beloved husband in the not too distant future. It's quite a juggling act to book online and avoid the crappy airlines, multiple stop overs, long lay overs, too early departure times, too late arrival times, and some absolutely ridonkulous prices. Cairns to Montréal is about as far apart as you can get on this planet, and it doesn't seem to be that common a route.

But we've done it. Last Wednesday: flight secured. I'll be in Montréal for most of February, which will give me a taste of just how freakin' freezing it can get there. Friday: tenancy approved on an apartment we both love just off Mont-Royal in the eastern Plateau district. Phew! Hopefully I can get back to being mentally present where I am physically present for the next seven weeks.

To celebrate, this afternoon I went to see Monsieur Lazhar, a beautiful film despite some gaping holes in the plot. I have loved my time in the Tropics, but boy, oh, boy, I'm looking forward to moving to Montréal. There's only so long your body can bear to be separated from your heart.

An Ode* to Aburi Salmon

Dear Aburi Salmon

I love you

You rock my world.

How happy was I the day we first met?

The merging of flash-searing, mayonnaise and salmon

- three of my most very favourite things -

Combined in a perfect storm of flavour.

How appropriate that I buy you from an outlet called Sushi Paradise.

Nirvana of ricedom.

And you are only $8.

$8 ... $8!?

Every time I finish you

I wish I had bought two.

You make a crappy working day resplendent.

You haunt my foodie dreams.

You make me fight to only see you once a week.

On Thursdays. Pay day.

The serving girls reach for you now as I walk in.

We are as one.

Aburi Salmon, you are perfection.

And I love you.

*with apologies to actual poets. But seriously, the aburi salmon at Sushi Paradise, in Grafton St, Cairns, iz the shiz! It is my go-to if I am having a shitty day, or just generally feel the need to spoil myself. I bet you have a special lunchtime treat that you save for those days when you really need something to put an unqualified smile on your dial. It is such simple pleasures that make life worthwhile, non?

PS the little love heart of spring onion pictured above absolutely just appeared of its own accord on this week's purchase - it'd been a tough week, the God of Aburi must have thought I needed a little something extra. Straight after I took that picture, I dropped my phone right on top of it. Splat!

All in a day's work

Entrance to Mossman Gorge Centre

Wow! Crazy times! I am in the middle of the biggest three weeks of my annual work calendar and tomorrow it is only two weeks until I get married. I have so much I want to write about and absolutely zero time to write about it (except for these precious few moments tonight before I pass out cold on my bed).

This weekend is the Cairns Indigenous Art Fair (CIAF). My organisation historically does three months' regular trade in a week during this time. The amount of work to prepare for and clean up from such intensity is immense, but it is very rewarding and it's great to catch up with so many people in the industry and see what artists have been working on since last year.

The two artists we are presenting in our galleries have absolutely knocked it out of the park: both have developed the work in their exhibitions as a result of residencies and both have reached a new level of technical mastery and clarity of self-expression. I'm really happy for both of them and proud to be able to sell their work, although, really, it's selling itself, I'm just holding on to my hat trying to keep up with demand! We were also beyond privileged today when Seaman Dan offered to sing a song as part of the opening ceremonies for the exhibitions. He's just released a new CD at age 83, so much for his plan to retire from singing at 80! He was amazing, of course.

In the lead up to CIAF I went on two great road trips. One to the Girringun Art Centre in Cardwell, and another to the recently opened Mossman Gorge Centre, which is an initiative of the Mossman Gorge Aboriginal Community and employs 80% of the community.

Sugar mill, Tully

The trip to Girringun is three hours' drive each way, into the coastal country south of Cairns that was so devastated by Cyclone Yasi in February 2011. The Girringun artists were in the pre-CIAF production frenzy and two workmates and I went there to bring screenprint editions to the artists to sign. I won't post photos from the Art Centre because every which way you turned a photo opportunity would be a breach of artists' copyright since they weren't all there to ask permission of; however, the mood in the Art Centre was uplifting—everyone was excited about their work and there was a lot of playful teasing going on between the artists, making for a fun and funny working environment. It was also a perfect Far North Queensland mid-winter's day and it was sugar cane harvest, so the air was thick with sweet smoke and dust, and the steam plumes coming out of the sugar mills along the way were beautiful in the afternoon sunlight. It was one of those days in life that is just perfection in every way, right down to working on the tan during a late lunch of barra burger on the beachfront with a view over to Hinchinbrook Island.

Cardwell looking to Hinchinbrook Island

Cardwell

Mossman is another sugar town, but an hour and a bit to the north of Cairns. It is one of my favourite towns in the region. The Visitor Centre is the culmination of 20 years of work from the local Indigenous community to make their vision of a sustainable way to have tourists come to view their Country a reality and provide jobs for the community. As a $20M development, it is a massive achievement for the community and their funding partners and has consistently hosted 800–1,000 visitors a day during the two months it has been open—that's equivalent to a CIAF a fortnight! The Centre is environmentally and culturally sensitive and stunning and will disappear into the rainforest in a few years as the forest regrows from the reclaimed sugar cane field the Centre is built upon. It was a very happy day. 

I may complain about a lot of things in this life, but a boring job is never one of them.

Mossman Gorge Centre

Sugar cane field near Mossman

Ad Gloriam Dei vs Instagram

This week Wonder got a little moment of her own to make up for the post-op trip to the hospital Reason had just had to make. On the way back to work I passed the Freemasons' Lodge. It was a perfectly sunny Cairns mid-Winter day and this amazing building was looking, well, glorious. I had to stop.

The Freemasons' Lodge is a couple of streets off the tourist trail, so it doesn't get admired as much as it should, so here are some snaps for you. I'm still mastering Instagram (yes, I still prefer Hipstamatic, but what's an Android user to do), and the sun was so bright I couldn't see the screen to tell what the editing effects were doing, so this is the pick of the pot luck!

 

 

  

Are you an asylum seeker? No? Then I don't want to hear about your 'problems' today.

I can't bear this anymore. I can't even read or write about it without crying. How can my country, as I believe it to be, what I believe it stands for, allow this to continue? These are people who have already suffered so much, who are so desperate that they will get in a boat that more resembles a colander than something seaworthy. The irony of the acronym SIEV (Suspected Illegal Entry Vessel) overwhelms me! How can we continue to maintain "policies" that allow them to take such risks and die in this way after everything they have already endured? I have no problem with them coming here, hell, I even have a spare room. But I have a very big problem with them being allowed to try to come in a way that is so dangerous. Shame on our politicians, shame on us, shame on me.

I have talked about this a fair bit in my time, but now I can't not try to do something. I am horrified.

Update 28/7/12: I wrote unique letters to 13 elected representatives of all persuasions straight after I wrote this post. To date I have received one sanctimonious hard copy form letter from Christine Milne (leader of the Greens, but not the only Greens member I wrote to) reiterating their refusal to compromise their stance, and one very grateful and encouraging email from Independent Rob Oakeshott's staff outlining further action I could take to encourage a break in the impasse and providing links to useful facts and figures. From the rest? Nothing but the sound of crickets! Hmmm.