Sport is the most visible way in which Australian-ness seems to be expressed © Getty Images

Does Australia matter? The topic came up over lunch with two Australian journalists in Melbourne at the very start of this trip. To be fair the question barely came up again unless I raised it, so it isn't as if that is such a thing to worry about. But now, as we leave, is as good a time as any to revisit, maybe broaden it.

We were talking of sacred cows in various countries; most nations have a few. One of the journalists said the matter of whether Australia matters to the rest of the world is as close to a sacred cow as you can have here. Australia was a major ally in the war on terror, he said, adding, even if the US President thought it was Austria.

It is worth reflecting upon. The country is so far from much of the world. It is also out of place; its neighbours are vastly different cultures and peoples. Perhaps that's why there is a need not only to be distinct but to be involved and known.

Ads about Australia Day, great over-the-top stereotyping ones, seemed to suggest so. A number of other ads loved to begin with 'Australians love to do this' or 'In Australian homes' or some such (in Tasmania replace with Tasmanians of course). I only caught snippets and bytes of the news during my stay. I looked for Australian links to big, international news; an Australian casualty in the Haiti earthquake, how Australians fared in a TV and films awards show and even something about Australian security after the failed attempt to blow up a plane in the US. But I only did so because a colleague had told me to keep an eye out for it, as he reckoned it was Australia trying hard to be part of the world.

This happens everywhere, though, and it is increasingly the nature of news, to localise it, to make it relevant to its viewers; dog no longer bites man, dog bites you, or an Australian, Pakistani or Indian.

But in no other field or realm of life globally does Australia seem to matter as much as in sports. It is how I first came to know of Australia in early life; squash players, cricketers and hockey stars who mingled with and often beat Pakistani counterparts. Later only did I find out about Rolf Harris and Kylie (I preferred Danni because she was more anti-establishment somehow), Vegemite, 4X, Neighbours, Home and Away but later Heartbreak High. Much later, I learnt a little about how Australia came to be and the story of the Aborigines.

But sport is an opportunity for Australia to be relevant; few sports that they take part in actively are they poor at. Football (soccer) is picking up and it would be no surprise if a decade or so down the line they become more than just competitive. Having not heard much Australian music, or seen much of the country's art, sport is the most visible way in which Australian-ness seems to be expressed. They just know how to do sport, how to play it, structure it, nurture and develop it and respect it. Few countries show the world how important sport is to life.

There is much more to the country than just sport. Life, in all its tastes, seems to be lived well in the bigger cities. Certainly in Sydney the question of whether Australia matters just because it is so much a part of today's world. It is, like the other great, big cities, an overwhelming multicultural experience and there is so much of the rest of the world in it - as well as its own character - that it must matter, to many parts of the globe. Melbourne has become much more cosmopolitan just in the last few years apparently.

But it was in Tasmania, beautiful, lonely and a little spooky Tasmania, where we felt at one remove from the world. The clouds of Hobart were so angry and so alive, so vivid that it often seemed they were conspiring with the city's people as they floated on by, sniggering at some little shared secret or joke outsiders didn't know about. Here, it felt, whether Australia - or Tasmania as may be politically correct - mattered or not didn't really matter at all. The rest of the world didn't seem to matter much to Hobart.

At the plainest level of course, whether a country matters in the way the world goes round doesn't really matter anyway, for the world will go round regardless and the country will too. Living in Pakistan it sometimes seems like it might not actually be a bad thing if people stopped noticing for a while. And certainly it isn't as if the deepest imprint on my mind as I leave is that Australia is obsessed with proving itself. That would be that everyone wears skinny jeans here.

A late discovery: many young kids play tape-ball cricket here in their backyards. Perhaps Pakistan might be able to beat them at that. Perhaps not.

	Marais Erasmus is all geared up for his first Test © Cricinfo Ltd

At least four people in Cape Town will be tuning into the India-Bangladesh Test in Chittagong. A father, a wife and twin sons. Marais Erasmus is making his debut as a Test umpire tomorrow. He is chubby, friendly and slightly nervous. “Butterflies are good. I mean you should get them in your tummy, otherwise what’s the point? It is a big match for me,” he said with a laugh.

