Early yesterday morning, I was fishing at Nudgee Beach just off the edge of Moreton Bay, adjacent to the Brisbane River and Airport. It’s a grubby little area and is just 20 minutes from Brisbane City, so it is very accessible.
It’s my release. A way to get away from all the humdrum. The noise. To be one with nature. The gentle breeze. The mangroves and the white-faced herons that can stand still for what seems an eternity, unlike most of us that struggle to be still for a few seconds.
It might have been a fishing village 50 years ago and the décor would be similar. But unfortunately, there is not much left of that, nor much fish left just the same.
I looked forward to being alone. But fate had other ideas.
For whatever reason, there were just the two of us. Me and another “old bloke”. Well, an even older bloke it later turned out.
Naturally, after some small talk, we got to talking about the recent horrific events of Bondi.
We didn’t talk about who or what was to blame. Or grand solutions. We just shared in the tragedy.
The old man was heavily accented, which made me curious. So I asked him what country he was originally from.
He immediately told me he was a “nationalized Australian”. It was almost as if he had rehearsed that line, or had used it so often it had become second nature. For whatever reason, he didn’t really want to tell me. Or maybe he really wished he could.
We ended up speaking for about 3 hours on that jetty. We covered so much territory. He was 83 and his wife was in her 80s, and he hinted at her dementia without wanting to go into much depth. He was a retired fitter and turner and a very intelligent man.
Eventually, after sizing me up to see what I was like, he admitted he was Palestinian. The fact that he went through a vetting and screening process to tell me his country of origin probably explains the sensitivities he experiences in a society that does not understand much about Middle East politics and culture.
He explained as a Palestinian, he was essentially a blood brother of all the Arabs. He felt some similarities with our own Indigenous people in Australia, but for him it was the Middle East. He was a long-term devout Muslim, but converted to Christianity because his wife was a Christian and found the teachings inspiring. My feeling was he was both proud and embarrassed about his heritage because he was acutely aware of how it was perceived after living in Australia for many years.
However, he was sympathetic to the Islamic cause and explained to me some of the subtleties of the various factions, from the Lebanese, Syrians, Qatar, Egypt, Iran and, of course, the Jews.
He had no time for the terrorists or the terrorism of the region, but explained how deeply ingrained they were in their thinking. We quickly agreed that the Catholic Church was probably one of the most corrupt institutions on the Christian front (my whole family — wife, me and all our kids — are Catholic, so don’t get lost on that). He did also say he believed Jesus’ teachings were the most justified of all the religions.
One thing that came out of our discussion was not the importance and the damage religion can do, but the need for many to have faith in something when it appears there is nothing else to place your hopes on.
My personal view is that the people that come into these discussions on forums like ours have little understanding of the need for faith for some of these people, who we seem to treat as statistics, and not understand their lack of alternatives in a life that has passed them by.
In between these deeper conversations, we got to the real business. One that two men needed to do. Fishing lol.
We only caught one fish between us but shared our bait and ideas. Our aligned common sense was a constant in the whole discussion.
The one fish was caught was by me. Maybe, that made me feel better after everything I learned from him. It was about 3 inches long, a little bream. I live-baited it and left it on a sleeper rod trying to catch something bigger. It was on for 40 minutes or so and was not taken. My view, when I wound it in after inspecting it a number of times, was he had done a pretty good job, so I took the hook out. I let it go free and he swam away, seemingly unaffected by the ordeal. When I was younger, I never would have let it go and let it be free.
Now, if two old bastards from entirely different cultures can get on a jetty for a few hours and agree on most things, it goes to show there must be some hope for this world.
PS: I originally posted this on the Bondi Massacre blog but was advised I should put it to a wider audience. It’s a terrible shame that the children of the current generation are fighting these pointless battles and cannot shake their parents and grandparents out of this recycling of violence and destruction. I accept they may have been quasi-brainwashed, or committed to a cause of revenge or justice. But today’s generation has enough information readily available — at their fingertips — to put a stop to these vicious generational cycles. There are no excuses. Tell your children, but explain to them they have a responsibility to get it right, because the current generations and their predecessors for the past 3,000 years or so have really screwed it up big time, and it’s time to let it go and move towards a better future.
Replies
Message received..... subtle as always
Great write up, it's disappointing to see racist views on a footy site it doesn't help anyone.
Gordon, "racism" or heavily biased views are almost always due to fear and limited perspectives (or worse such as natural sociopathic leanings) and it gets dressed up in all sorts of wrappings, justifications and ego-mechanisms. Some can grow out of it, many can't.
Everyone, that is, no exceptions, have some racism in them, even if only a tiny little bit. But it is there. Often recognised by: "I'm not a racist but....."; by jokes esp about Indigenous peoples of various nations; and by those getting on a stage to hurl abuse at people ideologically opposed. P.S. I'm a Catholic. I saw recently that those who stop going to Mass often say "there are too many people in the pews who are hypocrites and so I don't go". Thought Jesus was the centre of attraction. Well, I certainly didn't expect to be posting this today.
Interesting observation Clayton, I hope I did not offend you personally in relation to the Catholic Church. I could tell many stories good and bad (their's that Curates Egg again Lol).
I think most Catholics could say that they have met many fine Priests and some not so fine, that said the Church Heirachy was probably the main offender in my summation.
man after my own heart Gordon.
Pops, Love this story. Two old men on a Jetty. What immediately struck me as a powerful theme, besides moments of shared humanity, was your friend's fear of judgment in relation to his Palestinian ancestary.
Fear, Trepidation or a want not to cause conflict..... all part of the message Hoe...... you get it! I wonder who else will, it was an eye opener and maybe not a coincidence I found myself there yesterday?
The other message is the brainwashing and cohesion of the terrorist mentality.....their young people now have an information package that can circumvent this madness!
The "brainwashing part" is a far more complex discussion Pops, which is why I didnt immediately go there.
If you're living in bombed-out rubble. Sand. Dust. And not much else. No organized police or army to protect you. No helicopters. No M16s. No food or hot water. And you've seen your family turn to bits of bloodied fragments on dusty, bloodied soil. Or kids with head shots, courtesy of highly-trained skilled snipers that almost none will remember except for some outraged doctors doing their autopsies or some outraged journos that will be called fake news. Oh and you remember stories your long gone relatives used to tell you about the lands they used to live 70 years ago. Where even Jews, Christians and Musliens co-existed. Before your people were booted out. Then what? What do you do about how you feel? What's left for you?
Meanwhile, a brotherhood reach out. The only ones there with you on aground Zero. Some speaking of peace and a better way, others for justice and revenge. To top it all off many in the West will assume you're a "troublemaker" and a Islamo-jihadist terrorist.
And how can you trust the people who represent or "symbolize" the types who provided the missiles, the arms? The US. The West. The people who also say your brotherhood, your faith, is evil and the cause of all the trouble in the world. The ones that live in a very different world. A paradise in comparison.
The irony of all this is the Jews know exactly how this feels and are also a brotherhood. They went through the Holocaust and persecution. With no land to call home until 70 years ago. In land some of the Palestinian generations used to call home. Before the were herded out. Decided by politicians. Seven decades later it isn't getting better. But worse...
I'm sure your friend was on top of all that far more than I am.
Mmmmm. Very difficult and complex topics...
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