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nimrod
Joined: 24 Feb 2002
Posts: 9209
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 Posted: Sat Apr 21, 2012 12:00 pm Post subject: |
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Not meaning to take away the significants of a dawn service or simple respect for our fallen, but I have a mate that regards anzac day as 2 up day.
He looks forward to getting into a game of 2 up all year round and saves his pennies all year to have his flutter and a damn good time while he is about it.
Frank
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yar76e
Joined: 13 May 2006
Posts: 240
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| Posted: Sat Apr 21, 2012 12:20 pm Post subject: |
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In 2004 I was fortunate enough to be posted to a small village called Atori on the island of Malaita (Solomon Isands) on ANZAC day. I was one of a couple of Australians there and was asked by one of the Tongan soldiers what ANZAC day was all about and the relationship with the New Zealanders.
My best response that the Australian / New Zealand thing is like two brothers in the back yard, we are allowed to fight with each other, call each other names and generally run amoke, BUT if anyone else does anything at all to either of the brothers... stand back and prepare to receive.
Our countries have shared blood on battle fields serving the wishes of governments both national and foreign and that is a bond that is forged much deeper than any attack or insult can destroy
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ironmaiden
Joined: 26 Jan 2008
Posts: 1434
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| Posted: Sun Apr 22, 2012 4:25 am Post subject: |
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Great post, I have enjoyed reading every one 
To me ANZAC Day is about more than Gallipoli, more than a single day in a single battle in a single war.
Every ANZAC day me & my 3 boys get up around 4.30am we don’t say much, we cook up some eggs & bacon on vegemite toast, have a cup of coffee and get ready to drive into town for the Dawn service….
I’ve never gone to war & that’s thanks to the many thousands who have gone before me.
This quote from Charles Bean says so bloody much…
“Many a man lying out there at Pozières or in the low scrub at Gallipoli, with his poor tired senses barely working through the fever of his brain, has thought in his last moments: “Well – well – it's over; but in Australia they will be proud of this.” Charles Bean, 1918
And as The Last Post echoes through the dawn I always think ‘I’m so Lucky….I’m Australian and proud to be!’
Ironmaiden
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TheBream
Joined: 17 Apr 2004
Posts: 3798
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| Posted: Tue Apr 24, 2012 9:24 pm Post subject: Re: |
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| yar76e wrote: |
When I was younger and had not experienced a little more of life, it was a day off for me as well.
I came from a small country town and worked with a Vietnam Vet who I became very good friends with. His best mate, Sammy Graham was killed while on tour with 4RAR. In 1997 I was in the re raised 4RAR and stood in front of his memorial at Holsworthy. It was very moving to know the link and to have heard the stories of what he was like and who he left behind.
Go to a dawn service, you will be amazed at the spirit you will feel when the minutes silence occurs. I am not ashamed to say that I have had moments when it has moved me to tears.
I guarantee you, you will be all the better for the experience. |
well get F###ed isn't it a small world
i too was in the re-raised 4RAR so no dout we know each other started in 4platoon and was moved beofe the mayasia trip to 6platoon
me it means freedom and whist i have missed more than enoght dawn services over the last ten years i'm not going to anymore
this years plans are to go to the dawn serivce and then come home and get the boat ready and hit the rivers chaseing the most aussie fish going with the family (australian bass) i call it 'operation Duty First and Freedom'
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TheBream
Joined: 17 Apr 2004
Posts: 3798
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| Posted: Tue Apr 24, 2012 9:44 pm Post subject: |
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ironmaiden
Joined: 26 Jan 2008
Posts: 1434
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| Posted: Wed Apr 25, 2012 3:58 am Post subject: |
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Good morning Aussies 
Happy Anzac day to you
I would have thought eatmypilchards post might have had a few more members posting their thoughts on ANZAC DAY?
Where ever you maybe today, whatever part of this beautiful country your enjoying, be safe and remember what these men & women did for us 
Ironmaiden
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carplips
Joined: 11 Sep 2005
Posts: 1505
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| Posted: Wed Apr 25, 2012 5:26 am Post subject: running |
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god morning , gotta go running late for the service...........
regs carpy
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EatMyPilchard
Joined: 14 Jan 2007
Posts: 1934
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| Posted: Wed Apr 25, 2012 8:22 am Post subject: |
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Wow.
I was really quite surprised by the volume of people. An estimated 35,000 attended in Melbourne in pretty ordinary weather. It was interesting to hear some of the stories. Here's one they spoke about...
One well-known Waler was Major M. Shanahan’s mount, ‘Bill the Bastard,’ who bucked when asked to gallop. Yet, during World War I, when the Major found four Australians outflanked by the Turks, ‘Bill the Bastard’ carried all five men – three on his back and one on each stirrup - three quarters of a mile .75 miles (1.21 km) through soft sand at a lumbering gallop – without first bucking.[2]
At the end of the war, 11,000 surplus horses in the Middle East were sold to the British Army as remounts for Egypt and India. Some horses that were categorised as being unfit were destroyed. Also, some light horsemen chose to destroy their horses rather than part with them, but this was an exception, despite the popular myth that portrays it as the fate of all the war horses. Parting with their Walers was one of the hardest events the light horsemen had to endure. A poem by "Trooper Bluegum" sums up the men's sentiment:
I don't think I could stand the thought of my old fancy hack
Just crawling round old Cairo with a 'Gyppo on his back.
Perhaps some English tourist out in Palestine may find
My broken-hearted Waler with a wooden plough behind.
No: I think I'd better shoot him and tell a little lie:--
"He floundered in a wombat hole and then lay down to die."
May be I'll get court-martialled; but I'm damned if I'm inclined
To go back to Australia and leave my horse behind.
From Australia in Palestine, 1919
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ironmaiden
Joined: 26 Jan 2008
Posts: 1434
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| Posted: Wed Apr 25, 2012 8:27 am Post subject: |
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Great stuff eatmypilchard. What a poem. I'm speachless that's twice today
Again great poem!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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EatMyPilchard
Joined: 14 Jan 2007
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