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Cover design: Stephen Smedley
Front cover photograph: Ross Coffey from
Who Do You Think You Are? Series 5, Artemis
International & Serendipity Productions
In his early years on TV he was the wog who
was always being told to Leave the money on
the fridge by Ted Bullpitt in Kingswood Country.
And ultimately he became the majestic patriarch,
Manolis, in The Slap.
Between times, he attended the birth of Triple J, ran the rugby
league touchlines for ABC Sport, was a panellist on Andrew
Dentons Live & Sweaty, offered drolleries on Strictly Dancing
and directed one of the segments at the opening ceremony of
the Sydney Olympics, as well as appearing in umpteen lms
and plays.
Blood and Circuses is the wry and charming story of a young
Greek Australian boy, whose family ran a cafe in Wagga Wagga
in the 1950s and who dreamt of making his life in the theatre.
It is a vivid account of a life lived to the full, beautifully written
by a much-loved Australian.
M E M O I R
Lex Marinos
Blood
and
Circuses
AN IRRESPONSIBLE MEMOIR
From
Kingswood Country
to The Slap
For Anne,
my Alpha & Omega
First published in 2014
Copyright Lex Marinos 2014
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in
any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,
recording or by any information storage and retrieval system, without prior
permission in writing from the publisher. The Australian Copyright Act 1968
(the Act) allows a maximum of one chapter or 10 per cent of this book, whichever
is the greater, to be photocopied by any educational institution for its educational
purposes provided that the educational institution (or body that administers it) has
given a remuneration notice to the Copyright Agency (Australia) under the Act.
All attempts have been made to locate the owner of copyright material. If you have any
information in this regard please contact the publisher at the address below.
Allen & Unwin
83 Alexander Street
Crows Nest NSW 2065
Australia
Phone: (61 2) 8425 0100
Email: info@allenandunwin.com
Web: www.allenandunwin.com
Cataloguing-in-Publication details are available
from the National Library of Australia
www.trove.nla.gov.au
ISBN 978 1 74331 284 1
Set in 12.5/16 pt Granjon by Bookhouse, Sydney
Printed and bound in Australia by Griffin Press
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
The paper in this book is FSC

certified.
FSC

promotes environmentally responsible,

socially beneficial and economically viable
management of the worlds forests.
C009448
Contents
Prologue Rearview mirror vii
1 Papous cafe 1
2 Black crow dreaming 12
3 Bright lights, big city 22
4 Temple of desire 37
5 Campus revelations 47
6 Campus revolutions 60
7 Surfing the New Wave 73
8 The dark stranger at the coffee urn 88
9 Old acts, new beginning 110
10 Livin in the seventies 131
11 Nocturnal transmissions 146
12 Lights . . . 160
13 Camera . . . 177
14 . . . Action! 190
15 Mediterraneo 204
16 Live and sweatier 219
17 Jobbing around 231
18 Life is a Carnivale 242
19 Licking wounds 255
20 Five-ring circus 263
21 The land of the giant caterpillars 272
22 Strictly prancing 280
23 In pursuit of legends 291
24 You gotta have heart 301
25 Slap happy 309
Epilogue In the bloodstream 321
Appendix 325
Acknowledgements 328
Index 330
vi i
Prologue
Rearview mirror
H
ell be here soon. I keep staring ahead, waiting for him to
come into view. Kirsten applies some latex to my eyelids,
uses a hair dryer to help it set, and applies some fine brushstrokes
to the latex, creating more wrinkles than I normally possess.
Now hes coming closer, more visible. She uses her brush to
emphasise the furrows in my brow and the crescents beneath my
eyes, adds some age spots, brushes some more grey into my unruly
eyebrows and adds some to the untrimmed tufts sprouting from
my ears.
Hes almost here. She now uses a sponge to dab a little crimson
on my cheeks and nose, giving me some additional burst capillaries.
I look older. I feel older. I feel as though Im not there anymore.
Now hes present, in focus. I can see him.
Kirsten Veysey is the make-up artist for The Slapthe 2011
television series made from Christos Tsiolkass best-selling 2008
noveland is using her considerable skills to transform me into
the character of Manolis. As she powders me down, I read through
my sidesthe scenes from the film script scheduled for todays
shootingto reassure myself that I have memorised my dialogue.
