(Note: The title refers to that we travelled about 800 miles to get from Brisbane to Canberra.)
It started with a phone call — a colleague at work called me and asked me to join him, along with a number of people in the group I am working with, on a trip to Canberra to watch the Olympic torch relay.
By then, the chaotic scenes at earlier legs of the relay had been well documented, which made me tentative about joining up, as I am highly adverse to confrontations. To add to me fears, there had been postings asking people to guard the flame along the relay route in Canberra and elsewhere, which made me wonder whether my colleagues are part of a group that will try to keep the flame burning at all costs. Ultimately, though, my desire to see the relay in person (barely) trumped my concerns and I agreed to travel along.
Some of the things being said at the meetings we had before embarking on the trip hardly allayed my fears, as some people are quite passionate about the protests and the perceived slant in reporting by the (Western) media in the earlier portions of the relay. While the person in charge of the trip reminded each of us that we have to keep our anger in check during the event, I still wondered if there is someone among our group that may do something irrational. I tried to reassure myself by thinking that anyone who gets near the flame to douse/protect it would likely be arrested and, from what I know about them, my companions are people who prefer to stay out of trouble.
This anxiety should be enough to convince myself to opt out, but somehow I decided not to. I guess this is one of those moments when even the timid (such as myself) find the courage to do something one would normally not do.
On the journey to Canberra, I found myself worrying less about what might happen. This might have something to do with me (literally) on the driver's seat for some portions of the journey.
We arrived in Canberra at 1am and, after an way-too-brief nap, we went to meet a person from the group organizing to have thousands of people from different parts of the country to be present for the relay. On our way there, Chinese flags (and flags bearing the Beijing Olympics logo) can be found in many vehicles passing by, which made me wonder how big the Chinese contingent would be and would the crowd consist mostly of people with the same ethnicity as myself?
As we waited at the location assigned to us, the crowd, which consisted almost entirely of Chinese people, continued to grow. T-shirts and miniature (Chinese and Olympic) flags were handed around. The Chinese flag can be found on one side of the T-shirts, while the words "Support Olympic(s)! Support Beijing! Support China!" were printed on the other. One can also see a large number of banners stating support for the Beijing games, and China and the integrity of its territory, as well as decrying bias of Western media outlets. This had made me wonder whether this is a rally in support of China or to welcome the Olympic torch/Games. To many, I suspected, support of the two had become intertwined.
After a long wait, one can hear the ceremonies signalling the beginning of the relay taking place. While we waited, the crowd began singing the Chinese national anthem, followed by a number of Chinese songs whose lyrics I don't know. I guess the songs sing praises of China and its people and/or government, but I don't know if it was the case. As the songs continued, I thought to myself, wouldn't it be better to sing the Olympic anthem or songs written for the upcoming Games (even though I don't know the lyric of those songs either)?
While this was taking place, the letter F appeared in the sky. Laughter began to erupt. When the next letter, an R, appeared, a few people started shouting "One China!" and repeating the songs being sang earlier as additional letters are written. By now, most have figured out the message was the phrase "Free Tibet". While it appeared that emotions might boil over, many have urged calm and to ignore the message, which the crowd followed. While a few angry shouts can still be heard afterwards, most people just repeated the songs they sang earlier.
After the flame passed by, my colleagues and me moved to a less-crowded section along the route to try and catch another glimpse of the torch. Finally, a few locals can be found amongst the crowd. As the torch passed by, the crowd waved not only to the torch bearer but also to the officers, as a gesture to thank them for the hard work they have done to keep the relay going smoothly, I suppose.
To catch a glimpse of the torch one more time, we headed towards a local park, the finish line of the relay. By the time we arrived, though, the place was packed. On the periphery one can see people holding Chinese and Tibetan flags, along with a number of people holding Amnesty International signs. There were some shouting, but the groups were kept apart and, aside from a few verbal volleys towards to those opposite them, little went on there. Inside the park, there were a handful of people holding a Tibetan flag and/or a shirt saying "Free Tibet" entered. When they appeared, usually one at a time, some of my colleagues tried to capture a photo, but each time a large flag-holding crowd immediately surround him and shouted "One China" at him. There is no need to swarm him, I thought to myself, as the surrounding person can claim in front of a camera that he had been hit by someone in the scrum, all it would take is one errant flag pole. While their action was likely the result of raw emotion, which is hard to contain, any unruly behaviour would just give ammunition to those who already have a bias against the Chinese and would turn off those who are more neutral.
A few TV camera can be found near the place we were standing and we were able to listen to the live commentary by a reporter on site. From what I was able to hear, his comments were, to borrow the slogan from a certain news channel, fair and balanced. The mainly peaceful behaviour exhibited by the out-of-towners (us) might have made it easier for him to do so.
From I saw and heard, Chinese made up a majority of the crowd along the route, which got me wonder why there weren't more locals. A hopeful answer would be that the torch relay took place on a weekday and Canberra being the capital of the country, people have to work to keep the country running (try to suppress the jokes about the work hours of government workers for a moment). While I hope this is not the case, a number of locals might have wanted to attend to relay but chose not to because of their fear that confrontation would take place, given what they had seen before. It might also be that the crowd along the relay route make them feel like they are the minority in their own city, a foreigner in their own country. (These are pure speculation and my opinion only.)
My fears mainly turned out to be exaggerated, as is often the case, and I am glad I made the trip. Good thing most people from out of town remembered to bring their rationality and restraint along their flags and banners. As someone who is not highly nationalistic, aside from times when the national sporting team is playing, or patriotic, it is difficult to imagine myself making the banners I saw and singing the songs I heard.