CATALYST: 'SUBURBAN', Issue 2, Volume 73

suburban

issue 2

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Contributors Editors: Maggie Coggan-Gartlan Anthony Furci Claudia Long

Cover Image: Gemma Saunders Inside Cover Image: Gemma Saunders

Creative Director: George Coltman

Back Cover: Grant Trewella

Design Team: George Coltman Kit Tran Paige Linden Lisa Vu

Editorial Committee: Ben Madden Lisa Divissi Luke Michael Alayna Hansen Morgan Thistlethwaite Shannon Steuer Megan McKenna Tim Miller Abby Alexander Sophie Spence Kelsey Rettino Elizabeth Maidment Maddy Ruskin Sarah Dunwoodie Nicole Pereira Jack Hopkins Weijun Lam Natasha Lobo

Social Media: Megan McKenna Shannon Steuer Sophie Spence Creative Writing: Morgan Thistlethwaite Reviews: Ben Madden Events: Dharni Giri Visuals: Megan McKenna

Printer: Printgraphics Pty Ltd 14 Hardner Road, Mount Waverley, Victoria 3149 Australia PH: 9562 9600

Cataclysm EP: Natalie Pitcher

Catalyst acknowledges that this magazine was produced on the stolen land of the Wurundjeri People of the Kulin Nation. We pay our respects to their elders, both past and present. We also acknowledge the traditional owners of all the lands from where the stories and artworks were sourced.

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Contents

Editor’s letter

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@Pets Melbourne Central

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News update

8

Streets of your Town

9

Our mate, Moey

14

The Changing Face of Australian Suburbia

16

The new Outer Suburbs, Creativity and the Bush

18

Generation Gatwick

20

I sit Algined with all you Others

22

Train Station Reviews

26

Suburbs of the Heart

30

Love thy Neighbour?

34

Ballot Box

36

Renting vs Buying

40

Backyard Massacre

42

Snapshots

44

Ellie Dorset and the Mystery of Mensfield

46

Plovers

48

The Beauty of Boring

50

Cooking with Nonna Francesca

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Editor’s Letter Claudia Long, @ClaudiaLongsays Maggie Coggan-Gartlan, @MaggieCoggan Anthony Furci, @AnthonyRFurci

Hey there!

Semester one is almost over. You’re probably at the stage where you’re beginning to question everything - why am I at uni? Will it all be worth it?

Am I ever going to get a job? Will I ever be able to afford a house?

As some of us look to cities, universities and new towns as a means to escape our suburb, this issue is as much about the comfort of familiarity as it is about finding your own way.

One of our own has done just that, so in this issue we’re saying goodbye to Catalyst editor Claudia Long. After 16 months at Catalyst, Claudia’s off to become a journalist switching the suburbs of Melbourne for those of NSW and ACT.

Don’t worry - you’re not alone. We feel the same way.

But this awkward little family has got you covered.

Within the walls of this magazine, you’ll find stories and artwork reminiscent of the suburbs.

Train stations, nonna’s cooking, neighbourly relationships, and plovers - you’re bound to find something that will make you think.

So whether you’re still at home in the ‘burbs or you’ve already flown the coop, flip through the pages of the Suburban issue and find yourself at home among work from some of RMIT’s best.

Until next time, Claudia, Maggie, and Anthony

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@Pets Melbourne Central Julia Sansone @thesansberry Illustrations by Sarah Loo

The infamous @Pets Melbourne Central is again under fire as another change.org lobby circulates social media, calling on the RSPCA and Victorian Government to take action.

“And not least of which, they shouldn’t be selling large breed dogs from a city CBD location, regardless of whether they exercise them.”

Legislation which regulates the sale of animals falls under the Code of Practice for the Operation of Pet Shops. This defines the minimum standards of accommodation, management, and care, which are appropriate to the welfare, physical, and behavioural needs of animals held for sale in registered pet shops.

In the latest effort to shut down the notoriously negligent pet retailer, change.org user Alexandria Jadresic has gathered over 27,000 signatures, driven by a wide spread of passionate and frustrated Facebook users.

In her online letter, Jadresic claims she has witnessed dead fish, malnourished puppies, and kittens with eye infections at the business located on the ground level of the CBD retail hub.

People who operate or work in pet shops are required by the Act to comply with these minimum standards, but are encouraged to establish higher standards.

“When I raised [these issues] with staff, all they said was their animal care is up to date with RSPCA guidelines and is RSPCA approved,” she wrote.

While many people are turning to the RSPCA for support, they do not approve nor give licenses to retail pet stores. Thus, even if a store has a licence, it doesn’t always mean that the store will be cruelty free.

“I am fed up with this store’s treatment of animals. It has to stop.”

The RSPCA and The City of Melbourne are currently investigating the welfare of two dogs that are believed to be from the @Pets Melbourne Central business. However, RSPCA Victoria say that it is the responsibility of Melbourne Central itself to stop the further operation of the store.

The petition continues to be flooded with messages of support, angered by the disregard for the wellbeing of the animals.

“I am signing this petition as I have previously placed a complaint with RSPCA of this pet store for its neglect of animals,” says a supporter of the petition, Victoria Sanders.

“Whilst we can inspect reported cases of cruelty, we do not have the power to close a business,” an RSPCA Victoria representative said on Twitter.

“I believe they are associated with backyard breeders due to animal defects noted.”

“This needs to be taken up with Melbourne Central, as they may be able to terminate the lease.”

In addition to widespread unsatisfactory treatment, signatory of the petition Neil Robison says the breeds of animals being sold are not appropriate for the store’s urban location.

“This store is not showing the most fundamental duty of care to the animals,” he writes.

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News Update: Claudia Long, @ClaudiaLongsays Maggie Coggan-Gartlan, @MaggieCoggan Anthony Furci, @AnthonyRFurci

METRO TUNNEL CONSTRUCTION Just when you were hoping it might have been all coming to an end, the work on The Metro Tunnel Project is set to ramp up in April, with Franklin and A’Beckett Street closed down for the foreseeable future. So make sure you read those signs and get yourself ready for some more construction!

LIBRARY AUTO-RENEWAL RMIT’s Library has announced an auto-renewal service, so you don’t need to worry about reborrowing! The usual borrow times of 14 or 28 days (depending on whether you’re an undergrad/ VE or postgrad student/staff member) will automatically reset themselves three days before they’re due to end, unless someone else puts a hold on the book. The maximum borrow time is now 12 months, and the usual fee of 50c per day will stand for overdue books (if you manage to hang onto them for more than 12 months.)

LINK ARTS - MEET THE MAKER LINK Arts at RMIT is hosting a series of ‘Meet the Maker’ workshops, where students can go on personal studio tours of some of Melbourne’s most talented local designers and creatives.

These are running from late March, through to the middle of May. For more information, email linkarts@rmit.edu.au.

SUSTAINABILITY IN BUNDOORA Our Bundoora campus is now more sustainable than ever, thanks to an upgrade rolled out by Property Services. The ‘Sustainable Urban Precincts Program’ has seen Bundoora equipped with more efficient heating and ventilation systems, solar panels, and a high voltage network connected to a trigeneration plant - allowing the campus to generate its own power.

WHO SAYS RMIT DOESN’T HAVE CAMPUS CULTURE? Rush Week, organised by the RMIT Student Union, finished off in late March with great success.

Teams battled one another in challenges including an obstacle race, trivia night, and a laser tag tournament. RUSU Communications Officer, Ella Caulfield, said one moment she loved was when a member of ‘Straya Mates’ was “very obviously struggling” with an eating challenge, and when it “looked like she was going to throw up... every single person watching started chanting for her”.

No word is out on whether it’ll be back in 2018.

QUEER LOUNGE ON THE MOVE The RMIT City Campus’ queer lounge will be shifting location this semester. As the queer collective go into talks about a potential new site within the campus, keep an eye out for all their upcoming events on social media! The relocation is expected to be completed within 2 months, with negotiations for where to put the space currently underway.

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Streets of Your Town Cover image by Adam Hogan Every suburb needs a good soundtrack.

Whether it’s to cut through the mundanity or accompany the comfort of being somewhere completely familiar, a good playlist can make you feel right at home.

So polish off the old discman and untangle those headphones, as four writers take you through their suburbs, one track at a time.

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Red Hot Chili Peppers Californication Campbell Mowat @CampbellMowat

If suburbia was a film, Californication would be its soundtrack. Since its 1992 release, the record’s juxtaposition of weightless ballads and fierce jams have been the staple diet for BBQ-goers, r oad trippers and even that distant cousin you only see on Christmas. However, the album’s suburban value seems to lie in its brilliant means of escaping such neighbourhood realities – thus, to visually capture the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ sound, I made an escape of my own down the Great Ocean Road.

inland, stresses this alternate perspective on existence, while also chiming into the gritty nature of Around the World and I Like Dirt – tunes which use earthly metaphors to describe sex.

