THURSDAY 24 AUGUST BROOME
It was another lovely day.
John was still working on tax matters. After lunch, I persuaded him to go for a walk, to the Japanese and Chinese cemeteries.
The Japanese Cemetery is the largest one of its type in Australia, due to the numbers of Japanese coming to work as pearl divers here, and often coming to grief in what was a really hazardous profession in those days.
The headstones were chunks of beach rock – it made for a most interesting looking place.
I really liked the headstones made from chunks of rock
The Chinese came early in Broome’s history, too, intent on making money as shop keepers. Possibly a number of these came via gold rush centres in other parts of the country. A few were pearl divers. Some were domestic servants.
The Chinese section of the cemetery
We were intrigued by pretend paper money held down by rocks on top of each headstone. The burial custom is to provide food and money offerings that the spirit may need on its onward journey. For obvious reasons, these have to be symbolic, rather than real!
On the walk back, called in at Shinju Motors. The required parts are in, Truck will be ready tomorrow. It is a week since we broke down.
Tea was cold roast lamb, and mashed potato.
This Adventurous Age 