Reality

Discussion Open Forum
1

My sister (oldest of nine) is totally cool.

We might all have cool siblings and if you do here is the place to share them.

Mary has lived in outback Australia in an Aboriginal community for 30 years. A lot of that time was spent in a “lean to”. Given its name, it’s not hard to get an impression of what it is. It’s corrugated iron and a tree stump (or bark if she’s going green). So in terms of going native, she pretty much has done it to the pits of 4th world Australia and lived to tell the tale.

So she sends me this email:
I had an exhibition about a couple of months ago. I didn’t sell anything but two works were stolen so that’s the next best thing.

Now if ever a glass was half full with optimism and irony…

2

Your sister knows what 99.9% of us don’t know we’re missing.

Wrapped in technological cocoons to compensate for living in a concrete jungle.
Defining ourselves by the brands we wear and bling bling bangle.
Measuring each other by the number of certificates attained,
by staying in school instead of experienced gained.

This story reminds me of the price I’ve paid to get out of the bush. Oh that sweet bloody bush.

Reality.

3

Now let’s de-romanticise the Aboriginal lifestyle (which repeats itself throughout the world) for a moment:

Life expectancies considerably lower than everyone else, extreme poverty, rampant alcohol and substance abuse, communities rife with incest and general sexual and physical abuse, extremely limited educational and employment possibilities and extremely poor access to general infrastructure and social services.

Sounds fucking fantastic! I can’t imagine why more people don’t make the change!

4

I felt quite uplifted there, until I got to post number 3,

Back down to reality with a bang.

5

I have a lot of respect for people who want to turn their back on modern materialistic society and make a go of living on the land out in the bush (well, provided that they aren’t on welfare i.e. sponging off the system they so despise and have “left behind” which is sadly often the case).
Fox, is your sister a full-time artist?

6

[quote=“GuyInTaiwan”]Now let’s de-romanticise the Aboriginal lifestyle (which repeats itself throughout the world) for a moment:

Life expectancies considerably lower than everyone else, extreme poverty, rampant alcohol and substance abuse, communities rife with incest and general sexual and physical abuse, extremely limited educational and employment possibilities and extremely poor access to general infrastructure and social services.

Sounds fucking fantastic! I can’t imagine why more people don’t make the change![/quote]

lol A gift to one is not neccessarily a gift to another!! Well put Guyintaiwan.

7

I did and thats why I live in an Aboriginal village. But you make sound so extreme.

But life without all the technology suits me fine. I like it when typhoons come and there is no power for a week.

You learn to spend more time with the people around you than your stupid internet and tv junkie lifestyyles.

8

Reality.

theplaceswelive.com/

We have it good.

9

[quote]Now let’s de-romanticise the Aboriginal lifestyle (which repeats itself throughout the world) for a moment:

Life expectancies considerably lower than everyone else, extreme poverty, rampant alcohol and substance abuse, communities rife with incest and general sexual and physical abuse, extremely limited educational and employment possibilities and extremely poor access to general infrastructure and social services.

Sounds fucking fantastic! I can’t imagine why more people don’t make the change![/quote]

I’m not sure I understand your point exactly.

For AJ,

Mary is an artist: music, film (documentaries), and drawing.

She wrote the first Arrunda dictionary for use in schools–a project she did in collaboration with another one of my sisters. She spends much of her time just documenting aboriginal oral histories and collating and archiving those histories. She usually works from grants.

She’s a very good song writer on an amateur level. For example, she won the annual Tamworth country music song writing comp. a couple of years ago.

She has exhibitions of photography, drawing and installation pieces that usually reflect some aspect of the bush life. I think she gets funding for those projects as well.

No one who has lived in the bush in a ‘lean to’ has a romantic notion of the bush. I grew up in the bush and so too she–even still the aboriginal life in terms of material wealth is a much poorer one than she or I experienced, but it isn’t a miserable existence necessarily.

Community is strong. Interestingly enough, in Australia they had an intervention into Aborigine communities because of all the claims of incest, child sexual abuse etc. The ABC (Australia’s national broadcaster) followed the story for 18 months in one of the communities. It made for a very interesting program. The most telling thing was that sexual abuse was no greater than in the broader community and because of the intervention the incidences of it were well documented and data was more far reaching than that in the broader community. They did find, however, incidences of treatable diseases like deafness caused from chronic ear infections was hundreds of times higher than the general community.