His father, who thinks his son can do no wrong, is crazy about the game and watched the first Test in Cape Town after the Second World War. Marais' wife and kids watch cricket just to see him umpire. Last month Erasmus officiated in an ODI in Rajkot which had a 5.30am start in Cape Town. “Apparently my sons got up bright and early and saw me walking out to the middle. They shouted out in joy and then went back to sleep!”

Erasmus acknowledges his experience of umpiring in the Duleep Trophy last year helped him prepare for his ODI series in India, but not for the noise levels in the stadiums. “I was, of course, told about it by the other umpires but that noise is something else. I will never forget it and you can’t prepare for something like that.”

Erasmus had more unforgettable incidents from his umpiring life to share. The funniest? “Nantie Hayward was batting in a domestic game and there were probably four or five people in the stands. One of them shouted out: ‘Nantie, if you hit a four now, I will give you 50 rands!’ His voice boomed across the empty stadium. The next ball Nantie swung to the boundary and shouted, ‘Where are those 50 rands?’"

The worst decision? He chooses one from his days umpiring for Under-13s. “He went for a sweep and it went off the toe end of the bat and I gave him plumb lbw. The square-leg umpire told me my mistake and I called the boy back. I am sure there will be many more like that in the future.”

The talk shifted to the pressures of umpiring games involving batsmen like Sachin Tendulkar. “I am aware he is a legend but you have to be truthful to your job and I won’t be letting it affect me. I also like to watch Virender Sehwag bat. He is exciting since you don’t know what he will do. The man I liked watching the most was Shane Warne and I have heard how he used to put pressure on the umpires.”

Just then, Billy Bowden, Erasmus’ umpiring partner, passed us by. Even as Erasmus laughed at the question of how he handled umpiring with a superstar like Billy, Bowden replied: “He [Erasmus] is super, I am a star, together we are the superstars.”

	Boating on the Derwent River © Getty Images

When we first arrived here a few nights ago, it seemed as if we had walked into Northern Exposure, that early to mid-90s US series about a New York doctor moving to a town in Alaska. Isolation is instantly felt, befitting of a town at one edge of the world, but not that of an underdeveloped one. Hobart is fine and functional. It just moves to its own pace, one similar to other small, port cities.

As a Hollywood actress, Hobart would be Ava Gardner, with its aloof and distant beauty. Hills of a few colours, shapes and textures skirt it.

The Derwent river lurks through it, opening to greater things. The view from the press box at the Bellerive Oval, looking out at the River end, is outstanding and distracting. Hills creep up on either side of the Oval, but are kept apart by the Derwent , which seems to form a lovely crescent around the back-end of the ground from where we sit.

Mount Wellington - calling it a hill, as I did, can be offensive - overlooks the city with a benign but still stern care. The cap can often get snowy and the weather in the city is as moody as a young, wayward rockstar.

The Tasman Bridge, which connects Hobart to its eastern suburbs and crosses the Derwent, intrigues me the most. A great tragedy visited it in 1975, when a bulk carrier, the Lake Illawarra, crashed into it, causing a section of it to collapse. Four cars fell off it and 12 people died in all.

Three taxi drivers have spoken to me about it, including one who says he was just driving off it when it happened. That kind of disaster leaves a stronger imprint in smaller cities and apparently there was a collective social fallout in the days after the incident.

Somehow, it adds to the sad grace of the city.

Paul Collingwood admires his massive equipment © Getty Images

Cricket bats have become bigger and bigger in recent years to the extent that they are like railway sleepers. However, Paul Collingwood has taken it to the extreme by using one that really wouldn't look out of place on the West Coast Mainline.

He has been using the extra-large bat, which weighs around four-and-a-half to five pounds compared to the normal weight of just under three pounds, during nets on the South Africa tour.

"It's something the Durham second-team coach Jon Lewis came up with about six months ago,” he said. "He asked the manufacturer to make him the biggest bat possible, just to see if someone could use it in Twenty20.