When shes finished I peer ahead and mutter, Mirrors arent what
they used to be. I catch her eye and we smilethis corny joke has
vi i i
Lex Mari nos
become as much a part of our morning ritual as the latex, brushes
and sponge.
, (Ela, Manoli mou, pame), I instruct
the reflection in the glass. Come on, my Manoli, lets go. Thanks,
Kirsten, youve done it again, made me miraculously older. How
do you do it?
Easily, with the start youve given me!
We laugh and I shuffle off to get a coffee and head for the set.
I have deliberately stopped taking my Mobic anti-inflammatory
tablets, and I wince as my osteoarthritis stabs away; it helps the
process of ageing and enfeebling Manolis.
And while its Manolis that others see, the truth is its my
father I look for in the mirror. Its when I can see him that I am
confident Manolis is in place. Just as Christos undoubtedly drew
upon the experiences of his own father, I have appropriated a great
deal of Dads life and experience in order to make sense of the
complex emotions inherent in this role of an old, disillusioned
Greek migrant.
Although Dads been dead for a decade, I feel as close to him
as I ever have. As close as I felt to him more than half a century
ago, when I sat beside him at Sorlies Revue, a vaudeville tent show
that toured regional areas of eastern Australia during the 1950s,
until it was superseded by television.
It was the first time I had been allowed to attend a night-time
show with the grown-ups. We had been given tickets in return for
placing a poster advertising the show in the front window of our
cafe in Wagga Wagga, a town in south-western New South Wales.
Dressed by Mum in our best clothes, my brother and I joined the
queue outside the massive tent that had been pitched on a vacant
piece of land up near the railway station. Our tickets were checked
by Mrs Grace Sorlie, a formidable woman dressed theatrically in a
black evening gown with feathers and fur flounces, plus audacious
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Bl ood and Ci rcus es
spectacles that predated Edna Everage. She dripped ostentatiously
with lavish jewellery, possibly fake but probably not.
We found our allocated seats on the wooden benches and,
after an eternity, the houselights finally dimmed; the overture
commenced and, as the stage became bathed in magical colour,
time was suspended. With my mouth agape and my eyes popping,
I witnessed the cavalcade of comedians (notably, the Master of
Ceremonies, Bobby Le Brun), singers, contortionists, trick cyclists,
whip crackers, magicians, jugglers, dancers, and gorgeously statu-
esque chorus girls.
The highlight came when the most glamorous woman Id ever
seen took to the stagetall, with beautiful blonde hair, elegantly
costumed in a long, sparkling dress. As the orchestra struck up
something with an exotic rhythm, she began to sway and twist and
turn, moving sensually around the stage. The diaphanous panels of
fabric hanging from her dress swirled as she twirled. The rhythm
became more insistent as she moved . . .
But something must have gone wrong. She seemed to be losing
bits of her dress as she moved around. Then she peeled off her
long gloves and threw them nonchalantly away. The drums and
cymbals pounded and punctuated. My blood pulsed in time to the
rhythm. I looked to Dad for some explanation, but he was leaning
forward, transfixed. I quickly looked at Mum, who seemed more
concerned and was biting her bottom lip.
Trumpets shrieked and cymbals crashed as the woman began
writhing. It seemed like she was having difficulty keeping her dress
up, so she was forced to step out of it. She was now only in her
undies. How embarrassing. Why didnt she stop? Instead she kept
going, while the lights pulsated and the relentless rhythm became
unbearable. She shook and she shimmied and then, as the music
reached its crescendo, she reached up and tore off her hair. And
her bra. And she was . . . a MAN!
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Lex Mari nos
Blackout. The audience (led by Dad?) was on its feet applauding
and cheering. And, although I had no idea what was going on,
somehow I knew in that moment, amid the magic and mystery,
that this was the business I wanted to be in.
So as I search the mirror for Dad, I occasionally fancy I can
see that incredulous little boy peering over his shoulder. If I tilt
my head and squintif the light is right, if the angle of incidence
is trueI can fuse the two images and catch a fleeting glimpse
of myself.
