Somewhere over the rainbow

                                                          Photo by: Michelle Day

Somewhere over the Rainbow was the joke of the night on Saturday at the Adelaide Cabaret Festival.

A very popular Mark Nadler was doing his thing in the Piano Bar at the Festival Centre, "menacing the keyboards" in Broadway Hootenanny and introducing special guests. He explained that the night before after the "gala performance" one of his guests had sung Somewhere over the Rainbow and then maybe not aware of this 2012 artistic director Kate Ceberano dressed up to look like Princess Leia or maybe a Grecian goddess sang the same classic number from The Wizard of Oz.

So on Saturday night Nadler begged his guests to pick another tune.

"Even Olivia sang it during her show tonight," he said, referring of course to Our Livvie (or Olivia Newton John) and pointing out that being a pop singer she only sang the chorus and not the verses.

Nadler's guests were formidable - for example Simon Burke in town for a show and a bevy of women singers including a lesbian (as he put it) he'd seen in a Fringe Cabaret act called  Libby O'Donovan. Sporting a white Mohawk she threw off her mock fur coat to reveal a tightly-fitting plastic nurse's uniform and sang about being on a slut walk for love.

And then came the Magnets, a British boy band, who are a six-man sound machine - making all their music with their mouths alone. After a couple of songs they burst forth with a jammed uptempo version, with the outrageous Nadler on the piano, of you guessed it - that rainbow song.

Meanwhile a very sparkly Olivia performed all the old favourites to an adoring audience- standing and clapping away with her and her American backing band and the Adelaide Art Orchestra. She can still "get physical" and shake her beautiful body better than people half her age. Must be all that tea she drinks on stage - no bourbon and coke for her.

The night  before at the gala she'd done the final number - Xanadu - surrounded by drag queens covered in yellow feathers.

After the show it was a bit hard to tell who were the drags and who were Adelaide matrons decked out in their 70s sparkly numbers they obviously keep in the back of the cupboard for such occasions. The fashion was not the high point of the night. At one stage, I wondered if a wedding party had got lost and wandered into the bar. Some people seemed to be dressed in their bridesmaids outfits.

Changing the mood somewhat, for an hour on Saturday afternoon I was mesmerised by the performance of Ansuya Nathan, in her show Long Live the King, telling the story of her Indian parents' arrival in Adelaide on the day of the death of Elvis, her mother's idol. Weaving in and out of their past and 70s present, she told a moving tale that linked Elvis intimately with her mother. Both Ansuya's mother and Elvis's lost one of their twins at birth. And she can sing Elvis songs too. Beautiful.

For David Campbell this is his last cabaret festival as artistic director - he made the most of it by getting up on stage and singing You're the One that I Want with a leather-jacketed Olivia in her show.

Ceberano was asked on opening night what she plans to do for next year and she said she would just make sure she had good acts. Doesn't look like it will be hard.

Adelaide can be rather dreary at times - I know I have lived there and also spent two long weeks there last year - but during cabaret festival time it shines.

     

Masai Warriors and Goosebump Trails

They say those who know do and those who don’t teach. But I can’t see why you can’t do both.

I love travelling, I love travel writing, I love journalism but I also love to teach. It’s fun to impart what little knowledge you might have come across to other people. And it’s even more fun to see what they come up with. And with this in mind I have started teaching travel writing.


In the past few years, I’ve been to around 20 international destinations and scores in Australia and New Zealand.. I’ve interviewed everybody from Masai warriors to Republican voters in the US to Irish genealogists to Albanian professors to Indonesian villagers. And I’ve written hundreds of travel stories.


But I didn’t start out as a travel writer. I did a pretty traditional journalism cadetship on a newspaper and worked in the Press Gallery in Canberra before heading to the Kimberley in Western Australia and then the Northern Territory to cover the burgeoning land rights movements there.


It wasn’t really until I worked in Central America in the mid 80s that I started writing travel stories. It was a way of getting stories published that you couldn’t get into the world news or features pages. One I remember was about the Atlantic Coast of Nicaragua and what an evocative destination that was, even with a war going on there at the time.


