What it means to be Australian

We have just celebrated Australia Day.  Interestingly I’ve noticed that with every year that passes I feel more patriotic, more Australian and more committed to what I believe are “Australian” ideals.  We have so much to be grateful for.  It really is the lucky country and we don’t have many trade-offs for being allowed to live in paradise.  Unfortunately we do have to cope with the occasionally extreme weather and the consequences that go with it.

Today we are waiting with bated breath for the arrival of Cyclone Yasi.  We’re tired, beaten and sore after the floods but we’re battening the hatches again and bracing ourselves for round two.  An entire nation is looking to its North and hoping against all reason.  There is no chance at all that this storm will be suddenly downgraded to light shower status but we’re still crossing our fingers and even the atheists are praying.

Yasi is a hurricane Katrina-sized* storm cell.  It’s heading straight for us and its size and strength is only increasing as it approaches the coast.  Remember Cyclone Tracy?  At its heart Yasi is similar in intensity to Tracy.  The difference is that the eye of Tracy was only 50 kilometres wide and Yasi is ten times that with an eye 500 kilometres wide. 

Many of the people in its path are yet to recover from Cyclone Larry.  Only just now getting back on their feet, a blow like this combined with the flooding will strain our economy for the next five-ten years as we struggle to rebuild while filling a void left by lost produce and exports.  It seems grim but rest assured we’ll bloody well get through it.

Australians are a funny lot.  We’re stoic. Laidback. We laugh at ourselves and our (mis)fortunes when most people would cry.  Last night, overwhelmed by the anxiety of what’s coming for our Northern Neighbours, my husband and I put this together;

I have no explanation for why we did it other than it made us feel better for about ten minutes (poking fun at Adelaide and pretending there'd be any chance we'd move to New Zealand will do that). 

We’re at the point now with this cyclone that anyone who has not yet evacuated is going to have to stay put.  It’s that same awful feeling of anticipation and dread we had at the start of the recent flooding, Black Saturday and January 2003 bushfires.  We know it’s coming even if we're not sure how bad it will be.  We know not everyone will make it out alive.  We know it will take a long time to recover.  We also know there is just nothing at all that we can do about it now.

Out of that list I personally have only experienced the January 2003 bushfires (thankfully the least lethal out of the lot).  I remember that day so well even now.  It started out bright and clear and hot.  Towards midday the sky on the horizon turned black and we thought a storm was on the way.  Later in the day my husband came back from a trip out and soberly informed me that the black was smoke, not a storm.  An hour later a hazy darkness descended, the sun and sky above turned blood red and gum leaves began to fall from the sky – perfect in every way except that they were black as coal and turned to dust when we touched them.

Until then we hadn’t heard anything about the fires being close enough to threaten Canberra and we still didn't think they'd get that close.  As a precaution we turned our radio to ABC.  We continued to go about our business but we were both pretty uneasy.  Suddenly in between chirpy little tunes the announcer informed us that homes in Duffy were on fire.  And then it was back to Tchaikovsky.  It was surreal having that serene voice telling us that Canberra was slowly being consumed in a raging inferno in between up-beat jazz and classical music.

After a half hour we got the call that the fires were threatening the home of some of our family.  A very short trip later involving much speeding and avoidance of closed roads (not many people were going in our direction – most were going the other way) we were in the thick of it.  It was horrible but it was better to feel like we were doing something – not watching helplessly as it unfolded on a television screen.

This is my country.  These are my people.  I know what Anna Bligh means when she says our hearts are breaking but our will is strong.  I watch helplessly as the storm rolls in, knowing I can’t help now, but committed to doing everything I can to help in the aftermath. 

Already all our spare change** and money is going to the Premier’s fund.  I’m shipping clothes and supplies to a friend in Queensland who is distributing to people who have lost everything.  One of my builder friends is considering taking some time to go and help with the rebuilding of homes and I may well stock my X-Trail with tools and join him.  There will be lots to do for months to come.

Australians are tough.  Fired in the heat of our sun, we’re resilient and strong.  We’re a nation full of goodwill and we’re not afraid of hard work.  As the storm fades and the water recedes it will be time to mourn our losses and bury our dead.  And then it will be time to stand together and remind ourselves that whatever comes we’ll survive, we’ll recover and then we’ll thrive.  Because that's just what Australians do.

*  Want to know the difference between a hurricane and a cyclone?  Essentially they're the same thing and they’re measured in the same way.  The difference is that a hurricane takes place in the Northern hemisphere and the storm cell rotates anti-clockwise.  A cyclone takes place in the Southern hemisphere and the cell rotates clockwise.  

** Which has been made super easy to do thanks to all the businesses collecting on behalf of the fund (and some are matching donations dollar for dollar).  I reckon donating all my change every time I shop probably amounts to a couple of hundred dollars so far and I know I'm not the only one doing this!