1
1
Papous cafe
K
asos is a small rocky island, part of the Dodecanese (literally
twelve islands, but there are more than a hundred in fact)
in the Aegean Sea. These days you can reach it via light plane or
ferry from Rhodos, or alternatively from the most eastern point
of Crete. In ancient times, its early settlements were Minoan and
Mycenaean, and it sent ships to the Trojan War. It was ruled by
the Venetians for two centuries during the Middle Ages, then
bythe Ottoman Turks for three centuries.
In 1824, at the beginning of the Greek War of Independence,
the Kasiots defiantly declared their allegiance to Greece, for
which they were brutally punished by Mehmet Ali, the Pasha of
Egypt, who despatched an armada to burn and pillage the island,
and slaughter most of its inhabitants. Despite independence being
achieved on the Greek mainland in 1830, the islands, including the
scant population that survived on Kasos, remained under Turkish
rule until the Italians took control in the early part of the twentieth
century. It wasnt until 1947 that the United Nations returned
the Dodecanese islands to Greece. Australias Doc Evatt played
a significant part in this process, as a prominent United Nations
diplomat, and as a politician whose constituents numbered many
2
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from the Dodecanese. They convinced him that their heritage,
allegiance and future belonged to Greece.
Adonis Manolis Karofilis left Kasos in 1914. As the eldest child
of Manolis and Kaliope, he was being sent to Australia in search of
material wealth to help support his family on the poverty-stricken
island. He was sixteen, couldnt speak English, and had no family
in Australia, although there were some other Kasiots already settled
there. Not many, but some, including a family in Newcastle. What
he lacked in education and possessions, Adonis made up for with
intelligence and the desire to work. And in Australia that was
sufficient to get a start.
His Christian names were anglicised to Anthony (Tony)
Emmanuel, although he steadfastly refused to abbreviate his
surname, despite being told that Karr would make life simpler
for all concerned. By the time he was twenty-two, Tony had met
and married an older divorcee from a Scottish family, Minnie
Margaret Matheson. Tony and Minnie were my maternal grand-
parents. Soon they had a son, Manolis, named after Tonys father
and inevitably anglicised to Noel. Unfortunately, little Noelie
died in infancysomething to do with a fever, a mustard bath(!),
and convulsions. His framed photo hung in my grandparents
bedroom until they died. I still have it and other family heirlooms
in a cupboard at home.
Tony and Minnie then proceeded to have four daughters: their
eldest, Anna Kaliope (Anne), is my mother; she was followed
by Ereni (known as Rean), Athena (Thena), and Eleni (Elaine).
Minnie had had another son, Gordon, during her first marriage (to
one Augustus Hampel), but he was sent away to be raised by her
parents. Whether my grandfather was unwilling to raise someone
elses son, or whether there was some misplaced Victorian sense
of shame about it, I dont know. Nor does my mother. We didnt
discuss those sorts of things in those days, she says wistfully in
response to my questioning. Minnie kept in touch with Gordon
3
Bl ood and Ci rcus es
and he attended Papous funeral. Many years later, out of the blue,
I received a letter from Gordons daughter. We met and I was able
to tell her much about the grandmother she never knew.
Papou (Grandfather) worked at many jobs in many towns
throughout New South Wales before establishing himself as
the proprietor of the Bridge Cafe in Wagga Wagga. He was the
patriarch, industrious and strict. If my brother and I became
too boisterous, he would quickly reprimand us: Stop behaving
likeTurks!
Occasionally he spoke of his early years on Kasos, although in
those days I had little interest in his history. But I was impressed
by the imagery and power of one of his stories. The Turks, and
subsequently the Italians, forbade the flying of the Greek flag, but
the islanders found ingenious ways around this. Most commonly
their rebellion manifested itself in the painting of their houses.
Traditionally, the houses were whitewashed with lime during
spring, partly to disinfect them, partly to reflect the heat of the
sun. Then, once the house was sparkling white, the Greeks would
paint their front door, window shutters, roof, and whatever other
features they could think of, with brilliant azure blue, thereby
perpetuating the colours of the Greek flag.
One day, according to Papou, he took an even bolder step and
tied a piece of blue and white material around his neck. Inevitably he
was stopped by an Italian soldier and told to remove the offending
scarf. With the brashness of youth, Papou challenged the soldier,
gesturing to the heavens and the ocean: What are you going to do?