We went over to cover the autonomy movement and elections. We sailed up the coast on a cargo ship and climbed into canoes which crashed over waves before landing on the beach. Everybody was green with seasickness but that didn't stop one girl carrying a birthday cake for her family the whole way. On the beach we were met by long-haired, wild-looking soldiers. I thought I’d arrived for the filming of Apocalypse Now.


The female Nicaraguan journalist and I slept head to toe in a mosquito-netted hammock, down with the soldiers. We thought we were safer there. It seems strange now reading about Nicaragua as the newest tourist destination. 


When I was there they used to blow up the ferry to Bluefields on the Atlantic Coast every second Friday.


Times change and so do politics and people. What was a war zone regularly becomes a tourist destination and vice versa.


That’s what makes it so fascinating to write about.


Come to one of my courses held in my Sydney home where you can also enjoy beautiful Balinese food cooked by my husband, Budi Arsana, and get some travel writing tips.


I also teach regional and family history writing. Nearly every story is enriched by historical background, I believe. And some of my favourites have been about tracing my family history in Scotland and Ireland, what’s known as the “goosebump trail”.


Email me on plater@optusnet.com.au for course dates, times and prices.

Lionel and Elvis

Sadly, great Australian boxer Lionel Rose died this week.

At the age of 19 Rose became the first Aboriginal person to win a world title – when he defeated Masahiko “Fighting” Harada in Tokyo in 1968 to win the world bantamweight belt.

Rose grew up in a bark shed at Jackson’s Track, a poor settlement near the Gippsland town of Drouin in Victoria but became a champion.

Rose represented a positive figure for Australian indigenous people. He was a part of my childhood, in a way as he was the first famous Aboriginal person I'd heard of as a teenager.

As a Victorian friend said to me, "he was a superb sportsman and someone that I looked up to at the time, and still do. Plus, he was very cute".

I was intrigued to read in his obituary by Gerry Carman that Rose gathered a glittering array of admirers around Australia and overseas and his biggest American fan was Elvis Presley. Rose and his trainer Jack Rennie apparently were the only outsiders allowed on to the set of a Presley film (Roustabout) and spent three hours with the king of rock’n’roll, who insisted on a brief “spar” with him.

“Elvis never forgot his raisin’” is one of the many tributes to Elvis Presley on a story wall at the shotgun shack he was born in at Tupelo, Mississippi, now a museum, which I visited in 2006. It was thus named because a shotgun bullet could pass from the front to the back.

The tribute was written by Annie Presley, a cousin by marriage and a dear friend of Elvis’s mother, Gladys.

Another tribute tells of Elvis sneaking away to the local black Baptist church to listen to gospel music.

The shack is not that different to back in 1934 when Elvis’s dad Vernon borrowed $180 for materials to build it with Elvis’s grandfather and uncle on land he sharecropped.

In 1948, Vernon moved the family to Memphis, about 160km north, to look for work. What they couldn’t load in their 1939 Plymouth, they left behind. But it was Graceland, the home he moved into after he became a star, when he was 22, that most people associate with Elvis.

On the way to the recent Byron Bay Bluesfest I listened in the car to Paul Simon’s Graceland:

"The Mississippi Delta was shining
Like a National guitar
I am following the river
Down the highway
Through the cradle of the civil war

I'm going to Graceland
Graceland
In Memphis Tennessee..."

With the civil war always as the backdrop, the U S of A is the land that created rock’n’roll – and before that gospel, jazz, soul, rhythm and blues, bluegrass and country. Elvis and later the Beatles and the Rolling Stones unashamedly turned black music into white music for a wider audience.

Rose, on the other hand, recorded country/pop music singles such as I Thank You.

I wonder if during those three hours together Elvis and Rose jammed or just talked about coming from the wrong side of the tracks – something they shared although from different countries and backgrounds.

They were both stars.

