Northern NSW Community Recovery Tour Diary - Day 2 - Garah

Date: Wednesday, March 28th

Venue: Garah Memorial Hall

Audience Numbers: 33

Number of Kitchens: 3

(The third kitchen at the Garah Hall)

It has rained solidly for the last 24 hours & precipitation is forecast for the foreseeable. At the shows, tour producer Sandy gives away ‘Grab & Go’ Bags, which are designed for people to secure valuable documents during flood events - items like passports, birth certificates, medical scripts, insurance policies & memorabilia.

(Moree Plains Shire ‘Grab & Go’ Bag. They come in a range of colours to match your evacuation ensemble)

( Some of the suggested items to pop in your bag as your prepare to leave)

The bag also contains fridge magnets, one of which shows the flood depths of all major, recorded flooding events in their area. This gives the population a reference when they hear projections on ABC radio.

(Flood level fridge magnet for Pallamallawa.)

(A sample of some of the other random fridge magnets thrown in for free)

As the steady rain syncopated on the tin roof of the Garah Hall, the uptake at the Moree Plains welcome table was close to 100%.

Garah is 50km north or Moree. It’s cotton & wheat territory. It’s got an old town and a new town. However, no-one could really tell me why the town had moved, so I suggested some ideas to the audience. The theory that they’d all moved to get some distance from a massive dickhead living in the old town, seem to get the best traction.

First some pictorial highlights …

This is the Club Hotel, Garah. It is the only pub in Australia with a dedicated witches car park.

This is Barb at the Garah Post office. Her family have been running the post office for 3 generations & her daughter is being groomed to take over. The post office still has the original exchange & Barb has left the calendar on the date of the day it was switched off in 1987.

She also has an impressive souvenir spoon collection. Barb has visited almost none of these places.

Lyn & Hugh run the general store. Lyn is also the hall president, so she’s too busy for a spoon collection. The fruit & veg section selection is functional.

The other shop & the garage appeared to be closed for the day.

One of the two churches is for sale.

I went to the OFI. It’s better on the inside.

The town seemed to be collectively hard on their kids. I mean, they might be, but don’t put a sign up … they probably can’t read it anyway. There were actually quite a few kids at the show and they seemed fine.

The hall is a ripper. A genuine memorial hall with a photographic display on the stage wall featuring every single man & woman from the district that has served. There was war memorabilia in the cloak room, including a pith helmet that Sandy made me return before I Ieft.

As well being hard on their kids, they are similarly brutal with their old hall chairs. The new hall chairs now live in the fear knowing what will happen to them when their time comes.

The show

• I mentioned the township Gravesend on stage. A bloke in his early 30’s immediately called out ‘Gravo’. Everyone else echoed ‘Gravo’. Clearly this is how it iss colloquially known. We added O’s to every town for the rest of the night. The people of GarahO were happy with that.

(Sadly we arrived only 12 years too late for the Gravo Rodeo.)

• Barry had an esky that was so big, they had to tilt it to get it through the doors of the hall. The Moree Plains Shire is the most agriculturally prosperous LGA in the country. With the steady flow of expensive French champagne appearing from the esky, I suggest Barry plays a healthy part in those statistics.

• The highlight of the night was the spontaneous re-enactment of the wedding of Reg & Jules. They were married in the hall 49 years hence. Jules was initially reluctant, but Reg seemed keen for another chance to re-consumate the relationship. A new bridal party was recruited - including some of the unfairly labelled, ‘slow children’, who took on the roles of flower girl & ring bearer. The page boy cleverly processed to the altar using a flood bag as the ring cushion. Reg & Jules were pronounced man & wife, and when I said ‘ you may now kiss the bride’ , the entire audience chanted ‘Pash .. Pash … Pash. The roof lifted when Reg made his move.

( Reg commits to the mime of putting an invisible ring on Jules finger)

( The crowd cheer ‘The Pash’)