Take the clouds out of the sky, and the waves out of the ocean?
Apparently the soldier just laughed, clipped him around the ear
and sent him on his way.
I was delighted with my papous courage and cleverness. Many
years later I discovered that this anecdote was part of the folklore
on many of the islands, and anyone old enough to have survived
those times could retell it, with themselves in the starring role.
4
Lex Mari nos
The fact that it was not exclusive, and was probably apocryphal,
did nothing to diminish the pride I felt in Papou.
He committed himself to his new country, and became a
respectable and respected member of the community. And not
just the Greek community, which was itself quite significant in
those postWorld War II days. In Wagga alone, there were close
to a dozen cafes run by Greeks: the Silver Key, White Rose, Rose
Marie, Acropolis, Georgian, Popular, and so on. Ours was the
Bridge Cafe, because we were close to the small bridge that crossed
the Wollundry Lagoon, a billabong in central Wagga. And there
were other Greek families involved in the catering trade in other
towns throughout the region. Most of them had migrated in the
early decades of the twentieth century. One of my acquaintances
who came out from Greece during the 1970s used to refer some-
what enviously to us and our ilk as the milk-bar aristocracy, to
distinguish us from later generations of factory workers.
Anyhow, Papou worked hard, assisted and represented his
compatriots, and became the acknowledged leader of the Greek
community in the Riverina (south-west New South Wales), as well
as chairman of the Wagga Chamber of Commerce. I discovered
much later that he had also joined the local Freemasons, an accepted
and astute business practice in those days, although I suspect the
desire to assimilate was also a strong motive.
Despite his severity, I loved my grandfather dearly. I used to sit
on his knee and sip his sweet muddy coffee. (A generation later
I watched this ritual repeat itself when my son would sit on my
fathers knee.) Papou would pinch my cheek and I would pinch
his, and this would end up in laughter and kisses. I remember the
cheek-pinching because we were still doing it years later when I
had started secondary school. In fact, it was the last thing we did
the night he died.
Although that moment was fifty years ago, its memory is still
as vivid as if it was last night. His cheeks had a beautiful texture
5
Bl ood and Ci rcus es
of soft, polished leather, which I stroked and nuzzled against. He
was complaining about a bit of an ache in his left arm. Eventually
I kissed his cheek and went off to bed.
By that stage, my parents had separated and my mother, brother
and I were living with my grandparents. I remember waking up
that night and hearing a lot of voices. I thought they must have
started a party after I went to bed, but it didnt really sound like
the merry babble of party voices. No laughter. I stumbled out of
bed, but Mum intercepted me and broke the newsPapou had
had a massive heart attack and died in the ambulance on the way
to the hospital.
I hurled myself back onto my bed. Bastard. Gamisas! [Fuck you!]
You bastard! I wailed as my mother futilely tried to restrain me.
I used all my twelve-year-old vocabulary to curse him for leaving
us, for leaving me, knowing intuitively that he had abandoned
usmejust when I was beginning to need him most. He was
only sixty-two, and his death removed a sense of certainty and
stability from my life.
I still miss him. Id love to talk to him now, ask him things.
About his journey, about Australia then and now, about his faith
in Australia and his aspirations. I know he would be proud of
his daughters, especially how his and their sacrifices enabled his
grandchildren to be educated and achieve satisfying careers far from
the rigours of cafe life. I can imagine his joy on seeing his flock
of sophisticated, educated great-grandchildren and the limitless
potential of their children. I suspect he would be astonished at the
diversity of contemporary Australia. And that he would be amused
at how readily available Greek (and other ethnic) food is now.
Grandma was very much the opposite of Papou, and maybe
that was the attraction between them. Quieter, self-effacing,
dutiful, domestic, a traditional wife and mother, she was much
less demonstrative than Papou (and the other Greeks), but was
caring and loving in her own reserved fashion. She must have been
6
Lex Mari nos
devastated to have lost her two sons, and I suspect she cherished my
brother and me just a little more as a consequence. She lived with
usor, more correctly, we with herwhen we moved to Sydney.
