Shepparton’s image emerged pretty much in tatters from a
story published in the “Extra” section of yesterday’s Melbourne Age.
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| The Furphy water cart - made famous in World War one. |
The story was, in itself fine, but the image it portrayed of
Shepparton, illustrated a city that was limping toward, or has, decided
difficulties.
Writer Peter Munro diligently excavated and illustrated all
those facts that suggested Shepparton, all of Shepparton, was living on “the
wrong side of the tracks”.
Obviously the story was planned and written not to present a
rounded picture of life in Shepparton with Munro zeroing in on events, programs
and statistics that illustrate the city is socially dysfunctional. It is not.
Ironically, on the same weekend as Monro’s story appeared in
The Age, throwing doubt into the minds of readers about Shepparton’s civility,
the city hosted and saw the conclusion of eleventh staging of the biennial
presentation of the Australian National Piano Awards.
The mission statement for the awards says: “The
Australian National Piano Award Shepparton Inc. has the mission of promoting
and directing a competition which embodies the highest of national and
international music standards, recognises the pursuit of excellence at a
professional level, offers educational benefits to performers and provides
challenges to the participants.”
Further, the weekend just gone saw a host of
events throughout the city for the Joseph Furphy Centenary Commemorative
Festival that recognized and acknowledged the work of Joseph Furphy who,
writing under the pen name of Tom Collins, wrote the famous piece of Australian
literature, “Such is Life”.
The dichotomies between rich and poor cannot
be denied as they most certainly exist, but not to any degree of more
significance than that of any other regional Australian city or, for that
matter, any state capital.
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| A water bird sits on a log close to the centre of Shepparton. |
In fact any journalist worth his or her
salary and allowed the time could certainly uncover circumstances similar, or
worse, in our capital city, Canberra.
Shepparton, as is most certainly the case
with most other towns and cities, is unquestionably feeling the effect of a
static economy a fact that is reflected by empty shops in the central business
district.
It is, despite the rather troubled outlook
portrayed in Munro’s story – “Rolling with the punches” – a city with decided
spirit, a city in which its citizens will quickly bond to see off most any
difficulty.
Having a daughter, son-in-law and two
grandsons living on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast, I have occasionally considered
and moving to live there, but the call of my community, this community, saw such
thinking quickly abandoned.
Interestingly, Munro is correct, but it is
not until you live here, and that gives me a distinct advantage, that he is
grossly wrong.
