At Westfields, Kotara, a phantom surfer is high and above the shoppers. 

 Another multinational, Cotton On, is brave enough to open a store right where Borders closed up after going into liquidation. The age old book company, Angus and Robinson, seem to be taken over by Borders and that was the end of that. A & R published many of the Australian classics. 

Cotton On stores are already in the shopping centres around here somewhere, shopping is not a favourite pastime of mine. As it is, several well known retail clothing chains are going out of business. Then, David Jones department store closed their store in Newcastle city and have a bet each way saying they may reopen it in the future and use the window displays to attract customers out to their store in Westfields, Kotara.  

Air Ambulance lands at the hospital. Otherwise quiet afternoon and a few onlookers return indoors to where the action is.

 

A toddler goes to the big local hospital and waits four and a half hours in the waiting room then waits three hours to see a doctor in A & E and is then moved to the hospital ward.  At least it was not into a bed in a corridor.   We know such as this is not for the faint hearted.  We cannot expect the impossible and are fortunate and this is not a complaint about delays but those officials who boast of improved waiting times in emergency departments need a reality check.

Update: the above times are inaccurate and somewhat overdone due to confusion about the waiting time as a total. In all, a morning spent waiting at the G P, then diagnostic tests, then in the afternoon, turning to hospital care and eventual admission very late at night - all of which is fairly usual.  

Yesterdays ferry moors beside a small boat yard/museum.

River and vehicular ferry on a back road out of Port Macquarie.

Remember how the sky randomly lit up brightly at night over Newcastle when BHP steel works carried out some big process?

Outer suburb. Still life with retro car, take-away - burgers, fish and chips etc (with 'non-traditional', whatever that is, shop keepers,)  and remnants of a post office site. Fish and chip shops were often operated by people of Mediterranean descent but those older generations have retired, or by Anglos. 

Stormy Newcastle Beach had plenty of white water on Saturday and a touch of sunlight for a brief time. 

From the Hibbart Island car ferry.  The ferry goes backwards and forwards - backwards and forwards (more frequently in holiday times!)

Is all reasoning affected by the summer weather on the other side of the world?  It certainly must be time to tap into the untold wealth of the high rollers to help save the economies that are going under instead of cutting into basic services too much.

Why do we copy what is done overseas - every bit of economic rationalism and privatisation  and closure of services - what have those countries gained as they sit on the brink of financial disaster? 

But then our economy is saved by mineral resources.

Our dollar has been higher than the $US for some time.  As a result of the high dollar Aussie tourists are having a field day but certain investments give no returns and go backwards and exporters groan. 

  

Wild weather in the tradition of a 'Pasha Bulker Storm' eased up today.  Rain squalls didn't deter onlookers and serious, well-equiped photographers.     

Tea tree plantation grown on low, probably sandy, probably damp coastal fields subjected to clearing. The oil produced from this native plant is antimicrobial and has various medical uses.  Producers could not depend on my support as fortunately I have never found much use for antiseptics and next to no lotions are on our shelves. 

On the other hand, beetroot is an enjoyable minor item on our menu and unlike the days of yore when it was prepared in the kitchen, canned beetroot has taken over and it ranges from very tasty to the tough and ordinary. Red staining slices lie in sweet vinegar.

Just which brand is purchased is an indication of how well the household budget is going along.  Why beetroot is singled out is a bit irrational.  To splurge on Golden Circle brand is gratifying and Golden Circle has been taken over.  Once I heard about grated raw beetroot as a useful addition to the diet for some reason or other but that was shortlived but worth consideration. Fast food chains are not into the beetroot tradition at all.

We are so very blessed to have abundant, albeit fattening, foods.  

The sun shiney shower soon changed to a 'dreaded' East Coast low, which decoded means rain and windy weather and more rain.  Terrific weather in some respects.
Weather reports have taken on a life of their own.  Every hour or so they reach us. 

Why did the cow cross the road?  It is difficult to see but at this point this dairy herd uses their own tunnel to cross under the four lanes of the Pacific Highway north of Taree.
A vast amount of work done to improve the Pacific Highway has made it so much easier and safer and faster for the motorist.  At the same time, every little idiosyncrasy has disappeared and the towns bypassed.  Kew; the truckies cafe - you name it - gone.  Endless trees trees trees.

