RIP Judith Durham

but please not her voice.

I put up a memory on Facebook yesterday - of hearing Judith Durham sing. It was just one short moment. I never went to a concert when the Seekers were at the height of their fame in the sixties. Our family didn't do that sort of thing. There was no money for anything like that and we would not even have thought of it. 

As a family though we liked the Seekers. We might not know or understand groups like the Beatles but we understood and appreciated the Seekers. In school J..., our maths and music teacher, taught us some of the songs. We sang them at a school concert one year.  (There was no charge for parents to attend so I assume the performance rights issue was covered.)

My siblings, all of whom were learning to play instruments, could all play versions of this song or that. The other students at the school would get Brother Cat to play them in lunch hours when it was raining too hard to be outside. It was that sort of rural school and that sort of music.

Forward a few years and I was at a conference for trainee teachers. It was being held in a building at a university which had a concert hall attached. I have forgotten exactly what was being discussed but tempers had become rather heated in one session. I know I was feeling rather uncomfortable about being around people who really were not getting along with one another. We broke for one of those inevitable tea breaks but the atmosphere was still rather tense among some of the group.  

Then, quite suddenly, there was a voice singing solo and unaccompanied in the concert hall. I can remember standing there quite still but watching the other people in the room. People stopped talking. They stopped drinking their tea and coffee.  Other people stopped walking across the university grounds as the sound soared out of the open windows of the concert hall.

All too soon the voice stopped and there was that brief silent moment of appreciation before people clapped. The person next to me said quietly, "What a voice!"

Even now I consider myself fortunate to have heard that moment. At the end of it the tension within the group I was with had almost gone. People were more prepared to be reasonable, to listen to one another. It was one of those times when music, just a small amount of music, can do so much. 

It was Judith Durham singing "Turn, turn, turn".

 

Building a hospital without a kitchen

was never going to be a good idea. Just how foolish has been made obvious to me yet again.

I was at the supermarket when it opened this morning because P... of the midnight phone call called to apologise yesterday. She obviously feels very badly about waking me in the middle of the night. (Her niece A... informed her of what she had done. I did not and would not have done but A... thought she needed to know.) 

P.... is also very frustrated. She is a very intelligent, sensible sort of person. She is well aware of what she should and should not eat and, unlike many of us, manages to stay pretty much within her diet. 

But hospital food? It comes in from outside caterers and it seems that individual diets cannot be catered for - at least to the extent they need to be. I remember what the Senior Cat was given when he was there with the 'flu. We both had the strain that was not covered by the vaccine but I was crawling in to see him because the food he was being given was so bad he did not want to eat at all. The Senior Cat was not fussy but it was too much for him when faced with tough meat and rock hard grey potato wrapped in cellophane. 

P... needs an almost fat free diet right now. She keeps it very low fat at the best of times but right now it is essential. 

"I don't know what it was meant to be but it was greasy," she told me of the meal she had been given an hour or so earlier. The other meal was a sandwich in a plastic container, a bread roll and a cup of tea.

And then she told me something that really shocked me. "The dietician came in at two o'clock this morning and suggested that I get someone to bring me in something from home."

No, she was not mistaken. The dietician came to see her at 2am. The dietician suggested someone outside the hospital which is supposed to be caring for her bring in food for her. 

I am well aware that bringing in food is common in some parts of the world. There are no facilities at all in some places. Family have to do what they can to help. In parts of Africa and Asia for example I would accept that - as necessary but not acceptable. 

In this country it is not acceptable but I promptly said, "Middle Cat and I will bring something in." P... barely argued with me. She wants to go home.  Her 94yr old housemate has gone into respite for a fortnight and the other nuns on the premises will see she is okay once she is home but right now she needs good food. 

I have made her a clear soup and some no-fat chicken stew. It is about to go into six small microwave containers. Someone can heat it up for her. Middle Cat is getting some of the right sort of fruit.

Who on earth thought that building a hospital without a kitchen was acceptable? Why on earth does a dietician have to work in the middle of the night? There is something very wrong here. 

War over Taiwan

remains a real possibility - or so we are being told.

My immediate neighbours on one side are Taiwanese. R... has been here for many years. How he managed to get residency and for what purpose remains something of a mystery. He has never informed me and of course I have never asked. 

From what little he has said I gather that he was in some trouble back there - not criminal, but possibly political. He brought both his children out here to live with him when they were about to start high school. 

