Under a hotter sun; The Christmas cake.

The Christmas cake;

When the sun stands highest, when the weather is hot and muggy, Christmas is not far off. In Australia it is tradition to bake Christmas cakes or make Christmas Puddings like it is a tradition in Switzerland to bake many different Christmas cookies as in many other countries all over the world.

Country people are generally very helpful and find Christmas time also a good time to help charities

One Charity, I won’t mention which one had a special afternoon tea to say thank you to all the helpers. An old lady, she was then well in her eighties baked every year a big Christmas cake for the members of this particular charity, to enjoy.

People come together in a jolly mood to enjoy a cup of tea or coffee and a delicious piece of her famous Christmas cake.

The cake was sitting on a plate, glistening with a sugary glace waiting to be cut. The president of the club had the honor to cut the first slice.

He cut into the cake and the knife got stuck. He looked up just slightly confused. With a mighty effort he tried to cut through the cake to no avail. By this time everybody was interestingly watching him, trying to cut a slice. His patience ran out and he cried bloody hell what is in this cake that the knife can not get through it.

Everybody was now standing around him, watching and wondering what was going on.

Quite urgently he cut into the cake from the side and opened it up. There was something sitting in there. He touched it with the tip of the knife and then grabbed the thing with his fingers and tore it out of the cake.

Triumphantly he hold it up, laughed and showed the culprit to all.

It was one of those old fashioned big, hard sink stoppers, even with the little ring on top to hold it. The dear, old lady had mixed the ingredients of her cake in the sink. She might not have had a big enough bowl.

The stopper must have been caught and lodged firmly into the dough, while she was mixing it.

Well, everybody was laughing because it was so funny. Nobody had ever experienced a Christmas cake with an inbuilt sink stopper. Some were not really keen to eat the cake, just some very hungry and adventures souls had a slice.

Under a hotter Sun; Autumn is only the end of summer;

Enjoying a Watermelon.

Planting a vegetable garden, one is very much in the hands of the gods!

In autumn when the sun retreats its fierceness and spreads out a golden mellow light, is the time for new plantings.

Most vegetables do very well over winter. Some have a standstill in the coldest month like July and August. All year round vegetables are growing; harvested and planted again, it is an ongoing job.

Herbs do well, mostly all of them all year round. Basil seeds itself. Lavender and Rosemary bushes are planted in the vegetable garden for use and for beauty Italian and curly Parsley and in autumn Coriander self-seeds. A big bush of Lemongrass its long sharp leaves gracefully weeping, waiting to be used in cooking and for cool drinks.

The Flame trees on the property.

I had a very hard job to prepare the garden beds for my autumn and winter plantings. The soil had become hard and compact over the hottest summer month from the rain pelting down, compacting the soil. The unrelenting heat of the sun-baked my poor garden beds so hard, it was ready to cut clay bricks from it.

After a lot of sweat and hard work the soil became crumbly again and spread with my coveted cow pads I had collected. Then came the easy, nice tasks of planting the tiny vegetable seedlings.

Lettuce, the snails liked the tender leaves just as much as we did. Cabbages and Broccoli, the beloved food of the larvae of the white butterfly. Beans were most of the time trouble-free if the weather was not to wet. Actually with everything I planted I was challenged by a myriad of insects, birds, possums everybody wanted a slice of my plantings.

I had to learn to share, which is hard when you rely on the planted vegetables and fruit. Very seldom I lost everything and then mostly because there was a bad hailstorm. Hailstorms were rampant in this flat land area.

The flower garden.

I was scanning the sky when I saw the ominous band of blue-green clouds settling like a bruise. When the cattle started lowing and collected to wander up into the bush I was sure something was up.

I have experienced one very devastating hailstorm. The vegetable garden looked at its best. The beans were ready to harvest. Tomatoes, Capsicum and eggplants were already showing off their beautiful colours lacquer red and deep purple, plump and shiny in between the foliage. Melons were filling out, everything was at its peak looking healthy and perfect. The sky was now shrouded with boiling blue-green and black clouds. Then came the hailstorm, jagged lumps of ice. Big as tennis balls were falling from the sky hitting the tin roof of the house with a noise not imaginable. It did not relent until all the trees and shrubs were stripped of leaves twigs and flowers. The vegetable garden was devastated, everything was smashed and pulped. It is quite strange the reaction one feels seeing all the devastation of ones work happening in such a short time.

Then the sun emerged, it slashed through the clouds and eerily a beautiful rainbow stretched its colours along the horizon.

Under a hotter Sun; A little "poddy rustling";

A little “poddy rustling”

We had a new neighbour on the southern boundary.

He kept a different breed of cattle than ours. We loved the Herefords; red brown with white faces very pretty animals. Our neighbours cattle were a mixed breed of Brahman cattle with long faces, a hump and quite aggressive.

