The Memorial Service

We attended a memorial Service for a long-standing member of the Church congregation.

About 150 people attended, and although the setting and format were traditional, many elements were, as happens these days, characterised as a celebration of her life, complete with reminiscences, grandchildren playing the cello and singing as well as Frank Sinatra recordings (and others) being played.  And then the refreshments afterwards spilled over into the worship space. 




All somewhat different from the orthodox tradition.

Pomen

Baba's 40 day pomen took place on Saturday.   It was in Melbourne to enable those who had been unable to travel to Canberra for the funeral to be present.  However, a contemporaneous service at the graveside also occurred. It was advertised in a couple of the Serbian-language newspapers.

This is an important service.  Literally, "pomen" means "memorial service", but the significance of the 40 days is that the Orthodox Church teaches that there are two judgements. 
The first, or “Particular” Judgement, is that experienced by each individual at the time of his or her death, at which time God will decide where the soul is to spend the time until the Second Coming of Christ.  This judgement is believed to occur on the fortieth day after death.

The second, General or “Final” Judgement will occur after the Second Coming.





Candles were also lit for Baba on the day by family members at this small church in Montenegro.

Sahrana

We went to Canberra for Baba's Sahrana.   The service took place in the church at the Serbian Monastery and the interment was in the cemetery in the Monastery grounds.  The forecast rain didn't eventuate and overall the send off was as she would have wanted it.

St Aidan's

One of the highpoints of the time we sent living in Perth was the welcome we received at St Aidan's Uniting Church at Claremont.

We returned to visit St Aidan's and received an extremely warm welcome even though it has been over 10 years since we attended regularly (we have visited once or twice in the intervening years when in Perth).   It was indeed lovely to catch up with a number of familiar faces and also to see the renovations that have made to their buildings.  

St George's Day

In the Orthodox (Julian) calendar, last Tuesday was 23 April  and the feast of St. George, the fabled dragonslayer and patron saint of many Serbs.

According to the legend, St George came upon a kingdom beset by a foul, plague-breathing dragon. To appease the dragon, they began to give it a daily sacrifice of livestock, and later even their children. When the saint came along and killed the dragon, the grateful citizens embraced Christianity.

In Serbian folklore, the feast of St George is the beginning of hayduk season - guerrilla resistance to Ottoman overlords that had conquered Serb lands in the 15th century. The season traditionally ended on the feast of Saint Demetrius (Mitrovdan), 26 October.

 
We attended Nata's slava, as St George is her family's saint.   As usual, there was lots to eact and drink.   A lot of self-restraint was needed!

  

Easter

It was Easter Sunday.  In accordance with the Western tradition there were lovely flowers at the Church, and later in the day, in the Orthodox tradition, we cracked painted eggs!

Historical Beechworth

We spent a little time in the historical precinct at Beechworth, including the gaol tour.   This lasted an hour and took us through all the main areas of the former gaol (although we didn't get to climb a guard tower as advertised on the web site).    It was obviously an extremely tough place to be in if you were there in the 19th century, and would still have been a most unpleasant place if you were there as late as 2004 (the year in which it was closed).

Interior of cell - used until 2004

Solitary confinement exercise yard

The tour included a close inspection of the gallows.  The only part missing was an actual demonstration of their operation!     Apart from that, little was left to the imagination.

Not sure if T class locos ever operated mixed trains, but does it matter?

One of the other buildings able to be viewed  was the telegraph office.  In addition to a good display of telegraphic equipment, a model of the Beechworth railway station in the 1950s was on display.

Cooma

Our last morning in Canberra was spent commemorating Savindan (literally, "St Sava's Day") (St Sava was the first Serbian archbishop) and then we drove to Cooma where we spent a night on our meandering trip home from Canberra.

 

I suppose I've driven through Cooma a couple of times over the years, but to the best of my recollection, I've never paused in the town.

It's clearly the gateway to the snowfields and the Snowy scheme.   But apart from that, it's, well, a country town!   The Snowy scheme is commemorated by a relief map of the area and a row of flags representing the countries from which workers on the scheme originated (including the flag of former Yugoslavia, but not of the successor countries - understandable, I suppose).

We by-passed the Services club and the Indian and Chinese restaurants for dinner and ate at a Lebanese restaurant.   It was quite good actually:   nice food, white cloth tablecloths and so on.   However, our bill doubled up on several of our items.    I guess we'll give them the benefit of the doubt and accept the explanation that it was a "computer glitch".

The National Portrait Gallery

I've previously blogged with my thoughts about the National Portrait Gallery.    As I stated in that post, I quite like this Gallery.  In particular, a reasonable proportion of the art is relatively conservative. Ar least, that is, until you get into the "Australia Now" room.

I revisited the gallery when in Canberra and confirmed my belief that I don't really like the Princess Mary portrait, even though it still has a very prominent position.   And this time there was even a religious portrait (mind you, just one, at least so far as I could see), being Bishop Burgman. Even this work (on loan, and there because Judy Cassab's work was being highlighted) is an "interesting" choice.  I've always thought this secular trait in this Gallery suggests a particular "take" on its claim to select portraits of Australians who have been "significant in the field of endeavour".    For example, Eddie Mabo, Clarles Perkins, Neville Bonner and Harold Blair are all there, side by side.   And the Gallery has managed to obtain photographs of Lee-Lin Chin and Tim Winton.


Anyway, Whitlam and Kerr still hang side-by-side.   Menzies and Evatt are separated by two other portraits,  both politicians (one Liberal, one Labor).

There was a special display of Elvis Presley photos, but I didn't have a lot of time so decided not to pay the charge to enter this section.

[Edited 26 Jan 14]

Auctioning the manse.

