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August 21, 2004

In search of Australian snow culture

On a recent trip to Australia’s Snowy Mountains I took a moment between exorbitantly priced shots of schnapps to look around for a distinctly Australian style of snow atmosphere.

Amongst my childhood memories of 1989 there are some songs I can’t stand (Collette “Ring my Bell” and anything by the Proclaimers comes to mind), some rather good trashy music by Transvision Vamp, a horribly bad duet by Kylie Minogue and Jason Donovan and a first encounter with the Snowy Mountains of Australia. I don’t voluntarily listen to the popular music of the time any more but I do still visit the snowfields of Australia on an “almost annual” basis.

When I first saw the snow at Perisher in September of 1989, had it not being for the fact that I was still quite young, I suspect I would have been thoroughly underwhelmed by the whole experience - Perisher in September often looks more like a lamington than it does a ski resort. As a child, however, it was a fantastic holiday with the lack of snow not even apparent to me.

Fast forward to 2004 and I’m spending the second week of August skiing at Perisher. Since 1989 I’ve only ever skiied (apart from a brief attempt at snowboarding about five years back) in Australia (never skiied overseas) and only ever at Perisher and anything nearby (never skiied in Victoria). My complete lack of experiential scope then must make me perfectly suited to go hunting for something unique to skiing, as an Australian, in Australia.

The easy answer would be that - like the Australian music industry - it’s small, patchy, and too often attempts only to badly imitate it’s international bigger brothers. Still, similiar to our music, The Snowy Mountains are our snowy mountains and we love them nonetheless.

We love our snowy mountains, much as in the snowy mountains we love our schnapps, vodka and imported beers like Stella and curiously, Corona. At least, they seem to love them these days. From memory, the whole Australian skiing experience was less trendy back in 1989. Of course, it might just have been me that was less trendy, but I distinctly remember bad fluoro coloured ski clothing, one piece suits and lots of skiiers going down the mountain using the rather horrid looking Arlberg technique (Snowploughing). It all seems to have become much trendier with the increased popularity of Snowboarding and the resulting entrance of major surf apparel brands into the marketplace. Yet, I don’t think that’s peculiar to the Australian ski experience. So I need to look elsewhere.

Perhaps the Corona might lend some clues. After all, why is a Mexican pilsenser so popular on the Australian ski fields? Why in August 2004 are Corona selling yellow beanies to patrons in a pub at Perisher? Oh, and why, why am I wearing a Rip Curl branded ski jacket?

Is it an odd conglomeration of cultural oddities on our far from impressive snowfields that makes the Australian experience or is there something else behind the increasing fascination that a reputedly beach crazy population has on the Snowy Mountains? Snowy mountains that as a result of climate change, in just twenty years time, may not get any natural snow at all.

That there might not be any snow at all in the Snowy Mountains twenty years into the future is a disturbing insight. More disturbing still are development proposals for some of the major ski resorts that include large cinema complexes. I think that to find what it is that draws me to the slopes each year I need to look at why exactly these two points make me uneasy.

The snow is an obvious point and not specific to anything obviously Australian. What I think really alarms me is the second issue. Why exactly does the idea of large scale development in the Snowy Mountains not sit well with me? Why indeed.

I’ve always considered the iconic Aussie character traits - laid back, easy going and down to earth to be on the whole misleading. To me, the nation of coastal city dwellers I have grown up with don’t resemble even slightly the mythical literary constructed peoples that inhabit Australian literature. Sure, I’ve been to small country towns and encountered people who might superficially resemble someone out of a Henry Lawson story. I’ve even driven through what could possibly resemble a Les Murray Sawmill Town” but ultimately, I’ve always though that the country I grew up in throughout the 80’s was really nothing like that at all.

Even today though it’s that same character type that often endears itself to the Australian people. That Pat Rafter be voted Australian of the year in 2002 and seems to be well-recognised and well-liked well after his retirement as a tennis player should give some weight to such an argument. Whilst I don’t think it’s a character that is well representative of a majority of Australians - I do think it’s a character type that many Australians like to identify with.

That brings me back to the Snowy Mountain atmosphere and why further “developments” don’t sit well with me. The place I stay when I go skiing is a place that feels slower, quieter and more laid back. It doesn’t have a television and while there’s a telephone line there’s no computer and as such, no internet. It’s an atmosphere that rubs off onto many (though not all) people that stay there. An atmosphere that makes the people more like the mythological characters that were once supposed to be iconic of Australian culture.

I think it’s the snow and the mountain terrain that helps this slowing down to happen. Walking in snow is difficult - especially uphill after a day of skiing and a few beers. Being forcibly slowed helps some to find a pace that lends itself to a different kind of thinking.

That this is the essence of the Australian snow experience is an alluring prospect. Yet, as I look at my bank balance after it’s all done, I see that it comes at a price. Moreover, I’m still stuck with an uneasy feeling that there’s no Australia to be found where I’m looking for it and that like most mythologies, it has vanished without a trace the instant I’ve tried to grasp it.