Today Thursday 9th June 2005 at 16.35 I was about to cycle home from the Bourke Street Mall, I looked around and saw
a person who looked nice so I decided to go over to say hello to the man sitting down.
We got talking and then introduced ourselves to each other, his name was John and my name is Roy, we then learnt about each other’s interests and became more interested in one another.
I asked John." where are you from? And John replied." I am from Perth: John then went on to say that he came over with his daughter to see his other daughter in Melbourne as she was born in Melbourne. Whilst talking about places I then asked John where are you from originally and John said Holland, and then I asked John what brings you to Melbourne, John then replied with the answer Perth in which instance I was quite amazed, but I told John that I wasn’t surprised as I have come to the conclusion that the people from Interstate, Intrastate, and Overseas are far more friendlier and
responsive than the Melbourne BORN and BRED citizens which puts Melbourne as an utter disgrace. As I told John about that he got a surprise, but I told him I have lived in Melbourne from 1949 when my family arrived in Melbourne. In those days the people were far friendlier all over Melbourne in those days; but in the last 15 years they have become quite unfriendly and self-centred. On the other hand the majority of people I have spoken to in all avenues like parks, pathways, bicycle tracks, places of interest, and many others who in most instances were more responsive; this in itself outlines those who are ELDERLY and from the other places I mentioned above as being the responsive; whereas the young generation except is the group that fits into that category; although there are a few who are more responsive and friendlier some of which work in specific areas where
friendliness is an important element in their jobs – they are in tourism, hospitals, eating places and others where they have a large lot of people coming and going from their place of employment. Those few young ones help to make people feel more at ease. It was even expected that a very few and far Elderly people were also un-responsive, which seems quite a surprise as friendliness is one of the most important elements of life. That experience made me write to the Premier, Mr Steve Brats in December 2004 to outline these points and as I had felt more needs to be done in order to make it be seen by the Victorians that Friendliness is an important element of life which needs to be well regarded. I also suggested to the Premier that in order to improve the Friendliness in order to impress tourists who will come to Melbourne to the Commonwealth Games in 2006, that the Victorians need to be educated by the MCC, Commonwealth Games, Parks Victoria where all groups use the Radio, TV, Newspapers of all kinds in order to advertise the factors relating to Friendliness, and finally to make distribution to the letter boxes so as to make all householders aware likewise. Those forms of awareness of Friendliness would benefit Melbourne and Australia, whereas if in the time leading up to the Games nothing is done then it could be that the ways in which the Victorians act in front of overseas tourists could on occasions put them off and may even bring them to the conclusion to not come back again; that in itself will lead up to 10 more making the same decision, which will further erode the Tourist Industry. I then got to the stage where John and I had to say good0bye to each other and we enjoyed each other’s company as well as having learnt a lot from each other during our conversations. When we finally went different way that afternoon it was a sad thing to have to go that way. Today is Monday 13th June 2005, which is a Public Holiday throughout Australia as the Queens Birthday Week-end. It was 10/30 am on Monday 13th June when I left home and headed towards Southgate. When Iarrived at Southgate I then parked the bicycle and then I Southgate; as I was walking down the path there was this sudden attention where as I was caught by this back seat to a bicycle for the parent to be carrying the young child, I continued on to do a few chores around I then decided to pose on that bicycle with an extension added on to the back; and to my amazement I was shocked to see my nephew Steven and his daughter on the back of his bike with Lachlan on his bike The person missing was Cassandra who was just standing and talking. That stunned everyone and Steven made claims that we will go to the Docklands soon; how long that will be goodness knows, we then said good-bye and went different ways. I then went to the ATM (Automatic Teller Machines) to get some cash; I had a look at several bookshops to see what they have on specials in order to take home some information of those prices, which will enable us to work out if possible.