Skip to main content

Christmas Firsts #13 - Bondi Beach




If you are visiting Sydney (Australia) from another country at Christmas time, and especially if you are a backpacker, it has become a tradition to spend Christmas Day celebrating on Bondi Beach.   I can’t work out exactly when this first became a popular destination for Christmas tourists, but by the 1980’s there were numbers like 20,000 international visitors enjoying a summer Christmas Day at the beach.
For years, backpackers and Bondi Beach on Christmas Day were synonymous. The beach was transformed into a drunken party scene, as those from colder climes lived out their fantasy of spending Christmas on the beach under a scorching sun. 


A similar Bondi Beach Christmas Day happened annually until 1995 when a “riot” occurred. Media reports called the affray a “riot” and here is a description of what occurred according to a Waverly Council document.Aggressive drunken revellers mar Christmas Day on Bondi Beach. Lifeguards report being overwhelmed with 146 surf rescues, mainly due to drunken people entering the surf. The trouble begins in the late afternoon when cool weather moves approximately 20,000 backpackers off the beach and onto Queen Elizabeth Drive blocking the road. Aggressive young people (described as ‘male youths from the Western suburbs’) arrive in cars and clash with backpackers. Violence erupted and police attempts to move the crowd saw it turn on them, throwing bottles and trashing police cars. The event was described across the Sydney media as a ‘riot’. In the clean up Council removed 30 tonnes of litter at a cost of $20,000. For weeks afterwards broken glass was reported in the sand. 

In 1996, for the FIRST time, Bondi Beach on Christmas Day was declared an alcohol free zone. Waverly Council, in an attempt to maintain a spirit of goodwill to tourists, and to encourage a more family oriented scene on the beach enforces the ban on alcohol,. However, a party of food, drinks and entertainment is organised in the beach Pavilion for most of the day for about 3,000 people, while the rest enjoy a more peaceful Christmas on the beach outside. So my contention is- the idyllic Bondi Beach Christmas Day, so popular now with young and old alike, FIRST occurred in 1996 with the banning of alcohol on the beach. What is it really like? 


"We absolutely love it," says Natalie William, a 23-year-old backpacker from London ( Christmas 2016)
She is busy frolicking on the beach, showing off her full Santa body suit, hat and beard, as we talk about Christmas Day on the other side of the world.
"Normally, I'd just be at home and it would be cold, probably raining. This is so much better."
But she has to admit, not being able to drink on the beach was a slight disappointment.

Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Thanks for reading my blog and please share your thoughts about my blog post by leaving a comment.Your comment won't appear immediately as comments are verified before publication in an effort to reduce the amount of spam appearing. Anonymous comments will not be published.

Popular posts from this blog

Is it a mutant? Is it an alien? It's an octopus - or is it?

Have you ever thought how strange a creature the octopus is?  This week's fascination started when I asked the question, "What colour is an octopus when it's underwater?"  The answer is  "any colour it wants to be " -  An octopus' coloration depends upon its surroundings.  An octopus possesses the ability to alter its coloration depending on its immediate environment. This defensive technique protects the animal from predators and entices prey to come close to the animal . ((from  https://www.reference.com/pets-animals/color-octopus-be94f74fcdc74ebe)    . Why did I want to know the colour of an octopus? Because I wanted to draw octopus tentacles as mermaid hair for my art journal! Then, I began to think it might be considered a little too weird and even perverse to give a mermaid octopus hair.... Facebook friends assured me that this was not so, citing Medusa and her snake hair as a precedent, and even one friend said that she thought it was l...
Post a Comment
Read more

Christmas Countdown Characters #22

So close to Christmas and it's getting harder to find Christmas celebrities but today here's  a wily W character.  W is for Wilma . Yes I am Wilma but I am NOT today's Christmas celebrity.  Wilma the weasel  is the one of the main characters  in  T he Flight Before Christmas , a 2008 animated movie    and its sequel   Little Brother Big Trouble: A Christmas Adventure . The Flight Before Christmas centres around the problem of Niko, a small reindeer afraid of flying, and in search of his unknown father who is one of Santa's Flying Forces (that is, one of the eight main reindeer who pull Santa's sleigh)  Wilma is a street wise fearless singing weasel, who Niki and his surrogate squirrel father, Julius befriend while saving Santa from a wolf pack attack .   Long story short, the climax involves  Niko, Wilma and Julius killing the wolf leader, the Flying  Squad saving themselves in order to save Christmas, Niko...
Post a Comment
Read more

Lilly Pilly

Today is Australia Day. I chose a photo of some Lilly Pilly berries as a celebratory image for this national day. Lilly Pilly is  a common name for a plant, Syzygium smithii which grows mostly in Eastern Australia, from the northern  rain forests of Queensland, throughout NSW to the southern Wilson's Promontory in Victoria. In New Zealand it is called "monkey apple, but other names used in Australia, besides lilly pilly, are Eungella Gum and Coast Satinash. The largest Lilly Pilly recorded was found in Dingo Creek Flora Reserve, near Tenterfield where I once lived.  The tree now growing in my garden was once a small seedling which I was gifted when I left Woolgoolga, a small coastal town in northern NSW. Its name  is said to come from the Aboriginal word 'weelgoolga' describing the lilly pilly which grows in profusion there. It is probably no surprise that the lilly pilly berries are edible as bush tucker, and make a beautiful jam or jelly. I have even seen re...
Post a Comment
Read more