What Do Australians Eat?

My hotel room has a fire with artificial coal in it. It must be gathered in fake mines by actors pretending to be miners.

Ross Noble - on twitter

I will not eat oysters. I want my food dead - not sick, not wounded - dead.

Woody Allen

"O Oysters," said the Carpenter,
"You've had a pleasant run!
Shall we be trotting home again?'
But answer came there none--
And this was scarcely odd, because
They'd eaten every one.

The Walrus and The Carpenter, Lewis Carroll

Fish and Chips À la Australienne

I recently "friended" someone I have never seen or met. It's easy enough to do, if you are on FaceBook. We have a mutual friend and the person I'd offered my FaceFriendship to, graciously accepted.

His name is Jonathan auf der Heide and he is making waves amongst the cinema literati for his movie, Van Diemen's Land.

"Van Diemen's Land" was made in Australia and has already been shown in a number of European countries. It is getting good audiences, not only because it is well directed, well acted, and set in a rather beautiful area of Australia, but because of its central theme which is cannibalism. And not the New Guinea tribesmen variety of cannibalism - cannibalism by white men, men from the British Isles. And it is based on HISTORICAL FACT. There's nothing us aussies like better than turning the screw into the Brits. Not only did they colonize our land, but they neglected to feed their subjects, and look what happened!

I hope "Van Diemen's Land" will come to America so I can see it. I am doing my level best. I've even written to the Food Channel recommending it. I told Jonathon about my endeavors but was greeted with a FaceBook silence. I assume that's because he is busy. Or perhaps he's hungry. I am cognizant of the film's tag-line: "Hunger is a strange silence". Yes I think that must be it. He's hungry.

Down Town Melbourne: Bill Clinton Ate HERE!

I'm becoming quite a FaceBook fan, though I tend to FaceLurk. I like the way I can log on and discover that a perky little blue cow has wandered in to Marie's paddock, or that Ginny has sent Peggy Ugg boots to remind her of Geelong. It is a veritable fairyland of fantasy.

Oh yes, Mr. Ross Noble of the hotel room with fake miners gathering fake coal for the fake fire, I can see that you are a FaceMan at heart! Hopefully someone will translate your fake miners into an 'app'. Or more to the point, perhaps someone will start a FaceBook rival, FakeBook, though I suspect that has been done already.

What has NOT been done, though, is virtual silences and virtual assuaging of hunger.

We can "friend" people and "un-friend" them. But how do we conspicuously ignore them? After all, how does Phil, who I un-friended, know that I'm cross with him? For all he knows, I've just been too busy to log on.

And although a plump little oyster might find its way to Anta's veggie plot, how can she eat it?

There must be some way of gratifying one's appetites. I have heard there's sex equipment that plug into one's PC, so that deviants can orgasm in chat rooms (apologies to Maggie - your secret is safe with me), but how can a keyboard serve up Peking Duck or a baguette? Virtual food just doesn't do it for me.

I think that Ross Noble is onto something with his pretend actors and fake coal. Now if he could only team up with Jonathan auf der Heide, perhaps their creative minds could together, solve the food problem.

Better still, they could hijack Bob Dylan. He is into helping feed the hungry and he obviously has at last lost any grip he had on reality. If nothing else, he could fund the project.

How about it boys?

I see a future for this.

After all, we are all virtual now. Even Bob. Especially Bob. Bob Unplugged. Bob Uncut, though with the references to cannibalism, perhaps not ....