Catching up with November

I've had a paper to write, talks to give and a lot of research tasks so I've been a bit (!) behind here. 

The garden has been full of roses and jasmine and so, therefore, has the house. 

We've had four birthdays in the family. 

I've been up at the Ballarat cemetery looking for a 19th century Ballarat Chinese doctor who is buried here.

and found him.

The weather has warmed up, summer is almost here and I have not caught up with the weeding - but I have put up a post.

Two Melbourne cemeteries

I enjoy visiting these two old Melbourne cemeteries every year about Easter, which is when Chinese families here carry out a tradition of visiting and cleaning family graves, making offerings and having a big family feast. 

The oldest Melbourne cemeteries have been built over, so Carlton is about the oldest cemetery in the city now,  right near the university in central Melbourne. 

Pines and peppercorn trees dominate. It is a dry, scratchy bent over old place.

Coburg cemetery, further north, higher up and looking down on the Merri Creek is greener, full of gold green cypress and palm trees,

A new label

Tapophilia. 

Check it out at Letitia's lovely blog Freefalling (she has several great blogs on the go). It seems that tapophilia is the art  and pleasure of pottering about in cemeteries. 
I think that the best cemeteries must be at least a little worn and untidy and softened by time.

This is the homely Chinese section of the Old Ballarat Cemetery. The simple headstones all face south, and it is tidy, but gently so, not too manicured and rose-bushed.

 So I am a tapophiliac.
I knew many other people love cemeteries and now I have the word.
Thanks Letitia!