It was his wife, H...., who stayed in Taiwan. She was a teacher there. H...came out here about seven years ago. She does not really speak English. The Senior Cat and I offered R... to help her with English but the offer was never taken up. I feel for H... Almost certainly she has to be very, very lonely here.

Earlier this year R... came in to see me with some questions about passports and visas and the like. They were planning a trip back to Taiwan. I saw H... over the fence a few days later and managed to make her understand I was asking if she was looking forward to going back. She nodded enthusiastically. There was no doubt she was looking forward to it. 

It still hasn't happened. R... thinks it might not happen now. It is not Covid considerations this time but the potential for the situation between China and Taiwan to escalate into a war over the territory.

This is a ridiculous situation of course. It has been a ridiculous situation for years. If, as China claims, Taiwan is part of China then it is nonsense for the Chinese not to do what they have done in Hong Kong. Why put up with a "self-governing" region that has consistently declared itself to be independent? 

Why does almost every other country make the same claim?

H... is very disappointed of course. Of late she has been even quieter than usual. She keeps her head down and scarcely leaves the house. I know - from our awkward, stilted, limited conversations - that she is increasingly anxious about the situation.

I suspect it is very convenient for China to have that point of tension for now. It isn't about ruling Taiwan. It is about ruling the rest of the world. Do what we want and we will leave Taiwan alone. It is bullying. It is a sort of blackmail and it seems other countries are giving in to it.

That is why Pelosi's visit was so dangerous.  

A midnight phone call

is never good news and this one came at about twenty past. I was asleep but the phone woke me. A wrong number....or something more serious? 

The phone kept ringing as I crawled out of bed and went to answer it. No, I don't keep a phone on a bedside table. 

It was one of the rare occasions on which I wish I did. It was my friend P..., the nun. P... was confused and frightened but had somehow managed to phone me.  

I didn't know it at first because her housemate B... had not thought to let me know but P.... was in hospital with a very severe bout of pancreatitis. At that time of night she was alone in a hospital room and not sure where she was. 

"I'm frightened.I'm confused. I can't stand up. I feel as if I have had a stroke," she told me, "Can you ask someone to come?"

As I had been woken from sleep I was not at my most alert but I recognised the signs of acute pancreatitis.  It's a horrible, horrible condition that can not only cause severe pain but it can cause serious side effects like depression and confusion. I had better not continue to try and explain because I am not a medical doctor. Please just accept that this can happen and it was happening to P... .

I told her I would phone the hospital there and then and get someone to check on her. She thanked me and hung up. 

I set about trying to do just that. It was not as easy as it should have been. 

Of course the hospital she is currently in is the new one and the phone number has changed. I couldn't find the new one in our personal phone book. No, not under R... for Royal... and not under H... for hospital. I found the almost impossible to read local phone directory. That only had the old one in there - although the directory itself is only two years old and the hospital is older than that. In desperation though I tried the old number. If that didn't work I would try something else.

Ah! A recorded message with the new number. Of course the pen I was trying to use didn't work properly but I tried twice and managed to take it down. I phoned the number. 

At that time of night you can be lucky. I was only "on hold" for less than a minute. I gave my name and explained the situation. The voice at the other end was kind and sympathetic, "Oh yes, she is definitely here. I'll put you through to the ward."

And there was another quiet, sensible voice. I gave my name and explained the situation. 

"I'll go and check," the voice told me. 

"Thank you," I told her.

"No, thank you for letting us know."

I crawled back into bed. I did not go properly back to sleep. I am  a very tired cat today...but I am grateful that P... could phone me in her confusion and that there were people at the other end who cared and could go to her.  

Separating conjoined twins

would be difficult enough but to be involved from half a world away is, as one of those on the team from Great Ormond Street Hospital put it "man on Mars stuff". 

It has to be the most extraordinary and disciplined sort of surgery there is. It is complex. It is dangerous. It requires hours of training for a specific operation. It requires discipline.

I have occasionally been very peripherally involved in surgical procedures. My role has been simple really. All I had to do was provide a "communication board" - something which has allowed people who speak different languages to communicate with each other. This has sometimes been needed in more remote parts of the world where interpreters are thin on the ground and, even if available, they may not have the necessary vocabulary. 

Every time I have been asked to do this I have been in awe of what some people will attempt to do. I have had operations described where a wire coat hanger, a pocket knife and a strand of nylon like fibre from a climbing rope have been used to save someone's life. Yes, the person survived. 

We are so used to the idea that surgery only takes place in sterile circumstances. In reality it can take place under the most appalling conditions - and people do survive. 