"I tried it in the nets as a bit of a laugh. The weight of it makes you bring the bat down very straight and play the ball as late as possible.”

The by-product of using such a heavy piece of wood is that when Collingwood returns to his normal weight bat it feels as though he is batting with a toothpick. "When you go back to your normal bat, your bat-speed is exceptional because you can't even feel a cricket bat in your hand,” he said.

However, regardless of size of Collingwood’s bat, plenty of balls having been hitting the middle in recent weeks after he made 40 from 188 deliveries to help England save the Newlands Test. There is only one problem about the extra piece of kit he is now lugging around in his bag.

"I've found it of benefit to me,” he said. “It might not work for everybody - and Phil Neale, our manager, isn't very happy with the excess baggage.”

The Manganiyar Seduction though, was as much a visual piece as it was aural © WireImage

Last night I saw a kid breakdancing to some Rajasthani folk music. As an image it worked better than I thought it might. The occasion was the opening night of the Sydney Festival, a three-week affair, the first night of which is always free. The festival is a sprawling one, showcasing theatre, art, dance, comedy and much music from all over the world. It reminds me of the Edinburgh Arts Festival, though only if that had been cross-bred with some music festival from the UK summer.

We arrived at Hyde Park with just enough time left in the night for The Manganiyar Seduction to seduce us. They are a group of folk musicians from Rajasthan and the music has all the elements of the desert region. If you were from Pakistan's Sindh, for example, the Sufi strains will come through.

There are traces of Qawwali as well, but as the dhols took over, crescendoing until it seemed they couldn't anymore and going further still, the most overwhelming memory - and music can be so associated with memories and experiences of times, places, smells and people - was of Pappu Saeen and his dhols at the Shah Jamal shrine
on Thursdays in Lahore. A similar frenzy slipped into the air here, unnoticed amid smoke, strange lights and a quiet sky.

Pappu Saeen was also involved briefly with that supreme Lahore percussionist outfit Overload, whose first album a few years back was among the freshest, most compelling to come out of an innovative, energetic local scene. They would've been good here, and appreciated.

The Manganiyar Seduction though, was as much a visual piece as it was aural. The musicians were placed in a box structure with 35 compartments, each housing one, or a group, of the artists. Each compartment was lit up with carnival lights and framed by red curtains, pulled back as each musician joined the piece, inspired by the red light district of Amsterdam. It smelt like Amsterdam as well.

Al Green was also playing somewhere, presumably where the largest crowd was headed to. I've seen him live once, so passing on this was easier. The pathways of Hyde Park were bedecked with lasers and smoke and bad BO. Sydney likes to party. Already we've been here for two in barely over a week.

Trapeze artists soared through the night air and there was wonderful jazz and reggae floating around the park elsewhere. AR Rehman will be around at some point over the festival. Rarely has a dead rubber in Hobart looked as unappetizing as this.

Covering cricket is certainly not a hardship and this tour has been especially enjoyable to follow. However, there are still moments that leave you cursing. Such as when you can’t find any internet access just as you have two pieces to file.

The final day of a Test is often hectic because all the issues from the game are wrapped up, but at Newlands it was extra busy courtesy of England’s latest great escape. Does Graham Onions know how much extra work he creates?

With two stories written and filed I decided to finish the day’s work back at the hotel rather than sit on my lonesome in the Cape Town press box. That idea was fine, it had worked on previous days, so I packed up and headed back to my room which was only a 10-minute walk from the ground.

Got there, unpacked the laptop and turned it on. Searched for the wireless – there it was, not very powerful but usable – and went to connect. Then the fun started. I paid for the connection period I needed and got my log-in number only for the server to tell me it couldn’t register me. Maybe I’d put the number in wrong? Tried again, nope. OK, this wasn’t looking good.

I tried two more times. Still nothing, so I got on the phone to the help desk. “Yes sir,” said the helpful man, “we have a problem with some hardware and the servers are down. They might not be up until the morning.”

Wonderful, surely they could have said that on the website before I paid for access. But saved the rant for later. Still had to file. Remembered the hotel had one internet kiosk on the first floor so saved my pieces onto a flash drive and high-tailed it down there. It was free, phew.

