Bart Bear's Blog

Monday was ANZAC Day, the anniversary of the landing of Australian and New Zealand troops at Gallipoli in 1915. It is a special and solemn day in Australia, when we remember all of our servicemen and women who have been killed in the wars. It is a national holiday but rather than ducking off to the beach most of us do something to remember our fallen friends and family. Members of our families (that's Dad's and Mum's) have been soldiers, sailors, airmen and civil auxiliaries in most of the wars that Australia has been involved in. In fact one of Mum's relatives gained the highest award for valour, the Victoria Cross, in WWI; you can read about him in an earlier post, just search Jeffries VC. Mum, Dad and I normally go to the Australian War Memorial for a while and just focus on remembering our relatives. Possibly the saddest places are the long walls covered with the names of the fallen. We will remember them. It has become a Canberra tradition that you place a poppy or a sprig of rosemary in the wall near the name of the one you are remembering. As you can see from this section of one of the walls, lots of other people do the same as us. War is a terrible thing but it is very important to remember the history, otherwise we might make the same horrible mistakes again.

Labels: Canberra