Makybe Diva, Melbourne Divide

Flamboyant hats. Plumes of feathers. And bubbly wines.

But of course, the main stars are the horses. Today is Melbourne Cup Day , a major horse-racing event that is so important to Melbournians that it warrants a public holiday. Who would believe that horses reign supreme , comparable to Queen Elizabeth ( Melbourne gets very few public hols, Queen's Birthday is one of them) ? Men would wear suits and ladies don their best outfits matched by colourful hair pieces with jumble of feathers just to watch the race and have a fabulous time drinking wine on grass lawns (watch this video to take a glimpse of the fashion showcase, quirky!) Provided that they are not too heavy into betting such that they are nerve-wrecked by the races themselves.Not that i care, but the rest of Melbourne seems to be charmed by the third consecutive win by Makybe Diva, a black beautiful mare that i would assume sprinted like wind.

Australians just know how to enjoy lives in general. Today the streets were dead quiet, i naively thought that the market would be open just to serve people like me who can't care less about which Diva wins the race,walked there to realise that all the vendors should possibly be wearing suits clamping champagne glasses now , yelling at the horses instead prices of vegies. Luckily the Asian grocery shop next to the market still opened. it is time like this u feel that Asian toiling attitude really adds value to customers. Good 'ole Chinese people! Rain or shine, war or peace, make money first! Phew, thank god for that today.

Melbourne city is like a giant pizza. Different groups of people come together yet not blend completely together. Each group still retains very much its own flavours, which on one hand increases the diversity of cultures.But most of the time, it feels really segmented,like everything is about to fall into various pieces with one bite. Think of pineapple pieces, strands of hams and rings of olives that roll all over the plate. While walking on the street, one can easily catch 10 different languages being exchanged animatedly. Japanese, Korean, India, Italian etc. And these pockets of people withdraw inwards exclusively to themselves, distinctly different from how Australians would behave.

I guess there's no one Melbournian identity , other than the common trend of weight-gaining after coming here, hehe.