Then realised that the voucher I’d bought for wireless access wouldn't work in the kiosk. Had to pay again, but at least it worked. Surely I was home free? Of course I wasn’t. Went to open my email account and a screen flashed up: “Access restricted due to unsuitable content." It had clearly read my work. Tried again, but this computer was having none of it. Fortunately I have a few email addresses and the machine allow me into another account.

Meanwhile someone else popped their head in to see if the machine was free. “Ten minutes,” I said. Wishful thinking.

Grabbed the saved documents and pasted them into the email. All I had to do now was click send and it should be sorted. “Server not found.” You must be kidding me. The clock telling me how much time I had left read five minutes. I was on the verge of dictating this stuff over the phone which, from experiences in West Indies, can be a painful exercise for those on both ends of the conversation.

At times like this violence is often an option. Give the computer a kick, slam the keyboard down and resort to foul language. But the computer wasn’t mine and I was in a public place. I calmly (honest) opened another email, pasted the text in and crossed both fingers and toes.

Send. Wait. The ‘loading bar’ at the bottom of the screen gets a third full, then half, before finally a moment to savour. “Your email has been successfully sent.” Hurray. The timer said two and a half minutes. Just enough time to check the pieces had been received in London. They had. Job done.

Was all the running around worth it? I guess that’s for everyone else to decide.

John Howard arrived sans entourage, and mixed freely with the fans © Getty Images

Twice in one day during this Test I saw John Howard, former Prime Minister of Australia, walking around. Once I came across him just outside the press box, as he was making his way to the broadcast booths. I initially couldn’t comprehend him being there so I thought he was a former Australian captain whose name I couldn’t remember. Only after he had gone past me did I realise.

I saw him again a little later in the day coming out of the Bradman stands at the SCG, bantering readily with fans. This is why I had trouble recognising him initially, I thought: he didn’t have an entourage with him of security, sycophants and all other kinds who usually hang around important people. He was just walking around, a man in a suit enjoying a day of cricket.

Kevin Rudd, the incumbent, has also been around. He made some hot dogs for the Jane McGrath Foundation, sat in the commentary box for a while (apparently he even predicted a 37-run win for Australia early in the Test). Earlier in the summer the defence minister was seen sitting in the stands unperturbed, watching Australia and West Indies battle it out. In New Zealand earlier, the Prime Minister spent around half an hour in the commentary box just chatting cricket.

No special arrangements seemed to have been made for Howard. If there was security I didn’t see or feel it. The roads weren’t closed down for Rudd’s arrival and mobile phones not taken in by stadium security. No sniffer dogs were sniffing. The Test started on time, as didn’t a Twenty20 in the Middle East last year because of a late arriving Royal.

I am not used to politicians and ministers, former and present, being so accessible and so unfussed. To talk to or approach the PM in Pakistan would take days and weeks. Here I could’ve asked Howard what he thought of Umar Akmal as he went past and probably Mr Rudd as well. When the head of state attends a match in Pakistan or India – always an ODI or a T20I – we all groan and moan, annoyed in advance at the logistical chaos and pandemonium about to unfold. When he or she does arrive, you spot them as a faraway dot somewhere, amid a sea of security and other important types, waving royally at no one in particular.

The Presidential spokesman in Pakistan has appealed for calm and patience after Pakistan’s 36-run Sydney loss. Perhaps the advice should’ve been given to the batsmen as they began their chase.

	Stuart Broad's antics didn't impress the South Africans © Getty Images

There’s nothing like a good controversy to spice things up. There hadn’t really been too much to get the match referee interested in this series except for Stuart Broad’s "inquiry" about the amount of time South Africa took to review his lbw decision in Centurion.

That all changed on the third day at Newlands – and Broad was again the centre of attention. A fancy piece of footwork was caught on camera as Broad stopped the ball then stepped on it with his size 12s. It soon became clear the issue was escalating and by the close South Africa had “raised concerns" about the state of the ball. That was enough to evoke the spectre of ball-tampering.