Some gathered at the camp fire these holidays, far removed from the mandatory tourist hot spots.

Sunlight will soon warm up everything, solar panel included.  Free power in abundance.

 'Roo in a hurry heading for a warmer place.
The worst frost in years occured right at the seaside in the warmer areas to the north - the Pleasure Coast  (!)- for instance at Coffs' and Port'.
Frosts do not occur in Newcastle city - as far as I know.

Rustic Wollombi

Catherine Hill Bay

Folks in Catherine Hill Bay and their worries about a development application.  The village had humble beginnings as a mining community and hasn't changed much over time.

To the south at Catherine Hill Bay.

Nothing is exported from this wharf anymore.  The live beef export trade to Indonesia is resuming.  Suspension of trade was likely to be short lived and was my prediction.  As you were....

The Fourth of July!  We received a post card from Oklahoma and were very surprised to see the locals!  A grand culture.
Mention was made of a visit to the State buildings decorated with impressive murals and of the Zoo.

Catherine Hill Bay late this afternoon south of Newcastle. 
Wimbledon Mens final, live, begins close to midnight our time.  Will it be another Spanish conquest?  Lorenzo just won the Italian MotoGP in a close race and it kept us awake for the tennis match.

Cow hide. Classic posters advertising Akubra Hats.  Stick to Akubra Hats!  See or buy on line at http://www.akubra.com.au/  Copies made in China are not the real McCoy.  Rabbit's fur goes into the manufacture of the felt hats and the fur is even imported when local supplies are low.  Rabbits are largly eradicated.  They were in plague proportions once as a result of their introduction to our shores.

  

The live beef export trade from Australia to Indonesia has been suspended beset with hugh problems.
A cow is significant in the following enthuastic words about an Indonesian Wedding, written about ten years ago by an English bride. Really the wedding is much much bigger than any cow!

...The day, for me, really began with the COW. The cow was the first big surprise - not the fact that we had bought a cow to be slaughtered for food, nor the fact that the cow was LIVING, until not long before the wedding outside M's aunt (M the groom) and uncle's house, being fattened up for the big day. No, the big surprise for me was the sheer SIZE of the cow, or to be more precise the PRICE. The cow cost a whopping 4.5 million rupiah.  To put that into perspective, we are talking about $900 AUD - which (to explain my shock) was just under a third of the total cost of the wedding and about 10 times more than many Indonesian's monthly wage.  The cow (which I knew nothing about until I arrived in Indonesia a week before the wedding) was suddenly a very important part of my big day. I never knew I would spend more than on my wedding outfits, photography, flowers and entertainment combined on one BIG COW.

And let's be very clear about this - the cow was big.  Most of the meat was used to make massive amounts of beef 'rendang' - a traditional dish, made by cooking the beef slowly in coconut milk and spices until almost all the coconut milk is absorbed into the beef, making it extremely tender and very richly flavoured.  Rendang is mostly only served at special occasions as the price of beef is far too expensive for Indonesians on a meagre income to eat regularly.

Hugh pots of rendang filled the primitive cement floored kitchen on the morning of the wedding.  You couldn't walk through the kitchen without walking around a pot of it. It was my first meeting with the cow - and more importantly, my first real indication about just how many guests we were actually expecting.  That many pots of rendang?  How was it ever going to all get eaten?  I asked one of M's aunts - Isn't there a bit much here? - Oh no, she said gravely - we think we may have to buy some chickens later this evening.

And so I left the kitchen, to take my place in the main bedroom with R - my hair/make up artist and all round fairy godmother who was my personal assistant for the day.  With a cautious stroke of foundation (she had never prepared a Westerner for a wedding before and was absolutely terrified)  we began to prepare for the wedding costume.  It was 9 am.

