I had the chance this morning to help a bewildered visitor to Melbourne town who was trying to get to RMIT from the corner of Elizabeth and Collins. Now for all the non Melbournites out there, this kind of direction is quite simplistic and helped me feel good about myself for the next hundred meters or so till I started dodging trams jaywalking on Bourke St.
The man, of unknown overseas origin, wandered on his way happily hoping that he was one step closer to his destination than he had been when standing on our meeting corner. And I can't recommend enough that you ensure these tourists, visitors, new residents, interlopers or otherwise time travellers do get the assistance that they are asking for.
It may be a little far to run ahead of him and drop bread crumbs or pay a skywriter to lead them towards there intended goal but it does give you a good kick to make people feel a little better.
Now, I know you can all see this as self congratulatory but this should lead to an obvious conclusion.
People need to help people out.
Well, I don't think that was that much of a revelation but maybe, just maybe if you're feeling a little down you should go out and find someone who is incompetently trying to parallel park their scooter and assist them (without appearing to actually steal the scooter).
Heck, this should be naturally for everyone to assist any stranger, who happens to walk by, across a pedestrian crossing regardless if they want to cross or not. Why not wait half an hour to merge onto a freeway letting everyone else past first, you'll feel 189.3% better than you had earlier in the day(figure not yet proven)
But lastly, if you want to truly help someone else. Maybe you should let them help you. If you notice a friend or colleague feeling a little glum then what better way to make them feel better than to go out there and injure yourself(only to a slight degree, no point killing yourself) so that they can give you the kiss of life, tourniquet up your acute angled knee and feel for a good two days on top of the world.
Well, that's all from me for this post.
I think it's time I went and helped some people out.
Maybe just a twisted ankle this time, broken bones just take too long to heal.
Showing posts with label australian. Show all posts
Showing posts with label australian. Show all posts
Monday, November 9, 2009
Tuesday, March 10, 2009
What's in a name?(What's their name?)
Have you ever asked yourself what is really in a name?
What defines you to someone else?
What makes them remember that your name is not Fred or Antoinette?
Because often, if you're in this fair country of ours it's not the name that people will refer to you. I mean what is really in the use of a name. It's whole idea is to give you an individual persona but it's real usage is only to identify you in documents, across a crowded room and by the police should they ask your friend who it was that drove them from the scene of the crime.
But the real heart of your personal moniker is the nickname, especially in your local neighbourhood and workplace. With such a diverse creative flair in most people Darren can become anything by shortening from D to Dazza to D-ren then to lengthening it to something like Dublin Darren even if he’s from Bangalore and has a liking of Gridiron. And with our current trend of expanding nicknames Dublin can change to Ireland and be Irish in a blink of an eye.
So this very Australian method or renaming people, places, animals and any other noun within sight probably has a lot to do with the fact that few Australians speak clearly enough for you to understand there name. If they happen to be from somewhere like Melbourne. They tend to speak with speeds akin to a Japanese bullet train whereas up north near Cairns the vocals are so drawn out that by playing there words back at double the rate it still takes a minute to say the name Bob.
So the fallout of such a movement inside this country is that no-one actually knows the real name of a person that they talk too and the ‘AKA’ line in the Police report looks more like an internet phone directory. Many a friend gets into a conversation with another on a street corner only to start referring to them as Walker, for walking around all the time.
Still, you can take heart in the fact, that when your parents failed miserably in attempting to give you an unshorten-able name that they didn’t call you Moses or Apple and expect you to go through a playground without any minders.
What defines you to someone else?
What makes them remember that your name is not Fred or Antoinette?
Because often, if you're in this fair country of ours it's not the name that people will refer to you. I mean what is really in the use of a name. It's whole idea is to give you an individual persona but it's real usage is only to identify you in documents, across a crowded room and by the police should they ask your friend who it was that drove them from the scene of the crime.
But the real heart of your personal moniker is the nickname, especially in your local neighbourhood and workplace. With such a diverse creative flair in most people Darren can become anything by shortening from D to Dazza to D-ren then to lengthening it to something like Dublin Darren even if he’s from Bangalore and has a liking of Gridiron. And with our current trend of expanding nicknames Dublin can change to Ireland and be Irish in a blink of an eye.
So this very Australian method or renaming people, places, animals and any other noun within sight probably has a lot to do with the fact that few Australians speak clearly enough for you to understand there name. If they happen to be from somewhere like Melbourne. They tend to speak with speeds akin to a Japanese bullet train whereas up north near Cairns the vocals are so drawn out that by playing there words back at double the rate it still takes a minute to say the name Bob.
So the fallout of such a movement inside this country is that no-one actually knows the real name of a person that they talk too and the ‘AKA’ line in the Police report looks more like an internet phone directory. Many a friend gets into a conversation with another on a street corner only to start referring to them as Walker, for walking around all the time.
Still, you can take heart in the fact, that when your parents failed miserably in attempting to give you an unshorten-able name that they didn’t call you Moses or Apple and expect you to go through a playground without any minders.
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