Today, Queensland opened its border following five months of isolation. Bob told us that there were going to be 10,000 people rushing to get across first thing this morning. He is putting off driving up there until tomorrow for this very reason. He also told us about people camping along the border in preparation. Then, this morning on the World Service, I heard about the Queenslanders who had gone on holiday days before the snap decision to close the border. They have been camped for almost the entire five months because they’ve been trapped.
This had me wondering how they feel about the English cricket team. Just last week they were allowed to play a game of cricket at the Gabba. Okay, they had to go into quarantine after landing at Brisbane airport, but I bet the facilities were first class, presumably paid for by the ECB. Not to mention the Australian cricket team. I’m assuming the entire cricket team hasn’t been in Queensland for the whole five months.
The normal, ordinary people, however, have to be double vaccinated or face 14 days in a squalid quarantine hotel which they would have to pay for. I love cricket more than most but, seriously, how is it more important than the people who live and work in Queensland? This article paints an awful picture of how the Queensland government feels about its people.
But, I’m sure the Queensland premier will say, at least the people will be home for Christmas. Scant relief for people living in sheds, losing jobs and paying for rentals they can’t live in.
And, in another home for Christmas story, tonight I watched a WFA webinar about the Christmas 1914 truce given by the amazingly entertaining, Gordon Corrigan. Here he is with a bunch of protagonists wearing far too many medals.
Gordon has a great talent for straight faced comedy. He takes you along a path of serious information then suddenly sends you down the hilarity highway with an understated but perfect quip. The last time I heard Gordon speak was back in 2020 during our first week in Sweden, and he was just as brilliant. I think I’m in danger of becoming a major Gordon Corrigan fan-boy.
Anyway, tonight’s talk was about the Christmas truce of 1914 and dispelled a few myths. Most importantly, the football game. It couldn’t have happened for various reasons. As Gordon reasoned, No-man’s Land, where it was supposed to have taken place, was pitted with shelling. It would have been impossible to find enough flat ground to accommodate a football pitch.
Then, later during the Q&A, a member of the audience ventured that given the amount of stuff a soldier had to haul around with him, a football was probably low on the list of priorities. Even deflated, he’d then need a pump.
And then, another member of the audience said that the famous photograph, said to depict the football game, was actually taken somewhere else, some time else and was between two British teams. All very informative.
One particularly delightful story Gordon told was about three soldiers from the Queen’s Westminsters. They’d over-indulged in a bit of Christmas Eve cheer and staggered, drunk across to the German trenches and started talking and chatting with them. They were taken prisoner.
The next day, a group of their fellows went over to swap cheer with the Germans and, in the course of much joy, asked for their mates back. The Germans, regretfully, said they had to remain prisoners because they’d seen too much and knew where the machine gun emplacements were, etc.
The men were shipped off to a POW camp for the rest of the war.
My first thought was how lucky they were, but that was not the case. Another knowledgeable listener volunteered the information that they were at the Wittenberg camp which was rife with typhoid. (Here’s an excellent blog post about Wittenberg and the typhoid epidemic of 1915.)
Obviously more lucky were the millions who received a present from Princess Mary. She decided that the armed forces needed a Christmas boost from home. Rather than spend any of the royal cash, she organised a fundraiser which enabled her to send the men a metal box filled with cigarettes, sweets, a photo of her and a small Christmas card.
You can find some on ebay if you want to spend considerably more than they originally cost to manufacture. Of course, the cigarettes and sweets will have gone. But you might get a photograph of Mary.
All up, it was a wonderfully informative and amusing webinar.
But, before I sign off, I spotted this final bit of Christmas in Castle Street this morning. It is all that remains of yesterday’s Christmas market.
And, yes, the weather continues drizzly.
And I almost forgot: Happy Saint Lucia Day! A pity I didn’t have any saffron buns.
