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Post by Deleted on Jun 29, 2010 13:45:35 GMT
I just read your previous post, ilbonito. That is so interesting. It would make sense that they were Sikhs also. I do think that something is missing here though. From what I understood, there were many convicts that were shipped over and on a regular basis from India to Australia. The Indians wanted nothing to do with the convicts and I image the authorities responsible for them were probably paid to give them away. It is quite a well know fact within the Indian communities. I'll have to look more into this.
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Post by ilbonito on Jun 30, 2010 5:42:44 GMT
Deyana, its so interesting this idea of Australia looming ominously in the Indian imagination, as some kind of place of exile across the "black waters", a Siberia of the South. But it doesn't seem to be borne out by the info here. I wonder, do you think the idea of transportation to Australia might be some sort of urban myth, all the more potent because it was based on a seed of truth - after all convicts were sent to Australia in chains from all over the empire, and some of them were Indian, but as far as I can see not in large numbers. Maybe "Australia" was some kind of boogieman with which to keep people in line, especially children, which is why "bad people" were sent there, and maybe why you were told about it by your mother! I think children of my parents generation here were told they would be kidnapped and sent to China if they misbehaved - the same kind of deal perhaps? its all very interesting to think about anyway ...
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Post by Deleted on Jun 30, 2010 8:43:38 GMT
To compete with the Las Vegas slogan, "What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas" perhaps Australia could come up with a new advertising line: "Australia: where the bad people go!"
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Post by ilbonit0 on Jun 30, 2010 8:55:34 GMT
Reminds me of an ad I saw in a local gay magazine for the country town of Daylesford, near Melbourne, trying to promote itself as a "weekend escape" for sophisticated city people.
The picture showed a muscly, shirtless man tied up with ropes, and the slogan: "escaping has never been so much fun" ...
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Post by Deleted on Jun 30, 2010 20:16:40 GMT
That could catch on, K. That's a good theory, ilbonito. I always was quite misbehaved, so maybe my exasperated mother was just trying to find a way to keep me line!
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Post by Deleted on Jun 30, 2010 21:28:50 GMT
There are very few countries that didn't tell recalcitrant children "you have to eat this food because children in China are starving."
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Post by ilbonito on Jun 30, 2010 23:36:10 GMT
In Bangkok they have the embalmed corpse of an infamous child-killer, cannibal and rapist, Si Ouey Sae Urng, in a museum. Parents tell their kids that if they are bad he will come back and finish them off!
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Post by ilbonito on Jul 2, 2010 8:18:08 GMT
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Post by bixaorellana on Jul 2, 2010 13:52:27 GMT
Well, that was an enjoyable and illuminating jaunt ~ thanks for directing me over there. Even after poring over this thread, I was still surprised by the range of what Melbourne has to offer. And you know I'm a big fan of your writing and pictures, so it was a pleasure to look and learn.
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Post by gertie on Jul 6, 2010 9:26:59 GMT
Ilbonita, what wonderful pictures and an interesting telling of the tale, so to speak. We never ate our food for the starving children in China, maybe that was an older generation? It was the starving children in Ethiopia. We have a funny story because when my sister was small, she proudly told a crowd of my parents friends in for a bbq she had cleaned her plate for those starving kids in tapioca.
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Post by joanne28 on Jul 9, 2010 16:47:35 GMT
It was the starving children in India for my sister and I.
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Post by kerouac2 on Apr 17, 2023 4:13:01 GMT
I saw on the news that Melbourne is now the biggest city in Australia, having passed Sydney. However, it appears that it is more because they have obsorbed some of the suburbs rather than a jump in the birthrate.
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