Just two sleeps! All our wits are twittering and our twitters are tweeting.
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The bureau says Benders will be a sunny 27 on Christmas Day and a still sunny 26 on Boxing Day. Hmmm. Bzzzt. For many, Tuesday will be a tad foggy with about a 15 per cent chance of regret.
Down The Mall did some research on what you might feel like doing on Boxing Day – apart from yet another eruption of shopping.
Bendigo Tourism’s website offers some suggestions. Perhaps Reveries at Living Art Space. It has works by three artists including works by metals sculptor David Dawson. His pieces are grouped under the appropriate heading Overwrought. No, perhaps another day.
How about Visions at the Heathcote Winery? Yeah, perhaps too soon.
We consulted Trip Advisor’s list of the top 58 (?) things to do in Bendigo. No. 1 was the Central Deborah Gold Mine and then came a splendid range of eateries, drinkeries, shopping, art and culture. No. 58 seemed the right speed. Relaxation Therapy.
It looks like it’s going to be the Boxing Day Test on TV again.
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Last week, Down The Mall discussed the curious case of 17-year-old Anastasia Maher who in August 1872 was seduced, became pregnant, was kicked out of home and gave birth to a child in a pigsty at Maiden Gully.
She was viciously assaulted by an absolute scoundrel who was later hanged at Castlemaine gaol. DTM thought it was an interesting parallel with another story told at this time of the year about a young woman kicked out of home, pregnant under mysterious circumstances who gave birth in an animal shelter.
But it turns out it resonated much more than we suspected. We’ve since been informed Anastasia went on to have 13 children, was married probably a couple of times, once to one of Bendigo’s pioneering Chinese residents, James Wang Ah Ling. Our region is chockers with her great and great-great grandchildren.
At least one of them is a well-known Bendigonian, an old chum, Bendigo Chinese Association president Doug Lougoon, who commented he was quite chuffed to be descended from the Bendigo Nativity.
About 40 of her descendants met in Bendigo last year back and the Bendigo library has a copy of a book on her life: The Murderous Assault at Dead Horse Flat – And Other Tales of the Life and Times of Anastasia Maher and Her Descendants.
She was certainly a colourful character who, according to one descendant became – among other things – a champion for women getting the vote.
Now that’s probably the real miracle of this story.