It happened that one of his heifers went through the fence into our property. Peter saw her when he was checking if all the animals were OK. He did not like riding a horse so made his rounds usually on the small motorbike belonging to the girls. He tried to maneuver her towards the fence where he had opened a space to let her through. Yet the furious heifer turned around and charged him full speed on his bike.

She did some damage to the bike, fortunately not to Peter. She did not want to leave so Peter left her in our property and closed the fence.

Later when he saw the neighbour he asked him if he missed a little brown heifer. The neighbour said yes and asked where she was. Peter said that he tried to drive her back to his property but that in the process she did some damage to his motorbike. Then the neighbour changed his tune and didn’t want to acknowledge the heifer.

So the little heifer, she was a pretty girl, stayed with us.

A year later this neighbour said to Peter, I think I saw one of my heifers at your place. Didn’t you say that you saw one of my little heifers on your place? Peter said, oh no, that was a year ago and your heifer went back to your place, so I don’t know what you are talking about. And that was the end of it. Peter was not giving him back this little beauty which he had fed for the last year. The neighbour had never paid for the damaged motorbike. So we were more or less quits.

Cattle rustling was going on all the time on more remote properties.

Under a hotter Sun; Pick up the mail;

Pick up the mail
The mail was not conveniently delivered to our house. We had to organize a post-box in a post office or a letterbox at the entrance of the Tucabia road near the highway. A few letterboxes in all shapes and sizes, disused milk cans were very popular and made nifty letterboxes, were already placed there from people who lived along the road.
For a while we rented a post box at the post office in a tiny village on Goodwood Island. It was a pleasant drive only about 15 minutes from our place. Along the Pacific Highway over the bridge and then along a small lane flanked on both sites by rustling sugarcane. The houses nestled in gardens along the river.
At harvest time the cane fields on fire were a spectacular sight at night. The next morning small particles of soot took advantage of the lightest breeze to land with accuracy on the whitest linen hung out to dry, settled on window sills, outdoor furniture, on my nose and chin appeared tiny smudges like sooty freckles.
The Post office was a lovely, white painted weatherboard house surrounded by a beautiful garden. Over the post office reigned Miss N. She was like an apparition, standing behind the counter. Her long hair swathing her back. Her coiffure was elaborately done with ribbons or combs. Her face was smothered in make up and face powder. How she managed the make up through the hot weather I never found out. Her eyes were clear blue ringed in black kohl. The lips a cherry red cupids bow. She dressed in bright colours decorated with flounces and organdy flowers. Lots of jewellery joyously jangled and accompanied her activities.
Math was not her strong point; she always had quite a bit of trouble. When I bought three stamps she painfully started to add them together in a odd way. First the three ten cents, than add the rest and finally add it all together. When she got it she looked at me with a sigh of contentment.

Overseas letters were put on a scale to find out each one’s exact weight. At this procedure I was allowed to help. With squinting eyes we both peered at the tiny numbers on the scale. When the weight was established we pored over a booklet to find out the exact worth of stamps that was needed. This was an awful long process. At the end she happily bundled the letters together and said, now my dear it won’t take long and the letters are off where ever they go.

Later we organised a letterbox at the Maclean post office. The post office, a substantial building like the banks, lawyer's offices etc, generally are!

I have noticed in the country towns the banks usually occupy the most beautiful buildings in the towns. The buildings always kept in pristine condition.

From my place to Maclean it was about 30 km. A pretty drive on the highway, along the river and cane fields.

It was days before Christmas I was picking up the mail. Sitting in my car, I could not wait until I was at home to read the Christmas letters from Switzerland. My sister wrote how cold it was. My car was parked under a huge shady tree and still I could feel rivulets of sweat dripping under my dress. It was an odd feeling, this letter with the imprint of ice and snow and here I, sweating under my light, green halter dress.

I have never felt the heat so intensively any more.

Under a hotter sun; The Emus;

Between autumn and winter the Emus came down from the hills to graze in our paddocks. I did not know how they managed to get into the property. All the boundaries and paddocks were fenced. Did they get in through an open gate, through a fence or over the fence?
They walked and grazed up and down a big paddock.
At this time of year I went over the paddocks with my wheelbarrow to collect manure for my garden. It was very pleasant work, this might sound odd, but it was nice to look around in a leisurely sort of way and collect the biggest of the pads that already had a consistency of peat.

At this time I had not seen the Emus yet and did not know they were already in the paddock. I was on my way home pushing a full barrow, when they spotted me. I had a little rest, pleasantly looking around when I saw the Emus looking at me. Seven Emus stood in one row, like ordered there and not picked up!