Despite its contemplative nature, Californication also allows the suburban masses to indulge in a snippet of the band’s sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll attitude. This demeanour is made clear in Right On Time and Get On Top - two tracks that bounce around like the lovechild twins of funk and punk.

Their fiery sentiment emulates the destructive yet mesmerising flame, within the third photo.

“With the birds I’ll share this lonely view” rings out Scar Tissue in falsetto, the band’s introspective birds-eye view reflected in the first image taken on Lorne beach. The soaring bird encapsulates the “drifting, floating and fading away” described in the softly spoken track Porcelain; its words echoing the record’s ability to lift listeners into a soundscape of outer-suburban desires.

The final picture, taken more locally in St. Kilda, depicts the overall sonic rollercoaster of the Chili’s seventh studio release. The palm trees reflect the album’s title – that is, the widespread adoption of the Hollywood lifestyle - while the setting sun projects the final words of the closing song Road Trippin’. These concluding words, dancing around anacoustic guitar, extend the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ voice beyond the soundtrack of suburbia.

Their music binds together all suburbs, towns and cities into one simple category of “just a mirror for the sun”.

Likewise, Parallel Universe and Otherside place their focus on life outside of reality. From “a solar system that fits in your eye”, to the afterlife - a place where many of the Chili’s bandmates now reside. The second photograph, taken on a hike 10

Camp Cope Self-Titled Anthony Furci @AnthonyRFurci

I’m typing this while sitting on the floor of my bedroom, listening to Camp Cope’s self-titled debut album.

Only a disillusioned commuter could tell us that “the ticket prices are going up/And the trains still aren’t on time/And the thugs that patrol the lines are the reason I’ll never pay my fines” in a song titled ‘West Side Story’ – a reference to Melbourne’s western suburbs.

The first time I listened to it was on a freezing night in August last year. I placed the record on the turntable, sat at my desk, and followed the handwritten lyrics on the inside sleeve word-forword. Listening back on a 30-degree day in March, the album still gives me those wintry feelings.

But it would be completely reductive to say that vocalist Georgia Maq is ‘disillusioned’. She has a raw wisdom which shines through her brutally honest, jarring and emotional lyrics. This is clear through each of the album’s 8 tracks, but none are more poignant than the 8th – ‘Song for Charlie’.

All the photos I’ve taken have come from inside my room. I feel this reflects the album’s heavy introspection, alongside my own experience listening to it. (My cat was with me for that first listen, though. That’s why he’s in one of the photos.)

“We all sat there in silence, listening to our mother cry” really hits hard - and that’s an understatement. I dare you to listen to this song without getting goosebumps (or crying).

The first few lines of opening track ‘Done’ drew me in instantly. Just “walking on” after passing someone who looks to be in a bad state likely relates to everyone, ever.

This album is fucking beautiful. Pay close attention to the lyrics for the full effect.

There’s something uniquely Melburnian about Camp Cope – and not just because of their ties to local music haven Poison City Records.

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The Go-Betweens 16 Lovers Lane Claudia Long

@claudialongsays

16 Lovers Lane is as much about love as it is about finding sanctuary within a person, perhaps complementing - or substituting a stable, comfortable home. When Edward and the Magnetic Zeroes sang “Home is wherever I’m with you”, they channelled the ethos of 16 LL, albeit in a much more blunt, obvious way.

“Oh it’s great to be back home again, sure feels good to be in those arms again” A house has it’s own personality. As I prepare to leave mine in a week’s time, I find myself missing it’s features almost prematurely.

In the early mornings and late evenings, when I get to finally sink into bed or watch the sun rise, there are few things more enjoyable than being in the quiet house. Because oh it’s good to be completely, finally home, without distractions, work or the fluorescent overheads most of us deal with for the rest of the day.

This album sounds like a stretched out lazy afternoon, just as the sun is beginning to set.

Something familiar, but with a few unexpected bits too and there’s nothing more like home and the suburbs than that.

One of the tracks that captures this bliss best, is Casanova’s Last Words from the Go-Betweens classic record 16 Lovers Lane.

I have the album on regular rotation, whether at home to underscore the familiarity of being there or when I’m homesick, hundreds of kilometres away in another city. Round and round, up and down, this album couples the streets of suburbia with the excitement - and disappointments - of romance and relationships.

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Courtney Barnett The Double EP Lisa Divissi @lisadivissi

I take a hit from An asthma puffer I do it wrong I was never good at smoking bongs.

I’m not that good at breathing in.

— Avant Gardener

I woke up thirsty and needing to pee at 6.30 one morning and stumbled into the bathroom. Oh what a wonder, oh what I waste, I heard Courtney sing in my head. The malaise I felt the day before had failed to lift overnight. A cool breeze wafted over my face as I sat on the loo, so I looked out the window and this is what I saw – and like steam the feeling evaporated.

French singer Camille named her 2005 album Le Fil which roughly translates to ‘the thread’. All the songs are ‘threaded’ together by one note that plays at a soft constant from the beginning to the end of the album. This is how depression feels once the immediate anxiety lifts; it’s in the background and it’s not until things are still that you can hear it properly.

Avant Gardener to me describes the mundanity of feeling this way, even as you attempt to lift yourself out of it. How funny, and how tragic, and how wrong it can all go. And why even bother. Even the tone of her voice is dissociated from the story she tells. She is a passive witness to the events of her day, even as she attempts to shake herself out of them.

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Our mate, Moey Dan Batten @battenball96 Illustrations by Megan McKenna

Suburban football clubs are special places.

They are sanctums that provide a community to supporters, players, and fans alike.

While for some it’s about wins and losses, for many it’s the great people you meet that make it worthwhile.

footballer, but he would turn up to every training and welcome everyone with his famous looping handshake and a kind greeting. He was the kind of fella who cared about everyone, and just loved the community environment that sporting clubs provide.

However, it isn’t all sunshine and rainbows.

‘Footy culture’ has gained negative connotations in modern terminology, essentially becoming synonymous with exaggerated masculinity and sexism.

Admittedly, I never spoke much to Joey, but when I did, it was almost always about our beloved Richmond Tigers. His passion for them was clear every time I spoke to him. He was always hopeful, contrary to myself - the eternal pessimist, who would predict the worst.

There have been times where I’ve questioned the culture at football clubs in general - and I’m sure I’m not alone. The imminent ‘bloke culture’ that permeates the ills of sexism and ‘being a man’ can overshadow the companionship and community that a football club provides.

The big thing about Joey was that he would try his heart out and give 110% in any contest he was put into. If he failed, he would give 110% again. And again. And again.

In no time at all, he became a cult figure of the Vermont U19’s. A person with the sort of determination, honesty and compassion that typifies exactly what makes a football club great.

While I would be lying if I said this ugly side had been totally invisible to me in my experiences as a suburban footballer, there was one moment at my club where my overall view of football clubs changed forever.

Moey, as we all called him, had been ill for three weeks after being diagnosed with Colitis. The bowel condition had caused him to lose a number of kilos in hospital. After being absent from training during this time, he was up at the club for team selection on a Thursday night, supporting us in characteristic Joseph Moschetti fashion. He looked to be on the mend.

They say that the character of a person can be determined in moments of tragedy. In this instance, the character of an entire organisation - and more broadly, the positive interpretation of ‘footy culture’ - was realised.

My club, Vermont - situated in the eastern suburbs of Melbourne - had two Under 19’s teams. Both had enjoyed wins on what seemed like a normal Saturday in July.

The next day, Joseph went to bed with the intention of watching his side - the Feagles (Forest Hill Eagles) - play the next morning.

But he never woke up.

But the news we would hear in the next two hours would change our lives - and the lives of many others - forever.

Most of us found out about his shock passing an hour or so after our match on Saturday. We couldn’t believe what we were hearing. There was no way that it could be true. How could this happen to someone so young, so full of life, so

There was a player in my side by the name of Joseph Moschetti. He may not have been the best 14

full of love? How were we never going to experience that unique handshake ever again?

There was no one more deserving of the honour.

“When I heard my name called for the award, again my heart sank. But this time, it was different.

It meant more to me than you could ever imagine.

To receive that award from Joseph’s father - I was so honoured.”

We were all called up to the football club, and the feeling was indescribable. I sat there next to one of my best mates, Sean, and I just didn’t know what to say or do.

“At first, it was disbelief,” Sean said, looking back on that day.

Even though Joseph’s parents Rob and Jane didn’t know Sean personally, his heartfelt message meant so much to them.

“We refused to believe it, because we couldn’t accept it being true - we needed our mate Joe. I took it upon myself to call my friend who had passed on the news, and just by hearing his voice on the other end, I knew it was real. My heart sank.”

“It blew us away - many things blew us away but that was from the heart. It spoke volumes about him as a person. We’ve shown that letter to a number of people and we can’t believe it was written by an 18-year-old boy,” Rob said.

Footy clubs are sometimes referred to as ‘boys clubs’ by outsiders. A place where men must ‘act like men’. A place where emotion is supposedly kept inside, and ridiculed when it is displayed.