10am check-out time

I'd forgotten the joy of country town motels during the time I'd been working as a fulltime travel writer.

I'd spent many a night in them in years gone by, overnighting on long road trips all over Australia. They made a change from bunking on friends' couches, or camping out under the stars.

But my recent road trip to Byron Bay in northern NSW for the annual BluesFest reminded me that things haven't changed that much - once you get away from the big cities and the country five-star resorts and even boutique B and Bs.

The windscreen wipers worked hard against the splashing rain and I tried to keep my eyes prised open as my son's iPod played rock and roll. The close-up lights of huge trucks reflected in my rear window as they bore down on me even when I moved into the left lane, hoping they'd overtake.

Why hadn't my husband sorted out his Australian drivers' licence, I kept asking myself, remembering to keep to 60 or 80km in the road work areas on the lovely strip we call a national highway. And when would my son or even his friend be old enough to get their Ls? Why was I always the lone driver on these trips? And was I really going over 100km when the traffic cop beamed his radar at me?

We finally made it into Coffs Harbour where I'd booked a room in a motel.

As The Weight's lyrics say, I was "feelin' about half past dead" and I just needed a place where I could lay my head (after pulling into Nazareth). They'd kindly added a folding bed for my son's friend and all was well. I was even excited when I read the photocopied breakfast menu. Cardboard cereal and greasy eggs and bacon - yum.

But sick of takeaway food, crisps and Easter eggs, we headed across the highway to a local tavern for dinner. As we waited and waited for our meals and the kids finished their pink lemonades, I enjoyed some people watching.

A forlorn-looking wedding table covered in pink and white balloons was empty except for one kissing couple as the rest of the wedding couple smoked outside or danced to disco music.

Back to the motel room. After a fitful night's sleep I was woken by the sound of a father yelling at his children below our window. (Hadn't I left Sydney to get away from noisy neighbours?)

But the shower was hot and strong. Just as I was enjoying it and my hair was full of shampoo though I was interrupted by a loud banging on the motel room door.

"Ten am check-out time," an even louder voice proclaimed.

It was 10am on the dot but we hurriedly dressed and packed. I didn't want them to add another night to my credit card bill.

As we left, I smiled at the male cleaner who had so politely informed us it was time to leave. But he didn't smile back.

And up the highway we headed.

I believe, I believe in Ita...yes I do!

Christopher Lee, scriptwriter of Paper Giants.

It was great to see Paper Giants which was written by Christopher Lee about the heady days of the early 1970s and the Australian women's magazine, Cleo, on TV this week.

It brought back those days really clearly and reminded me of the sorts of stories that were then considered ground-breaking and how so many believed in Ita Buttrose. ("I believe, I believe, at the end of the day, Her magazine'll get me through" as the words of Don Walker's song, Ita, tells us.) He was talking about the Women's Weekly, which she went on to edit.

My only contact with Ita was a few years later when she started her own magazine, Ita (ofcourse) and I wrote a freelance story for her about an incredible woman photographer Hedda Morrison who worked in China before World War Two. I was pregnant with my first child and had Amelia just before the story came out. Ita gave me mothering advice, which I thought at the time was hilarious, remembering all those Women's Weekly editorials mentioning her kids Kate and Ben.

It wasn't until I watched the TV drama that I realised some of her own personal background and what an incredible struggle it must have been to bring up the kids on her own and do that job, and then become an ACP board member (under Kerry Packer).

Good on ya, Ita.

I interviewed Chris a few years ago for Spectrum in the Sydney Morning Herald and he reminded me he was a former journalist.

Chris was also one of the originating writers of the hit series, Secret Life of Us and has long worked with Southern Star producer John Edwards.

He said his first novel, Bush Week, had led to a year's fellowship by the Literature Board of the Australia Council in 1981. This gave him the "permission to get out" of journalism, having worked for eight years for AAP, including stints in Sydney, Darwin, Papua New Guinea and London.

But he abandoned the new novel when he got into the Australian Film and Television School and found scriptwriting was his forte.