I pushed my wheelbarrow a bit faster, looking back to see what they were up to. The Emus had advanced towards me and started to run. I left the wheelbarrow and ran and ran, the Emus behind me coming nearer and nearer. I thought that they might find interest in the wheelbarrow, but they ignored it I was much more interesting I had two legs running. Fortunately I was not far from the gate that I reached just in time to close it. These huge birds with their long powerful legs could have outrun me any time they probably just tried to have a bit of fun with me.

It was late autumn and I was on my knees dividing perennial plants. I liked this work very much. The late autumn sun warmed gently my back and I was softly humming to myself.
This garden bed was on the side of the entrance gate to the ornamental garden. The gate was open. I was deeply concentrating on my task when I suddenly heard a kind of a throaty noise behind me. I was listening with only half an ear and did not take any notice.
Until the noise behind my back got louder and I heard sort of a shuffling. I looked up and fell on my backside straight in front of three big grown up Emus. At first I did not dare to move I was just looking up at them with pleading eyes, don’t trample me.

They did not move, looked at me with unblinking eyes, talked to each other in guttural sounds.

I thought I had to get up other wise I could be trapped for ages. I slowly tried to stand up from my unfortunate position. The Emus came closer. They wanted a better look at this specimen wriggling before them.

Shakily I found my legs and waved my trowel at them and said:”shoo.” The emus did not take notice of my antics. My small, Australian Terrier Ali alias Ali Ben Ali Ben Yussef but just called Ali, must have heard something. He came running, barking, he was so excited he nearly lost his bark, his hair bristling on his neck. The Emus did not know what came upon them they charged out of the gate and ran taking advantage of their long legs, down the paddock. Ali, still furiously barking followed behind them on his short,stubby legs. He ran soon out of steam and I called him back, patted him and said:” my dear Ali you saved my life,” which was probably a bit far fetched but he understood what I meant.
Towards the end of winter the Emus disappeared back into the bush and the hills.
　

Purdy;

Ready for school;

“Purdy”
Marie-Louise saved a homing pigeon at school. It was still a baby, naked without down or feathers. They were going to close all the holes where the pigeons were nesting. All the holes were empty except one had still one nestling. The workers wanted to close it up with that baby in it. Marie-Louise asked the workers to hand her down the pigeon.

She brought the pigeon home and reared it and soon it grew into a beautiful glamorous Pigeon the scrawny bits of it gone and forgotten. That little pigeon was an extraordinary bird. It came flying from anywhere when she was called. Her name was Purdy. She accompanied Marie-Louise riding around the property flying close to her.
When the children were at school she followed me around and waited on the windowsill.
She followed the car when I was driving the girls to their bus stop. She was flying nearby at window height and I was worried a car could hit her. At the bus stop I would bundle her into the car where she perched on the backseat. Sometimes she would follow for a little while and then return home.

With time she would come further and further and I had to lock her up when I drove to Maclean or Grafton, as I was really afraid she could have an accident, as she used to fly right on the side of my car.

Then something terribly sad happened to little Purdy at home where she should have been save. Peter drove down from our gate to our house. When Purdy heard us arriving with the car she flew towards it and one had to be very careful because she would settle right in front of it.. This time she flew towards the car and settled just on the side of it and Peter did not see this. We cried out to him stop, stop, but he did not hear us, it was to late.
We were so very sad when we buried our Purdy.
　

Under a hotter Sun; The Hunter;

The hunter ;
The Kangaroos came down from the opposite hill to our property to graze.

I was always enchanted when I could observe whole families together. The mothers, their pouch stretched to its limits. The odd leg and foot, a diminutive head sticking out of the pouch. The half grown ones, hopping around still young enough to play and try a bit of boxing.

The joeys scramble out of their protective home to hop around on long skinny legs, nibble here and there a blade of grass.

They don’t run away as long as I stand still and keep quiet, just watching. The Kangaroos stand on their hind legs twitching the ears from side to side to listen, looking at me with lazy interest. They scratch their tummies and nibble neatly on grasses and scrub. If I don’t come to close they ignore me. On our property we saw mainly the grey Kangaroo but also many smaller ones the Wallabies.
One day, I knew, Peter was up to something. He had his gun slung around his shoulder. I asked him where he was going with his gun. He said that he was going to scare the Kangaroos away.
There is something about men when their primeval hunters instinct strikes. They don’t listen to arguing, why, and what for, leave them alone! He left and I was listening, but did not hear a shot. After a while Peter returned. I asked him what happened, I did not hear a shot. He said, he could not shoot them.

The Kangaroos were facing him, theire arms practically akimbo staring him straight into his face. The Macropods stood their ground their eternal right to graze where ever.
Peter never took his gun to the Kangaroos anymore.