It took two hours to do hair and make up and to don the first costume.  As I had expected, the door was often nudged open by giggling children and curious adults.  My hair had been teased, sprayed, pinned, shaped, sprayed some more and decorated with flowers and a golden hairpiece.  My eyebrows had been shaved, lined and brushed.  My forehead, most concerning to me, had been lined in heavy lack eyeliner - a traditional Javanese wedding look which I heared might look quite stupid on my white Western head: but as I said, R was truly my fairy godmother and I think she did a pretty good job.  My first outfit was a traditional Javanese outfit consisting of a tightly wound sarong in earthy colours and a heavy black jacket with gold trimming.  As I said, it took two hours for me to get prepared - M's dressing took less than 20 minutes.  Then we were on.

Before we exit the door and out into the marquis, I should explain a little about Indonesian weddings. They are not like Western weddings in many ways - most significantly because there is no specific arrival time.  When you receive a wedding invitation it says "From 11am onwards" - and that's exactly what it means.  Guests arrive all day long to pay respects, eat, maybe have a bit of a boogie, or a catch up with news and then go.  Many guests arrive and are gone within half an hour.  Few stay for the whole day.  Close family are pretty much the only ones there from the beginning until the end - and even they often leave at some stage to have a bit of a nap, or to get changed.  It is a very long day for the bride and groom.  As I said, hair and make up began at 9 am, and it wasn't until 2 am next morning that I crawled into the 'wedding bed' which also may offer you a surprise (more on that later!).

So it was 11am, and out we stepped into the incredibly, thankfully not too hot heat of the day.  There were quite a few people already there and the keyboard player had already started to play.

The music provision for the day is well worth a mention before I continue.  An absolute mainstay of the Indonesian wedding is the keyboard.  Without a keyboard, the wedding is considered to be not much of an affair.  I went to several Indonesian weddings with M, the first thing that he and his friends would discuss upon arrival home was the keyboard player, his range of songs and the quality of the speaker he used....So, I am sure you can well understand, after finding a fat enough cow, M considered one of his other most important tasks to be to find the best keyboard player. Than an email from M read - He had good luck! Best keyboard player for our wedding! Can play English, Indonesian, Spanish and Indian Songs!  His excitement was palpable through the email -  he couldn't believe the guy wasn't booked one of the most famous.  Indeed, luck had been with us. 

So, back to our exit, out into the heat of mid morning.  I can't remember what the keyboardist was playing, or singing, but I am sure it was probably an Indonesian love song.  So there were quite a few people there.  Many sitting down in the Sunday ( sorry, Friday) best, and kids lolling around, looking excited yet hot and itchy in their rarely worn very good clothes.

So, to the ceremonial part of the day: an MC, wearing a funky scarf and telling quite a few apparently very funny jokes in Javanese stood us before him, joke telling and then singing us a brief love song in Indonesian.  Very sweet.  An egg was then place at M's foot and the MC asked him to break it by standing on it.  I, then, with a great deal of difficulty, considering how tightly my sarong was wrapped around my legs, knelt down and washed the egg off his foot using floral water.  Everyone clapped and then we were led to our seat - really a throne.  All gold and bright colours and decorated with flowers and small parasols.  It was totally my idea of an exotic Far Eastern wedding throne.  I loved it.

Before M was allowed to sit down, he was taken away and returned with a procession of family members to be brought to me.  When we both sat together, officially, united as a couple, a large group of women with beautiful clothing and voices and accompanied by nothing other than a few small drums and tambourines sang some beautiful Indonesian and Islamic songs to us. It was very moving.

After the singing came the next part of the ceremony during which time M's parents and then grandparents sat on the throne and we knelt before them to receive their blessing. Everyone cried.

Following this, we returned to the throne and then people began to give us their blessings by sprinkling rice and flower petals over us and touching us on the forehead and hands with a small branch dipped in floral water.  More tears as M's close family came through, but as the whole procession of people took close to an hour, with the beautiful singing going on the whole time, we were almost trancelike,  it was quite mesmerising.

After this came the photo sessions, which continued over the whole course of the day. EVERYONE got their photo taken with us, it is very traditionally Indonesian to NOT smile in the wedding photo, such is considered the solemnity and importance of the day. All the smiling Indonesians suddenly become sombre and poe faced as soon as the camera appeared in fromt of them.