The entire team alongside members of the football club attended his funeral a week later, joining hundreds of people throughout the community who had the ultimate privilege of knowing Joseph.

While at times there is truth to this statement, that day was nothing like that.

Vermont Football Club held the wake at their precinct. In the eyes of Joseph’s parents, their overall support was a bit of a surprise.

When the news was officially announced to the group by our coach John Brown, no one could breathe, let alone speak. As time flowed on, tears began to fall. We started giving each other hugs, comforting words, and pats on the back, supporting one another in a way many wouldn’t expect from young footballers.

“We were new to the club. Joe was there just the one season, but they were above and beyond helpful. They were outstanding.”

Vermont South Cricket Club, the EFL Umpiring fraternity and Joseph’s former football clubs Waverley Blues and Glen Waverley Hawks were also “brilliant” in their support, according to his parents.

“It was horrible, one of the worst days we’ve all ever experienced, but aspects of it were so powerful.

I can’t speak prouder about how the entire club supported us players, and how we supported each other,” Sean said.

Rob and Jane say it’s highly suspected that a problem with the electrics in Joseph’s heart was the cause of death. We will never really know for certain, though, with no medical explanation for his passing.

As a group, we decided that we would hang around the club to support each other and celebrate Joseph’s life together.

However, there’s one thing that is certain.

Sean sent a letter to Joseph’s parents days after his passing, detailing his relationship with Moey and offering words of support - despite being virtually unknown to them. The enormous courage shown by sending this letter, alongside his attitude towards life and his peers, earned him the inaugural Joseph Moschetti ‘Moe’ Award for club spirit on Vermont’s 2016 Best and Fairest night.

Moey’s legacy will live on, in the hearts and minds of everyone that had the pleasure of knowing him.

Vale Joseph Thomas Moschetti.

6th July 1998 – 30th July 2016.

The criteria for the award proclaims: “the ‘Moe’ is awarded to a person who has lived our values and has enhanced our culture through their hard work, honesty, sacrifice, empathy, team-first approach and mateship” - a fitting description of our mate, Moey.

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When people think of the suburbs, we often conjure images of large backyards, children playing under the sprinkler in summer and local football games. Historically, these suburban visions would be dominated by the faces of Anglo-Saxon Australians. However, with the ebb and flow of migration and multiculturalism experienced in Australia over the past 30 years these dreams of suburban bliss have become more diverse. Some suburbs in particular have actively sought to welcome this new vision of Australian suburbia, such as the north-eastern town of Eltham.

The new refugees in Eltham have “settled in very well”, despite most never having lived anywhere like Eltham (and some members struggling with language barriers). However, that has not stopped them from wanting to give back to the community that welcomed them so generously.

Refugees and MP for the state seat of Eltham, Vicki Ward, alongside Eltham 1st Scout Group, further reinforced community ties during Clean Up Australia Day. They all worked together to keep Eltham’s parks clean and to share their love of Eltham.

In 2016, St Vincent’s and Catholic Care worked with Eltham to renovate 60 units at a local retirement village for housing units of up to 120 Syrian refugee families. The renovated units at Judge Book had previously been left abandoned and in a state of disrepair after flooding on Christmas day in 2010. However, they would be renovated and repurposed for this housing. The occupying families had fled their homes, left loved ones behind and faced insufferable odds in escaping war torn Syria, before being granted refugee status to live in Australia. This was done as part of the Coalitions one-off intake of 12,000 Syrian refugees last year.

Despite widespread support for multiculturalism in Eltham there is still some opposition. On the 6th of November 2016, anti-immigration groups came together from other towns and states to protest the changing face of Australian suburbs and called for the rejection of refugees in Eltham. However Vicki Ward, state MP for Eltham, believes that, “there have been no negative interactions…many of the residents enjoy having children around the area” despite concerns. While the anti-immigration protest may have alienated new members to Eltham, it was counter protested, with both sides remaining peaceful under the watchful eyes of a heavy police presence.

Mayor of the Nillumbik Shire, Peter Clarke, explained that the council fully supported this move and the council was “Working with the community to help the transition, to make it easy… [for refugees].” The council is also in talks alongside local church groups to create a therapeutic garden.

This garden would be built with the help from both old and new locals to build relationships, and to help provide peace and comfort from those fleeing persecution. However, it has been the general Eltham community which has moved to extend its hand in neighbourly welcome. In particular, a community group called Welcome to Eltham campaigned heavily to achieve their mission statement of “Sharing the neighbourly joy with the refugees of Eltham.” Drawing from Eltham’s unique history and environment Welcome to Eltham showcased their attitude of acceptance through the use of the symbolic Eltham copper butterfly. In the 1980s the local butterfly was placed on the endangered list due to threat of extinction. In response, the community came together to try save them. The butterflies were spray painted onto footpaths around Eltham as well as butterfly art installations created.

This once endangered species has become the unofficial mascot of acceptance as they rallied in support.

While this move has perhaps shaken up more conservative notions of how Australian suburbia should look, Eltham has stood together to welcome their new neighbours. Although there was, and still will be, some small minority who loudly shout at the moving times and changing faces of this suburban town, they possibly ought to heed the wise words of Ms Ward. “Eltham will continue to evolve, it is not the Gold Rush satellite village it once was,” she said.

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The New Outer Suburbs Creativity and the Bush Sam Flynn Illustrations by Sarah Loo

The New Outer Suburbs - Creativity and the Bush When my friend was a child, his Grandma would take him on day trips to the city. On the drive, as they reached the start of the seemingly interminable suburbs of Melbourne, his Grandma would always sing the same song:

When I began looking into this, I suspected, as many no doubt will, that these people are being pushed out of the city by its high cost of living.

But, having spoken to two young creatives who have made the move, I think there may be a little more to it.

Chris, Horsham, Playwright

Little boxes on the hillside, Little boxes made of ticky-tacky, Little boxes on the hillside, Little boxes all the same.

In some ways, Chris doesn’t quite fit the brief for this article. He didn’t choose to move to Horsham, a small town three and a half hours northwest of Melbourne. “I was like, fuck,” Chris said of the moment he was told he had to move.

The song is Little Boxes by Malvina Reynolds.

She wrote it while driving through a Californian suburb in 1962, perturbed by the sameness of the houses and their inhabitants.

At the time, he was a 26 year old Sydney-based playwright, an archetypal inner-city creative.

The prospect of being so isolated filled him with trepidation. But, over the two years that Chris spent in Horsham, he found that very isolation to be invaluable to his writing.

I generally don’t like antipathy for the suburbs, and I think one commentator was quite justified in calling Little Boxes “the most sanctimonious song ever written.” But what I like about this story, and why I think it has stayed with me, is that Grandma wasn’t an inner city snob. She was from a humble little town in the flat, dry land outside of Shepparton. She was simply saying: I’m happy where I am.

It wasn’t just that he had time to write without the distractions of the city; it was also that he found there to be a connection between nature and his creativity. He would walk ten minutes from his house and find himself in large open fields, alone. “Do you talk to yourself when you write?” Chris asked me during the interview.

Being in nature “gave me freedom, an entry point into that creative dialogue,” he said. While Chris didn’t know exactly what it was that inspired him, he stressed that he had to be away from people and buildings, from any marker of civilisation.

Recently, it seems many have heard Grandma’s rendition of Little Boxes. For these people, settling down in the city isn’t enough. They are looking to greener pastures, and they seem to have found them in quiet country towns, just as Grandma did.

While escaping to the country is not a new phenomenon, in recent years the people doing so are younger and more creative than their predecessors. Young people are now far more likely to move to the country, and there has been a marked increase in creative migration to rural areas. The Castlemaine region, for example, saw a 1206% increase in creative migration in recent years.

In 2015, Stanford University published a study which found that being in nature, rather than an urban space, significantly decrease one’s “rumination”, a psychological state in which one focuses repetitively and unhelpfully on one’s own distress. While I generally dislike pathologising human experience like this, reading this study I wondered whether this was the “freedom” Chris 18

talked about; whether the silencing of destructive voices allowed him to create.

think that it’s possible.” Part of this, for Maggie, arose from the fact that she wasn’t surrounded by people doing the similar things.

When Maggie told me this, I was reminded of a line in Sartre’s play, No Exit: “hell is other people.”

Sartre didn’t mean that other people were bad, necessarily. Rather, he meant that the presence of others disrupts the self. In a famous example, Sartre asks you to imagine that you are looking through a keyhole. You are completely engrossed, absorbed in whatever is happening on the other side. But, as you look through, you hear footsteps behind you.

Maggie, Katherine, Fashion Entrepreneur Last year, Maggie moved to Katherine in the Northern Territory with her girlfriend. Maggie has big white teeth and a big laugh, all tan skin and blonde hair. When she arrived, she worked for an Aboriginal legal service. But, she quickly realised something felt wrong. “When you’re a lawyer, you’re in this weird position of power,” she said.

“I didn’t want to tell Aboriginal people what to do.

