Why oh why did I drink Smoko Goon?
Saturday, October 15th, 2005
The little men pounding on the inside of my head this morning are making their objections heard very loudly. But it was Valedictory Dinner and my last (ever!) Ormond smoko! What else could I do? The pain will pass, but the memory of the fun will remain. (yes, I have memories, how much did you think I drank? :-P)
Some people have asked me for a copy of my valedictory speech. To save lots of tedious emailing and printing and etc, here it is:
Last November, for the first time in three years, I packed all my stuff at Ormond into boxes and prepared to leave this College over the holidays. Apart from a brief period in the summer of 2001/02 and a few Choir tours, I had lived at Ormond continuously for four years; and to be perfectly honest, it was time for a change. I had been offered a scholarship to spend the summer working at the University of New South Wales on a research project, and I thought it would do me good to get out of Melbourne, and Ormond, at least for those ten weeks.
Now, those of you who know me well will know that I don’t like being woken by a beeping alarm; my alarm wakes me gently by turning on the radio. Those of you who know me very well know that the radio is invariably tuned to ABC Classic FM. One morning in January, on the dot of 7:30am the radio clicked on, and what else should drift into my sleep but the opening phrase of Elgar’s Pomp and Circumstance March number 1. I’ve never been as aware of how much I love and will miss Ormond as I was at that moment.
I’ve spent five years at this college - that’s my entire undergraduate degree. I’ve been involved with a number of Ormond plays; I’ve sung in the choir and toured Europe three times; I’ve been the head of a subcommittee; I’ve been a member of the MCR; I’ve helped at and been to many smokos; and I’ve only ever missed one formal dinner. However, the list of things I haven’t done is equally impressive. I’ve never been on a sporting team; I haven’t been on the O-week subcommittee, or to ski week. I’ve never even been to the pub on Monday nights.
And this is the essence of what makes College life wonderful. There are so many opportunities to try something new; and there are so many amazing people who provide your closest friends.
But while I was in Sydney, I was also staying in a university college. These things are as true about Warrane College as they are about Ormond. Why then should I miss Ormond?
For me, what makes Ormond more special than any other college is the diversity we have here. We have so many events, activities, and subcommittees on offer that you can’t possibly do everything; and that’s as it should be. I would much rather have the choice of events at the cost of missing out on something, than have no choice at all, just so that I could participate in everything on offer.
Just as important is the diversity of Ormond residents. There are people in hall today of all ages, academic disciplines, backgrounds, and tastes. At Ormond we learn to live together in our diverse community; and to hold PSEs alongside smokos, music soirees alongside the sporting championships, and the play alongside the ball.
But let’s not forget that even Ormond can learn from other colleges. While I was in Sydney, I admired the way Warrane was very clear about its role as an academic community. Warrane held one evening lecture or seminar each week - even over the summer holidays! - and a group of senior students was organising an annual conference - in 2005 it was to be on Australian music, and they invited prominent Australian composers, performers and musicologists to lecture and conduct seminars with the residents, and with other members of the community.
Ormond is three times as large as Warrane College and we have vastly more diversity. One of the most wonderful things about Ormond is being able to live with people doing such a diversity of academic work: being able to talk to Rob Richardson about dissecting rats over lunch, and Richard Jackson about Proust and Rachmaninov over dinner, and Richard Lee about the GST at supper. We should remember that our studies and learning aren’t confined to our classes and tutes; because after all, we can get the “learning” kind of academia at uni; what we can get nowhere but Ormond is the “social” kind of academia.
One thing that I’ve come to realise in my time at Ormond is that all these things we enjoy aren’t natural; this state of affairs isn’t the normal way for things to be. Left to itself, a college won’t turn into Ormond; in fact it will become the opposite: a homogeneous society with only one kind of social activity and one small set of talents. We need to realise that Ormond is the way I have described it because many people, ourselves included, work hard to keep it that way.
I would like to use this opportunity, as so many before me have done, to throw down a challenge to the Ormond community. I would like to see all of Ormond - from the Master right down to the shyest fresher - discussing their visions, dreams, or ideas of what Ormond should be. And I don’t mean wishy-washy, vague values such as “community”; I mean concrete questions that people can act on, such as “how can the MCR make returning to college attractive for senior students?” or “how can we re-organise the calendar so it’s easy to find a good date for a PSE or the Bursary booze cruise or Car Rally?”
I’ve been given the opportunity to speak tonight, and I’ve told you part of what I enjoy at Ormond, and what I would like to see at Ormond, but that’s just one person’s opinion - if we want to keep Ormond as diverse as it has been in my time here, we all need to talk about our ideas of what Ormond should be. But also, we need to value each other’s opinions; and significantly, we need to value parts of Ormond that, like Monday night Naughton’s for me, we haven’t experienced - not just because one day we might, but because everybody else here has equally as much right to make Ormond theirs as I do.
And most of all, we should take the time to appreciate all those people at Ormond who have improved the lives of those around them, not through anything they have done or achieved, but simply through the conversations they have had at lunch, or the seminar they gave that was irrelevant for your course but nevertheless interesting, or the chocolates they bought you during SWOT vac. Because at the end of the day, it’s not the trophies we’ve won or the money we’ve raised for charity that makes this a great community. Of all the opportunities that Ormond offers us, the greatest one is the opportunity to meet other Ormondians. And this is what I will take away from Ormond, and treasure for the rest of my life, above smokos, balls, PSEs, choir rehearsals, tutes, AGMs, and student service: I have been privileged to call all of you friends.