The South African media immediately latched on. “Ball tampering furore,” was the front page Cape Times headline, which didn’t leave much to the imagination. On the IOL website there was a blown-up screen shot from E.tv, the news channel, which showed a large foot about to go down onto the ball.

The UK papers also went big with the story. “England ball-tampering bust-up!” screamed the Sun, while another red-top, the Mirror, said “Stuart Broad's balls up spikes England.”

After making their issues known to the match referee, South Africa had until the start of play today to make their complaint official. The clock was ticking as play grew nearer (well, it wasn’t quite that tense), till shortly after 10am the South Africa spokesman confirmed they wouldn’t take it any further.

A couple of hours later the ICC issued its own release, saying it “now considers this specific matter to be closed”, So, almost as quickly as the controversy erupted it fizzled away. Or did it?

The problem with the accusations that South Africa made, and they were pretty serious, is that you can’t suddenly back-track on them. Did they really think England had done something wrong or not? If so, take the complaint all the way.

There’s only one Test remaining in the series, but it’s shaping as a decider. Recent events mean we could be in for a tense finish to this contest.

	Akram Khan: "We were never mentally tough you know, like the current lot." © Cricinfo Ltd

It's nice when people match the image you have in mind. Former Bangladesh captain Akram Khan threw up the images of a burly person lofting the spinners down the ground. Luckily, time has a way of making you forget the less memorable facets and Akram certainly was no great batsman; he didn't have a great technique and wasn't too comfortable against pace. He had a slightly odd stance and yet his physique, coupled with his captaincy and most importantly, his involvement with some of special moments in Bangladesh cricket history, had left one looking forward to a meeting with the man.

Luckily, he hadn't changed much. He was still burly, the moustache slightly more trimmed, the mop of hair still intact, and he spoke softly with a gentle smile occasionally creasing his happy face. He is currently a national selector, but it was the past that was more interesting.

We rewound to 1997 ICC Trophy in Malaysia, which was the turning point in Bangladesh cricket. Bangladesh gained Test and ODI status after the triumphant campaign - a nation went mad, cricket toppled football as the No. 1 sport in the country, and they got an opportunity to play in the next World Cup.

Akram, who was the captain then, played a fine hand in an important game against Holland to lead Bangladesh to final; they were hopping at 15 for 4 when Akram hit a an unbeaten 68 to clinch a three-wicket win. He simply smiles when you talk about it, instead preferring to talk about the celebrations when they came back to Bangladesh.

"There were 100,000 people," Akram said before repeating, "Hundred thousand people". "We went in an open-bus parade from the airport to the parliament and there were all these people cheering for us. It's a feeling that I can't describe even now. We got money, free TVs and what not."

It was a far cry from his early days in Chittagong. Akram used to play football with his brother in the rainy season and play cricket in the winter. There used to be occasional glimpses of cricket - 15-minute packages on TV from the Sharjah games. There weren't many heroes but he found that he liked hitting the ball hard and the money, in club cricket, wasn't bad. He came to Dhaka to play the league and ended up playing for country not long after. Akram lurched from one eventful moment to another in Bangladesh cricket from then on.

Who can forget his role as a captain and top scorer in the 1999 World Cup win against Pakistan. "We just wanted to play the full 50 overs before we went out to bat," he said. Bangladesh weren't thinking about winning those days, unlike the current lot, who think about victory, he said. Akram hit 42 and Bangladesh ended up on 223 before chaos and controversy erupted when Pakistan collapsed to 43 for 5 in 12.3 overs.

Saeed Anwar's run-out was the moment that gave Bangladesh a strange belief that something special can happen that day, said Akram. Suddenly the pressure had got to Pakistan and their beleaguered captain Wasim Akram, who came out to bat.

"You could feel the tension and the pressure they were facing," Akram said. "Wasim, who is a very good friend to me, told me that, 'If we lose, everyone will say that we have taken money to lose the game."

"They were under so much pressure. I know there was a lot of talk about the match being fixed but for all I know, and my team, we played well to win. No one can take that away from us."

