December 1966 School Magazine

Brisbane Girls' Grammar School Magazine

December, 1966

Brisbane Girls' Grammar School Magazine

December, 1966

THE ESCAPE It is wedged between two old office blocks, half empty now, since the war. Actually, it is the basement of a disused ·ware- house. There is no outward sign of activity except, perhaps, for a drab figure skulking noiselessly along the footpath to disappear like a shadow, down the unlit stair-well. Standing there, it is hard to realize that the throbbing in- tensity of the city is reaching the height of its midday crescendo only three blocks away. Here, a mighty stillness broods over a long, deserted, concrete jungle of warehouses. Pigeons strut across the street, from the curb, into the gutters, and up to the window ledges, all the while contentedly cooing a drowsy melody. "Git outa that!" Upstairs a woman yells, crudely shattering the silence. Her coarse voice is high-pitched and cracked from hard drinking. Doors slam and finally a sullen girl stumbles out of an alleyway, along the footpath, and retreats into the abyss at the bottom of the stairs. A weedy youth with spots emerges from the depths of a doorway on the other side of the street. He cautiously fol- lows her-a dog cringing, tail between his legs, waiting for some- one to give him a blow. Following them down the stairs one finds oneself in a long, inadequately lit basement. The sullen girl puts a coin into a bat- tered juke-box. A scratchy old Chubby Checker number grinds to a stop, giving place to doleful, sentimental blues . The cavern is full-of cigarette smoke, thick music, and the aroma of stale cof- fee. People sit on the floor in scattered groups around trestles supported by fruit boxes. Tucked under the stairs, Joe, the pro- prietor, has his office, and his daughter runs the refreshment counter. No bones are made about supplying alcohol to minors . Joe has a neat little business supplying these destitutes, and the joint was quite a dope centre, before the last police raid. In a corner, un9er a light, two scraggy youths concentrate on their chess-board ( hired at the counter for three shillings) . Beside them three intellectual individuals play a boisterous game of "Snap", causing the chessmen to swear violently each time the table is slapped at the shout "SNAP!" A group of angry young men with a. guitar and a bongo drum sing about the injustice of war and the futility of women. One is a frustrated poet rejected by the publishers. Another is a truck driver affected by a transport strike and the others are university students on vacation. One of the latter occasionally 51

in the face of colour distinction? Above all, how can an Abori- ginal provide, at the least, a middle-class home and secondary education for his children, on his pitifully small \,\iage? · We must face these facts squarely in the face. An air of dangerous complacency shrouds Australia and it is up to Austra- lian youth to wipe it out. Complacency says that the Abo. has done all right all these years, why change? The Abo. hasn't the intelligence to reach the white's standard in education or housing -why waste time helping him? Let sleeping dogs lie. Look at the United States and South Africa and their nasty racial problems -we don't want that, just don't start anything which could turn nasty . . .. Wht right have we to say that the Aboriginal must stay edu- cationally, financially, and socially inferior? Remember the Uni- versal Declaration of Human Rights-the right to an adequate standard of life, the right to education, the right to participate in the cultural life of the community? Well, what do you think - or .have you never thought? Would you adopt an Aboriginal orphan into your home? Would you go out with an Aboriginal boy of the same standards as your white friends? Would you happily accept and mix with an Abo- riginal family next door? Would you?

MARGARET DELAMOTHE, VIE, GIBSON HOUSE

- !SABELLA RICHARD, VIE, GIBSON· HOUSE 50