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Postcard from Mebourne

by Libby Richardson

I’ve spent many years feeling un-Australian, culturally speaking. But this summer I realised that there are some traits which, whilst not wholly acknowledged as specifically cultural, are indeed factors which identify me as a true blue Aussie. This thought floated through my mind as I was ploughing heavily into the wild and frothy dumpers of the Southern Ocean with my 5-year-old daughter. I was literally chucking her over the crest of each wave whilst shouting into the wind, “Now, swim”. And all around me in the hot salt spray air was the roar of the ocean mingling with the swimmer’s wild and unadulterated screams of delight. Unwittingly I was participating in a kind of rite of passage for any Aussie child – learning to grapple with the ocean, to duck and weave, plunge and grip the sand, to go with or to avoid the disorientation. This is, in fact, what most Melbournians do. In summer, day after day, pretty much regardless of the weather conditions. This summer I got my fill and I learned something new about myself.

I reckon Melbourne has been journeying through its own rite of passage. It is becoming a modern city of the 21st century. Gradually the original grid pattern of the city is being broken down and interrupted by new transport routes and access points. Previously industrial zones such as the shipping docklands are being reclaimed and converted into high-rise residential zones. These developments are causing Melbourne to spill forth and redefine its inner city borders. The young crowd that once orbited the periphery of a static city has moved inwards and as more and more people begin to live within the central city new businesses have popped up within its laneways. Melbourne is suddenly a city abuzz with streetlife and a destination of choice with a plethora of eateries and bars. It has become an invigorating place to be and to accommodate the new invigorated lifestyle the city is quickly acquiring new architectural spaces.

Federation Square, Australia’s biggest public project ($440 million) completed in 2002, is a geometric conglomeration of irregular buildings which create a built environment of outdoor meeting places, enclosed atriums, restaurants and bars. The Australian Centre for the Moving Image (ACMI) and the National Gallery’s Ian Potter Centre are housed within this architecturally sophisticated complex. Elsewhere within the city, combined residential/shopping precincts are being developed such as the savvy Queen Victoria Centre. The list just goes on … the (new) Melbourne Museum, the (new) Australian Centre for Contemporary Art (ACCA), the very beautiful Botanic Gardens with (new) Observatory café, “Council House 2” a (new) international standard of sustainable building design. Ironically, simultaneously, the outer suburbs of Melbourne continue to expand shamelessly in an unabated and ugly consumption of the countryside. New housing estates pop up overnight. There are networks of congested freeways. Predictions are that Australia’s entire eastern seaboard will eventually be continuously populated from it’s southern Victorian tip to its northern tropical reaches.

This morning Melbourne is hotting up with some tropical weather of its own. I’m listening to the rhythmical ker-chink-ker-chink-ker-chink the scooter makes on the footpath as we teeter and fight for foot room on the pavement, all the while careering downhill with the scooter gathering speed. The corner is fast approaching and I wonder if we will make it, unscathed, before the school bell rings. Sweatily I push on, pondering: my daughter is growing up in Melbourne. These days however, I have no cringe factor and no doubt that Melbourne is capable of offering as cultural experience as you, she or any visitor could demand. And, it’s going to be a lovely 33 degrees.