NSW Library

April 30
Partly sunny, afternoon clouds
Sydney

I am sitting in the State Library of NSW with my new library card! It's 'blue level' Reader's Card, which will allow me to request material from the stack. I cannot borrow anything, of course. I am not sure if it will help me with my project, but it's a start.

Last year, I picked up a book on the history of the Djabugay people, an aboriginal group in Tropical North Queensland. It was an unusual text in that the account is from the point of view of the Djabugay themselves. In the book, the author tells about the time during W.W.II when black American soldiers were stationed in Queensland, and were befriended by the Djabugay. To the Djabugay, the soldiers were remarkable and inspiring. They were just as dark-skinned as any Aborigine, yet they were accorded a level of respect by the white soldiers that was not even imagined by the indigenous people. My objective during this trip is to learn more about this period and the interactions that took place then. I suspect that black soldiers in W.W.II would not say that the treatment they received by the military was all that great. We all of us know that we have had a rough road to social equality and that there's lots left to do. And I would not want to make any sort of argument that smacked of relativism. It just sounds like a neat story to me, and I hope to learn more about it.

So anyway, that's what I am about here today. The library is a very well-used place; I even had trouble finding a place to sit down to write this. The stacks are closed; one makes requests for materials, which are then delivered to bins nearby the circulation area. There are people of all ages and races, researching all manner of things. I am currently sitting nearby the Family History section. I suppose that this would be a place where one could find out a lot more about the Convicts.
. . .

It's about 30 minutes later. I have requested two books which should be retrieved from the stacks in about 20 minutes. I have asked for America's Australia, Australia's America and The Black Diggers: Aborigines and Torres Strait Islanders in the Second World War. The titles sounded interesting, and I hope they'll lead to something. The library also has several works on Black Americans in the armed forces, and several other works on Aborigines in the military here.
I'm a little surprised at some of that, as I had thought that Aborigines were not allowed to serve at the time. Australian attitudes about the native people have evolved, though they have a ways to go, but I'm pretty sure that since Aborigines were not citizens, they were not allowed into the military. There's one rather humorous story worth sharing. Apparently, some of the Djabugay women were out one day and spotted unfamiliar faces climbing in the trees near Cairns. The men they saw looked enough like the pictures of Japanese they had seen that they were convinced that the Japanese were invading right there. (The idea was not far-fetched; the Japanese had already bombed Darwin; the Australian forces were stretched to the limit protecting British African interests, and there was in place a contingency plan to forfeit all of northern Australia to the Japanese should they invade. One of the big reasons that Australia always seems to back America so wholeheartedly is that America -- not Britain -- came to their rescue after the bombing of Darwin.) But the fact was that the men in the trees were from the island of Java, and were being trained as scouts.

. . .

It's now early Monday morning. I spent the rest of yesterday continuing to reserach my project, and walking about the Royal Botanical Gardens. One of the most striking features of the gardens in the flying fox colony, thousands of fruit bats hanging in the trees. Though they are relatively inactive during the day, there were still several instances where the bats would fly about. I didn't get a good picture, but will try again today. There is also a flock of sulphur-crested cockatoos that fly about and squawk a lot -- I wonder if there's some tension between the species.

I wanted to mention my photos at Flickr. If you want, you can go to http://www.flickr.com/photos/chazjac/ and take a look. It might take a little bit if you're using a dialup account. I'll try to upload at least one photo every time I post, so you should frequently see something new. Occasionally, I'll post photos directly in the blog, too.