Monday, May 31, 2010 THE HERALD 9

OPINION&ANALYSIS

Facade ofgrandeurinsuburbancastles

PhillipO’Neill

WITLESS: Robin Boyd savages the Australian suburban landscape. – Artwork by Natalie Alcova

Professor Phillip O’Neill is directorof the Urban Research Centre,University of Western Sydney.

IT is50 years since RobinBoyd wroteThe Australian Ugliness.Boyd didn’tmention Newcastle inthe book, buthe could have,quite readily.

Boyd was a member of aremarkable Australian family ofartists and writers based inMelbourne and Tasmania. My guessis he didn’t get up north much.

WhenyoudrivethroughNewcastle’smiddle-ringsuburbs–thefibros, theweatherboards, thebrickveneers,built inthelate1940sand1950s–youcanstillseethewitlessAustraliansuburbanlandscapethatBoydsavagedinhisbook.

It’s funny how you didn’t noticehow ugly it was in post-war Australiawhen you were growing up in it. NowI laugh out loud when I think of theworld that Boyd wrote about somockingly.

Boyd, an architect, said Australiansuburban ugliness had threesources. One was Australia’s love offeatures. Another was ourcontentment with veneers. And thethird was our tolerance of muddle.

We do love a good feature, don’twe? I remember the first time Idrove down Aberdare Road throughCessnock and noticed the brickfacade at the entrance to the highschool. Then I saw the featureobjects that adorn it: two sandstone-carved koalas hanging on for dearlife high above the doors. I thoughtthey were wonderful, a real feature.

We were brought up in the post-war years to appreciate a goodfeature. Your living room boasted itsfeature wall. Where once there wereducks, now there was lurid stripedwallpaper, but only on one wall, thefeature wall.

In the days when it stood aloneand proud, pre entertainmentcabinet, pre flat screen, thetelevision also hosted a feature,invariably an imitation cut-glassvase, with a carefully arrangedbunch of plastic flowers, sittingproudly on a linen doily.

The garden was a good place for afeature as well. A tree stumppainted white was an earlypreference, but it was overtaken bythe tiled slate letterbox, often

surrounded by a fetching rockgarden.

Traditionalists, and southernEuropeans, preferred the front yardwater feature, and the blond brickfence with white lacework inserts,and a driveway gate to match.

The houses were modest, but classwas easily added with a well-chosenfeature.

What’s hilarious is that thefeatures are still there. Drivethrough our ’burbs and see thescalloped fence, the animal-shapedshrub, the palm grove, the stripedwindow awning.

Notice, though, how these featureshave been enhanced by veneer.

I remember one summer workingfor a brick veneer firm. Lovelywooden box sash windows werepunched out of walls before smoko,and cheap aluminium sliders lodgedin their place, a splash of concrete inthe footings and a crew of brickieswho’d never been near a technicalcollege in their lives would have thefibro wall covered in cheap

sandstocks by nightfall, just as thealuminium cladders were finishingup on the place across the road.

In the 1960s there was a materialto cover anything, laminex on theparticle board kitchen benches, alaminex kitchen table, random-groove panelling over the patternedvelvet wallpaper on the old featurewall, lino over the old floorboards,iron-on plastic (in a variety of woodcolours) over the laminex over thepeeling plywood desktop. We had nouse for the word authentic. Veneersgave us a world of choice.

Veneers made each of our housesunique. But this has meant thatunlike an English street, say, with itsneat row of terraces and cottages,our streetscapes have no coherence.There’s an older brick Federationand a flat-roofed deco and aMcMansion intruder, but they arecuriosities among an extraordinaryarray of bungalows withunfathomable extensions andconversions designed carefully onthe back of beer coasters, with

banged-it-up-on-the-weekendcarports, the four-inch nails into theside of the house as secure as theSaturday afternoon the boys camearound to lend a hand.

Our ’burbs are real muddle. TheKerrigans, the Day-Knights and theStephanides are all proud of theirdistinctive castles, all lovers of thetwo-stroke at full throttle, a shandywith the neighbours, the neat line-up of houses on their quarter-acreblocks, the smell of fresh paint, cutgrass and barbecued sausages, thesound of tennis ball on wood, thevibe of the street.

Fifty years ago, Robin Boyd calledthis a muddle, an ugly veneeredmuddle. He was right, but no onenoticed, and no one cared. Whichexplains why it hasn’t changed allthat much five decades on.

Bungeeandbuilding those ritesofpassageServing others can be life-changing, writesSharlene Guest.

Sharlene Guest is the director ofcommunications and marketing forthe Seventh-day Adventist Churchin NSW. This article is submitted bythe Churches Media Association.

