Back to Uni.
Way back in the early nineties I had put Monash University down as my fourth preference to study Maths and Engineering. It was a Band One University after all! There was never a chance that I would need to resort to considering any of the preferences apart from my first one, such was my high school results being what they were I pretty much could pick any Uni in the country. And fortunate for me, for Monash is out in the sticks! (Then again, ANU is in a big country town, not that much better than Clayton…)
The surroundings were familiar enough: a massive sprawl of really ugly buildings and patches of grass for the students to sit on and “study”. And really random bits of concrete that sort-of look like they’re supposed to have some kind of aesthetic value. A bit like ANU! The theatre where we performed was located near the Robert Menzies building, a breathtaking monstrosity that seems less “Melbourne” and more “Communist Russia”. Ironic because it is near a building housing an architecture exhibition and near another building that is housing student elections. It is so big and SO UGLY! Rather than inspire you to higher learning, it just makes you want to throw something at it. Like your textbooks.
Anyway... it was interesting getting caught up in the student elections. In search of nourishment, we were faced with a wall of hopeful candidates, mainly in blue, purple and orange. And because us dancers are quite fit, active and youthful-looking (and, with a full day in the theatre, wearing crap rehearsal clothes) we often got mistaken for being a student which I guess is kind of flattering in a way. For the first couple of times. After that we were calling it harassment. But not before teasing a couple of candidates: “Have you voted?” “No.” “Well blah blah blah….” “Oh that’s nice. And by the way I’m not a student…”
Later on, during the bus trip back to the hotel after our last performance, we were ruing the missed opportunity to question some of the candidates about their stance on indigenous issues at Uni. Just to stir the pot. It seems reasonable to assume that, with the indigenous population being a minority in their own country, they would be even more outnumbered when you consider that there seems to be many international students here as well. But, still, it’s a bit disappointing that out of the three major groups, Activate (not to endorse any of the groups, by the way) are the only one that even mentions the word Indigenous in their publicity material (well, that’s from a brief scan of the election guide). The Aboriginal and Torres Strait Island flags were flying over one of the buildings near the theatre but I wonder how many of the students even noticed. Not criticising (yet!), just observing.
Tags: Monash University
