Submit an event, attraction or venue for listing on these pages

The White Hat Melbourne Newsletter

Archived Newsletter No.203 - 18 January 2007

Contents

Water sports
Tips for grandparents
Comedy
Free Jazz in the Park
Crowd Sourcing
Outdoor cinema
Australian Garden
Entertainment in the parks
Ukulele
Monday is the new Sunday
Children
Festivals
Open days
Australia Day
Country Victoria
The White Hat Quiz

Water Sports

Next week Geelong Week begins with all sorts of waterfront and on-the-water entertainment. Geelong Week runs from the 24th to the 28th – apparently a week in Geelong lasts for five days. At the Docklands this week is The Docklands Invitational sailing with surrounding entertainment including Deborah Conway, Bomba and fireworks on Saturday evening. At the weekend you can come and try sailing for free at the Docklands Yacht Club. Details at Sailing in Melbourne.

Tips for Grandparents

If you are planning to do things with the grandkids you often want to have a good idea of the weather. The weather bureau website has current forecasts but, more importantly, a radar display showing the intensity and direction of travel of any rain out there. After using this a few times you start to get a feel for the radar and the patterns around your suburb and can fairly confidently predict that you’re likely to get rain in half an hour.

Quietly consult the radar, then in sight of the grandkids go and tap the barometer in the hall and study the needle. Anyone from the country knows that the technical name for a barometer is “the glass”, so tap the glass again and look quizzically at the needle. Make some reference to the arthritis in your little toe and pronounce “Yes, we’ve get a heavy shower coming in from the north-east in about twenty minutes but after that it will clear up.” You will find it adds considerably to your granparently mystique.

You can find the Bureau of Met site here. We will have further tips for grandparents in coming newsletters.

Jazz in the Park

Stonnington’s enjoyable free jazz in the park continues with a performance in a Malvern park followed by another one a Geelong week later in an East Malvern Park. You may want to put the dates in your diary. You might also want to note the Eltham Town Jazz & Blues Heritage Festival later this month. Details at Jazz in Melbourne.

Comedy

On Australia Day Eve, there is a comedy debate at the Docklands. Details at Comedy in Melbourne.

Crowd sourcing

There are numbers of travel websites out there created by people who have no personal knowledge of the city involved. The major purpose is to capture as much advertising as possible for that city. Basic information on the site might come from transcribing a few tourist brochures. Another common technique is ‘scraping’; gathering text from other people’s sites and displaying it on their own – often unacknowledged. The most popular technique is ‘crowd sourcing’. Invite submissions from readers or have a chat board which will soon have enough keywords to attract the search engines. Many travellers put much score by this information because it comes from ‘ordinary people’ and is ‘not commercial’. Some travel advice we have spotted in the last week from such sites include:

“Make sure to take a trip to St Kilda and go ice skating at St Moritz.”

“Under the clocks is a romantic place to meet a friend.”

“The Victoria Market is open every day . .”

Etc. They would be a bit of a giggle except we meet many people who have planned their brief stay in Melbourne around such information from ‘real people’. Crowd sourcing is also open to just as much commercial manipulation as other sources of information. Recently the VP of [a prominent advertising agency] stated “We have an entire division in Singapore devoted to seeding online forums and bulletin boards with targeted content” and went on to outline that these ‘real people’ continue posting innocuous messages to create a credible online presence ready for the next online promotion.

Keeping all this in mind you might have a bit of fun surfing around the various sites on Melbourne. The following posting has been sitting on the front page of one such site for the last few weeks.

“SPOTSWOOD - The people are so very friendly and the weather is just perfect the most incredible and unique place i have ever travelled to in my life so much so that i want to emigrate and live here. It certainly is a place where you will never be bored it caters for ages and is a great place to bring up a family.”
Supposedly posted from the UK about the Melbourne suburb of Spotswood.

Outdoor Cinema

Now is the weather for outdoor cinema (for baby boomers, outdoor cinema is a drive-in where you leave the car at home). In Melbourne you have a number of choices. There is Moonlight Cinema at the Botanic Gardens showing mainstream releases. See listing at Royal Botanic Gardens.

