The White Hat Melbourne Newsletter

Archived Newsletter No.124 - 29 April 2005

Contents

Festivals
Music
Forums
Theatre & Shows
Hidden Gems of Melbourne
Food and wine
Other stuff
The five dimensions of Melbourne

Festivals

This weekend there is Dutch Orange Day at Fed Square, an Irish festival at Koroit and a Swiss Italian festival at Hepburn Springs. Details at Ethnic Festivals in Melbourne. There are community festivals in Glenferrie Road Hawthorn and Pakenham. Frankston has the Mayor’s Family Picnic and the lady Mayoress has already started cutting up cucumber sandwiches. In the bush (sorry Country & Regional Victoria) there are festivals at Beechworth, Heathcote and Bright.

Music

This weekend there is an inaugural Blues, Jazz and Roots Festival at Willy. Details at: There is also a jazz and wine festival at Queenscliff and next week the major Umbria Jazz Festival commences.  Free classical concerts at BMW Edge in Fed Square. Details at Music in Melbourne.

Forums

This week marks the start of a major series of free public forums under the title of The Alfred Deakin Innovation Lectures. They cover a wide range of topics (some of them struggling to fit under the ‘innovation’ umbrella) and feature a variety of speakers. In the past the quality of this series has been variable and again some give the impression of being strong on opinion and short on substance in the style of ABC talkback radio, while others appear as though they could be excellent. There are plenty of topics to choose from so check them out at Forums in Melbourne.

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Theatre & Shows

This week there are suburban productions of The Full Monty (the musical), a one act play called The Tiger, a Cabaret of Monologues in Chinatown or War and Peace – improvised. I can imagine a scene in the not-too-distant future with a group of people standing around amongst the chunks of deconstructed classics with nothing left standing and somebody saying “Does anybody know how to CONSTRUCT something?”

In the country you can choose between Shakespeare in Gippsland and Shakespeare in the Grampians. Then there is Mamma Mia and Menopause the Musical at the Comedy and the Maj. Gentleman should be warned that this particular block of Exhibition Street can be quite scary as the theatres empty out and the streets become full of pre and post menopausal women. You may be safer taking your chances among the drug dealer in Russell Street a block away. The situation doesn’t last for long because they soon head off home because they’ve got to get up and teach in the morning.

Details of all these at Theatre in Melbourne.

Hidden Gems in Melbourne

Melbourne has so many quality free exhibitions that most weekends you can stumble across a hidden (but temporary) gem or two. At ACMI in Fed Square recently we stumbled across a beautifully made 10 minute film using digital technology to bring to life Japanese screen paintings. I’ll be going back to see it again. It may not be you cup of saki, but your are likely to find something in the exhibition of short films that will fascinate you.

Foods & Wine

There is a wine and cider festival at Kellybrook, a chestnut festival at Kalorama, apple & wine festival at Gladysdale, harvest festivals at Nagambie and in the King Valley and a Hairy Lemon Festival in the High Country which will give you ideas on how to use all that hairy food at the back of your fridge. Details at Food & Wine in Victoria.

Other Stuff

The Handweavers & Spinners guild have a fashion parade in Richmond. Details at Fashion in Melbourne. There is open garden at the Abbotsford Convent. Details at Garden Festivals.

The Five Dimensions of Melbourne

being part of a self-indulgent rambling series about the different ways people see Melbourne

Two Dimensional Melbourne

Let me tell you about Uncle Sandy. Uncle Sandy lived in country Tasmania and every year would hop on a bus and go on holiday to Hobart. He would have a great time and come back singing the praises of Hobart. One year some of the family were going to Hobart and took Uncle Sandy to save him the bus trip. As the family car was entering the very outskirts of Hobart, Uncle Sandy exclaimed “Stop – you’re going past Hobart!”. You see Uncle Sandy all these years had got off the bus where the sign said ‘Hobart – please slow down’, stayed in a little guest house and pottered around in the little settlement on the outskirts. At the end of his holiday he took the bus home. He knew it was Hobart because the sign on the road outside said it was.

We come across people who proclaim “I love Melbourne” but only visit the same few places that hold fond memories from the time when the world was young and fresh and so were they. There is probably a well known route between, say, the Princess and Pellegrini’s and they traverse it every few years when they come into town and are delighted that things are as they remember them - especially the Job Warehouse. They haven’t been to the new gallery because they have been instructed by their friends and talkback radio that Fed Square is ugly and they wouldn’t want to go there. They probably don’t know that Docklands exists. There is absolutely nothing wrong with this and it is comforting to know that some things don’t change. However the next time the sort of person who likes to be the focus of attention at a barbecue or dinner party proclaims “I love Melbourne” then proceeds to tell you the story about “the time they …” it is worth remembering that the possibly know as much about Melbourne as Uncle Sandy did about Hobart.