{"id":45818,"date":"2020-06-12T16:06:10","date_gmt":"2020-06-12T16:06:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/?p=45818"},"modified":"2021-12-19T07:17:51","modified_gmt":"2021-12-19T07:17:51","slug":"australia-personified-by-des-kelly","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/australia-personified-by-des-kelly\/","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;AUSTRALIA PERSONIFIED&#8221; \u2013 By Des Kelly"},"content":{"rendered":"<h1 style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"color: #800000; font-size: 28px;\">\u00a0\u00a0&#8220;AUSTRALIA PERSONIFIED&#8221;\u00a0\u2013 By Des Kelly<\/span><\/h1>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/FqtttbbYfSM\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">\u00a0<span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #000000;\">As a Sri Lankan (Ceylon) migrant to Melbourne,<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #000000;\">Australia, of nearly 60 years, I cannot help but remember the many times when friends told me quite emphatically that I had made a big mistake coming here. I should have gone to America, they told me. My musical career, my songwriting capabilities, my showbiz life in general, would have been much better in America, had I chosen to go there. I sometimes wondered if they were right. Now, along comes this American, giving us his candid opinion on Australia Personified.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #000000;\">\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 I found this very interesting indeed and decided to share it with all my eLanka readers, everywhere. To make a long story short, I am very pleased that I stuck to my initial decision of coming to Australia. See what you think.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-29898 aligncenter\" src=\"https:\/\/websitedesigns.com.au\/elankanew\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/10\/Desmond-Kelly-8.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"125\" height=\"178\" \/><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #000000;\">Desmond Kelly.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #000000;\">(Editor-in-Chief)-eLanka.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><span style=\"font-size: 24px; color: #7f10e0;\"><i>David Mason is a Writer, a Professor, and a Poet Laureate from Colorado, USA<\/i><\/span><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\">\u00a0<span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #000000;\">&#8216;There&#8217;s a lot to admire about Australia, especially if you&#8217;re a visiting American,&#8217; says David Mason.\u00a0\u00a0&#8216;More often than you might expect, Australian friends patiently listening to me enthuse about their country have said, We need outsiders like you to remind us what we have.<u><\/u><u><\/u><\/span><\/p>\n<p align=\"center\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #000000;\">So here it is &#8211; a small presumptuous list of what one foreigner admires in Oz.<\/span><\/p>\n<ol>\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #ff0000;\"><strong> Health care<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">I know the controversies, but basic national health care is a gift.\u00a0\u00a0In America, medical expenses are a leading cause of bankruptcy.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">The drug companies dominate politics and advertising.\u00a0 Obama is being crucified for taking halting baby steps towards sanity.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">You can&#8217;t turn on the telly without hours of drug advertisements &#8211; something I have never yet seen here.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">And your emphasis on prevention &#8211; making cigarettes less accessible, for one &#8211; is a model.<\/span><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ol start=\"2\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #ff0000;\"><strong> Food<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">Yes, we have great food in America too, especially in the big cities.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">But your bread is less sweet, your lamb is cheaper and your supermarket vegetables and fruits are fresher than ours.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">Too often in my country, America, an apple is a ball of pulp as big as your face.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">The dainty Pink Lady apples of Oz are the juiciest I&#8217;ve had.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">And don&#8217;t get me started on coffee.\u00a0 In American small towns it tastes like water flavoured with burnt dirt, but the smallest shop in the smallest town in Oz can\u00a0<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">make a first-rate latte.\u00a0 I love your ubiquitous bakeries and your hot-cross buns.\u00a0 Shall I go on?<\/span><\/p>\n<ol start=\"3\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #ff0000;\"><strong> Language<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">How do you do it?<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">The rhyming slang and Aboriginal place names are like magic spells.\u00a0 Words that seem vaguely English yet also resemble an argot from another planet.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">I love the way institutional names get turned into diminutives &#8211; Vinnie&#8217;s and Salvos &#8211; and absolutely nothing&#8217;s sacred.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">Everything is an opportunity for word games and everyone has a nickname.\u00a0 Lingo makes the world go round.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">It&#8217;s the spontaneous wit of the people that tickles me most.\u00a0 Late one night at a barbie my new mate Suds remarked: &#8221;Nothing&#8217;s the same since 24-7.&#8221;<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">Amen to that.<\/span><\/p>\n<ol start=\"4\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #ff0000;\"><strong> Free-to-air TV<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">In Oz, you buy a TV, plug it in and watch some of the best programming I&#8217;ve ever seen &#8211; uncensored.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">In America, you can&#8217;t get diddly-squat without paying a cable or satellite company heavy fees.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">In Oz, a few channels make it hard to choose.\u00a0\u00a0In America, you&#8217;ve got 400 channels and nothing to watch.