Almost Home
Tasmanian politics may be even madder than the British version. There was a budget here a few days ago. The age to receive the pension has gone up to 67! They are closing the Government departments of Arts, Heritage, Tourism and the Environment, but paying $15,000,000 for Hawthorne Football club to come and play six games here (whoever heard of Hawthorn?)
A couple of nights ago I went to the Uni Reveiw, I got a cancellation, it is so popular here the seats are booked up to a year ahead. There was lots of nudity and political jokes and at the end a girl rushed onto the stage and said “read my lips, no more Bush” at that she lifted her skirt and showed us her shaven crotch, very funny!
Was taken out on the boat today by my woofing host and his son, it was very cold and blustery with little squalls of snow and quite a swell on, but lovely to be out on the sea. When I got back we saw some birds wheeling about in the sky (we are high up here) so I went out with the binoculars. There in a tree right next to me was a pair of Wedge Tailed Eagles, they are quite rare world wide and there are only 80 pairs in Tasmania. So they sat in a tree, very close to me and I sat on a wall watching them for about 10 minutes, after a while they took off, it was gob-smacking, HUGE birds with an enormous wing span, just took off, it made me gasp they were so beautiful!
Yesterday I went to the Female Factory, it was a place in the mid 1800’s where female convicts were sent from England and Ireland. The area is freezing cold, there was snow on Mt Wellington behind, and the river close by often flooded at that time. The woman slept in tiny stone cells with no glass in the windows and no fires, they had very light clothing, were without socks or underwear and slept on hammocks because of the flooding. The Factory was used by pardoned male convicts and local men as a marriage bureau, but if the women did’nt please their new husbands they were sent back to the factory (often if they were pregnant, because the men didnt want to feed another mouth and the woman could’nt work) and the man could pick another woman up. When they came back they were punished for being unsuitable by being put in complete darkness in a tiny cell for up to 3 months, during this time they would wear a 3kg iron collar with spikes inside it so that they couldn’t lie down or sleep. The worse thing though was a display someone had made of 1,200 tiny baby bonnets, to represent the 1,200 babies who died in the female factory from malnutrition or by the cruel conditions, the 300 babies who survived were weaned at 9 months and taken to a childrens home and never given any details of their mothers, I had to leave at that point because all those tiny bonnets were just too much.
I have loved Tasmania, not as much as Great Barrier Island of course, but I will be back as I havent seen enough of it yet. Off to Melbourne tomorrow and my flight home two days later. Previous return trips have filled me with dread, nowhere to live, maybe not enough money and a real lack of confidence in myself. This time I am so looking forward to coming home and seeing all my pals and my Grandson, can’t wait! I really think that the 5 Tibetan healing rights I’ve been practicing have been so good for me.