Stereotypes are hard to break and many are laced with ignorance and prejudice.

10

That’s great; what an achievement. Hats off to her.

11

[quote=“GuyInTaiwan”]Now let’s de-romanticise the Aboriginal lifestyle (which repeats itself throughout the world) for a moment:

Life expectancies considerably lower than everyone else, extreme poverty, rampant alcohol and substance abuse, communities rife with incest and general sexual and physical abuse, extremely limited educational and employment possibilities and extremely poor access to general infrastructure and social services.

Sounds fucking fantastic! I can’t imagine why more people don’t make the change![/quote]

Are you describing Glasgow or Manchester there?

12

It’s funny. I just wanted to start a thread about cool things that your parents have done. My mother punched a baboon in the face. And this one did actually involve my sister. My sister was about 4 and eating a bag of peanuts or something in the back of the car, when a baboon jumped up and grabbed the bag. My sister refused to let go, the baboon refused to let go, and my mom turned around and punched it in the face. I think hanging onto a bag of peanuts is about as cool as living in the bush. Especially when the baboon happens to be bigger than you are.

13

[quote=“Fox”]My sister (oldest of nine) is totally cool.

We might all have cool siblings and if you do here is the place to share them.

Mary has lived in outback Australia in an Aboriginal community for 30 years. A lot of that time was spent in a “lean to”. Given its name, it’s not hard to get an impression of what it is. It’s corrugated iron and a tree stump (or bark if she’s going green). So in terms of going native, she pretty much has done it to the pits of 4th world Australia and lived to tell the tale.

So she sends me this email:
I had an exhibition about a couple of months ago. I didn’t sell anything but two works were stolen so that’s the next best thing.

Now if ever a glass was half full with optimism and irony…[/quote]

This is a lovely story from Fox. I have the feeling that I’ve met him before (in which case he’s a bloody nice bloke), but whether or not that’s the case it’s still a lovely story. I’m also pretty certain that I’ve met Guy In Taiwan before, and if that is the case then in the flesh he also seemed a nice enough bloke. So why continue with this misanthropic nonsense online?

14

I’m the only person in my family to have seen the inside of a university. My two youngest sisters never went to school. They did home-schooling and school of the air. They are two of the most reliable, dependable, capable, self-sufficient, independent and successful people I know. Schooling is highly over-rated methinks. One sister breeds birds and reptiles, the other grows beef, sorghum and hydroponic vegetables. They are both happy and healthy.

15

Definitely. And, living in the bush in and of itself is not very cool–cold, hot, dusty, wet and often uncomfortable, yes, cool well that’s a different matter.

I don’t think Guy in Taiwan meant to be misanthropic. I don’t know what he meant, except that living in an Aboriginal community has some serious problems. They don’t call it 4th world for nothing. It’s not for everybody. It’s not for me, for example, but I can get it.

16

Yes, ‘misanthropic’ was way too strong a word. I guess I just felt really positive after reading the post and didn’t want any reality to sully my ‘feel good’ moment. Apologies Guy, I crossed the line several times last night whether I was attempting humour or sincerity.

17

Shouldn’t this just be “one person’s reality” or “my sister’s reality” or something? Why is living in the bush “more real” than living elsewhere?

18

[quote=“TomHill”][quote=“GuyInTaiwan”]Now let’s de-romanticise the Aboriginal lifestyle (which repeats itself throughout the world) for a moment:

Life expectancies considerably lower than everyone else, extreme poverty, rampant alcohol and substance abuse, communities rife with incest and general sexual and physical abuse, extremely limited educational and employment possibilities and extremely poor access to general infrastructure and social services.

Sounds fucking fantastic! I can’t imagine why more people don’t make the change![/quote]

Are you describing Glasgow or Manchester there?[/quote]

The entire British Isles. :raspberry:

tomthorne: I’m not being misanthropic (for once – though that’s largely my odd sense of humour more than anything real). No, I was just saying that remote Aboriginal communities are rife with problems. I didn’t think you crossed any line, btw.

19

Reality had nothing to do with living in the bush. That relates to my sister saying:
I had an exhibition about a couple of months ago. I didn’t sell anything but two works were stolen so that’s the next best thing.

20

Well, like the Taiwanese, we rilly rilly rilly care what a bunch of tourists thinks. I’ve never been to your country.