By the middle of the afternoon as the weather heated up, when some guests had gone home and more had arrived, and when we had changed costumes - into stunning bare shouldered blittering wrap around outfits of Jogjakarta - I began to make a real game out of trying to get people to laugh, or at least smaile, as the photos were taken.

The afternoon passed in this way.  I must admit that the keyboard player was indeed very good, and could play a very impressive range of songs.  His female companion was also very talented - particularly good at singing Indian songs (which 2 years in India--music-mad Indonesia have given me quite a taste for).  Quite a few people got up and danced whilst many just sat, ate, chatted and then left.

Until mid afternoon, D was the only Westerner in sight apart from me.  D was the subject of an intense amount of interest and was incredibly gracious and patient in both posing for photos and trying to work her way through a lot of broken English and mime and those who just insisted on speaking flat out Indonesian to her as everyone tried to communicate with the only other European peron at the wedding.

Mid afternoon saw D much relieved as many of the foreign guests arrived - mostly teachers from work - including E, who had been built up in the village as a very important man - an Australian Honorary Consul. A special arrangement had been made for a dozen bottle of beer to be put on ice for their arrival.  So as the afternoon melted into evening, focus shifted for a while from the bride and groom to the small group of foreigners in the middle of the marquis, merrily gulping down beer out of bottle whilst all the Indonesians looked on in curiosity sipping their water or tea.

By evening, such a crowd had gathered that stall holders had arrived selling icecreams and small toys for children, parking their bicycles laden with wares at either end of the marquis, cashing in on the festival atmosphere.  With no seats left, people had taken to sittingon their haunches anywhere they could and more and more people arrived.  We changed again, into lovely green costumes, again Javanese.  The headpiece was a crown, and very beautiful.   I really did feel like a queen.

At 7pm M's brother rushed up to the throne to give M the bad news that the BEEF, had indeed all been eaten.  I expressed momentary disbelief until I took a good look around.  The place was as packed as an outdoor music festival.  The COW had been BIG, but not big enough.  Money discreetly changed hands and M's brother took off on a bicycle in search of some chicken.

The evening prayer time (around 7 30pm) saw a brief lull in activity as many (including M) disappeared to pray.  I changed costumes again, this time into a Melayu dostume of bright blue - which involved a change of hair do as well as make up.  The costume was quite loose fitting - a lovely chance to breathe freely after all the tight fitting sarongs.  Not that I am complaining - I promise! I loved every minute of wearing every costume.  It was such a special opportunity to really be treated as a princess. I loved it.

The number of guests swelled even more. The atmosphere was electric.  A bus load arrived and carried over 50 people, some who had travelled on the roof, and a few who had spent the two and a half hour journey hanging out of the bus doors.  But they were not tired, they were ready for good times.  The music picked up, and as the 'young crew' of jungle dwellers began to dance, taking turns in singing a few of their favourite tunes (I never though I would be so entertained by a version of Knocking on Heaven's Door at my wedding).  There was dancing, Western and Indonesian style and by 9 30pm when it was finally time for M and I to leave our throne, cast off our regal wear and return to world as a married couple and no longer royalty, I was ready for a dance. The party went on until 1am when local laws forced us to shut down the music (yes, even in an Indonesian village!) and we returned to being entertained by a couple of guitar strumming lads singing Indonesian rock songs under a black Indonesian sky, lazily swatting mosquitoes from our skin.

It was almost 2 30am when I jumped on the back of a motorbike to be taken to M's aunt's house where we would spend our wedding party night - but not together.  Such was the way things work out in Indonesia, there was one bedroom free.  So, I gave my gorgeous new husband a great big kiss and curled up in the big bed, under a fan, not next to my husband, but to Christine, while M slept on a mat on the living room floor among his good mates.
An Indonesian wedding, right until the end.  I drifted off to sleep with the tune of My Delila on the lips, and wondering just where the hell the keyboard player had learnt to sing that song.  And realising, only now, that I, the bride, had not even tried any of the BEEF RENDANG, but didn't care.  Nor did I mind.....life couldn't have been any better......