During February there is outdoor cinema in Birrarung Marr with a slightly different mix. See listing at Birrarung Marr.

In the city you can enjoy rooftop cinema on top of a city building with 200 deck chairs and a more eclectic selection of films. See listing at Curtin House.

On Sunday nights during summer there is Junkyard Cinema in Fitzroy featuring some cult films (apparently Woody Allen is now ‘cult’). See listing at Rose Street Artists' Market.

Up in Belgrave is the Cameo Outdoor Cinema and plus the traditional camping ground film shows. Readers might like to let us know if you have a favourite.

Australian Garden

During an indulgent ramble in newsletter No.45 in April 2003 we commented:

“We live in a wide brown land on the driest continent on earth. I have always regarded the adopting of the term "green" to indicate environmentally responsible as particularly mindless. In many parts of Australia where you see large areas of green, you know that it is probably the result of unsustainable practices.”

This drew a number of angry responses back then, but will probably not draw as many in this time of dying lawns. If you are interested to see what can be done with native plants in a garden without a trace of lawns we recommend a visit to the Australian Garden at Cranbourne. The gardens are open daily (entry fees apply) but until mid February there are twilight sessions on Tuesdays with music and other entertainment, Go along and watch the sun below the stunning red sand garden.

Entertainment in the Parks

The free entertainment in city parks continues. On Saturday you can listen to Soul Connection perform music of the 60s and on Sunday Jamination perform music from Diana Ross to the Eurythmics and Rolling Stones. Before the Sunday session you can learn funk dancing. If your dancing skills lend themselves more to the box step (tarantara) then you will probably enjoy (ra ra ra) the Gilbert and Sullivan singalong (tarantara) on Sunday afternoon. Details at Treasury Gardens.

Ukelele

This weekend you can head off to the Docklands and learn the ukulele for free. For you singles out there imagine what an impression you could make under the balcony with a ukulele. Although White Hat has a mandolin page we don’t yet have a ukulele page - we’re waiting until we’ve finished our transcription for ukulele of Mahler’s Eighth Symphony. Thus you will find the details at our Docklands page.

Monday is the new Sunday

We were recently asked “why are there so few things to do in Melbourne on a Monday?” Here is the brief answer.

150 years ago a group of contractors and skilled tradesmen working at Melbourne University negotiated and eight hour working day. The 48 hour week gradually filtered down to unskilled workers and other employees who, by working longer hours on weekdays, were able to gain Saturday afternoons off. Melbourne was one of the first major cities in the world to have this half day weekend and it goes a long way to explaining why Melbourne has such a strong sporting tradition. (Something of the reverse happened later when in certain towns traders took half a weekday off in return for working Saturday mornings, Are there any towns out there that still have half-day closing? Maybe some of our readers can let us know.)

Of course people didn’t work on Sunday either but that hardly counted as part of the weekend as most people understand it today. Nothing was open (except the church of course) and in a good Methodist household to take out a pack of cards and play a game of patience was seen as a major step on the way to perdition. Couple the Sunday observance with 6 o’clock closing of hotels and you had a pretty sombre Melbourne – at least on the surface. As late as the 1960s tourists would come to Melbourne and find it closed for the weekend.

Unions had made steady gains for employees in the area of working hours except in the area of shop assistants. In the end, governments legislated to restrict trading hours which offered a fair degree of protection to retail employees even if it did create inconvenience for the customer. Old-timers (anyone over 30) will still remember the meat section in the supermarket being covered over at midday on Saturday. If you wanted to buy meat on a Sunday you had to head off to Balaclava where the Kosher Butchers, having been closed for the Jewish Sabbath, were given dispensation to open on Sunday.

Trading hours have been relaxed in recent years but in the end traders, particular small businesses and family operated businesses, need some breathing space so there are certain ‘dead times’. Retailers in the city used to open at 9am. Now, most open at 10am. Similarly on Mondays many restaurants are closed, most live theatres are dark and many regular entertainments and tours do not operate. Historically, Monday was always a slow day for certain traders. Monday was washing day withy the womenfolk slaving over a full week’s washing with little time to shop. Few traditional markets were open on a Monday and you will still find many closed Mondays.