For a brief little moment, he transforms into a man wary of losing his dignity. As we fell silent, luckily, the grim moment passed and he quickly recovered to throw one more anecdote. "There was a bowler called Rahul [Niamur Rashid, the medium-pacer and the only Bangladeshi bowler that day to not pick up a wicket] and he was appealing for every ball. Wasim called me and said, 'Akram usko mana karo, har ball appeal kar raha hai! Out de diya to aadmi samjhega... [stop him, he is appealing every ball! If the umpire gives out then people will think...' I just laughed. I didn't say anything to Rahul."

Needless to say, though there weren't open-bus cavalcades this time around, the players were gifted loads of cash and prizes after that special victory.

Unfortunately, Akram was also there on the field on that fateful day when Raman Lamba, the Indian cricketer and his friend, died after a fatal blow to the head, while standing at short leg. "It was the last ball before drinks break and I told Raman bhai to move to short leg and asked him, 'Aren't you getting a helmet?' He said, 'I have been fielding at silly point for the last 15 years without any helmet. Forget it, just one ball, let's apply pressure on the batsman.'"

It was a gentle tossed-up delivery and Mehrab Hossain [Akram doesn't take the name, just says "batsman"] crashed one straight at the temple. Lamba went down in pain and the ball was hit so hard that it actually lobbed to keeper for a catch. Lamba got up, had drinks, and even fielded for 15 more minutes before he swayed across to his captain Akram and said, "I am not feeling well, I think I should leave."

"I told him, you go Raman bhai, I will take care here," Akram said.

Later, there was to be one more final meeting between the two friends in the hospital. "I asked him [Lamba] whether he was hungry and then we ordered a soup from a Chinese restaurant," Akram continued. "He was sipping it when he began to vomit violently and he...it was so sad. He was a great senior figure to us, some one who taught us finer points of the game. I remember, he would say, 'don't hit a bad bowler too much at the same time as he would be taken off the attack. Make sure you milk him'. Small little things like that we weren't aware of. He helped us become more professional."

During the course of conversation, you find that Akram is never shy of speaking the truth about himself and the older generation of cricketers. "Oh, we were never mentally tough you know, like the current lot," Akram said. "We were in awe of India and Pakistan and to do well against them was something great. It's really nice to see the current players are so much so mentally stronger than us." He also mentions how some one with his physique would find it really difficult to get selected today.

These days, he isn't just a selector but he also owns a fleet of buses, called Silk Line, operating between Dhaka and Chittagong. The idea came during a chat with his friend and current partner, a former football captain of Bangladesh.

I ask him whether he has taken the bus along with his 97 ICC Trophy winning team-mates just to recap that glorious day in Bangladesh history. He simply smiles.

	"Leave those flies alone!" © Getty Images

There are fewer flies in Sydney than there are in Melbourne. And in Melbourne there are more flies than I care to acquaint myself with. The subcontinent clearly isn’t fly-less. But Australian flies are what we in Urdu call dheet: they are stubborn and persistent and they know it, which makes it worse. On the many walks in that city, my companions were mostly flies, having a word in my ear, giving me a kiss, counting the number of eyelashes I have left.

Lesser men than I have had similarly famous troubles of course. Some Englishman called Douglas Jardine spent most of a trip to this country in 1932-33 swatting away flies in some little ground somewhere in the back of beyond. A watching spectator, an enlightened by the name of Yabba, politely told him to stop annoying the flies. “Leave those flies alone, they’re the only friends you have here.”

These kinds of friends I can do without. Sydney, more humid as it is, should have more, but this being such a big city perhaps, they are busy doing the other things that you do in a big city, like working 9 to 5 and, to quote a local, pilates and yoga and coffee and things.

Sydney is a far greater proposition than Melbourne. You can get lost here far quicker, amid the skyscrapers, the many side streets and old terraced houses. The pace of life is quicker for sure, and the city is home to many more cultures. It might be worth delving its dynamic with smaller, sedate Melbourne; such city rivalries, like Karachi-Lahore, are as fascinating as they are revealing about a nation and people.

