Purity Control

I had intended to write about my adventures with my brother in New Zealand, but university work has gotten in the way. I will write about that trip, pictures included, at some future point, hopefully starting this week. This last week has had some newsworthy events, included the discommendation of a particularly powerful sports team. It remains to be seen how far the repercussions will reach.

I returned to Canberra from New Zealand on the 17th and almost immediately I had to retool my thinking for university. The 2-week break was a welcome respite but it didn't take too long to get back into the rhythm of scholastic activity. This is now the 2nd half of the semester and all are anxious about the upcoming exams; I know I am.

I received an interesting letter from the Australian Electoral Commission the other day stating that I was not enrolled to vote at my current address. Under Australian law, both registration and voting are compulsory under penalty of monetary fine. While that is all well and good, it overlooks the fact that I am not an Australian citizen and, therefore, not entitled to vote at all. Luckily, the form had a box which I could tick informing the agency that I am not an Australian citizen and that should be the end of the matter. Many decades ago, it wouldn't have mattered. A former professor of mine, Dr. Martin Rudner, stated that during the Gough Whitlam Affair in the 1970s, while he was travelling through Australia, he, as a Canadian citizen, was also obliged to vote. What an odd country this is that takes voting so seriously that even non-citizens had a duty.

2 nights ago, I was invited to a Turkish dinner at a restaurant called Harem in the suburb of Kingston. After some misdirection, where we ended up in the neighbouring suburb of Griffith, myself and 3 companions found ourselves at the appropriate establishment. We ordered a small dinner banquet that was delicious, although slow in coming. A particular centrepiece was a belly dancer who performed a short number for the patrons. I'm not a great fan of Turkish cuisine but this dinner was pretty good. I won't frequent a Turkish restaurant for some time, but I'll keep them in mind from now on.

The big news in sports is the terrible dishonour visited upon the Melbourne Storm rugby league team. It has been brought to light that the club has deliberately violated the salary cap imposed by the league as revealed in secret account books found in a search of the club headquarters. As punishment, the team has been stripped of all competition points acquired to date, it cannot acquire anymore points for the remainder of the season (guaranteeing a last place finish) and, a bit bizarrely, has been stripped of its 2 championship titles in 2007 and 2009. Curiously, the opposing teams will not be granted the championships meaning that, technically, no one won the championship in 2007 and 2009. I'm not sure that I would have imposed that last penalty. It's not like the team bribed an official or fielded otherwise ineligible players, they won only by playing better than the other teams. It's also a bit of an absurd penalty if you think about it. Anyway, the NRL is contemplating further civil suits while it will be left up to the Victorian or NSW police to lay criminal charges. Needless to say, this has shocked the rugby community especially as the NRL was trying to expand its profile in Melbourne, traditionally the home of aussie rules. The Super 14 Rugby Union league is also expanding into Melbourne and it remains to be seen how this scandal will affect those plans.

Today was also one of the most important days on the Australian calendar, ANZAC Day. It's sort of like Remembrance Day for Australians. It commemorates the disastrous Gallipoli landings in World War One of the Australia and New Zealand Army Corps. It has since expanded to commemorate all Australian soldiers lost in war; New Zealand also celebrates this day. As the holiday falls on a Sunday, tomorrow is a holiday which will give me more time to do my school work. There is no rest for the weary.

Big Wins

As I'll be in New Zealand for the next 2 weeks, travelling around with my brother, I might as well post an update today. Luckily I finished the assignment I needed to so it means no working vacation; I'll get to relax as much as possible. In other good news, there have been some big wins in my world recently.

A few days ago the ANU team won the Jessup Moot, the World Cup of international law moots. It was held in Washington, DC this year and the ANU team took the championship. Naturally, the law school and the university have taken full advantage of this and I am sure that the winning team will be lauded as heroes when they return. An acquaintance of mine, Rohan Kapur, was on the winning team. I guess they deserve congratulations.

The other big win was Fenner Hall winning the Interhall Trivia Competition, again. This makes it 4 or 5 years in a row, I think, though one year we tied with John's College. They way it worked this year was that each college had 3 teams and each college's team's score would be added up to find the winner. Each individual team that won would also receive prizes. The topics were geography, history, famous faces, science, literature, sports and entertainment. Each team selected their "lightning round", the round in which correct answers were worth double. My team, Fenner 2, selected geography, the first round, and a good thing too. We answered all questions correctly including the one with the number of Canadian time zones, which, I'm sorry to say, I nearly got wrong but I caught myself almost immediately. The other Fenner teams did extremely well too and the final tally proved interesting. Fenner 3 tied with another college for third place while Fenner 2 and 1 tied for first! With 3 of the top 4 teams from Fenner, it came as no surprise that we won the competition. We're still the smartest residence, either despite or because were are off campus. Hopefully this wasn't my last trivia night but I'll have to see how my GDLP goes. Maybe I'll be able to get one more in.