Australian Amblings
Discovering the land down under in bylanes of Bangalore
As I am moving towards the end of my project of discovering countries from Bangalore, I am realizing how the proximity of countries play an important role in cultural remnants and immigration. China and Bhutan were invariably easier to explore than Africa. And this week , I ventured even further, to Australia!
Almost as a nod to my project, Sydney team visited our office for a series of talks and I got a cute koala for my desk! Then I started my research - the obvious similarity is the British colonization - so both Australians and Indians speak English, love cricket and have Wellington and Victoria terminal(and many other landmarks) ! But what more, let’s find out..
What comes to your mind first when I say Australia? For me it is a TV show.
And yes you are correct in guessing which. But the irony was my culinary experiences were pretty underwhelming.
I started with an unsuccessful culinary hunt for Australian food. The only Australian chain in town is Cookie Man and although I ended up ordering, it didn’t feel Australian in any sense - they were simply good chocochip cookies. I searched Australian vegetarian recipes and settled on Pumpkin soup as the Lamingtons needed eggs.
My pumpkin soup was barely edible and I will leave the soup to tomatoes in future. But here’s the recipe I used in case someone wants to appreciate tomato soup again:
Next I moved to music! I was in luck, almost. An Australian band was performing in Bangalore last week and I almost booked my tickets till I saw the venue was 20 km away and it was a weekday evening.
So I stayed at home with my “Yellow Tail” and karaoke-ed in my room. Sharing a great Australian band recommendation to go back to school days with :)
In my series of finding interesting things on the journey of searching cultural , Art has always been my favorite part of exploring a place. What is unique and different about the art forms ? Can I learn something? Is there a workshop happening in town?
I discovered a bunch of new and fascinating arts : Nuno felting which is learning the art of making cozy scarfs, almost knitting hygge into existence. There is a cool and cute instrument called Didgeridoo and even though I had no idea what it is(still don’t), it has a community in India. My last find was what I eventually picked up to try - Dot Painting.
Dot painting is an Aboriginal art form which was mostly filled with spiritual and religious narratives. And in a true artist Ananya style, I decided to recreate it. I used a normal paintbrush and canvas to create patterns. Turtle symbolizes wisdom, longevity and connection to natural world for Aboriginals. It reminded me of the glass turtle showpiece at my home, the Chinese symbol of long life. Around two years ago, I saw 200 years old turtles in a sanctuary in Zanzibar, they are more than just a symbol. And so here is my token of long life, it is your responsibility to make it a wider one..
I also came across these beautiful watercolor landscapes by Albert Namatjira, one of the most famous Australian aboriginal artists. Australia is mostly inhabited at the coastline, leaving inland bare. As I was reading more about the geography of the place, I was surprised to find it has the most number of beaches in the world! almost 10k. My guess would have been Philippines or Indonesia.
There’s another cool artist I discovered who started painting/ sculpting at the age of 80! And here I am fearing the incoming 30s. A lot of time the lessons you are looking for are not the lessons you learn. And although I admired Emily Kame Kngwarreye’s depiction of Aboriginal culture through colors and bold curves, I was much more inspired by the sheer boldness of her creative spirit - a fire not restrained by age.
The whole Australian experience has definitely created new connections in the landscape of my mind. A country which symbolizes freedom for me - you can blame Dil chahta hai, Break ke Baad and Bachna Ae Haseeno for that. A country which appears the most frequently in cricket conversations. A country which I now know a little more about.
Off to discovering my last country of the project - Scotland this week, see you on the other side :))