I wanted to learn from them.” So, Maggie quit the law and started her own fashion label, Magpie Goose, collaborating with local Aboriginal artists.

Sartre thought that at the moment you become aware of the other person, you lose yourself.

You forget whatever it was that engrossed you a moment before, and all you can see is what the other person sees: you. As he put it, we lose our own project, and become the project of the other.

So too with Maggie, she feels as though the mere presence of others would force her to lose her own project, and to become theirs. “I never would have done this if I lived in the city,” she said.

Maggie is clearly inspired by working with Aboriginal communities, as she has done for years in both Darwin and Katherine: “you could spend a whole lifetime learning about just one community’s stories and culture.” But Maggie also recognised that there is something about being in the country, in and of itself, that allowed her to do this. She described the country as giving her a similar feeling of freedom as Chris: “it gives you the boldness to

“You can do anything out here.”

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Generation Gatwick Brigid Cooley

Yvette Kelly is rummaging through a plastic folder of clippings she has collected throughout her fourty-six years at the Gatwick. There are old features heralding her work, and recent sensationalist tabloids dubbing the business she has dedicated her life to - ‘a hotbed of villainy’.

disturbances from the Gatwick are causing the street to suffer.

“It will have a substantial impact for the street in the right direction” he says. “There will always be a side of politics that will cry foul, you know ‘oh this is terrible, those poor homeless people...’. The next big thing is to get the soup kitchen removed from the area.”

“They called us the Saints of St Kilda” she muses, “they wrote some really lovely things. And then in the last three or four years it’s turned around”.

Yvette isn’t surprised by his comments, though she believes the blame the Gatwick receives is unfair.

Yvette, along with her sister Rose Banks, is coowner of The Gatwick Private Hotel on Fitzroy Street, St Kilda. Originally owned by their Maltese mother Vittoria Carbone, Yvette started working there at just fourteen, after her mother acquired the boarding house. When their mother died in 1998, Yvette and Rose have run it since.

The Gatwick has a certain notoriety. Since the 1950s, it has been called a place of last resort - housing the addicted, mentally ill, paroled or otherwise ‘fringe’ demographic of Melbourne society. Outside, it has somewhat of a stereotypically spooky appearance, a battered heritage listed 1930s mansion sitting in prime Melbourne real-estate. Inside, there is a strong odour of cigarette smoke. It’s interior is dark oak, covered in faded red and gold carpet – remnants of a grander bygone era. The foyer is dominated by an impressive staircase, a poky reception. A picture on the reception door reads “Caution: Maltese bites”.

“There are a lot of shops closed on Fitzroy Street, but that’s the state of retail. Its downfall is the lump of concrete in the middle (a divider making U-turns impossible). That’s killed Fitzroy Street, because that never used to be there. They’re using the Gatwick as a scapegoat.”

At Healthtime, an afternoon tea in the Gatwick’s kitchen, I meet Peter Andrews from St Kilda Community Housing. He tells me the organisation is committed to rehousing the Gatwick’s residents in the four months before closure. This will not be an easy task - the public housing waiting list has skyrocketed to over 33,000, and there are limited alternatives.

“St Kilda has been gentrified” he says. “The community housing sector has moved from boarding-house-style accommodation to more self-contained. From a homeless perspective, it has issues. Suddenly, you’re losing stock levels, there are seventy odd rooms here that won’t be used, there will be less options.”

In this reception, I sat down with Yvette to talk about why they made the recent decision to finally close.

“It’s the pressure from the media, the police and shop traders” she says, “it’s hard to describe, because you think you are doing the right thing by housing these people, and the tenants appreciate it. With the gentrification of St Kilda, no one likes to look at the slightly marginalised people.”

Vincent Cooper, general manager at the Tolarno Hotel, is one such shop trader. He claims that

Angela*, is an ex-resident. Homeless for 10 years, she lived at the Gatwick for six years and credits the sisters for arranging her public housing.

“This place had facilities and support services that came to the building” she says, “it’s very hard to find that elsewhere. A lot of the residents have 20

their public housing forms and are waiting to be contacted, once they move out there’ll be no way to contact them. It’s very sad for them.”

St Kilda Police declined my request to comment.

The possibility of the Gatwick’s sale to Channel 9 for the next season of ‘The Block’ was one ironic issue that came out of the closure. Yvette reiterates there are multiple parties still interested, indeed she is interrupted mid-interview to give a tour to a prospective buyer.

But for short term tenants like Jessica*, the future is uncertain. She describes her lifestyle as “transient” and has been staying at the Gatwick on and off.

“I have no idea where I’m going to go, no one has contacted me” she says. “I’m worried. The thing about the Gatwick is, it’s like my home”.

Nevertheless, on March 22nd 2017, Channel 9 confirmed their purchase of the building.

Crime was a focal point in the call for the Gatwick’s closure. St Kilda Police have stated they receive on average five call outs a day here, irrespective of several high-profile murders, including that of Simon Gurfinkel in 2005 and Arthur Karatasios in 2006.

John*, a former resident who now works part time at the Gatwick, is worried about the future homeless of Melbourne.

“These ladies brought me out of the gutter and gave me a roof over my head, that’s gonna be gone for the next generation that falls on hard times”.

Yvette is wary of comments made by the police.

“Our closure won’t have any effect on crime, I think it will make it so much worse. It will be dispersed, it will be on everybody’s front door step.”

Towards the end, a teary Yvette cannot imagine her life beyond the Gatwick.

“I have no idea what I’ll do, I’m too old to learn anything else. Maybe I’ll be a brain surgeon,” she laughs.

“They (the police) tell me it’s run really badly and I don’t know what I’m doing. Well I’ve been doing this for 46 years; how can they tell me that when they haven’t done it for a day? We do everything they ask of us and try to make everybody happy, but nobody’s happy.”

“I do love the Gatwick though, it was always my soul.” *Names have been changed.

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I Sit Aligned with all you Others Adam Hogan

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Train Station Reviews Jen Park

Flinders Street Station Can I be honest for a second? Train stations suck. They’re like purgatory, a long and open waiting room that doesn’t even offer magazines to pass the time with. Instead, you have to watch the local bogan lose his temper at the Metro staff (which is another form of entertainment in itself). But finding a good train station, one that caters to all your aesthetic and logistical needs, is hard. So I dived into Melbourne suburbs to discover ~The One~.

I wanted to go into this review saying Flinders St station is overrated, I really did. But I couldn’t.

Why? Because this station has… everything: coffee, Lord of the Fries, a bloody FLORIST, and their new and improved bathrooms (which are actually sick, like ten out of ten, for real). I just can’t loathe a train station that allows me to pee in a clean environment and buy a bouquet of tiger lilies in the same day. Plus, it’s like a historical masterpiece, brown and yellow and ringing those old clocks (although you can’t see half of it from inside the station now that it’s all covered up for construction). But you know what the biggest problem with Flinders St station is? The fucking potato cakes. They’re the stalest, most pale yellow looking bastards I’ve tasted in my entire life.

I’d probably be better off eating a Fillet-O-Fish than that thing.

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Footscray Station

Caulfield Station

I have a soft spot for Footscray and its genuineness. I’m familiar with its huge train station, but I’ve never properly looked at it… until now. In many ways, Footscray has become a pretty good station after it was renovated three years ago. It’s modern—mostly grey with touches of colour—and although it doesn’t have a tuckshop, it’s right next to a bunch of cafes. There’s also this long, patterned footbridge that I thought I liked, but upon further examination, I now think otherwise.

It looks like the checkered pencil case you bought at Target when you really liked Fall Out Boy and thought you were the punkest kid in your entire primary school. But guess what? You’re not punk at all, you’re actually more like the Average Joe, so get over yourself and go back to liking cheesy memes that really aren’t funny at all. Kidding! You’re alright. But seriously, that footbridge kinda sucks aesthetically. It was named after William Cooper though, who was an Indigenous leader and activist, so he’s pretty DAMN PUNK.

Caulfield train station is right next to Monash University, so I think we can safely assume it’s an inferior station purely because of that reason. If Melbourne Central, the closest station to RMIT’s city campus, is the God of Metro, then Caulfield is Satan. Now stay with me. Architecturally, it’s dull and old-looking — gum from past years embedded into the concrete, scuffed walls, cobwebs in corners, and some weird netting over the timetable board, maybe to keep away the flock of delirious students who try to tear it off and break it in half while screaming, “WILL THE HECS DEBT REALLY BE WORTH THIS PAIN??!! TELL ME!!” Anyway, it’s a bit like Satan in that way: built to drive you mad.

However there is a sweet tuck shop that sells sandwiches and rolls as well as dim sums that’s open till 11.30pm. Satan always has his ways…

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Brighton Beach Station

Clifton Hill Station

I’ve found my one true soulmate and that soulmate is Brighton Beach station. You can see that blue and sparkly sea from the platform, for Christ’s sake.