Monday is also traditionally a slow day at work after the rave parties on Sunday. Look closely at the pupils of your bank teller on a Monday morning. However, some organisations capitalise on Monday being slow. If you put on a poetry reading or a magic show or a rehearsal you know there will be few things that clash and many community committees can only raise a quorum on Monday nights.

Few things happen in Melbourne on a Monday because Monday is the new Sunday. That was the short answer.

Children

If you have kids from mid Primary age on you have probably been following McNaught’s Comet. It is the brightest comet for 30 years and first spotted by an Australian. It is visible to the naked eye and for those currently holidaying away from the city (and the bushfire smoke) it is an ideal time to get kids interested in the night sky. On Saturday (20th) there will be a grouping of the crescent moon, Venus and the comet if the clouds are kind.

On the Mornington Peninsula there is the sand sculpting exhibition at Rye and free children’s activities at Arthurs Seat. In the city there is outdoor cinema (mentioned above), learn to paint (free) in the Carlton Gardens and don’t forget the free flying displays at the RAAF Museum at Point Cook.

Details of these and other children’s activities can be found at Children's Activities in Melbourne.

Festivals

This weekend is the Frankston Festival by the Bay. There is also the Yarra Valley Medieval Festival bringing back fond memories of jousting, ladies fayre, the black death and dentistry without anaesthetics. The Midsumma G&L Festival begins next week. (You will find us using numbers of abbreviations and asterisks in an attempt to penetrate your spam filters. There are several local governments who seem to employ people full time to dream up combination of innocent words which may be offensive and then ban email which contains any two of them.) Details of all these at Festivals in Melbourne..

Open days

As usual Government House will be open on Australia Day. A great place for a picnic. I also assume the annual large display of heritage cars will be outside in the Domain. On Sunday 28th Rupertswood, the Clarke mansion in Sunbury and birthplace of The Ashes, has an open day. These don’t come around very often so you may wish to note it in your diary.

Australia Day

As usual there are a large number of events coming up on Australia Day. Some of the highlights include Government House Open Day, the traditional Picnic Races at Hanging Rock and the Quarantine Jazz Picnic at the old Quarantine Station at Point Nepean. For a selection of events go to our home page and select the appropriate date from the drop-down calendar of events. You do know the date of Australia Day, don’t you?

Country Victoria

This weekend in country Victoria there is the Cottage by the Sea Queenscliff Fair, Organs of the Ballarat Goldfields, the Portsea Swim Classic, Red Hill Harvest Festival featuring music and short films. In the following week there is Geelong Week, the Fryerstown Antique Fair, the Rainbow Serpent Festival the Centre State Hot Rod & Collectables Swap Meet in Bendigo and of course Geelong Week. For details go to our home page and select the appropriate weekend from the drop-down menu of events in country Victoria.

The White Hat Quiz

How well do you know Melbourne?

First to last week’s quiz.

Some Art Deco buildings in Melbourne.

 We had a number of responses, the first two being from Alan and Meredith, but first complete set came from Jason and Glen.

“At last a quiz we can answer (we think)"

Please note: This section of the newsletter has been removed as it forms part of a forthcoming publication or because it is forms part of our Questing activities. If you find yourself on a tour where the guide is White Hat Accredited they are likely to know the answer to many questions you may have in this area. All guides on White Hat Tours are White Hat Accredited.

Now to this week’s quiz

1. What event does Australia Day commemorate?
2. The Southern Hemisphere has no pole star. In Victoria what is a simple way to find south using the night sky?
3. Where can you go ice skating in Melbourne?
4. What class of training yacht is a Melbourne invention?
5. How could you get a drink after hours during 6 o’clock closing? (many answers are possible here)

No prizes – just glory and a warm inner glow. However the first correct entry may just win a weekend in Spotswood.