ANZAC Day 2011

Today is ANZAC Day. ANZAC stands for Australian and New Zealand Army Corp. It is a day when we Australians, and New Zealanders, commemorate:

• the ANZAC landing at Gallipoli Peninsula on 25-April-1915, and the heroic failure that ensued. ‘ANZAC’ initially meant a soldier who had landed & fought at Gallipoli.
• the various meanings of war, sacrifice, mateship, larrikinism, loyalty, bravery

During and after WWII, it became a day to remember all Australians who fought & died in wars, peace-keeping and police actions: the Boer war, WWI, including WWII, the police action in Malaysia, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and from all the services.

It is a commemoration: a public display of individual, group and society’s remembrance and respect.
This year, a relative of mine who has marched in Sydney for years, will not march. He is not well enough. He will watch it, and look for his mates on, the ABC’s TV coverage. I rang him yesterday to wish him a good day.

Ode to the Fallen (‘the Ode’)

(from ‘For the Fallen, by Laurence Binyon)

They shall grow not old, as we that are left grow old:

Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn.

At the going down of the sun and in the morning,
We will remember them.

Lest We Forget.

John