She survived Papou by ten years, finally passing away quietly and
unassumingly one day while I was at university. Forty years later I
discovered more about her, and was ashamed I hadnt appreciated
her more while she was alive.
My fathers background was another thing altogether. Dad came
from the small village of Rizomilos in the Peloponnese peninsula,
the vast area of south-western Greece joined to the mainland by the
Isthmus of Corinth. Peloponnesus is associated with many great
events and legends, including the ancient Olympic Games and
Pauls epistles to the Corinthians. Its been invaded and inhabited by
Romans, Venetians, Turks, Slavs, Franks, Egyptians and repatriated
Greeks, and the Greek War of Independence began there.
Rizomilos (rice mill) is on the northern coast, on the road to
Patras (and the ferries to Italy), in the region known as Archaea.
To watch the sun rise across the Gulf of Corinth, illuminating
Delphi, is an epiphany. Turn around and you are equally inspired
by the mountains in the background, where the beautiful village
of Kalavryta nestles, as does the Monastery of Agia Lavra, despite
several attempts over the last thousand years to burn it down.
The Marinopoulos family has been in Rizomilos forever, as far
as I can tell, fishing and farming. Over the centuries the land was
subdivided among generations of sons so that, by my fathers time,
his immediate family had a meagre holding of olive groves and
citrus orchards, sparse but still productive. His parents also ran
a general store to make ends meet. Although I never met them,
Igrew up with photos of them, and subsequently gleaned as much
about them as I could from my uncles, aunties and cousins.
My grandfather, Alexios, after whom I am named, was fond
of socialising, talking, smoking, drinking and gambling. My
yiayia (grandmother), Eleni, was strong and blunt, working from
7
Bl ood and Ci rcus es
sunrise to sunset and beyond. I had guessed as much from their
photosAlexios is invariably smiling invitingly, Eleni not at all.
Eleni got things done. I still have two rugs she wove, and which
she sent as wedding gifts to my parents. Like her, the rugs are
sturdy and practical. Alexios and Eleni produced eight children,
of whom Dad (Fotios) was the third oldest.
I never really understood why Dad came to Australia. Was
it a punishment or a reward? An adventure or to help support
his family in Greece (like Papou)? I couldnt decide. He always
said it was for a holiday, but that never convinced me. It seemed
implausible that a seventeen-year-old village peasant would take
a grand tour in Australia. However, I did understand why he
stayed. The ship on which he was due to return to Greece was
commandeered as a troop carrier at the start of World War II,
and Dad was stranded here.
Years later, when I began travelling to Greece, I received more
doleful accounts from aunties Chrysanthi and Marika. Apparently
Dad was a wild and unmanageable youthwagging school,
mucking around, getting into trouble. Alexios didnt seem to notice
and the discipline was left up to Eleni, who even resorted to tying
Dad to a tree to stop him escaping. Exasperated, she sent him to
relatives in Athens, where I gather he worked a bit, but mainly
played cards. As a last resort, she sent him to two of her brothers
who had migrated to Australia, to see if that might settle him
down. It didnt.
Like my papou, Dad was a teenager when he arrived in Australia.
He joined his uncles and began working in their cafes, and in
others around New South Walesin the Riverina, the Illawarra,
the South Coast, and in Sydney. I suspect he had cash for the first
time in his life, and he began the task of assimilating into his new
country. He ventured outside the Greek community to experi-
ence new codes of behaviour, new codes of football, new cultural
practices. But he was at his most relaxed among his compatriots,
8
Lex Mari nos
especially those from the Archaean Brotherhood, one of the many
organisations formed by the immigrant Greeks. He worked and he
played, mainly at football (soccer), cards, tavli (backgammon) and
the horses; and when he busted his leg playing football, he took
up lawn bowls very successfully. He was naturaliseda quaint
term from a bygone era, which indicated the granting of Australian
citizenshipand Fotios Alexios Marinopoulos became Francis
(Frank) Alexander Marinos. He grew up, but he never matured,
and he always remained unnatural.
