Month: September 2015

The new Target Store at Chadstone: Are we there yet?

Lili Gans totally absurd

It’s no secret that the Chadstone Shopping Mall is undergoing a refurbishment and an expansion to rival the Seven Wonders of the World.  It’s taking quite a long time, but we are all reassured it will be worth it.

For the past few months Target has been closed and so we have been waiting for the opening of its new resurrection in September.  It will be so terrific,  marvellous and fantastic that poems will be written about it. I’m thinking of Kubla Khan’s pleasure dome, of course.

There may even be a musical written devoted to the brand new super dooper Target and how its construction added to the attractions of the most liveable city in the world. (Melbourne, that is)

Well,  it opened about a week ago and there has been a noticeable hush all over the world  (Melbourne, that is) about the new improved Target.

We went there today for a peek and had a rather long trek through corridors and passages, past the construction area.  Our excitement grew with each painful step. It was a long way to go,  about one kilometre there and back,  but it would be worth it,  yes?

Not exactly.

I expected to be handed a bottle of water at each turn, as happens in a regular marathon, but there was none and so we marched on in an intrepid but increasingly breathless manner.  When we finally arrived at Target, which is situated in the bowels of this planet,  we noticed a sign saying “We hope you enjoyed the journey.”

Apparently this was meant to amuse us,  but we could not even conjure up a chortle.

Still,  we persevered in a pioneering spirit.  We were nothing if not optimistic.

As it turned out,  we were nothing since the new Target is very uninspiring.  Same old, same old.  Surely there should have been some welcome for those of us who had put in such an effort. No great special offers to tempt us. No elegance or chic appeal. No ambiance.

Is it a work in progress,  perhaps?

As for me,  I can wait to find out.

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Why “the migrants” should thank Hitler

Lili Gans Society

Hundreds of thousands of migrants are coming to Germany as I write. They do not want to go to Hungary nor do they want to stay in Greece where they often come ashore.  They don’t even want to remain in Turkey, a Muslim country,  even though the migrants themselves are (mostly) Muslims.

For them,  Germany is the land of plenty, the land of people who are friendly to foreigners who are not Aryan.

It is hard to reconcile this Germany with the Germany of of the Thirties,  the Germany of Hitler who was determined to create a pure race of perfect human beings who would rule the world for the next thousand years.

Well,  that did not happen and Germany was left with a rotten reputation to say the least.

For years, the Germans pretended that they were unaware of what was going on under their very noses. Those who had an “inkling” claimed they were only following orders.

To give the current Germans their due,  they have gone out of their way to make amends and it would be wrong to blame the children and grandchildren for the horrors perpetrated during the Holocaust.

In my opinion,  therefore,  I regard their expressions of welcome as a desire to further distance themselves from the evil deeds of their grandparents.

I also suspect that had the Syrian war occurred thirty years ago, the Germans would not have been ready to acknowledge the reality of their monstrous past,  not while the Nazi perpetrators were still alive and kicking amongst them.  And while that was the situation,  the migrants would not have been welcomed with balloons and streamers as they are at the moment.

How long this elation lasts, however,  remains to be seen.