There’s foliage and trees peeking through the bars or swinging over them, and did you know they have two waiting rooms that are JOINED TOGETHER? The brown-bridged statin welcomes you with two sets of giant archways and makes you feel like a goddamn royal too. I don’t even mind that there’s no tuck shop. Why would you need a stale sausage roll when this station is practically enlightenment itself? When I look along the platform, my heart flutters: it’s fucking clean. No trash, ANYWHERE. Just stone-potted bushes and vending machines that actually function. Is this what heaven looks like? I’m taking one last gaze at the ocean when the staff pull me away and throw me on the train back to the city. “Please… no.” A single tear rolls down my cheek. “Mind the gap,” they warn.

Yeah, I’ll mind the gap, the gap between me and Brighton Beach station…

Clifton Hill is the epitome of a waiting room.

The moment I saw the station through the train windows, I knew this wouldn’t end well. For one, it was generic: boring bricks, straight and short parallel platforms, a green bench every metre or so. On one side, a normal residential street; the other, a huge main road with nothing but cars zooming past. What a riveting and ethereal view of Honda Civics and tradies in utes! Sure, their customer service hub might be inside a room with sliding doors, but that room is probably the size of one of those Honda Civics with even lesser seats in it. Everyone on the platform seems to have their guard up, like something really bad happened to them at Clifton Hill station once and now they refuse to acknowledge their fellow commuters’ existences. Whatever it was, it probably wasn’t as a bad as the weird tunnel they have connecting platforms. It’s lined with flickering fluorescent lights and makes me feel as if I’m walking through a portal to the next nightmarish parallel universe AKA Clifton Hill’s next platform.

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Burnley Station Going into this, I hoped I would find one station that looked like it was in the middle of fucking nowhere. Burnley station was my answer. It all started when the train began to enter the industrial area, rolling past dry bits of grass and weeds, graffitied grey walls, until finally: Burnley. The station is sandwiched in between buildings with peeling paint and a bunch of trees that obscure the street behind it, with huge trucks going past on the bridge that arcs over the station. The tunnels, though painted cream, feel like bunkers (they’d be perfect to hide out in, just saying, and shout out to all the fugitives reading Catalyst).

The waiting rooms, though cleanly and separated from the platform by a sick sliding door, generates that weird buzzing sound in your head that you’re 85% sure is being used as a subliminal messaging technique, but you’re also not sure because it could just be the cheap fluorescent lights (probably the latter). The only signs of life on Burnley train station are flowers and the memory of “STOP LOGGING OUR WATER CATCHMENTS” painted onto a parallel building. What are these things doing in BURNLEY of all places? Save yourself while you can.

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Suburbs of the Heart Maggie Coggan-Gartlan @MaggieCoggan Ben Madden @benmaddentweets Morgan Thistlethwaite Alisi Falevai There’s something special about receiving a letter, and something even better about writing one.

Over the next few pages you’ll find love notes, break ups and make ups, between writers and their home towns.

Get your stamps at the ready, as four Catalyst contributors open up the letterbox and introduce you to their home ‘burb...

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Love thy neighbour?

Most of us don’t even know them.

Megan Whitfield @M_eganWhitfield

I grew up next door to my best friend.

the loner, the nerd. And we haven’t discovered that all this time we’ve been madly in love.

It feels like a cliché when I say it, a stereotypical suburban upbringing if ever you’ve heard it.

But you know what? It was still pretty great.

Sophie and I met at kinder, and were thrilled to find out that not only did we live close by, but we were literally across the street from each other. Think of the sleepovers we could have! The tunnels we could build to connect our bedrooms!

I grew up with two back yards, two bedrooms, and two pantries. Countless baking sessions have been saved by the generosity of the Antidormis. I once went over to borrow an egg and came home with a 10kg bag of onions- I’m still not quite sure how it happened.

We would spend all day together, anxiously waiting for either parent to come and collect us, begging to turn it into a sleepover. Countless summer afternoons were spent in my cubby house, or going for bike rides that in reality lasted about 10 minutes before turning into hours-long gossip sessions on the local primary school play equipment. Every week Carlton had a home game, you could count on a knock on the door, and a desperate Soph seeking refuge.

Sadly, it seems that these neighbourly relations are no longer so commonplace. The more friends I spoke to about this article, the more I realised that my upbringing was unique.

Most of my friends don’t know their neighbours at all, the exception being a recognisable face here and there.

All the wholesome goodness you’d expect from what sounds like the beginnings of a heartwarming coming-of-age movie.

According to a survey of 1,010 Australians conducted by Finder.com.au, a mere 17% of us would be able to name the people living right next door.

Admittedly, we don’t completely fit the cliché. We weren’t absolutely inseparable only to drift apart in high school, one of us the popular jock, the other

Brunswick dweller Jas Mee Lee can relate.

“I wouldn’t even recognise [my neighbours],” she tells me-and that’s after living in her house for two years.

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What’s more, she’s okay with that. A few years ago, Jas moved from Brisbane to Brunswick, and had very few connections here in Melbourne. However, forging relationships with her neighbours didn’t cross her mind.

Professor Charlotte Williams, dean of Social Work at RMIT, contends that the urbanisation of our society plays a big role in this.

She recently conducted a study on wellbeing based around Footscray, and found that residents were very unlikely to turn to neighbours and rely on them for social support, preferring to speak to someone from their own background instead.

“In an abstract sense, I knew I wanted to go to university and would be working full time-I’d find my friends that way.”

What is causing this shift in attitudes?

“The rental sector can disrupt the potential for more than just a wave,” explains Williams.

Changes in the way we live appear to be a major contributing factor, with the rise of highrise and apartment complex living alongside housing affordability and renting culture all influencing our priorities.

Further, “houses used to be developed for more connectedness, whereas now in the suburbs some tend to build their own ‘palace’ of sorts.”

People come and go through their garages, unseen by their neighbours.

Results from a study conducted of 1000 Australians

by Jigsaw Research in 2015 suggest that for 80% of participants, this was their biggest priority. As such, the desire to set up roots is impacted.

“More and more people are living in the suburbs due to affordability, but these suburbs often lack the infrastructure for convivial exchange,” she notes.

Apartment-complex resident Emma Pruys has experienced this first-hand.

The same goes for high-rise and apartment complex living.

“The biggest thing is the changeover… a lot of people are here short-term. I’ve been here for about 12 months… and I think almost half the residents on my floor have changed.” That’s six new sets of neighbours for her floor alone, in only a year.

“People are very isolated.” While technically they may have more neighbours than ever, “there’s no sense of interaction.”

Making the effort to get to know her neighbours just doesn’t seem as worth it.

However, Professor Williams points out, perhaps we’re not as disconnected as it seems. We shouldn’t forget the power of nostalgia-perhaps we’re simply attached to the notion that people were more connected back then. Now, our relationships are “just more varied… we have a new ‘localism’.”

“It might be different if I were raising a family,” she thinks, but for now “on the list of things, it’s not as important.”

And sometimes, the privacy can just be nice.

“Particularly in apartment-living, it can be nice to keep a degree of separation. You can chat to people out on the balcony, but still have that space of your own.”

Nonetheless, it can’t be denied that these relationships remain important.

I pose the same question to both Jas and Emmawould you think of knocking on the door of your neighbours’ place for an ingredient you needed while cooking?

“In the face of a big, curious, wide world, the social glue is of great importance.”

Williams phrases it particularly eloquently.

So, maybe times are changing. Maybe now we have to work a bit harder to build these relationships. But they are absolutely worth the effort.

“Not really.”

They’re not alone in this choice- according to the aforementioned study, only 52% of Australians would invite a neighbour into their home.

It seems the stereotypical act of ‘borrowing a cup of sugar’ may be dying out.

And to Sophie, if you’re reading this… you’re never allowed to move.

Sorry.

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Ballot Box Declan Williams / Left Wing Liam Straughan / Right Wing Illustration by Lisa Vu

Gains Tax discount. Capital Gains Tax is where a tax payment is made on the profit from the sale of an asset. However, under the discount, there is a 50% reduction in the tax if the asset has been held for more than a year.

Declan Williams / Left Wing On every level, it is clear that young people are finding it difficult to enter the housing market.

There are two major problems identifiable, among a raft of many issues: investor bonuses and the local job market.

Currently, investors purchase properties that are Positively or Negatively Gearing.

Have you ever seen an article about somebody buying a property for cheap and flipping it for big bucks after just a year of holding it?

Capital Gains Tax discount.

Positive Gearing is lesser seen in the market, it is effectively a home that tends to be in a low capital growth area with a high rental yield (usually found in the country or rural areas of Australia), the property generates more cash than the investor is paying in borrowings and fees.

Negative Gearing and the CGTD need reform urgently. Negative Gearing should be limited to new housing (with of course no retrospective stripping of Negative Gearing), as this will drive investment growth into new housing projects; encouraging more affordable housing to be built.

Negative Gearing is more common, and far more controversial. In this scenario, an investor purchases a property where their rental income is less than their costs of borrowing and fees.

