Gość: pijar
IP: *.nsw.bigpond.net.au
23.02.04, 07:09
Oddajmy glos innym. Oto wyznania Trishy Goddard, popularnej na pocz. lat 90-
tych pierwszej 'czarnej' reporterki i spikerki telewizyjnej w Australii,
ktore owego czasu ukazaly sie w dodatku Good Weekend do Sydney Morning Herald
w artykule pod tytulem 'Australia is the most racist country I've ever been
to'. Po tym artykule, juz nigdy wiecej Trishy Goddard w australijskiej
telewizji nie widzialem. Niedlugo po tym opuscila Australie i jest dzis
osobowoscia telewizyjna w Anglii.
I was born of a black west Indian mother and a red-headed, freckled father.
(...)
Dad's brothers and sisters had gone to Australia, but because he [my father]
had married a coloured woman, White Australia ruled him out. (It would have
been easier for us to get into South Africa at the time.)
(...)
Much later, hitch-hiking around the world, I came to Australia and wrote in
my diary, "It's green and lush, and arid and dry all the same time! Weather's
fantastic! But I could never live here. It's the most racist country I've
ever been to. It's like going back in time.
(...)
I met and fell in love with an Australian. He asked me to marry him, and I
followed him back to his homeland: the country in which I had said I would
never live. When I told my black hairdresser in London, she said I was
mad. "Australia is like South Africa for blacks," she said.
I waited in the Department of Immigration office in Chifley Square,
Sydney. "How clever of the Australian Government to punish these obvious
racists by making them work as staff here," I thought, as I watched two
bitter women mimic a polite, smiling Oriental gentleman, because his English
wasn't perfect. At least they didn't do it behind his back. No, these women
viciously and sarcastically welcomed coons, wogs, slopes, Lebos, the lot,
into wonderful, egalitarian Australia - whether they were immigrants with
thousands of dollars to invest or refugees who had spent the last few months
being tortured. If I sound bitter about that visit, I am. There was one
sweet, sympathetic lady behind the counter, however, and we all jostled to
see her.
On a visit to Melbourne to see my grandmother, I was physically
thrown out of a taxi, because the driver didn't want a "boong" in his cab.
When I asked an uncle what a "boong" was, he told me all about the "Abos" and
how they were all useless drunks. His attitude was, "Good on the cab driver.
You'll have to put up with that, because people will think you're an Abo."
My husband and I lived in Paddington in Sydney. I was always being
stared at, sometimes shouted at. trendy, liberal yuppies wanted to teach
their spoilt little offspring how cool it was not to get freaked out about
black people.So they would sit opposite me on the bus, pointing out at the
top of their informed voices my flared nostrils (good for hot climates) and
my fuzzy hair. Other passengers would either look out the windows in
embarrassment or would join in the "Let's learn about black people" lesson. I
would sit, blinking back tears, or leave the bus half a dozen stops too early.
And all the while, my husband's friends told me I should enjoy it.
People were just curious, they said. Once, on a train, a woman pulled my
hair, and shouted to her mate "'Ere, Raylene, have a feel of this!" And
still, my husband couldn't understand. He liked showing me off. All I wanted
to do was hide.
(...)
Then I started to get the letters. Dozens of them. They came mainly from
children, who had only ever known Australia as home, but felt they didn't fit
in. When they turned on the television, they never saw anybody who looked
like them. They went to bed at night anmd cried, wishing that when they woke
up God would make them white like the kids in the Weet-Bix ads. (...)
When I was made presenter of the ABC's 7.30 Report, the press went
mad. Every racist in the country came out of the closet. During my first few
nights on air, there was barely one phone call that criticised me without
criticising my colour. I had applied for a job as Trisha Goddard. I never set
out to be this country's first black anything! (...)
And as for all those pious media people who asked why an Aborigine didn't get
my job, they have been in ideal positions for years to train and employ
Aborigines.
