From Melbourne : 15th January 1982

From Melbourne

15.1.81

Dear Alan,

                                You mentioned in your last letter that you had been walking and had seen some rock drawings by bushmen and this week I bought a copy of Country Life to read an article on London and in the travel section there is an article on bushmen paintings in the Drakensberg Mountains. There is a picture of a group of men and eland and a picture of the mountains they were drawn on. It looks very dry country, not very   many trees and rocky at the top. You said you saw animals but you didn’t tell us what kind. In the article it said the National Parks people are replacing the introduced wattles and eucalypts with native trees so in some parts it could look like Australian bush.

                I have a good example of people hearing only what they want to this week. In the National Times there have been a few articles @ letters about emigrants from South Africa. There was a letter from a English man who had just settled from SA saying how Australia should be glad to take them because they were such good workers etc. On Monday we went to Evelyn’s for lunch. I took Auntie Grace @ Win to see Auntie May. Jenny was there and she was talking about she had last week. When Jimmy’s family left Egypt about 20 years ago his family came to Australia. Most of the rest went back to Greece but one family went to South Africa and worked in Johannesburg.  Last year some of that family left SA and came to live in Australia. They stayed with Jenny and Jimmy for a week. They have two young children who were the main reason they came. Jenny said one night they were talking about conditions in SA with some of Jimmy’s cousins. The two who had just been there said that conditions were improving for some blacks even if slowly. Jenny said several of Jimmy’s cousins wouldn’t believe them and a blue started. They said that they were so brainwashed by the Government in SA they didn’t really know what was going on. As Jenny said the ones in Melbourne were so sure they knew what was going on 1000s of miles away they wouldn’t even believe someone who had lived there for 20 years. As I said we only believe what we want too. But I suppose all people where-ever they live are much the same.

                Glen and Jenny are coming to tea tomorrow night and are leaving next week to spend 2 years at Penang. Neither Lois nor Anne have heard anything about a teaching position for this year.

                                                                                                Love from Mum