December is a great month, I’ll go further and say it is an extraordinary month. It is a month of reviews of the past year and previews for the next year.
January of 2009 - Israel continues their defensive incursion into Gaza, while the first African American President is inaugurated into office and the White House. The New first lady wore Cuban designer Isabel Toledo and it is evident that black is the new white. In New York, a brave pilot lands an Airbus A320 on the Hudson River. All on board survive, and the real hero is Obama. He eloquently praises the captain of the aircraft and the miracle on the Hudson it was. Financial markets continue to tumble, while the American mint was busy printing money and Slovakia adopted the Euro currency. Somewhere in between all that, an American newsreader mispronounced the word ‘plethora’. Happy birthday wishes, to all those January people.
February – bushfires ravage and cause some of the worst destruction in Australian history. Lives are lost; communities are devastated and insurance companies feel the heat too (excuse the pun). Zimbabwe appoints a new Prime Minister, although the dictator Robert Mugabe has already inflicted much damage on to the Commonwealth State. This leads to the eventual indefinite suspension of the Zimbabwean dollar in April 2009. Meanwhile, the Oscars took place and sadly Heath Ledger did not show up to collect his Oscar. Oh, but there is this thing called the after-life.
March – call it predictable, but TIA (this is Africa) and Guinea- Bissau President was assassinated in his own home. The Russians continue to assist African nations; and many Kalashnikov guns can be bought and traded throughout the diamond-laden lands. Some of us trade gossip for coffee, whilst others trade lives. Terrorism continues as Sri Lankan cricketers are fired upon on their way to a match in Pakistan. During all this savagery, I turned a couple of pages in Tolstoy’s ‘War and Peace’. I was introduced to a beer aptly called ‘Arrogant Bastard’. Winter slowly disappeared in the North, as did the value of bonds, stocks and shares. The travel industry seemed to have survived the global economic crisis; airports such as New York’s John F Kennedy, London’s Heathrow and Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion were occupied with eager travellers, the proverbial drug smugglers and tough security enforcers.
April – the four questions were asked at the Passover table and other questions were raised and debated too. The detection of swine flu caused scare and fear amongst the world. It initiated in Mexico (what was possibly a drug export gone wrong) and spread. The disease, called swine flu, is not spread through the eating of pork, however, swine flew around the globe causing death and harm. I thank my sister, her family and my cousin for hosting me during my stay in Israel during April. It was a memorable trip. Jerusalem was magical, Tel Aviv was audacious and everywhere else in between was just Israel.
May – Mother’s day came and went and spring weather was welcomed in the North. Frisbees were taken to the outdoors and beaches were targeted by the multitudes who wanted to become brown or browner. The Pope made the pilgrimage to Jerusalem as the aromatic smell of barbeques filled the New York City air. North Korea undertook a nuclear testing, but the world failed to notice. Somali pirates continued their assault on the seas and exorbitant ransoms were sought for release of captives. In brighter news, Australia qualified for the soccer World Cup in South Africa in 2010.
June – tragedy strikes as an Air France Airbus cannot duplicate the heroics of the miracle on the Hudson and all those aboard perish in the sea off the coast of Brazil. The human ‘spider-man’, Alain Robert continues to scale skyscrapers around the world. Iran goes to elections and riots break out causing havoc and a potential revolution. June had other moments, but none greater than the untimely (which is of arguable nature) death of pop singer-cum- icon Michael Jackson. He joined Elvis Presley, perhaps in heaven. Michael Jackson fulfilled his very own words and ‘healed this world, and made it a better place for you and for me’. Michael Jackson left so many orphans, in a now safer world. Michael died on a Thursday in his Los Angeles mansion, this was followed by Friday mourning. Life moves on, even for Bernie Madoff who was sentenced to 150 years imprisonment for his involvement in a 50 billion dollar ponzi scheme, but Bernie still managed to celebrate his final father’s day before incarceration.
That is, just, half of 2009.
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