Chris told me during the interview that the script is the most important ingredient of a good TV drama:

"It's the script initially, that's what we writers claim, and we're not going to be talked out of it," he said."I find that, immediately after episodes in my life, I can't turn them into fiction because it's too close, but after a few years something happens and I think, 'That's a good story.' It's finally got into a fictional perspective and I'm able to write it."

Although back then he said he was not too sure journalists worked well as TV and film characters, he'd found his own journalistic training has been beneficial for his scriptwriting. In fact, he wished there were more former journalists in the television industry rather than fresh-out-of-film-school writers.

"You meet prime ministers and criminals and desperadoes and injured people. So it seems to me really good background for screen fiction. And the other thing it teaches is the value of a deadline.

"When I arrived, I always delivered on time, always. And [as head writer] I got calls from writers saying, 'I can't deliver because the dog ate my homework' [or] 'because I'm blocked'.

"I thought: 'Imagine if a journalist rang the editor and said, 'I can't deliver my copy, I'm blocked.' The editor would say, 'Well, block yourself out the door.' "

Gotta go now...I'm on a deadline.

Spiked Stilettos

I don't know but young women these days are enough to make a feminist roll in her grave (if she's dead).

Overheard conversations about upcoming nuptials make the Windsor Knot look like a simple garden tea party. Will and Kate may be inviting thousands including their exes but are they fighting over what colour the napkins should be?

I'm not against people having the wedding of their dreams but do they need to spend every cent they'll ever make in their life on it? Are they worried they'll look cheap?

And why do women think they need to be proposed to? In some "romantic" place like Hawaii too? Shouldn't marriage be a joint discussion?

And what is this propensity to give away your name and take your husband's? Didn't we fight for years to keep our own names? Overheard: Young woman telling IT to make sure they change her name when she weds. She won't be X anymore. (I can imagine IT's groan at this.)
But even worse overheard conversation: If he wants me to stop working, I will – I already deposit my pay in his account and he withdraws money for me when I need it. EEEK!

And while we're on the subject of going back to the 50s... those shoes young women these days are wearing are not only bad for their feet and backs, they're UGLY! Stilettos can look OK on certain occasions but those strappy ones that look like bandages should be banned.

I made a fool of myself once when I sat next to an actor who was going out with some famous shoe designer who he spoke lovingly about and I didn't have a clue who she was. Only a few months later they broke up. Maybe her stilettos were just too spiked.

When light-skinned means coloured

Nine Aboriginal people are part of a Federal Court class action started by Aboriginal woman Pat Eatock against (Melbourne) Herald Sun columnist Andrew Bolt over articles and blogs on Aboriginal identity. After writing about so-called light-skinned people of mixed heritage who identify as Aboriginal, he has been accused of racial discrimination. Bolt has given evidence that he was being tried for exercising his right to free speech, and for raising topics that were "little discussed" because of intimidation.

Years ago I met Pat Eatock and interviewed her with student Samantha Weir for an oral history project. She spoke about her life including her early days and her involvement in the Aboriginal Tent Embassy in Canberra. I'm telling you now, she goes way back!

Whatever you think of the matter, the discussion in court reminded me about how being light-skinned doesn't make it any easier for Aboriginal people.

Here's a story, told to me a few years back by Vincent Wenberg, a member of the Stolen Generations. One day he showed me a photo, one of those you often find in albums of the 1940s - a snapshot of a man and woman, sometimes with children, walking down the main street.

They're usually wearing their best clothes, gloves and hat and possibly carrying a parcel or two.

They've been in town shopping and some anonymous photographer has snapped them, then sold them the photo.

This one depicts a soldier, complete with slouch hat and a cigarette in his mouth, holding the hand of a little boy, wearing shorts, long sleeved white shirt and a tie and panama hat.

Next to him is a slim, pretty Aboriginal woman clutching a purse and wearing a cotton dress and flowered hat.

