gullybogan

Dear Reader,

How freaky is this?

I was just settling down to watch this week’s SBS documentary on the Nazis, when an associate of mine rang up to tell me about her chance encounter with World Youth Day pilgrims in Melbourne today.

Seems she was wandering down Bourke Street, minding her own business, when – all of a sudden – she found herself in the midst of a group of Polish pilgrims, proceeding towards Telstra Dome in Glory and singing Hallelujah songs in Polish as they went.

She remarked to me how proud and enthusiastic they seemed about the whole thing, like the Catholic Church was somehow a Polish thing. She said that it was probably because the previous Pope had been Polish, and the current Pope had invaded Poland.

I pointed out to her that it was the Wehrmacht that invaded Poland, and not the Hitler Youth, and that she was risking being arrested for annoying Catholics, saying something like that.

Duly chastened, she went on to tell me all the other exciting pilgrim news she had to tell.

Apparently the United States and Vietnam were hanging out together at a tram stop, and apparently getting along very well together.

Mexico was constantly being mistaken for Italy, due to the uncanny similarities in their flags and language.

Italy was constantly being mistaken for Canada, due to their peculiar blue cowboy hats. Not sure why that would make them be mistaken for Canada, but there you go. My associate went up and said ‘Ciao’ to some of the Italians, and they looked at her as if they were seriously worried she was about to be annoying.

There was a solitary bloke from Cologne, waving a flag of his city and telling everyone who would listen that he was from Cologne and he was all alone. Which was a nice rhyme and showed off his command of the English language. My associate congratulated him on his work, and he asked for her number.

Hong Kong was standing on a street corner, waving and smiling at passers-by.

My associate said that there was a palpable feeling of love and acceptance in the air. She said that she felt almost as if the Holy Spirit had come upon *her*.

She’s had a lot of things come upon her, this associate of mine, but never the Holy Spirit.

At the junction of Bourke Street and Swanston, a number of singing, hallelujahing nations came together, and started trying to outdo each other with the enthusiasm of their spiritedness through the power (and volume) of song.

My associate said that the only ever time she’d heard spirit-inspired song at that corner was when the Hare Krishnas used to dance there.

So, in the midst of all that Catholic joy in the Holy Spirit, she started chanting

Hare Krishna Hare Krishna
Hare Hare Krishna Krishna

…and so on.

While doing a little Hare Krishna dance.

Curiously, she was not placed under Citizen’s Arrest.

Since no-one seemed to get the joke, she said she stopped chanting, abandoned the volkssturm of religious enthusiasm for pre-pluralist thinking, and went home.

I was disappointed that she didn’t try to sneak into Telstra Dome with them all.

I would have liked to have heard how she got on, surrounded by fifty thousand virgins.

Yours,
Gullybogan