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THE GREEK AUSTRALIAN The oldest circulating Greek newspaper outside Greece email: VEMA [email protected] MAY 2008 Tel. (02) 9559 7022 Fax: (02) 9559 7033 In this issue... Our Primate’s View THE ‘UNDERMINING’ OF THE SYNODAL INSTITUTION (Part 1) PAGE 5/23 Federal Treasurer Wayne Swan, while delivering Labor’s first Budget WINDOWS TO ORTHODOXY The Earthly Heaven PAGES 8/26 - 9/27 Voters undecided ABS reveals snapshot on Budget of work and family Many voters, including families, appear to be undecided Just 17 per cent of voters believed welfare payments should not about Labor’s first Budget, a new opinion poll shows. be means tested. PAGE 7/25 According to the Galaxy poll taken for News Limited The $150,000-a-year household income threshold introduced in newspapers at the weekend, 44 per cent of voters were unsure the budget was endorsed by 34 per cent of voters, although 22 about the effects of the budget, while 33 per cent said they per cent supported an even lower level of $100,000. would be worse off and 23 per cent believed they would benefit. Nearly 70 per cent of households with children feared they The $150,000 threshold was also supported by 37 per cent of would end up worse off, or were undecided, despite being a key those it would likely affect - workers earning $70,000 or more. target of the budget handed down last week. In the preferred economic manager stakes, Treasurer Wayne Swan had turned the tables on his rival, gleaning the support of The most concerned group was the over-50s, with 41 per cent 36 per cent of voters, ahead of opposition treasury spokesman worried they would suffer, a sentiment shared by more than a Malcolm Turnbull on 25 per cent. third of voters earning under $70,000 a year, News Ltd reported. In good news for the federal government, 49 per cent of voters A Newspoll before the budget had Mr Turnbull on 35 per cent supported the tax cuts and the majority of Australians supported compared to Mr Swan on 29 per cent. means testing of the baby bonus and other family welfare AAP payments. GREEK ORTHODOX ARCHDIOCESE OF AUSTRALIA Vouliagmeni’s secret New Website The untamed treasure of Faskomilia is a haven for the busy capital’s nature lovers www.greekorthodox.org.au PAGE 16/34 ANOTHER WEBSITE BY PROSITOS.COM.AU The Greek Australian VEMA MAY 2008 2/20 TO BHMA ‘Selling an American Dream: Australia’s Greek Café’ A Nationally Touring Social History Exhibition Photographer Effy Alexakis and historian Leonard Janiszewski have once again Effy Alejxakis joined forces to produce a major social and Leonard Janiszewski May 25, 1977 history exhibition that portrays the Star Wars opens significance of Greek settlement in Australia. On 11 July 2008, the National Museum of Australia in Canberra will proudly launch their exhibition as the first venue of a projected 7 year national tour. The new exhibition, entitled Selling an American Dream: Australia’s Greek Café, On this day in 1977, Memorial Day puts forward the view that Greek cafés in weekend opens with an intergalactic Australia were a ‘Trojan Horse’ for the bang as the first of George Lucas' Americanisation of this nation’s eating blockbuster Star Wars movies hits and social habits from the very start of the American theaters. twentieth century. The incredible success of Star Wars-- seven Oscars, $461 million in U.S. For Alexakis and Janiszewski, Greek ticket sales and a gross of close to $800 cafés initially introduced American com- million worldwide- began with an mercial food-catering ideas, technology extensive, coordinated marketing push and products and later influenced the by Lucas and his studio, 20th Century development of cinema and popular Fox, months before the movie's release music. The Greek café they say, helped date. "It wasn’t like a movie opening," ‘transform’ Australian popular culture. actress Carrie Fisher, who played rebel leader Princess Leia, later told Time Their new exhibition not only looks at magazine. "It was like an earthquake." how this was done, but also the personal Beginning with- in Fisher’s words-"a stories of those involved. clearly reveals significant cross-cultural Selling an American Dream: Australia’s new order of geeks, enthusiastic young transmissions and transformations affect- Greek Café will be on display at the people with sleeping bags," the antici- The exhibition brings together historical ed by Greeks upon mainstream Australian National Museum of Australia in the pation of a revolutionary movie-watch- and contemporary photographs, oral his- culture. National Focus Gallery from 11 July to 16 ing experience spread like wildfire, tories and café memorabilia gathered over For its Australian audience, the message is November 2008. The