Marathon

We checked out the Commonwealth Games marathon on Sunday, joined by Adrian (aka "Adi", aka "88"), Jurate and Graham. Uta was particularly excited about the opportunity to cheer on her fellow GSU alum, Andrew Letherby, who was running for Australia. Letherby won a bronze at the last Commonwealth Games in Manchester and placed 5th at this year's games (seen here crossing the finish line).


I'm always amazed by the fact that people voluntarily participate in a sport that killed the first guy who ever tried it, and where paramedics follow you around as you're running in case you collapse (e.g., the chick below that went down in front of us). That's hard-core.

Texas Lightning

What the hell is an Australian Band named Texas Lightning doing representing Germany at the Eurovision Song Contest? OK, to be fair, only the singer is Australian, and the band calls Hamburg home. I'm just surprised to see anyone outside of the U.S. voluntarily associating themselves with Texas.

Fantasy Coffins?

As part of the Commonwealth Games, Melbourne is hosting an exhibit of "fantasy coffins" from Ghana. Cell phones, spring onions, chickens, running shoes, lobsters - Ghana seems to produce coffins resembling just about anything you can think of.Click here to see a short video.

Opening Ceremony

The opening ceremony of the 2005 Commonwealth Games occurred Wednesday night. Some of the more interesting aspects included the following:


1) A boy and his duck...


2) Icarus' Sister... (or is that an angel?)


3) A flying tram...


4) Sporty Jesus...


5) Naked chicks...(Ha! Eat your heart out Janet Jackson)


Add all that up, and I have no clue what it means, but for the most part it looked pretty cool - particularly the fireworks:

There's No Place Like Home

OZJet founder Paul Stoddart decided there's no place like home, clicked his heels, and filed for bankruptcy just four months after launching his business class airline. He figured out much too late that running a successful airline requires one key element: passengers.

Sorry, I Thought You Were Someone Else. . .

Two Australians, recently kidnapped in Iraq, were promptly released (with apologies) after it became apparent they weren't Americans. How courteous, particularly since Australia has troops in Iraq itself.

Weekend Visitor

"I Love the Smell of Napalm in the Morning"

Economists - is there anything they can't quantify?

"Petrol sniffing costs Australia $79 million a year, and providing unsniffable fuel across the nation's central areas would save $27 million, a new report shows."

SXSW

Article about Australian acts at this year's South-by-Southwest.

Don't Date Him

I'm happy to see that my name does not appear on "Don't Date Him Girl.Com". What about you?

Grace Park Open

Uta competed in Grace Park's Club Championships over the weekend, advancing to the finals before facing defeat at the hands of Ola Luczak, who's recently returned to Australian tennis after a stint at the University of Central Florida. The two put on a good match, particularly in the second set which come down to a tiebreaker.

Commonwealth Games

The opening ceremony of the Commonwealth Games kicks off Wednesday night with a gala event along Melbourne's Yarra River. Event planners have been quite active preparing the city for the event, largely in an attempt to assist tourists in parting with their money.

As a citizen of a nation that sent the Brits packing back in teh 18th century, I'm a bit ignorant on the whole Commonwealth thing. So here's a bit more. And here's a list of member countries:

Antigua and Barbuda
Australia
Bahamas
Bangladesh
Barbados
Belize
Botswana
Brunei
Cameroon
Canada
Cyprus
Dominica
Fiji
Gambia
Ghana
Grenada
Guyana
India
Jamaica
Kenya
Kiribati
Lesotho
Malawi
Malaysia
Maldives
Malta
Mauritius
Mozambique
Namibia
Nauru
New Zealand
Nigeria
Pakistan
Papua New Guinea
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Saint Lucia
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
Samoa
Seychelles
Sierra Leone
Singapore
Solomon Islands
South Africa
Sri Lanka
Swaziland
Tanzania
Tonga
Trinidad and Tobago
Tuvalu
Uganda
United Kingdom
Vanuatu
Zambia

Queen's in the House!

Much to the chagrin of Australia's republicans, the Queen arrived in Australia over the weekend, stopping off in Sydney on her way to Melbourne to attend the Commonwealth Games which start this week.

Thorpedo Sunk

"Australian swimming star Ian Thorpe has pulled out of the Commonwealth Games after failing to recover from a bronchitis and chest infection."

This won't be good for ratings. . .

Stage Right

The Oscars are now over, and much to the delight of conservatives across America, neither George Clooney nor Brokeback Mountain managed a clean sweep. It seems good old-fashioned racism (i.e., Crash) is as far out on a limb as Hollywood is willing to go with respect to social commentary. It's worth peeking at some of the conservative blogs to see what America's grumpy white men are saying about Clooney these days. Amusingly, the patrons of Ace of Spades HQ hate the entire catalog of Clooney's work (as well as his politics), except for O'Brother, Where Art Thou. Go figure - the one character with which conservatives can identify is an uneducated, crooning, redneck convict.

