In the fight between you and the world, back the world.

Playgroup HQ. St Johns Park. New Town. July 2010.

Here you can see the HQ of Playgroup Tasmania, which is located on the way in to St Johns Park, as you make your way up into the road that leads to ~~nowhere~~ the Carruthers Building.

What most intrigues my boys about Playgroup HQ is not their wargaming tables, reams of maps or extensive files relating to millions upon millions of naughty and nice children; no, their interest is about one thing and one thing only: TOYS.

You see; this innocent-looking former church hall (I’m speculating about that bit) is actually home to ~~the worlds~~ ~~Australia’s~~ ~~Tasmania’s~~ Hobart’s largest and finest TOY LIBRARY.

Comments

Magpie said…

It's a lovely building. Does have the look of a church.

4 August 2010 at 14:31

Kris McCracken said…

I suspect it was once a church.

4 August 2010 at 18:03

Roddy said…

Methinks a bawdy tavern Circa 1800ish. Churches for some unknown reason tended to be a little more pretentious. I like the colour scheme though. Very vibrant and outgoing.

4 August 2010 at 18:25

Unknown said…

I think it was part of the colonial orphanage. Isn't there a church next to this building and then on the other side of the church another building like this one? Maybe one side for boys and the other for girls?

I have tried to join an group called "Friends of the Orphanage" because they do historical tours around St John's Park and I want to know more about it. But they are very hard to contact.

4 August 2010 at 20:20

Kris McCracken said…

Poor orphans!

12 August 2010 at 08:50

Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it...

I still have the robot on the job. Here you can see the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery . And here is a poem: Soliloquy for One Dead Bruce Dawe Ah, no, Joe, you never knew the whole of it, the whistling which is only the wind in the chimney's smoking belly, the footsteps on the muddy path that are always somebody else's. I think of your limbs down there, softly becoming mineral, the life of grasses, and the old love of you thrusts the tears up into my eyes, with the family aware and looking everywhere else. Sometimes when summer is over the land, when the heat quickens the deaf timbers, and birds are thick in the plumbs again, my heart sickens, Joe, calling for the water of your voice and the gone agony of your nearness. I try hard to forget, saying: If God wills, it must be so, because of His goodness, because- but the grasshopper memory leaps in the long thicket, knowing no ease. Ah, Joe, you never knew the whole of it... I like Bruce Dawe. He just my be my favourite Austral...

There was nothing left. No reason, no conscience, no understanding; even the most rudimentary sense of life or death, good or evil, right or wrong.

Here is a self portrait. I’m calling it Portrait of a lady in a dirty window . Shocking, isn’t it? However, it is apt! Samhain , Nos Galan Gaeaf , Hop-tu-Naa , All Saints , All Hallows , Hallowmas , Hallowe'en or HALLOWEEN . It’s Theme Thursday and we’re talking about the festivals traditionally held at the end of the harvest season. Huh? No wonder Australians have trouble with the concept of HALLOWEEN. For the record, in my thirty-two L O N G years on the planet, I can’t say I’ve ever seen ghosts ‘n goblins, trick ‘n treaters or Michael Myers stalking Tasmania’s streets at the end of October. [That said, I did once see a woman as pale as a ghost turning tricks that looked like Michael Myers in late November one time.] Despite the best efforts of Hollywood, sitcoms, and innumerable companies; it seems Australians are impervious to the [ahem] charms of a corporatized variant of a celebration of the end of the "lighter half" of the year and beginning of the "darke...

Hold me now, oh hold me now, until this hour has gone around. And I'm gone on the rising tide, to face Van Dieman's Land

Theme Thursday again, and this one is rather easy. I am Tasmanian, you see, and aside from being all around general geniuses - as I have amply described previously - we are also very familiar with the concept of WATER. Tasmania is the ONLY island state of an ISLAND continent. That means, we're surrounded by WATER. That should help explain why I take so many photographs of water . Tasmania was for a long time the place where the British (an island race terrified of water) sent their poor people most vile and horrid criminals. The sort of folk who would face the stark choice of a death sentence , or transportation to the other end of the world. Their catalogue of crimes is horrifying : stealing bread assault stealing gentlemen's handkerchiefs drunken assault being poor affray ladies being overly friendly with gentlemen for money hitting people having a drink and a laugh public drunkenness being Irish Fenian terrorist activities being Catholic religious subversion. ...

This will hurt me...

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