Melbourne Musings-1

It is 'midsumma' in Melbourne. It is so hot here that it could give Chennai an inferiority complex.

It makes me feel nostalgic , however. It is very much like the scorching heat during the summer holidays of my childhood back in Karaikudi, Tamil Nadu when the you could see through the beams of light of an approaching car, whatever moisture in the soil at the time of sunset rise in faint streams of vapour against the black background of the tarred road. Even after sundown, the heat is oppressive owing to radiation from the surrounding concrete.

The residential units are not designed to handle this aberration in the weather this time of the year. Sooner, summer will give way to cooler times. There is no air conditioner in most homes though room heaters are invariably present. Day light extends past 9 p.m. The women wear shorts or skirts with hemlines exposing much of their legs like polished wood.

Melbourne was founded as recently as 1835. One enterprizing grazeir-businessman from Tasmania and part-time explorer by the name John Batman, signed an agreement with some aboriginal tribesman off Port Philip. Port Philip is an inland bay of considerable proportions and the areas around it were inhabited by the Australian aboriginal tribes whose names I have given up remembering. The white man had not set foot in those places till then. Travelling up the Yarra river John Batman discovered hospitable land with fresh water source. He signed a agreement with the aboriginal tribes for about 1600 acres which stirred considered interest among  the settlers. This was the first instance of any white man making a deal for land with the indigenous people instead of merely occupying it and driving them away. The government of New South Wales ( there was no government in victoria then) promptly declared it null and void on the ground that the tribals did not possess title to the land in the first place, so as to nip any legal precedent in the bud. This lead to another enterprising young man, freshly released from prison , come with his some of his compatriots and settle in the same place. He was Fawkner. There is a beautiful park named after him today. While Batman died soon after he settled in 1836 in Melbourne, Fawkner remained and thrived as a member of legislative assembly till he died in 1869. The Melbourne public library has beautiful hand drawn maps of early Melbourne along the Yarra River with the settlers names and their habitats marked on it.

If you ask me, as far as natural endowments go, Melbourne is nowhere near our cities of Bombay, Kolkatta , Delhi or Bangalore ( Madras is another case altogether, it was described as 'most ill-suited for commerce that surprisingly did considerable sea-borne trade' in an old Encyclopedia passed on as a heirloom in my home). But the foresight with which the city fathers and the various Governers appointed by Queen Victoria planned the settlements and legislated to govern them is truly amazing. Mind you, even today, after decades of migration from all over, one in every five Australians can trace their ancensters to convicts. ( There is a site www.ancestry.com.au devoted to it) In those days, almost all, barring those in Her Majesty's service, must have been convicted of serious felony - thank good ness, they did not maim or kill convicts in victorian England as is done even to this day in the lands of 'the most egalitarian faith'.

I will give you an example of this foresight. When I was working in a Project in the Central Business District, the road next my office had a Pub that was started in 1853. On the opposite side of the road is a building which in 1860s served as a sheet-metal fabricating unit. The road between both these a clear 100 feet wide. When there were just a few thousand people and horse drawn carts, the layout of the roads were created that would befit a city of 40 million that Melbourne is today!

Melbourne is an example of what good city planning and governance can do to wealth-creation.