Meanwhile, as a counter to the immoral fanfare of the Oscars, film producer Michael Class has been promoting the American Values Awards for family-oriented film-making. His picks: Cinderella Man, The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch, and The Wardrobe, Star Wars: Episode III and Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. Yep, nothing says "family-values" like movies about boxing, the proliferation of evil throughout the universe, and witchcraft. After all, it's far more important that Americans learn what drove Darth Vader to the dark side than the intricacies of U.S. econcomic, energy, and foreign policy or the humanity of gays.

That's Not Cricket

"US President George Bush, an avid baseball fan, yesterday tried his hand at cricket - and was pronounced "not bad" for a first-timer."

Having tried cricket, I can testify that it is incredibly hard to not be very bad one's first time out. I'm wondering if he got some practice bowls in down the aisles of Air Force One.

Solar Schools

In an attempt to use an environmental agenda to wrestle power from the Liberal government, Labor Party leader Kim Beazley has announced a long-term plan to equip all of Australia's schools with solar power.

Howard Government Turns Ten

The Howard Government celebrated its 10th anniversary last week. There were lots of parties and protests and stuff like that.

JKA Seminar

Friday night I had the pleasure of training with Sensei Takahashi, who was in town for one of his periodic visits. In addition to being a world class karateka, Takahashi is also a member in the Order of Australia - he was awarded the honor by John Howard himself in 2003, in recognition of his 30+ years as chief instructor for JKA Australia.

Wax the Hoff

Enjoy!

World's Best Boomers

Every two years, teams from around the world compete in the World Boomerang Championships. This year's event will be held in July in Asahikawa, Japan. And if you're wondering who is the best of the best, don't look to Australia. Turns out that since the initiation of international boomerang competition, the sport has been dominated by two countries: the United States and Germany.

Bet on Iraq

Check this out.

Gangland

Like a Martin Scorsese sequel, gang violence appears to be back on the agenda in Melbourne after a brief hiatus. In early February, Mario Condello was shot dead in the suburb of Brighton, on the eve of his appearance in court to answer criminal charges. I guess someone thought he might squeal. Meanwhile, convicted murderer Lee Patrick Torney disappeared last year, and is now believed to be another casualty of war.

Update (8/2/06): Lee Patrick Torney's body was discovered yesterday in a mine shaft in central Victoria.

"Us" vs. "Them"

Australia's Treasurer, Peter Costello, made headlines last week via a speech where he effectively denounced multiculturalism - a bold, and perhaps, assinine statement in a land that is increasingly non-Anglo. And of course, when pressed to single out a group for discrimination, it should come as no surprise that he chose to target Muslims. In his speech, Costello went to great pains to criticise those that come to Australia intent on challenging "the rule of law", and has proposed updating immigration policy to keep undesireables out and revoke citizenship from those that stray from the Australian way. Needless to say, there are heaps of non-Muslim Australians that have trouble with the rule of law, so I'm not sure why Muslims should get special mention (other than they're the people some think its OK to hate these days). Furthermore, anyone living outside the rule of law is generally referred to as a criminal, and I beleive there are already systems in place for dealing with such folks. Dare I say, this seems like an attempt to motivate the conservative base with rhetoric that sounds tough, but is in effect, meaningless. Or perhaps Costello was just trying to outdo MP Danna Vale who, in her attempt last month to rally opposition to the drug RU486, suggested Australia will soon be a Muslim nation, because "we are aborting ouselves out of existence". I'm assuming by "ourselves" she was referring to white/Christian Australians, but who knows? Vale also happens to be one of the MPs who supported recreating Gallipoli in Australia.

Slogan

Tourism Australia has launched a new ad campaign, which, according to some, is controversial and attracts the wrong element, because it employs the catchy slogan: Where the Bloody Hell Are You?. A bit low-brow, perhaps, but so is "put another shrimp on the barbie", and I think Australia did pretty well out of that one.

Here's what Australians think:










UPDATE (3/14/05): The Tourism Australia slogan "Where the Bloody Hell Are You" has been banned from UK television, due to a policy against offensive language (apparently "bloody" is potentially offensive). Visits to the ad campaign's website have subsequently tripled.

Avoid the Salad Bar!

From The Age"
"A woman will face court today charged with planting rat poison in the salad bar at two Brisbane Sizzler restaurants."

The Horror

According to the journal Nature, I'm currently working in a "culture of fear". This in reference to recent publicity and debate (public and private) over the potential censorship of CSIRO scientists by politicians, particularly in the arena of climate change. The story broke via the ABC television program Four Corners (with a segment amusingly entitled "The Greenhouse Mafia"), where various individuals, including current and former CSIRO employees, were asked to comment on the freedom (or lack thereof) of scientists to speak openly on the issue of climate change. This led to various press articles (here and here)and the drafting of many a talking point by various individuals (including Peter Garrett of Midnight Oil fame - now an MP)within both government and CSIRO.

At the end of the day, however, public sector scientists are accountable to the public, and maintaining the objectivity of research institutions necessitates that such institutes go to pains to avoid critique of, or advocacy for, public policy. Furthermore, there will always be a bit of backroom maneuvering, but if scientists here think they've got it bad, they should try spending some time in the U.S.