They then claim the cash flow loss against their tax. Considering that these properties are almost always in high capital growth areas, they are in a situation where their wealth increases, while their tax diminishes.

The CGTD should be lowered from 50% to 25%, with of course all previous sales being unaffected and fully grandfathered. This will not apply to small business, to encourage their growth and promotion. This could lead to up to a $32.1 billion improvement in the budget over a decade.

The job market is where a strong element of the problem arises. We take the view that investors are squeezing out desperate workers looking for their first home, which, undoubtedly, is rife.

The third thing we must consider is the Capital 37

However, many of these workers aren’t at auctions to compete against investors. Why?

The following are two things I think should be taken on board by the Coalition in the May Budget on the issue of us being able to buy a house.

Banks don’t tend to loan money to people who have little or no job security.

In our own state, I will give credit where it’s due to the Andrews government on eliminating stamp duty for first-home buyers. Over the next fiscal year, people who are purchasing properties worth up to $600,000 catch a lucky break. This will likely save each of us up to $8,000 per annum, and allows us to focus on the almighty deposit needed (a bare minimum of $50,000!).

1 in 6 jobs are at risk of computerization/ automation by 2030, including butchers, labourers, bank tellers, admin roles and hospitality workers. University graduates can expect to be, on average, competing against 32 other graduates for one job vacancy.

We have seen the rise of ‘labour hire companies’ that have managed to screw workers out of secure, full-time employment into conditions of casual work, less pay, no superannuation and thus much easier conditions for an employer to lay off said worker.

Stamp duty and speed cameras are, for the most part, revenue raisers, with little to no impact on our habits.

We still want a comfortable home and want to get our money’s worth where we can. The Real Estate Institute of Australia agrees.

Commonplace unpaid internships, falling fulltime employment, higher casual positions, over 1 million people in temporary employment, youth unemployment at 13.3%, wage growth dwindling at 1.9%, housing prices on average increasing up to 11% per year, 1 in 5 youth workers out of work for more than a year, a 20% underemployment rate for youth, and to top it off, a Liberal governmentsupported penalty rate cut.

Do I feel that young people are finding home ownership difficult?

In 2000, first-home buyers in Melbourne had the choice of 53 affordable suburbs to live in (source: domain.com.au). In 2017, there are only seven. We need to see an increase in the amount of suburbs our generation can afford to live in - without breaking the bank.

I believe this can only be achieved by allowing the expanded use of land outside the major capital cities through land purpose deregulation.

The permits needed to build houses on land ripe for development must be made easier for developers to obtain, if anything is to be done.

More inner-city highrises alone just won’t cut it.

To answer the question bluntly – no, I don’t feel that young people are struggling to find secure work, to attain a decent loan and to beat out the deep pockets of investors.

I know it.

The benefits will be reaped when more money is injected into the housing market by our sheer numbers alone. People aged 18-40 make up approximately 37.1% of Australia’s population, according to SBS.

Liam Straughan / Right Wing I am an enthusiastic reader, and have recently spent many a nice Sunday afternoon, much like the one during which I am writing this column, reading Scott Pape’s The Barefoot Investor.

These actions alone would take a great burden off our shoulders and ensure the continued profitability of the housing sector, through the influx of a demographic currently all but excluded from the market... ours.

The primary goal from reading this book is to save for a property to own and call home.

The issue of housing affordability for young people has become a hot-button issue in the context of Australian politics. Our Federal Government seems to have taken the hint that it is currently difficult for us to achieve the goal of owning our own home, and looks set to step in.

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Renting vs Buying Holly Hales @hollyhales Infographics by Claudia Long

With no formal qualifications beyond the HSC, my parents bought their first house at 25 in Melbourne’s now prized inner north. They attest to fifty-hour working weeks in a myriad of low paid positions while forgoing any remnants of a social life at the time, but the market still allowed for them to make it happen.

Bureau of Statistics data shows.

In addition to this 80 per cent of first-home Millennial hopefuls are unable to get on the ladder, a survey from REST Industry Super of 1000 young Australians found.

About 40 percent said they had “no idea” how they’d fund their retirement.

That three-bedroom weatherboard in Coburg is now worth nine times what they paid for it in the early 90s.

Owning a home was part and parcel with adulthood in Australia, like year-round barbecuing or buying a boat and taking it to the Murray.

This is perhaps when the woes of ‘generation rent’ will become the clearest. According to data from the Association of Superannuation Funds of Australia it is estimated that for someone to afford a comfortable retirement at 65, a single would need $545,000 and a couple would need $645,000

Growing up overseas I always thought of Australia as a place where rationality and frugality ruled all. People worked hard and had little shame in buying used goods and saving the difference. While much of the developed world watched as over inflated housing markets crashed taking entire economies with them in the late 2000s, Australia seemed unfazed.

Along with this, the most recent research from the Australian Housing and Urban Research Institute show a surge in the proportion of long-term tenants renting for 10 years or more. A third of all private renters were long-term in 2013, up from 25 per cent two decades ago.

By last year’s December quarter the average price of a house in Melbourne had climbed to $777,000, over 10 times the average annual wage. The figure was almost 14% more than it was at the same time the previous year.

Despite this, things may be on the up. According to a report released last month, the research arm for the world’s richest nations said Australian house prices “have reached unprecedented highs” and that a market crash, or “significant downward correction” would likely cut consumer spending and push up mortgage defaults.

Buying a home in 2017 is truly a numbers game. For young people without help from wealthy relatives or as Joe Hockey once put it, the ability to “get a good job that pays good money” the future is scarily uncertain.

Although this generation may be set to join the cohorts of noughties who watched as economic recession riddled their nations, it means one day I may too be able to buy that weatherboard in Coburg, if I’m lucky.

Figure 1: House prices to average income

While older Australians already have an 85 percent rate of homeownership, the number of first homebuyers has halved in the past 10 years the latest Australian 40

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Of course you are!

There's plenty of ways to contribute to Catalyst in 2017 whether it be in our magazine, podcast or online.

Get in touch at rmitcatalyst@gmail.com to get started!

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Backyard Massacre Tessa Stickland @tessa_sticks Illustration by Sarah Loo

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Secateurs are the weapon of choice In my haphazard attack on the garden

It is too close to the ground I free it from the weight of its lower limbs For its own good

There is an invasive vine, leeching onto other plants, Strangling Stifling I slice and tear it from its hosts It bleeds milky white sap Thick and gummy And cold.

A drop marks my jumper

Grass is covered in the debris of battle Fresh wounds cover trees Bark pulled back Tender wood exposed White blood of the hostile vine Continues to leak

The Good Vine is under foreign occupation, But that doesn’t give it the right To assault my disused trampoline.

With its sunshine yellow flowers Don’t make me go easy on it.

It hangs off the garage, creating a walkway Which I trim along as I Walk and clip and walk and clip And walk and my shoes clip-clop

I wash my blades Under the garden tap.

The metal is sticky The sap looks a blue grey on the rust It embraces my weapon, Stubbornly, despite the pressure of the water.

I move in my fingers They stroke the surface And my thumb slips I feel the metal under my skin Chill water rushes over my hand I look at the cut There is nothing I sigh in relief But - then the blood oozes, In brilliant red, Before thinning and washing down the drain I take my hand out of the water It hasn’t stopped It seeps down my hand, Water and blood.

Drops stain my jumper

I catch my reflection in a window Blood is thinly smeared across my check It’s origin: my palm.

They’re fighting back.

The conquering vine is up high It clings tightly to a tree Its older sections Are thick, and dry, and have lost their colour It has stretched itself Across the plants by the side fence I stretch my body to reach Snip Snap Beads of sap Lightly dot the tops of leaves below White lays harshly on the green The neighbour’s tree hangs Over the back fence and into my yard

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Snapshots Olivia Morffew @livmorf

Prelude Of Prep There was a girl with curly hair, the colour of autumn leaves.

Introduction To New Things She shifted in the padded chair, trying to ignore the sweat forming on her arms, never expecting that much heat. It was always colder in South Melbourne. A hairdresser with plump lips stood behind the girl, armed with a weapon.

Scissors.

‘A trim?’ the hairdresser asked.

‘Maybe, that much,’ the girl’s mum replied, using her fingers to show how much to cut.

She was five and wore the checked monstrosity of blue and green and white – the uniform of her South Melbourne school. It was a small school, her mum had said, and everyone remembered everyone, so her shoes were polished to Year Prep Perfection. She fussed about the plastic pots at the kitchen ensemble, creating imaginary cakes with exotic flavours.

It was too much, but after years of rehearsed complaints, the girl knew she wouldn’t be listened to. Her mum sat on a soft-but-hard couch that lined the wall, a magazine in her hand.

A boy with Sharpie black curls like hers, came up beside her and asked, ‘Can I cook too?’

She shook her head. ‘Boys can’t cook.’

There was the creak of scissors in action. A slight breeze made the plastic cape flutter. The girl nibbled her lip, and could only watch the hairdresser slice her lengthy, apricot locks. Tendrils of orange landed on the floor with a sigh.