He met my mother at a big Greek community social func-
tionone of the Grecian Balls which were very popular in the
1940s, in the cities and regions, wherever there were significant
numbers of Greeks. They were both in their early twenties when
they married in 1944 at Agia Triada (Holy Trinity) Church in
Sydneys Surry Hills, the oldest Orthodox church in the southern
hemisphere. By now Dad had lots of experience working in cafes
and, with Papous help, he and Mum started their first cafe in
suburban Rockdale, in southern Sydney.
Im fond of speculating about why they married one another, or
more particularly why Mum (or any woman) would marry Dad. I
can see from his point of view that it would have seemed like a good
ideaanother adventure, providing security, a job, and regular
sex. Mum was a very attractive young woman from a good family;
for a gambler, it must have seemed like hed drawn a royal flush.
There may have been pressure on Mumpressure to get
married and start a family, to perpetuate Papous dynasty. Much
as she revered education, study had never been an option. She had
grown up in small country towns during the Depression, working
in Papous cafes since she was youngshe had been needed there
as her parents battled to make headwayand she understood that
for a girl the idea of a career was unimaginable. Besides, her great
aspirations were to be a loving wife and mother, just as she was a
loving daughter. As the eldest of four girls she had responsibilities,
9
Bl ood and Ci rcus es
which Im certain included marrying a Greek. Papou would have
insisted on that, and Dad was eligible, handsome and charming.
Now, if Mum was looking for a husband comparable to the
father whom she idolised, she couldnt have chosen more ludi-
crously. While Papou was strong, responsible and disciplined, Dad
was pliable, unreliable and carefree. Papou was respectable and
moderate; Dad was excessive and gregarious. Papou was resolute
and optimistic; Dad was weak and despairing. Papou had authority;
Dad had charm. And Mum ended up squirming anxiously between
the two of them.
Frank and Anne made a go of it for a few years. My brother
was born in 1946, in Sydney, and christened Anthony Karofilis
Marinos. In Greek families, the first son is traditionally named after
the fathers father, but in this case, my brother received not only his
mothers fathers Christian name but also his family name. Papou
used to proclaim, My sons son is twice my son, and he meant
it, especially considering his only son had died. What he really
meant was my daughters son is twice my son, but he preferred the
arithmetic and poetry of repeating son. In any event, he claimed
my brother for his own, and that was that.
This didnt help relations between Papou and Dad. Im not sure
what happened with their Rockdale cafe, but my parents had now
moved back to Wagga and they were working for Papou again.
Dad always maintained that he was meant to be a partner in the
business, but I suspect Papou knew a gambler when he saw one.
Relations between the two men grew more fractious as Dad was
relegated to the kitchen and his status as father was usurped. At
least when I came along, in February 1949, Dad was able to name
his second son after his own father.
My grandparents and aunties lived in a large home in one of
Waggas newer suburbs, while Mum and Dad and us kids lived
10
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in the compact flat above the cafetwo bedrooms, a lounge room,
kitchen, bathroom, and a big staircase leading down to the shop.
From an early age I developed an understanding that there were
two worlds. The first was when the shop was open: this was the
day-to-day world of commerce, which brought the outside in to us.
For fifteen hours a day customers would come and go as my family
worked to please them, fulfilling their role in the widercommunity.
The second world existed when the cafe was closed. Especially
on Sunday nights, when it closed early. Then the other Greek
familiesa dozen or so, many of them cafe owners as wellwould
congregate at one cafe or another. Tables would be pushed back to
create space for dancing. A gramophone would materialise, along
with a collection of 78s bought from specialty shops in Sydney
or Melbourne, or brought directly from Greece by friends and
relatives. Bouncy pop songs and mournful rembetika, originating
from the bars and hash houses of Piraeus and often referred to as
Greek blues. Komboloi (worry beads) would spin back and forth
around chunky fingers. There were cards and backgammon. A
couple of bottles of wine would produce barrels of laughter. Voices
loud and excited, carrying more animation, emotion and expres-
sion when they spoke Greek in private than they could achieve
speaking English in public. And every sentence embellished by
theatricalgestures.
And then there was the food. Lamb baked with garlic and
oregano. Cabbage rolls. Spinach and beans in olive oil and lemon
juice. Olives. Fetta. Yoghurt. Rice. Pasta. Sticky sweets. Sugar-
coated almonds. The food that we ate. Food that was never on the
cafe menu. I thought it was our secret food. The revelry continued
for hours and, fight it as I might, sleep always overtook me before
the night had ended.