exhibition is part of causing long lines in front of movie the 26 years that the couple have been clear: Every time you drink a Coke, enjoy the Vivid National Photography Festival. theaters across the country and around researching Australia’s Greek past. an ice cream or sweet chocolate treat, go the world. to the cinema, or listen to the latest popu- The curators are grateful to the exhibi- For both Alexakis and Janiszewski, this is lar music hit, you can thank Australia’s tion’s major sponsor, The Nicholas June 5, 1968 their most important display to date as it Robert F. Kennedy shot Greek settlers. Aroney Trust. At 12:50 a.m. PDT, Senator Robert F. Kennedy, a presidential candidate, is shot three times in a hail of gunfire in the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles. Five others were wounded. The senator had just completed a speech celebrating his victory in the California presiden- tial primary. The shooter, Palestinian Sirhan Sirhan, had a smoking .22 revolver wrested from his grip and was promptly arrested. Kennedy, critically wounded, was rushed to the hospital, where he fought for his life for the next 24 hours. On the morning of June 6, he died. He was 42 years old. On June 8, Kennedy was buried at Arlington National Cemetery, also the final rest- ing place of his assassinated older brother, President John F. Kennedy. MAY 2008 The Greek Australian VEMA TO BHMA 3/21 Editorial The prices we deserve appetite and reality clash: We cannot have what we want the market depends either on ministers’ largess (with nor can we pay the prices they ask. It’s time for everyone, taxpayers’ money) or the generosity of truck owners. This By Nikos Konstandaras - Kathimerini especially consumers, to act. When we show just how explains why one must pay about a million euros for a PSV much we are prepared to pay, when we demand quality at license. These documents do not only allow their holders When Calvin Klein was young, his father had a grocery lower prices, then we will have the products and services to transport goods but also to blackmail society in order to store in Harlem. There the designer learned his first lesson we deserve. increase their income. in marketing. Closed professions and closed minds There are more closed professions. There are notaries public, drug store owners, taxi drivers and many others “I would see grapefruits in the fruit-and-vegetable By P. Mandravelis Kathimerini department, and some of them were 29 cents a pound and - that enjoy monopolies in their provision of services. Even others were 49 cents,” he recalls in a recent issue of Vanity university education has become a closed sector (thanks to Fair. “What’s the difference between the two?” he asked Fortunately Greece has not been hit by a major natural the much-debated Article 16 of the Constitution). his father. “Some people like to pay 29 cents and some like disaster. It has not been struck by an earthquake on the to pay 49 cents,” his father replied. Leo Klein satisfied the scale of the one that rocked China, nor has it been swept Critics claim that market liberalization causes problems. broadest possible clientele by offering the same goods at by a cyclone like the one that has devastated Burma. That is true, sometimes. In a competitive market, there are different prices. good and there are bad products; there are expensive and Nevertheless, it is in a state of constant crisis. A series of there are cheap products. Clearly, not everything is a political decisions, legislative provisions, social contracts success in a free market, but one person’s flop is somebody In Greece, it seems that bitter experience of endemic and economic deals have spun a thick web that impedes else’s success. A bad or an expensive product that doesn’t poverty and the proverbial cunning of our merchants have any response to the changing international environment. sell well will inevitably be replaced by another. No one can made everyone wary of cheap goods. “Cheap meat goes to The latest example is the strike by public service vehicle prevent another entrepreneur from offering a better the dogs,” old-timers would say. Only the desperate would (PSV) drivers. A small group of people have the power to alternative. buy cheap things, knowing they were being cheated by cause a major crisis, causing long queues at fuel stations. buying overpriced rubbish. When the Greeks finally got The country has no other option: It will either yield to the State intervention breeds failure, both on a social level (see some money they went after “good things” with a demands of a small group of vested interests or it will end communism) but also on a sectoral level. Bad and vengeance. And the “good” was also expensive, be it food, up in deadlock.