Manning - Aussie movies and Aussie literature

Dear Aussie culture lovers (I know you exist!),
In preparation of my Australia trip I have of course read a lot of information about this big big country. Especially in travel guide books like the Lonely Planet but also in magazines and on the internet. Since I arrived in Australia and especially since working as an Au Pair in Perth I took the chance to join the local Manning library to borrow some books and DVDs about Australia.

This first book however I got from Eva whom I met in Adelaide.
Therefore it is in German but Bill Bryson is quite a famous travel journalist and I really enjoyed reading "Frühstück mit Kängurus" which translates to "Breakfast with kangaroos". He describes his short visits to different parts of Australia and what he encounters there, for example a ride to the Outback, a cyclone near Cairns, visiting Uluru, his stay at the Top End in Darwin, his outlook on the capitol Canberra, his drive from Perth to the Shark Bay Heritage Area and also about Melbourne. It is especially nice to read the small little stories he encounters and as I have been to all these places (except Canberra) it brings back nice memories :-)

On a Wednesday evening I made it to the library to gain a temporary membership and asked the two staff members for typical Aussie literature and the first thing they recommended to me was "Red dog" in bookform as there is also a movie about this dog who is constantly covered in red dust and who travels around Western Australia. Yes, he travels like a tramp by making aquaintances all over the mining areas and little towns and then catches a ride with the people. At first I thought "Oh Geez! It is a book about a dog who gets people into liking him and then travels around the country." But somehow this dog's attitude and all the little stories about him won my heart and I nearly cried at the end. There is apparently a statue of him in Karratha. On my West Coast Tour we didn't get past Karratha as we detoured landinwards to Karijini. It is a rather thin book and very easy to read. If you get a chance, please have a go at it.

Friends of my hostparents gave this movie "The castle" to them as it is supposed to be very well-known (have you ever heard of it?). We watched it together and seriously, it is so funny! It is about a normal family who live on the outskirts of Melbourne directly next to the airport. Like in their garden fence is the fence of the airport! It seems to be a pretty low-profiled but happy and sympathic family who face their home being sold to the airport for an airport expansion. But the father won't take the compensation as he doesn't want to lose his house which is his home and therefore his castle. Several twists and turns appear and I was surprised by how in the end this story translates even into a real message: the fear of getting throwing out of their home is being compared to the Aborgines being thrown out of the land they lived in! I really liked this movie and would recommend it to everybody for a good laugh and a little bit of a thought.

The next thing I have been recommended at the library was this TV series Cloudstreet based on a book. It's divided into three parts about two very different families in the 1940's and 1950' in Perth who are living in this haunted house together. It is a rather strange story but I was still eager to find out what happens at the end and watched the full nearly six hours of it. I assume it had something to do with the characters, they were well played and you just want to know what happened in No. 1 Cloudstreet and how will it be resolved?

A few weeks back I was working really crazy hours. I took on every job that would fit into my spare time to make as much money as possible. So although I am a total book lover I went for another DVD from the library. "Two men in a tinnie" is a documentary about this two guys who follow the biggest river system of Australia - the Murray - from Queensland down to New South Wales and then West through Victoria and into South Australia. A six week journey downstream with quite a few surprises and you see a totally different side to the life in Australia. As the dryness of this country dictates the way of living close to the shore explains the big satellite cities on the edges (like Sydney, Melbourne, Brisbane, Cairns, Adelaide, Perth and Darwin). Landinwards you highly rely on water as in rainfall and in the river system. I was amazed by what I learned but it isn't the greatest thing to see if you are not interested in these sort of things if you know what I mean.

Next on my recommendation list from the library was "A fortunate life" by A.B. Facey's in form of a stage book. It describes the life of a young boy from Victoria who goes over to Western Australia to follow his mother who left him and his siblings behind to find out what had become of their father who went there for the gold rush. The main character Bert is facing quite a few bad experiences with employers who treat him badly and don't pay him as promised although he is a reliable and hard-working man who is willing to learn new things. He gets more bound to the bush than the city and is also lucky to find the sort of people who help him out for no return favor. In 1914 he joins the army in the first world war and survives the fight at Gallipoli wounded. This seemed to me as a more accurate description of what you had to expect out in the West Australian bush back in those days but I was a bit disappointed by the end of it all.

Currently I am reading "The girl in steel-capped boots" by Loretta Hill. This is more of a modern read about a Perth city girl who just finished her engineer degree and has been sent of to a construction site in the Pilbara. She is one of five women on the site, among 350 men where she has to prove her engineering skills against her gender and city attitude. I am only a hundred pages in and I like it. It seems the main character has a dark secret about how she actually achieved her degree and she slowly adjusts to the life at the construction site. Let's see what comes up :-)

Well, here I am, in Western Australias capitol Perth: the most isolated city on earth. Working as an Au Pair and doing other odd jobs to earn and save some money for my next journeys and reading books and watching movies about different aspects of Australia. Why? Because I am a sucker for books and like to get to know this country in more detail. But I also have some other things coming up on my agenda.
My next stop: the Greyhound races!
Yours Aussie-literature-exploring Stefanie