And the next morning the front doors would again be open for
business, and again the outside world would come in and we would
11
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go about our business of serving steak and eggs, fish and chips,
mixed grill. And we would also continue our efforts at assimilation.
Both these worlds coexisted in a functional, albeit cautious,
relationship. Peaceful most of the time. Disrupted by an occasional
drunken bigot. The first time I heard the word dago, I knew,
without knowing its meaning, that it was not a good thing to
be. Evidently my grandfather was one. So too was my father.
Iconcluded that I must be one as well.
PostWorld War II Australia was very conservative, particularly
in country areas, and not notable for its tolerance of foreigners.
Dago was the preferred insult in those days; wog hadnt quite
gained its more recent universality. The other popular epithet was
reffo, mainly signifying those displaced or seeking refuge from the
war. I can still hear the angry snarls of Speak English, ya dagoes!
if we were speaking Greek too volubly in the street. Inthose days,
trunk calls to other cities and countries were routed through the
local telephone exchange. Often, if Papou or Dad were speaking
in Greek, the operator would arbitrarily disconnect them. Colonial
racism had been enshrined in the Australian constitution via the
Immigration Restriction Act, better known as the White Australia
policy, and it remained a powerful force throughout Australiaafter
the war.
My mother understood the mood perfectly and insisted we
spoke English, even at home. I think this was also motivated by
the fact that she had never learned much Greek, although Papou
and Dad continued to talk to us in Greek, which I understood but
invariably answered in English. Now I lament my poor language
skills, and am still self-conscious about my execrable grammar
and accent when I speak Greek. However, once I started school,
Iwas grateful to Mum that my English was good. I was sure that
it would help me fit in and be Australian, in a quintessentially
Australian country town.
12
2
Black crow dreaming
W
agga Wagga (place of many crows in the Wiradjuri
language), on the mighty Murrumbidgee River, is
Australias second largest inland city (after Canberra). It began as a
colonial settlement in the 1830s and quickly became the commercial
centre of the area south-west of the Great Dividing Range. It also
established itself as the administrative and service centre for the
surrounding pastoralists, and in the 1940s added army and air force
bases to its existing educational institutions. During the 1950s its
population was about 25,000. It was declared a city after World
War II, but I always thought of it as a big town.
Wagga was a great place to grow up. (Incidentally, if youre from
there it is permissible to refer to it in the singular, Wagga, but
if youre a stranger or a blow-in, you should observe the complete
Wagga Wagga so you dont get harassed by the locals.) All my
memories of the place are tinged with languor. They all replay in
slow motion, lazy and fluid. Like the baker with his horse and
cart delivering fresh bread to the houses; the tar melting in the
bitumen; frying eggs on the footpath for fun; picnics and picking
mushrooms. The sharpness of the winter frost, chopping wood to
feed the ovens and stoves, fireworks on Empire Day night. The
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billycart races down the big dipper driveway at the technical college
on Willans Hill. They waft in and out of focus.
I can see myself as a toddler, sitting in my high chair at the
end of the massive table in the cafe kitchen. Everyone is there, or
so it seemsparents, grandparents and aunties. A large glass of
lemonade is placed in front of me. I promptly pick it up and pour
it over my head. Stunned silence is followed by uproarious laughter.
Maybe I just wanted to get their attention, or was curious to find
out what it felt like to spill my drink over myself. (Id find out often
enough, later on). However, what I did discover was that making
people laugh made them feel good, and it made me feel good and
special. We were all happy. Entertaining people was a good thing.
By the time I was five, I couldnt wait to begin school. My
brother was already there, and I was always keen to catch up to
him; besides, I could already read and count in two languages,
and I wanted to explore the world outside the cafe. We walked
from the cafe, around the back on the path alongside the lagoon
and ducks and geese, past the ambulance station, across Johnston
Street, up Trail Street, and we were there. I already knew some of
the kids from the Greek familiesMavroudis, Nomarhis, Kallis,
Poulos, Soulos. Soon I knew other kids: Short, Eggins, Ingram,
Bagley, Goldsmith. I was bright and I loved learning; accumulating
information, calculating answers, solving problems, expressing
ideas. I also kissed my first girl, presciently named Anne. It felt
good, just like the lemonade on my head.
