CAFÉ:
Coffee Break.
On takeaway coffee cups and
coffee saucers.
I would’ve sold my soul for this.
Exhaustion ground us down.
Rest was rare. We were lucky to get the length of your coffee break.
But boy, we cherished whatever we got.
It was something we looked forward to, and a chance to keep ours souls a little
longer.
Between dates and statistics were the daily lives of men at war.
They left ordinary boys and returned experienced men.
Experience the in-between at the Anzacs exhibition.
Crafted by Weta Workshop, and alive at Te Papa.
Smells like Home.
On café plates.
The smell of your breakfast ensured my return.
Who knew the war would go on for so long. Four
years! Four years without even a whiff of my sizzling love.
Thinking of bacon led me straight home. Sunday breakkies on our porch was a
weekly tradition.
And I was determined to come home to keep it going.
A Soldier’s Washcloth.
Your tea smells like a cleaned soldier.
Water was too precious to
waste on things like washing.
So we’d just take the teabags and smear them over ourselves and declare
ourselves clean.
Feel free to do the same. Consider it a practical history lesson.
Between dates and statistics were
the daily lives of men at war.
They left ordinary boys and returned experienced men.
Experience the in-between at the Anzacs exhibition.
Crafted by Weta Workshop, and alive at Te Papa.
CINEMA:
Baby
soldiers.
Sound: baby crying in dark cinema.
That’s my mate, Jack.
Stuck in mud with two broken legs, a shrapnel-filled arm, and a hole where
his ear should’ve been.
They said there are 500 bodies to an acre over there—either dead or dying.
No Man’s Land. Capable of making even the toughest soldier wail.
I couldn’t do a thing but listen to him, knowing that it was only a matter of
time until he fell silent.
Fear of silence.
Sound: siren in dark cinema.
We took comfort in the noise.
It meant that we weren’t deaf—yet. Or dead—yet.
Silence, well… That meant there was a shell above you.
Our bodies would scream to get the hell out of there, but fear paralysed you.
And soon, silence was all that followed.
Best Mates.
Bill and I met with our pants down.
Here we were side by side, two
grown men perched over a muddy ditch unloading out bowels. Not exactly
something we did back home. Might as well make mates. Might make things less
awkward.
Turns out, Bill saved my life on the field. Our friendship saw us through the
war.
And sixty years later, we’re still best mates.
But we have separate toilets now.
Between dates and statistics were the daily lives of men at war.
They left ordinary boys and returned experienced men.
Experience the in-between at the Anzacs exhibition.
Crafted by Weta Workshop, and alive at Te Papa.
Was the sex worth it?
You’d still be riding the postcoital high when disinfectant was forced up your
urethra.
Many caught venereal diseases. About one in five was the surface figure; but I
bet there were more hidden in closets. I saw some boys commit suicide after
hearing they had syphilis. It was pretty much a death sentence.
Between dates and statistics were
the daily lives of men at war.
They left ordinary boys and returned experienced men.
Experience the in-between at the Anzacs exhibition.
Crafted by Weta Workshop, and alive at Te Papa.
