Anzac Day

I got to the Anzac Day service at 11 am this morning, which featured much threatening darkness of cloud and spatterings of rain.  It’s held outdoors at the local War Memorial gardens, mowed and done up for the occasion.  I think the weather is why the proceedings were unusually short, with less pontificating and no singing of Recessional or Abide With Me, [though the band did play Abide without singing happening] which was rather disappointing.  I like the music without being a believer at all.

The only song was the anthem, Advance Australia Fair, which a lot of the considerable crowd seemed not to know.   Only two of its verses ever get sung and only one on this occasion, so not that hard.   The rest of the song is a terrible cringe to Britain even though it was written by a Scot.  This was the first unrestricted “year back”  since the ceremony was cancelled in 2020 due to plague among us.

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