Heavy footsteps thundered behind her, cutting through the childish chatter. She turned and her lips parted, eyes rounding in horror. The man was big, like the trolls in her books, but there was a gentleness to him that made her relax.

Her view was blocked by the hairdressers boobs and a flush stained the girl’s cheeks. She tried looking away. Water burst across her face and she cringed, then closed her eyes.

The hairdresser smoothed fly away strands, then held a length of orange out to snip. The girl

He had the same curls as the boy, and said, ‘Boys can cook too.’

The girl nodded and passed the plastic spatula to the boy. She left for a table, her imaginary cakes forgotten.

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thought of something, then. A term used at her new Burleigh Heads school, and something she saw on the Gold Coast streets. She had to ask, and she could finally fit in.

‘I want a side fringe,’ the girl said.

‘You’ll need to straighten it daily.’

Another term the Year Four Girls used, another way to be normal.

She turned a page and was on a chapter about Ma’at, the goddess of truth and justice. Ma’at would’ve been beautiful if she were human. Tall, thin, and with skin the colour of ink – smooth and with a sheen to make others curious. She wore a white dress in the book, with a feather strapped to her headpiece. A lovely distraction.

‘Well, do you?’ asked the boy.

How could she forget? It’s what defined year six, what was whispered when the teacher’s back was turned, and what made her beg her parents to move back to South Melbourne.

She nodded. The hairdresser lobbed off chunks of hair, orange curls pooling in the black cape.

As the hairdresser chopped, the girl squeezed her eyes shut, then opened her eyes again when the hairdresser announced she was finished.

How could she forget the way the boy with a smile of an innocent liar, gathered up the class, and planned her downfall? She couldn’t.

‘It was a test,’ he said.

She closed the book, and it slammed in the silence.

She gnawed her lower lip, her mouth quivering.

‘I wanted to see if you’d say yes.’

That look, the one she had when she met the boy’s father in Prep, came across her face. It shifted into something, bluer. Her lip trembled.

It wasn’t a side fringe.

But a front one.

Her mum paid and they headed back to the car.

She gnawed her lip, tears pricking the corners of her eyes. When her mum started the ignition, water flowed down the girl’s cheeks. Any chance of being normal was now forgotten.

She shot to her feet. She didn’t have that expression she had at the hairdressers, or when she met that boy in prep. This was something else. This was when she realised her cakes were imaginary, and that her fringe would be tedious and ridiculed.

But it was brief, and a surge of warmth coursed through her.

Overture To The End It was Year Seven, her final year of primary school, and her last year with the sniggering fools and gossiping buffoons.

‘Disappointed.’

‘Shut up.’

The boy looked at her, the shock evident on his pasty face.

‘Just, shut up!’

She was in the library, because only girls like her lament their social skills with the company of books. A boy her age entered, and only an idiot like him would come inside the air-conditioned safety net of the library, to do whatever it is idiots like him do.

He didn’t say anything more. She knew why he picked her. There was a slight bulge where a smooth stomach should be, a pair of breasts pushing against her shirt. She wasn’t like the Year 7 Gold Coast Girls, with their thin stomachs and flat chests.

She was different.

Her grip tightened on a hardback Egyptian textbook. The table was near-empty, save for the girl and her Egyptian Gods carved on the pages.

The boy sat opposite her, and she wanted to scream.

‘Leave me alone.’

The boy rose out of his chair and his mouth gaped slightly. He left the library, left the girl.

She slumped back into her chair, chest rising and falling from sudden energy. The girls’ fingers curled around her book, and as she opened it back up Ma’at smiled up at her from the golden page. The girl couldn’t resist.

She didn’t.

Scarlet stained her cheeks, and she focused on the tea-stained pages. She felt his stare burn the crown of her head. The girl peered over her book. ‘What do you want?’

A slight tug pulled at her lips, her small triumph always remembered, the boy’s taunts forgotten.

‘Remember when I asked you out?’

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Ellie Dorset and the Mystery of Mensfield Rhianna Malas

I kept looking up at the glowing orb attached to the pole. The wires, they must be embedded inside the post, the lens must be inside the glass, no! The lens is the light itself! It must be in there, the camera, I swear I could see it if I just stared hard enough, it had to be there.

All the rumors were in one way or another proved true, and damaging to all reputations involved.

And the mother’s club knew them all in deep and uncomfortable detail, even I know this was information that wasn’t given out freely, it had to be taken.

You must think I’m crazy, but if you knew about Mensfield then you’d be suspicious too, but you likely don’t, so I’ll tell you.

I started looking at street lights, cracks in the wall, searching for a lens, a microphone, a flashing red light to prove my theory: For reasons of gossip, Mensfield is under heavy camera surveillance.

Mensfield is a suburban town somewhere in the very Eastern part of Australia, just under the O in Victoria.

Like most small towns we have a sculpture (an optimistic person might call a ‘landmark’), and ours happens to be A.B Paterson. The townsfolk said that this is where he wrote Waltzing Matilda, but I think it’s because he stopped by here for a cup of tea, and and not much more.

“Stop staring at that light post, Ellie, it’s bad for your eyes.” My sister instructed, trying to pull me away. “Come on, we have a disco to go to, and do you have to wear that beanie?”

“Yeah.”

The yearly school disco fell on the night of A.B Paterson Day, tickets cost five dollars each, and despite the pitifully low price, it still wasn’t worth the price of admission. The smoke machine, Black Eyed Peas blaring, footsteps, talking, noise, noise, noise. I needed to get out of there.

The key feature of the town that it was voted ‘The fourth best retirement location in Victoria’ in the 2001 edition of ‘Destination Weekly’. Every person in town knows each other well, intimately well, a level of intimacy that made me squirm uncomfortably whenever it was brought to my attention.

I vacated the school gymnasium, passing drunk teachers in the hallways to find a quiet space.

I found an unlocked door, opened it quietly, and stopped.

A good starting place would be the celebration of Mr Paterson’s birthday. Now, does our town celebrate this day every year? Do I know the entirety of “The Man from Snowy River” off by heart?

It was a room I’d never seen before, monitors, rows of them, one on top of the other in a room which, other than a desk and an office chair, is completely empty. I was so filled with shock I couldn’t make out what was on those screens, we can’t afford a security system here, not here or anywhere else in Mensfield. I slammed the door, ran away and didn’t look back.

My cul-de-sac always celebrated holidays together, all of them went the same way, I never minded this until I tore my eyes away from my sister beating everyone at something on the Playstation 2, leaned my head back, and listened to the mothers’ gossip with intrigue. They all sat around the dining room, glasses of wine in painted fingers as they spoke nonstop.

“They fight about…”

“I saw him in bed with…”

“She had an…”

Something inside of me was electric, tingling in my fingertips. It was time to get to the bottom of Mensfield, the surveillance suburbia.

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Plovers Maeve Kerr-Crowley @tweetsbymaevekc

When people hear the word ‘plover’, they usually have one of two reactions. Most won’t know what you’re talking about. If they do know, then their eyes will light up. They’ll grab your arm or smack a table and shout something like “Oh my god!

Plovers!” Don’t mistake this for excitement.

You’ve just sent this person on a trip down traumatic memory lane. The sounds of wings flapping and birds screeching are playing on a loop in their heads.

Another encounters them regularly in country Victoria.

But a fear of plovers seems to be felt most strongly in the suburbs, and even more so in the outer west.

There, it’s hard to meet anybody who doesn’t have a swoop story. These suburban plovers lay their eggs in paddocks, parks and schoolyards, declaring a warzone wherever they choose.

When I was a tiny, impressionable gremlin - barely knee-high and still overwhelmingly positive about the world - I went to Bethany Catholic Primary School in the outer west. With a big oval and lots of space to conquer, we were a prime target for plovers. For the six months or so that the birds were breeding the grass was a minefield of eggs, and their temperamental parents were never far away.

Because yes, for those unscarred by such memories, plovers are birds.

Their official name is the Masked Lapwing–to distinguish them from a number of other birds called plovers which are significantly more endangered and significantly less evil than their common counterparts. But the plovers we’re talking about are average-sized birds with bright yellow faces and a nasty habit of swooping anyone who gets too close.

But that was just a fact of life. The plovers weren’t going anywhere, and we still had to play. So we didn’t go to the back of the oval, and we watched our step. Of course, someone always got unlucky and stood on an egg, and they’d be chased screaming around the oval by incensed birds as hordes of children watched in fascinated horror.

The species is supposed to be evenly-distributed throughout most of Australia, and plover horror stories can be gathered from all corners, if you look hard enough. One victim tells of a plover that looked her dead in the eye before stomping on her sandcastle in Byron Bay when she was a child.

To know a plover is to fear a plover, as everyone figures out eventually.

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Sheree Hegarty began teaching at Bethany five years ago and is terrified of plovers. She’s been swooped four times on the job, but before she took up the position had never even heard of the species. She’d been working at a school on the southside, and had concerns about working in Werribee thanks to a fear of snakes.