FOR a generation born with theiPod, iPhone and iTunes, it’s nosurprise we’ve bred a culture ofiNeed, iWant and iDeserve.However, the “me, me, me”mentality is not the exclusivedomain of generations Y and Z. Infact, this demographic may beleading the way in the search formeaning and purpose.

I watcha YouTube videofilmed ina village ofVanuatu depicting anoutrageous ritualundertaken byteenagers totransit fromadolescence toadulthood. I gaspas Iwatch teenagers leapinto theunknown, jumping froma primitivebungee platform eightstoreys high tothe dirtbelow, with onlyjungle vines

around theirankles. Eachparticipant emergeseuphoric. Theirrite ofpassage is successfuland theexperience hasbeen ‘‘life-changing’’.

While this ritual may seembarbaric, such rites of passage are auniversal phenomenon —significant events within culturalgroups that mark a person’stransition to the next stage of life.

And while I’mnot endorsingjungle-vine bungeejumping,anthropologists havediscovered thatwhere aculture fails toprovide adefined rite ofpassage, young peoplecreate their own.News broadcastsfrequently show theramifications ofteenagers attemptingto provethemselves throughunhealthybehaviours such asbinge drinking,drug useand street racing. Butat atime when youthculture draws somuch negativeattention, teenagersin our ownbackyard are developingresilience, character anda sense of

purpose throughhelping others.I watch anotherYouTube video

filmed in avillage of Vanuatu,depicting anotheroutrageous ritualundertaken by teenagersin order totransit fromadolescence toadulthood. I gaspas I watchteenagers leapinto the unknownof aforeign country, forgoing theircreature comforts andtechnology for10 days ofvolunteer work andselfless giving.Each participantemerges euphoric. Theirrite ofpassage is successfuland theexperience hasbeen ‘‘life-changing’’.

While many year12 students flockto ‘‘schoolies’’on the GoldCoast, thisgroup of MacquarieCollege studentsparticipated in aninitiative calledStormCo – ‘‘ServiceTo Others ReallyMatters’’. Organised andrun byyouth, StormCo isan adventure inservice that hasinspired others, with20 teams fromthe Hunter Regioninvolved inhelping communities

across NSWand overseas.One StormCo leader said: “The

impact these teenagers had on thecommunity in Vanuatu wasincredible, but the most amazingimpact was the transformation inthe students themselves.”

Ariteofpassageforapostmoderngeneration?Ibelieveitreallycanbethroughservicetoothers.Servicewithoutexpectation.Serviceforthesatisfactionofknowingthatyoumadeadifference.Theseyoungpeopleareproofpositivethatit’s life-changing!

StormCo is an initiative of theSeventh-day Adventist Church. Seennswyouth.com.

Topics today

Today’s fact

‘‘Smart money’’ refers togamblers who fix a bet or haveinside information.

Today’s word

Mugwump: A person who holdsaloof, especially from partypolitics.

It happened today

From our files – 1911: Opinionsremain divided in thecommercial and shippingcommunities over a governmentproposal to form a Harbour Trustin Newcastle.

Today in history

455: A Roman mob tears emperorMaximus Petronius limb fromlimb when he tries to escape anapproaching Vandal fleet.1043: Lady Godiva rides nakedthrough the market square inCoventry, England.1813: Explorers Blaxland,Lawson and Wentworth reachhighest point in Blue Mountainsand see fertile plains to the west.1912: Arthur Stone makes thefirst powered aircraft flight inQueensland at Rockhampton in aUS-built monoplane.1928: Aviator Sir CharlesKingsford Smith sets off fromOakland, California, to fly acrossthe Pacific to Australia (hearrives on June 9).1942: Three Japanese midgetsubmarines enter SydneyHarbour; ferry Kuttabul is sunkbut all three subs captured.1990: Soviet president MikhailGorbachev arrives in the UnitedStates for summit talks with USpresident George Bush.

Born today

Walt Whitman, US writer(1819-1892); Judith Wright,Australian poet (1915-2000); ClintEastwood, USactor (1930-);Terry Waite,AnglicanChurch envoy(1939-); RainerWernerFassbinder,German author/filmmaker/theatre-director(1945-1982); Todd McKenney,Australian TV personality(1965-); Brooke Shields, USactress (1965-); Sarah O’Hare,pictured, Australian model(1972-); Colin Farrell, Irish actor(1976-).

Odd spot

A rat bit a British woman visitingan upmarket shopping district inHong Kong, local newspapersreported, raising fears the attackcould damage the city’sreputation.

Today’s text

Be completely humble andgentle; be patient, bearing withone another in love. Ephesians 4:2