The man is Private John Wenberg, who was then with the Second AIF based in Tamworth.

His skin is dark, because Wenberg explains, he was English but with possibly some African blood.

The woman is his wife, Lily Wenberg, nee Mercy, and Vince's mother, a Bundjalong woman from the northern rivers region of NSW. The boy is Vince's younger brother, Johnnie.

On the back, in black fountain pen, Lily has written, "father and mother and son John Wenberg 1940".

Johnnie never had the opportunity to display this photo in an album.

Like Vince and another brother, Gus, Johnnie was a member of the Stolen Generations.

The three boys were taken from their parents and spent the war years in the Kinchela Boys Home near Kempsey on the NSW mid north coast.

While there, Johnnie's complaints of stomach aches were ignored until it was too late. He was taken to hospital where he died of appendicitis. He was seven years old.

"The people in the home didn't let Gus and me go to see him in hospital," Vince remembers.

"If he'd seen us or had his mother there to comfort him he would have been happier."

After the funeral service the brothers and the other boys from the home were made to march through the main street of Kempsey.

From on top of the hill, remarks such as "Blacks go home!" were yelled at them. In the meantime, the Welfare Board wrote to Mr Wenberg asking for the details of the Mutual Life and Citizens Association insurance policy he had taken out for Johnnie, in the hope that it would cover the funeral costs.

The Wenberg girls - Rita, Adelaide, Amy, Pat, Valerie and Dorothy - were also removed from their parents and taken to Cootamundra and to Bomaderry Children's Home.

According to the Bringing Them Home report, the Aborigines Protection (later known as
Welfare) Board's main aim was to rescue Aboriginal children from what were considered neglectful family lives, and to assimilate them into the wider community as menial workers.

Yet of the estimated 400 boys who went through Kinchela between 1924 and 1970, many became alcoholics and homeless, unable to identify as either white or black.

In contrast, Vincent gained a job with the Railways in Sydney after his four years at the home and worked there until his retirement.

But he is still bitter about the policies that took him there.

He asks how the Welfare Board could claim to have been protecting Aboriginal children from neglectful parents, when his sister Dorothy, then around 18 months, died in the Bomaderry Childrens Home when her head became caught between the bars of her cot.

Pat was deemed uncontrollable by the authorities and received shock treatment in Callan Park, the Sydney psychiatric institution.

When her younger sister, Valerie, went to visit her she was upset to find her wearing a straight jacket. Not long afterwards Pat died. She was 18.

Valerie, herself, has distressing memories of the Cootamundra home and life as a domestic on farms, including a series of sexual assaults. She was the first member of the Stolen Generations to win monetary compensation for her treatment, winning $35,000 from the NSW Victims Compensation Tribunal in 2002.

While the Wenberg boys kept in contact with their sisters by visiting them at Cootamundra after they left Kinchela, what became of Lily and John, the parents?

Vincent opens the concertina files holding the official documents of his life that he has collected, urged on by his children. He discovered that he was born out of wedlock when Lily was 16 and that his real father was Wally Randall. He has also discovered many new half brothers and sisters.

He shows me the letters that for many years John and Lily continued to write to the Board, begging that their children be returned.

One letter from Lily, written in 1948, suggests "I think it time he (Vincent) came home now. Will you let me know. I think it time he was home now."

A letter written to Lily by the Acting Secretary of the Welfare Board in 1947 insists that Vincent must stay under its care until he is 14 and points out that "you and your husband badly neglected your children". Vincent denies this.

In 1948, the year Vincent was released from the home as a 14-year-old to find work on farms and in the bush, Lily died of pulmonary tuberculosis. She was buried in the Methodist Cemetery at Bellingen. She was 34 years old.

*The Wenbergs are mentioned in the book I wrote with Ollie Smith, Raging Partners: Two Worlds, One Friendship (Magabala Books, 2000). I met Vince while working for the Sorry Day Committee several years ago, when the issue of an apology to the Stolen Generations first arose, but I was well acquainted with his sisters and nephew before that.