Gurwood Street Public School was a lovely, gentle introduc-
tion to the world beyond the safe sanctuary of the cafe. I didnt
even mind the polio injections they gave us. Every morning we
wouldstand in assembly and sing God Save the Queen. I under-
stood that Elizabeth II was an important person in the other world
that I was beginning to negotiate, but when she visited Wagga
during her first tour to Australia, in 1954, I actually made a small
republican gesture of insurrection. Because her motor cavalcade
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Lex Mari nos
was going to pass our cafe in Fitzmaurice Street, my family took
up vantage points on the footpath. But I sneaked upstairs to my
parents bedroom, which overlooked the street, and, armed with a
peashooter and some dried peas from the kitchen, settled into my
grassy knoll. As the Queens vehicle passed, I pinged a couple of
peas out the window, then ran downstairs and through the cafe to
join the throng on the footpath, hoping I hadnt been seen.
Clearly, I was initially confused about the Queen because I
understood from Papou and Dad that, as Greeks, we had our
own flag and our own king. But at school I learned that we were
also Australians, therefore we had her and the Union Jack as well.
So that began to feel okay too, and besides, she was married to a
Greek. Republicanism to one side, she seemed like a nice lady, and
our family, especially Mum, liked her.
Mum was also very fond of Princess Margaret; whenever we
saw a photo of the Queens sister, Mum would exclaim, Isnt she
the image of Thena! Aunty Thena was held to be the beauty of
their family; and she was, although she, Mum and Aunty Rean
looked very much alike. So much so that family folklore contains
the story of a peculiar car accident caused by these three sisters.
They were out driving in the Morris Minor and whoever was in
the back was leaning forward with her head between her two
sisters in the front. Apparently an oncoming motorist thought he
was being approached by a three-headed monsteran attractive
maidenly Cerberusand took evasive action by swerving his car
into a tree. I think the story concludes with him being uninjured,
and laughter all round.
Rean and Thena ultimately married and moved away from
Wagga. Im sure they could see the sort of pressure Mums marriage
was under, and the tension between Dad and Papou, and realised
that they needed to escape from the old man if they were to have
any chance of building their own lives. I suspect they also didnt
want to be forced to marry a Greek; as it turned out, they both
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married nice blokes from Scottish families. Rean married Neville
from the Stewart-Roberts clan and had a daughter, Kerrie, while
Thena wed Norman Munro and had Mark and Catherine. But
not until well after she was crowned Miss Wagga.
Yes, Thena was the first ever Miss Wagga, in 1948. It was a
fundraising exercise for the Community Advancement Fund (along
with the Ugly Man competition), and Thena, nominated as Miss
Cafes, won it. It must have been a great thrill for the local Greek
community to see one of their own being accepted in such a public
way. Im equally sure Papou would have used his godfatherly status
to emphasise to his compatriots the importance of contributing to
such a victory. It helped us fit in.
Meanwhile I was fitting in at school. I was shy, and took a little
while and required sacrifices, particularly at recess and lunchtime.
It was obvious that we Greek kids didnt have the same food as
everyone else. Just like at home, I had keftedes (meatballs), tiropita
or spanakopita (cheese or spinach pies), dolmades (stuffed vine leaves)
or makaronia (baked pasta). They had white-bread sandwiches with
baked beans, vegemite, curried egg, banana, pineapple or soggy
tomato. Yuck. I wasnt prepared to give up the food I liked, but I
became skilled at hiding it inside pieces of bread to make it look
like a sandwich.
Id already been sick at school, from the notorious flavoured
milk that was compulsory at recess. It was clearly an admirable
idea to give kids a bottle of milk every day; it just wasnt such a
good idea to leave crates of it standing in the summer sun, curdling
away until we drank it. Still, since it happened to all of the kids at
one time or another, it served to bond us. See, Im not different,
I can vomit too!
But I did feel different, and my assimilation was hindered by
the fact that, as I got older, I began to help in the shop. I used to
like being out the back in the kitchen with Dad, helping cut the
vegetables, fetching wood, pinning up the orders. Anthony was