A friend who is a keen surfer and works at GOSH emailed me about something else yesterday and I asked, "What was the mood like there?" His response was, "Concerned but when it was over it was almost like catching that elusive wave."  

Let's hope the two little boys survive and are able to enjoy relatively normal lives...and that they go out and catch the wave. 

Registering the bike

was a suggestion made recently. It was made  in the state newspaper by our partly retired columnist.  He pointed out that push bikes are registered in some places.  

His argument for this centred around bicycle riders being road users and, as such, liable for damages when damage occurs. They should be insured against damage so that when their pedals scrape the paint off cars they have to pay up.

My three wheels have, so far, never done any damage to a car - but cars have done damage to them. I have been properly and securely parked and come back to my three wheels and discovered damage. No note has ever been left. It is possible the car driver was not even really aware they had hit something. 

I ride mostly on the footpaths. It is legal to do that. I am also old enough to be conscious of the dangers posed by cars exiting driveways without watching. In the usual way I go at the pace of someone walking ahead of me until I am quite sure they know I am there. If I had a cent for each time someone has said, "You could have rung your bell...." I would probably be rich - but equally I might have been paying damages to someone into whom I had run the front wheel  or  startled someone into falling over as they moved aside.  It is better to wait. 

And of course registering bikes has other issues. What do you do about those tiny bikes with trainer wheels? Do parents have to pay? What about all those curb jumping teenagers - mostly male - who pays for them? 

Do we issue licences? Are people required to be medically fit to have a licence? Do bikes have to undergo an annual mechanical check and get a certificate to say they are roadworthy?

There could also be an new level of bureaucracy to handle all this. 

I remember my first tricycle. The Senior Cat brought it home one day from school. It was a "Cyclops" brand - the most common on the market back then. They were strong and stable. They also had the most useful tray on the back in which things could be carried - including the cat if you could persuade it to stay there for the distance of a few feet.  

The Senior Cat repainted mine bright red and put wooden blocks on the pedals so that I could keep my errant rear paws where they were supposed to be. I kept it "parked" under the tank stand at the back of the house...next to the fire wood. 

It was a tricycle like that of every other child in the cluster of houses we lived in. The Irish boy across the street inevitably had his painted green. There were more red trikes and some blue trikes. We pedalled everywhere. 

I don't think we ever did any damage. I doubt we could go fast enough to harm anyone if we did run into them. It would have been more of a gentle nudge. It simply wasn't possible to do that.

Things have changed. The three, almost four, year old girl across the street from here has a "two wheeler" without any training wheels. Her speed up and down the street frightens me - because she has no road sense. Her older brother is not much better. Would they do damage? Do they need to have "L" plates and then "P" plates? Their father says it is an interesting idea.

I don't know. I do know they lack that wonderful tray at the back. Pluto (the now elderly cat from the end of the street) just sits on the fence watching them. Then he looks at me as if to say, " You had a lot more fun going places?" And yes, I did - without a licence.

 

Who is "aboriginal"?

This is a question which needs to be addressed in this country. It needs to be addressed before the proposed referendum on a "voice" to parliament for aboriginal people. It is also a question which is not going to be easy to answer. 

The reason it needs to be addressed is not, as some will suggest, "racist" but because people need to know just who that "voice" will represent. We cannot simply continue to allow people to self-identify, or some to be accepted for political or activist reasons but others with almost identical ancestry to be denied.

I am not "aboriginal". My four grandparents were the first to be born in this country. 

It also seems I am not "indigenous" either - not according to the definitions which require some sort of association with the land here. I do not have that strong tie to "country" felt by some aboriginal people. I actually have no strong feelings about it at all. I am not someone who waves the flag - and I do not like the dirge which is supposedly our "national anthem". It is people who caused me to return here - not place.

I also know other people feel quite differently about all this. They are immensely proud of the country to which they "belong". For some of them it is their ancestral home stretching back far before records began. For some of them it is the country which has given them shelter as refugees. 

Between these two extremes there are all sorts of differences in association with "the land". It is an issue which has to be addressed. We need to know if someone who has a single great-great-great grandparent "who might have been born on an outback station to an aboriginal woman and a white man" has the same claim to being aboriginal as the person born to someone whose grandparents were the first to have any contact with white settlers.  (This happened as late as 1984 when contact was made with the Pintubi people in the Gibson desert.)

Where do we draw the line - and for what purpose?  It's going to be a hard question to answer.