Sunny city where life's a beach

By Patrick Whiteley (China Daily)
Updated: 2009-03-12 09:49

Spending an afternoon on the beach is a good way for visitors to experience typical Sydney life.

A Sydney family feasts on a beach barbecue of oysters, shrimp, crabs and fish. Children splash about in the surf, men fish, women prepare food and everybody sunbathes under a glorious blue sky.

Suddenly a strange flock of weird water creatures appears. These floating beasts are three times the size of whales but have tall white wings protruding from their backs.

The locals soon realize these monsters are massive canoes carrying strangely colored people wearing strangely colored costumes.

"Warra, warra (go away)," are the first words they say.

Unfortunately for the Australian Aborigines, the foreigners decided to stay and over the next two centuries, my hometown of Sydney develops into one of the most beautiful, multi-cultural and modern cities in the world.

On board those first 11 ships were mostly convicts and until the 1840s, Sydney functioned as the world's remotest prison.

"Transportation to Sydney" were frightening words for an English prisoner to hear. If they were lucky enough to survive the five-month ocean voyage, they then had to face spear-throwing natives and a very inhospitable land.

Fortunately for me, "transportation" was just what great-great-great-great-great grandfather James received in 1820. After serving his seven-year sentence, he married an Irish woman and worked in a local church as a Sydney gravedigger.

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