So I was born the daughter of a seppo. A septic tank. A yank. Who, for some reason, decided after about 34 years of life in Australia, that she’d like to be able to look fondly upon a pie made of meat. To see a kangaroo and feel a sense of kinship. To go to the polls on election day and vote against Howard. In short, she was going to get herself naturalised, and become a dual citizen.
I told Small Brother, drunk, in London.

“WHAT?!” he screamed down the phone, “If she’s made my US passport redundant I’ll…I’ll…” he paused, spluttering, unable fix upon the awful fate of the woman who had to endure Christmas 1980 looking like a turkey that ate the honey ham before popping him forth two days later.

“The startling thing is,” I said soothingly, “That whatever it’s about, I don’t think it’s actually about you. Oddly enough.”

There was brooding silence. And I began to wonder if I shouldn’t have got the bazillion year US passport instead of the cheapy ten year deal.

So last Wednesday, M and I threw my mother, in the last remaining hour of her solo citizenship, into the HiAce van, and hooned her down to the Brighton Town Hall.

It was a dramatic looking day. I was guessing that a naturalisation ceremony at Brighton Town Hall was going to be slightly different to the one I went to a few years back on Australia Day in Bundoora. Just slightly. Actually, once we went in and sat down, it became more and more like M and I had planted ourselves in the middle of an ever-expanding creche. There were little kids everywhere; snotting, sicking, drooling, giggling, screaming. It was bizarre. And as for the people that were getting naturalised, I’ve never seen such homogenous lot of Channel Ten soapie extras!

So I was waiting for the big ceremony. The big moment where they would begin calling out people’s names and the Australian-to-be would get to prance up on to the stage, graciously accept their native pot plant, certificate of authenticity and faux handshake from whoever happened to be standing in for the mayor (who was ‘overseas on business’). I continued to wait. Babies continued to screech.

“Blah blah blah blah, a very important occasion, blah blah,” said a man, who looked like he thought he was quite important. “All repeat the oath after me,” he suggested, then paused, and with a look that was meant to convey the absolute life shaking importance of what he was about to utter, he added, “Remember to clearly state your full name in the space that has been left for it.”

Like someone was going to notice (or care) that someone, somewhere, among the other three hundred people, mispronounced their own name while they were all swearing their oath At The Same Time. Yes. So the bloke up the front chanted his way through the oath, with everyone following along dutifully in good voice. When they hit the bit where everyone had to state their own name it sounded like a paddock full of talkative martians had just done a brief foreign exchange trip. A woman down the end of our row smiled dotingly at her toddler as it pulled a stray chair along the wooden floor while screeching, which added a lovely ambience to proceedings.

“Right,” said the man, “You are all now Australian citizens.”
He could have just asked someone on the other side of the table to pass the serviettes please.
M and I looked at each other. A lot of the brand new Australians looked at each other. Disbelievingly. Like they wanted poke each other and whisper that was it? All eyebrows were briefly raised. Most brows were minutely wrinkled.

I settled back in my seat. From my veteran experience at these events, this was the bit were everyone got their little moment in the spotlight up on stage with their stringy-bark gum in its tube. But apparently not. At that point, some of the dignitaries who had been lounging on the stage made their way down the steps. I am sure I was not alone in thinking that the show was over, it was time to break out the Coolabah casks. But apparently not. The chosen dignitaries then arranged themselves in a line and the new Australians had to shuffle past, like they were in a queue for some crappy Jetstar flight at 8am on a Monday morning. All that was missing was the ‘your flight has been delayed’ announcements.

Of course this made it very difficult for anyone to get a decent photo of their new Australian mother or whoever, as everyone was down on ground level. So M got a couple of snappy shots of what could have been the back of my mother’s head. Or not. She finally emerged from the scrum bearing some kind of bottle brush and her certificate that gave her the authority to shorten everyone’s name to one syllable and then add ‘o’ to the end.

I am sure I was not alone in thinking that the show was over, it was time to break out the Coolabah casks. But apparently not. We had to retire to our seats, toddlers scattering like emboldened guinea pigs evading their mothers, and listen to a couple of earnest looking Brighton Grammar boys grind out their version of ‘I Still Call Australia Home’. They sang it with great solemnity and depth. I almost went hysterical. Then we got talked at a bit more. The woman sitting in front of me positioned her baby on her shoulder, and it looked at me while neatly vomiting something that was probably formerly milk.

All of a sudden we all had to stand and pretend we knew the national anthem. M and I poked each other with great amusement as we harmonised on ‘girt’; and I wondered why whenever you have to sing Advance Australia Fair it always feels like it’s in the wrong key. Finally it was over, and we took my newly Australianed mother to the pub for some champers. Cheers. It only took her thirty four years.