“She goes out there,” Sheree says.

“Looks out at the plovers like we’re in a police lineup and says, ‘Which one was it?’ So I just point at one and run. I have no idea which bird it was! I was face first on the oval!”

This is one of many suburban communities working around a population of plovers, accepting the birds as a vital part of their pecking order. But apparently, this is not a universal experience.

“Who would’ve thought it was the birds who’d get me,” she reflects now.

The first time Sheree was swooped, she’d gone out to the oval to check that it was safe for the kids to play on.

As I’ve grown up and gone to high school and then university, these fascinatingly sadistic creatures have stuck with me. I’ve asked my friends; “Oh hey, do you guys remember plovers?”

“I literally had to hit the deck. I thought it’d take my sunglasses right off my head!”

One time out of ten, they do. The other nine it’s a blank look. “What the hell is a plover?” they’ll ask.

For those who have never been swooped by a plover, let me set the scene. They come out of nowhere. They spread their wings out wide, and they screech like nothing you’ve ever heard before.

In short, you’re pretty sure you’re going to die.

So why have so many people gone through their lives in blissful ignorance, while others have lived in constant fear? By nature, plovers are made for areas with open space and undeveloped land. And while it makes sense that they’re not out seeking a city lifestyle, it just hardly seems fair.

Sheree tells of a thrilling action scene where she ran, rolled and dove her way across the school grounds to safety. After hearing her harrowing tale, the Principal, Marlene Monahan, asked Sheree to identify the offending bird.

But no matter where you live, one thing remains certain: plovers are out there, and we should all be very, very afraid.

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The Beauty of Boring Alexandra Russell Illustration by Sophie Wallace-Crichton Over the last few years it has become very common for society to decide Instagram filtered activities are the ultimate in “life goals�.

But whilst these images might make us feel a moment of #wanderlust or a craving for brunch, media that truly depicts the honesty of a life wonderfully close to ours is what will remain in our hearts and minds longer than a snapchat story.

So, when it comes to channelling suburbia and family, who does it best: Australia or America?

Let’s find out!

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Team USA: Malcolm in the Middle

Team USA: Modern Family

Sometimes, watching something that embraces the imperfections of life and growing up can ultimately remind us that we aren’t alone. Following the character of Malcolm and his dysfunctional family; Mother Lois; the control freak, Father Hal the good cop, brothers Francis: a high school dropout, Reece: a reckless delinquent and Dewey, the youngest and most picked on brother.

Malcolm’s struggles to get away with as much as possible with his brothers, to deal with being placed in the “gifted class” at school and generally figuring out who he is, connects to all families.

However, unlike programs like Kath and Kim and Modern Family, Malcolm in the Middle relies a little too heavily on stereotypes without turning them on their head as much as later programs. Still, doesn’t mean there isn’t a place for Malcolm and his family on this list seeing as it’s a good opportunity to appreciate Bryan Cranston before he became a meth dealing dad in Breaking Bad (how has this not been made into a crossover tv show yet? A true missed opportunity).

An instant hit with audiences, US Television series Modern Family began with the overly excited Cameron going behind partner Mitchell’s back to introduce their newly adopted daughter Lily to the rest of the family; by dressing her up as a lion cub, recreating the iconic Lion king lift (film soundtrack included). From Phil’s humourous frustration over constantly forgetting to fix the loose step in his house, to Mitchell’s struggle to inform Cameron that his revealing bike shorts are inappropriate, Modern Family celebrates the constantly evolving position that families hold within traditional suburbia. If Modern Family has taught us anything, it’s that family can come in many forms and that the best way for anyone to introduce their new baby to the family is via a Lion King re-enactment.

7/10

7.5/10

TEAM ‘STRAYA: Kath and Kim

TEAM ‘STRAYA: The Castle

Before we get into this, have a tiny teddy. Is there anything more noble than the call from Sharon Strzelecki for “BBQ shapes and a bottle of Baileys”?

No, no there is not.

Kath and Kim has earnt it’s place in the hearts of Australia since 2001, reminding us all that there’s always a joker somewhere in the pack.

It is a celebration of family, suburbia and all things bogan, from Kim and Brett’s spontaneous renovation plans to Kim’s clear sense of style; Kim’s phrase “If its not Dotti or Witchery, don’t talk to me!” is surely something we can all live by. Even though we may not all want to head down to Fountain Lakes shopping centre, there is something excellent about seeing Australian suburbia and family on the small screen rather than re-watching the slew of cheap American sitcoms that get produced quicker than Kel can whip up a sausage platter. Now, where’s the Baileys at?

Mate, is there anything that captures the Aussie ‘burbs better than this? This movie is one that’ll go straight to the pool room every time, because it lovingly depicts Aussie suburban life with tongue firmly in cheek and has too many good quotes to not be considered a favourite. Darryl Kerrigan, a man who believes that “fishing is 10% brains, 95% muscle and the rest is just good luck,” and Bonnie Doon are a paradise representing the everyday suburban man. He takes pride in his family, such as when his daughter graduates Sunshine Tafe as a hairdresser or simply when his wife makes something new for dinner. He takes pride in where his lives, even fighting to keep his home, due to the firm belief that “a man’s home is his castle”.

Honestly, what’s not to like?

9/10

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Cooking with Nonna Francesca Words & photography by Anthony Furci @AnthonyRFurci Illustration by Ying Wang @yiingstagram

Eggplant Parmigiana

Ever wanted to cook like a nonna?

Specifically, my nonna?

Now’s your chance!

You will need: • 2 large eggplants, or 5 to 6 small ones.

(Note: can be substituted for zucchini if you like. We used both!)

• Grated Parmesan & Mozzarella cheese • Salt and pepper • Canola oil • Breadcrumbs • 3 eggs • Milk For the sauce: You can use your own recipe, or buy your own sauce - whichever is easiest for you. This is the way nonna does it.

• 1kg tomatoes • 1 cups water • 1-2 onions • 3 tbsp. olive oil • Basil • Garlic • Bicarb soda

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Sauce: 1. Wash and peel the tomatoes.

Then, fry the onion/s, until lightly brown.

2. Place the tomatoes in a pot with the water, and add a pinch of bicarb soda.

(Note: If the tomatoes are fresh, you won’t need the bicarb.)

3. Drizzle 3 tablespoons of olive oil over the tomatoes.

Add the onion/s if they’re ready, and a dash of basil.

4. Let it sit on medium heat for about an hour and a half, or until the oil begins to rise. Stir with a wooden spoon every 15 minutes or so.

Nonna: “More cook, more taste good!”

4. Fill a pan about a quarter full with canola oil.

Let sit on high heat.

5. Crack the three eggs into a bowl.

Add salt and pepper, and a dash of milk.

Beat with a fork until yellow.

6. Pour the breadcrumbs into a separate bowl.

7. Dip the sliced eggplant into the egg, then coat in breadcrumbs.

Place into pan to fry until golden brown, then place on a plate to the side.

(If you’ve given up and decided you just want to make eggplant fritters, feel free to stop here!)

8. Spread the sauce on the bottom of a baking tray, then cover the bottom layer of the tray in eggplant slices.

Cover the slices with another layer of sauce, then put the mozzarella and parmesan on top.

9. Repeat – like lasagne. (We made 2 layers worth.)

10. Preheat oven to 190°C/170°C (fan-forced/ conventional).

11. Place tray on top shelf. They’ll only take about 15 minutes.

To put it all together….

1.

Slice the eggplants.

Not too thick, but not too thin either – about a finger’s width.

2. Place the sliced eggplants in a strainer or two (depending on how many slices you have), and wash them.

3. Place a paper towel and a face-down plate over the washed eggplant inside the strainer/s, and let sit for about 15 minutes – to absorb the moisture.

Nonna: “If it comes good – that’s the recipe!”

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Leaving Petula Bowa There was nothing wrong with the suburbs, but there was something wrong with the familiar. The routine. The identical houses. It clouds everyone in this false blanket of security; if you do A,B,C, you will get X,Y,Z. It was like a math problem. A formula that always equalled the same goddamn thing!

Nothing ever changed, and everyone just grew up and became like their parents. But I knew that the real world wasn’t supposed to operate like that. I didn’t know what it was supposed to be like, but I was determined to go out there and find out!

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Recliner Samuel Hughes Avenue bemused reptiles roam reflected opaque lakes of facial fabric.

Sentries to inflamed estates, turned home for the mode of paracetamol passerbys.

Us that try sway supreme when aggravated, crash like watercress waves, told ‘sandpaper sighted’, coalesced mindnumb to plowing through low-grade asphalt and smiling at pastel dressed towns.

Result: the reverb songstress of grey timbre, grates its brushed palings to move sleep to street-side delves and underpass drains.

Walls watching more closely than predators in a David nature documentary.

Too busy botching your virgin hood to save the good.

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Illustration by Lisa Vu

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