	Table Mountain shadows Newlands with often stunning effect © Getty Images

There are few better settings for a cricket ground than Newlands. It doesn’t matter how many times you come here (and sorry if you've read similar entries before), the backdrop of Table Mountain and the surrounding scenery still takes the breath away. Lord’s is a special ground because of its history and grandeur and the MCG is inspiring due to its sheer size, but Newlands matches them as one of the finest grounds in the world.

The evening before the third Test the media were generously entertained by the Western Province CEO Andre Odendaal for ‘sundowner’ drinks on the boundary edge. Down at ground level you really get an idea of the impact the mountain has over the ground and as the sun began to set it created a wonderful glow across the stadium.

Other than the gathering of journalists on the boundary (I wonder what a collective noun for a group of journos should be?) the ground was almost deserted with preparations complete for the next day’s Test. However, one other person very much still there was the security guard who kept a beady eye on those who dared encroach on the playing area.

That was understandable, he was only doing his job, but it was mildly amusing when he signalled in no uncertain terms that the club’s CEO that he wasn’t allowed on his own outfield. Seniority, though, didn’t matter and anyone who put a foot over the boundary rope was given a swift ticking off.

***

Perhaps it was Newlands’ stunning location that prompted a couple to get married on the opening day of the Test. Before play there was a ceremony on the outfield complete with an archway of roses, although the wedding did take place in front of the Snake Pit – one of the grass banks and popular bar areas on the ground. Perhaps that's where they’ll be having their honeymoon?

***

Yesterday was carnival time in Cape Town with the annual Kaapse Klopse, a minstrel festival that packs the streets of the city centre that gets its routes from the slavery movement. More than 10,000 people parade through the city bowl area, many with darkened faces, dressed in an array of wild clothing. The musical instruments create an air similar to the Notting Hill Carnival in London and it certainly brings the city alive.

It is still known as the Coon Carnival among local Capetonians, but Cape Town authorities have renamed the event the Minstrel Carnival because of concerns by visitors of the derogatory connotations of ‘coon’. However, these are not shared by many in the city and most of the people I spoke to still use the original name.

	Fireworks over Sydney © Getty Images

To write about the fireworks display in Sydney on New Year’s Eve is nearly futile. Really it just has to be seen. We were right at the harbor in North Sydney for it, a piece of good fortune at par with being dropped on 99 when a maiden Test hundred beckons.

But for 15 minutes, to celebrate the end of the decade, the night sky exploded with colour and shape and hope. The Sydney Harbour Bridge and the Opera House stood proud in the backdrop though possibly bored for having seen it before. At times it was like being at those 3-D movies; sparklers bloomed out of the sky, right at you, coming closer and closer and yet not coming close at all. What anyone on hallucinogens might make of it I only wonder. The night might change their heads forever. It’s difficult not to feel good about any year that begins like this.

But almost as impressive was the aftermath.

I’m not sure how many people were out on the streets last night, but from where we were, it felt like some latter-day wave of immigration onto the shores of Australia: come one, come all and come build this country.

An eminent local remarked when the night was young that Australia is probably over-regulated, a nanny state. When we got into the harbor the sentiment felt right. Crowd control security felt brusque and officious. People were trying to have a good time and nobody likes checks on a good time; many barricades were up and many people couldn’t get to the harbour.

But as we made our way home when the night was older, a happy flipside emerged. With so many people drunk, the queues at the nearest train station were still orderly. A security MC (a fine title for a rapper) kept the crowd informed, with good humour, of the train times. Many were
drunk, many were more and yet a broad order remained. There was no stampede as the station doors opened, no riots.

Security or control staff were stationed along the way to help anyone and everyone find a way back and probably even talk to anyone who told them they loved them and they never loved anyone more and that this year, really, was the year things were going to change and did they tell them that they loved them?

To maintain order on this kind of night, to prevent any major catastrophe when the mix is so volatile takes some doing. We got back safe as I imagine the vast, vast majority of people did. Maybe over-regulation is not such a bad thing. The flipside is chaos and attractive as that is, it
is also exhausting.