A Migrant Tale

I have known Harry (derived from Leonhard) well for much longer than any of my own seniors (including my own parents).

A childhood in Austria, detained as an enemy alien in England after flight from Hitler (alone in the nick of time after Kristallnacht - he was briefly arrested, leaving parents who perished), sent to Australia for internment. The Dunera trip here must have been unpleasant with mistreatment by the British military guards (see a good wikipedia account : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMT_Dunera ), but Harry was always afterwards explicitly thankful for the opportunities (especially university education) that being an Australian gave.  The train trip for internment at Hay climaxed at the sight of, and being given, butter from a half pound block, and jam, for his bread.
He volunteered for the army and served within Australia. Later, his wife strongly vetoed him joining up again for Korea.
He made a career as a chemical analyst in the Commonwealth public service (Customs), including  a posting in Canada for six months which he really enjoyed, and it provided a memorable experience for his young family.
He was an existentialist and intellectual who made buying good books from Reader's Feast a hobby, was happiest reading Shakespeare, Proust, and Goethe, or listening to Stravinsky, enjoyed opera (strangely he loved Wagner's), theatre, and movies.
He hand built a house at Mount Martha, and made furniture and remodelled the kitchen for the home in Ashburton.
He was very generous financially to family and other individuals,  and also in constant support of Melbourne University. 
Harry died last Sunday 30 June, aged 91. There was a private funeral yesterday afternoon.




 Lino cut print?  Hanging in Harry's study, given by Ludwig Hirschfield-Mack, a camp inmate who is also exhibited in the NGV.

Nature Strip

We awoke this morning to find that in the night (alright, we didn't go out the front door yesterday afternoon) a row of gum trees had sprouted on our nature strip without warning.
We didn't get one right outside, and one neighbour told the planters to get away from his bit of the strip, and they obliged.

Now, we're in favour of street trees, but the proximity to the street elms is ridiculous. What's going on here??

Conspiracy theory #1: The Council wants to forestall a possible plan to copy the current Gardening Australia series starring that nice bearded chap on ABC1 with residents  planting a full scale vege garden along what in Sydney is called the "verge".

Conspiracy theory #2: Beset with complaints of cracking walls caused by street elm roots, the Council will remove the offenders shortly. If so, the Council may not be aware that unless every last root is removed (impossible) the remaining roots fight to create thousands of new elms, as has been demonstrated when the Council cut roots out of our side gutter a couple of months ago. Since then a weekly elm hunt has been a highlight of gardening: the number of baby elms summarily dealt with so far is too  large to estimate, and we know the roots are still bursting with life energy.

Conspiracy theory #3: Concerned about resident objections to a planned new apartment block with reduced parking requirements, the Council reckons that moving the trees from the road to the nature strip will provide room for several more car parks.

Intelligence sources may furnish a further briefing when the situation is clarified.