<\/span><\/p>\n<ol start=\"5\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #ff0000;\"><strong> Small shops<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">Outside the big cities in America corporations have nearly erased them.\u00a0 Identical malls with identical restaurants serving inferior food.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">Except for geography, it&#8217;s hard to tell one American town from another.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">The &#8221;take-away&#8221; culture here in Australia is wonderful.\u00a0 The human encounters are real &#8211; people love to stir and stories\u00a0get told.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">The curries here are to die for.\u00a0 And you don&#8217;t have to tip!<\/span><\/p>\n<ol start=\"6\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #ff0000;\"><strong> Free camping<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">We used to have this too and I guess it&#8217;s still free when you backpack miles away from the roads.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">But I love the fact that in Oz everyone owns the shoreline and in many places you can pull up a camper van and stare at the sea for weeks.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">I love the &#8221;primitive&#8221; and independent camp-grounds, the life out-of-doors.\u00a0 The few idiots who leave their stubbies and rubbish behind in these\u00a0<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">pristine places ought to be transported in chains to the penal colonies.<\/span><\/p>\n<ol start=\"7\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #ff0000;\"><strong> Religion<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">In America , it&#8217;s everywhere &#8211; especially where it&#8217;s not\u00a0 supposed to be, like politics.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">I imagine you have your Pharisees too, making a big public show of devotion, but I have yet to meet one here.<\/span><\/p>\n<ol start=\"8\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #ff0000;\"><strong> Roads<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">Peak hour aside, I&#8217;ve found travel on your roads pure heaven.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">My country&#8217;s &#8221;freeways&#8221; are crowded, crumbling, insanely knotted with looping overpasses &#8211; it&#8217;s like racing homicidal maniacs on fraying spaghetti!<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">I&#8217;ve driven the Hume Highway without stress and I love the Princes Highway when it&#8217;s two lanes.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">Ninety minutes south of Bateman&#8217;s Bay I was sorry to see one billboard for a McDonald&#8217;s.\u00a0 It&#8217;s blocking a lovely paddock view.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">Someone should remove the MacDonald&#8217;s Billboard.<\/span><\/p>\n<ol start=\"9\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #ff0000;\"><strong> Real multiculturalism<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">I know there are tensions, just like anywhere else, but I love the distinctiveness of your communities and the way you publicly acknowledge the Aboriginal past.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">Recently, too, I spent quality time with the Melbourne Greeks and was gratified both by their devotion to their own great language and culture and\u00a0<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">their openness to an Afghan lunch.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ol start=\"10\">\n<li style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #ff0000;\"><strong> Fewer guns<\/strong><\/span><\/li>\n<\/ol>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">You had Port Arthur in 1996 and got real in response.<\/span><br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">America replicates such massacres several times a year and nothing changes.\u00a0\u00a0Why?<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">Our religion of individual rights makes the good of the community an impossible dream.\u00a0 Instead of mateship we have, &#8221;It&#8217;s mine and nobody else&#8217;s&#8221;.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">We talk a great game about freedom, but too often live in fear.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">There&#8217;s more to say &#8211; your kaleidoscopic birds, your perfumed bush in springtime, your vast beaches.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">These are just a few of the blessings that make Australia a rarity.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">Of course, it&#8217;s not paradise &#8211; nowhere is &#8211; but I love it here.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px;\">No need to wave flags like the Americans, and add to the world&#8217;s windiness.<\/span><\/p>\n<p style=\"font-weight: 400;\"><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #ed0e81;\"><strong>Just value what you have here in Australia and don&#8217;t give it away!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 20px; color: #000000;\">\u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0 \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00a0\u00a0&#8220;AUSTRALIA PERSONIFIED&#8221;\u00a0\u2013 By Des Kelly &nbsp; \u00a0As a Sri Lankan (Ceylon) migrant to Melbourne, Australia, of nearly 60 years, I cannot help but remember the many times when friends told me quite emphatically that I had made a big mistake coming here. I should have gone to America, they told me. My musical career, my [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":45826,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"aside","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20,1104],"tags":[22307],"class_list":{"0":"post-45818","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-aside","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-articles","8":"category-desmond-kelly","9":"tag-david-mason","10":"post_format-post-format-aside"},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.7.1 (Yoast SEO v25.9) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>&quot;AUSTRALIA PERSONIFIED&quot; \u2013 By Des Kelly<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Australia, of nearly 60 years, I cannot help but remember the many times when friends told me quite emphatically that I had made a big mistake coming here.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"noindex, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"&quot;AUSTRALIA PERSONIFIED&quot; 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