While there are quite a lot of auctions at this time of year, a recent one in our area had some significance for a number of us.  It was the auction of the Church manse, sold by decree of the Synod in order to raise funds to pay off the debt resulting from the Acacia College debacle.  There have been a lot of reports about this, here's just one.  

Locally, as I've previously mentioned, the impact has been that the manse has been sold and it's planned that Church hall will be re-configured to provide accommodation for a couple of Church agencies (whose present accommodation is being sold).   Change is indeed upon us.

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The Sisters

We went to the picnic day at the Orthodox Christian Mission Sisterhood of St John The Eleimon.  Yes, the name's a handful, but this is a group of women of the Greek Orthodox tradition who run an extremely active charitable program supporting needy people both around Melbourne and overseas (mainly within the Orthodox tradition).  They run an Op shop, and here's an article about them.

Their base is out past Gisborne, where they have a few acres.  There's a small chapel and facilities (including three big ovens!) to provide food and (if necessary) shelter for the literally hundreds of people who were there on the day.  The picnic day when we attended was in honour of their Saint, St John the Eleimon (the Merciful), even though his normal feast day is in a few weeks time.  Sister Joanna who is apparently in charge is a ball of energy:  she is busy all day, welcoming everyone, overseeing all that's going on and running the charity auction.

A group of us attended and the weather was great.    Lots of the activity is in Greek, but enough was in English for our group to work out that one of us had won a prize in the raffle! 

The Uniting Church

The Uniting Church's financial issues - and the proposed response - has been getting some media attention.

How all this (the so-called "Acacia College" issue) arose - and the failure of anyone to accept responsibility - is still an issue for me. The Moderator says there's no single person or group to be blame for this.  Maybe, but this hasn't prevented the consequences being felt far and wide.  At Armadale, we're impacted because some of the Parish's property is to be sold (although not the Church itself), and it looks as though we're going to have to share the Church complex with an agency (some of whose property is being sold).

Yes, I'm doing my best to be generous of spirit, but........

The Eureka Flag

I see that the original Eureka flag has been moved to a new home.  

It has been tucked away in the Ballarat Art Gallery, and many visitors (especially if they're heading for a special exhibition) may not have been aware that it was there.   Although we found it when we visited the gallery, it was almost by chance that we did so.

No doubt it will get greater prominence at the new "Museum of Australian Democracy" at Sovereign Hill. 

The Church fete

Church fetes seem to have gone out of fashion, but there was one in our area recently.


Unfortunately, they didn't have a bookstore, which is always my favourite.  However, they had some good cakes and jams, some of which we invested in.  We also picked up a couple of knitted items (not sure why.....).  However, we passed on the the plants.

Church for Sale

The nearby Anglican Church closed over a year ago, and now it's up for sale.   Unfortunately, this may not be the only Church in the area to close, as the Uniting Church that we attend is also seriously considering its future in view of an ageing congregation and declining numbers.  Although nothing is imminent, the medium to long term outlook isn't great.


In spite of first impressions when glancing at the sign, only one Church is for sale.  On closer reading, the reference to "both" is a reference to the fact that the adjoining manse is also for sale.

I haven't enquired what is to become of the stained glass, which includes an impressive "West window", completed only a few years ago.

Enthroning the Bishop

One of the main reasons for our trip to Canberra was to be present at the inauguration of the new Bishop of the Free Serbian Orthodox Diocese of Australia and New Zealand.    The event was reported in the Canberra Times complete with better photos than I took, but in my defence, the reporter did have some impressive-looking photographic gear, and she did venture to locations that I had reservations about!

The new Bishop Ambrose was made very welcome by a large crowd (I think the Canberra Times only took account of the people actually inside the Church).   He's actually a Scot, and is a bishop of the Old Calendar Greek Church, based in Athens.    Perhaps this gives a hint of some of the political undertones here?

The ceremony was mostly in Serbian, although the new Bishop's address was in English.   It was conducted by Bishop Auxentios (from the USA) and included blessing the Church from each direction.

The week-end's activities also included the St Sava Festival, so there was lots of music, dancing, eating and drinking all round!

 





 











  

Norman Lindsay

I can remember really enjoying The Magic Pudding as a child!   However, at that time, I didn't know very much about Norman Lindsay, and in particular wasn't aware of the fact that he liked to paint voluptuous nudes!    Even though this particular omission was rectified in later life, when we visited his former house at Faulconbridge - now a museum  -  I was able to fill in some of the remaining details of his life and work of which I had previously been unaware.

The house contains an impressive collection of his works, especially his paintings.    It also contains a number of large model sailing vessels, which he built for relaxation.  The meticulous detail of these is really quite amazing.  

Outside are a number of his statues.   The painting studio was closed, but we joined a short tour which included admission to the etching studio.  This left us with a great respect for the time and effort that Lindsay put into the creation of his etchings (consistent, I suppose, to his approach in constructing the model sailing ships) and just as much respect for the efforts of his second wife, Rose, who laboured long and hard printing them - a task in which Lindsay himself apparently didn't participate.




We finished up with coffee and scones at Lindsay's Cafe, which is within the grounds.

The National Museum

I caught up with J for coffee at the National Museum, and we then spent some time looking around. It's an  interesting building, in a great location on the lake.

I've previously visited the museum (but apparently I didn't mention it on my blog at the time).  However, I thought the exhibits that I saw this time were more comprehensive.  On reflection, perhaps some areas were closed off last time I was there (perhaps exhibits were in the course of development?) 

The Museum's focus is obviously Australian history, and generally speaking I think it does this well.   It covers a great deal of ground, much too much to describe.    Yes, there's an indigenous theme in a number of the exhibits, but I don't think this is overdone.  In short, definitely worth a visit.

Introduced rabbits

The Saw Doctor's equipment

Reports of floods at Wagga in a previous era

Walter Burley and Marion Griffin